Niagara's Nothing

Day 4, Tuesday, December 24, 1996

This is a tale of three cities, separated by two rivers and belonging to three different countries.

When we boarded our morning bus to Foz do Iguaçu, it was immediately obvious that even though the three cities are in close proximity of each other geographically, separated by national boundaries they are different. For one, the Brazilian buses carry a fare collector near the back door in addition to the driver. The passengers board in the rear and alight in the front. To get in, one has to pass through a rather small turnstile guarded by the fare collector. It took a few bus rides for me to master the art of passing the tight turnstiles - take off the backpack and go in sideways. I didn't know that the bus to Foz was operated by a Brazilian company until changes in reals were given back to me for my pesos.

Puerto Iguazú is small, quite, clean, and affluent - more of a vacation town. I had imagined Foz do Iguaçu to be like Puerto Iguazú by simple extrapolation without justification. So I was surprised by how large and bustling Foz is. Many of the people came for the construction of the Itaipú Dam. The city look a little chaotic and rundown at places. We wanted to go to the central bus station to catch the bus to the falls, but the ride through town took much too much longer than I had anticipated. We got off at the last stop. There is a market there, but no bus station to be found. The bus driver was nice enough to take us back, and let us off at the central bus station. It's no more than several rows of curbs in between rows of stalls for hawkers. I couldn't find any signs indicating that this is the bus station. No wonder we had missed it on the way here.

We didn't see any signs for the bus to the falls, but found out from the people hanging around. It was so obvious that we were tourists and that we were going to the falls, merely approaching someone got us the answer. We got to the place where the bus was supposed to be, but still didn't see any signs. Just around that time a bare-chested and deeply tanned man came by. He went to a pole, turned around the loose plate on top. Voilà! It said Cataratas, the falls. He turned and came to talk to us, speaking surprisingly fluent English.

When a stranger approaches you on the street, he wants two things from you. He wants either your money or your soul. I am not surprised that given my cynicism, I thought of only these two. Ed suggested a third one - he might want your help. Along the same line, I thought of another - he might want to help you. I find it hard to see why anyone, under most normal circumstances, would want to get help from me - a clearly identifiable tourist, who has a camera in the right hand, a guidebook in the left, and a day-pack on the back, and who appears to be not very knowledgeable or resourceful. There are indeed genuinely good natured people who upon sensing that you are in need will come to your aid. I do cautiously give help if asked, and graciously accept help if offered, but my antennas go up and I go to yellow alert. Maybe I have lived in New York for too long. But I have to believe from experience that often times asking for help or offering help are mere covers for more sinister motives. If you don't believe me, please allow me to call to the stand Mustard Artists #1 and #2, and please allow me to relate to you the following story.

I was at Port Authority Bus Terminal in New York City trying to catch a bus to Boston. Since on this particular day I decided to try Peter Pan instead of the usual Greyhound, I had to go to a different gate. A flight of stairs down led to the gates. I paused at the top of the stairs to look at the signs. A homeless-looking man asked where I was going. I said Gate such-and-such, although I already knew where I was going. He said, "Right this way," and proceeded to lead me downstairs. I thought this much attention was rather lavish, and told him twice, "Thank you, sir."

By the time we got to the bottom of the stairs, just as I was going to keep on going, he stopped me, "Where is my tip?"

"What tip?" I couldn't believe it. "No."

"Gimme my tip." Now he's menacing me.

I didn't want to find out what would happen if I insisted. So I gave him a quarter.

"Fuck you!" he said as he took the quarter. Great. I addressed him as sir, gave him a "tip", and he still wanted to fuck me.

"Fuck you!" I replied. Well, what else can I say? It's New York.

I don't know about you, but I really hate losing my money, and I sure don't want to give up my soul. In unfamiliar territory, I am in no business giving help for I can barely help myself, and I have to be cautious accepting unasked help.

The bare-chested man chatted with us. He complained about how dirty the streets were with all the garbage and that the mayor wasn't doing anything. Upon hearing that I lived in New York, he asked if the mayor of New York was still that black man, referring to the former mayor David Dinkens. He told us that he had been a sailor for many years and had been to many places, including China. That explained his English. He was born in the Amazons, of Portuguese and native Indian parents. Since it's hard to find English speaking locals here and we don't speak Portuguese at all, I took the opportunity to ask him where the bus to Ciudad del Este was. He pointed out the bus stand on the other side of the street.

I felt a little eccentricity in his demeanor. We kept our distance. He made no attempt to get close to us. I wondered what he wanted. It would be too good to be true that he only wanted to talk with us. The thought of giving him a dollar or two came across my mind. I shot it down. Here is some friendly guy, a bit eccentric maybe, and I am thinking about paying him for conversation. This is too condescending and insulting.

A more normal looking man came on a bicycle. They seemed to know each other. We all talked a bit in English. The bus to the Cataratas came, but there would be a few more minutes before departure. Our friendly sailor asked us which year we were born. I couldn't understand why but told him nevertheless. He pulled out a sheet describing the Year of the Dog to us. Too bad it's all written in Portuguese. I only understood the lone Chinese character on the sheet. He then gave us some seeds and told us to throw them over the falls and make a wish. Rather smoothly and casually he said, "Now I need some money for food." He wasn't pushy or anything. He talked to the other guy, giving us some time to decide what to do and how much to give. Oh, well, it turned to be money after all. My first instinct wasn't too inaccurate. We gave him two dollars. I rationalized that the two bucks bought the information on where the bus to Ciudad del Este was.

