by Jerold Last
"What should we try tonight?" Suzanne asked.
"We're in Brazil. How about something with rum in it? The national drink is Caipirinha, a cocktail made from rum, sugar, lime, and crushed ice. They use a special rum for this drink, so it tastes different from most rum drinks."
We had a couple of the Caipirinhas each, which made the idea of the coming dinner a little less obnoxious. After returning to the hotel to relax for an hour, we walked over to the restaurant.
We met the Brazilian Nazis, a couple named Goulart, at the restaurant. They looked very familiar after the Uruguayan Nazis we had met. Both were short and fat, somewhere in the 50s, and had faces that looked like they never smiled. After brief introductions we sat down for dinner. Appetizers, side dishes, and salads were served buffet style. We all filled our plates and ate while exchanging small talk, mostly about life in Sao Miguel. Ernesto Goulart steered us to the Feijoada (the most typical specialty Brazilian dish, made from black beans) as a must taste item. The main course was churrasco (Brazilian barbecue, their equivalent of the Uruguayan parilla). Brazilians ate their beef cooked over the open fire the same way as the Uruguayans, but used the whole beef loin coated with salt, barbequed, and sliced to order at the table. The amount of beef consumed per capita is much less than in Uruguay, and in general the beef isn't as good even though it costs a lot more, so the side dishes take on a lot more importance in the national cuisine.
Over beef, the conversation took an unexpected turn. Ernesto Goulart asked us, "How much money are you planning to donate to our very special cause here in Santa Caterina?"
I had no idea how to answer that one. "What's the usual amount?" I replied.
"There is no usual amount," he said. "But I assure you that our friends in Uruguay would not waste our time with strangers for no good reason. Why do you think we agreed to meet with you?"
"Because we share your political views," I suggested.
"There seems to have been a misunderstanding here," Ernesto responded. "Let's finish our churrasco, have coffee and desert, and say goodnight. We thank you for buying us this dinner."
And that was that. We had little more to say to each other besides goodnight. Suzanne and I walked back to the hotel. One of us said "win some, lose some", and the other agreed.
Suzanne added, “You know, this happened at exactly the right time. I’ve had just about all of the dinners with South American Nazis I can stand for the foreseeable future. Let’s skip that part of the itinerary for the rest of our vacation. We can either eat alone or find people to eat with who don't make my skin crawl.”
We went back to our room and talked a bit more about our day, especially the visit to the university. Today had not been a total waste of time. The new collaboration with Sao Miguel, if things worked out, would get her access to samples from an enormous number of plants from the rapidly vanishing rain forests and jungles of Southern Brazil. The flora and fauna of Brazil and Paraguay were being destroyed at a rapid rate by deforestation for agriculture and relocation of the population from the crowded coastal cities. Now was the time to collect and analyze these disappearing species.
It also seemed like it was time to meet one of the good guys over dinner for a change so we decided to call from Iguazu Falls to arrange a meeting with Lieutenant Gonzalez's counterpart in Paraguay. After Paraguay we'd return to Uruguay. We didn’t want to disappoint Columbo with our progress on the Ambivalent Corpse case.
It was officially bedtime.
"Roger, have you thought about things any more since we took that ride on the pampas and talked about us and our future?"
This seemed to be the kind of question best answered by doing. We kissed long and passionately. It felt like our bodies were joined from top to bottom. Suzanne's tongue was exploring my mouth. The kiss went on for what seemed a very long time.
"Suzanne, I think I've loved you since the first day we met. It only gets better as we spend more time together."
We turned out the lights and snuggled together in the bed.
I asked Suzanne, "What do you call a Brazilian German who is always in a bad mood?"
"Senhor Goulart?" she guessed.
"No, a sour Kraut," I told her.
And turned off the lights.
Chapter7. Iguazu Falls
Breakfast in the hotel included our choice of several types of tropical fruits and juices, and chimarrão, the Brazilian form of mate, served as a traditional tea in a cup. We were on the road by 9:30. It was only about a 3-hour drive to Foz do Iguazu, a large city with a population of about 200,000 on the Brazilian side of Iguazu Falls.
Suzanne had planned this part of the trip thoroughly. “Iguazu Falls is on the border of Brazil and Argentina. Let's visit the falls and the big hydroelectric dam from the Brazilian side of the park and stay in Foz do Iguazu tonight. The food will be better and Foz do Iguazu has cheaper hotels than Argentina. Tomorrow morning I want to see the falls from the Argentine side before we leave Brazil to go to Paraguay."
Today was hot and humid, the first time we really hit typical South American summer weather. In town we filled the car’s gas tank at an interesting gas station. In addition to gasoline (actually E25 or gasohol, a blend of 75% gasoline and 25% ethanol) and diesel fuel pumps, there were also pumps for pure alcohol (E100). Brazilian cars are made to run interchangeably on either gasoline or alcohol as fuel. Consumers buy whichever fuel is cheaper that day. The government subsidizes sugar production for alcohol and heavily taxes gasoline. Thus, the cost of either fuel is about the same and market forces don't have much effect on the day-to-day price of fuel at the pump.
