Brazilians often say they live in a continent rather than a country, and that's an excusable exaggeration. The landmass is bigger than the United States if you exclude Alaska; the journey from Recife in the east to the western border with Peru is longer than that from London to Moscow, and the distance between the northern and southern borders is about the same as that between New York and Los Angeles. Brazil has no mountains to compare with its Andean neighbours, but in every other respect it has all the scenic - and cultural - variety you would expect from so vast a country.
Despite the immense expanses of the interior, roughly two-thirds of Brazil's population live on or near the coast; and well over half live in cities - even in the Amazon. In Rio and Sao Paulo, Brazil has two of the world's great metropolises, and nine other cities have over a million inhabitants. Yet Brazil still thinks of itself as a frontier country, and certainly the deeper into the interior you go, the thinner the population becomes. Nevertheless, the frontier communities have expanded relentlessly during the last fifty years, usually hand in hand with the planned expansion of the road network into remote regions.
Other South Americans regard Brazilians as a race apart, and language has a lot to do with it - Brazilians understand Spanish, just about, but Spanish-speakers won't understand Portuguese. More importantly, though, Brazilians look different. They're one of the most ethnically diverse peoples in the world: in the extreme south, German and Italian immigration has left distinctive European features; Sao Paulo has the world's largest Japanese community outside Japan; there's a large black population concentrated in Rio, Salvador and Sao Luis; while the Indian influence is most visible in the people of Amazonia and the Northeastern interior.
Brazil is a land of profound economic contradictions. Rapid postwar industrialization made Brazil one of the world's ten largest economies and put it among the most developed of Third World countries. But this has not improved the lot of the vast majority of Brazilians. The cities are dotted with favelas, shantytowns which crowd around the skyscrapers, and the contrast between rich and poor is one of the most glaring anywhere. There are wide regional differerences , too: Brazilians talk of a "Switzerland" in the Southeast, centred along the Rio-Sao Paulo axis, and an "India" above it; and although this is a simplification, it's true that the level of economic development tends to fall the further north you go. This throws up facts which are hard to swallow. Brazil is the industrial powerhouse of South America, but cannot feed and educate its people. In a country almost the size of a continent, the extreme inequalities in land distribution have led to land shortages but not to agrarian reform. Brazil has enormous natural resources but their exploitation so far has benefited just a few. The IMF and the greed of First World banks must bear some of the blame for this situation, but institutionalized corruption and the reluctance of the country's large middle class to do anything that might jeopardize its comfortable lifestyle are also part of the problem.
These difficulties, however, rarely seem to overshadow everyday life in Brazil. It's fair to say that nowhere in the world do people know how to enjoy themselves more - most famously in the annual orgiastic celebrations of Carnaval , but reflected, too, in the lively year-round nightlife that you'll find in any decent-sized town. This national
hedonism also manifests itself in Brazil's highly developed beach culture ; the country's superb music and dancing; rich regional cuisines ; and in the most relaxed and tolerant attitude to sexuality - gay and straight - that you'll find anywhere in South America. And if you needed more reason to visit, there's a strength and variety of popular culture , and a genuine friendliness and humour in the people that is tremendously welcoming and infectious.
Your Tips For Brazil
Brazil Travel Videos
Discover Rio de Janeiro - Brazil Discover Rio de Janeiro- Brazil.Narrated in English. quotSea,Lagoon, Forest... And all of that in the middle of a cityquot
Pantanal - Brazil Pantanal is Brazils largest wet lands. The top place in the country for wildlife observation. For an 18 minute high definition audio/slideshow go ...
Brazil For Travelers Breathtaking landscapes,great climate, megabiodiversity, wonderful people, vibrant culture and a fascinating history. This is Brazil a country ...
The Travel Linguist - Brazilian Portuguese 101 Learn 10 Portuguese survival words compliments of The Travel Linguist. For a full list of instructional language DVDs, phrasebooks, audio CDs and ...
Southern Brazil 1942 A tour of Southern Brazil in the 1940s.Footage from this subject is available for licensing from www.globalimageworks.com
Blm, Para, Brazil Some views of Blm, a city of 2 million people in the Amazonian rainforest. The music is a cover by by Keigo Oyamada Cornelius.
Brazil - The giant Brazil - Frank Sinatra Pictures of some Brazilian cities
Iguazu Falls, Brazil - Destination X The waterfall system consists of 275 falls along 2.7 kilometres 1.67 miles of the Iguazu River. Some of the individual falls are up to 82 metres ...
Week 19 - Amy - The Pantanal, Brazil Amy goes trekking in the Pantanal in Brazil, where she goes swimming with anacondas, catches a caiman and witnesses a fully grown man falling off ...
So Salvador City - Bahia/Brazil Pictures and music about Salvador, city of state of Bahia/Brazil.
Brasilia - Capital of Brazil One of the modernest cities in the world
UFO in Piracicaba, Brazil UFO viewed while driving with friends back in July, 2007
So Paulo - Brazil So Paulo is the 19th richest city in the world and is expected to be the 13th richest in 2020. According to data of IBGE, its Gross domestic ...
Street carnaval - Salvador Beach Brazil Watch this amazing street carnival party in the beach resort of Salvador. This is one of the most popular places to go on Carnival besides Rio ...
New Year celebrations in Brasil www.euronews.net
Roundtrip Brasil - Natal Recife Olinda trip South A brilliant round trip full of variation, starting in Natal and passing through 3 Brazilian states. 8-day round trip with Dutch tour guide. Learn ...
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Goias and Tocantins Brazil Travel Videos Brazil Travel Itinerary Almost 1000km from Rio and located in the barren sertao of the Goias highlands - very much in rural, peasant Brazil - Brasilia is the largest and most interesting of the world's "planned cities". - Brazil
Northeast Brazil Travel Videos Brazil Travel Itinerary The Northeast ( nordeste) of Brazil covers an immense area and features a variety of climates and scenery, from the dense equatorial forests of western Maranhao, only 200km from the mouth of the Amazon, to the parched interior of Bahia, some 2000km to the south. - Brazil
Rio Brazil Travel Videos Brazil Travel Itinerary The citizens of the ten-million-strong city of Rio de Janeiro call it the Cidade Marvilhosa - and there can't be much argument about that. - Brazil
Sao Paulo Brazil Travel Videos Brazil Travel Itinerary The citizens of the Sao Paulo state , Paulistas, never tire of saying that their state is Brazil's economic powerhouse, and they produce a mountain of statistics to sustain the boast. - Brazil
South Brazil Travel Videos Brazil Travel Itinerary The states forming the South of Brazil - Parana , Santa Catarina and Rio Grande do Sul - are generally considered to be the most developed part of the country. - Brazil
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