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30 days in South America (including Universo Paralello #6)
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traveller
IsraTrance Senior Member
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Posted : Jan 19, 2006 12:30
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I posted this at UP thread too but I feel it deserves a post of its own so..
My trip in South America began long (well like a week anyways) before Universo Paralello even started. I saw a little bit of Rio De Janeiro with Gui (IT) as my guide. I must say that the Christ monument is a lot bigger than it appears to be. I went swimming too. A day later I picked up my little sister from the airport. Some time later I met my mom, dad and grandma. Christmas and the surrounding days passed by at the great waterfalls of Iguassu (Foz de Iguassu) in southern Brazil where she meets Argentine and Paraguay which we also visited. After that it was only me and the sis. I think it was the 26th when we flew to Bahia’s Salvador. Around that time I caught a lovely puke-diarrhea thingy so pretty much the only thing of Salvador I saw was our hotel room. I think it was the 28th when we headed Universo Paralello.
At first it was a ferry to somewhere and then a bus from there to another somewhere. From there it was a shared taxi/van to sort of close of Universo Paralello. I was offered weed and cocaine. I declined. The last part was a ride with a truck thru the jungle to the festival gate. A bit of a discovery channel moment. At some point I heard a convincing story on how the festival got its name. Apparently not unlike my nick it derives from that movie “the Beach”. Like in the sort of endish part when the French bird takes a group shot at the beach and then a bit later (if my memory serves me well) Leo looks at the pic at some cyber café and there’s the text “parallel universe” written over the pic. So yeah anyways maybe after 20 minutes in the truck we found ourselves from the gate and I had absolutely no trouble in sneaking in my 2 precious bottles of Salmiakki Vodka.
About then it began to rain like in a rainforest. It’s always a pleasure to setup a tent in a hellish nightmare storm. I sure was happy I was completely sober. We were tired and decided to go to sleep. We both thanked god we had bought a tent from Salvador. Hammocks and nightmare storms don’t mix too well. I woke up very early and it was very, very hot. I went swimming. Instead of water I was shitting mud so it was something to celebrate. The first artist name I mention in my notebook is Aphid Moon so I suppose he was good and if someone knows the first tune he played I’m all ears! At some point mud turned into solid. I was very happy! I’ve written something about escaping the full on circus that took over the chill out the 31st in my notebook. Also quite a few times I’ve bitched about the program, or rather the lack of it. I think it was the 4th day of the festival when they finally handed them out. What the hell? What was up with that?
When ever I was awake I wasn’t too sober so my notes are somewhat incomplete and full of gibberish. January 1st I wrote that the fireworks were pretty 3rd world. Why the bitchy attitude, I don’t know! I recall having the time of my life thru out the festival. The first day of the year I woke up soaking wet as the waves were washing over me. I didn’t mind. There’s a big question mark about some tune that was played in the chill out. Some guy singing a story with once-in-a-while high pitched tone. Anyone?
My malaria prevention medicine was contributing to my dreams in epic proportions, but that was just cool. Weird dreams are awesome. In a way the festival felt as if I was dreaming 24/7 and the dream was weird, weird but very pleasant! One night I spent at the bonfire talking to lovely people. When I woke up it was once again very hot. About then I realized that I hadn’t seen my lil sis in perhaps days. No worries, I ran into her like 5 minutes later and we had fruit salads. Everything was perfect. Other artists I mention in my notes are Atmos, Freq (which I actually remember.. perhaps the best act in the festival!!), Beckers & D-Nox and the one who played before Jaia who I thought was Jaia. Only realized my mistake when I heard Orchestra 2.0 from some distance. Yes Jaia was brilliant too although I think the sound was somehow disturbed in the beginning. If the girl who danced at the stage is his gf/wife/love slave he’s one lucky bastard!
The Britons and the Italian guy we were camping with where really nice people. Later my sis told me that the last night while she was about to fall asleep she saw a pair of hands reaching inside the tent for my already packed bag pack. When she said something menacing in Finnish the intruder fled. This was the only time thru out our entire trip that some scum criminal tried to rob us. If you identify yourself, I hope you get decapitated you scum fuck! Now on a lighter note I must say that the festival was like a dream (come true). Next best thing to a paradise for sure! Thank you so much to everyone (other than the scum fuck) who contributed or took part! Already I find myself longing back.
