UPDATE - Lottery Winner's Wife Arrested

Last week I wrote about René Senna, the 54 year-old man who had won R$56 million reais in the Mega Sena lottery back in 2005. He was murdered while drinking a beer at a local bar in his city.

Yesterday his 29 year-old wife, Adriana Almeira was arrested for the crime. She is being held without bail. Evidence was also shown proving that she was cheating on her double-amputee husband.



If convicted, Almeira would probably get the maximum sentence of 20 years in jail and be out in eight years. I will update more as the story unfolds.

Don't Ask Me

We had been living in this house for a few weeks when we heard a dog howling. I looked out the window and saw this scene:

I had to do a double-take. Thankfully my camera was close by. Here's a closeup:

To this day, I can't figure out how the dog got up there unless some mean kid did it. There is no way he could climb up there. I looked out a few minutes later and it was gone. There were no splat marks near the house that I could see so someone must have helped him down.

I've felt like this poor guy a few times in my life. In a position where there is no way up and you're afraid to go down. I guess we all need help now and then.

A Rose By Any Other Name...

I thought I had gotten used to things having strange names in Brazil and seeing confusing product names. We once lived in a city that had a stationary store called "Sniff". I talked to the owner and asked him why he named it that. He said he liked the way the word sounded.

I thought I had seen it all until Saturday when we stopped into our local Angeloni grocery store to pick up a few items. While Marilze was shopping, I just started wandering around, as I usually do, trying to find some decent junk food. I was walking by the frozen foods when I looked up and saw this can:

Sucky brand orange juice. I just start cracking up in the store. Who was the marketing genius who came up with this name? Did no one do any product research? Are they thinking of exporting it to the US?

To be fair, the word for juice is suco (pronounced soo-coe) and this product would be pronounced sookie but man, what a bad choice for a name.

When we lived in Goias there was an offbrand of Koolaid there called "Suks". I wished I had one of the packets but I only tried it once and the only thing I can say about it is at least they were honest about their product when they named it.

Tchau Lissa!

Our niece, Lissa, is on her way home to São José do Rio Preto SP after spending almost a month with us. Marilze and I got up at 5am to take her to the bus station. Her bus was supposed to arrive at 6 am but it was almost an hour late. Actually, buses usually arrive on time so this was unexpected.

Lissa (pronounced like "Lisa" in English) is a really sweet young lady and she has been a real joy to have around the house. She has about a 13 hour bus ride ahead of her but it was a super nice bus. The seats reclined back like a Lazyboy. They handed out pillows and blankets, just like on an airplane and they even had an "in-flight" type magazine for the passengers. We miss her already and pray she has a safe trip home.

Saudade Lissa. Volte logo. (We miss you Lissa. Come back soon)

Thank you Treo

Last night Marilze asked me to go for a walk with her down by the beach. I grabbed my camera and cellphone and we headed out. We got there just as the sun was going down. I grabbed by Konica-Minolta DIMAGE Z5 and got ready to take some pictures.

Now this camera was trashed by a lot of reviewers when it first came out and I've had to send it back to the factory one because the auto-focus quit working. But other than that I have been more than pleased with it.

As I get ready to take my first shot, an alarm on my camera goes off. Then the screen shows that there is no memory card. I had been copying pictures from the SD card earlier and I forgot to put it back in the camera.

I was packing it up when I suddenly realized that I had my cellphone with me. My Treo 650 and it had a PNY 2 gig SD card sitting in it's memory slot.

I took the SD card out as quickly as possible, which was quite a job because of its second skin case.

Now usually this memory card is loaded with a movie or some TV shows that I watch when standing in line at the bank, post office, lottery house, any government office, etc. When I lived in Nashville I got upset if there were three or four people ahead of me. Now as soon as I see the line I have to determine if I will be there waiting enough time to watch an episode of Newhart or Stargate.

I had about 400 meg free on the card so I took about 140 pics. I have always loved my Treo but this just made me love it more. Here is an example of what I would have missed if not for my Treo. You can see more on my Flickr site.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/westnashvillegringo

A Little Sightseeing

Yesterday we took our niece Lissa on a little sightseeing trip around town. First we went to Morro de Careca (Bald Hill). It's a strange sensation when you get there. You feel like you are on top of the world and the view is breathtaking. Here is a photo I took of Balneário from the hill. You can see Praia dos Amores (Lover's Beach) in the foreground.

