John Baeyens

You have probably a romantic idea of Cariocas being the kind of laidback “carpe diem” people; and that’s probably the image you’ll also have when you visit for a week.  When living here in a day to day routine, you realise how sick this urban jungle truly is.  By nature I have a absolute allergy to people invading my ’space’.  When I walk over an official pedestrian crossing, cars should stop, especially when there’s a light and the light is green for me.  I cannot keep track of the number of times a car keeps on going and I eventually have to jump back.  I promised to myself that next time I’ll just jump on the card’s hood.
It’s no different biking in Rio.  The buses are truly killing and the only thing which truly helps is being faster then them.  And then there are the smaller unofficial vans who stop each 50m to pick up people.  Once I was so mad when one drove me off the road that I kicked the van; unfortunately the kick left quite a bump in the van and the driver went gallore; luckily for me there’s a lot of one way streets.

But all that is zen.  The thing which freaks me out is that people take over at the left side of the lane.  Traffic is completely saturated in Rio; unless you drive after 10pm till 5am.  There’s really np use taking over.  But yet all drivers will hideously chase you up by flickering with their lights and eventually even start honking when you don’t move.  What I usually do is go to the right lane, get after them; glue myself to their back and do the same for the whole remaining drive; it usually does the trick by getting them close to a hart attack.  Last saturday there was a 40-some women (the kind with the fake Channel sunglasses on) who was glue to my back and flickering her lights warm.  At the traffic lights I couldn’t help getting out of the car and moving towards her.  With my 196cm appearing she quickly locked her car and then I realised I need to be more prepared for Rio urban life and always carry lipstick on my, so that I can write the most embarassing text on the back windows of drivers like these. 

I should start Parkour Rio, the city needs it.   IfAnd somebody should invent a Parkour verison for bikers.