Driving in Brazil
The roads

August 20th 2005






Rant Alert!

 Ok, let's start with the roads. I can only talk for Sao Paulo, that's where I do most of my driving. And how can I put this charitably.....?

The roads are awful. Potholes, bumps, the occasional cobbled street just when you do not expect it. It adds up to a truly vibrational driving experience. God help you if you have back problems, because these roads will shake you up.  
Buy a tank if you can. If can't , get something with the best suspension you can. You'll need it.
Perhaps the people who build the roads have a financial interest in the garages that repair clapped out suspension.

When the rains come, and they can come sudden and heavy, some nasty jagged holes can open up. These will shred your tyres unless you are very careful.
They will get repaired within a couple of weeks, the preferred method being to fill them up with tar until it is level with the rest of the road, and then to pour the left over tar on top so everyone can see the hole has been repaired.

The sleeping policemen are vicious and can turn up anywhere. Proceed with care. You may get a warning or a notice at the side of the road, saying 'Lombadas' (more poetic that the term sleeping policemen), but this is quite likely to be obscured by vegetation or a shop sign. They are often called traffic calming measures.
Ridiculous! Traffic can't be calmed. I hate it when they anthropomorphize traffic...traffic has no feelings... drivers on the other hand do have feelings. They would be better called 'Driver anger measures'. Id there a  correlation between the sleeping policemen and  'Road Rage?' Who knows.

That being said, the main avenues are usually OK, but it does depend on the borough. Most motorways are also OK.
The best way to get around is by car, as the metro does not cover very much of the city, so there is lots of traffic. Lanes tend to be narrower than in Europe, probably because Latin people  have a closer comfort zone than Europeans. if you try to keep a South American at 'arm's length' you will have to back away constantly. This rule for personal space seems to go for the driving lanes as well
It also applies to the space between cars front and back. Cars will be closer on your tail than Europe.

Driving in Brazil is very different to driving in Europe, but more of that anon....

 
Buying a Car...

August 30th 2005
Today we went to look at cars to buy.

Plenty of showrooms - we visited Citroen, (but the French can't make decent cars), Honda, Toyota, Hyundai (don' t they do 'My little pony'?) and Audi (the Germans certainly know how to make cars).

Cars are expensive in Brazil.
So expensive, I think they fly them over one at a time in Executive class of BA. Strangely enough, hardly any cars have sunroofs (or is it sunrooves?...). Apparently Brazilians don't seem to like sunroofs. Maybe because they always have sun. In Europe you can't count on the sun, so as soon as it comes out and you are in a car, you want to open the sun roof to get the benefit. If you wait until your journey is over, the sun may have gone in. In Brazil the sun will still be there when you get out, so why bother with a sun roof? Also they will mess up your carefully set air conditioning.

Car salesmen dress in jeans, sneakers and T shirts. the only way you can tell who they are is because they wear an ID card with their name and picture hanging around their neck. In the middle range car showrooms, the salespeople have a corporate uniform of jeans and T shirt in corporate colours.

In the really expensive car showrooms they wear jeans and T shirt and not even a ID card around the neck.
Don't try to steal a car in Brazil - at least not an expensive one.
In the expensive showrooms, they have  armed guards in paramilitary uniforms standing behind the desk. I guess they keeps tabs on who are the salesmen and who are not. It surprised me to see a gun in a car salesroom. Maybe not, they are quintessessential boys toys. There is a lot of expensive stuff there, and where there is expensive stuff, that is where thieves are attracted....

What did we buy? Ah, we are still deciding, so mein freunden e nakamas, we still have some test drives to do, so tell you later....
Still trying to buy a car...

September 3rd 2005
The title says it all.
Having settled for a Toyota, we are now faced with a fiendishly difficult financial puzzle.
The 2006 model will be out in a month. This will cost about 4% more than the 2005 model we wanted to buy.
But it will count one year newer in terms of depreciation if we want to resell, even if in truth it is only a month older. ...

So after juggling depreciation rates, discounts, budgets, and how many casually dressed car salespeople, it would take to sell three cars in two days... we gave up and went and had a chopp. 
That's a beer, not a  martial arts move.

Everybody has cars. Most people have two. (In case the main one is pointing in the wrong direction?)
No jokes aside for a moment, everyone needs a car in Sao Paulo, there is a underground Metro of sorts, there is a good bus service, but the buses are always full. The roads are completely crowded, the only way to get anywhere is by car, so everyone has a car, so the roads are crowded so.... Well I give up.

There are so many cars that the Ministry of Transport...

Have you noticed how Government departments are always call by the opposite of what they really do? the ministry of employment deals with unemployment. the Ministry of Transport deals with nose to tail traffic that isn't transporting anything. the M9nistry of Defence deals with... well you get the idea.

Back to the plot...

....has instituted a Rodizio. This means that you cannot drive in the rush hours on one day of the week. The day you cannot drive depends on the last number in your car license. So if you only have one car, there will be one day when you can't get to work, so it's a good idea to get another car, otherwise you can't get to work. And the traffic is terrible. If only all those other people who don't really need cars would go by bus....

Oh, and then you have to buy a car for your son or daughter, otherwise how will they get around? You will be a perpetual taxi service. So three car families are common, and you don't have to be rich to have three cars.

It's very hard to get a driving license for a foreigner.
I had to have a proper authorized copy of my driving license made up a properly qualified translator. I have to submit authenticated copies of all my documents, Passport, Brazilian bank cards, Collar measurements and favourite music and then they might give a driving license for a year.

Brazilians are....interesting drivers. they have some ...remarkable habits...but that must be the subject of another post.
Just a hint. Don't even think about driving in Brazil unless you can drive around Hyde Park Corner a sixty in rush hour. If you are intimidated by buses, forget it...

 
                        
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