friday night in lapa...

in case english-speakers are still reading, here's a not-so-nice snapshot of rio de janeiro last weekend:

the kid who seemed to be a 14-year-old boy was actually a 17-year-old girl.  but it was impossible to know that when we saw her kneeling on the ground of the plaza with her head on the ground.  behind her, a municipal security guard (sort of a junior police officer) twisted her arms behind her back, while another threatened the girl with his hyper-phallic nightstick, a meter-long hard cock.

there were almost thirty of us watching, but the guards only let the girl stand up when six of us - all white university students, and mostly gringos - made our way to the front of the crowd.  the girl - black, with a shaved head, wearing long shorts and with her breasts invisible under her baggy shirt - lifted herself up crying silently, while one of the guards showed the crowd half of a broken bottle, which the girl was supposedly carrying with her as an improvised weapon. one of the university students went to talk with the guards, and told us later that they'd wanted to search the girl, even though she was female and underage (and therefore not legally subject to search by male guards).

the guards, increasingly aware of the crowd's gaze, took the girl to the "shock of order" trailer, which is
right in front of the new "official" graffiti mural.  the mural is subsidized by antarctica beer, which is turning into an official brand for the newly "cool" and "good" lapa neighborhood, the historic bohemian nightlife district that's been heavily spiffed up in recent months.

the plaque celebrating the "union of public and private forces" present in lapa's "revitalization"

as university students, we followed this small spectacle of order in action knowing that lapa is turning "cool" in this way in order to attract people like us, especially gringos.  we also knew that, unfortunately, our gaze has much more power than the other folks out for the night in lapa.

at the trailer, the guards consulted someone - an civilian boss or coordinator - who told them to let the girl go, since there was no video proving anything against.  we escorted her away as a group, because the lack of video wouldn't keep her from being held again, and without the weightier gaze of a group associated with human rights, a second time wouldn't be easy.

writing now days later, i see how the girl - in spite of being at the center of what happened - wasn't the central character in the event.  for the guards, she was an inconvenience, less worrisome than the 6 white university students watching them.  for us, she was a victim, a reflection of various abuses of power that surround us - but we don't know her name, or where she came from, or anything about who she is.  and for lapa as a neighborhood, none of this was out of the ordinary...this sort of thing must happen dozens of times every friday.


a lot of the redefinition of lapa has to do with changing the meaning of the word "malandro."  traditionally, it's represented scoundrels, rascals, and misfits, the clever guys who know how to use the streets to their advantage, to sweet talk, con, seduce, or fight their way to what they need.  a malandro is someone you might admire for his cunning from a distance, but not someone you want to take advantage of you.  now, however, "malandro" is losing any sense of danger or otherness.  these days, real malandros are the hip kids who go out to have responsible fun and spend their money in expensive bars.

being a malandro means not peeing in the street

malandros don't mess around.  don't park illegally.

the other kind of malandro hasn't existed for a long time, and now it's being substituted by street cleaners wearing panama hats (on friday and saturday nights in lapa), street vendors wearing official antarctica beer aprons, and a newly painted aqueduct.  i know that police brutality is also an old tradition in lapa. in that sense what we saw last friday night wasn't especially significant:  beating up poor folks, black people, and gays has been part of the neighborhood's heritage at least since the days of madame satã, the legendary drag queen, malandro, and street fighter from the 1920s.  but i also have to think that real malandros don't beat up women, and especially not girls.