I’m in the air now, about an hour and some from landing in Seattle,
where I’ll see my lovely wife and daughter after almost two weeks. Man
this has been hard!

Before I forget, I wanted to put down some observations about Brasil.
These aren’t in any particular order, but maybe you’ll find them useful
someday.

• Brazil is big, and thus you can’t stereotype the people or a place.
  It’s like saying all Americans are the same, but people from Seattle and
  Little Rock are wildly different.
• People in Bahia are poor but content and happy. They don’t need tons
  of money to be happy… they have music, friendship, and gorgeous
  beaches everywhere. And they seem OK with not trying to get into the rat
  race. Good for them.
• Lots of parents exploit their kids as beggars. Kids make great
  beggars, and parents know this. So they send out their kids, who are
  wearing reasonable clothes and good sneakers, to beg. This just seems
  like something that’d be easy to outlaw and police, but I’m sure I’m
  missing something — for example, the legitimate cases where the kids
  have to help because there isn’t enough money to go around.
• There are lots of beautiful people in Brazil, but it isn’t like
  everyone is. Sure, you’ll see a lot of women who look amazing in bikins
  at the beach, but you’ll also see ordinary women in bikins at the beach.
  People are different, it’s OK. Although the speedo-like tighty-whities
  the men wear are still kinda too revealing.
• Panhandlers are a lot more aggressive in Brazil.
• Merchants and souvenier sellers are the same — they’re hucksters,
  but they’re the same kind of huckster in every country.
• There’s a lot of English in Brasilia and São Paulo, probably Rio too.
  Not much anywhere else.
• In São Paulo, buiding security is tight. You need a card to get in AND
  out, and the receptionist will take down your info and take a digital
  picture of you before she lets you up. This happened at both the MS
  building and Amanda’s.
• When you greet someone of the opposite sex, at least in São Paulo, the
  man kisses the left and then right cheek of the woman. Jean-Francios
  said that in France it’s also like this, except in Paris where it’s
  left-right-left-right. But only in Paris. I guess ‘cuz they like kissing
  there.
• Bahia is like almost any other near-the-beach place…. 5 minutes is,
  well, 5 or 10 or 15, whatever.
• People in general are very friendly and inviting.
• Looks seem to be more important in Brazil. I’m not talking about how
  many women have plastic surgery (they do), but it seems to be more
  acceptable to do things based on looks. For example, Amanda mentioned
  that a firm she once worked at apparently only hired pretty people (she
  picked up that pattern after some good people were rejected), and at the
  company dinner one year all the female players had to play a soccer
  game…. apparently so all the men could see pretty girls running around
  in short shorts. They probably don’t have much in the way of sexual
  harassment laws there yet, either.
• Local cell phones are key… although the international rates on them
  can kinda eat your minutes quickly.
• They’re pretty open about sex. In fact, one channel (MultiShow, which
  shows a lot of US content, such as South Park) has “SexyTime” which is
  an hour of (usually American-made and subtitled) softcore porn. Flipping
  channels at the Hilton, it appears there’s some other channel that also
  shows softcore movies late at night.
• You can still smoke indoors (although I heard a rumor that there was
  some law that made it illegal… maybe they’re all just ignoring it).
• Mosquitoes, even those that don’t carry malaria, still suck.
• Brazil has a ton of different fruits, and they’re good. Bananas taste
  better, and they have a couple different varieties. There’s also a ton
  of different citrus fruits that you don’t see in Seattle. All good stuff.
• Brazil has better beef. Free range organic is simply better.
• Brazil is very Catholic. I saw lots of crosses, and in Manaus all the
  busses had a big “JESUS” sign. Also, decent number of people who had a
  religious saying on their back window — like in the US we’d see a
  company ad / contact info. But they don’t appear to be obnioxious about
  it… e.g. I don’t know anyone who started off with the Portugeuse
  equivalent of, “Well, I’m a Christian, so……”

I think that’s about it…. welp, I’m seeing some volcano out the left
side of the plane… I think Shasta, but I’d swear we’re too far north
for that. Maybe Mt. St. Helens from a weird angle, as the peak is rather
pointy at the top. But, it’s almost time to land, so I’ll end this part
of the travel journal. Until the next blog entry then, cheers!

-e

No, not Paris Hilton. She’s just a shining example that you can be filty
rich and yet still be po’ white trash. No, I’m talking about where she
gets her money - Hilton Hotels.

Hilton Hotels are your standard business hotel. They cater to the
business traveler who is spending his or her company’s money. The rooms
are all very nice and comfortable, and there’s a good work environment
with a desk and a phone and all the things you like. There’s a nice TV
with many channels and may pay-per-view movies, all of which will show
up as “Guest Services” or something on the bill so your employer won’t
know you’re expensing your porn watching (although in Brazil, they
actually just have softcore on TV normally, but we’ll get to that later).

The problem I have with Hilton is that you pay extra for Every. Last.
Little. Thing. OK, the $10 mini-bottle from the mini-bar, fine. We all
know that the mini-bar is stupidly overpriced, but occasionally we need
it, so fine, extort your $5 more from us. Whatever. However, local calls
should not be metered *by the minute*. We’re calling across the street,
not a 976 number. And don’t tell me that everyone in Brazil has calls
metered by the minute, as they didn’t have them metered in Salvador or
Manaus.

Of course, they meter local calls, because people like me can dial into
a local modem and check mail. And they’d much rather I pay $30 a day for
a 128k connection. or I can pay $40 for 256K, on up to 1M. Gee, I get to
pay more for a faster pipe… lovely. Didn’t that go out when Compuserve
stopped the surcharge for 1200 baud modems vs 300 baud?

Random tourist hotels usually have free wireless, or at least free
broadband, and local calls are cheap. Even hotels in Japan have this,
and you breath out money in that country. So, yeah, a nice staff and
pretty room is fine, but really, if I’m in a place to get work done, I
really don’t want to have to keep adding on to the tab to get work done.
Just increase the price of the room by a few bucks and include it. And
if that causes people to go to other hotels? Well, then maybe perhaps
competition is doing what it’s supposed to do — drive prices down to
where they’re fair.