Casting My Ballot in Brazil…

Rainy Sunday morning, wet and cold, oh how I wish I could stay in my warm bed.

I need to get up and do what a rightful citizen must do – vote.

Democracy is what reigns Brazil. We won the right to vote in the early 80`s with the fall of the dictatorship regime. But what democracy is this when one must vote. If you don`t, you have to pay a fine and other complications resulting in red tape.

I wake up early on this Sunday morning because the place where I vote is far away from home and there are many people that vote there, for it is in a poorer part of town.

I my car on the same street, been doing this since 1996. The street is uglier for no one takes care of the houses on it and the paint is withered. A few buildings have been put up. I notice that there is a boy taking care of the cars for a few coins. He has grown since the last time I was there, four years ago.

As I walk to the school where the voting will take place, I am approached by simple people who are handing out slips of paper with pictures of candidates and their numbers – last minute to beg for a vote. I say thank you and do not take any. The sense of frustration that these people throw in your direction is unbelievable. What do they get from this? Nothing! Some of them don’t even get a drink. They stand there all day long in the cold rain.

I go to the same classroom as always and there is already a long line with a 30-minute wait. There are people in line who do not need to vote anymore for now they have reached an age that you can decide whether or not you will vote- democracy?

Less than a minute is how long I take to vote. It took the young man who had to give me my proof of voting slip longer to find my name on the list- poor schooling? It seemed like it.

I leave with a feeling of mission accomplished. Not a mission of choosing the people who will govern the country, but the mission of having to fulfill and obligation and hoping that there won`t be another one in 15 days because of numbers.

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 ( Written on October 5, 2010)

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