Sign in. It’s quick, free and it’s up to you.
An account is an optional way to support the work we do. Find out more.
WHEN BARS IN Rio de Janeiro’s hottest nightlife districts throw open their doors these days, they don’t know who’ll walk in.
Paulo Sergio, who owns Bar do Serginho in the Brazilian city’s trendy Santa Teresa area, says he has been the target of a dozen assaults over the last year.
All of Rio is experiencing rising insecurity but the crime wave in Santa Teresa is especially bad — and it threatens to kill the city’s party spirit.
“Clients aren’t coming anymore. They’re scared,” Sergio says.
Brazil’s government has sent almost 10,000 troops to help the police in Rio de Janeiro state, which is nearly bankrupt after years of corruption and hosting last year’s Olympics.
However, that is not helping to maintain what had been a growing nightlife economy.
With its cobbled streets and quaint houses, Santa Teresa has become a magnet for music events, small hotels, restaurants and galleries. But now it’s also a magnet for brazen robberies.
“They arrive in groups of four, stop the car outside, then steal clients’ phones and watches and remove the cash register,” Sergio, who has run the bar for four decades, says.
“At night, you don’t see anyone in the streets. You’d think it is a ghost town,” he says. “People will use their car now just to go 400 or 500 meters.”
The owner of a restaurant called Espirito Santa, Natacha Fink, says there have even been clients who called ahead “to ask if the restaurant is safe”.
Home delivery
Businesses are responding to the crime wave as best they can. When taxis refuse to take passengers to Santa Teresa, one restaurant offers to pick them up and bring them home free of charge.
Sergio has had to start closing early because “the attacks start at about 8pm”.
Francisco Dantas, who runs Cafe do Alto, is among those who have started doing home deliveries. ”If people won’t come out, then I have to go them,” he says.
“The number of clients coming into the restaurant has fallen 30 to 40% since November. It’s the first time that my revenue has fallen in 15 years.”
Banding together two months ago in a neighborhood association called Amosanta, locals hope to improve the area’s image and pressure the authorities into doing more about their safety.
“It’s better. There are already more police, but it’s still not like before,” Fink says.
Not so hot
Rio’s hottest nightlife area, Lapa, is also feeling the chill.
Valter Gabriel said visits to his bar Arco Iris have dropped a third since last year’s Olympics, and that customers leave earlier.
“I’m afraid of getting robbed,” he says. “People don’t feel safe in the streets.”
Ricardo Rabelo, from the culture website Bafafa, says Lapa is Rio’s “thermometer” and that the diagnosis is not good. Rio’s residents, called Cariocas, “aren’t afraid of crowds — it’s empty spaces they are afraid of”.
The city’s cultural life is actually growing, he says, with about 70 events typically scheduled on any given weekend.
“The difference is that Cariocas are going to the ones that take place in daytime.”
Annual “festas juninas”, or June festival street parties, once ended much later. “Now at 8pm they’re finished,” Rabelo says.
“The police don’t have enough cars, bullets or even food,” he adds.
How could people Madagascar be unhappy !! They have lemurs singing ” I like to move it move it ” .
But they have the foosa! The scary, scary foosa
So why do the Danes have the highest consumption of anti depressants in the world ?
They’re the happiest anti-depressants in the world, though.
I know why they are unhappy…….how many symbols and drawings and such of Africa do you see without Madagascar? Enough to outdo the elation of singing lemurs
It’s not science, it’s Lego.
It’s not Lego it’s Carlsberg .
Probably is!!
Conversely, are they trying to say the further you get from Ireland the happier you get ?
We wouldn’t be happy there. It’s about 10 quid a pint.
Oh and Costa Rica top the world happiness index , now unless they have magically rowed the entire county from central America to Scandinavia , I’m calling Shanagains
Danes go in for equality, consensus , comprise, and discussions and debate always focus on what is best for society in general,
whereas Ireland, in my opinion is ruled by the elite for the elite.
plenty of countries like Spain have lower suicide rates than the Nordic countries, they aint all happy
It must be the genetic viking influence that makes me happy when the sun is shining.
Genetic Viking how much is that a pint
Highest taxes in the world and they’re still happy, well blow me.
I would be happy paying higher taxes if we could see that it improves our quality of life, instead of just paying for more of the same sub standard bulls#it.
€10 a beer and 57% income tax and still happy.
Is this is true Denmark my words Il be moving there
Ya beating helpless dolphins to death, sounds like a great place to live.
That will be addressed in the “Dolphin Happiness Index” article to be published shortly. I suppose you realise that the Faroe Islands are an autonomous province of Denmark, not actually part of the country and are self-governing ? No ? Well you do now. Not condoning what goes on, just putting the record straight.
Obviously true as LaFin-land is right beside it….I’m sorry!
Interesting, but their may be a simpler explanation , the Netherlands and Sweden are rich and well developed countries, Ghana and Madagascar are very poor. Now if a Viking gene is the answer, people in Northern Scotland and the Faro Islands should be just as happy, now I doubt if the are.
The entire “findings” of this Danish study are derived from the popularized idea that serotonin is the “happy chemical.” A lot of sound evidence shows that this notion is an assumption instead of a well established fact (see: http://www.supplements-and-health.com/tryptophan-side-effects.html ). The drug industry is behind the misleading promotion of the serotonin-as-the-feel-good-substance in order to sell their antidepressant drugs.
have your say