Yet on another evening (like, say, this evening) if you were to order, say, just ONE of these staples, you’d be tearing the space-time continuum, and the laws of supply and demand, right in two. And like the holy Trinity, the Brazilian Quinity of cheap-ass staple foods can NEVER be divided, or aforementioned laws of the universe will cease to apply.

Case in point – Hot Chips

Hot Chips, when ordered separately, somehow cost more than the entire meal you get them with. I’m talking *caviar wrapped in albino fur seal bacon* expensive, by comparison.

Prato Do Dia - Typical Brazilian meal (includes chips)

Prato Do Dia (Carne) – A decent meal of steak, prok or chicken w/ salad, big portions of sides, with about 1 cup of chips.

Cost: BRL$8.90

Medium-size takeaway container of Hot Chips, solo:

COST: BRL$11.00

This is no isolated event. Three times now I’ve been sent packing for a container of hot chips by a hungover girlfriend, and three times wandered back home from different vendors: dazed, confused and counting my money muttering “Quest-ce que le f&*ck??”.

“Dear Brazilian Prime Minister Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva (“Lula”),

How will you ever pull your country, and countryfolk, out of economic disparation and social inequality if the cornerstone of your economy – the small businesses that sell me ripoff chips – simply don’t understand rational economic principles?”

The Economist magazine has their Big Mac Index, measuring the relative prices of Big Macs according to Purchasing Power Parity, worldwide. Maybe they should update it to include fries with that, and BRAZIL CAN SUCK EVEN MORE.

"Is it better to be feared or respected? I say, is too much to ask for both?"

There’s been a lot of smack-talk lately about big wheels vs. small wheels.

Fixed gears vs. single sprockets vs. common sense.

What I like about Brazilian history is they’ve gone beyond racial and cultural purity into an endless mestizzo-mix of black, white, indio, portuguese, BMX and big girl’s bikes.

Ladies and gentlemen, I bring you Rio’s famed BMX Roadster Basket-on-front hybrid urban transport system: It’s a Bicycle Motorcross and Mountain Bicycle and wussy Girl’s Bike with a Basket On The Front all rolled into ONE.

“The BrazMX: Bandit up front, Business out back.”

BrazMX - Blurst of Both Worlds

BrazMX Roadster - Utility Edition

YouTube – RARE Ben Phillips sighting (Brazil)

Credit: Marcelo Carnaval / Agência O Globo

Construction has already begun on a 2,900m long series of containment walls in Rio’s South Zone, aimed at stemming the expansion of favelas behind its richest suburbs.

The first part of the concrete and steel wall will be erected behind the favela of Dona Marta, which has been occupied by police special forces since November 2008, when the ruling drug cartel was expelled.

The walls are slated for construction in most of the South Zone’s favelas, including Rocinha (where I work) and Pavaozinho and Cantagalo, directly behind my apartment.

550 houses will be destroyed to make way for the walls, and resident will be re-placed or reimbursed, according to an article in O Globo, the largest Brazilian newspaper.

Rio’s South Zone seems to have reached a crisis point, with no more land left for standard housing construction, and now the end of favela housing expansion onto the hills.

More demolitions in the favela

Last week, demolition began on a large housing centre (“Minhocão”) in Rocinha that was deemed unsafe and illegal. The courts  suspected that the development wasn’t in the public interest, and instead was developed for commercial profit from housing sales.