The street on which she lives is not well lit and is sporadically quiet.  For periods of up to an hour there can be may people on the street walking, cycling, driving, hganging out at one of the 2 bars, shopping at the small grocery store.  But for 10 or 15 minutes the street can be completely empty, and this gives robbers opportunities.  She had explained to me that in recent years crime has increased in her neighborhood because a favela (public housing project) had been constructed not far away (1.5 kilometers) and men from there rob people in the surrounding areas.  She was robbed as she turned into her street at 6 pm when the sun had just set and everyone was indoors preparing dinner.  She cancelled the dinner invitation because she felt so badly.  The most materially valuable thing she lost was her cell phone.  The robber also wanted her tennis shoes but a car was approaching and he ran away when it appeared.  We went shopping for a new cell phone in the ensuing days.  The hotel manager said to me that Sunday is the day with the most assaults and robberies.

We also shopped for Christmas dinner needs.  During grocery shopping, she told me she was impressed with my patience.  In her experience most men do not enjoy shopping.  Neither do I but I was using the opportunity to observe how she shopped and spent money.  I was very impressed.  She keeps a mental list of what she is looking for and shops ONLY for that.  She does not get distracted by other things that may be on sale.  However, she doesn't keep track very well of how much money she is spending.  When the grocery shopping was finished and we were in line, I asked how much she thought the bill would be.  She said around 90 reais. I felt it would be closer to 140 reais.  It came to 125 reais.  

Chistmas dinner was wonderful!  My namorada prepared duck with pineapple, rice with raisins peas and shredded carrots, tomatao salad, potato salad, fried bananas, and some other dioshes whose names I don't remember.  In Brazil, Christmas is celebrated at midnight.  We had midnight dinner and then exchanged gifts.  I was given some music CD's because I had said that I enjoyed Brazilian music.  I had taken a course in conversational Portuguese before this trip and the teacher, a native Brasiliera, suggested a nice gift.  I gave her body lotion from Victoria's Secret with the fragrance Amber Romance.  She liked it a great deal.  I had also given her mother a gift that she liked.  After this it was 1:30 am and too dangerous for me to go back to the hotel.  So we stayed up until dawn, 5 am, when I left for the hotel.  Later in the day, noon, we went to the beach and just hung out there until 5 pm.  After which we went back to her house to eat leftovers.

At the end of my trip we found we had both received what we needed from each other.  She learned much more about "me" the person, and I saw our relationship deepening in intimacy in all aspects.  There will very likely be a serious committment made during my next trip to see her.

This afternoon I am travelling to spend New Year's with my family.  I have not told them about my Brazilian namorada or my quest for a Latin wife.  I will tell them on this trip.  That is going to be interesting because some of my female relatives are against men going to other, poorer, countries to find women.

You know, I had thought many times of going to Brasil.
The women there are beautiful. A while back, as I was thinking of where to go I discovered they spoke Portuguese. I began to learn that at the same time as Spanish, however it was too much and Spanish won.

I am curious, do you find that someone could get by without Portuguese? Personally, I just don't want to learn it. I probably won't go to Brasil unless some girl really catches my attention online. Going cold, I am still off to some undecided land... Probably Colombia, or Peru.

Just curious,

V-Dude

then again if you don't meet a bilingual brazilian, speaking Spanish may help you read a menu but it won't be nearly enough to effectively communicate with brazilians.

I am not the only man who goes to Brazil.  Several other list member regularly travel there. In particular, a list member, Bueller, currently lives in Florianapolis, a city in southern Brazil.

I have been to Colombia and Cali specifically, several times.  I had a novia in Cali, but it did not work out.  I like the ocean.  I swim and scuba dive.  I found the Brazil's beaches and other lifestyle issues were more to my liking than Colombia's in general and Cali's in particular.  Cali has no large bodies of water.    

A major reason why I focused on Brazil for wife searching is that I would not mind living in Brazil if I could find a decent paying job there.  I would not enjoy living in Colombia nearly as much.

I will report on my family's reaction.

In Brazil, there is even more controversy in comparing women from Rio to those in Sao Paulo, or women from thre south like Florianapolis to women in the North like Belem, to Women in the northeast like Salvador.  Then there are the women from the non-coastal central areas of Brasil or from the Amazon area like Manaus.  

Each region has its own physical traits and cultural quirks.  

Then, I have spent most of my time in Colombia in Cali, and most of my time in Brasil in Salvador and Recife.  I can really only compare my experiences with the women in those cities.

The only generalization I am willing to make is to say that I saw more racial mixing and variation in skin tones in Salvador than I saw in Cali, though about the same as in Cartagena.  I think the Brasilieras in Salvador and Recife are marginally more attractive than the Colombianas in Cali and Cartagena.