Now if anyone cares. As the festival ended we caught a bus to the Salvador airport. A plane to Rio Branco via Brasilia it was. We arrived in Rio Branco in the very early hours and as we got to the train station the local junkies and hookers were there to meet us. A room by the bus station for a night it was and in the morning the journey continued to Assis Brasil. We crossed the border river and walked in fat red mud to Peru. New stamps to our passports and we went on and on with a cab shared with some Brazilian couple. We sat in that cab for mere (unreal) 6-7 hours but finally we arrived to the lovely town of Puerto Maldonado. In the morning it was an airplane to Cusco. Now Cusco is one beautiful and charming town, perhaps the nicest I’ve ever been to! During the day it’s very warm and during the nights it’s somewhat cold, not that surprising when you consider that the town is @ 3.5km above the sea level. That is about 2.5km higher than the highest point of Finland. We chewed coca leaves. We chewed a lot of coca leaves and drank vast quantities of coca tea. We felt good, very good but a little weird.
It was starting to get pretty obvious that we would not make it back to Rio Branco in time to catch our flight to Manaus (via Brasilia). No worries! It took a very long phone call but I finally managed to make a point to Varig’s customer service. The tickets were cancelled and we’re even supposed to get our money back someday from someone. In my notebook the tone gets rather cheerful as I get to the pages which are dedicated for January 7th. That’s when we made it to Machu Picchu, after 22 years of waiting I was in an awe. Just whoa! It began half 8 in the morning with a bus (maybe 2 hours). A train (maybe an hour) followed. The final stage was yet another bus to the top and the lost Inca city of Machu Picchu it was! After some broken English by a local guide we decided to climb the mountain that overlooks the city. It was once again very hot and the air was very thin. We had no coca leaves and were running very low on water. We were also cursing our somewhat heavy clothing. Perhaps an hour later we were at the top! I smoked a cigarette and felt very good. The view. The view! There were no safety nets nor rails. I guess it was pretty much exactly how the Incas left it (+ a few centuries).
Back at the hotel in Cusco HBO felt very good. We had soo good barbecue steaks later that night although at the time of ordering I felt remorse for not choosing the local specialty, guinea pig. Now if you ever go to Cusco pay a visit to Café Cappuccino which overlooks the central square. There (if anywhere) time stands still.
I didn’t have a bad feeling about it but as we landed Lima things didn’t turn out too rosy. We were expecting to catch cheapish direct flight to Brasilia. No such thing! Instead we had to take rather expensive flight to Sao Paolo via Buenos Aires! I’ve dedicated quite a few pages to my stage of being very pissed off about this to my notebook. Well what do you do, Sao Paolo it was. The positive thing is that we managed to change a flight which we had already missed from Brasilia to Manaus to flights from Sao Paolo to Manaus for a tax of 35 USD. Not bad at all. However all the planes were overbooked and we had to spend 2 days in Sao Paolo.
In Sao Paolo we were proper westerners. We went to museums and art galleries (saw some killer Gogh’s too). We even caught King Kong in a cinema. I also mention a semi psychedelic Brazilian western soap in my notes, whatever that is about. We also learned that outside Peru absolutely no one is interested in changing their currency. So if you are interested in buying soles worth of 300€ for say 270€ do feel free to contact me.
In the early hours of January 12th we reached Manaus. We slept in a thing by the harbor which is best described as a mixture of a dodgy hotel and a sleazy brothel. Maybe it was the pimp outside selling his hookers for a bargain price or perhaps the fact that you could buy a room for an hour or maybe the used condom which I found next to my bed but as I turned on the telly only to see 2 girls snowballing while the other was getting it from behind I was pretty convinced that the place was not honorable. It took a hell of a lot of effort to kill most of the mosquitoes and other bugs in the room but with the help of a sin smelling hotel towel and a bug spray I was pretty much done in half an hour. A good night sleep and a boat by the river Amazon to Santarem it was. Our initial plan was to take a boat all the way to Belem but due to our little fuck up plans had to be changed. Oh by the way the Manaus harbor is very atmospheric, a cheer of crowd, loud crappy Brazilian music, sounds of a construction site, all mixing to the very humid fish and grease smelling air, watching the massive rainfall outside, I liked it a lot!
