Pedra do Sal

This guide to Pedra do Sal in Rio de Janeiro centers on Hilaria Batista de Almeida, known as Aunt Ciata, who arrived from Bahia in 1876 carrying the rites of candomble and settled in the district once called Little Africa, near this old salt-loading rock. It follows her double life: selling Bahian sweets on the street by day, and by night, in the back rooms of her house, becoming the woman who protected the drums at a time when police treated samba as a crime. Stand at the rock itself, where enslaved hands once hauled sacks of salt, as you listen.