Wrong Turn: Brazil

Sun, sea & suffering.

Brazilian life is set at a different vibrancy. The spectrum of colours radiating off the average city street seems wider and brighter. Senses trained on drearier hemispheres never really adjust. Everyday sights make tourists rub their eyes in disbelief, like a child raised in darkness. Awestruck gringos stop and stare at household weeds and pests.

The Equatorial shift not only affects the sight. That stubby Braziliana banana was the first taste of life outside the Matrix. 

Those brave nanas that survive the great journey north are not the same nanas that left. 

Tropical tropical fruit had me justifying my first-ever use of adjectives like ‘succulent’. Words that, with my narrow understanding of juiciness, had always squelched of paperback erotica. Damn, if that mango wasn’t succulent, nothing is - least of all an overwritten vagina.

As is often the case, the brightness of a country is reflected in the easy-going charm of its people*. Brazillians carry the beach into the joyful whine of their every interaction.

However, for the disadvantaged majority of the population, life isn’t all sunshine and papayas.

Brazil is a nation the size of Europe where the richest five per cent have the same income as the other struggling ninety-five. Unlike Western countries, the government can’t sweep the suffering out of the way for the consciences of overseas visitors. 

Not that driving past a favela with a wound-down window gave me much of an insight into the hardships, beyond the police blockade. But the cascades of tin shacks overlooking the beaches of Rio De Janeiro are heartwrenching.

The desperate extremes of poverty where, for some, stealing is basically foraging. Considering their circumstances, robbing a misty-eyed slum tourist is pretty much a victimless crime.

Our guide, a double-digit muggee himself, drilled a pragmatic anxiety into us. Every city excursion was an exercise in risk management. Guards ushered us between cars and buildings in presidential huddles. Even smoothie bars have a Jujitsu blackbelt posted out front. So, there we sat, on the billboard-ready sands of the Copacabana, jumping at every offered coconut.

For those few Brazilians who can afford it, muggings are an accepted part of the routine. Nobody leaves the house without a 20 reais peace offering, so the transaction is as smooth as possible. Most street robberies are relaxed exchanges, with a flip-flopped assailant going through the motions. In Brazil, even the muggings are laid back. 

How the global economy is structured, what’s crippling for them is rather handy for us. With the 5X exchange rate, I could just-about afford the kind of luxury resort that, in the UK, would prod me away with a bladed cane. 

After overlooking starvation at every stoplight, the greasy-chinned opulence was revolting. The all-you-can-eat feeding frenzy made me sick to the well-plumbed depths of my stomach. A banquet hall of rich folks gavaging down caviar and champagne, like a lazy allegory of the haves and the have-nots**. 

The clientele were enjoying the rare opportunity of showcasing their wealth. Outside the castle walls that age-old folly has direct repercussions. Fat timepieces on to-scale wrists. Toned mistresses dangling chandeliers into their second plate of untouched shellfish. Bulbous coffee barons with their trophy wives and hit-and-miss children.

Sidenote: there’s so much soul in Brazil, even the fat, rich and/or white people can dance. 

Brazil is a breathtaking country with breathtaking problems cropped out of every Insta picture. A tourist can eat at an open-air Michelin-star restaurant, a block away from a burnt-out shanty town. The local 5-percenters are at ease with stepping over a possible corpse for the top-rated Crème brûlée, but I couldn’t look past it.

Then again, I’m ashamed to say I did breathe a sigh of relief when the gates closed on my 5-star beachside vomitorium. Seems I was more comfortable there than I’d care to admit, than I was anywhere else. 

The 2nd world sure makes it painfully clear which side of the planetary draw you landed on. Passing holiday guilt is as first-world as a problem gets.

*And vice versa. See: England.

***I was going to include a picture of me fatly holding a margarita here, with the caption ‘not that I was on hunger strike myself’ but the file size was too big, for obvious reasons.