A country only a few million square kilometres smaller than the entirety of Europe is going to be diverse in more ways than most countries could ever achieve. Everything from the food to the music, traditional dress, and accents is different across Brazil’s vastness. In my short and hardly well-traveled time here, I have witnessed so many variations of just what it is to be ‘Brazilian,’ and it’s always different.

Play now. Work later

Similar to many of the Latino countries I have strolled through in the last two years, where work sits on the list of the Brazilian population’s collective priorities is significantly lower than the ones I have been more familiar with. Brazil is not lazy by any means, and they’re not workshy. They recently hosted the G20 summit and hold their position on the world stage comfortably. Not many of the countries in that list aren’t driven aggressively by capital and work over everything.

However, there are many things that come before work, it seems, for brazilians. If there is a BBQ going on, they’ll make time to attend. If there is a concert playing, but it doesn’t start until midnight on a Wednesday, they’ll attend and just be tired for work. If the sun is out, and the sand is perfectly cool that day, maybe it’ll be a later start and a much longer lunch. Work will get done, and to the standard it’s to expected, but it won’t be the priority. When a whole country works on this system there is nobody to blame, and nobody who minds, because they’re too busy enjoying the sun too.

It’s similar to the Mexican mañana-mañana attitude but with a Brazilian flavour. There are many things the rest of the world could learn from the Latinos, and the work ethic is certainly one of them. When a collective of people’s minds aren’t obsessing over work, there is all of a sudden a lot more space to obsess over other things instead. This is part of the reason I think the Brazilian culture has become so rich and varied in its time. The people give themselves time to enjoy the small, finer things. People still have time to create.

I mean, these observations are, again, from my limited experience. Either way, it is a play-hard, work-hard lifestyle, and it’s exhausting to keep up with. I don’t know when they sleep.

Living Arrangements

Rio, at first, was overwhelming in a very comfortable way. Within days of arriving in the city I had more things to do than the day had hours. Every moment was full of another event, dinner, or exhibition. Within days I had met more people than I had the capacity to remember. From the relative quiet and solitude of Salvador, it was a welcome and necessary change.

Salvador

Salvador was a quiet place for me. I met some folks while I was there, but mostly, I cleared my mind, swam, drank, and worked. As far as I could tell, I didn’t think I was lonely, and I wasn’t bored either. I just kind of existed in Salvador and enjoyed the warmth and sounds of an incredibly vibrant and musical place.

Salvador is, once again, considered an incredibly dangerous city. I didn’t notice this, really. Of course, there are darker, more risky places, but you can avoid these completely like you would Hull or Swindon. Aside from these areas, the whole city is beautiful. It is built upon the characteristic coastal mountains of Brazil, meaning towering cliffside houses perch over beautiful white sand beaches and stunning coves. It is considered one of the only African cities outside of Africa and is the home of Afro-Carribean culture. There are not too many white immigrants there either; it was an interesting experience to be one of the only white folk around for a while.

Salvador was a wind-down. I lived a five-minute walk from two beaches, and the bars, food, and drink there were amazingly cheap. My host, however, wasn’t a fan. She was very welcoming at first, but clearly, we weren’t supposed to be friends. Her dislike may have begun when I brought someone home, but I think our animosity was always going to pop up at some point.

She would make her displeasure of me known by hanging over my shoulder when I cooked. She would obsessively clear around me while I was trying to prepare anything. I would finish chopping onions and turn around to grab some garlic. By the time I had turned back to the chopping board, my knife would be being sharpened, the chopping board would be sanitized and shelved, and somehow she would have freeze-dried the onions and stored them in Tupperware. When I left, she would polish it all for a solid half hour afterwards. It was an interesting one.

I drank and ate a lot in Salvador. I left by coach to Rio. It was a solid 32 hours nonstop. Looking back at it, I would do it all again. Moving through the states like that was phenomenal.

Rio

I knew I would like Rio which is why I booked two months there before I had even seen the place. Prices were exceptionally high compared to my past two years so I moved in quickly on the two spots I ended up in. I couldn’t have two more different places, and they were both amazing.

My first spot was a bitch to reach. It was between two of the most popular beaches in Rio: Ipanema and Copacabana. However, despite these both being Gringolandia, squeezed between them is a Favela. I was living at the bottom of it, and this caused an issue. Taxis see the police posted at the end of the road and the community MotoTaxi boys and refuse to go another step.

With my 20/25 kilos on my back and about another 10/15 on the front, I am Thicc. Walking up a Favela, safe or not, with that much weight was going to be hell. I couldn’t get a MotoTaxi for the same reason. First, one Taxi dropped me at the bottom, and then about three cancelled on me. In the end, it was a simple yellow taxi hailed from the side of the road that took my desperate, sweaty corpse to the door. He still moaned about it, though.

This became a habit while staying there. Both Moto and car would stop at the bottom and refuse to drive the 10-minute walk up the hill to my door. I didn’t mind this in the end. The bottom of the favela was absolutely live every single day and night. Walking through the folks sitting around the street, bashing down 40oZ beers, watching football, playing pool, and dancing was never unwelcome. It was completely the opposite.

My apartment was right on the peak of the ridge on which this particular community was built. I could access from both sides, but neither was better. Too many times, I trudged up the silent mountainside streets as the sun came up, praying the streetside snack bar would be open yet/already. It kept me fit and meant I didn’t feel inclined to do leg day that month.

I had my own ‘Suite’ in a building five floors high due to being built flat onto the side of a cliff face. I had my own living room/ bedroom, a private bathroom, and a terrace to hang my hammock and watch the bats at night. On the top floor of this house, there was an enormous kitchen and balcony. It looked out over to the sea, sitting atop the mountain that peered down over the city and the surrounding Favela. There wasn’t a single day I looked at that view and didn’t get emotional.

But I had to leave after my month was over because I was booked into somewhere else. It was just a single room in a house with the host. After Salvador, I wasn’t looking forward to the lack of privacy and space. I needn’t have worried. The host was a wonderful, accommodating, and kind woman who never made me feel like I was anywhere but home. It turned out I only really used my room as an office most of the time anyway. I slept elsewhere.

When I first entered the flat on the ninth floor, a block away from the beach, I was shown to my room. The walls were covered in printed-out black and white pictures of my host, Theresa, with various famous-looking people. I had a wooden desk and chair, a small ottoman sofa, a built-in wardrobe and an enormous bed propped on crates. I had a widow who looked out onto the central opening in the block-sized building, so not much more than pigeons and the tiered walkways. The rest of the walls were covered in tourist London Memorabilia. I slept beneath a three-foot canvas of Tower Bridge at sunset.

Theresa was a dream to live with. It turns out she was a famous theatre producer, and when I asked about the pictures on my wall, she showed me who each of them was she was being shot with. From her beautiful younger years, I was able to see her with various A-Listers she was working with as she gradually aged into the lady she is now. Her career was fantastic.

Theresa is now a tiny lady, and she loves her microwaved waffles at 11 p.m. She has them with honey and always giggles when I catch her grilling up her midnight snack. She told me stories of disasters and successes in the Brazilian world of theatre and the toll they took. I saw her arms and shoulders under her frumpy T-shirts sometimes, and they were a patchwork of wild tattoos.

She had worked until her mind snapped, pushing herself just a little too hard for too many years under the strains of high-end theatre. Her mental breakdown has left her a beautiful person full of life, kindness, and peace. But she sleeps a lot and can’t really get out much. She moves slowly and with a tremor that effects her voice also.

But she clearly carries the memories of someone who has lived a thousand lives.