Pictures will tell a good tale of today. Mike took some good ones as we were driven home. They show the urban area and atmosphere we live in, the people, the life. If he strings a few picture together, it may even show the bumps in the road.
Today we went to the famous opera house of Manaus. When I first heard of Manaus in 1998 or so, it was because of the Opera House, Teatro Amazonas. Such a paradox to have an elegant opera house in the middle of the most wild jungle on earth. And now I’ve seen it. The pictures tell a fair amount of the story. I’ll try to tell the rest.
Our guide was Benedict. I think he joked that it was a “pompous” name, but maybe he said a “papa’s” name, since papa is the Portuguese word for Pope. Either way, people laughed. Benedict spoke of the stones for the structure all being imported from Europe, as there are no stones in the Amazon. Why they didn’t get it from other parts of Brazil, I didn’t think to ask. The money to build the opera house came from the “Rubber Barons.” As America had Robber Barons, Brazil had men (mostly Germans) who made a fortune on rubber and were hence called the Rubber Barons. After 15 years of construction, their opera house was done in 1891. They would have it for 35 years or so until Malaysia successfully stole the rubber tree seeds and the rubber market. In Brazil, rubber would, uh, never bounce back.
During those heydays, the Rubber Barons enjoyed seats at nearly stage left and stage right. Benedict made fun of the Barons often and, in this case, he pointed out that these seats are now the cheapest in the house, the acoustics being worst so close. The VIP section is now in the second level center, exactly where you’d probably pick.
The elegance of the place is exquisite in velvet covered dark wood chairs, large white pillars (hollow), elaborate artwork all around and on the ceiling, and wood floors mixed of dark mahogany and a lighter yellow wood, signifying the meeting of the waters that occurs off the port in Manaus (that we’ve yet to see). The stage is now moveable up and down 2 m and was currently down as they prepared it for a new opera tonight after Roger Waters’ opera last night.
Upstairs was an entire ballroom for music and dancing. We entered only after putting on large slippers that covered our shoes. In the most irreverent way – which is seemingly how to best enjoy Rubber Baron culture – we slid around the floor like children in those slippers. They moved across the beautiful wood floor almost like dull ice skates. Where Rubber Barons waltzed, Mike moon-walked.
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