Tartaruguinhas

My second post about Praia do Forte. Here's what it's like to visit there now:

Praia do Forte today really is one of my very favorite places to visit (and it was even before I knew the sea turtle story). It's one of the places I go when I want peace and safety and calm, and, yes, when I want to buy bikinis! Yes, it's very touristy, but in a good way - you aren't pestered; there aren't bazillions of street vendors running at you; instead, you just stroll along the lovely shaded avenue, the Via, and there are just just lots of cute little shops everywhere. I get into sort of a trance walking along the Via: Bikini shop, ice cream shop, jewelry shop, art shop, restaurant. Bikini shop, ice cream shop, jewelry shop, art shop, restaurant. Really, anybody who can't find the right bikini in Praia do Forte just isn't trying! For the ice cream, though, you MUST wait till you get to the 50-flavors place. Where else can you get passionfruit ice cream, jaca ice cream, fruta-de-conde
ice cream, etc. etc. etc., AND an all-you-can-eat bar of every imaginable ice cream topping?





But what I really notice, coming from Rio especially, is how safe and peaceful it is. In Praia do Forte I can let my guard down. I can wander around swinging my bag loosely from a shoulder, and nobody is going to purse-snatch it away. I can have my camera out all day - I could probably wave a fistful of 50-cinquenta bills all day - and nobody is going to run up and steal it. I can sit for hours on the porch of the Tango Cafe eating one of their marvelous sandwiches, just people-watching or reading my trashy Brazilian mystery novel, and I can .... just .... relax.

Several times a day I go to the unbelievably peaceful, ridiculously quaint little beach - which still, even today, is lined with small fishing boats - and float on my back in the peaceful waves with all the little kids. (it's a sheltered cove with hardly any waves - good for lap swimming, good for little kids, and definitely good for floating on your back in a trance!). Or I can walk for miles on the beaches in either direction. Or.. perhaps head back to the pousada and lie down in a hammock for a while. After floating in the water for a while, you know, you get kind of tired out from all that exercise, and you might need a nap in a hammock. Eventually, after your nap, you rouse yourself to go look for a caipirinha, or maybe it's time for a coconut. It's that kind of place.





And, at this time of year, you can see the sea turtles hatch! Almost every day at 5pm, in December and January and February, the TAMAR people open up the nests of whichever of their "rescued" sea turtle nests are due to hatch that day. Typically the turtles have already hatched and are piled up in the nest waiting for sunset, and the TAMAR people come along and dig them out. It's called the Abertura dos Ninhos, the opening of the nests.

When I went to the Abertura dos Ninhos yesterday, I was amazed at the size of the crowd. There must have been two hundred people gathered around the turtle nests. We were all clustered obediently behind a little fence while a couple men with clipboards picked out which of the several hundred turtle nests were due that day, and they got down on their hands and knees and started digging and... turtles! Teeny tiny turtles! They piled all the turtles into a plastic bucket, and a couple of the TAMAR kids ("Tamarzinhos" the kids are called) had the important job of picking up the baby sea turtles and slowly carrying them around the crowd of people. Letting everybody touch the amazingly tiny, brand-new-to-the-world, little flapping sea turtles. (Olive ridleys and loggerheads, in case you're wondering.)

I couldn't help but notice the pride with which these young (black) local kids carried themselves. They were the stars of the show, carrying the baby sea turtles; and rich (white) Sao Paulo tourists were begging the kids to come closer ("Please! Please! Over here!")

And oh, as each little sea turtle came closer to a clutch of excited Brazilians, what an excellent opportunity to hear every possible Portuguese word for "cute"! The diminutive suffix "inho" was suddenly attached to every possible word: "Aiiiiiiiiiii!!!!!! Que PEQUININHO! Que BONITITINHO! Que FOFOZINHO! Que TARTARUGINHO!" (What a little-little! What a pretty-little! What a cute-little! What a turtle-little!) How soft! How tiny! How adorable! Look at his little eyes! Look, he's flapping his little flippers! Isn't he amazing!







Now I see what the TAMAR folks mean about the power of baby sea turtles!





Finally the Tamarzinho kids carried the bucket of baby turtles to the sea - dozens of Sao Paulo tourists running close behind. They instructed us sternly not to "mix" the turtles - "Nao mexe nao!" (Don't touch them, don't interfere with them.) They tipped the turtles out onto the damp sand and everybody screamed with delight as the little turtles instantly started scampering to the sea. All those deep evolutionary instincts triggered at last, every turtle somehow knowing exactly what to do the moment it hit the damp sand. They motored down the beach like little wind-up toys, their enthusiasm absolutely contagious. Then they were all are swept back by a wave (cue dismayed screams from the crowd, shouts of encouragement) - they slowly righted themselves, got reoriented, headed out again - were swept back again (screams, shouts, "Swim!!"). Finally they made it out past the waves. We could just see the tiny dark dots of their little heads popping up for air as they motored valiantly on out to sea - starting their great adventure.

Everybody cheered and applauded, and a man right behind me called out loudly: "E PARE DE COMER OVOS DE TARTARUGAS!!!!" (And stop eating turtle eggs!)

The man next to me said to his friends, very righteously, "I've never eaten them. I don't even know what they taste like."

And then we all went and sat on the beach and watched the sunset, and wished the little turtles well, on their mysterious journey to wherever it is that they go. They won't all survive. But some of them will.