So, I spent the past month traveling in South America with my brother. Neither of us spoke a word of Spanish of Portuguese prior to the trip but we didn’t let this hold us back. Also, first time on the continent for both of us so we decided to see a lot. The city of Rio De Janeiro was our first destination. Rio is a tropical coastal city of tremendous beauty, famous carnival celebrations, and complex history.
On our third day in Rio we went to see the famous Cristo Statue (aka giant Jesus on a Mountain). Here we met a family from Queens , NY , who were originally from Brazil and their 21yr old cousin who lives in Rio. We chatted a bit and they kindly offered us a ride to our next destination, the Sugarloaf Mountains (see picture) and we gladly accepted. This family served as temporary local tour guides, translators, and transportation. This accomplishment perhaps blinded us into taking them up on their next recommendation. Instead of taking a cable car to get to the top of the Sugarloaf Mountains, as the normal tourist and local alike do, we would hike the mountain.
My brother and I were under the impression that we’d hike the first flat-topped mountain that you can see in the picture and then take a cable car to the higher peak. However, after 30 minutes of hiking it appeared obvious that our expectations were off, we were in the process of hiking the tallest peak! The 21 yr old cousin guiding reassured me “I did this hike with my ex girlfriend and her mother”. That was good enough reassurance for me to keep on going. As you can imagine from the pictures, the hiking had intense, steep slopes, I was often relying on metal bars to prevent sliding down to the crushing stone at the intersection of the mountain and the Atlantic Ocean.
About 3 hours into the hike my brother and I were sweaty and out of breath, but we were high on adrenalin and the surrounding beauty and only had one short very steep wall left to face. We got to the wall and there were some 20 men all dressed in black jumpsuits, shaved heads, scared knuckles, and numbers identifying them to their leader. The leader was yelling commands to his men as he helped them climb with supporting rope tied around him for safety. These men were in training for a very elite group of police in Rio called BOPE (Batalhão de Operações Policiais Especiais). This police force is known for its brutal and competitive training program, and deadly short range fighting tactics to combat druglords in Favelas. The Favelas in Rio, are huge populations of poor people where drugs and violence are predominant forces (I highly recommend seeing the movie City of God if you are unfamiliar, and also see the movie Elite Squad which is specifically about 
the BOPE).
Back to the story, the commander refused to let us climb the mountain before his troop finished. He scolded us at the top of his lungs “you stupid tourists! Did you not see the sign that forbid you to hike! It is dangerous here you may die! What did you do this for a fucking adrenaline rush you fucking idiots!”. Yupp, I was scared, and we didn't even get the worst of the yelling, that went to the father and the cousin of the family we were following. We all waited for 3 hours until it became pitch black outside and the final soldier climbed up the mountain. At that point, the commander realized the girl in the family was a minor and suddenly he had a legal responsibility to keep her alive. He tried to get her up the mountain in pitch dark, and realized it wasn’t possible. So, he tied her to his waste and told the rest of us we had to follow him back down the mountain! It took us about 4 hours to crab-walk down the entire mountain on our hands and butts with no source of light, except the leaders flashlight that was more blinding than helpful. But, we made it down and we were all thrilled to be alive. It turned out the commander was a really nice guy when he wasn't trying to intimidate his troop. He was a professional Marine Biologist who saw a greater calling in protecting his people and joined BOPE. He also had an article in a famous Brazilian magazine Veja ( check out that baddass dude in the picture).
That night I got the best pizza and soda of my life even though it probably cost 50 cents and was made of cardboard. What did I learn from this? If you want to appreciate what you have try to hike the steepest peak in you're respective locations with minimal water and no equiptment... no actually how about don't blindly trust everyone who comes off as friendly and helpful (even though these people had good intentions). Also love what you've got. Peace!
Works Cited: the second picture in the post was taken from: http://p6.hostingprod.com/@ricardosblog.com/blog/2007/04/rio_de_janeiro_pictures.html
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