Any Travels

Brazil shares a border with almost every other country in South America, only Chile and Ecuador are untouched, and covers almost half the continent. It is the fifth largest country in the world, behind Russia, Canada, China, and the U.S.A., with an area of eight and a half million square kilometers.

Despite its vast expanse of territory, Brazil's population is concentrated in the major cities of its coast. The urban sprawls of Rio de Janeiro and Sao Paulo dominate the southern coast. Further north, towns such as Salvador and Jo?o Pessoa retain the colonial atmosphere of the early Portuguese settlers. The great interior, much of which is covered by the rainforest basin of the Amazon, remains sparsely settled.

Almost half of Brazil's territory is covered by the basin of the Amazon River and its tributaries, a region that is one of the world's largest rainforest ecologies. Unfortunately, a substantial proportion of this area has suffered the effects of modernization in recent years. From the Amazon's mouth on the Pacific to Manaus, the region's bustling main city, the river is heavily traveled, and wildlife is scarce. Away from the cities and the main course of the Amazon, however, smaller tributaries lead past unspoiled habitat and traditional villages.

South of the Amazon region, the country's interior is dominated by the Brazilian Shield, an expansive bedrock flat that is slowly falling victim to the elements. The Mato Grosso, a smooth, grassy plain in Brazil's center, slowly gives way to the Planalto, a low-rise plateau that extends across the central and western regions. In the far west, along the border with Paraguay and Bolivia, is the Pantanal, one of the most extensive swamplands in the world.

Brazil's winter lasts from June to August, with temperatures between 13 and 18C, but it only gets really cold south of Rio. Summer is from December to February, a period frequently bringing stifling humidity to the far south. Brief rain showers are common, given Brazil's tropical climate, but the dry interior has only a few months of heavy rainfall a year. Of course, the Amazon Basin is the wettest area, with damp, moist temperatures averaging 27C.

Brazilian culture has been shaped not only by the Portuguese, who gave the country its most common religion and language, but also by the country's native Indians, the considerable African population, and other settlers from Europe, the Middle East and Asia. The result involves fascinating music, earthy writers, and damn tasty food.

Among Brazil's writers of fiction, Machado de Assis stands out with his terse, ironic style. The son of a freed slave, Assis worked as a typesetter and journalist in 19th-century Rio. Brazil's most famous 20th-century writer is the regionalist Jorge Amado, whose tales are colorful romances of Bahia's people and places.

The staples of the Brazilian diet are arroz (white rice), feijao (black beans) and farinha (manioc flour), usually combined with steak, chicken or fish. Brazilian specialties include moqueca, a seafood stew flavored with dende oil and coconut milk; caruru, okra and other vegetables mixed with shrimp, onions and peppers; and feijoada, a bean and meat stew. On many street corners in Bahia, women wearing flowing white dresses sell acaraje, beans mashed in salt and onions, fried in dende oil and then filled with seafood, manioc paste, dried shrimp, pepper and tomato sauce.

Brazilian music has always been characterized by great diversity and, shaped by musical influences from three continents, is still developing new and original forms. The samba, which reached the height of popularity in the 1930s, is a mixture of Spanish bolero with the cadences and rhythms of African music. Its most famous exponent was probably Carmen Miranda, known for her fiery temperament and fruity headdresses. The more subdued bossa nova, popular in the 1950s and characterized by songs such as 'The Girl from Ipanema', was influenced by North American jazz. Tropicalismo is a mix of musical influences that arrived in Brazil in the 1960s and led a more electric samba. More recently, the lambada, influenced by Caribbean rhythms, became internationally popular in the 1980s.

Events
Although there are festivals taking place all year round in Brazil, the country's most famous event is Carnaval, which lasts for five days from the Friday to the Tuesday immediately preceding Ash Wednesday. It is celebrated all over Brazil and there are more authentic versions than the glitzy tourist drawcard held in Rio; but Rio's is a fantastic spectacle nonetheless. In its sambodromo, a tiered street designed for samba parades, there is a frenzy of sweat, sequins, noise and mayhem as the 16 top samba schools each have their hour of glory.