Maria Gorda, the Baobab of Paquetá

The sign in front of this baobab makes an offer: eternal luck to whoever kisses and respects me, and seven years of bad luck for every unkindness done to me. Islanders take it seriously enough to embrace the trunk, which is ten metres round. Maria Gorda, Fat Mary, is the main reason a good number of people get on the ferry to Paquetá at all. She is listed individually by the state heritage institute, and she was also one of ten trees on the island landmarked together by the city back in 1967. Her age is a mess. One account has her planted in 1627 by early colonisers who brought the seed from the African savanna. Another, which we could not read directly, claims a baobab arrived from Manaus in 1907 and took the name then. Almost three centuries separate those two, so the band here is left wide rather than picking a side. Local tradition ties her origin to the death of an enslaved woman, Maria Apolinária, said to have vowed to leave a mark of African culture on the island. That is oral history rather than record, and it is told here as such. She was alive and well in January 2025. A resident of sixty-four years told a reporter there had been no vandalism lately, and that she had thrown three seedlings, all replanted elsewhere on Paquetá.