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Astonishing: Bar Beleza in Lichfield Street.
It's not often that I get to use the adjective astonishing, but Bar Beleza
on Lichfield Street was, literally, astonishing. Backing on to the Poplar
Street area from Lichfield Street, you probably wouldn't think much of Beleza
from the outside. It kind of blends in to those other imposing old buildings.
Inside though, Brazilians have taken over.
Beleza has a main bar that is quite narrow with three large booths. It has a
large second room with pool tables and table soccer and an outside part with a
barbecue and a wood-fired pizza oven. Being Brazilian, there are
green-and-yellow streamers and toucans. It doesn't quite look properly lived-in
yet, but they're getting there.
Their caipirinha limes, sugar and cachaca (Brazilian sugarcane liquor) was good,
but pricey at $15. The beers and wines were an average selection of mainly
local stuff. The food is simple but excellent rustic-style snacks that conjure
up a Brazilian beach-side village despite your being in a back alley in the
most non-Brazilian town in the world. We had barbecued prawns, fish and spicy
sausages with garlic bread for $12. I tried their pizzas, which are pretty good
Beleza Peixes, their fish pizza, is a good option. The astonishing part was
that on Thursday night they had a cabal of magicians who had taken up
residence. They come over to your table and perform mind-bending tricks right
in front of your eyes. It's a great gimmick for a bar personal, interesting and
really, really fun. The first guy did a fantastic trick involving cards with
numbers on the back that left us more than baffled. The second guy also did
phenomenal card tricks (although he insisted there was another guy who was "the
card guy" I shudder to think what he could have come up with), but then he
started doing tricks with squashy little balls. They would disappear and
reappear and multiply in his hands and pockets and we were entranced. He put
one ball in Giles's hand that, when Giles opened his fist, had become two.
Credulous Giles even swore he felt "a pulse" when the second ball was magicked
in there. Astonishing. Bar Beleza is a great change from your average night out
in Christchurch. The pool room doubles as a band room and, being Brazilian, I'm
sure there is some dancing to be had. All it needs is a few more people and an
ashtray or two outside and it'll really come into its own. So get along there.
Ian Steward
Bar Beleza. Open from 4.30ish, seven days. 130 Lichfield Street, ph
379-8648
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