Here is a picture of Lissa and Anna that I took while on the hill.

From the other side of the hill you can get a great view of Praia Brava (Angry Beach)

We had a great time and I took about 250 pictures. The best ones are on my Flickr site.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/westnashvillegringo

My Ocean View

Moving to the south of Brazil was a real experience. After living almost 10 years in cattle country and having never lived anywhere near the beach, I was a little unsure of the move. Add to the fact that I get sunburned in the shade and you can understand my apprehension.

But one of the joys I have found of living on the coast is being able to see the ocean. Thankfully I have an ocean view from my office balcony. Let me share it with you. Here it is.

OK, I know it's kinda hard to see. And it's obstructed. Let me point it out to you.

Alright. It's more obstructed than a seat at Wrigley field but it is my view. It would be a lot better except for this main obstruction.

You can see from this zoomed in photo how this electrical pole blocks me from having a better view. It is aggravating but I have found a way around it. If I lean way over the edge, I get a view more like this:

To be honest, I only leaned over the railing to take this photo cause I'm not too keen on falling three stories.

I know it's not much of a view but I do enjoy looking at it from time to time during the day. Sure beats looking out your window and seeing Tidwell Tires.

It Doesn't Pay To Play

Over the past week or so I have been ragging on the lottery here in Brazil as well as people who play. Actually my rants have been about the people who stand in long lines in order to play.

René Senna was one of those people. This 54 year-old farm worker from the little town of Rio Bonito RJ, stood in line back in 2005, wrote down six numbers and won R$56 million reais (about US$25,000,000).

He was overjoyed. He bought the biggest farm in the city (R$9 million), shacked up with a 29 year-old hairdresser and her three kids from two previous marriages and then proceeded to live his life as he had before. Work a little during the day and then visit a local watering hole to drink and talk with his buddies.

Hole is the right word. This place would make Virginia's Tavern (that used to be where White Castle is now on Charlotte Pike) look like the Wild Horse Saloon. Here's a guy worth more than his entire city and he's throwing back cold ones in a dirt road beer joint. Go figure.

Anyway, a couple of weeks ago, he's relaxing, nursing a Kaiser (our version of Old Milwaukee) when a fight breaks out and René ends up dead. No witnesses. No one else injured.

This just days after his young wife, Adriana Almeira, had moved out of their home and he threatened to divorce her. Rumors were also floating around that she was having an affair with one of his six body guards, none of which were around at the time of the shooting.

René's 20 year-old daughter, Renata, has been the most vocal. She has requested a full investigation into her step-mother's love life trying to prove her affair and her motive for murder.

The widow, on the other hand, is demanding that Renata take a DNA test and has stated that René believed that Renata wasn't actually his own flesh and blood but the result of an illicit affair between his first wife and another man.

When the widow was brought in for questioning, a lynch mob surrounded the police station demanding justice for their fallen friend. I guess they were upset that no one was going to be around to pick up future bar tabs.

The crowd was dispersed after officers fired a pistol several times in the air and the sprayed the crowd with pepper spray. Two cars were destroyed in the melee.

OK, so René had a pocketful of cash but not too much sense. I guess money can buy you love and happiness but not brain cells.

A Childhood Dream Come True

I grew up reading comics. Lots of comics. Thousands of comics. Most of them are stored in boxes in my sister's attic. As a kid I dreamed of a TV show that would show my heroes weekly. I guess I wasn't the only one.

I've watched just about every comic turned TV show or movie. Even the bad stuff. Thankfully in the last few years, it has mainly been good. Last week Smallville took a huge step forward to becoming one of the best.

Smallville is a huge hit here in Brazil. It is one of the most popular shows on television. I constantly have people ask me if there really is a city named Smallville in the US.

I've been watching Smallville from the beginning, all the while wishing they could get over the teen angst of Clark and Lana and move on to the Superman saga. They did even better than that last Thursday night.

Flash. Green Arrow. Aquaman. Cyborg. Superman. The Justice League.

