Rio in search of a legacy

COMPLEXO DA MARé, RIO DE JANEIRO – On the drive between Rio de Janeiro International Airport and Copacabana Beach, about a 50-minute car ride more or less, it’s impossible not to notice the gigantic barriers recently installed by the municipality along the retention lane. Approximately 10-feet-tall and more than a mile long, made of acrylic and sheets of steel, they were stickered with festive commemorative banners, colored in green, yellow, blue and orange. Some proudly display the phrase “Rio, a new world.” It’s a kind of promise for those that pass by car, a welcome message for the 350,000 tourists that should arrive to see the first Olympic Games in South America, starting this Friday evening. 

But more than showing the “new Rio,” the so-called barriers truly only hide the scars of a divided city. They just cover old contradictions, occult dated problems and camouflage archaic conflicts. Back there, now out of the sight of foreign tourists, is the largest set of favelas (slums) in Brazil, the "Complexo da Maré" (Maré Complex). It is a two square mile area where 129,770 residents squeeze themselves within 17 different favelas. Back there, Antonio Machado works from 9 a.m. to 9 p.m. in a small grocery store that he was able to set up in the garage of his house, at great cost, after working as a bricklayer for three decades. “I had to work a lot to have this here, just look at my hands. But even so I am treated as a second class citizen by the government,” says Antonio, who now sees the so-called colorful barriers from his bedroom window every time he wakes, said.

Back there, Rosa Fonseca, 25, works nine-hour shifts as a telemarketing attendant, cares for her two young children and still finds time to study at night. “I sleep three or four hours per day, maximum. But all that I want is to have financial stability, so that in the future my children are not also treated like they are invisible,” she said.

Back there, Ismail dos Santos, 22, has been looking for work for five months without apparent success. He’s one of the 11.4 million currently unemployed Brazilians, according to the latest official statistics. “These Olympics are for who,” asks Ismail, as he points to the barriers. “What are we going to show the world, a bunch of propaganda? Why don’t they show who we really are? And why don’t they invest to better our lives instead of hiding them?”

As Ismail speaks, people that pass by listen to everything and even nod their heads, but don’t comment. All of them know that there are no answers.

It is with all of these inquiries, precariousness, contradictions and differences that Rio de Janeiro receives, starting this Friday evening, the 31st edition of the Summer Olympic Games, a tournament created to conciliate the irreconcilable, unite people and celebrate differences. After four years of preparations, the competitions have finally arrived, the 11,000 athletes deplaned, the tourists have multiplied, but the Olympic spirit is still far from taking over the souls of the Cariocas (people from Rio), quite far. And it’s not for less. In one of the most delicate moments of its history, with construction and unemployed people everywhere, with happy tourists at the Copacabana waterfront buying towels with the Brazilian flag and street kids begging inside restaurants, with an alienated president that will not watch the Games and an interim president that does not have popular support, Rio will carry out the opening ceremony still in search of its own identity. It’s a Rio that’s still looking for an imaginary unity of the city to show the world, and itself. It’s a Rio that, like all of Brazil, arrives to the Olympics hurt, hidden and divided.

“With the entire political and economic crisis that we’ve been living through since last year, the Cariocas have practically turned their backs to the Olympics. It’s a very different vibe from when we won the bid in 2009, when Brazil was THE place, the country of the future that would finally fulfill its prophecy,” said Murillo Nogueira, political scientist at the Federal University of Rio de Janeiro.   “The Zika epidemic, terrorism, traffic, none of this affects our lives, to be sincere. What affects us today is the lack of hope, not knowing how tomorrow will be. We won a chance to host the Olympics by celebrating our stereotypes, saying that we are a festive people, a welcoming people, happy. But today we are in our most desolate moment, our most dismal period. Today we are really a country without an identity to show the world.”

