by Alli Curran
“At least we live on the tenth floor,” says Grace, as we watch the insects skitter into the foliage. “They probably won’t find their way back, right?”
“I doubt it. They’re not like migratory birds. Though I wouldn’t be surprised if they still have relatives living upstairs. About the food you mentioned….”
“At the moment, I’m feeling a bit queasy,” says Grace.
“Well, I’m not,” I say. “And if I don’t locate actual food soon, I’m going to be forced to eat this Tupperware.”
“Don’t worry, Emma,” she says. “Your problem is about to be solved.”
To my great relief, Grace directs my attention to a vendor situated just across the street from our building. Wearing a white turban and a matching cotton dress, an extremely wrinkled old woman is seated behind a rectangular, metallic food cart.
“Emma, this is Lucineige. Lucineige, Emma,” says Grace, once we’re close enough for introductions.
When I wave to Lucineige, she smiles in return, deepening the thick crow’s feet lining the corners of her eyes.
“Lucineige is a Baiana.”
“A Baiana? What’s that?” I ask.
“A seller of Bahian street food.”
In my ketotic state, Lucineige looks more like an angel of salvation, the Bahian version of weenie man. Though all of her teeth are missing, she is absolutely beautiful. When I attempt to snap her picture with a disposable Kodak camera, she hides her face in her hands, and I quickly slip the camera into my back pocket.
Grace speaks to Lucineige in Portuguese, ordering something called abara. Ironically enough, it turns out that abara is shaped just like a hot dog. Grace explains that the “bun” is made from mashed black eyed peas steamed in banana leaves, while the center, rather than holding mystery meat, contains a sprinkling of tiny shrimp.
When I take a bite, the warm, salty concoction flows over my tongue like manna from heaven.
“Oh, my goodness, Grace,” I exclaim. “Abara is the most delicious thing I’ve ever eaten!”
Grace raises her eyebrows doubtfully.
“That’s probably because you’re so hungry,” she says.
Whether she’s right, or abara is genuinely good, I’m not sure. After I wolf down the portion in seconds, Grace laughs and buys me another one.
“You know, abara isn’t the only thing to eat around here,” she says. “Let me take you to a little supermarket around the corner.”
As we stroll together, I get a better sense of the neighborhood. Right behind our building, Grace points out a favela, or shanty town. Hundreds of tin-roofed shacks are packed closely together on a dirt hill rising up directly from the edge of our complex.
“If I were you,” she says, “I’d stay away from the favela.”
“How come?”
“Drug use and crime are big problems in there.”
“But Grace, it’s ten feet from our building. We can’t really avoid it.”
She sighs and gives me a shrug.
“Just don’t go looking for trouble.”
I don’t mention the fact that trouble usually finds me, whether or not I go looking for it.
Walking along, I notice that most of the roads leading to the market are unpaved and dusty. When the occasional car drives by, dirt kicks up and the air becomes unbreathable. Grace explains that it’s the dry season here, and Brotas has received almost no rainfall for the past two months. Nonetheless, lovely blooms of bougainvillea overhang archways between houses and low-roofed, brick commercial buildings, draping the neighborhood in floral swaths of white, pink, red, and purple. Stray dogs roam the streets. One female, who must’ve recently given birth, ambles along the road, her swollen teats swinging close to the earth. On another corner I’m impressed by a stone retaining wall depicting a colorful, larger than life-sized image of Bob Marley’s face. Brotas is a palette of contrasts.
“Is reggae music big in Salvador?” I ask.
“Are you kidding?” Grace answers. “Bob Marley is like a folk hero down here. The local drumming groups, like Olodum (pronounced ‘Oh-loh-doon’), are also really popular.”
“Olodum? Who are they?”
“I’m sure you’ve heard their music. You just don’t recognize the name. They collaborated with Paul Simon on Rhythm of the Saints.”
“Right,” I answer, and a dim light goes off in my head.
