Brazzil

Jean Chretian the former first minister of Canada. He stayed in power for more than Ten years. His first language is French. His English still considered poor. He even was a person that did not end the high school but he was an excellent politics.

It is very stranger that the Rio Branco Institute demands English for the person to be approved by the institution. I lived in Toronto for more than 8 years. I went at least three times at Brazilian General Consulate in Toronto to copy and stamp my diploma of pharmacy and my diploma from my PhD in Science from Brazil and ask further documents and stamps for me to apply as graduate student in Canada. They always gave me the documents in Portuguese even I asking if it was possible to give me in English. Then, I need to pay the translations to such documents and pay for more stamps and so on. Thanks ohhh! Lord! We have an office from Catholic Church here that makes such translation in affordable price. Result! I never was being accepted in a graduate program in Canada. So much paper for a simple application.
I also went in the same consulate to see if it was possible to register my marriage in Brazil. I married with a foreign woman from Indonesia. The last time, I went there, I brought my wife with me. I think that I spoke with all consular body. It seems to me that everybody wants to see an exotic woman and not to solve the problem.
In the end my wife decided not to go to live in Brazil, she is not a stupid woman, she can see clearly what is going on.
In January she got a part time job in the Canada govern in administration. Today, she started a full time job in a financial sector of the same government institution, with responsibility to work with money and she is not a Canadian Citizen.
When I read that the Rio Branco Institute demands that the personal should know English, I started to ask my self, do they know English? Or they passed the Rio Branco Institute in playing the game of godfathers (comprades). If they really know English why they do not make the life of Brazilians more easy abroad doing documents in English when it is necessary and showing more concerns to Brazilian citizens problems?
It seems that so much education in Diplomacy is not doing better to Brazil.
I am still very angry with Brazilian Diplomacy. My plans were to come back to Brazil this year and suddenly I was lost. I really needed to think all my life again, since my wife saw how she would be treated in Brazil.

I wrote the text below in February and probably, I am going to publish this in my entire life.

Dear Sir or Madam:

In 1999, I had the opportunity to travel to Indonesia. I knew a lady with which I got married following the law and traditions from Indonesia.
Since that, I have tried to legalize this marriage in Brazil. However, I just find a hard time. My wife tried to register this marriage in the Brazilian Consular Service in Indonesia when she was living there but they did not accept because I was not in Indonesia.
In these last years, I went many times at Brazilian General Consulate in Toronto, Canada and always heard half explanations about the procedure for legalization of such documents. We went in a notary office in Toronto and we did a document with recognize signature stating that our marriage is in partial goods share to satisfy the Brazilian law. All these documents were brought to the Brazilian General Consulate in Toronto and we paid a fee of $ 72.00 dollars for such documents being recognized to be original.
We sent such papers to Brazilian Embassy in Jakarta. Although, so far we met a bad willing from the Brazilian Diplomacy Service in recognize the documents. I changed various e-mails with Ms. Ingrid about such documents. Ms. Ingrid through of her e-mails told me that the staff Ms. Jenny was responsible for such documentation.
In February 11, 2005 my sister in law went from Surabaya to Jakarta and visited the Brazilian Embassy with purpose to pay the fees and make the burocratic service in Indonesia Institutions.
To make things more easy, in this day, I called Ms Jenny, and she did not knew where was the file and told me that such procedure was only with Ms. Ingrid that was absent from the work.
Then, I called twice the embassy in Jakarta to speak with Mr. Jose Auri in the same morning and I asked him politely if he could give these documents to my sister in law.
So, he decided to give the papers to her and ask her to go to Surabaya to recognize the signature of the Justice Official that did the marriage.

It is very hard to believe in what is happening. I went to Indonesia; I was treated as a King. I respected the laws from that Country. I married conform the laws and traditions of Indonesia and now the Consular Service of my Country is making so difficult to recognize and register my marriage. Why? Discrimination? Envy?

My wife has an accounting degree from Airlangga University in Surabaya, she worked for more than 8 years at Ernest & Young and she was a senior audit when I met her. She came to Canada and recently ends a program in accounting at Seneca College with honours. She works from Monday to Sunday in two part time jobs and goes to College at night. I believe that any Country wants to recognize our marriage. The Canadian government never did a question about our marriage. Why Brazil makes so hard to recognize such documents?
Brazil should have good diplomatic body in any country. If the person is not fit for such service should be sent away and not sent to work in poor countries.

