Button unharmed in armed mugging attempt.
From the F1 website this morning.
---------direct copy and paste ----------
World champion Jenson Button escaped an attempted armed mugging as he and a party of friends left the Interlagos circuit in Sao Paulo on Saturday night.
Button, his father John, manager Richard Goddard and physio Mile Collier were approached while travelling by car from the track, where Button had earlier qualified 11th for the Brazilian Grand Prix. None of the party was hurt.
McLaren had provided both Button and team mate Lewis Hamilton with reinforced armoured vehicles driven by armed police drivers, who had been trained in avoidance techniques.
The driver of Button’s vehicle reacted swiftly and rapidly forced his way through the traffic, taking them quickly away from danger and back to the Hilton Hotel.
The Sao Paulo authorities also acted quickly and promised to provide additional security to transfer all of the topline drivers and team personnel to the track for Sunday's race.
Termas Aquarius (aka Termas 61)
Bit of a shorter report than the last one on 502. If you don’t read any more of this report, at least read the next 2 words – DON’T BOTHER.
However, for completeness, here is some info and my impressions on the club. Note: I went on a Monday which is a notoriously quiet day for most Centro termas.
1) Location
Termas Aquarius is located at 61 Rua do Acre in the Centro region on the other side of Av. Presidente Vargas. I travelled from Copa and got off at Uruguaiana Metro station. There are two ways to get to it on foot. The most direct (and quickest) way is to exit the Metro and turn left to Vargas, cross over the road and carry on Uruguaiana until you come to a crossroads at the end (100 yards or so). Directly opposite you is Rua do Acre. Cross over the road, stay on the right hand side of Acre and the termas is a little way up the road on the right. If you want to walk on the larger, well-lit roads, head to Rio Branco, cross over Vargas and carry on down Branco until you come to R. Visco de Inhauma. Turn left here and this will bring you down to the crossroads I mentioned earlier, turning right will put you on R. Do Acre. Route 1 will take 5 minutes from the Metro if you don’t have to hang around for the traffic lights, the second route takes a bit longer. I was in the general area from 8pm until 11 pm. It was very busy with people at 8 and very quiet at 11 but I felt pretty safe walking around.
2) Getting in and getting started
The guy standing in the doorway will give you a numbered plastic card, go through the entrance and there is a reception desk immediately inside on the right in the entrance hall. Give her the card, she enters it on the computer and your drinks get charged to that account number. Entrance is R$20 and includes 2 free drinks (I don’t know how much extra drinks or garota drinks cost – I struggled to stay very long in the place as it was dead). You pay on the way out. You get a stamped receipt which you give to the guy on the door on the way out.
Prices aren’t advertised at reception but inside the girls told me that the cost of sessions are R$140 for 40 mins and R$170 for one hour. I don’t know what the rooms are like, none of the girls interested me and I struggled to stay there for as long as I did - 30 minutes just to get a feel for the layout and to drink my 2 drinks to get my money’s worth.
3) The termas itself
There are 2 bars in the termas – one is downstairs and you can see it straight ahead of you as you stand in the reception. It has a pool table, I didn’t go in there but I guess it doesn’t have a bar as I think the few people in there came upstairs to get drinks.
You will see the stairs leading up to the bar upstairs on the other side of the entrance hall, the door on the right at the top of the stairs leads into the main bar. This is a large room (much bigger than 4x4, slightly larger than 502) with sofa-cushioned seating and tables around the outside of the room. There is a sound desk on the left side of the room, a large stage with a pole in the centre on the other side of the room and the bar on the right hand side.
Show the barman your card when you order drinks and he adds them to your tab. The computer screen is up on the wall so you can see what he adds onto your account. Music was a mixture of some western-style pop plus (mainly) Brazilian accordion pop! Noise levels are ok.
4) The girls
What girls? I walked in and immediately thought “oh dear, I’ve just wasted R$20”. The place was dead (mind you I was there from 8pm to 8.30 pm). When I went in there were 4 girls and about 6 guys and about 8 girls and 10 guys when I left 30 minutes later. Girls were a mixture of 3 anorexic matchsticks, a chubby and 4 normal looking. Some of them were mid-range at best in my opinion and others looked a bit rough (or at least in need of feeding). Most of them looked pretty bored – it was early in the evening though. As I left, a group of 3 local young guys came in and 4 of the girls made a beeline for them.
