Rio de Janeiro is one of those cities that gets under your skin. Not just for the beaches, the mountains, or the famous skyline, but also for the people. Beneath the iconic landmarks, the city pulses with artists, musicians, and community leaders doing extraordinary things every day, channeling a culture that is unmistakably alive.
At Journey Brazil, this is what we travel for. More than simply to see a place, but to genuinely connect with it, and with the people shaping it. Those connections can lead somewhere unexpected.
This is one of those stories.
Vidigal: Rio’s Most Vibrant Favela Neighborhood
From Journey Brazil’s office in the South Zone of Rio, you can see up into Vidigal: a vibrant favela neighborhood set into the Dois Irmãos hillside. It’s somewhere our founder Mika knows well: “my wife and I loved going up there in the evenings! Grabbing delicious sushi and watching the sun go down behind the mountains.”
On one of those evenings, he noticed a young girl named Isis drumming on plastic buckets outside a small restaurant. She was amazing. Mika kept coming back to see Isis drum, first on Thursdays, and then as the sun was setting on Friday afternoons too. And so did many others; she was drawing a crowd.
She got better, was gifted a proper drum kit, and one day began teaching the local kids who’d gathered around her. A few became a few more. Before long, it had grown into a group of girls performing regularly outside a bar at the top of the hill: playing the drums, and combining this with energetic choreography. Always pulling an audience.
How a Girl Drumming on Plastic Buckets Started a Movement
Mika began bringing guests up to experience the energy, too. Following in the footsteps of his own family, visitors would climb the hill in the late afternoon, watching the light soften over Rio before arriving at the bar where the girls performed.
As the shows went on, Isis’s vision kept growing. From a handful of local kids gathered around her drums it gradually matured; more students, more drums replacing the plastic buckets, a following of dozens eager to learn. For someone who had faced enormous challenges growing up: raised by her grandmother while her mother was incarcerated, the determination was striking. Over time, she became more than a drummer or a teacher. Isis became someone who young girls in the community looked up to, even though she was only in her early twenties herself.
When Travel Moves You to Act
Over the years, the growth of the project has been shaped by many moments: a new student joining, a performance that brought new opportunities, a connection made between Isis and someone who believed in her vision. Some of those connections have come through travelers: in one case, a visitor was so moved by what she witnessed that she donated $100,000 on the spot. Contributions like this have helped Isis to formalize the project as an NGO, known today as BatucaVidi, and find a dedicated home for her school.
Today, the space is filled with life. Dozens of kids rehearsing, painting, learning, and growing together. What began with a girl drumming on plastic buckets has become a whole community. A place of safety, culture, and possibility, where young people are learning skills and rhythm, but also confidence and their place in the world.
As Mika puts it: “If you are so moved by a mission, you can make it happen. What it takes is connecting the right people. Travel can be one of the most powerful ways to do that; those small moments of connection can become transformative.”
Visit BatucaVidi: Experience Rio Beyond the Postcard
Stories like this are part of what makes Rio such a rich place to explore. Beyond the iconic beaches and famous landmarks, you’ll find the people shaping the city.
For Journey Brazil travelers, visiting BatucaVidi offers a chance to witness this spirit firsthand: the space that Isis has built (and getting to meet her), seeing the students rehearse, and experiencing the energy.
If you’d like to embark on moments like this as part of a wider journey through Brazil, connecting with its diverse culture, natural beauty from rainforest to sea, and remarkable people, we’d love to start crafting your personalized itinerary.
