A new Life in Brazil

Following the line of reasoning opened at the first post of "In a Land of Future", I’d like to keep reflecting here some impressions, comments and opinions from people who once chose to settle in Brazil, called by the promise of a different life, detached from the sometimes frantic pace we are used to in old Europe. People and characters of all kinds we came across in the last 6 years brought their reasons, their experiences and their vision of what this country gives them and what they believe will be their future relationship with it. 

Sympathy, spontaneity and open arms with which Brazilian people welcomes foreigners collide with force against the increasingly closed and restrictive bureaucratic attitude of its institutions and agencies, especially those that regulate and determine the opening of the country to the outside World. It is surprising how a country that has been an unparalleled example of multiracial integration, welcoming and coexistence appears now so restrictive with the European visitor.

Since January 2013 Federal Police is not extending any European tourist visa for more than three months, forcing the traveler or extended stay visitors to leave the country after that period. This restriction, for instance, is being suffered by relatives of aliens who want to spend long periods in the country, homeowners who do not have residence visas, retirees who decide to spend the European winter in a land of gentler climate, and displaced staff of multinational companies that do not want to go through the formalities of endless and thankless work visa to finish, in most of the cases, receiving a incomprehensible refusal. This restriction began in late 2012 for French and Italian visitors, followed soon after for Spanish and Portuguese, and the rest of nationalities that make up the core of the European Union have fallen behind.

The Brazilian citizen links this attitude of their immigration authorities to a reciprocal treatment to their fellow citizens when entering “Schenguen” territory and justifies the sometimes unfair treatment and arbitrary immigration agents to "bleeding cases" as the old woman who spent several days in Barajas Airport (Madrid) unable to enter Spain to visit her daughter. The headlines about this issue all around the country, appealed to popular outrage and to a reciprocal treatment for the Europeans arrived in Brazil, specially for Spanniards. The truth about the case disclosed by the Brazilian Embassy in Madrid (a few days after the major fuzz in the Brazilian media) in which it was stated that this woman was visiting a daughter in an illegal situation, with two orders of expulsion from Spain, and also had had consular assistance from the first moment she was banned to entry into the EU, of course had the least media attention and passed without any highlights.

Attending to these blatantly manipulated news, created to generate attitudes of rejection towards the wave of European immigration towards Brazil directed in recent years of financial and labor crisis, the foreign resident in the country cannot be more than puzzled, confused and even a little angry. The pulse on the street, especially in communities where foreigners and Brazilians share space without the slightest problem, displays exemplary coexistence and total integration. European residents feel increasingly annoyed and confused by the multitude of obstacles and restrictions that we are facing now for the opening of new foreign-funded enterprises or carrying out any procedures for renewal of permits or documentation.

Federal Police, agency in charge of immigration proceedings and control, justifies this stiffness in its actions with cases that they considered "rogue". They explain foreign companies have been set up with little or no activity just for residence visas, which brought the country increasing currency sums. Any way this money is not easy to repatriate back to their home country and therefore was driven to facilitate, at greater or lesser extent, local economies. It is even more surprising their will to restrict this form of obtaining visas while they offer retired Europeans a residence permit where the main requirement is they should "only" send to Brazil a minimum monthly pension of R$6,000. That is, at the current exchange rate, €2,500 representing nearly 10 times the base Brazilian salary (and a pension that not many people enjoy today, for example, in southern Europe). It is not understandable to find such strong restrictions on the side of a professional investor visa, for instance, which will mean such a boost to Brazilian economic activity, while they open the door without hesitation to "luxury" retirees that will contribute little to the Brazilian productivity besides some foreign exchange earnings. And what is even less understandable from this attitude is finding, in recent years, residence visas granted through successive amnesties to foreigners that had long been considered illegal and that rarely could be considered as a serious contribution to the productive, social or entrepreneurial core of the biggest Latin American economy.

Despite this nonsense we find lately, people who decided to stay and live here really feel that this is their place to escape from the stressful way we deal every day in Europe. They rarely repent of their decision as it normally came from a balanced and realistic thinking on what will be their new life on this side of the Atlantic. We commented about this issue a few days ago with two Catalan businessmen, settled for more than seven years in a famous tourist spot in the Northeast of Brazil. They believe it is very easy to detect when someone is installed in Brazil with a mistaken idea of ​​what will be his new life. They argue you cannot come to Brazil thinking you will win be earning more money than in their homeland and will enjoy full advantage of the same services and benefits as from the structured life we ​​come. To enjoy this experience it is necessary to mentally adapt to the change. One should know that life here must not move around work. Our patience will undergo an ordeal if we pursue results in an organized and quick manner as that we generally obtain in our country. We must forget about that and find ways to have a job that gives us a means of earning a living and enjoy the day to day life in Brazil, filled with moments of joy, beauty and simplicity. Being centered, even obsessed, with work and money is not a clever focus in this part of the world and may even be counterproductive to mental health. The hours of effort and tireless dedication here do not guarantee better results because the environment in which we are going to deliver such effort is not going to keep our pace. Better said, it has its own rhythm. The balance point is different and we should value more non-business factors to evaluate whether we will be able to adapt to this new and different way of life.

If you manage to find that balance, very different from what we have experienced and developed over our years of working life in the "Old World", we will adapt smoothly to the new rhythm and we will hardly get out of here. If, as it happens to many of us, we still need to tackle and face life with a different speed, always having the feeling that something is missing in our current day to day in Brazil, we will have to return to our place of origin or fetch a new "adventure". Yes, we'll get in the backpack the memories and experience gained in this continent as special and magnetic as Brazil is. We will have gained wisdom to appreciate the best each world offers to us and we will enjoy them without doubts or prejudices.