Now I know what you're thinking. Why in the world would a 43 year-old man want to watch a show about superheroes? I wish I could think of something cool to say but I can't. These are simply the shows I wanted to watch when I was 12 but they didn't exist.

I guess I'm not alone since Heroes (my new favorite show this season) is a huge hit. I guess there are a lot of us out there who have dreamed of this kind of TV program only to have to settle for another version of Law and Order or CSI.

My thanks to NBC and CW for bringing us this type of programming. Please produce more. There are more than kids watching.

I Wish I Would Have Stayed Awake

I can't believe I missed the comeback.

Like many UT fans, I automatically started following the Colts when they drafted Peyton Manning. Never really cared for them before. I liked Johnny U as a kid but not much more than that.

Now no one player, not even Manning, could take away my allegiance to the Skins but still I follow his stats more than any other player. He just makes the game of football fun.

Last night must have been a lot of fun but I missed it. I fell asleep.

There are two main reasons for that. One, the game didn't start here until 10pm. The second is that I was on pain medication for my back -- the reason I didn't post anything yesterday.

In the second quarter, right after Asante Samuel's interception-turned-touchdown and a score of 21-3, my eyes started getting heavy. I couldn't resist. I wanted to watch but I drifted off.

Now I wish I would have stuck needles in my arm to stay awake. One of the greatest comebacks in NFL playoff history and I was snoozing.

Now Manning and his Colts are headed to the Show to meet the Bears. There is no way I'm going to sleep through that.

Congrats to Peyton, Tony Dungy and the rest of the Colts. You guys deserve it.

Man To Swim The Amazon

Martink Strel is a marathon swimmer. Actually, he is an insane marathon swimmer. He swam the entire Danube, then the Mississippi, then the Yangtze and now he is going to take on the Amazon. World's longest river. Three-thousand three-hundred and seventy-five miles.

This 52 year-old man is going to try to achieve this feat in 70 days, swimming an average of 11-12 hours a day. He heads out from the jungle settlement in Atalaya Peru on the first of February and plans to enter the Atlantic Ocean on April 11th.

What does he plan on doing about the caiman crocodiles and piranhas? He will have a staff on board an accompanying boat that will through buckets of blood into the river to attract the piranhas and any other flesh eating fish away from Strel.

Worse than that is the dreaded Candiru or toothpick fish. Known as the "vampire fish of Brazil".

The candiru is attracted by urine. Someone swimming 11-12 hours a day might have to do that. Once attracted, the candiru swim for body orifices where it enters and attaches itself inside the body using spiny bones that cover it's body. There it remains as a parasite feeding on its host. It is the only know human parasite that is a vertebrate. (I'm getting dizzy thinking about it)

Knowing all this, Strel moves forward. His website will have live video feeds from the Amazon. I personally think he's nuts but more power to him. I hope he makes it. And I hope he does it parasite-free.

http://www.amazonswim.com/

Observations from my balcony Pt 1

I am fortunate enough to have a balcony off the side of my home office. During the day I will get up several times and walk outside to look around a bit. I can see the ocean, although it is an obstructed view, but it gives me time to think and relax before returning to work.

The other day as I was standing there looking over my neighborhood, it struck me how many satellite dishes I saw. I mean, there were a lot of them.

With the advent of DirecTV and digital cable, most large dishes in the US have been relegated to Dickerson Road type trailer parks. Not so in Brazil.

We have two pay satellite services, DirecTV and Sky, who have recently merged into one. Many people opt for one of these instead of cable because there are more channels.

But regular satellite service is different. You pay no monthly fee. You just buy a dish and receiver (about US$150), set them up and you get 18 channels for free. Forever.

This happened because there are many regions of the country where there is no reception because there are not enough transmitter towers. So they developed a co-op satellite system with the networks to provide basic programing via satellite to the whole country.

Here in Balneário Camboriú, which is one of the most modern cities in Brazil, we can't pick up any broadcast channel well, including the powerhouse network Globo so most of my neighbors have opted for a dish. Here is the proof. All of these photos were taken from my balcony.

This one is mine. You can see many more dishes that I can see from my balcony at my Flickr site. From time to time, I'll be updating and adding more dish photos.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/westnashvillegringo/sets/72157594480671078/

Hanging out the laundry

I was driving home from Rogerio's house when I decided to turn down a street I normally never use. It was one of those inspiring moments a blogger lives for.

