Merry Christmas from Handcarry Only!
Here’s wishing all my lovely readers and all at home a fantastic Christmas.
Incidentally, Handcarry Only has also just turned 1! Yes, I’m delighted to have been able to share my photography and travel experiences with all of you out there for the past year. Its my first time putting words and photos together in this format and I feel I’ve grown both as a photographer and a writer, thanks to your generous encouragement and support. Keep on keeping on!
Feliz Navidad from Buenos Aires!
I left my job as an advertising Creative Director in August 2012 to travel Africa and South America for a year with my wife, documenting these beautiful places with my Fuji X-Pro1. View the rest of my RTW adventures on Handcarry Only and follow me on my journey by subscribing/following/bookmarking.
The district of Botafogo at twilight.
The cable car up to Pão de Açúcar, with Praia Vermelha in the foreground.
Home to the largest carnival in the world, the fabled Carnaval and set enviably amongst the stunning natural surrounds of Guanabara Bay, Rio de Janeiro is the most visited city in South America. The stomping ground of the rich and famous as well as the more budget constrained traveller, Rio was the next stop for us after São Paulo along the well worn tourist trail..
We prepared for our arrival in Rio by watching José Padilha’s Tropa de Elite (gang violence in Rio and the elite police squad tasked to combat them), City of God (gang violence in the Cicade de Deus suburb of Rio) and Rio, the animated feature. Not sure to expect drug lords with AK-47s ruling the streets and street kids toting handguns or colourful macaws singing and dancing along to a Samba beat when we arrived, we got off the bus with expectations for pretty much both ends of the spectrum.
I have to report that fortunately (unfortunately?) we saw neither, the few macaws that we saw at Jardim Botanico were gorged full on bananas and lazily preening themselves, they could hardly be bothered to fly, let alone sing and dance, and the kids we saw on the beach were more interested in selling us Caipirinhas than crack coccaine. We hear that things have been cleaned up significantly in recents times, ostensibly for the upcoming World Cup and Olympics and that favelas, traditionally the hotbed of crime, had mostly been ‘pacified’.
Caipirinhas for 5 reals on the beach anyone?
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Immortalised in the mid sixties Bossa Nova hit, “The Girl from Ipanema” by Antõnio Carlos Jobim and Vinicius de Moraes, Ipanema Beach has been drawing crowds from around the world ever since. Sister beach Copacaba is arguably just as famous, and the quintessential model for a city beach.
Personally, when I think of a beautiful beach, the image conjured up is usually of a gently curving bay, with turquoise waters silently lapping on a crescent of fine white powdery sand, disappearing into a dense green forest, and most of all, quiet and secluded. I knew not to expect that prior to visiting Ipanema and Copacabana, (it is afterall, in Rio de Janeiro and not an isolated Carribean island) but I guess it took a while to fully comprehend the number of people on the beach. A great equaliser, the beach is loved and frequented by all social classes in Rio de Janeiro, a city of stark contrasts between the haves and have-nots. Everywhere you look, there are parasols and flags flying, with thousands of Cariocas and tourists occupying every square foot of sand, despite it being a weekday afternoon. Most are to be found lounging on the sand, people watching, others playing beach volleyball, football and footvolley, a unique Carioca hybrid of football and volleyball.
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Winged seraphims and dramatic bodies sculpted in stone greeted us as we entered the Necropolis São Paulo, also known as St Paul Cemetery. The sculptures would not look out of place in a medieval church, and indeed, some of the monuments and family mausoleums are almost little chapels unto themselves.
The resting place of many a Paulista elite, Necropolis São Paulo has seen over 140,000 burials within its grounds since its founding. Amongst them, politicians, writers, artists and society figures but also perhaps more people of more humble origins, whose remains line the walls of the huge cemetery in little niches, somewhat overshadowed by the grand monuments in the more prime real estate within the cemetery.
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As a good Singaporean, I am brought up to revile graffiti in all its myriad heinous forms. Defacing public property? Vandalism of street furniture? Oh, the shock and the horror. Afterall, we are the nation that put American teenager Michael Fay in the slammer and subjected him to some good old fashioned ‘corporal punishment’ when he decided to practice his redecorating skills on some cars whilst studying in Singapore, and also, more recently, Swiss national Oliver Fricker faced the same fate after tagging a couple of local public metro trains.