One girl, a slim blond (who was the best looking one there IMO), came over and we chatted for 10 minutes or so. Friendly, didn’t try to push for a programma, from Petropolis. She said that the place is open mon-fri, 2 – 12, 10 girls on Monday and 18 girls (many garotas as she said!) on Fridays. Another girl, one of the anorexics came over for a brief chat, but as I was ready to go by then, we only exchanged greetings.
5) Conclusions.
DON’T BOTHER GUYS!!
PS: As it was still early, I went round the corner into MV30 on R. Mairink Veiga – this is a much better place, I stayed for 2 hours and will definitely go back there to session again this week. I’ll give a detailed report on MV30 later plus Bar 22 in Copa. I also plan to try out more of the 2nd division Centro termas this week.
Bar 22, Copacabana - a bit of an updatye
As I'm staying in Copa, I thought I would check out the local night scene (over the last few days) and this has entailed going to Bar 22 and Balcony. I'm leaving L'uomo until my last week here – no need to report on there as it well reported on the forum. Bar 22 is a small bar/termas which I have been to several times now (once in 2009 and twice in 2010), so here are my observations and comments as a way of providing an introduction for anybody thinking of visiting somewhere off the well-trodden path on Copa. I always think it helps to have some background info so you can walk in and know hat to expect and how the system works.
A number of people have posted useful reports on Bar 22 (also known as Club Azulzinho on the Brazil forums) in Copacabana over the last 2 years – notably Slim Hole Drill (e. G. Report # 4047 in this section) and Puta Playa (e. G. Report # 4734) – so I would do a search of this forum to find out more from them. If you've never been to 22, then treat this as a 22 "101", if you've been before then here are the updated prices from those listed earlier in the year. Gpguia is not very helpful with only 3 reports on the place and the "latest" from back in 2009.
1) Location
Bar 22 is located a block from Av. Atlantica at 22 Siqueira Campos on the corner of a square called Praca Serzedelo Correia. Bar 22 is located above a very nice-looking bar called Boteco Cervada on the corner, however, the entrance is just around the corner and is the first door facing the square itself. There is not a lot to advertise its presence: there is an open door with stairs leading up, there is an awning over the door which has "22" written on it and, after dark, there is a light blue light on the stairs – hence the "azulzinho" name (which is also a name used for Viagra due to its light blue colour!). Puta Playa did post a photo of the bar taken in the day (sorry, I would provide the links to these various reports but I haven't got round to learning how to do that yet). If you go after dark then its location is obvious from the light blue light on the stairs. If you look on Bitchmaps for its location, it is in the wrong place as it is marked on the map as being on the opposite side of the road from the shopping mall where L'uomo is located further up on Siqueira Campos.
2) Getting in and getting started
I was told by one of the girls that the bar is open 6 days a week from 2 in the afternoon until 3 at night Monday. Friday and from 2 until midnight on Saturdays. Walk up the stairs. At the top there is a guy sitting a chair, when you reach him, the corridor turns to the right and immediately on your left is a little counter where the receptionist sits. She will ask you your name and write it down on a slip of paper which is a printed drinks order slip which will be marked for your drinks from the bar. There has been some debate on the forum about whether the non-locals who have gone into 22 have been ripped off and charged a "gringo tax". Previous reports from earlier in the year state that the entrance charge is R$12 (May & July 2010). I paid R$25 which I suspect includes a slight rise in all the prices (see prices for sessions below) which has been reflected in prices everywhere (Termas & Casas) and a slight gringo tax. Whatever the price is, it includes three free beers – I've never had more than 3 drinks here so I don't know what the charge is once you go over three beers, or if you drink spirits instead of beer. It has been suggested in a previous report (Slim Hole Drill, # 4047) that buying drinks for the girls was more expensive (R$15), maybe this was for something other than beer/soda?, as the girl I spoke to on Saturday got a coke and it was marked down on my drinks slip and I didn't pay any extra. On Saturday night I paid the entrance fee on the way in and as I didn't session I handed them my slip of the way out and walked down the stairs.