Since I was raised by a couple of Dead Heads on music from the sixties and seventies, I’m a huge Paul Simon fan. In using the term “Dead Head,” I should clarify that my parents weren’t drug addicts. At least I don’t think they were.
“Sure we experimented,” said my dad when I questioned him, “but no more than anyone else in the sixties.”
“What did you take?” I asked.
“I don’t remember.”
“That’s because you lost too many brain cells,” said my mom.
“Not because it was such a long time ago?” said my dad.
“That too,” said my mother.
“You didn’t answer my question,” I pressed.
“Oh, I don’t know, Emma,” my dad continued. “We smoked a little pot, but not much. Maybe we tried a few hallucinogens.”
“Like LSD?” I said.
“Yes,” said my mother, “and you should know I only tried that stuff once.”
“How come?”
“It was a completely terrifying experience. After I took it, I didn’t know which end was up.”
“So you’re not recommending LSD?”
“Definitely not,” she said.
Though they apparently didn’t care for the drugs, my parents loved the music from that era, and they shared it all with me. As a child, I was raised on the songs of the Beatles, Joni Mitchell, and Crosby, Stills and Nash, amongst other quintessential folk-rock artists from that time period. Unfortunately, this early education ruined my taste for “modern” music. Since about 1990, I’ve been unable to listen to any of the crappy pop that’s played on the radio. Flipping through the stations always makes me feel like I was born about 20 years too late.
“I’ve heard Olodum play a few times in the Pelourinho (pronounced ‘Pel-oh-reen-yoo’),” says Grace. “Maybe we’ll see them before you go home.”
Speaking of home, I really start to miss New York when we arrive at the so-called super market. From the outside, the place appears to be little more than a tumble-down shack. Though I eat my share of junk food in the city, I also consume fresh fruits and vegetables on a regular basis, and it’s doubtful whether I’m going to find anything like that here. Indeed, even before we cross the threshold, the rancid smell filtering through the doorway decimates what’s left of my appetite.
“Umm, Grace,” I say, “I’m not sure I want to go inside.”
“Don’t you want to see the food?”
“Why see it when I can already smell it? What’s that noise, by the way?”
As I stand in the entryway, my eardrums begin vibrating in response to an intense buzzing noise. When I reluctantly step forward, the source of the droning becomes obvious. Hundreds of flies hover thickly over a series of wooden stalls holding an assortment of rotting bananas, apples, pears, and some local varieties, like jack fruit. Even for a bug advocate like me, the scene is vile. What a waste. When I try to locate a refrigerator, or any fresh vegetables, I’m similarly disappointed. However, I do notice some canned greens, including peas and string beans, which look decent, at least externally.
“Have you got a can opener?” I ask hopefully.
“Nope,” sighs Grace. “I’ve been trying to find one since I got here. Sorry, Emma. I should’ve told you to bring one.”
“That’s okay. I’ll be sure to mail you one once I go home.”
Then it occurs to me that Grace isn’t malnourished, and for a moment I study her physique. With her full face and derriere, Grace seems a bit heavier than your average Korean American woman. Intrigued, I ask her what she’s been living on this whole time.
“You mean other than chocolate mouse?” she replies, smiling.
“Yuck,” I say, making a face.
“Seriously,” she says, “it’s been tough. For lunch, the lab used to have a great salad bar, but they lost power a month ago, and they’ve been closed ever since.”
“So things get fixed quickly around here?”
Grace rolls her eyes.
“Luckily, Paula’s been coming by with feijoada (pronounced ‘fay-jhoo-ah-duh’) every few nights,” she says.
“Feijoada? What’s that?”
“It’s a Brazilian stew, made with rice, beans, and different types of salty meat, like beef or bacon.”
Feijoada sounds like a great dish to sustain a person during times of famine. In Grace’s case, it appears to be doing a more than adequate job. Hopefully, Paula will forgive me for attracting Luciano’s attention and continue supplying us with this calorie-rich concoction. Having another female friend around, especially one who likes to share food, would be fabulous, and perhaps essential. I’m not sure whether it’s the jet lag or my recent hospitalization, but as I perseverate on our limited food supply, my anxiety level starts to rise.