The trail along the Brazilian side of the horseshoe offers a panoramic view of the cascades of falls on the Argentinean side. I was amazed at how wide the set of falls are. It's not just one big downpour at one place. What seemed like pretty big falls yesterday on the Argentine side are really just small pieces near the end of one leg of the horseshoe. As we walked towards the bent of the horseshoe, the trail gets wetter as the air became thicker with mist from the falls. The biggest downpour at Devil's Throat was completely obscured by the mist. It was still not accessible today, because of the high water volume, as we found out from the visitors center at the Argentine park this morning. The downpours on the Brazilian side at Salto Santa Maria and Salto Floriano, some distance away from Garganta del Diablo (Devil's Throat) were no less impressive. On the catwalks extending from the trail to the edges of the falls, there was so much water in the air, it was as if it was raining hard. The reddish earth washed down from upstream made the water look cream coffee brown. Judging from the postcards on sale, the water is usually clearer. Properly dressed for the occasion today, I wasn't going to let a little coffee with cream stop me. Taking pictures was a little trickier, however. I had to use my body to shield the camera and take pictures very quickly.

The statistics on the Iguazú Falls say that Iguazú is taller than Niagara and wider than Victoria. I had been to the Niagara Falls a number of years ago, so I don't remember it very well. After we got back, I saw a postcard of an aerial view of the Niagara Falls in Ed's lab. I looked at it, "This is it? Niagara's nothing!"

Walking along the trail, we saw a number of these raccoon like animals. The Argentinean side of falls, on the other hand, were full of foot-long lizards. The trail ends at the foot of Salto Floriano, a big downpour. A round platform reaches out near the edge of the fall and catches some of the water coming down and dropping through the iron mesh floor. Standing there was like taking a shower in brown river water. Against the rim wall is an observation tower. A short elevator ride up the tower gives a better view of the area. But it's still not high enough to see Devil's Throat not far away behind the rising mist. The top level of the building is at the rim of the horseshoe, where we caught the bus back to Foz do Iguaçu.

The information our two bucks bought came through for us. The bus to Paraguay looked no different from any other city bus except a placard behind the windshield that said Paraguay. We had wanted to visit Itaipú Dam, but it was closed to visitor because of Christmas. We nevertheless decided to come to Ciudad del Este because it is just across the bridge. Border control was fairly loose. If a guard thinks he needs to stop a car or bus, he whistles. I was wondering how our bus almost cleared the customs booth without stopping, when my eyes caught the eyes of a guard. Darn, I had to look out of the window. He came up, skipped everybody else, asked for our passports, took them, and got off. We followed. Another man behind the desk in the customs office slowly looked through my passport page after page. I figured if he took such an interest in my passport, I should ask for a stamp. He said something in Spanish, but we guessed that he wouldn't stamp it because there was no exit stamp from Brazil. We had gotten our Brazilian visa a little too early. It was issued on October 4th, and it had to be used within 90 days, even though it's valid for five years. A day trip from Argentina to Brazil requires no visa and got us no stamps. Now going back from Paraguay to Brazil wouldn't get us any stamps either. By the time we go to Rio de Janeiro on January 5, it would be beyond 90 days. I was slightly worried.

The guard asked if we needed a taxi. We declined and said we were just going to walk around. We walked along the main avenue, which continues directly from the border control on the bridgehead. The streets are lined with shops selling cheap manufactured goods made anywhere but in Paraguay. There are also many stalls on the side streets. Signs and billboards are everywhere. The border control booths are sponsored by Samsung.

Ciudad del Este was a shock to me. If Foz was a little dirty, Ciudad del Este was really dirty. The streets were covered in a layer of dust and strewn with garbage. But this was the least of it. At one intersection not far from the border control, there were a group of five or six soldiers standing around brandishing assault rifles and shot guns. We waded through the sidewalk extensions of the shops that line the streets. We passed someone sitting at a doorway. I suddenly realized that he was sitting there cradling a shot gun. No uniform. We walked on. We saw more plainclothes armed men guarding banks, etc. A car passed by. A young Asian woman was driving. Seated behind her were a young child and another passenger. In the front passenger seat was a uniformed soldier holding a shot gun. This abundance of weapons and the anything goes atmosphere made the place feel like a modern day Wild West frontier town. I genuinely felt unsafe and walked around on high alert. This was the only place on our trip and indeed one of few places that I have ever been to, where I felt unsafe in broad daylight.

We caught the town at its fiesta time. A lot of the places were closed. There was nothing I wanted to see and nothing I wanted to buy. Ed picked up a Bad Boy T-shirt, not realizing at the time that the Bad Boy was making an obscene gesture. No. No. Not the finger. That Ed would know. We waited near the border control for a while and waved down a bus that goes directly to Argentina.

To sum up succinctly, this tale of three city is "the good, the bad, and the ugly."