The boat was about 30€ a person and the price included hooks for hammocks, 2 meals and a breakfast and as much (supposedly) drinkable mineral water as one might need. Our expectations over “Karolina do Norte” were not too high. Never mind that she turned out to be a fucking lovely boat! Our hooks were on the lowest deck right by the rumbling engine which provided not only 60-70dB but also some heat. We didn’t mind. Just lovely! On top of our deck there was another which was also mostly hammock country. However it also had a few (expensive I assume) cabins and a small kiosk which served as my source of beer. I wasn’t aware of the kiosk before we boarded so I had also a liter of cheap vodka on me. The 3rd and the uppermost deck was the “sun deck”. There was no pool. When dark they projected crappy Brazilian music concerts to a sheet. During my time in Brazil I came to learn that there are 3 things those god forsaken people love more than life; football, Jesus and recorded crappy Brazilian music (forra) concerts. All together I’d say there were about 250 people on the boat and it was a lot smaller than you’re thinking! You pretty much had to fight for airspace in the hammock area!
The view was somewhat monotonic thru out those 1000 or so kilometers. The only wildlife I saw other than some birds was a few dolphins. We had suspected that the food wouldn’t be too good if even edible so we had some food of our own on us. That wasn’t necessary as the food turned out to be just fine. So yeah other than being grilled by the sun and getting drunk there wasn’t too much to do at the boat. We didn’t mind. I love reading in my hammock! It felt too good to be stress free for a while but it turned out to be an illusion. As in Santarem I learned that all flights to Belem were overbooked I honestly almost fainted. Missing a cheapish domestic flight in Brazil is one thing and missing a expensive trans-Atlantic one is another. Well we were very lucky and got to the first leaving plane by the waitlist.
Belem turned out to be rather boring city. Other than the rather lovely food stalls in the harbor there was nothing to do or see. No playa, nothing but HBO in our room. As we got to Rio De Janeiro we were fucking dead, something that we ate at the harbor. I had no choice but to take a room at the airport hotel which turned out to be a place James Bond probably used in the 60’s. A lot of wood panels, weird smelling air and all that. My upset stomach haunted me thru out my journey back to Finland but I made it without any embarrassing incidents, thank god. So yeah now I’m at home, still rather tired, still cursing the food stalls, but other than that I feel fucking great.
..a few pics follow as soon as I get them from my sis
  "The dinosaurs became extinct because they didn't have a space program."
- Larry Niven |
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Licio2
Started Topics :
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149
Posted : Jan 21, 2006 17:06
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excellent report, I've really enjoyed it.
Especially the fact that the festival report is in the middle of your trip report! |
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candyman
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Posted : Feb 2, 2006 18:02
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WOW WOW WOW.. that was an amazing write up.. i loved reading that.. awesome.. |
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traveller
IsraTrance Senior Member
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234
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3803
Posted : Mar 28, 2006 20:50
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I sure could use some of that sun shine right about now.. fookin' neverending finnish winter! 
"The dinosaurs became extinct because they didn't have a space program."
- Larry Niven |
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byli
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Posted : Apr 2, 2006 13:42
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that is fantastic report bro!!!i've realy enjoy it.A realy good masterpiece.
Peace!!!!! |
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Raphael
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Posted : Aug 28, 2006 17:48
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Note that festival Universo Paralello is older than "The Beach" Movie.
But, of course, this name wasn't created by them.
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traveller
IsraTrance Senior Member
Started Topics :
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Posted : Aug 29, 2006 16:26
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Quote:
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On 2006-08-28 17:48, Raphael wrote:
Note that festival Universo Paralello is older than "The Beach" Movie.
But, of course, this name wasn't created by them.
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2005 - 2006 was the 6th UP
2004 - 2005 was the 5th UP
2003 - 2004 was the 4th UP
2002 - 2003 was the 3rd UP
2001 - 2002 was the 2nd UP
2000 - 2001 was the 1st UP
So the first UP happened the last quarter of 2000. The movie, the Beach came out the first quarter of 2000. Thus the movie is older than the festival 
Actually this makes a lot of sense. Now I'm almost sure that it's indeed the movie which inspired the name of the festival 
"The dinosaurs became extinct because they didn't have a space program."
