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The Third Bank of the River: Power and Survival in the Twenty-First-Century Amazon
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About The Third Bank Of The River: Power And Survival In
Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved. The Third Bank of the River Power and Survival in the Twenty-First-Century Amazon By Chris Feliciano Arnold PicadorCopyright © 2018 Chris Feliciano Arnold All rights reserved. ISBN: 978-1-250-09894-8 Contents Title Page, Copyright Notice, Dedication, Map, Epigraphs, PART I: A FINITE WORLD, 1. Fan Fest, 2. Isolation, 3. A Way Back from Oblivion, 4. Site X, 5. The Real Jungle, 6. The Brazil Reader, 7. Wolves Among Sheep, 8. The Devil's Paradise, 9. Quarantine, PART II: HOW MONSTERS ARE BORN, 10. Biti's Gang, 11. Maximum Power, 12. The Bloody Weekend, 13. A Sense of Security, 14. Três Fronteiras, 15. Operation Wolfpack, 16. Ghost Riders, PART III: THE AMAZON CLOCK, 17. A Land Without Men, 18. City of Vultures, 19. Soul Counts, 20. Guardians, 21. Last Dance, 22. The Torch and the Jaguar, Acknowledgments, Notes, Selected Bibliography, About the Author, Copyright, CHAPTER 1 FAN FEST It was high noon on July 18, 2014 when our 767 touched down at Eduardo Gomes International, the godfather of all jungle airstrips, cut dead center in the Amazon, and waypoint to a city of 2 million people. Across the tarmac, palms wavered like a mirage through the jet fumes. I was one of a million sweaty gringos landing in Brazil for the FIFA World Cup. An arctic blast of air-conditioning welcomed the new arrivals to Manaus. In anticipation of the biggest public spectacle in the region's history, the airport was undergoing a $100 million renovation, but like most of the country's infrastructure projects, it remained in the throes of construction. The terminal smelled of drying paint, some gates boarded over with red Coca-Cola ads spotlighting the gilded World Cup trophy as if El Dorado had at last been found. Beyond the customs check, a pair of tall, sporty women greeted visitors with complimentary mini Budweisers, making themselves available for selfies. The cold brews went down fast on the way downtown, a ride barely recognizable from my last visit eight years earlier when I'd traveled to Brazil for the first time to see the country where I was born. The city had mushroomed like never before. Just beyond the airport perimeter stood a fresh Subway franchise, sandwich artists squeezing sauces on canvases of bread. A recently paved and painted four-lane highway unrolled into the city, flanked by business hotels, night clubs, and love motels. The road led to a knot of overpasses and underpasses, the latest attempt to wrangle the city's notoriously chaotic streets. Trees had been supplanted by billboards: 3G cell phone service, cosmetic dentistry, and home appliances with easy monthly payments. Motorcycles, buses, and American sedans zipped from lane to lane as if testing the asphalt for imperfections. At first glance it seemed as if the World Cup in Manaus was already fulfilling its economic promise, against all odds and the will of the chiefs at FIFA, who had consulted their maps and spreadsheets and determined that the capital of Amazonas state was no place for the Cup of Cups. They said that Brazil could feasibly host matches in eight stadiums. Ten at most. Brazil's national organizing committee disagreed, proposing an audacious seventeen-stadium network that would span every region of the fifth largest country on Earth. Even on paper, hosting matches in the remote interior looked like a disaster. Coastal Belém was the ideal rain forest host city. A no-brainer, as the Americans would say. Positioned at the mouth of the mighty Amazon River, Belém would fit seamlessly in the itineraries of athletes, tourists, and journalists, a quick flight from the beachfront cities of Fortaleza, Recife, and Salvador. Manaus was, well, Manaus. Aside from BR-174 — the cratered route to Caracas, Venezuela, that closed at sunset to accommodate nocturnal wildlife and native tribes — the city was accessible only by plane or boat. Manaus wasn't even a soccer town. Its biggest team, Nacional, hadn't competed in Bra
