Country in Review: Brazil

[Mr. TM]

Capital City: Brasilia
Population: 191,000,000
President: Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva

Thought this would be an interesting topic for my second edition of my country in review. First one didn't spark much debate, so maybe Brazil will. I just was watching City of God the other day, so it inspired me to choose Brazil next.

Brazillians play soccer. Quite well from what I hear. Something of a big time thing there. Reason? What else is there for a street kid to do. Brazil is filled with people living in poverty. In fact, they had to move their capital to get away from the poverty for their national image. As in many South American nations, the country has its drug and corruption issues.

The country has the worlds largest river in terms of capacity, the Amazon. As it falls in the clime which promotes rainfall, it also has the greatest rain forest on earth. But quickly, is is being cut down, the wood sold for profit, and the land used for their big export of grazing and raising cows. Its a shame that one of the most important parts of Earth is going to be destroyed to feed people cheeseburgers.

Brazil is a country that speaks Portuguese. Everyone who knows their history (I know my Spanish friend Marquis knows) why. Kind of a rip off for the Portugese, as the lands of the New World were split into two, at a point which was estimated to be the midpoint of the New World. One half would go to Catholic Spain, and the other half to Catholic Portugal. Portugal's halw would become Brazil. We can discuss this if you are interested.

And any other topics that you know of about Brazil. Its a country rich in history, and hot girls on beaches, who trick Americans to cut them up for organs, or so certain Hollywood movies tell me.

 

[Mantaur Rodeo Clown]

The actual secret is, that the Portuguese were bullshitting the entire world the whole time. Although Christopher Colombus is praised with "discovering the new world", the Portuguese had already sailed down the West Coast of Africa to India. Sea currents would have obviously taken them west to The Americas. In order to not give away their advantage, they probably kept it secret to everyone.

So when the Pope decided to draw up the Treaty of Tordesillas, and as TM put, split the world down the middle, with a line drawn in the Atlantic Ocean, the Portuguese weren't too pleased. They knew how valuable the New World was, even though the Spanish weren't aware of its existence (they thought past that ocean was India and that the world was much smaller).

So they asked if the pope could just extend that line a little bit further west. A little bit further west, and then the boundary would mark that Brazil would be in Portuguese territory. Territory that wasn't supposed to exist. How would the Portuguese have know to extend the boundary? Because they knew about The New World beforehand. This got their foot in the door and onto Brazil, whereas Spain got the rest of the Continent. Thats why most of the South American Continent speaks Spanish, whereas Brazil, the most Eastern part, speaks Portuguese.

Fuck me, History.