Post on 08-Apr-2018
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afrot
he CandomblCeremonyhasjustbegunandalreadytheworshippersare twitching and moaning, channelling their West Arican gods, the orixs.
Bareoot, dressed head-to-toe in white, they shue through a deep carpet o
broad green leaves toward the me de santo, a white-turbaned Candomblpriestess seated on a plastic chair at the back o the whitewashed room, where
she watches as, one by one, the dancers all into a trance. A stocky man with a close-
cropped beard clutches his waist as i gored by a spear and hollers, Arrrgghh!
46 WestWorl d >> november 2008 Elcio Carrico/gettyimages.com
MUNDO
byJennifer Patterson
A journey to the
African heart of Brazilreveals the secret tosurviving 300 years
of slavery
Existiu um El Dorado Negro no Brasil
Existiu como claro que o sol da liberdade produziu
Refetiu a luz da divinidade do ogo santo de Olorum
Revivieu a utopia um por todos, e todos por um.
Once there was a Black El Dorado in Brazil
There it was like a shat o sunlight that liberty released
It was there, reecting the divine light rom the holy fre o Olorum
And there it revived, the utopia o one or all and all or one.
Lyrics from Quilombo, O El Dorado Negro by Gilberto Gil/Waly Salomo
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When the drumming stops, he growls and
snores, eigning sleep. A slender woman
with pale eyes aps her elbows, eyes closed,
eyebrows twitching. Another whimpers as
she crumples to the oor in a aint.
Tonight, on the outskirts o Salvador da
Bahia in northeastern Brazil, we are witness-
ing a Candombl ceremony. Similar to thesyncretic religions o Santera and Vodoun
brought by Arican slaves to Cuba and Haiti,Candombl is the oldest Aro-Brazilian reli-
gion, a mixture o traditional Yoruban,
Bantu and Fon belies. The practice was out-
lawed in the 16th century under Portuguese
rule, but survived underground until its per-
secution by church and state oicially
ended in 1976.And on this July evening, weare again honouring Xang, lord o justice,
lightning and thunder, and Ogum, god o
war. Notably absent are my personal avou-rites: Oxum, the siren o resh water and
goddess o wealth and love, and Iemanj,
Yoruban goddess o the sea.
Until now, Ive had little exposure to
Candombl, though over the years one
might say Ive nurtured a mild voodoo etish.
I married an Aro-Cuban, so I know about
Santera irst-hand. And world-renowned
ethnobotanist Wade Davis opened my eyes
to Haitian Vodoun ar more hauntingly
complex than Hollywood would have us
believe with his 1985 non-fction adven-
ture The Serpent and the Rainbow. But my jour-
ney to Bahia and the Arican heart o Brazil
really began a decade ago, when I discovered
Gabriela, Clove and Cinnamon, a novel by Bra-
zilian Jorge Amado, at a used-book store.
48 WestWorl d >> november 2008 (tp) P. naaya, (tt lft) mafd Gttschalk/axxiags.c; (y,Baiana) Jif Patts
(pag 47) Canmb pi ah Fa Bnm pcin in hnu
f oxa, h Af-Baziian quivan f
Chi; (cckwi fm f) bach if inBaa; -wn faa; Puinh
Piy squa; h gan fBahian wmn fabic an ign
imp fm Afica in h a 19h
cnuy w nc famu hughu
Bazi; savaan yuh paci hhyhm f um up oum.
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Inside, a personal note to a past owner was
penned: This book is one o the most
amous Brazilian romances. Its set in the
1920s, but many habits remain the same in
the state o Bahia, Brazil. The book shows a
little o Brazilian northeastern culture, which
is, in my view, the strongest regional culture
in my country because o its Arican roots.
Intrigued, I read Amados popular love story
and thenDona Flor and Her Two Husbands,
both set in or close to Bahias capital, capti-vated by the languid sensuality o the tropics
and Bahias rich Aro-Brazilian heritage. Still,
it would be another 10years beore I fnallyew over Brazils jungle canopy and into Sal-
vador this place o Yoruban chants, Can-
dombl, carnival and capoeira, where
traditions brought by Arican slaves are pre-
served in amber.
