Mugged by the Last Mile

A Brazilian friend who has lived in the UK and US and like (almost) all such people feels disappointed on returning to his homeland, is leaving Sao Paulo today to take up a new job with a US-based company. Aged 29, he knows he must spend some of his most productive and energetic years working for a foreign company in order to get some respect back home and thereby ascend the career ladder much more swiftly than would otherwise have been possible - poor thing, he doesn't have family connections in the elite ranks of commerce and government. His forced action is another slap in the face for "booming Brazil".

Anyway, he kindly gave us his bed (In London it would have been a classic Freecycle item), for which generosity I had to pay the ever-present parasitical middle man, in this instance a delivery van (or so I presumed). Fee of R$ 150 (roughly £57) for a drive across town. As ever, we were told this was a big discount on the usual rate. Brazil is swimming in oil and alternative fuels like ethanol but that counts for nothing when it comes to the consumer. Just think what this country could achieve by making transport much more affordable.

When the bed arrived, I was met by the sight of a crappy old truck, which apart from the driver's cabin was totally exposed to the elements. Since it's been raining again, that was not good. The bed was covered by a couple of dodgy-looking sheets. And of course I was expected to help drag the bed up the two flights of stairs to our apartment. The bed itself, when finally installed, seems okay-ish but with legs that don't rest evenly on the floor. Made in Brazil.

I enjoyed making a scene with the delivery man because confrontation is much-needed here to widen people's horizons and make them aware that with a high price should at the very least go a commensurate service. It's interesting to see this producing some stirrings of anger - in this case he turned to a guy nearby and did the "he's nuts" gesture, while telling me he could leave now because he's got other places to be. Any reaction is better than no reaction, at least he was thinking outside of his bovine, non-confrontational comfort zone.

Before I came to Brazil I was warned about the muggers. Thankfully, I've not yet had the pleasure of those kind of overtly criminal interactions. What I wasn't warned about were the daily muggings, the covertly criminal, which are sewn into the fabric of almost every expenditure in today's Brazil. These have been infinitely more dangerous to health and wealth.