A snapshot of Brazil

Brazil is really a crazy country. It´s so huge and varied in every way. I still only know a tiny bit of it but I feel like I´m getting to know it a bit better. Salvador itself is really unique as it is sometimes referred to as 'the second biggest African city in the world' (I´m not 100% sure this is true but it doesn´t really matter) 80% of the population are black and there are lots of African influences- in the food, the religion etc. Meanwhile many of the doctors are paler than I am (!) as they are of Germanic or Italian origin and clearly never go out in the sun, as my tan is only from two days on a Salvador beach and really not very impressive! The people are so much fun and the way the doctors treat their patients is so different from in the UK (or Peru)- they hug most of them to say hi and are much less formal.

One interesting thing at the moment is that there´s an election soon and so lots of campaigning is going on. One method used a lot is to cover a car or van with posters of the candidate and then drive along with a huge pair of speakers blasting out a song about the candidate. They proclaim how hard working and fair they are or how dedicated to the job. It´s really really weird and the songs are very annoying but it keeps me amused on my walk into the hospital! On the other hand, if you talk to any Brazilian they will tell you that the government is basically powerless. They make hundreds of laws (according to the guy who works in the hostel a lot more than most countries) and no-one obeys them.

The same guy lives in the favela where he grew up but is in the army and used to go on secret missions in Rio´s favelas to find (and then kill) the drug-lords. He was saying how he´d pretend to be buying drugs and drive up in a posh car, or would start going out with a girl from the favela so he could get in and have an excuse to be there. It´s so sad though, because he said almost all of his friends from when he was a kid are dead, mostly because they didn´t have money to pay for the drugs so they were shot, sometimes for owing only about 100 reais (40 pounds). It´s so tragic and scary to hear the stories first hand. If anyone there found out he was in the army he´d be killed too. And because the army (like him) pretend to be doctors,postmen etc any unknown people entering the favela re often just killed without questions, so most doctors don´t dare to go in.