I thought youwould be black,my Brazilian host Brbara Nascimento de
Oliveira an award-winning writer and
riend o a riend said upon welcoming
me into the home she shares with her
mother, Zlia. The assumption about my
race was understandable, or whywas I sokeen to explore Bahias Aro-Brazilian cul-
ture? My English ancestors could be consid-
ered colonizers. Perhaps I was here to make
amends, to take my Eurocentric view o theworld and turn it on its head. But then,
thats what I was here to explore, as, rom
that irst day, she and Zlia escorted me
around their town and guided me in my
quest: to witness a Candombl ceremony,
just as Wade Davis had done with Haitian
Vodoun in the 80s.
One thing I did know: the majority o
Bahians are descendants o West Arican
slaves. In act, the state o Bahia has the
highest concentration o blacks in Brazil
which, in turn, has the worlds second-larg-
est black population behind Nigeria. But as
Brbara and I strolled the streets, I drew my
own comparisons to Cuba mostly, though
Salvador seemedsomehow closer to Cam-eroon than the Caribbean. Salvador is like
Angola, Brbara declared one morning as
we passed rows o shops signs in Yoruba.And it appearedto be true rom theimpromptu capoeira perormances in ront
o the Aro-Brazilian Museum to the Bahian
street vendors dressed in white lace, hoop
skirts and turbans, selling Arican-inspired
fnger ood. The aroma omoqueca, a rich
seaood stew made with coconut milk, and
acarajs, deep-ried bean ritters stued with
My quest:to witness a Candombl ceremony as Wade Davis had done with Haitian Vodoun.
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shrimp, were hard to resist. Still,
we opted instead or tropical ice
cream: cashew and passionruit.
Geographically, as well, Salva-
dor is closer to Arica than North
America. Draw a line across the
Atlantic and you ind Angola,
while the same chart that traces the
transatlantic slave routes between
West Arica and Brazil illustrates
how snugly the South American
and Arican continents once ittogether: the coastline o north-
eastern Brazil tucked beneath the ormer
Arican Slave Coast that comprises mod-
ern-day Ghana, Togo, Benin and Nigeria.
Almost 2,000 km northwest o Rio de
Janeiro, on Bahia de Todo os Santos (All
Saints Bay), Salvador was established as the
countrys capital in 1549, ater the regions
discovery by the Portuguese in 1501. The
city soon served as an important slave port,
its abundance o churches (one or each day
o the year) earning it the nickname Black
Rome. The frst Aricans were transported
herein 1550, and an estimated 4.5 millionslaves rom Senegambia to the Kingdom
o Congo, romAngola to Mozam-bique soon ollowed, more than
were enslaved in any other colony
or country in the Americas, to cul-
tivate Brazils coee, cotton, cacao
and sugar. It would be three centu-
ries later, in 1888, beore Brazil
abolished slavery, the last country
to do so 81 years ater slaves were
reed by Britain, 40 years ater their
emancipation in France and 23 years
ater the end o the U.S. Civil War.In Salvadors old quarter,
Pelourinho, the cries o slaves were once
heard as men, women and children were
publicly whipped and tortured on the
steep, wedge-shaped Largo do Pelourinho,
or Pillory Square. Today the pedestrian-
only colonial district has been transormed
into a hive o black pride. Declared a
Geographically,Salvador is closer toAfrica than North America.
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UNESCO World Heritage site in 1985, it is
now a popular tourist attraction, with cob-
blestone streets bordered by storeronts and
restaurants neatly painted aades o tur-
quoise, ochre and lime green. Reerences to
Arica are everywhere: beauty salons spe-
cialize in beaded braids; shops hawk ebony
sculptures and T-shirts in gold, red, greenand black, the colours o the Arican
diaspora; the percussion group Olodum
(which perormed on Paul SimonsRhythm
of the Saints album) is headquartered here;
and martial arts studios oer workshops in
Angolan capoeira.
