SolaceSoul

I understand what you are trying to say. However, what you described in the latter part of your comment is not that much different in the USA. I do like the aggressive and more punitive anti-racism laws that were recently instituted in Brazil, though. I know of one (former) garoto that got his ass handed to him in criminal court for calling a dark-skinned black female Brazilian celebrity disparaging racial slurs on the Internet. It was publicized widely in Brazilian media. I wish we’d do more of that in the USA. Our racists here have recently become bolder and more emboldened to say and do whatever they please.

This is definitely a “YMMV” topic, but I completely disagree. Just like after a few years in the bright lights and big cities of New York and/or LA will turn even the brightest-eyed, bushiest-tailed freshest freckled-faced ingenue into a jaded and bitter seasoned game player, so goes the way of the Brazilians / Dominicans / Cubans / Africans that land in Europe. Maybe when they FIRST get off the plane or boat from their home country — but after a year or two, and definitely more, in a Western metropolis takes away most or all of the cultural charm and brings out the capitalistic vulture. I’m all for anyone wanting to do something that they view improves their station in life for themselves or their family, but if I wanted shady, shifty, robotic, greedy, mechanical, non-emotional, unsafe-sex-practicing, recreational drug-abusing, face-painted-for-the-gods hookers that make it clear that they are al about the highest dollar, I’d just keep my ass in Manhattan.

I’ve stayed at several AirBnBs in Brazilian cities that had safes in the master bedroom. I stayed at one in Cuba that had a safe. I just returned from Spain and two of the apartments where I stayed both had safes. They are more common than you think. You might want to do a search that includes the word safe or lockbox, or just read the apartment descriptions. Or you can just send a message to the owner and ask them directly before committing.

I was the one who made that remark. Perhaps I could have been clearer. Pele is the one who considers himself white — he said so in a famous American magazine interview in the late 70s (I wish I could find a link to it — but it created a bit of an uproar in the African-American community at the time, and is one of the things that “we” remember most about him and helped to formulate a somewhat skewed opinion amongst African-Americans about racial identity and race relations in Brazil. The comment was something along the lines of what you suggest: that his social standing has erased his blackness and that he is now white and experiences no racism. His three wives (I believe Xuxa was included) have all been white. He has never once stood up against racism in Brazil, or even in his own sport of football — and recently was harshly critiqued by a now more Afrocentric generation for encouraging black or pardo soccer players who encounter racism (and by extension, any black person encountering racism) to simply ignore it. I’d argue that Pele is more of a product of his nation’s peculiar culture and history of race, color and class than an anomaly of it. It is almost remarkable that a dark black man like Pele from the same era as a light-skinned black man like Muhammad Ali had almost the polar opposite belief and outlook on black pride, black beauty, anti-racism and activism. But that, IMHO, is just indicative of the differences in racial identity in the two largest nations in both of the Americas.

As a 20-year resident of New York City, let me be the first to say, “been there, done that, bought the t-shirt.” Need I also remind you how many garotos can be had for the price of one New York City escort? Or how many nights one can stay in a Brazilian hotel or apartment for the price of one night in Manhattan? And the weather, the food, the culture, the people? Yes, if you’re going to Brazil just for the boys, you’re missing out — but even if you’re going just for the boys, IMHO, it’s the best place to go to just for the boys.

The same (or probably even more so) could be said for all these skinny twinks that some fawn over at these boards. There are PLENTY of young, bone-thin gay guys here in the USA — some of them even think they are appealing enough to be sex workers! — so why waste time and money venturing to Brazil, or Thailand, or anywhere else for that matter, if you can find them in the States?

That security guard (Turkish?) was a sight to behold. On some days thereby, he was the only one I really wanted. Alas, he is unavailable. When one worker was a little pushy with me (wouldn’t seem to stop trying to make a sale with me, even though I didn’t express much interest), the security guard did come up to me to make sure everything was fine. I wanted to tell him how he could really make things better!

We would never have to fight over garotos.

If you truly have the game and the street sense that you seem to have, you should know how to pick up a gogo boy without even needing to ask on this forum. You should know it’s all about timing, finesse discretion and game. Unfortunately, many posters here seem to have all the discretion of a bull in a china shop.

I wouldn’t pay 3 reais for an Abercrombie & Fitch model. Do you have a better example?

