Vibrant Brazil - Recife

RECIFE , the Northeast's second-largest city, appears rather dull on first impressions, but it's lent a colonial grace and elegance by Olinda, 6km to the north and considered part of the same conurbation. Recife itself has long since burst its original colonial boundaries and much of the centre is now given over to uninspired modern skyscrapers and office buildings.

But there are still a few quiet squares, where an inordinate number of impressive churches lie cheek by jowl with the uglier urban sprawl of the past thirty years. North of the centre are some pleasant leafy suburbs, dotted with museums and parks, and to the south there is the modern beachside district of Boa Viagem . Other beaches lie within easy reach, both north and south of the city, and there's also all the nightlife one would expect from a city of nearly two million Brazilians.

Tourists wandering around Recife should be particularly careful with their possessions and it's best, too, to use taxis to get home after an evening out. Recife is one of Brazil's most violent cities, an unsurprising statistic given the immediately obvious disparity of wealth and stark poverty, and the large number of homeless people on the streets. On Sundays in the old centre of Recife, the streets often seem deserted except for beggars; everyone else seems to be on the beach at Boa Viagem. Tourists tend to hang out in the much pleasanter environment of laid-back Olinda

Eating
Eating out is cheapest in Santo Antônio, more expensive in Recife island and Boa Viagem, with Olinda somewhere in between. Recifense cuisine revolves around fish and shellfish . Try carangueijo mole, crabs cooked in a spicy sauce until shells and legs are soft and edible, which solves the problem of digging out the meat; small crabs called guaiamum; and agulhas fritas, fried needle fish. As befits a sugar city, a favourite local drink is caldo de cana, the juice pressed from sugar cane by hypnotic Victorian-looking machines.

Cheapest of all, and surprisingly pleasant, are the food sellers and suco stalls clogging the streets of Santo Antônio , with the usual selection of iced fruit juices, kebabs, cakes, sandwiches and pastel. There's a row of reasonably priced stalls licensed by the city authorities on the pedestrianized Rua da Palma , across the road from the main post office, much patronized by office workers. The area also has many cheap lanchonetes and restaurants, although as their clientele is mainly workers they tend to close in the early evening. There's also an inexpensive lunchtime-only vegetarian restaurant, O Vegetal, which has branches on Avenida Guararapes (no. 210, 2nd floor) and Avenida Dantas Barreto (no. 507). Santo Antônio is pretty dead at night, with the exception of the cobbled square around São Pedro church, the Pátio de São Pedro , where there are some good regional restaurants, with tables in the square and nice views of the church. Also worth a visit is the classy Restaurante Leite, Praça Joaquim Nabuco 147 (tel 081/3224-7977), close to the Hotel Quatro de Outubro, which serves good local dishes in a very stylish nineteenth-century interior.

Nightlife
As elsewhere in Brazil, nightlife in Recife starts late, after 10pm. The variety of music and dances is enormous, and Recife has its own frenetic carnival music, the frevo , as well as forró , which you hear all over the Northeast. The dancing to forró can be really something, couples swivelling around the dance floors with ball bearings for ankles. In the past couple of years, Recife island has become the most happening place in the city centre, but there's also plenty of action in Boa Viagem as well as in Olinda. There are other interesting nightspots in suburbs like Graças and Casa Forte, but they're not well served by public transport, so you'll have to take a taxi.

For a taste of strongly regional music of all types it's worth trying out an espaço cultural or two. The Espaço Nodaloshi, at Estrada dos Remédios 1891 in Madalena (tel 081/3228-3511), frequently brings together large numbers of musicians from all over Pernambuco, generally starting the shows around 10pm or later. The Espaço Cultural Alberto Cunha Melo, at Rua Leila Félix Karan 15 in Bongi (tel 081/3228-6846), runs similar live music shows. These and other similar places generally promote their programmes through the Agenda Cultural.

Carnival Recife
Carnaval in Recife is overshadowed by the one in Olinda, but the city affair is still worth sampling even if you decide, as many locals do, to spend most of Carnaval in Olinda. The best place for Carnaval information is the tourist office, which publishes a free broadsheet with timetables and route details of all the Carnaval groups. You can also get a timetable in a free supplement to the Diário de Pernambuco newspaper on the Saturday of Carnaval, but be warned that it's only a very approximate guide.

In Recife the main events are concentrated in Santo Antônio and Boa Vista. There are also things going on in Boa Viagem, in the area around the Recife Palace Lucsim Hotel on Avenida Boa Viagem, but it's too middle-class for its own good and is far inferior to what's on offer elsewhere. Carnaval in Recife officially begins with a trumpet fanfare welcoming Rei Momo, the carnival king and queen, on Avenida Guararapes at midnight on Friday, the cue for wild celebrations. At night, activities centre around the grandstands on Avenida Dantas Barreto, where the blocos parade under the critical eyes of the judges. The other central area to head for is the Pátio de São Pedro. During the day the blocos follow a route of sorts: beginning in the Praça Manuel Pinheiro, and then via Rua do Hospício, Avenida Conde de Boa Vista, Avenida Guararapes, Praça da República and Avenida Dantas Barreto to Pátio de São Pedro. Good places to hang around are near churches, especially Rosário dos Pretos, on Largo do Rosário, a special target for maracatu groups. The balconies of the Hotel do Parque are a good perch, too, if you can manage to get up there. The day is the best time to see the blocos - when the crowds are smaller and there are far more children around. At night it's far more intense and the usual safety warnings apply.