For seven sultrydays o Brazilianwinter, urther warmed by the Bahians
gentle, lilting accent and orr and samba
tunes, I explored, rom the bookstores o the
upscale residential district o Barra to thewhitewashed seaside churches and orts
across town. One entire morning was whit-
tled away at the Mercado Modelo, beneath
the art deco Lacerda Elevator that connects
Salvadors upper town with its seaside har-
bour, where Brbara took meshopping orsouvenirs Arican-inspired clay igurines
and musical instruments like the one-
stringed berimbau and high-pitched cuca,
the laughing sound o samba. Some days,
we ate our biggest meal at midday, vegetar-
ian buets on leay patios where monkeys
climbed the jungle-like plants. But mostly, I
skipped lunch and made the 20-minute pil-
grimage by bus to Pelourinho in the upper
town, away rom the sur, sand and salty breeze
o the palm-ringed beaches, yet with occa-
sional views o the Atlantic and the reighters
in the bay that reminded me o Vancouver.
One lazy aternoon, down a cobblestone
side street decorated with azure, orange and
jade-coloured ags, an impromptu peror-
mance by Escola Olodum: boys in red
T-shirts beating carnivalesque rhythms on
brightly painted oil drums; teenage girls in
canary-yellow tops, many with Arican
tresses, tilting their aces skyward, swinging
their arms and sidestepping to the layered
beat a rapid barrage o percussion. The
troupe leader blew his whistle and the crowd
squeezed onto narrow Rua das Laranjeiras,
where a boy, barely nine years old, pounded
a drum with a orce that belied his size. As
the swaying throng pulsated down the
street, the beats reverberated o buildingsand resonated like a communal heartbeat in
my ribcage. Carnival was still six months
away, but, closing my eyes, I could already
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eel the energy o Salvadors pre-Lenten
party that is said to eclipse Rios.
Only the day beore, I met with Denil-
son Jos, black activist, choreographer and
English teacher, inside his classroom over-
looking Praa da S.Salvador is the black-est city outside Arica, he told me as we
discussed the countrys contemporary blackmovement and the importance o its cul-
tural links with the Arican continent. Bra-
zils long military dictatorship ended 20
years ago and, since then, we have been
trying to make new ties with Arica espe-
cially while [Aro-Brazilian singer] Gilberto
Gil was cultural minister. Under Gils ten-
ure, Salvador hosted the second world con-
erence o Arican intellectuals and the
Arican diaspora, where world leaders con-
vened to discuss an Arican renaissance, a
new world order and enhanced culturaland economic ties between black popula-
tions on both sides o the Atlantic. During
the 1970s and 80s, the black consciousness
movement o Brazil may have taken its cues
rom the American civil rights movement,
the Black Panthers, unk and James Brown.
But today, Jos stressed, Aro-Brazilians look
increasingly toward Arica or afrmation.
Black Brazilians are still struggling to
fnd their place in Brazilian society, agreed
Dr. Joclio Teles dos Santos, anthropology
proessor and director o the Centre or Aro-
Oriental Studies at Salvadors Federal Univer-
sity o Bahia, when we met that same
aternoon over sweet black coee in his colo-
nial ofce. To urther complicate matters, dos
Santos explained, race is not defned by the
American-style one-drop rule, whereby
one drop o black blood makes you black.In act, in Brazil, the deinition o black is
much more complex and depends mostly on
skin colour and acial eatures, rather than
racial heritage. For example, in a country
where interracial relationships are the norm,
there are also many terms to designate skin
colour: rom black, black/brown, dark brown
and light brown to the dark-skinned cafuzo
and copper-coloured caboclo.
And, still, history repeats itsel in Bahia,
even in Black Rome. Not ar rom the Cen-
tre or Aro-Oriental Studies is the ormer
senzala, or slaves quarters, which despite its
sad history has been converted into an
upscale waterront restaurant. Here, one
aternoon, I ound only middle-class whiteBrazilians dining on pricey lobster moqueca
and shrimps in coconut; yet the kitchen and
wait sta were black. Outside, two shirtless
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boys rowed past in a painted wooden boat,
heading or their cliside slum.Asked i theghosts o tortured slaves still haunted the
place, the waiter smiled broadly. No, he
said, there are no ghosts. These days, this is
a happy place.
