The sunga (pronounced soon-ga). Reassuring bums tightly wrapped in yellow, red and black. Rio welcomes me back, standing legs apart, facing the ocean, tan and muscled. Sometimes - kitsch heaven - they are wearing matching hats.
It's late June, the beginning of winter, and the famous Posto 9, Ipanema Beach, is windy and cool. Surf is decidedly up. Oh, wait, there goes a blue sunga. Perpendicular to the water line, he stands up. Kind of gives a whole new meaning to side profile, this swath of bathing suit.
Not that I'm looking. Well, of course I'm looking, but in a completely different way this time. It's a spectacle. And yes, it certainly wakes up the first chakra. It's gotta be the combination of skin and sun. I'm not looking too bad myself.
So indoctrinated into this culture of color - hint - white is the absence of color - that I made a point to spend an hour tanning today. Tonight's a big night, and I want to look good. I'm meeting the News Team at my new gig, the online weekly employing yours truly to edit and write stories about Rio for people whom I imagine are as white or whiter than me. It's ironic that after years of trying to fit in wherever I go, especially in Latin countries, with my blondes and blues, I'm the head of the outgroup's flagship publication, the Gringo Times! I love it. Sweet contradiction.
Back to the action on the sand ... I'm looking around at the beach vendors, total characters - some even in costume - and can't believe that I live here! It's a carnival all year round in Rio, they just put everyone on the streets for that one week in February. Otherwise, the freaks, geeks and chics are all beaching it, or coming out at night, to Copacabana and Lapa, to strut their stuff and tut their tut.
The vendors, right ... what about the guys in Egyptian Pharaoh get-ups, white and gold, complete with tomb hats and long tunics. Then there are the guys selling matte and limao, tea and lemonade, who go around with a mini-keg of each on their arms. Or the guy selling Globo biscuits who rings a little bell, just in case you didn't hear him shouting 'biscoito Globo, 2 Reais'.
My personal favorite is hard-working barbeque man, who will make you grilled shrimp and cheese, and literally comes around with a mini-barbeque on his shoulders. But wait, there's a new one - fruit guy. He's got a large wicker bowl of pineapples and mango on his head, held up African style, perched on a flattened sarong. The crowning touch is his green surgical globves - safety first!
And let's not forget the tattoo action. Usually guys that wear sungas don't have tattooes, as they would distract fro mtheir muscles. If they have them, they're small and black. The surf trunks guys will have tattooes, and they can be big, ala a life-size cobra down their leg or a crescent moon spanning both shoulder blades. And lest women be left out, they sport them as well. Song lyrics in italics on the back are popular for the gentler sex, as are the ubiquitous stars and hearts on the waist/ankle/wrist.
Welcome-body-back, Rio. My observations may be skin-deep, but there's alot going on under the surface revealed right here on the sand, no ex-ray goggles necessary.
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