By Brazilian law, even being married, if I have sexual intercourse with a prostitute, and if she can prove it, she has the same civil rights than my wife. Now, why my wife in which a married inside a mosque does not have the same rights? Is it because she is Muslim? Or because she has another ethnic background?

I demand an explanation; I am fed up with this story. My sister in law wants to wait a new diplomatic body start to work in Jakarta to proceed with such documentation.

I feel ashamed from such service as Brazilian citizen.

• Pharmaceutical R&D Technology Post Diploma 2003 - 2004
Toronto Institute of Pharmaceutical Technology – Canada
• Industrial Pharmaceutical Technology Post Diploma 2001 - 2002
Faculty of Technology, Seneca College, Toronto
• Chemical Technology Diploma 1998 - 2001
Faculty of Technology, Seneca College, Toronto
• PhD in Science, Biochemistry Program 1988 - 1993
Centre Polytechnique, Parana University, Brazil
• B.S. in Pharmacy 1983 - 1986
University of Santa Catarina, Brazil.

Man, you are a real sucker. You post parts of your resume here without noticing that they provide clear proof of your own incompetence. Only incompetent Ph.Ds need to get another undergraduate or graduate degree in their field of expertise in order to obtain a good job. If you are competent enough, you will have a good publication record (a decent number of publications in journals of high impact factor) after you Ph.D. and people will give a damn about where you got your doctorate.
I know plenty of people who studied/worked in centers of excellence in Brazil (not yor case, by the way) and later on were offered quite good positions in other countries. If you could not find a good job after grad school don’t blame others, blame your own incapacity for producing good research.
By the way, just for your information, I graduated from a world class university and have never had any problem to find a job, inside or outside Brazil.
You are a joke.
Stop annoying us with your stupid posts …

If emphasising English less is just to expand the talent pool and focusing on the job description for a given position, that is one thing. If it is to feed the anti-American racism in Brazil, it's wrong.

or we are going start to talk about how people got and kept jobs in North America and Brazil. Then Brazilians and Americans will become a big joke.

Unlike The Great Cristaldo's illogical rants that always seem to talk himself up while frothing at the mouth and insulting our intelligence, the above article makes a cogent argument for policies of the Rio Branco Institute and foreign language education. Thank you!

What about to make a law and enforce the law. Public University to Public High School Students.

It is so funny. Angry articles perhaps from people from Rio Branco Institute.

When I needed some information on my visa when I was in South Korea on business, the consular staff there spoke great english. This helped me out a lot, cuz I don't know Korean and my portuguese is poor. Still, I was looking forward (psyching up for it, really) to struggling and trying to tough it out in portuguese. It was just easier to do it in english. Even though it easier for this gringo, I still think it's a good idea to drop the english requirement. I believe it will have the benefit of opening up the diplomatic corps, a great step in the right direction. And maybe it's force us gringos to know more than one language.

Perhaps you found a consular staff that spoke English with you by chance. I also believe that Englsih should not be teaching in Brazil at all. This way the population do not need to know what is going on far and away from our boards. So, it will stop the flow of people to other Countries around the world looking for a betther live.They are the modern barbarians. Then, we rich people from Brazil can travel abroad with out the risk to meet unpolite, poor, illegal brazilian that only ashamed us.Today, there are a lot new technology, equipments that make translation immediately to any language. Why spend time studying another language? think about it.

I'm sorry about my poorly written post. I guess my typing and grammar isn't much better than my portuguese.

