Cachaca is a Brazilian alcohol that was first made by the slaves the Portuguese brought to Brazil. It’s sugar cane-based - very sweet - and like gumbo, red beans and rice, jazz music, and the Mississippi delta blues among other things, it was what the poor people created due to a lack of resources and that the wealthy people eventually wanted. Crazy how that works so predictably. It’s clockwork.
Anyway, my wife and I were enjoying our first cocktail made of cachaca by the pool last week in a small coastal community north of Sao Paulo called Paraty. However, we struggled to enjoy the drink.
I’m certain you can relate to what happened. It’s become a meme. There was someone in an environment too small for their voice, talking too loudly. Loud people having private conversations on the phone in small spaces, loud Zoom calls in coffee shops. You’ve witnessed this. In our case, it was a British couple lying in lounge chairs by the pool on speakerphone with their daughter talking about finding her an apartment in London. The father, to be heard, raised his voice to nearly a yell so the phone would hear him from three feet away. Well, my wife and I heard him, neighbors living next to the hotel heard him, the birds in the trees on the coast heard him, the shop owner across town, people in the next city over and the Uruguayans 1000 miles to the south also heard him. We didn’t want to, but we learned a lot about this family and their dysfunctional and helpless daughter. Our relaxing drink tasted like cachaca, lime, and disgust.
Around the pool were two other couples. We met and stood talking in the pool. One couple had been traveling since January 1st. They were recently retired and described retirement as having three distinct phases – Go Time, Slow Time, and then No Time. Go Time is travel. Slow Time too old to travel and now sit around the house. No Time is travel back and forth to your final doctor appointments. They retired early to have a longer Go Time and were doing it right.
They were telling us about how they planned their extensive trips then, and I promise I’m not making this up, the British man got into the pool and began swimming laps right through middle of us three couples and another guy who had joined us. We stood there in water up to our waists in disbelief. He kicked right through us, splashing us, no more than a foot or two away as he came by. I’d never seen anything like it. Was it aggressive, or was it just plain clueless?
Anyway, the three different couples plus the one guy decided to not move, and he kept swimming. We’d pause our chat as he swam through. It’s sad that after traveling about 18 hours to get to a place way off my radar and another 18 hours to get back, the only story I have from my trip is about a British man in our pool, which makes me want to drink lots of cachaca.
I’m Cam Marston, and I’m just trying to Keep It Real.
