Copacabana, Rio de Janeiro: 26oC, warm and sunny.
Sunday is the day I like to reserve at least the morning for myself. If I were living alone, like when I lived in Copacabana, and if Yasmin was not with me that weekend, I would love to be just alone, enjoying my own company. I would love early morning exercise and quality time for myself and nobody else.
I used to go to the street fair at Praça Serzedelo Correia in the middle of Copacabana to buy fruits and vegetables for the week. After returning home, I would wash and prepare a large plastic Tupperware container to keep the salad fresh for the entire week.
I also enjoyed doing housework, such as tidying the wardrobes and bedrooms, sweeping and mopping the floor, doing the laundry, and hanging clothes to dry.
I found it quite pleasurable and rewarding to do housework while sipping on a nice glass of wine and listening to good music. Being in my own company was worth every second of being alone.
Some people do not like or are afraid of being alone, but I love it. Being alone and being good with yourself is one of the world’s best and cheapest forms of simple therapy. If you can arrange to spend time with others, great, so why can’t you also arrange to spend quality time with yourself?
Now that I am temporarily living with Yasmin and Nalva, having alone time on a Sunday is almost impossible or difficult. This is probably one of the reasons why I like to go out early to exercise, to walk and walk and walk.
I left home at about 8 am, quickly passing by the baker’s to buy a large coffee to takeaway to drink whilst walking. I walked up and inside Flamengo, not outside around the perimeter of the bay and beaches, towards Largo do Machado; I continued, passing through Catete and finally arriving at Gloria and MAM, the modern art museum between the city centre and at the back of Marina do Gloria.
As I love boats so much, the marina is like a second home for me, but today, I did not want to stay too long, just long enough to see if there were any new or interesting boats. There were not. The marina is a little weak at the moment, so I returned along Aterro, which is closed for cars and open to the public on Sundays.
Aterro is a dual carriageway connecting Copacabana and the south zone with the city centre, which is basically a fast track to the centre. It runs along the perimeters beside the bay and beaches of Botafogo, Flamengo, Catete and Gloria and then around and into the centre of Rio. Besides the dual carriageway, it is also a public park, supposedly one of the largest in South America.
Projected by the famous landscape gardener and architect Carl Burle Max, the long stretch of public park greenery and trees follows the road between the road and the beaches; you have to cross the park to get to the beaches.
Aterro is quite very special, but what makes it even more special for me are the enormously high lampposts that line the dual carriageway and have four large round floodlights on each in the form of a clover leaf or a daisy flower. These flood-lit lampposts are particularly impressive at night. The powerful light they emit can illuminate the whole park and beaches.
As an amateur photographer, I am intrigued by urban furniture: man-made structures created for public use, such as bus shelters, towers, advertising structures, public clocks, lampposts, etc., that mark the urban landscape. I have been interested in and developing this for some time.
I think it began when I lived in the north zone of Rio, where there is a plethora of old abandoned, deactivated, unused man-made structures that nobody stops and looks at except me, but are pretty interesting to the discerning eye. Many people who have seen my photos have praised me for them, and I am grateful for their recognition.
When I arrived home, it was 1 p.m., and Nalva had already prepared lunch. After lunch, I washed the dishes and cleaned the kitchen as usual, and then we all rested for an hour or two. At about 4 p.m., Nalva and Yasmin said they wanted to go to Gloria’s street fair because Yasmin had seen something that had interested her the last time she was there with me.
I had already been there once today. I didn’t want to go again, but I decided to go in order to keep the peace. When I went there in the early morning, it wasn’t as crowded as it is now, in the late afternoon, almost evening. It was utterly packed and heaving with people.
I had noticed this difference in energy or vibe from when I lived in Copacabana; when I went out very early in the morning, the energy and ambience were completely different from later in the day, and it was the same here in Gloria from when I had been here earlier in the morning.
I prefer the early morning part of the day. The ambience and vibe are more tranquil, with fewer people, traffic, and movement. It is more natural and easier to soak up and appreciate the surroundings.
We stayed for about an hour and a half at the fair, took a taxi home and had a snack for supper.
In bed by 10 pm.
Thank you.
Thanks for taking the time to read this blog post. Feel free to explore my other posts and share your thoughts in the comments section.
Richard
