What emerges through the account of these informants' arrival is that despite the dif- ferent personal paths that bring newcomers to live in Vidigal, there are recurring pat- terns when looking at what it is that attracts them and how they construct meaning about the favela. The possibility of living in a community of people that is different from the rest of Rio appears as a recurring element in what newcomers like about Vidigal. Paul30 (app. C.12), a French newcomer, expresses this feeling very clearly: “I have trav- 30 Paul is the French owner of the first room that I rent in Vidigal. He is 31 years old and has
Part II – The Analysis
elled for few years in Brazil, but I found in Rio all of Brazil concentrated. In Vidigal it is pretty much like the countryside. […] If it was Leblon or Ipanema I wouldn't have bothered to come here really. It's too much like Europe or America”. In a somewhat sim- ilar way, Vidigal represents for Timo (app. C.18) a place where he can avoid anonymity and have a more “town or villagey feeling” in contrast to the “concrete city”; Hugo (app. C.6) “love[s]” the community and in “London or Paris [he has] never been so grateful”; and British make-up artist Ida31 mentions several differences between Vidigal and Lon-
don that amuse her, such as having neighbours visiting without the need to make ap- pointments, living in a tree hut made of recycled materials and in general the feeling of living in a community where people know and help each other.
While newcomers praise almost unanimously the feeling community, I have pointed out in section 5.1.2 how some old-timers do not perceive Vidigal as a tight community. Many examples of the sense of community emerge through the old-timers' accounts, such as people helping each other in building a house or taking care of the ill. However, old-timers such as Julio or Rita refer to the sense of community as a memory of the past, and deny its existence in today's Vidigal. Nonetheless, newcomers tell they have arrived to Vidigal as they perceived it different from where they used to live. Reneé, a French newcomer that has lived in Vidigal since 2008, tells that he came back to Rio after his ex- change program as he had grown tired of Paris. Similarly, 25-year-old American new- comer Lisa32 spells out the contrast between life in Vidigal and in a Western metropolis:
[Vidigal] was more welcoming. I felt like why go live down there in the city if I can go live in New York or Chicago or San Francisco, other than it being by the beach. To me… I'm not seeing that much of a difference in city terms. Like the neighbours don't know each other, you know?
Lisa, app. C.10
lived in Vidigal since 2011. When he is in France, he works as a gardener.
31 Ida is a 26 year old British make-up artist and hair-stylist. She has lived in Vidigal since 2011. 32 Lisa is a 25-year-old American who moved to Vidigal in 2010. She works as an English teach-
er in a language school. Together with her Brazilian husband from Rocinha, she sometimes arranges guided tours to the top of the mountain Morro Dois Irmãos, on which Vidigal is perched.
Chasing the Real: Place Construction and Authenticity
Brazilian newcomer Joaño, surfer and Harvard graduate, also shares this view, and presents it in a more academic tone. While presenting theories of bonding versus bridging of social capital, he states that in neighbourhoods such as Copacabana or Ipan- ema people do not know each other and live in fear, while inside the favela residents bridge social capital, showing interest and engagement in each other's lives. This can be good or bad, says Joaño, but it is a consequence of the fact that Vidigal has been aban- doned by the state for so many years, and people “had to take care of each other” (app. C.7).
In section 3.4.3 I have introduced different approaches to the conceptualisation of place in a global context. Paul, Lisa and Timo point out that other areas of Rio are not worth moving to, as they are no different from Paris of New York. Considering the risk of time and space compression in the globalised world presented by Harvey, it is no sur- prise that a place that is still perceived as authentic or unspoiled, can be seen as attract- ive. Vidigal becomes attractive, as for decades it has been neglected by both the state and private investors, while it has kept its premium location and a sense of community.
The different informants want to escape what they perceive as the homogenised neighbourhoods or cities they come from, and move to a place that they feel maintains its sense of locality. The understanding of community that emerges from these new- comers' accounts is very similar to the romanticisation of community that Brown-Sara- cino (2004) highlighted in her study about social preservation. Brown-Saracino high- lights how some newcomers “associate[…] community with individuals bound together by shared religion, ethnicity, race, class, and—most importantly—way of life. Specific- ally, they equate the economic and social struggle of marginalized groups with strong social ties”. This is the same view of community that can be found in the accounts of many of my informants. In fact, for these informants meaning about Vidigal is construc- ted in opposition to what lies outside of the favela (i.e. Rio's other neighbourhoods), or to the places the informants come from. Vidigal is seen as something different from what is “down there”, to use the words of Lisa.
Part II – The Analysis