Lapa Night Tour: Samba and Caipirinhas

Carlos is an urban planning and policy researcher at the Federal University, and an assistant professor at the Rural Federal University, both in Rio de Janeiro. He has an MA in juridical science with an emphasis on South American politics and fundamental rights. His main fields of interest are urban/regional planning and policies, architecture, and Brazilian history. He is a native of the northeastern city of Fortaleza, the region of the first modern-age settlements in Brazil. This area has a diverse culture and is the birthplace of many influential Brazilians who have shaped the city, thus giving Carlos the perfect background with which to introduce travelers to Rio's rich history.

Amber is an architect, landscape architect, and author by trade, and an urban researcher, teacher, and adventurer by experience. She arrived in Rio de Janeiro and fell in love with the city after a thirteenth-month trek by truck, boat, and bicycle from San Francisco, CA, to Salvador da Bahia, Brazil, traveling alongside a seventy-year-old biking capoeira master. Her professional focus is on small-scale sustainable urban development for and by the public who will benefit from it. To these ends, she and renowned landscape architect Randolph T. Hester Jr. wrote <u>Inhabiting the Sacred</u>, a study of domestic spaces forthcoming from George Thompson Press. Today she calls Rio de Janeiro home, though she was literally born on the road: Rota, her birthplace on the Bahía de Cádiz, España, means in Portuguese 'route, circuit, walk.' Amber loves to share her knowledge of this incredible, beautiful, and interesting city.

Juanjo is an atypical hybrid between an IT professional and a childhood development specialist. He is a dedicated capoeirista (one who practices capoeira, an afro-brazilian cultural expression) and a world-touring cyclist who has ridden from Mexico to Brazil researching and learning about music, dance, and many art forms that enrich the human essence. He believes that the key to sharing knowledge and experience is empathetic engagement with people, be they children or grown-ups. He settled in Rio where he is a freelance photographer and runs an Internet-related business while simultaneously immersing himself in the unique world of Brazil's music, culture, and people.