For lunch we had Feijoada as a main course with salad made from fresh vegetables and a bottle of the local beer. A hotel in the central part of town was only a 30-minute drive from the Park that contained the waterfalls, so we checked in. Our room was surprisingly expensive at about US $150 per night including air conditioning, which was most welcome. Iguazu Falls is one of the major tourist attractions in South America and the economy of this large city was totally dependent on tourism. In the lobby of the hotel was a stack of newspapers, mainly in Portuguese but a few in Spanish. We picked up a copy of yesterday’s La Prensa, Argentina's national newspaper, to catch up on the regional news.
Headlines and the feature story on page 1 were a follow-up story about the Ambivalent Corpse. A suspect had been identified. There was now a theory to explain the murder, at least in the newspaper. Suzanne volunteered to read and translate, an offer I quickly accepted.
“The corpse was identified as Maria Fajao, a Paraguayan citizen who had crossed the border into Uruguay ten days previously accompanied by her 4-year-old daughter and a female friend, traveling as tourists. Maria was estranged from her husband. There were broad hints in the story that the female friend was more than just a friend. Apparently Maria was a symbol of contemporary women’s liberation in Paraguay, living openly as a lesbian despite several episodes of alleged abuse at the hands of her estranged husband. The police were looking for the estranged husband, who was missing, as a suspect in the murder. The adult female friend and Maria’s daughter were also missing and were also being sought by the police as possible material witnesses to the crime.”
Our time in Salta taught us that Argentine newspapers often blur the lines between objective news reporting and editorial innuendo. The reporter was obviously having a field day with this juicy and titillating story. He presented as fact his theory that the husband had killed his wife for her sexual transgressions, which reflected poorly on his manhood, and for taking his daughter from him.
“The dismemberment and staged presentation of the pieces of the corpse,” he suggested, “were to divert suspicion from the most obvious suspect, the estranged husband himself.”
Suzanne looked up from the newspaper she was reading. “What do you think?”
“I think that the newspaper story seems to explain everything about the murder, at least as far as we know.”
Suzanne thought
a bit before she commented, “We have a saying in biochemistry that a bad theory is a theory that explains nothing or a theory that explains everything. I’m not sure that a theory that explains everything is enough reason for us to stop looking for the answers.”
“I agree.”
I called Lieutenant Gonzalez’s policeman friend in Paraguay and arranged to meet him. He suggested meeting for dinner in Ciudad del Este, where he would stay overnight in case we were delayed en route. Our first job was to find a hotel in Ciudad del Este for tomorrow evening when we arrived. I was instructed to buy a cheap disposable cell phone with Paraguayan minutes available as soon as we crossed the border into Ciudad del Este. He gave me his cell phone number. We were to call when we got to Ciudad del Este to tell him our new phone number, and again when we checked into a hotel in the city. Lieutenant Gomez would give us directions to a restaurant to meet at for dinner when we called him from our hotel.
“Let's go visit the reason we came here,” Suzanne suggested. “Iguazu Falls is the place I was most looking forward to visiting this trip. It's the largest waterfall in the world even if it isn't the highest. Iguazu Falls has lots of water all year round and is a very wide set of waterfalls. I’d also like to visit the second largest hydroelectric-power producing dam in the world, Itaipu, which is less than 8 miles from here on the Parana River. It produces more power annually than the Three Gorges Dam in China, the largest dam in the world, because of the huge amount of annual rainfall around here. The dam is enormous due to the depth and width of the river. It produces about 95% of the electricity used in Paraguay and almost 25% of the electricity used in Brazil. Think about that," she said excitedly, swinging her arm over her head and pointing towards the distant falls for emphasis: "Just upstream from here this water coming over Iguazu falls made 25% of all of the electricity used by Brazil, the largest country in South America which has more than half the population of the USA and is larger geographically than we are, and almost all of the electricity used by Paraguay. It defies comprehension!"
Suzanne reached over, grabbed my hand, and squeezed it hard. I squeezed back, then moved my hand to her back and gently rubbed it, which I knew she loved.
We drove to the park, bought a 3-day park pass (the best deal available, since it was good on both sides of the falls, Brazil and Argentina), and followed the crowd. The trail to the falls is well marked, perhaps unnecessarily because we could hear the falls from a mile away. The trails are well kept and fenced to keep people out of trouble as they walk through the jungle to the river. Several seemingly tame coati-mundis, a distant relative of the raccoon, entertained the passing tourists by scrounging food. These animals are definitely not tame, just well fed. Eventually we came to the falls themselves. The falls on the Brazilian side of the Iguazu River are about 800 meters wide, and tourists in Brazil have access via the system of walkways to spectacular views. The fenced paved walkways give way to fenced wooden plank walkways that allow the adventurous to get a lot closer to the base of the waterfalls then would be allowed by lawyers and risk managers in the United States. My first impression of the falls was how big and loud they are.
We followed a walkway that took us out over the river to a spectacular view from the base of a small set of the falls. Visually and sensually the falls are more amazing than I can begin to describe to you. Their power is so physically overwhelming that it just throbs in your bones. Further out over the water there was one spot where you could stand in the spray of one set of the falls, just above where the water landed on the rocks. Suzanne stood there with her arms outstretched until she was soaked to the skin. The power, the noise, and the absolute insistence of the water mesmerized us. As far as the eye could see, which wasn’t very far because of the thick fog from the spray, there was water crashing down the falls.
