Panties, tweezers, Havaianas and other items Brazil does better than the rest of the world.

São Paulo is quickly becoming one of my favourite cities in Latin America, along with Santiago and Montevideo.

Rio is a complicated place. It’s a stressful city yet some parts are stunning and relaxing, it’s a rich city with many poor people, it’s an old city trying to look modern.

“So, no Aquaman.”
“Zero chance.”
“Nemo?”
“We should be able to find it.”
“Dory?”
“Likely in the same tank. Eh, you might see sharks too.”

Rio de Janeiro always stresses me out a bit. I feel bad just mentioning it. It’s okay to bitch about Paris when you’re French, it’s perfectly acceptable to hate Toronto when you’re Canadian, but complaining about Rio de Janeiro makes me sound like a snotty, ungrateful traveller.

At 1:30 a.m., I had a sudden craving for a pão de queijo. Don’t judge if you’ve never had this quintessential, addictive melt-in-your-mouth Brazilian snack. Hotel to gas station in the middle of the night. Easy.

You know you’ve been stuck in a traffic jam for too long if the songs play in the alphabetically and you started with Alanis Morissette to end up only a few kilometres further with Bono complaining about the world.

Come to the beach in Brazil. You’ll see every skin tone, every weight, every body shape, you’ll see cellulite, surgery scars, stretch marks, weird toenails, wrinkles, loose skin…—and yet, everyone is wearing a swimsuit and having fun.

The stunning woman who looks like a model out of a photo shoot standing on the rock with her friends isn’t me—I was below, capturing this Brazilian moment. Dear stranger, I wish I had your butt and your agility.

The hardest it is to get to a spot, the more likely you’ll enjoy it. It feels like a precious, unique experience, you’re mentally set to appreciate it. And sometimes, you do stumble upon a true gem.

I don’t need beer, food or a new swimsuit. I’m going to explore this five- or six-kilometre-long deserted stretch of sand.

“I think we’re going to walk for at least an hour.”

“More like thirty minutes. I’ve just been there and back, it doesn’t take that long. And it’s a sand dune, sand dunes are cool, right?”

I’ve never considered eating an entire roasted chicken, drinking cocktails (that’s what bars are for right?), blasting music on loudspeakers or buying a new bikini right on the beach. Clearly, I’m not Brazilian.

Tropical paradise with all the conveniences of a big city and without the usual island price tag. This message was not sponsored by the state of Santa Catarina (but hey, I can write more taglines if you provide room and board for a while!)

It’s the kind of day when you know you won’t accomplish much except going from point A to point B and hopefully make it to your destination, which is admittedly a goal in itself.

São Paulo has a soul—a heart too, I feel it beating. This megapolis that stretches as far as the eye can see isn’t an overwhelming sea of buildings. Paulistas, those who call São Paulo home, make it lively, fun, interesting.

The sun was shining, the city sounded dead quiet and we didn’t need hangover remedies since we only had half a glass of a mini bottle of cheap champagne.

“Well, I hope you can wait because we don’t really have the choice. First, it’s a bit of an old tradition that the new year starts at midnight, second we’re kind of stuck in a crowd of 1.7 million people.”

It’s only minutes before landing in São Paulo for the second time in nine days that I realized I could barely remember the first three days we spent there when we came from Canada.

This is one of the things I like best about travelling—first-hand experience. You can read all the books you want, chat with people and browse pictures, you won’t truly understand a place until you’ve been here.

You can eat, drink, exercise, shower, play, buy and sell stuff and more on Avenida Atlântica and on Copacabana Beach.

The 15-minute subway trip from Cardeal Arcoverde to Cinêlandia is barely long enough to realize that you’re not just travelling from one neighbourhood to another but stepping into a different world.