Just as I begin losing feeling in my fingertips, Grace makes one additional stop, at an ice cream shop on the next corner.
Entering the store, a blast of frigid air hits my face like a bucket of ice water, reviving my failing neurons and narrowly averting my second panic attack in the span of two days. Hallelujah. With working freezers and an air conditioner, the shop is the most high-tech facility I’ve encountered thus far in Brotas. Standing at the counter, grinning beatifically, I gaze in wonder at the colorful buckets of ice cream arrayed before me.
“I had a feeling you’d like this place,” says Grace, watching my goofy face. “The stuff they serve here is closer to gelato than regular ice cream, but it’s still really good.”
Digging into a small cup of dulce de leche, I’m in heaven.
Working on our Dixie cups, we cross over the busiest road in town, which is paved and heavily trafficked with cars and buses. Grace explains that most Salvadorans get around via the municipal bus system. Unlike the United States, where a person can simply walk onto a lot and buy an automobile, cars in Bahia are apparently sold by lottery system.
“Even if you’re middle class, buying a car here can be really difficult,” says Grace. “After trying for a few years, Luciano finally got his first one a few months ago.”
“So what do you think of Luciano?” I ask.
“I love that he’s been driving me all over Salvador,” says Grace.
“What about Paula? Does she get jealous?”
Grace gives me a funny look.
“Not at all. Most of the time she comes too. Why do you ask?”
“Paula seemed a little insecure around Luciano when I met them yesterday.”
“The two of them started dating when I got here in August,” says Grace. “For the past month they’ve been joined at the hip. I haven’t noticed any problems.”
Considering Grace’s perspective, I wonder whether I wrongly envisioned the tension between Luciano and Paula. Perhaps I judged him too harshly. After all, it’s possible that Luciano is just a harmless flirt. Moreover, as Grace pointed out, the man owns a car, which is reason enough to cultivate a friendship with him. Alternatively, since she’s totally flat chested, Grace might’ve missed the fact that Luciano is a lecherous jerk because his eyes never bothered roaming in her direction.
Maybe I’m not being fair, but I can already sense that keeping an open mind about my new boss is going to be challenging, especially considering my upbringing.
“Never trust a man farther than you can throw him,” Grandma Sally always said.
Even before she raised my mischievous father, Grandma Sally was one tough woman.
On the next street corner, Grace points out a man chopping sugar cane. Similar to Lucineige, his skin is dark, leathery, and wrinkled like a prune. I can’t begin to guess his age. Smiling broadly, his mouth is a rotten cave, nearly devoid of teeth, excluding a handful of withered stumps. Cracking a stalk of sugar cane in half, the sun-dried man begins sucking on one end. Though his remaining teeth are clearly in jeopardy, he seems untroubled. When he offers me the other half, I respectfully decline.
Hanging out on the curb near the sugar cane cart are three skinny, school-aged boys.
Grace waves to the children, saying, “Ola!”
When the boys flash huge smiles in return, their remarkably white teeth contrast sharply with their pitch black skin. All are barefoot, wearing ragged clothes caked in dirt. I wonder whether they live in the favela behind our building.
Just watching the boys makes me uneasy. Though it’s the weekend, I imagine they’re not returning to school on Monday, and I can’t help worrying about them. Are their teeth destined to rot like those of the sugar cane man? As teenagers, will they succumb to drugs and crime? Will terrible infectious diseases strike them down, before they even have a chance to grow up? If I was their mother, and I lived in the favela, would I do a decent job raising them? Considering that I can barely take care of myself, I doubt it.
“Are you okay?” Grace asks. “You’re looking a little pale.”
My pulse rate is indeed accelerating, but I’m trying to remain calm. Little kids always make me nervous. The smaller they are, the more fragile they seem. I never hold babies, for instance, because I’m terrified of accidentally dropping them. Still, I’m surprised by my strong reaction to the street urchins, who aren’t exactly babies.