Three years ago, for example, 64% of Brazilians were favorable towards the the Olympic Games. Today, that figure is below 30% according to the most recent national poll. The research even highlighted that 63% of people believe the event will bring more losses than benefits to Brazilians in general. That figure was at 38% in 2013. Even Rio’s mayor, Eduardo Paes, recently agreed that this was a lost opportunity. “We are not presenting ourselves well,” he said to the Guardian. “With this economic and political crisis, with all of these scandals, this is not the right time to be in the eyes of the world.”

Even so, here we are, just a few hours from an opening ceremony that intends to show all of these discrepancies and inconsistencies that make Rio be so Rio. After all, it’s not the first time that this happens. In September of 1922, for example, the city hosted the International Exposition precariously compared to earlier editions held in Europe. But many investments remain in the daily lives of cariocas still today, like the current configuration of the city center region, the demolition of Morro do Castelo (Castle Hill), the Santa Luzia Beach landfill and a newly constructed city with luxurious stately houses. Of the immense exhibit, still remaining include the Administration and Federal District Pavilions (current Museum of Image and Sound), from France, a replica of the Petit Trianon, occupied by the Brazilian Literary Society, Statistics Pavilion (Port Authority- heavily modified) and the Palace of Industries (National Historic Museum).

 (Pictured, Rio’s beautified downtown for the 1922 International Exposition)

Almost three decades later, for the 1950 Soccer World Cup, Rio again became the center of the world with the construction of the Maracan?, the largest stadium in the world at the time, inaugurated while still in construction, as pictured below. Everything worked out in the end, meaning, except the loss to Uruguay in the final, but in terms of the event, everything took place as planned. The same construction confusions took place for Eco-92, the Rio de Janeiro Earth Summit, which took place amidst many makeshift solutions, but left as legacies, the Linha Vermelha Highway, which links the international airport to Rio’s Zona Sul (south zone), and a residential complex for nearly 800 families. 

Rio’s City Hall promises that this time the legacy will be much greater, even with the avalanche of gaping cases of the city’s faulty preparations to host the games. Termed the “heart of the games,” the Barra da Tijuca Olympic Park will have the better part of its area used for commercial and residential development after the Olympics. Apart from being transformed into a public park, the remaining area will be shared-use by public school students and high performance athletes, in spaces that will be supervised by COB, the Brazilian Olympic Committee.  

The installation for handball and volleyball, named the Arena of the Future, was planned to be of easy assembly and disassembly and would be transformed into schools after the games. The four schools to be built with the Arena of the Future’s structure would be for 500 students and would have 17 classrooms each. The areas would be suitable for higher education, contemplating multiuse rooms, informatics, library, multisport court with stands, among other installations

The stage for one of the main Olympic competitions, the aquatic stadium, was also projected to be transformed into two training centers and an Olympic size pool after the Rio Games, next year. The Radical Park, which will host 11 modalities, will be transformed into a large public park, with diverse activities for the population. Another good example of suitable use of resources is the construction of Carioca Arena 3, which will showcase the fencing and taekwondo competitions, as well as judo during the Paralympics. After the games, the structure will be converted into a full-time school with capacity for 1,000 students, who will be able to practice 10 sports modalities in the space.

(Click the image to read more about the project)

For those that see the situation as “glass half full”, Rio 2016 can leave a legacy in terms of infrastructure for the city, even with lower costs than those incurred in other editions. The expenses incurred so far near BRL 39 billion, equal to almost USD 12 billion, 60% of which was from private initiative. China, for example, spent USD 43 billion, while Russia burned USD 51 billion to host the Sochi Winter Games.

Mega events like the Olympics in fact can and should transform, in radical form, the cities that are willing to host them. But a city is not made up of just concrete, bricks, construction sites and promises – they are primarily made up of their people. Like Antonio Machado, who is probably hard at work at his grocery store while you are reading this article. Like Rosa Fonseca, who still does not have a public daycare for her children. Like Ismail dos Santos, who is still looking for a job. The great challenge of the Games is to transform the lives of all of these residents - the visible and invisible ones.

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