This is a bar not a classic high-end termas so you don't change into a robe here, you walk in the bar straight off the street. The entrance into the bar is opposite the reception (so on the right as you come off the stairs), although it was not immediately obvious and it wasn't signposted. To me, the most obvious route to take was straight ahead and I walked down the corridor into one of the cabines at the end of the corridor (luckily it was unoccupied) – so much for trying not to look like a gringo greenhorn!
When I asked one of the girls (Valery) inside about the prices for sessions, I was told that they were R$100 for 40minutes and R$125 for one hour. This is slight increase over those reported earlier by Slim Hole Drill (40 = R$95; 60 = R$115 in May 2010) and Puta Playa (40 = R$90 in July 2010), but I am guessing that this just reflects the general rise in prices in Rio over the last year. In addition, Slim Hole Drill has reported that they do offer 20 and 30 minute sessions but they don't seem to be mentioned unless you specifically ask, no doubt trying to extract the most bucks for the bang. Based on paying a slightly inflated price for entrance, I would talk to the girls inside about prices as I got the feeling that they were more straight up about pricing.
3) The bar itself
Well, if you haven't got the impression of what it's going to be like from the reception/entrance corridor (I. E. A little run down), then as soon as you work in the bar you will realise that this is not like any of the top- or mid-end termas in terms of decor and comfort. This is a functional, local bar with girls in skimpy outfits and rooms in which to do the deed. As you walk in, you will see that it is a smallish bar with a pool table (free) in the middle of the room and seats and tables (not fixed to the floor) around the outside. There is a small stage with a pole to the right on the opposite wall as you walk in although I've never seen anybody get up and dance there on my 3 visits. The bar is to the left as you walk in, order drinks from the bar and the guy will mark your drinks slip.
Everytime that I have been to Bar 22, the place has been very quiet. No more than 4/5 girls in the bar and 4-5 guys in the bar between 9 and 10 pm when I was there. Definitely catering to blue collar ground rather than businessmen and tourists. There was no smoking in the bar and a juke box in the corner blaring out pop hits that were a couple of years out of date. There is a small TV over the juke box that 2 years ago was playing porno but was switched off when I visited this year.
4) The girls
Unfortunately, it is difficult to provide detailed information here as every time I have been here there have never been more than 4 or 5 girls there. I've always gone on a Saturday night, which I expected to be busy and it has been quiet. I was told by one of the girls that there are more girls (she said "muitos" but didn't give a number) during the week. If you read the earlier reports it does sound as if things are busier, I. E. At least 10+ girls on a weekday. Garota quality is variable, again beauty is in the eye of the beholder, but I would say that most of the girls were pretty rather than stunning. Most girls were quite friendly and treated the guys like friends rather than clients to be milked (both figuratively and literally). It seemed like the guys in the bar were regulars, out for a beer, only one guy sessioned whilst I was there. Unlike my impression of 502, where there was a lot of groping going on, there was none here in Bar 22. It may be that I have just been here on quiet nights, but the atmosphere was more chatty and cuddly with the occasional kiss. No making out like you see and do in places like L'uomo and 4x4. No groping like in 502. The girls didn't work the room or stand in front of you and preen to get your attention: to be honest with the size of the room and the number of people they would look like a bit of prat if they did those things. But, it was quiet when I have been there. Plenty of opportunities to interact like you would in a normal bar – the pool table was a focus of interest – it's free, so play games of pool with the girls. None of the girls appealed to me, except perhaps a cute blond called Valery.
I was surprised at the lack of almost any attempt to try to seal a deal by any of the girls, it was almost as they are not expecting to sessions with you (unlike the hard sell you get from some girls in the top termas).
5) So what are the differences between Bar 22 and the top-end Termas?
Firstly, and, well its blindingly obvious really, this looks like a small bar with rooms where locals go to drink beer, talk to girls, and occasionally session. It is not a high-end luxury termas. On the three times that I have been, it never seems to be crowded. Don't expect lots of girls and lots of stunners.
Secondly, how the girls interact with you is different to a high end termas, all were very natural, friendly and with no hard sell tactics.
Thirdly, although I didn't session, my accidental venture into one of the rooms suggested that they were functional rather than comfortable.
In conclusion, Try it out, why not? I found it a friendly place. If nothing else, you can use it as a cheap watering hole to get a few beers and chill before heading up to L'uomo further up on Siqueira Campos or walking round the corner to Monte Carlo on Hilario Gouveia for entertainment in a more upscale and expensive environment.