Jayblk has the most precise explanation here. And every poster has made salient points. In Brazil, the legendary soccer player Pele, due to the meteoric socioeconomic standing to which he rose, who came from one of the worst favelas in Brazil to become one of the greatest athletes, was / is considered “white” — and he is as dark as asphalt. This concept would be laughed at and even sneered at in the USA: the black person who would claim to be white would be scoffed at as self-loathing by communities of color, and white people would definitely not embrace him as white (although he would benefit from a higher economic class due to his status). As mentioned here before, I come from a family of very fair-skinned black Americans, with a grandfather who was a darker Afro-Latino. There is no “bi-racial” in my family, similar to that of the fabled loving one white parent / one black parent like Barack Obama had. In fact, the last relative from our family tree to have a white parent was my great grandmother on my father’s side — who was the product of a white rape in the South in the 1900s. Our light skin comes from white slavemasters, overseers and sharecroppers raping black women with impunity. Most of my family, myself included, are as fair skinned as Derek Jeter, Vanessa Williams, Wentworth Miller or Paula Patton — complete with lighter eyes, freckles and lighter hair. And no one in our family is considered white. Other than a great aunt who moved from Louisiana to upstate NY in the 1950s and “passed for white” (another uniquely American concept), everyone in my family is called black, and proudly identifies with black. The light skin has nothing to do with it, or even the features. It’s the black heritage, the black parents, the black in the family tree — the black blood, if you will. In the USA, that historic “one-drop rule” still applies — and the term “mulatto” is considered just as wholly offensive and dated to the slavery era as “mandingo” is. Due to the African slave trade and its variances in brutalities, Black people in Latin and South America have both shared histories with and distinct histories from African-Americans in the USA. Brazilians are far more historically and culturally in tune with the concept of “mixed-race”, most likely because they’ve (at least the European men and the indigenous / African women have been) openly been screwing each other for centuries. However, it isn’t exactly the racial utopia that some claim it is. Although economic class can improve a darker Brazilian’s standing (as in the Pele example), the truth is that most multi-generationally impoverished Brazilians and most lower-class Brazilians are a lot less European-looking than the lit middle-class or upper-class counterparts. Servants and backroom restaurant laborers tend to be dark. — as fo the perpetually unemployed and underemployed. Unspoken Jim Crow-styled regulations still culturally and legislatively exist in many/most parts of Brazil. It would be more accurate to describe Brazil’s issues as colorism and classism, while the USA definitely has a serious racism problem, with classism and colorism taking back seats to racism. And don’t even get me started on The Dominican Republic! That place’s colorism issues are enough to fill a year of National Geographic issues. The hatred and disdain shown to their darker fellow Haitian islanders is deeply disturbing. A conversation that I always have with Latin Americans / Brazilians during my travels as an African-American who would be considered branco/ blanco, pardo / mulatto / mestizo instead of preto / negro in Brazil / The DR, goes a lot like this: ”In America, Barack Obama, Mariah Carey, Halle Berry, Beyoncé, Derek Jeter, Tiger Woods, Meghan Markle, Paula Patton and Vanessa Williams are all considered black. And you would be, too!” BTW, Cuba? It’s no coincidence that the majority of Cubans (anti-Castro regime, mostly economic exiles, majority Republican) in South Florida are white(r), and the Afro-Cubans (the ones who are generally more favorable to Castro regimes), when you actually go into the barrios of Havana Este and inland, are mostly the ones on the island. Cuba is a LOT blacker than one would see in America and tourism areas.

This subject AGAIN? Pay for what you want. Give what you feel comfortable doing. If you think it’ll make you a fool for doing so, then just don’t do it. If it makes you happy and you can afford to lose it, then do it if you want. People ask me for shit for all different ridiculous reasons all the time in the States and I don’t kvetch over the decision over whether to give or not to give as much as I see people doing here for guys that are thousands of miles away. It isn’t that serious.

Here is a very detailed review of the new airport train service (in English) that also specifically addresses many of the concerns listed by posters here: http://checkinsaopaulo.com/en/testamos-o-trajeto-de-trem-que-liga-sao-paulo-ao-aeroporto-de-guarulhos/

... AND the cost of the meals and drinks (about 100 residents), the cost of the stolen designer cologne..(estimated at 250 reais), the time wasted out of the sauna (hours?). Wouldn’t it have been cheaper just to pay the arrogant one that you were REALLY physically attracted to the extra 50 reais? You would have saved about 300 reais and a few hours of your time — and you would know if the handsome arrogant guy was great in bed for you (you still don’t know, but 350 reais later, you do know that the less attractive guy was not.) Yes, the lessons learned should be: try them out at the saunas if you have the opportunity. That’s what they are for. And go for the ones you like, not for the ones you don’t really care for.

Several major mistakes were made here by the poster, which could have been avoided (easy to say in hindsight, I know). But the one that stands out the most: You emphasize several times that you weren’t that particularly attracted to the garoto, but you voluntarily invited him back to your hotel, anyway? That’s a whole lot of trouble to get into, just for a guy that you are only moderately into.

The irony is that the saunas in Brazil were probably at their peak in the late 1970s to early 1980s during a military dictatorship.

In February, Las Vegas had still been closed (since September) due to renovations and Binbom was closed with no word on reopening. As far as gay nightclubs, there are Karabali on Ls Rampa (only certain nights), Cafe Cantante on Saturdays, and a club on Thursday nights only that is near Parque Central (name escapes me, but it’s near the Inglaterra Hotel). There’s hustler / hookup cruising at and around Toke, the restaurant next to Vegas, and the Wi-Fi park around the corner from it, and Parque Central. AYOR and YMMV disclaimers apply.

So, you post here solely for affirmation, or mostly for it? Which one is it?

Chinelo means flip-flops in Portuguese. The Portuguese word for Chinese is chinês.

I always bring various gifts whenever I travel out of the country to give to locals, not just garotos or guys so want to sex with with. I was just taught that it’s a courteous thing to do when visiting a place that isn’t yours. I don’t breat the bank, but it gives me some pleasure to give gifts to locals that they ordinarily wouldn’t find in their country. I have never gotten a sex freebie out of it and never really cared to do so.

All I’m saying is, next time I’m there, I’m taking a big box of new underwear!

I don’t know who the Peters brothers are, but judging by the photo, I think the dual performance of The Mendez Twins from the 1990 Kristen Bjorn classic “Caribbean Heat” predates theirs: But they didn’t “do” the big act with each other (though they did almost everything else), they tag teamed a third.

What I meant by my comment is that the poor or lower-class in the USA also shoulder the burden of military service — voluntary or draft.

You just can’t stop with the right-wing talking points, Ted Cruz.

I take ownership of my snark. But I punch up, not down. I try not to insult or taunt the aging and the overweight. And I often call out those that imply (or directly state) that they are doing a favor for those in poorer nations by paying them a fair wage for their services.