Favela tour

On the 4th feb we went to a tour of the favelas. Ive seen the film City of God, which is based in a favela, so was expecting bullets to be flying around our heads and drug dealers shooting people for stepping onto their patch. I was a bit on-edge about safety and not sure about the morality of seeing some of the poorest people in the country for pleasure, but the tours put some money back into the community and give money to schools and health centres, so thats ok.

We travelled to the favela on the back of an army jeep (which was an experience in itself), and the guide took us around the favela on foot. The favela didnt meet my expectations at all. The people were not threatening in any way, and seemed to be ok with us walking about. The favela is like any other city, with the main shopping street, water and electricity (although a lot of people make illegal connections to the supply), even a bank. The trip wasnt disappointing though, the architecture is amazing - if someone wants to move there, they just build their house on top of someone elses. The houses are so close together that the side streets are barely the width of 1 person. There arent official addresses for the houses, they collect their post at the post office. The favela we went to is the largest and houses about 200,000 people.