FROM THE BRAZILIAN PARADOX

In my wanderings around the world, I never found a people talking bad about themselves like us, Brazilians. Impressive. And these days, on the eve of the elections, this self-criticism becomes an anguish turbocharged by all digital and other media, a hopelessness, an apathy and a directionless country. Everything is bad, nothing interests me, I don't want to know.

Suddenly, a Brazil comes to mind, with the same z, that was presented to me and still comes to me today, different. Not without defects or prospects for improvement, but an admired, respected country. It starts with the people. I've never heard a gringo say that Brazilian is not polite, friendly, helpful. Of course, in your own way, because Brazilian is not Prussian, but is Brazilian. I just see the carnival, where a few thousand people gather in the parades of samba schools, using more advanced technologies, but with unparalleled music, visual and rhythm. And with an incomparable discipline, organization, beauty. Not even royal guards of the King of England are so disciplined, organized and do not have the beauty of our samba schools. And the carnival in Pernambuco, Bahia, blocks in Belo Horizonte, millions of people, in an organization of envy.

Brazilian culture is the standard of Brazilianness. Music, from Villa Lobos, in the classic, to Chico Buarque, Sérgio Mendes, Bossa Nova, Carmen Miranda, Gilberto Gil and more and more. Grave. Body in the dance. Literature, Jorge Amado, Clarice Lispector, Paulo Coelho. Fine arts such as Segall, Tarsila de Amaral, Portinari, Vik Muniz, Eduardo Kobra. The lists are endless. Sala São Paulo, a former railway station with the world-famous São Paulo Symphony Orchestra.

The construction of Brasília, with the trio Niemeyer, Lúcio Costa and Burle Marx. They created not a city, but a style, a respected school of architecture and urbanism, as well as Jayme Lerner in Curitiba, is followed around the world.

King Pelé and his football generation, no one forgets! Then, the thing gets a little more complicated, because even if some players continue to be a reference in world football, the country with its team is left behind. But, he advanced in athletics, where the 101-year-old São Silvestre race is a brand. The recent world record holder of 400 m with barriers, Allison dos Santos, nailed the Brazilian flag in the major discipline of athletics. And more medals in Olympic gymnastics, volleyball and even in the Winter Olympic Games.

The first plane was developed by Santos Dumont, but today it has EMBRAER, has the co-founder of MICROSOFT - Severin, KALSHI, forecasting company, Luana Lara, and many more world-class entrepreneurs and entrepreneurs such as JBS, ABN, SUZANO, WEG. Scientists such as Oswaldo Cruz, César Lattes and the Butantã Institute. Community hospitals such as Albert Einstein of the Jewish community or Syrian Lebanese. And without forgetting Inhotim, a world reference in contemporary art.

This and thousands of other examples, of people, facts and acts, are also part of a Brazil that stays. That the people outside, in addition to so many natural beauties of the country, know, respect and admire. In an intimate quiz, you wondering, how much I know of this admired Brazil out there, what would you answer? To your gringo friend?