Customer Reviews

Journey On The Estrada Real: ENCOUNTERS IN THE MOUNTAINS OF BRAZIL

5 star:		(6)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

This book is about the author's remarkable journey on foot through the back country of Brazil. Each Chapter provides a story of a day's trek. Very readable and provides easy-to-grasp knowledge of both historical and modern Brazil. This is an adventure book that both entertains and teaches.

In Journey on the Estrada Real, Glenn Cheney takes us with him as he travels one of the oldest roads in the Americas. Mr. Cheney introduces us to the many people he meets along the way, involving us in their lives, relating their numerous joys and commiserating with their sorrows with a palpable sense of humanity. His knowledge of the geography and culture of the Minas Gerais region of Brazil, through which the Estrada Real runs, informs his narrative, as does his familiarity with the history of the area. This historical perspective permeates the book; historical digressions are frequent, yet never seem to interrupt the narrative flow. The result of this approach is that the reader not only understands what present-day life is like in the towns and villages along the Estrada Real but also how it came to be that way. Furthermore, Cheney speculates about what the impact of growing globalization and reliance on technology may hold for the future of the region. While offering no definite prescriptions, he hypothesizes that the local cultures may be able to survive largely intact, but only with careful planning, some economic assistance and a realistic recognition that time can never be completely stopped. This refreshing perspective is a welcome view into a fascinating and little-known area of the world.

"Journey on the Estrada Real" is a beautiful, funny, honest and warm look at rural life in Brazil's interior state of Minas Gerais.

The author takes you along as he walks the historic Estrada Real. Three hundred years after this critical colonial artery was established, it is all but forgotten now except for the historic cities strung beautifully along it's route. Cheney opens an English window into that part of the world, which is mostly unknown outside (or even inside), Brazil.

This is a great book on Brazil for those who want to learn more than just the "highlights" and collect destinations. Brazil is full of fascinating stories,wonderful people and great places to go and Mr Cheney travelled one of these routes and you feel you are looking over his shoulder. I lent this book to several people who know Brazil and they all loved it.

I would have loved to give 5 stars, but the book has some little inconsistencies and somehow seems unfinished. Nevertheless it is a great read and I highly recommend it.

Just about two months into my 1500-mile walk across Finland (research for my book "Notes for the Aurora SocietyNotes for the Aurora Society") I came to a crossroads. No, not a literal fork in the road but rather a forced choice-point in life where the cognitive dissonance in my soul demanded a solution.

I had come to a research station deep in the boreal forest where a boisterous woman with a loose eye and jarring laugh was heading up a government-funded wetland restoration project. Ecological restoration is my passion. The "job" I had given myself on my walk however was one of impassioned observer only- not that of a participant. However, there I was, not wanting to walk on but instead stay and help this woman restore these wetlands. I did walk on of course and over the coming days found a resolution to a question that plagued me most of my adult life - participant or observer?

And so, for me the most profound point of Glen Alan Cheney's "Journey on the Estrada Real - Encounters in the Mountains of Brazil" doesn't come until page 167 when, falling away from a community party in the town of Serro, Cheney observes of himself:

"I'm over here, everyone else is over there...for the last 30 years or so, I've been sitting off to the side...essentially talking to myself by outing thoughts on paper...I will always be on the outside, looking in, observing, writing about it, a sad detachment that began in youth and evolved into a profession."

Cheney is a kindred spirit.

Brazil's Estrada Real - Royal Road - climbs from the port of Praia dos Mineiros on the Atlantic, over the Serro do Mar, to Diamantina, a place "where creeks were exposing diamonds to daylight." The Portuguese Crown ordered the road (the oldest European road in the western hemisphere) built in 1697 to control trade with the interior. Much as colonial British laws did in North America, the Portuguese action was intended to keep Brazil from developing its own industrial capacity by making the interior dependent on European imports. The Americas existed for one reason - to make Europe rich.

This lovely little book is an eye-opener to a place and a trail and a people I had no idea existed. The world of the Estrada Real is a fascinating one. As Brazil pushes its way in to the 21st Century and finds itself not only a regional powerhouse but a growing player on the world stage, this cradle of Brazilian culture - strung out along a highway built well before Benjamin Franklin was born - finds itself under great pressure to change - and to stay the same. And so, Cheney set out by foot about halfway up the approximately 400 mile road in the town of Mariana. He proceeded 200 miles on foot to Diamantina to document how these global forces are both effecting and being dealt with by the people and communities who live on the road. How is this part of the world handling the age of the internet, GMOs, corporate domination, global warming and extractive industry (although the extraction is nothing new - Cheney visited some of the dark precious metal mines worked by slaves whose lives valued little). Given that these stark global forces are questions many of us struggle with these days, it's fascinating to grasp how these rural Brazilians deal and how we might deal if we were in their place - and given the current economic situation, many more of us are in this situation than were when Cheney made the trip just a few short years ago.

Cheney is uniquely suited to both make this journey and write this book. Married to a Brazilian and capable in Portuguese, Cheney had at one time spent several years banana farming in these same mountains of Brazil. That background opens new doors on his ability to translate this culture for those of us who have never been to Brazil or seek to know more about the place.

