Racial legacy that haunts Brazil

Gary Duffy-BBC, 11/04/09
The BBC’s Gary Duffy looks at how the African heritage of the Brazilian city of Salvador raises questions about race.
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Evangelical march in Brazil draws 1.5 million

Andre Penner-The Associated Press, 11/02/09
More than 1.5 million evangelical Christians joined Brazil’s annual “March for Jesus” on Monday, an event sponsored by a church whose leaders recently returned after being imprisoned in the U.S. for money smuggling.
Now in its 17th year, the march unites faithful from hundreds of evangelical churches and attracts dozens of Christian [...]

Rio must learn from our costly Olympic mistakes

Simon Jenkins-London Evening Standard, 10/07/09
Memo to Rio from London: enjoy it while it lasts. Brazil’s winning of the Olympics last Friday was greeted by Pele in tears, President Lula da Silva weeping with joy and an entire nation ecstatic.
I remember being in Trafalgar Square in 2005. The announcement was so staged that even an old [...]

Olympics – Brazil Olympians face long odds in their own Games

Brian Ellsworth-Reuters, 10/05/09
Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva wept with joy when Rio de Janeiro won its Olympic bid but he may shed tears of sorrow at the 2016 Games if Brazil does not reverse a history of Olympic mediocrity.
The five-time World Cup soccer champion and home to famous athletes like soccer stars Pele [...]

Foreign Policy: Why Brazil Won The 2016 Olympics

Eduardo J. Gomez-NPR, 10/05/09
As of Friday, Brazil certainly has a lot more to boast about. Aside from its beautiful beaches, world-famous carnival, crowd-drawing soccer, and a renowned HIV/AIDS program, Brazil is the next host of the summer Olympic Games as declared by the International Olympic Committee in Copenhagen — beating out Tokyo, Madrid, and even [...]

Rio Wins Bid for 2016 Olympic Games

Juliet Macur and Lynn Zinser-The New York Times, 10/02/09
COPENHAGEN — The Olympics were awarded to a South American city for the first time when the International Olympic Committee on Friday voted for Rio de Janeiro to be host of the 2016 Games.
Rio de Janeiro was the winner over Madrid in the final round of voting. [...]

Rio tells Obama and Olympics rivals: “Yes we can”

Karolos Grohmann-Reuters, 10/01/09
Brazil’s president took a leaf out of Barack Obama’s electioneering manual to cast aside any lingering doubts about Rio’s ability to stage the 2016 Olympic Games with an emphatic ‘Yes we can’ rallying cry on Thursday.
Mimicking the phrase used by President Obama as he was catapulted to the White House, president Luiz Inacio [...]

For Brazil, Olympic Candidacy Is About Role as Global Player

Alexei Barrionuevo-New York Times, 09/27/2009
President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva of Brazil, on the other hand, has thrown himself behind Rio’s bid and said he would definitely make the trip to Copenhagen.
He has lobbied I.O.C. members wherever he could and called Mr. Osorio and others on Brazil’s bid committee for regular updates.
He attended the opening [...]

“Brazil President: Country Needs the 2016 Olympics” – (Even Chicagoans Think So)

Lula: Brazil needs Olympic games
Associated Press, 09/22/09
Brazil’s president on Tuesday defended Rio de Janeiro’s candidacy to host the 2016 Olympics, saying no other country needed it more than Brazil.
President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva said his country was the only one among the world’s 10 largest economies that has never hosted the Olympic games and [...]

Untamed Creature

Fernanda Eberstadt, The New York Times — 08/19/2009
During her lifetime, Lispector, a catlike blond beauty with movie-star magnetism and an indefinably foreign accent, enjoyed an enormous succès d’estime in Brazil. Her fiction, which combines jewel-like language, deadpan humor, philosophical profundity and an almost psychotically lucid understanding of the human condition, was lauded for having introduced [...]