Tower Air has a fleet of only 747’s, three of which are exclusively freighters. This month we’re flying computers and other electronic gear to Buenos Aires. We would then layover in BA for a few days, fly empty to Santiago, Chile, load up with flowers/produce and head back for Miami.
Our loads, the outside air temp and max gross weight of the plane would decide whether a stop for fuel would be required. Tonight’s flight had us making a “tech stop” for fuel at some place called Manaus, on the equator in Brazil.
Being new to the company, I was excited and nervous about flying to South America, as well as meeting and flying with Captain Larry Lopes, who I had never met. We were all going to meet up in the hotel lobby at show time. Living in Florida, I decided to rent an Avis Car, crank up the radio to “Monsters of the Midday,” (104.1 out of Orlando), and drive down in my shorts, t-shirt and flip flops. It was a fun, relaxing drive down to Miami. “Bubba whup-ass” Wilson and Samantha had some raunchy diatribe going on concerning her shaved pudenda on Monsters… a great radio show.
The bellhops at the Miami Airport Hilton helped me in with my bags, and my uniform, which had been hanging in the back of the car. One porn movie, a four-hour nap later, and my phone rang for my wake-up call. Meet downstairs in the lobby in one hour.
I shave, shower and dress in my uniform. Except for my shoes…my black, pilot shoes which I have forgotten at home. I’ve got white tennies, red rubber flip-flops, but no uniform shoes. I’m a ‘newbie’ a new hire, on probation, about to meet my Check-Pilot for the first time, and no shoes. Shit!
In the lobby of the hotel I introduce myself to Captain Lopes, and to Michael Marks, the Engineer. We’re all cordial, and I point down to my feet (which nobody noticed) showing them that my feet are in black socks and the red flip-flops. They break-up as I explain what happened.
Larry says: “Hey, well be stopping in Manaus for fuel, but were running late out of here, so we’ll probably be there overnight. You can buy yourself a pair of shoes in Manaus.”
Fast Air, the company in Miami whose freight contract we are flying, are having problems. They are always having problems.” Larry explains. “They are always late. We always have to wait for the freight to arrive; and then we wait a few hours more while the plane is being loaded.”
We’re sitting on the plane for five hours, it is now seven A.M. and we’ve watched a beautiful Miami sunrise. We are just about ready to go, but we still won’t push back for another 45 minutes. The plane is “maxedout,” its take off weight will be about 805,000 pounds, which is no problem for Miami’s 13,000’ runway, especially in the cool of the morning.
Manaus, however, will be another story. Their only runway is 8000 feet long, and is only 2 degrees from the equator, in the heat of the Amazon jungle. Because of our delay, we will be arriving there in the heat of the day, about noon, and the temp will be about in the nineties. After we refuel, no way will we be able to get our airplane off an 8000’ strip, not until the temp falls below 30’C. That won’t happen until early next morning, so Larry tells Fast Air to make hotel arrangements for us all -two pilots, one engineer, a load-master and one of our mechanics, Sylvester, known as Sly, a slick, lanky, black fellow.
En route to Manaus, Larry, who has lived in Santiago, Chile, and whose ex-wife and kids still live there, fills me in on Manaus.
There’s been nothing but jungle for hours. Then we find the little concrete strip in the middle of the Amazon, right on the water.
“Hey Chubby,” what city was the richest city in the entire Americas, until about 1930?”
“You mean North and South America?”
“Yeah. Both, the whole nine yards, Americas.”
“I don’t know, let me think…”
“Don’t bother, it was Manaus! Also, had more millionaires than anywhere else in the world.”
“This place? This jungle, what did they have here, gold?”
“Better, rubber. Before vulcanization, Manaus had the rubber plantations that provided all the world’s rubber. Wait till you see this place, you’re lucky we’re staying over.”
After an excellent meal of cerviche, a south American fish that is prepared by allowing it to cure itself in lime juice, I go out to explore Manaus. I allow myself to get lost again, in order to enjoy the city my way. I turn a corner, and I’m face to face with La Scala, Milan’s beautiful Opera House. My God, it is La Scala, an exact replica, in the middle of this city being reclaimed by the Brasilian jungle. Investigating further, I find that the inside is an exact duplicate as well.
During Manaus’ heyday, Enrico Caruso had been invited to perform for this community of ultra-wealthy lovers of the opera. He promised to come on one condition, that they would build for him a decent opera house. Wanting to impress Caruso, who was then the world’s foremost tenor, the City Fathers did the ultimate, they replicated La Scala in downtown Manaus. Caruso died just before the project was completed. The opera house, mansions and cathedrals, lonely in their magnificent isolation, are surrounded by millions of square miles of unimpressed Amazon jungle.