Brazil’s farewell to its most beloved son

Thousands lined the streets for Pele’s journey to his final resting place.

Pele’s casket is brought by fire engine from Vila Belmiro stadium to his final resting place, the world’s tallest vertical cemetery, on Tuesday. Picture: Reuters

Pele made his final journey through the streets of Santos in southern Brazil’s Sao Paulo state on the bed of a fire engine. The weather was hot and humid, the roads, dense with crowds, coagulated to a standstill, and the cortege moved at a snail’s pace.

Such was the height of the ­vehicle and the position of the casket that Pele was not visible to the thousands who lined the route on Tuesday, but that did not seem to matter. In a way, it was the culmination of a journey made by all great athletes who grow old, from the vivid physicality of their glory days, when their feats must be seen to be believed, to their retirement years, where they settle as an idea, a myth, an image held in the mind.

The largest crowd gathered outside a house occupied by members of Pele’s family, including his 100-year-old mother, ­Celeste, who remained inside, and his sister, Maria Lucia do Nascimento, who joined other relatives on the balcony, waving at the crowds.

Some chanted “Pele, 1000 goals” and “Pele is our king”. One man waved a Santos flag. His sister, her soft white hair pushed up behind a knitted headband, led the crowd in the Our Father.

As the cortege reached Pele’s final resting place, a light rain began to fall. After a private ­funeral ceremony, he was lowered into a vault on the ninth floor of the world’s tallest vertical cemetery. He had chosen that level in honour of the shirt number worn by his father, Joao Ramos do Nascimento, known as Dondinho.

Brazil’s newly inaugurated President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva had flown by helicopter to pay his respects at Pele’s lying-in-state at the Vila Belmiro stadium. “It’s an irreparable loss for Brazil,” he said. “Pele, in addition to being the best player in the world, was a humble, simple man.”

Others were conspicuous by their absence. In Brazil, there has been surprise, and some criticism, that so few former Brazil internationals came to mourn Pele. Ze Roberto, who played in the 1998 and 2006 World Cups, came, and Mauro Silva, from the 1994 winning team. So did Clodoaldo, Pele’s team-mate from 1970, and Falcao, from the 1982 team, but they are both employees of Santos. Most sharply criticised for their failure to attend were Tite, who recently resigned as manager of Brazil, and the players who won Brazil’s fourth and fifth World Cups in 1994 and 2002: Cafu, Ronaldo, Ronaldinho, Rivaldo and others.

“He is the world’s idol,” said Neto, a former Corinthians star and a popular broadcaster. “But our country is a country without culture, without education, where the fifth-time champions did not come, the fourth-time champions did not come, the coach of the national team did not come.”

Bruno Formiga, a cable TV pundit, noted that other than Santos, only two Brazilian clubs, Palmeiras and Sao Paulo, sent directors to Pele’s wake, which was “a slap in the face”.

Mariana Spinelli, of ESPN, wrote on social media: “Where are Kaka, Ronaldo, Marcos (the goalkeeper of the 2002 Brazil team)? I’m outraged.”

Cafu has said he was unable to change a flight but will attend a memorial mass, on a date yet to be announced.

Street vendors around Santos have been selling Brazil shirts carrying the words “Pele eterno”. Pele often said Edson, his birth name, would die but Pele would live on. Maria Lucia sought to separate the man and the legend. “I’m Edson’s sister,” she said. “To be Pele’s sister is impossible to explain because he was chosen by God to represent Pele on earth.”

Neto made the same distinction: “People have to understand that Edson Arantes do Nascimento was a person, who made mistakes … not Pele.” In fact Pele had his own faults and sometimes undercut his own legend. In retirement he struggled to find dignity in a world that had made him a dignitary, struggled to find a vocation beyond the evocation of a glorious past.

There were perhaps too many commercial endorsements. He was a staunch supporter of disgraced FIFA president Sepp Blatter. For years he failed to recognise that he had a daughter called Sandra, even after DNA tests confirmed his paternity. Pele’s was a real life, not a fairytale, and all the more powerful for it. He was born in a shack, played barefoot as a child, worked as a shoeshine boy and stole peanuts to be able to afford a football. Few people have been as successful at capitalising talent into a stratospheric leap in status. Garrincha, his brilliant Brazil team-mate in 1958 and 1962, died penniless.

Pele, who died last Thursday aged 82, showed that fame could be earned rather than inherited, that sport could be a vehicle for mobility, that those who delighted the world with their artistry could rise from the bottom to the top. He was born into this world a pauper and borne from it like a king.

The Times