It is hard, however, to see the flamboyant paintings and psychedelic designs covering entire buildings in Buco do Batman, or Batman Alley in São Paulo as the work of criminal masterminds. Elephant gods in baseball caps and a chain smoking Batman with a potbelly and Havaianas do not exactly instill fear in the heart of the general populace. A constantly unfolding canvas, the graffiti that exists in Rua Gonçalo Afonso in the bohemian Vila Madelena district is the work of many local street artists and some international ones, some known and some unknown.
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A passing lorry kicks up a cloud of dust whilst a group of nuns make their way across the Zim-Zam border.
Our yellow fever vaccination documents.
We did a border run over to Livingstone in Zambia whilst we were at Victoria Falls, Zimbabwe. Having changed travel plans, we were no longer scheduled to visit Zambia, but not wanting to let our $300 yellow fever vaccinations (required for entry) go to waste, we decided to do a quick visit to Livingstone, about 10km across the border from Zimbabwe into Zambia.
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Known to the locals as Mosi Oa Tunya, “The Smoke That Thunders”, the Victoria Falls were a sight to behold, even in the dry season when we were there, where the flow of the water was a mere fraction of what one might see during the wet season from November to March. More than double the height of the Niagara Falls, the cascading sheets of water raise a mist that heralds one’s arrival to the falls, birthing rainbows and showering visitors with a cool wet spray.
Scottish missionary and explorer David Livingstone noted in his diaries upon seeing the falls, “No one can imagine the beauty of the view from anything witnessed in England. It had never been seen before by European eyes; but scenes so lovely must have been gazed upon by angels in their flight.”
Next up, Iguazu Falls on the the Brazilian-Argentinian border.
I left my job as an advertising Creative Director in August 2012 to travel Africa and South America for a year with my wife, documenting these beautiful places with my Fuji X-Pro1. View the rest of my RTW adventures on Handcarry Only and follow me on my journey by subscribing/following/bookmarking.
The difference could not be more stark, after 2 months of being surrounded largely by nature, mountains, forests, the ocean, deserts and mostly small towns, I find myself thrust into the third largest city on the planet, São Paulo. Where there was the silence of the night, occasionally punctuated by animal sounds, now police sirens and the low mechanical drone of twenty four hour traffic are omnipresent. Where there used to be mile after mile of arid bush, now people fill every square inch of available space, all going about their separate chores. This was supposed to be familiar territory for me, having grown up in Singapore and living in London, but someone, it seems strangely alien, perhaps what the prodigal son might have felt when he first arrived home, a sort of reverse culture shock perhaps.
I know my mind will switch modes to accomodate The City but for now, the African bush is a temptress in my head.
The largest city of the largest country in South America
A contemplative moment in the city
I left my job as an advertising Creative Director in August 2012 to travel Africa and South America for a year with my wife, documenting these beautiful places with my Fuji X-Pro1. View the rest of my RTW adventures on Handcarry Only and follow me on my journey by subscribing/following/bookmarking.
We arrived at village of Clarens to blue skies and gorgeous weather, and coincidentally, also in time for the centenary celebrations of the town. The sleepy mountain retreat was abuzz with activity and it seemed like everybody and his horse had made their way to the town to celebrate, with feathery hats to boot.
School’s out and the party’s on!
Named after Clarens in Switzerland where President Paul Kruger-the face of the Boer resistance against British rule in the Second Boer War spent his last days in exile, the pretty mountain village is surrounded by the Rooiberge Range and the Maluti mountains, and is the gateway to the Golden Gate National Park.
Storybook idyllic, the village of Clarens is surrounded by spectacular mountain ranges.
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An oasis in Botswana’s harsh and arid Kalahari Desert, the Okavango Delta is one of the largest inland deltas in the world. Originating in Angolan highlands as the Cubango River before it flows into Namibia as the Kuvango River and eventually ending up in Botswana as the Okavango River, it breaks up into a huge labyrinth of channels, lagoons and islands, forming the Okavango Delta, a haven for wildlife seeking water and respite from the Kalahari. The water from the Delta never flows into any river or sea, and 95% of it is eventually lost to evaporation.
We spent 3 days bush camping in the Okavango Delta, a definite challenge for a ‘soft’ city boy. There was no running water, no electricity and basically, no facilities of any kind. The bush toilet was a hole in the ground with a spade to scoop some dirt in. We could not use any soap or detergent for fear of contaminating the pristine environment so our swims in the Delta served both to cool us off from the unrelenting heat and to act as sort of a bath. Food was cooked on a wood fire, which was also our primary source of light in the evenings. In short, life was pretty basic.
African sunsets are always a magical moment
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