- Larry Niven |
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Raphael
Started Topics :
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Posts :
27
Posted : Aug 29, 2006 19:55
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Quote:
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On 2006-08-29 16:26, traveller wrote:
Quote:
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On 2006-08-28 17:48, Raphael wrote:
Note that festival Universo Paralello is older than "The Beach" Movie.
But, of course, this name wasn't created by them.
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2005 - 2006 was the 6th UP
2004 - 2005 was the 5th UP
2003 - 2004 was the 4th UP
2002 - 2003 was the 3rd UP
2001 - 2002 was the 2nd UP
2000 - 2001 was the 1st UP
So the first UP happened the last quarter of 2000. The movie, the Beach came out the first quarter of 2000. Thus the movie is older than the festival
Actually this makes a lot of sense. Now I'm almost sure that it's indeed the movie which inspired the name of the festival
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hahahhahaa
OK. I thought this movie was more recent.
Anyway, the term "parallel universe" is much, much older than this Hollywood movie.
Since the discoveries of the new physics, the question of the existence of parallel universes - worlds which exist side-by-side along with our own - has been taken.
Now I ask yourself:
Which one is older? The Hollywood movie "The Beach" or the physics that study the existence of parallel universes?
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traveller
IsraTrance Senior Member
Started Topics :
234
Posts :
3803
Posted : Aug 29, 2006 22:07
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Quote:
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On 2006-08-29 19:55, Raphael wrote:
Quote:
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On 2006-08-29 16:26, traveller wrote:
Quote:
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On 2006-08-28 17:48, Raphael wrote:
Note that festival Universo Paralello is older than "The Beach" Movie.
But, of course, this name wasn't created by them.
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|
2005 - 2006 was the 6th UP
2004 - 2005 was the 5th UP
2003 - 2004 was the 4th UP
2002 - 2003 was the 3rd UP
2001 - 2002 was the 2nd UP
2000 - 2001 was the 1st UP
So the first UP happened the last quarter of 2000. The movie, the Beach came out the first quarter of 2000. Thus the movie is older than the festival
Actually this makes a lot of sense. Now I'm almost sure that it's indeed the movie which inspired the name of the festival
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hahahhahaa
OK. I thought this movie was more recent.
Anyway, the term "parallel universe" is much, much older than this Hollywood movie.
Since the discoveries of the new physics, the question of the existence of parallel universes - worlds which exist side-by-side along with our own - has been taken.
Now I ask yourself:
Which one is older? The Hollywood movie "The Beach" or the physics that study the existence of parallel universes?
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Of course the term is older, I never said otherwise. However it's the movie that most likely inspired the organizers to call the festival "Universo Paralello"..
"The dinosaurs became extinct because they didn't have a space program."
- Larry Niven |
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Raphael
Started Topics :
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Posts :
27
Posted : Aug 29, 2006 22:53
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Quote:
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Of course the term is older, I never said otherwise. However it's the movie that most likely inspired the organizers to call the festival "Universo Paralello"..
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I don't think so man. I think that this name was choosen because of the concept of this term: a parallel universe, a place that people have never gonne before, a place and a experience that you can't get at a ordinary "world". Not because of a Hollywood movie... hehehe... mostly because the first UPs weren't at the beach.
But, anyways, ... you can think whatever you want about the Universo Paralello Festival name.
Best Regards!!
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traveller
IsraTrance Senior Member
Started Topics :
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Posted : Aug 31, 2006 22:19
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BTW you were right:
Quote:
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Hello Traveller,
No.. its not true... long time ago, about 20 years ago, before our first
contact with eletronic music or trance culture, we had a cultural project
(never released) named Universo Paralelo, inspired by the book of Alvin
Tofler..
Than, on the first festival, we feel that the name fits very well on the new
concept...
Greetings from Brazil,
UP Crew
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So I've been lied to
"The dinosaurs became extinct because they didn't have a space program."
- Larry Niven |
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Raphael
Started Topics :
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27
Posted : Sep 1, 2006 05:44
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I don't know anything about this book.
But if it inspired the name of this festival, must be great.
Well, anyways, I were wrong about it too... hahaha...
Cheers
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- Indoor Party
- Outdoor Party
- Free Parking
- Free Water
- ChillOut Area
- Free Drink
- Free Entrance
- VJ
- Deco