“This is completely, absolutely amazing.” Suzanne was totally awe-struck. “I love it. It's unbelievable how it feels like all of that water is speaking directly to me. I’ve been to Niagara Falls and Yosemite Falls, and all of the other famous waterfalls in Yosemite National Park. None of them are anything like this. The total amount of water here, the noise, the feel of the place, the way it’s set up to make me feel like I’m standing in the waterfall itself blows my mind. I can’t wait to see Iguazu Falls from the other side tomorrow. I’m really, really, really glad that we came here. It makes this entire trip to South America very special for me.”
There were more walkways we followed, each leading to a different angle to view the falls and each leading to a more spectacular view than the one before. Suzanne and I found continuous reasons to touch each other as we walked. The memory of the commitment we made to each other at the Dude ranch was obviously fresh in both our minds. The millions of tons of water endlessly cascading over the cliffs and booming onto the rocks below spoke to all of the people assembled at Iguazu Falls. Everyone around us seemed to be feeling the same sense of awe we were. It was a very quiet audience in a very noisy theater, all of whom felt very small in comparison to the falls. There was almost a religious feel to experiencing Iguazu Falls. The Falls reminded me of how small I am in relation to the world around me, and how powerful nature is by comparison to individual human beings. I thought it would be a good idea to send politicians and CEOs in-training to Iguazu falls so they too could realize how insignificant we are in the total scheme of nature.
Eventually, after what seemed like several hours but was probably less than one hour, we started back towards the car from the spectacle of the falls. There were several more walkway options during the return trip. After walking along a couple, we realized that they were more geared to looking at trees and forest than giving any different perspective on the falls themselves. We both had reached sensory glut at the falls, and didn’t find tree watching particularly exciting in contrast.
“Have you had enough yet?” I asked Suzanne. “I feel like my brain and my entire sensory system are just about full.”
"Does that mean it's my job to give your sensory system some more stimulation?" Suzanne said rubbing against me. “How's your sensory stimulation doing? Mine is enjoying it."
I looked directly at Suzanne. Her breasts were clearly outlined under the clinging t-shirt. Her wet jeans were plastered to her curves. I could feel my response. "Yeah," I managed to get out, "it's working. Maybe they should rename this place Viagra Falls."
"If I remember right, you really liked how I looked in wet Levis when we were in Molinos in Argentina last fall. It's so humid around here that I'm not going to dry out for a long time.”
I found a lot of excuses to touch Suzanne, "helping" her over the steeper parts of the path even though it was clear that she didn't need any assistance, on the way to the car before we got in and drove back to our hotel. We were both feeling stimulated by then, so used the bedroom for some intense lovemaking and a much needed nap. By the time we woke up and cuddled for a while, it was time for dinner. We dressed and asked the desk clerk to suggest a good restaurant within walking distance of the hotel. He recommended a place that was OK but nothing special. But we were hungry and OK seemed good enough.
Then it was back to the hotel for a couple of hours spent catching up on e-mail, a bad joke, and a good night's sleep.
"A young brunette goes into the doctor's office and says that her body hurts wherever she touches it."
"Impossible," says the doctor. "Show me."
She takes her finger and pushes her elbow and screams in agony. She pushes her knee and screams, pushes her ankle and screams and so on.
The doctor says, "You're not really a brunette are you?"
She says, "No, I'm really a blonde."
"I thought so," the doctor says. "Your finger is broken."
Chapter8.Paraguay
The next morning was sunny, hot, and humid. It was a non-stop drive into downtown Ciudad del Este, Paraguay’s second largest city, except for brief stops to get our passports stamped at the border crossings and to buy a cheap cell phone at an
open-air electronics bazaar. This city of 250,000 is one big duty-free store where imported goods, especially electronics, at cheap prices attract shoppers from Argentina and Brazil. Culturally it is closer to Hong Kong than Paraguay, a feeling enhanced by the city’s large population of Asian and Arab immigrants. Suzanne called our new Paraguayan police contact to tell him where we were and our new phone number, while I concentrated on my driving.
After a short pit stop to top off the gas tank on the car and buy empanadas for us, we drove to the Tati Yupi environmental protection unit on the Paraguayan side of the Itaipu Dam. A quick call on our new cell phone got us a room reservation for tonight at a local hotel advertised on a convenient roadside billboard we passed on the highway.
About 8 miles further north we came to Hernandarias, gateway to the Itaipu Dam and Tati Yupi, and parked the car. We entered the Dam area, which contained a huge concrete structure across the entire Parana River. The mammoth dam creates a reservoir that powers the hydroelectric plant. The top of the concrete wall is a path for visitors to observe how a modern hydroelectric plant works from the inside. Looking down into the dam you can see the turbines and generators that convert the energy of water into electricity. Huge outflow channels return the water to the Parana River downstream of the dam. It looks like a massive LEGO project constructed by a giant kid.