Last week I wrote about how most Brazilians won't use a dryer. In a city with hundreds of thousands of tourists, there isn't always a good place to hang your clothes so they improvise. Here is the jewel I found.

I don't know who these people are or where they got this flag from but I was so shocked I nearly ran off the road. At first I thought it was a beach towel but it was really a flag. I'd love to know the story behind this one.

Quiet day at the Beach

As I have mentioned in other posts, this is now our tourist season. Our city has a population of about 40,000 and it is an awesome place to live. We have one of the most beautiful beaches in the world, we are 20 minutes away from the largest amusement part in South America and it's considered to be in the top three cities in Brazil for restaurants.

After living in much more rural areas, moving to a modern city like this one has been a true culture shock. We've felt at times like we had moved to another country.

But for three months out of the year, people from all over South America pour into our town. Everyone kept telling us this was coming but nothing could prepare us for actually living through it. Right now there are about a half a million tourists here. You can't get near a grocery store, restaurants are packed and traffic is a nightmare. A drive that normally takes 5 minutes now takes up to 45 minutes.

Double-click on this picture and you can see how many people you can actually cram on the beach.

Now I don't like crowds. I don't like feeling crowded. I can't imagine sitting in the middle of this mass of sweaty humanity. Doesn't seem like fun or a vacation to me. I can think of a whole lot of other things I would prefer to be doing.

The tourists will be here for about another 6 weeks or so. We are learning to deal with it. Soon we'll have it all to ourselves again. No matter what, it beats Hermitage Landing any day of the week.

Check out my new photos from Balneário at my Flickr page:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/westnashvillegringo/

I guess I shouldn't have run my mouth

This is me. Its 9:17 am and as you can see, I am not very happy. I have been forced by the powers that be to go to a lottery house. Why?

Because Celesc, our electric company, has nothing better to do than to make us try to figure out each month where we can pay our phone bills.

Normally you pay your bills in a bank. Most of the time you can set them up for automatic deposit. But not in Balneário Camboriú. Each month is a cat and mouse game trying to figure out where you can pay your bill.

Some months you can pay at your bank. Most of the time you can pay at your local grocery store, except for right now, with over a half a million tourists in the city, they've decided that the only place they will allow you to give them money is at a lottery station.

Thankfully I had my Treo in my pocket and was able to take this shot of my view from the end of the line. I counted 17 people ahead of me, all with dreams of hitting the number and making it rich.


To be fair, about half of these people were in the same situation as me. Poor slobs just wanting to make sure their lights stay on, but almost every one took advantage of the situation and decided to play.

Finally, at 9:36 I hold the fruit of my fruitless labor in my hands. My reciept for $277.05 reias (about US$130). The line moved faster than I expected but it was still frustrating.

And I didn't play the lotto. If it had been Powerball I probably would have but the Mega Sena pot is still too small to get me excited enough to play. Plus I keep thinking about that fool and his money thing.

Just to prove a point

This afternoon we had to go to the bank and then pick up a few things downtown. When I saw this, I was thankful that I was carrying my Bushnell Digital Camera with me.

This more than proves my point that these people are addicted to the Lotto. First off it's 3pm on a Monday afternoon and it's about a 100 degrees in the shade, much less standing out in the sun. Second, the drawing isn't until Wednesday night so these people are trying to get an early jump on buying their tickets (don't these people have jobs?)

But most important, someone won last week so the total is only 17 million reias (about $7.5 million US dollars). Now I know that will buy a lot of beans and rice but let's be serious. I ain't standing in that line unless the pot breaks 100 million. And even then I'd only be doing it to make my wife happy.

Can you imagine what would happen if we had Powerball here?

I Knew This Day Was Coming....

A little over 17 years ago, when I found out that my first child was a baby girl, I knew that someday some boy was going to start hanging around too much and made a nuisance of himself. That day has come.

Rodrigo actually started his pursuit of my little girl while I was out of the country (I have to give him props on that - smart move on his part). But he did man up and ask permission to date her when I got home. This past Saturday night, he took it a step further.

