Tonight we fly out of Rio to our next adventure—in Houston, Texas!

Corcovado shines in the returning sunlight

After the heavy rains earlier this week, the sunshine yesterday was a welcome relief. Corcovado sparkles with the Jardim d’Alah, the canal and park that separates Ipanema from Leblon, in the foreground.

An uprooted ficus tree on Visconde de Albuquerque, Rio de Janeiro

Rio de Janeiro was hit by three days of heavy rains and wind this week. Some 200 people lost their lives in the state, most in landslides. The landslides occurred in the mountainside favelas. Earth and rocks, already destabilized by illegal deforestation and unlicensed residential construction, were loosened by the vast amounts of rain and avalanched, burying residents in the debris. Another factor exacerbating street flooding was the high tide entering the canals and canalized rivers that drain the Lagoa and provide sea passage to both sewage and rain run-off and coinciding with the period of heaviest rain.

The tragedy highlights the need for both improvement to civic infrastructure and more importantly, for land reform laws that would make it possible for all of Rio’s residents to lease or purchase housing in the urbanized zones served by public utilities and construction safety codes.

Corcovado on the cluttered skyline of midtown Leblon, Rio de Janeiro

This is our view of Corcovado from our hotel apartment’s varanda (balcony) here in Leblon, shot on 5 April when we moved in for our last few days in Rio de Janeiro. This is a much more normal version of “a window that looks out on Corcovado.”

Ipanema beach near Posto 9, 2 pm on 4 April 2010

Saturday afternoon before Easter, and the beach is hopping near Posto 9, Ipanema. It was sunny, but a bit cooler than it had been earlier in the week. Ipanema was full of tourists, Brazilian and foreign. It was a good thing everyone got their fill of sun, because:

Easter Sunday morning, Ipanema beach at Arpoador, looking west

Easter Sunday dawned with overcast skies. The early strollers and sunworshippers got out as usual, but the tourists were no doubt disappointed.

The last sunrise seen from our Rio apartment

Dawn vista on the last morning in our apartment here in Rio de Janeiro.

We’ve been so very blessed to see this wonderful panorama every morning for 3 years. Our best wishes to the next inhabitants, whoever they may be!

The school controversy continues in Leblon, Rio de Janeiro

This banner was strung up on my old building on Sunday, March 29 (or at least, that’s when I noticed it). The photo was shot on 1 April, after I’d moved out.

The slogan reads, “We will struggle without ceasing,” and was posted by one of the anti-school-expansion faction.

"Save our schools," reads this protest banner in Leblon, Rio de Janeiro

This banner was hung on this apartment building near the base of the Timóteo da Costa hill the week after the protest march. It reads, “Save our schools! Where is the priority for education?”

Close-up of Cristo under scaffolding, 23 March 2010

Shortly after Carnaval and end of the big tourist season, city authorities began a conservation project on the Cristo statue. He is suffering rust to his interior frame, and missing tiles and damaged tiles on his hands, face and torso. The repair project is scheduled to require three months, so will likely be finished around December, in time for the next tourist season.

In the meantime, the poor fellow looks fuzzy and out of focus!

Neighbors demonstrate against a proposed school in Leblon

Not all is bucolic bliss here in Leblon. While the toucans and hawks were locked in existential battle on the back side of my building yesterday morning, the good burgers of Leblon engaged in civic battle in front at noon.

The green space under the banner is the entrance to an old house behind two predios. The current owners run a small private school for primary grade children, and have won permission to expand the school. An ad hoc neighborhood group has formed to prevent this.

Timóteo da Costa is a very narrow two-lane street snaking up a very steep hill. It loops back down as Rua Sernambetiba and has no cross streets except at the bottom. There is also no legal parking on the street (not that that stops anyone!). An increase of school run traffic would cause huge bottlenecks on a busy residential street. If we were going to live here past the end of the month, I would certainly be happy to sign any petitions for this issue.

What was humorously contradictory is that a group founded to ease traffic would hold a protest that itself caused a giant bottleneck. People heading up the hill to their Saturday tennis match and feijoada at the Clube Federal were trapped by pamphlet-wielding Ladies of Leblon and their DHs. Much honking and angry shouts of “Oopah!” when hungry feijoada-cravers would break the picket line and slowly drive on through the pedestrian crowd (small as it was).