Monday, January 27, 2014 at 12:01PM 
As you may have seen or read in your own national media, there were more protests in central São Paulo on Saturday night. This time they were against the World Cup being staged in Brazil (as opposed to the hike in bus fares that was the flashpoint for last year’s protests), and, as with the previous demonstrations, they didn’t come off peacefully.
Thursday, January 23, 2014 at 10:52AM
Updated on Thursday, March 20, 2014 at 12:42PM by
Matt Phipps
Updated on Tuesday, March 17, 2015 at 07:45PM by
Matt Phipps
Wednesday, January 22, 2014 at 06:56PM Here’s a list I’ve been compiling on my phone over the past few months of my favourite Brazilian forenames. This sounds kind of sad, and it probably is. But in my defence, the names I see as I go out and about round here, on name-tags and the like, really are a vast and richly variegated treasure-house of insanity.
Monday, October 21, 2013 at 12:05PM 
Are the current protests the end of Brazil as we know it? And how did Brazil get into this state in the first place? I argue that one reason for the current anger might be a newfound ability to protest against decades, if not centuries, of rigidly demarcated social stratification resulting from a history that is, by contrast with other countries around the world, relatively unaffected by the traumas of war.
Friday, October 4, 2013 at 08:44AM Growing up insulated by the bubble of first-world economics, in which consumer demand has dictated supplier behaviours for decades, I never considered that there could be places, indeed whole countries, where people might be relatively as well off as me, but unable to buy nice clothes or goods because the economy simply didn't make them available at that price. Moreover, all the people running those businesses and banks, who can afford the quality goods that are beyond the reach of the middle classes, and who are well aware of the disparity, must think they can get away with flogging this crap because the general population won't do anything about it. Yeah, go on, just chuck some patriotic nonsense at them, some TV shows, some sex, some alcohol for the adults and sugar for the kids, and depend on them remaining ignorant of the fact that they could be enjoying a better quality of life if they had just been born in another part of the world.
Life, O Brasil, economics, globalisation, politics 