I read the articles and the Americano article looks like someone that worked or works in the diplomatic service in South Korea trying to make some points in this forum. This is my career.It is better to talk better about my self.
This people that goes to Rio Branco Insitute are originated from the dominant political class. You must to have some good connections to have the opportunity. Anybody here already saw the test to Rio Branco Insitute? Some questions, what is the name of bird that has an yellow colour in the wind, red colour in the tail, make piu piu every morning and lives in south africa? If a guy talks with you about barroco music, what the follow artist are you going to introduce in the conversation? bettoven, Chopin, Mozart, Bach. Who painted the picture Las Meninas? And when you see the results. Many of the candidates got 100%. An observation, all of them from Rio de Janeiro and Sao Paulo. Who did not hear that the Federal Police's son was approved in the medicine vestibular in first place or governator's son, the major's son, the president of the Union's son and so on.... Brazil is the Country of corruption and they think to cheat everybody with some fake vestibulars, programs and tests.

I'm hurt that you would think that I'm someone from the Consul looking to score points. Look, I'll do something very silly and give my phone number on this post. It is a Korean cell phone. I don't know what country you're calling from, but you'll have to get the correct country codes in order to reach me. My phone number is 010-6873-7113. I work in a town called Tongduchon, about 2 hours north of Seoul. That number will be good until 20 April, then I'll be going back to the States for a while. If you call me you'll reach someone with perfect, California english. I grew up in Sunnyvale, near San Francisco. I went to Homestead high school. Graduated in 1989. I remember watchin Pat McCormick on KTVU channel 2, a local television station. I live by the bay, but (like many locals) I've never been to Alcatraz Island. It's mainly for tourists. I say "dude" a lot. My poor writing is the result of a public school education and chemicals between classes. I'll speak portuguese to you. You should be able to tell that I speak it terribly (that is a difficult thing to fake: perfect english, genuinely terrible portuguese).
Also, I'm confused. It seems that it is common knowledge that the system is rigged to favor those with connections. Isn't it good to take away one of the things that gives the well connected an unfair advantage? I would think so. Do you? I can't tell by what you wrote.
Do you think eliminating the english language requirement will help the less connected?
Or are you saying that eliminating the english requirement is just a superficial change, that it won't really change the status quo?

P.S. Please be mindful of the different times of the world when calling me. Don't wake me from my bed. The best time to call is during business hours, Monday through Friday, Korea time.

Are you having a date here?

Until the 50’s and 60’s for you to work in an University as Professor you should be from the dominant class and end an undergraduate program and have some good marks in your degree. It was enough to hold a position as an auxiliary professor.

Soon, they realized that was the needed to have Doctors teaching Brazilian Universities. Therefore, they created small graduate programs to teach themselves, each professor wrote a monograph about one issue and among them got the Title of Doctor. After that, many of them started to travel to the United States, England, Germany and France doing laboratory training. It was a good time those days, everything was so sweet. They were able to create true feuds in the Universities, some of them managed to get big salaries being chief here, dean there etc…

In general those entire pioneers were males. They chose by finger the gorgeous students in the 70’s to work in their labs. So, all those beautiful girls became their first students. Of course there were some males students. Not all Professors males like females. Since they did not have enough capability to be mentor, they created doctors without the ability to work in serious Research Program in general the students follow the same Research line from the mentor or try to make a similar Research from a good scientific paper that they found in a scientific magazine.

Any way, many of the ladies were abused by the mentors but in the end of many years, they were doctors. They got jobs as Professor, they did excellent marriages and they went to work from 9 to 5 and take care of the family. Not everybody knows what is going on inside the campus, so people were naïve and married those ladies. Today is hard for a woman with a PhD to get married. Once, Research with low knowledge and abilities you do not expect great results, therefore productivity and any Scientific Expression in the International Community were very low.

In the 80’s and the 90’s all those gorgeous girls, now fat and older became responsible for the new generation of the doctors. Sorry. I forget to comment again that there were guys also because many old professors did not like girls.

The doctors whose formation was done in the 80’s and 90’s have a big story of psychological and sexual abuse. Many graduate student waist more than 10 years to have a PhD dissertation approved. Let’s not talk that many female students left the program as single mother and many others have an affair with the mentor.

Students with serious psychological problems will not produce anything. See the files from many of them. With an undergraduate degree, two or more specialization, a master, a PhD, and some times even with a Pos Doctor in a foreign institution and where are they? Some are in private institutions teaching some subjects, some left the Country and went to work in very different profession. Many of those people were female.

