It's been almost a decade since I've been traveling abroad on vacation. Since then, a lot has changed, the first time I was in London in 2003 I found many Brazilians working at the counter in stores, restaurants or even as well-known cleaners, but at that time it was unlikely to find Brazilians in museums or tourist buses. In 2009, before the European crisis, it was possible to see the Italians' noses in the air, and the harsh treatment with no intimacy. But in 2011 we began to be seen in a completely different way by the same Italians, a taxi driver negotiated the price, sang and treated us like childhood friends, and even said: "if you miss the ship I'll call my wife to prepare a special dinner for you in my house."
Miami has long been known as the paradise for Brazilian baggers, but now it's more like São Paulo's Rua 25 de Março. The store salespeople already speak Portuguese or are even Brazilian, the store saleswoman said that we bought everything and didn't even ask prices, a taxi driver from a Brazilian cooperative called "Copacabana" said that we are supporting tourism and especially the food market. cruises. Obama also said this there at Disney, he said that he will make the visa even easier for us and that we will no longer need an interview to renew the visa. He says that 95% of visas are being approved, we are considering removing the need for our visas!
Obama is already in the race for re-election, but it is difficult to find someone who trusts that he will succeed, it seems that he was a very good appeaser and made Americans look less arrogant and insane, giving Americans back the appearance of good guys and benefactors that they really are, he cleaned up the mistakes of the disgusting George Bush, but he was not the savior of the country and he was not able to get the commercial machine rolling again. The crisis there is still serious, many people are still unemployed, just talk to taxi drivers to find out. A taxi driver from the wealthy city of Fort Lauderdale said "thank God for having this cruise terminal, because without it this city would be much more bankrupt." The sad thing for an American admirer is to see that the most desired cell phone in the world is created in the United States, but manufactured by the Chinese, just like this cruise I was on, it is the largest in the world, serves the American port, but was manufactured in Finland . Is the American government unable to reverse these various absurdities?
But returning to our Brazil, there on the largest cruise ship in the world, the Allure of the Seas, Brazil is also the savior of the country, one of the most popular restaurants is "Samba Grill", where Brazilian barbecue is served, with feijoada, Picanha, maminha and that look of the gauchos with their meat on a skewer being passed around the tables. The store salespeople treat us as if our arrival were the luck of the day, they want to talk to us in Portuguese anyway, as they want to train the best customers in the language. They said that last week there were 1000 Brazilians on board, and that more than 3500 beds were sold to Brazilians for Carnival. The ship has a capacity of 5500 passengers, and 3500 were Brazilians, incredible, right? It's no surprise that all the graphic material is also written in Portuguese, and that one of the cabin's television channels shows films dubbed into Portuguese.
Impressive, right? But it's just a summary, the Brazilian traveler has a much bigger ball than that. But watching the American news channel CNN, we learned that a car with illegal Brazilians traveling through the United States had an accident and left fatal victims, and only one survived, her name is Lidiane. It's strange that all this happens in parallel, but she must be in the United States from another reality, and living a difficult life, fleeing immigration, always having to travel in secret. I hope she can someday come back and see the progress we are making.
Traveling more around the United States, going to the coast of the Pacific Ocean, the scenario changes, you meet a Brazilian every 2 or 3 days, unlike Miami or New York where you meet a Brazilian every 2 or 3 minutes. The distance, high prices and the lack of direct flights still make the west coast an area little explored by Brazilians, but this could change, the merger of Lan with Tam, which will become Latam, could bring cheaper and more frequent flights here. SP or RJ, then Los Angeles, Las Vegas and San Francisco, get ready, the Brazilians will take over!