Be it a teenager who goes out his way to scoop up and depot in the trash can a plastic bottle on a street in Catas Altas or the drivers who thoughtlessly toss trash out of their windows and into the streets of Sao Goncalo do Rio das Pedras, Cheney masterfully captures the economic and social struggle playing out in these communities. And he does it with many beautifully crafted descriptions: "And she has a current husband, a toothless old man who keeps on taking snuff from a tin in his pocket" , "Viscous yellow-gray smoke hemorrhages from a short, fat smokestack and blends into the low-lying clouds" and "She no longer eats compete meals, living instead by nibbling cheese and crackers. She never drinks water. Her coffee is Nescafe instant."

Wonderful.

I have two complaints about "Journey on the Estrada Real". First is the lack of maps. I'm a stickler for good maps and having a detail of where the author is going day by day at the front of every chapter is invaluable - a failing I note in my own book.

The other complaint is a general pet-peeve of mine about current travel literature. That is the constant and offensive use of the present tense. I'm talking about such gunk as "I stop to check my map" instead of "I STOPPED to check my map." Nearly every work of travel literature I pick up these days from the Smithsonian magazine to National Geographic to books like Cheney's attempts to hoodwink the reader with the ridiculously unattainable proposition that I'm right there with the traveler. It is distracting and off-putting. The trip happened in the past, write it as such. I as a reader want to know what happened not get jerked along on some fantasy that I am actually there.

In the end, Cheney's "observer", while skilled in his reportage, is a little unconvincing. Why? I just don't think he is as firm in that role as he thinks he is. It is because Cheney cares. Just a few pages after his `I'm just an observer" epiphany, Cheney comes to a village that lacks in many simple comforts and economic activities. Upon finding an industrious woman in this village, Cheney offers up a litany of solutions and things he's like to do to help that woman meet her goals and grow the local economy. Every single one of those solutions is closely within his grasp - simple and inexpensive. His "observer" knows what it will take to improve life there. My "participant" wanted him to act. But would I appreciate such an intrusion?

Well. ...yes. I would love for some rich Russian or Arab to come to my high desert community and drop me enough to finish my landscaping and to bury the power and telephone lines and close unused roads and build sidewalks and...

And I'd love to see Glen Alan Cheney take up just a thousand dollars and a wash machine and go...


Browse Cheney's previous works here: []

The other book that I read of Cheney's was a historical book about the Pilgrims, and while I did enjoy that one I wasn't quite sure of what to expect with this book. This is more of an autobiography of his life, as well as the real story of road in South America.

The book started out a little slow, but the further along the Estrada Real we were taken the more interesting the story of this road becomes. The people he meets while walking each have such great stories. They're not amazing people, they're not rich and famous, they're just real people living the lives that they were given. While some of the people have high hopes, they aren't any different than anyone else. Everyone had dreams right?

While I don't know that I would ever try and tackle the feat that Cheney did I would at some point in my life like to see some of the places that Cheney visited on his journey. Some of the cities seem so vibrant and some of the wilderness was described so beautifully. By the time Cheney makes it to the end of his journey I was so enthralled with the journey that I didn't want it to end. I could feel the happiness, tiredness, and humbleness that Cheney experienced while on his journey.

When Cheney first described some of the places he was staying I thought to myself "I could never stay someplace like that". But the more he travels and the more commonplace these accommodations become I realized that for these people this is what they know. I can't imagine not having electricity and my luxuries and these people can't imagine having them. I was truly humbled by the lives of these people and by the fact that they have stuck to their way of life despite the fact that the whole world is changing around them.

A review copy of this book was provided by the author. This is not a paid review and is a truthful and honest review.

I've got to tell the story of this book coming into my hands before I review it, so please bare with me...

I won this book on the first reads giveaway and the author PMed me to very politely tell me he didn't think this was my type of book and that I wouldn't like it. He didn't suggest that he not send it, just that I might like one of his other books better.

I tried to strike up a conversation about hookers and waited for the book arrive.

It did, along with his other book "Frankenstein on the Cusp of Something" and a letter in which he again (politely) tells me he doesn't think this book is my style and he doesn't think I would like it. At one point he said "It's dull as dirt. Or I guess you would say (I'd say, anyway) it's as interesting as dirt if you like dirt."

This is an interesting marketing strategy.

Here is my review:

I feared parts of Cheney's tale would be insufferably long and tedious, as I find even the travel to my mailbox to be so, but he did a great job of editing the book down to highlights. There is a good amount of personal commentary on the traveling itself (I was privy to the state of Cheney's clothes more than I would have liked) so the personable aspect one expects from a travel log are here.

Unfortunately, the thing I was most relieved about turned out to be the book's biggest problem; the content of the book itself is made up of events alone (for the most part) and there is little reflection made on the study of culture. Really interesting themes of gender relations, race relations, spirituality, political and educational climate are presented but just skimmed over. I wanted to hear more about what made Brazil what it is and what makes Brazilians what they are. Not that I expected a text book read, but I was looking forward to seeing an outsider's interpretation of the country and people. I would have liked to hear more about what and how the people Cheney met affected him.

This is a book for those who want to go on the journey themselves, not for those who want to go on the journey through the writer's eyes.

A wonderful trip through the back woods of Brazil on the Estrada Real. I felt like I was along for the ride. This is a great guide on what to expect on a trip to the out back. I found much of interest and lots to laugh about in the wonderful writing style of Glenn Cheney.

A Brilliant travel book! As Mr. Cheney travels on foot up the Estrada Real he gives voice to the people who live along the way and who tell the Estrada's story - past, present and future. Recommended for anyone interested in Brazil or the larger ethical issues associated with "development."