Perhaps my problem is that I view children—particularly needy children—as a direct threat to my own livelihood. Since I receive very little financial assistance from my family, I’m responsible for devising my own means of support. Undoubtedly, caring for a child would be the quickest way to end my career. Speaking of which, I’d damn well better get a fabulous job when I’m done with all of this training. How else am I going to pay off the enormous student loans that I’ve been accumulating since college?
“I’m okay,” I answer. “Just tired.”
“Then let’s head home,” Grace offers.
On the return loop, we make one final stop at the key maker’s shop, another street-side cart, where we obtain an extra set of keys for our apartment and the lab.
“Wow! I can’t believe this key works,” I say, after successfully turning the lock in our apartment door.
Grace smiles.
“Occasionally technical things work around here,” she says.
“So what should we do next?” I ask.
“You’re already looking for something else to do?” she says. “Don’t you ever relax?”
“Only when I’m sleeping.”
“You’re not manic-depressive, are you?”
“No. I just get bored easily when I’m not busy.”
I’ve never been good at twiddling my thumbs. As a kid I couldn’t sit still for more than five minutes, which used to worry my mother, who assumed I’d eventually end up on Ritalin. Though it’s hard to believe, so far I’m still drug free.
“Have you finished unpacking yet?” Grace asks.
“Actually, no,” I say.
“Off you go, then.”
At Grace’s suggestion I put away the rest of my clothes and belongings. Lying at the bottom of my suitcase is the only picture I’ve brought, a four-by-six photograph taken by my mother on a family trip to Vermont nearly 10 years ago. Our final vacation together, the trip occurred just weeks before my mother and I had our falling out. In the picture, I’m sitting in a canoe with my dad, who’s proudly displaying the enormous trout he’s just hooked. Clutching my dog-eared copy of The Cider House Rules, I appear to be smiling, but in reality I’m trying not to grimace at the unfortunate fish. While I’ve never understood his love of fishing—particularly catch and release, which is nothing short of animal abuse—my dad and I have always been close. For the sake of full disclosure, I should admit that the fresh trout tasted
great after my dad grilled it over our campfire.
“Where do you think I should put my picture?” I ask Grace.
“How about in the living room, on the table next to the couch?”
“Sounds good.”
Holding it in my palm, the image of my father is a comfort. After carefully leaning the snapshot against a lamp on the small glass table, I blow my dad a kiss and plop down onto the couch.
“Hey, this is different,” I say.
“What is?”
“The couch is black,” I say.
“What’s so different about a black couch?” Grace asks.
“Have you noticed that everything else in here is white? Whoever decorated this place had no imagination for color schemes.”
“Maybe not, but at least it’s easy to keep the couch clean,” says Grace.
“Good point,” I admit.
As the sun begins to descend, Grace runs downstairs to get more abara, which luckily still tastes great. However, I nearly gag when I try vatapá, a slimy, pureed topping resembling infant stool in both color and consistency.
“Oh, yuck,” I shout, dashing toward the kitchen sink.
“You don’t like it?” Grace calls after me.
“No!” I say, spitting into the drain. “That stuff is disgusting. What’s in it, anyway?”
“Okra, I think, or possibly eggplant. Actually, I’m not sure which one it is.”
“I’ll bet you anything it’s eggplant—my least favorite vegetable,” I say.
“You don’t like eggplant?” asks Grace.
“No. I hate the bitter taste.”
“Oh, I don’t think it’s that bad,” she says.
“I totally disagree. Growing up, my mom forced me to eat this horrible eggplant parmesan dish. Whenever she wasn’t looking, I’d scrape off the cheese and pass the rest to Inky…under the table.”
“Who’s Inky?” Grace asks.
“She was our family dog—a big, black Labrador retriever—but she died a few years ago.”
“Inky must’ve been one gassy dog,” says Grace.
“Now that you mention it, she was. That dog was always belching and farting up a storm.”