The man must be in his late sixties, but he is as agile as a twenty year old, as he beats out a rhythm on his drum and moves his feet across the pavement, in time to the samba beat. Vicki and I are sitting at a plastic chair beach bar, on Copacabana beach, sipping Brahma beers, in the fading light, the sun having already disappeared behind the tall apartment holiday blocks behind us.
In the 40 minutes that we have been sitting here we have had 15 beach vendors come up to us with services and/or objects for sales, all with a very hard sell attutude; Football shirts, Caiparinha making kits, Towels, T-Shirts, Beads, Beads and more beads. The Samba man is number 15 and he finishes his routine by cheekily slapping out a beat on my shoes. As he accepts his tip he tells us that he is a Samba teacher in his full time job. Number 16 is another bead seller or, as we quickly find out, a drug seller disguised as a bead seller. We refuse to buy either his beads or his drugs, even though it is the drugs that he has a hard time believing we do not want. Eventually I accept his offer of barter, and I buy him a beer in exchange for a ring, of Vicki´s choice (who said I´m not a romantic).
His name is Kleva, and he tells us a bit about his life in Rio as he drinks his beer. He has an ex-wife and child living in the favelas that he needs to support by selling beads (which he claims to also make), and drugs. As he talks his embellished tale gets more unbelievable, and by the end I am convinced that he has been sampling way too much of his own products. Once he has gauged that my charity only extends to a single beer, he is quick to move on - as are we to avoid any more costly exchanges.
