Romance in Belem (1990)

Romance in Belem
March 29th, ’92
rev 7/5/92
Finally, a date with Gorete. Gorete, the tall Brazilian beauty with the brilliant white smile, bright brown eyes, and a voice so smooth and sexy.
I’d drink in the hotel’s veranda bar every nightjust to watch her work.

Gorete was usually the bartender and would give me a big smile or two if I was lucky. After a month of glances and smiles, it was the Fourth of July.

Berenger and all the other crazy film crew gringos were throwing a boisterous Fourth of July party out on the veranda. We all sang the Star Spangled Banner, and I vaguely remember talking to Darryl Hannah, telling her how much she looked like my daughter, Hanna, and I asked her if her brother Daryl was there.

The party got too loud for me so I went inside to Calm Eddie’s bar to get some peace. Calm Eddie always wore a tuxedo. It gave the hotel some class.

Most people in the Amazon, a thousand miles from anywhere, don’t wear tuxedos. And I met Gorete’s friends Jackie and Margerida sitting at the bar. We hit it off right away.

Jackie set up a date for the four of us to go out dancing the next Saturday night. Margerida had a car and we’d hit the night clubs ( which I hadn’t seen ) and they’d teach me to dance the lambada.

I was to wait for Jackie, Margerida, and the lovely Gorete in front of a bank machine a block from my hotel. So I stood for an hour waiting, wearing my khaki slacks and polo shirt, trying not to sweat in the hot, humid tropical night. And then there they were in Margerida’s pale blue Toyota. They were all laughing and carrying on in Portuguese. I said,” The bank machine is a very romantic rendezvous.”

Jackie translated this to the other two, and they all laughed.
I sat in the back seat with Gorete, and we were both very nervous. Or at least I was. Gorete was beautiful! She wore a gold and black blouse, vest, and a combination skirt/shorts, and bright red lipstick. The Belemese women are beautiful in bright red lipstick, and when they wear it, look out!
We drove to ‘La Pianus Bar’, which means ‘Piano Bar’ in Portuguese, but it set me thinking. We were very early. It was only 10:30pm. The nightclubs don’t usually open until eleven. I never did find out when they close.

The club was almost empty and open air. We found a table in the courtyard. The moon was full and rising over the concrete wall topped with broken glass andbarbed wire. We ordered our drinks and Tira Gosta (bar food consisting ofchunks of beef and white cheese eaten with toothpicks).

There wasn’t live music tonight, and the DJ started out playing romantic melodies. Gorete was beautiful! I was completely smitten! Maybe I was crazy from living in my hotel room and on the movie set in the jungle for two months. I don’t think it was just loneliness. Gorete told me later she was attracted to me at first sight ( I think, my Portuguese isn’t so great). I know I fell for her the first time I saw her there behind the veranda bar.

Jackie told us to dance! “Go! Go, before the dance floor gets crowded!”
Ah, Jackie, my old matchmaker/translator friend. Jackie is maybe older than I and was married to an Englishman for many years. She lived in England and has a teenage son and daughter. Margerida is about my age and divorced. She also has a teenage son and daughter and lives in the same apartment building as Jackie.

And Gorete is much younger than I and beautiful, and we are going dancing out on the wooden pista (dance-floor).

Gorete is tall, five feet eight or nine. She feels very good in my arms. I’m the only gringo in the place, the only blonde for miles, and people stare, but I don’t care. “The Lady in Red” is playing. I look around and see other couples kissing. Kissing is a mild description. So.

The world just went away. Just Gorete, me, and the music
The music sped up to a lambada beat. Ohh, I was lost. Gorete was fluid, mesmerizing, dancing fast and close, and we were both covered with sweat in seconds. I tried to keep up. We were the tallest and oddest couple there. After a few songs, I begged off and we walked back to our table. The sweat was dripping from my nose, and my shirt was soaked in sweat.

And when we got back to Jackie and Margerida we were lovers. At least I
thought so. Maybe Brazilians think it’s just normal Saturday night behavior, but I know whole counties back in Nebraska that haven’t felt that much excitement in a hundred years.

The rest of the evening blurs together, but I do remember we walked Gorete home. Her house was only a few blocks from the club. I remember looking up and seeing the moon and wondering if it was north or south ’cause Belem is only a hundred miles south of the equator. It was late when Margerida and Jackie dropped me off at the Hilton.

The next day was hot, humid, blazing sun as usual, but it was Sunday. The one day a week, the film crew doesn’t play at film in the jungle.
I was a bit hungover and went down to the pool for a swim and some sun. After an hour, I felt better and I couldn’t get Gorete out of my mind. I kept thinking of her lips, her kisses, her voice, her eyes, but mostly the kisses.

So I thought of the moon, the streets, and my old days trekking about the Great Plains, and figured I could find her house. I could even walk there.
It was noon and very hot. I wore my light blue tennis shorts and a green polo shirt, sunglasses, tennis shoes, and a light heart. Romance is a lot of fun. I knew Gorete liked me and she’d be happily surprised to see the’rich’ gringo come see her after our first date.

Belem is poor and hot and foreign, but I was never scared walking the streets there. It’s a lot safer than East St. Louis.

I figured out where the moon was last night over La Pianus Bar when I went in and when I came out. From that, I got East and West, and added to that a few clues from what I remembered of the car rides. I headed east for Gorete’s house.
And after an hour of hot walking, I found it. My shirt was soaked with sweat, and even my shorts. The street was ablaze in light.

I could hardly see even with my dark sunglasses. And there I stood on the streetcorner of broken cement and wrinkled asphalt ( I swear it flows downhill in the heat ) looking like a fool, a lauco gringo as out of place as can be. TJM