Recife’s Erotic Pagan Temple |
Tourists swarm Rio de Janeiro’s iconic hilltop Christ statue and Manaus’ magnificent opera house. By contrast Recife’s big “can’t miss” attraction is often, well, missed by visitors to the state capital of Pernambuco. For those who catch a cab for the 15 kilometer ride to the Várzea district on the outskirts of town, the Oficina Brennand provides a new meaning for the term living museum. Like sex and death, Francisco Brennand’s sometimes monstrous ceramic sculptures, always pregnant with life, both attract and repel – but never fail to fascinate.
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The Manatee Project in Itamaracá, Pernambuco |
The IBAMA Aquatic Mammal Center on the island of Itamaracá, Pernambuco, offers visitors the chance to see the endangered animal described by a 16th century Portuguese explorer as “larger than an ox, covered by a hard skin similar in color to that of an elephant."
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Prainha do Canto Verde: Community Tourism in a Fishing Village |
In Prainha do Canto Verde, locals have managed to throw a novel twist into the plot that usually unfolds as communities are “discovered” as tourism destinations. Unlike many neighboring fishing villages along the coast of the Brazilian northeast, it has not been overrun by carpetbaggers, sprawl, pollution, drugs and crime. In Prainha do Canto Verde community tourism generates extra income for the locals and acts as a weapon in the battle against real estate speculation and the social and environmental problems that inevitably accompany mass tourism.
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São Luís, Maranhão: Replanting the Urban Amazon Forest |
To get a bird’s eye view of the park, we have to compete with the vultures that alight amid plastic sacks in the makeshift neighborhood dump. Young men loiter across the way in front of a dilapidated shack that passes for the corner bar. The valley below shows signs of incursions by poor families like the ones who have mounted the favela that surrounds us on higher ground. Follow us on a visit to Bacanga State Park in São Luís, Maranhão.
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Rio São Francisco: Brazilian River Threatened |
The São Francisco River runs through a culturally rich but economically impoverished and drought-stricken region called the “sertão.” The struggle of subsistence farmers to eek out a living under such conditions has been captured in Graciliano Ramos’ novel Barren Lives, with a film version by director Nelson Pereira dos Santos. For decades politicians have used the suffering of smallholders like those that populate Ramos’ novel to convince taxpayers to throw money at the northeast. President Lula appears bent on pursuing a questionable irrigation project that activists say could further exacerbate the river’s environmental troubles.
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Maceió: Brazil’s Undiscovered Coast |
Add up all the factors that make a beautiful coastal vacation spot and Maceió may very well come out as of the best in South America. Surprised? Most visitors are when they see what this destination has to offer. Adapted from the “Moon Handbooks Brazil” guidebook.
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| João Primo: São Luís do Maranhão (1998) |
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