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The new Brasilian - why are we swapping the heat of the tropics for the cold of London?

Challenge | London has also attracted qualified Brasilian professionals. Luciana Dannerman, 30, decided to hedge her bets on the British job market and hasn’t been disappointed. She left Salvador in 2003 to work as a trainee banker at Lloyds and is currently manager of the bank’s Financial Analysis for Projects department. Working on transactions of over £300 million at a time, Luciana believes that being Brasilian has helped her get ahead in London. “Smiling has opened a lot of doors for me”, she reveals.

25 year old Art director Bruno Chavier and 26 year old journalist Ronni Veck are in a similar boat to her. They’ve just been contracted by BBH, one of the largest advertising agencies in the world, to work on campaigns for major brands like Levis, Baileys and KFC. Professionally motivated, the two Cariocas don’t currently have any plans on going back to Brasil.

Professional fulfillment isn’t the only thing motivating Brasilians to cross the Atlantic. An ever-greater number of people have invested their life-savings into coming to the UK in search of a better life than back home.

Many Brasilians arrive as students or tourists - only a small amount of them have a European passport - and don’t go back until they’ve saved up enough money to buy their own houses or set up a business. They work as office boys, cleaners, nannies, dish washers, beauticians, etc, earn between £5-10 an hour and in less than five years achieve their financial goals. This kind of dream back home in Brasil can take 20 or 30 years to fulfill.

Money transfer agencies are another money-maker. Barbara Medeiros (pseudonym)works for a Brasilian money exchange company that’s been in operation for the past decade. On average she serves 500 clients a day and the majority send money to the states of Goiás, Minas Gerais, Espírito Santo and Bahia.

“In September 667 transfers exceeding £1,600 were made, and over 4,000 exceeded the £350 mark”, she explains, and more than 16 Brasilian agencies advertise their services in newspapers and magazines. Despite the fact that the money crosses the virtual borders of the financial system, the Brasilian Central Bank has no records on money coming in from the UK. The black market is to blame.

“Out of every 100 money transfers we make, only 10 are from bank accounts. During the same month, 10,590 transfers arrived in Brasil illegally. Clients want the highest exchange rate possible; they don’t care who sends the money over”, explains Barbara. A report published by the Inter-American Development Bank, showed that $7 billion was sent to Brasil in 2006 alone.

Illegatily | Last year, 6,335 people were sent back to Brasil by the Home Office. This figure includes the ones that were deported, barred and voluntarily removed, and places Brasilians at the top of the deportation list after asylum seekers.

In 2006, 4,985 people had their visa refused at UK airports. Solicitor Mara Prado (pseudonym) woks for the British authorities and explains that a lack of preparation is the main reason why so many people are denied entry. “A lot of them don’t answer questions clearly. They don’t have proof to back up their visa claims and they’re sent back home in less than 24 hours”, she reveals.

Nevertheless, a lot of people get past the authorities, and many of these people go on to buy and sell false documents in order to remain in the country. Mara states that couriers caught in police raids make up 90% of deportees. According to her, there are also a significant number of illegal Brasilians who are shopped by other Brasilians.

The Brasilian Consul-General in London, Flavio Perry, explains that several Brasilians have used the “washed passport” excuse when confronted by the police. “On a number of occasions, different people have claimed that their passports aren’t stamped because they accidentally left them in the wash”!

Figures published by the British Ministry of Justice show that over a two-year period the amount of Brasilians in British prisons doubled. In 2005, 47 Brasilians were serving a prison sentence, whilst in 2007, this figure had risen to 95 (73 men and 22 women). Brasil has the second highest number of inmates serving prison sentences in the UK out of all the other countries of Latin America, coming close behind Columbia (114).

Drug smuggling is one of the main reasons why Brasilians fall foul of the law. Mara explains that over the past few years several Brasilians - the majority coming from SĂŁo Paulo and Rio de Janeiro - have been arrestedfor selling ecstasy in bars around Vauxhall.

But Brasilians have also been the victims of crime in England. This year, three Brasilians were killed. The advisory minister of the Brasilian Embassy in London, Laudemar Gonçalves de Aguiar, explains that the Brasilian community is a part of British society and, as such, has suffered from increases in crime across the British capital. “The Brasilian community is complex, dynamic and evermore integrated into London’s multi-cultural society - and is growing its roots”, he said.

According to Aguiar, anyone dreaming of going back to Brasil but afraid of the country’s precarious economic situation, should be patient. “The social and economic advances made by the Lula administration are slowly improving living standards for the population”. But no matter how much Brasil may have advanced, figures seem to demonstrate that they won’t be rushing back home any time soon. It looks like a lot of Brasilians living in London feel right at home. JD

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