On a muggy afternoonin the
heart o Pelourinho, I climbed a narrow
staircase to the Federao Baiana do Culto
Aro-Brasileiro, the association that connects
outsiders with the secret world o Candom-
bl. A woman oered the single wooden
chair in the sparsely decorated space. The
only light: shats o equatorial sunlight fl-
tering through the shuttered windows.
Moments later, a man emerged rom the
shadows and led the way across Pillory
Square to the sky-blue slave church, Our
Lady o the Black Rosary. The baroque edi-fce, which was built in the 18th century by
slaves, or slaves, and took almost 100 years
to complete, was decorated with yellow and
white gerbera daisies. A breeze rued the
curtains and the scent o candle wax min-
gled with the aroma o peanuts and palm
oil. The streets din o voices, canned bossa
nova music and the occasional car horn
turned distant, otherworldly.
In a back room, an older gentleman
swept the uneven tiled oor. He was black,
but so were the aces o the saints whose
portraits hung romthe walls around him.In the ar corner, a display cabinet o wooden
fgurines: black patron saints, slave martyrs
and guardian angels, a long-haired Rastaar-
ian Bom Jesus, a black baby Jesus, and a Bra-
zilian rendition o Saint Francis o Assisi in a
brown tunic, his hand on the shoulder o a
shoeless boy whose yellow-and-green
clothes are the colours o the Brazilian
national soccer team. In the cloister, I paid
the young Candombl guide, Elaine Batista
Santos, 50 reais (Cdn.$25) to attend that
evenings Candombl ceremony on the out-
skirts o town.
The churchs Yoruban-language mass
starts at 6 p.m., leaving just enough time to
sample local dishes at the nearby Senac
cooking school and return or a recitation
o chants, which now competed with the
samba-reggae rhythms rom the music
shops on Pillory Square. Fittingly, the mass
seemed to reect a new social order: most
o the whites were standing; the blacksseated in the pews. Only latecomers are
orced to stand among the tourists. Elaine
then ushered six o us an Italian couple,
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two Spaniards, a Mexican man and me
down a side street and into a passenger van.
And we negotiated trafc-clogged roads
fve lanes o trafcowing each way in achaotic blinking river o red-and-white
lights through the already dark suburbs o
Salvador, then descended a steep ight o
steps through a terraced garden laced withoerings to the gods. In this place o wor-
ship, mulheres (women) are seated on one
side o the room, homens (men) on the
other. Visitors wear white out o respect or
the orixs. We were not to speak or take
photos, as the dancers circled the room
and, one by one, ell into a trance chan-
nelling their gods.
givenmyanglo-saxon, roman CatholiCupbringing, I fnd the dancers possession
by Arican spirits difcult to comprehend.But, like Wade Davis, I try to understand,
recalling something Denilson Jos told me
a ew days earlier, about the importance o
Candombl: that our people came to this
country completely deeated, yet they could
imagine a god o war. It is the most impor-
tant thing or us that Candombl resisted
persecution. Candombl brought people
together and gave them hope. Try to imag-
ine fghting against the Catholic Church in
slavery conditions. Our ancestors only per-
severed because they were very strong.
Ater a short break, the now-costumed
dancers return, kissing the loor as they
enter the room. The me de santo pus on
her cigarette. There is a warrior, a prince, a
king and a woman in straw channelling
Omol. A statuesque young man in pale
aqua wears a crown and carries a sword; he
is Xang. Another crowned, ebony-skinned
worshipper holds two swords, a white
sheet tied around his midri; he evokes
Ogum, god o war. The two men dance
aster and aster, legs ailing, arms slicing
the air, their bare eet clearing a pathway in
the leaves scattered on the oor. The pale-
eyed woman lunges like a wild animal. A
matron convulses and a young man trem-
bles like a rumba dancer. And in the midst
o this crescendo, I at last eel a connection
to the shores o Arica and these people
whose ancestors crossed the Atlantic in
slave ships centuries ago. I eel strangely
elated. Ater this night, I realize, I will leave
Brazil with more than a ew drops o Aricain my blood.
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