Brazilian Universities have a big story of female abuse. Female are abuse even from Female Professors. I knew a male Professor, each of his female students had an affair with him and he was the Greek educator, since he had the right to sleep with the student like the Greeks. He used to give an elephant work to the student and then started to work day and night with the lady until the woman break down.

The problem is not lack of female opportunity. There are two big problems that must be work out.

First, to work in a system that the mentor will not interfere with the private life of the student female or male, such as having sex or interact so much with the student.

Second, reduce the years of graduate program. A serious master in a University with international standards should be done in no more than18 months and a doctor degree no more than 36 months.

Third and very important issue, the transcripts from graduate programs should be the responsibility of the University and not from the Departments that sometimes they think that they are bigger than the University.

Students can not be anymore lab technicians, secretaries and lovers of their mentors. Health minds make better professionals. Graduate programs must stop immediately to produce mental sick diseases such as depression and anxiety.

I like some of the changes that are being made and generally I agree with this decision. However, the focus has to be in great academics, and how are they going to screen the people that get this extra advantage because of their daddies??

This is coming from a Brazilian who lives in the states. I currently attend college here, and to acquire a great job, a lot of research is required, but it is alwasy who you know that will help you get a job faster, and also a decent one. But this is not corruption, it is a connection and everyone has at least one. The problem is the Elitism that is passed down like the kings were. In order to stop this from our culture (it has become part of our culture, just like corruption has) there needs to be some type of immediate action to severely evaluate those with these "opportunities" so that this means of elitism is removed. But until anyone can think of how to do that, and right now all I can do is hope since I am not involved directly in the issues at home, for now.

You are in the College. You are the luck ones.College in the USA are the best in the world.
In the USA and Canada for to get a job you must to have the right connections. They do not care about your education and trainning, you must know somebody. You are right, you do not see elitism in this system of connection here.
When I was graduated student in Brazil. They used to call me by names. When I was in a Science Congress Meeting in Caxambu a white professor said to me in front of a group. Hello! Native. Why you do not take off your cloths and jump in the swimming pool. I look at him and I said. Unfortunately, the best production scientists in this congress if they are brazilians they have native heritage in their blood. And he became quite because was a big true.
Those white in the congress were there because they came from the dominant families decades ago inside university like big feuds. This is one big reason why the brazilian academic did so poor in the last decades.
When you come with a good idea, there are 10 of them saying no to you. If you want survive among them you must kiss their ass.

Let us despise the really shameful comment posted on 2005-4-4 above, made by a really insensitive person whose huge superiority complex forbids his/her poor intelligence to sense and be considerate towards troubled and obviously suffering human beings. I feel real pity for the lost soul who wrote that post.

You really make us all sick with your lack of sensitivity and sheer arrogance. You will get what you deserve fellow!

The Instituto Rio Branco is a real waste of the money from Brazilian tax payers who deserve a real service for their very hardly earned money. Even though a few of its officers are extremely helpful, some on the contrary, are completly insensitive and careless towards the needs of common Brazilians who need assistance overseas (and pay their salary).

This institute is so directed to commercial purposes, that it must have all of its agencies shut down - and reborn under a new name, new training courses and specially - a new team. Brazilian diplomacy is currently on its infancy in regards to enforcing respect and protection of the rights of common Brazilians, their values and traditions worlwide.

Thanks for your comment. New information for me. I really did not know that the Institute Rio Branco focus in Commerical Purpose.
Now, I know why they treat us like nothing over seas.
Yesterday, I was walking and then came in my mind a conversation with a man from Egipt. This man came to me, and ask me. Are you a Brazilian? and I said, yes.
Then, he started. I was responsible for a big oil complex and my wife also was working and my kids were in the school. I had a Philipine maid. So, she applyed for another job in the Brazilian Embassy.
Then, the Brazilian embassador called me and asked me if he could pass in my job because he wanted reference from his maid. Then, he said that he was a busy man. The embassador said. I am also a busy person. They did an arrangement to meet at lunch time. However, the Brazilian embassador went there and stay all afternoon talking and talking. He offered to the Philipine maid 3 times more than the Egiptian was paying.
I was so ashamed to hear such blame. Our diplomatic body forget that people travel and they talk. It is ashamed. This man was still mad that the Brazilian Embassador took his maid.