Since he is still breathing and has no gaping wounds in his body, you can understand that this doesn't mean what you think it means. This is the Brazilian version of going steady. Instead of giving your girl your Cohn High School class ring, you both wear what appear to be wedding bands on your right hand. I see it as Rodrigo trying to mark his territory but that's ok by me because that just means I only have to keep my eye on one of these rascals.

I guess that Rodrigo is a good enough kid. He's a hard worker and helps support his family. He's very involved in our church. He is a gaucho, which is someone from the state of Rio Grande do Sul, the state right below us. I guess the best thing I can say about him is that he's not from Fairview.

Still doesn't settle too well with me though...

A Day At The Beach

Living in Balneário Camboriú, we’ve gotten pretty used to going to the beach. Our house is only two blocks away but everyone wanted to spend Saturday at the beach so we packed up some stuff and headed to the next city down the road, Itapema.

You might as why we would do that if we had a beach so close by. The answer is simple. More than 700,000 Argentineans, Paraguayans, Uruguayans and Brazilians. This is one of the most popular tourist cities in Brazil and the beaches are simply packed. It’s hard to see the sand for all the umbrellas.

Ilhotas Beach in Itapema is another story. As you can see in this photo, it has not yet been discovered by tourists.

The sand runs along about a mile stretch before ending in a giant rock formation.

As the surf comes crashing in, it produces some spectacular spray

You can see more of my photos from Itapema at my Flickr site.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/westnashvillegringo/

I guess having your own TV show isn't enough...

We spent the day at the beach today. I'll post pictures and comments tomorrow. In the meantime, thought you might get a kick out of this. This week Germany announced the opening of the Sponge Bob Amusment Park. Not to be out done, right here in Balneário Camboriú we've got our own Sponge Bob's car wash. And Bob ain't cheap either. I'd let them was my car as long as they'd promise to sing the goofy goober song while they did it.


UPDATE: I was looking over the blog when I realized something. Right below the phone number is a sign that says "Attention" and then has a crossed "E". That means "no parking" (não estacione). Course there is a parked car right in front of it. Evidence of a common saying here: There are no laws in Brazil, only suggestions...

The Brazilian Way of Life Part 1

This morning I got up and and it was raining. That was no surprise. We are in the middle of our rainy season and it had been raining all night. Yesterday afternoon while the sun was out, Marilze (my old lady), hung out clothes to dry on the line. We didn't get home til after midnight and by then it had already been raining several hours.

So all of these clothes ended up hanging out all night in the pouring rain. You might wonder why, especially if were to turn slightly to the right and see this:

Our brand new Brastemp electric dryer that my parents gave us for Christmas. It's not a Whirlpool from Allen & Bean but it's the best Brazil has to offer. Why is it sitting there not being used? Because it uses too much electricity. Marilze says she will only use it when necessary.


While we grew up in a land and time of cheap energy, my wife grew up with hyperinflation. There were several years where the inflation rate was 100,000% a year. That would mean that prices doubled every two or three days. There were wage increases but they were monthly and didn't keep up with rising prices.


Just to show you how pervasive this way of thinking is, I don't know anyone who has a dryer except us. Of course that's not a question I normally ask people but I've never seen one in somebody else's house and I always see their unmentionables hanging on their clotheslines. Because dryers use too much electricity.


Maybe one day I can get her to splurge and do a load a two. I keep telling her she should live a little. She does put the towels in the dryer. After 11 years drying on the clothesline, they were all stiff as a board but now they're soft as can be. I guess that's her version the good life.

Brazilian Home Cooking

One of the best things about living in Brazil is the food and last night, Miriam Soares, my business partner's wife, invited us over for some homemade caldo de feijão or bean stew.

Now I know that doesn't sound nearly as appetizing as white beans and cornbread from Wendall Smith's but let me tell you, this is some good eating. Miriam is from the centro-oeste or midwest region of Brazil where they are known for their cooking. And she is an excellent cook.

Miriam loaded her caldo down with linguiça (sliced sausages) and pork ribs and let it cook for several hours. She served it with chopped green onions, grated cheese, fresh bread and ample amounts of hot sauce.

It´s the morning after now and my digestive system is telling me that I am too old to eat like that at 11:00 PM. It was worth it. And I´ll probably do it again.

Lion Hunt Gone Bad Video

This is the video I mentioned in the YouTube post earlier. I hope this guy had an extra pair of drawers with him.

YouTube.com - BANNED IN BRAZIL

So I guess by now you have heard the uproar over YouTube and how some Brazilian judges wanted to get their names in the paper.

If this is news to you, let me fill you in. Seems that an Brazilian supermodel named Daniela Cicarelli and her banker boyfriend Renato Malzoni went on vacation to Cadiz Spain. Evidently things got a little romantic on the beach and, well, things happened. Now being a supermodel, she should realize that paparazzi would be following her around. Maybe she wanted an audience. I don't know. Don't really care but someone filmed the whole thing and then uploaded on the web.

As with everything salacious on the internet, it went from site to site until YouTube made it famous. Brazilians by the thousands were uploading and watching. Then Ms. Cicarelli got modest. YouTube was making money off her indiscretion and she wanted a piece of it. A suit was filed in a Brazilian court, she claims, by her boyfriend back in September. A Brazilian judge ordered YouTube to remove all copies of the video from their site. They did but more were uploaded. The case now goes before a panel of three judge who will decide whether or not to fine YouTube US$119,000 a day until they install filters that would prevent this video from reappearing.

Remember, this is all taking place in Brazilian courts which have no authority in the US and can't do a cotton-pickin' thing to make YouTube pay up. Evidently they were feeling a little frustrated so on Tuesday, they shut down any access to YouTube for the entire country. I know that's not nearly as heartbreaking as when they tore down the BelAir Drive In but I was trying to watch a video of a lion hunt gone wrong and was shut out because of these bureaucrats.

Thankfully, a few hours later, Supreme Court Justice Enio Santarelli decided he wanted his name in the papers as well and lifted the ban. Freedom returned to South America.

Now I know that many a West Nashvillian has done what Ms. Cicarelli and Mr. Malzone did, albeit probably at Collins Lake or off Annex down by the ferryboat, instead of Cadiz Spain. Thankfully there is no known video footage of such escapades presently on YouTube. They'd probably have to pay us US$119,000 to watch.

Lotto Mania Brasileira

One thing I have learned since moving to Brazil is that Brazilians love the lottery. Love it may be putting it mild. Obsessed. Yeah that sounds more like it. I mean they like it so much that they had to invent jogo do bicho so that people who could play the lottery not by choosing numbers but by choosing one of 25 different animals.

When we lived up north in Goias, you would see a people standing in line at the licensed lottery houses, called lotericas (the only place where you can legally purchase lottery tickets) waiting to buy their chance at a better future. Sometimes 5 or maybe 10. More than at Charlotte Park Market but really not that many. Some of them weren't even playing the lotto because you can also pay many of your bills there. Occasionally the local governments like to play games with you and make you pay your light or water bill there as well. For only one month. That usually entails an hour or two wait in line -- a pastime that Brazilians seem to love even more than playing the lottery. I'll talk about paying bills in Brazil in another rant soon.
Anyway, after moving even further south to Santa Catarina, we have found that people in this state take the lotto seriously. Very seriously. They have incorporated their two favorite pastimes into an artform. Yesterday the Mega Sena (our version of Powerball) hit 50,000,000 reias (about US$22,000,000). We headed to our local Angeloni Supermarket which also has a lotérica in the store. I was anticipating some serious lines. I wasn't disappointed. Here is the evidence thanks to my Treo. This is the front of the lotérica. You can see about 10 or so in line. Not too unusual.

This is moving around to the front door. It´s Powerball-fever, Brazilian style. No big deal.

Moving around you can see that the line moves out to the front of the store. This is no bigger than your average line at the bank. Still nothing worthy of a post.

Walking out the front door I see the line has snaked out of the building and up the handicap ramp into the store. Now we are talking some serious lottery players. Getting at the end of this line means probably losing your job and needing to hit just to pay rent.

I took this last one from the upper handicap ramp just to show how much the Catarinense (people from Santa Catarina) love to stand in line and believe they are going to win it big.

BTW, somebody in São João da Barra, RJ played 15,17,23,33,39 and 49 and won 52 million reias. Guess he picked the right day to stand in line.