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August 23, 2006
Meu candidato
Leda's father, Julio Martins, is once again a candidate for elected office, Deputado Federal (federal representative), and the house is in full campaign swing with meetings, cars with loudspeakers, lines of people at the gate, and "santinhos": those little campaign flyers with the candidate's picture, party affiliation, and number. I was inspired to make one of my own:
Posted by johnn at 08:17 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
August 22, 2006
Computers + Security = Chaos
I've not been to Rio or São Paulo or Brasília for more than a week or so of tourism since 1997, so I'm in some doubt about whether my observations here in Roraima involving craziness in the commercial sector are national phenomena or Roraimense ones (I mean, we are here in the fim do mundo :-).
Specifically, it seems to me that as more and more Brazilian companies integrate their computer systems and network more of their operations, these systems clash with the culture of suspicion that compartmentalizes employee access and authority and produce nightmarish chaos, far surpassing the the typical bureaucratic lunacies of the governmental sector. (By compartmentalized I mean variations on the the familiar process in which, for example, one orders a R$1 coffee, receives a piece of paper with the price, stands in line to pay and have the little piece of paper stamped, and returns to the counter to the present the paper and collect the coffee, all to make sure that the guy beyond the couner doesn't pocket your R$1.)
For example, I tried in vain for nearly a week to buy an airline ticket on TAM airlines, newly servicing Boa Vista. Neither their online ticket site, nor any travel agent, nor their own representatives in their own TAM store at the airport were able to process my purchase with an international credit card. We have heard many reports that credit cards issued outside of Brazil cannot be used online, and TAM is processing its own tickets through an online system. I can use my US credit cards to buy practically anything here in Boa Vista, except airline tickets!
We got a Vivo Zap wifi/modem/Internet deal. It was quite expensive, both for the purchase of their modem and for the monthly fee, over R$100. The deal was unlimited time and 40MB of usage a month. After about a month, our accout was blocked because of high pending bills (we had yet to receive a single bill). No one by telephone or at the store could explain what the charges were for, why we had not received a bill, or why the account had been blocked. The rep scribbled a Banco do Brasil account number on a slip of paper and asked us to deposit several hundred reais in order to unblock the account - this with no receipt, no statement, no nothing. A friend of the family with a similar situation made the deposit, which still didn't unblock his acccunt! After several weeks of no service, we were finally able to see a statement, at which point we discovered that our account had switched over to counting minutes of connect time and not usage, hence a pending balance of hundred of reais. Here's the rub: the agency manager saw the mistake but was unable to do ANYTHING until the next statement cycled. She couldn't unblock the account or correct the problem. She was unable to call ANYONE in the company to do ANYTHING. So, we have sued them, which should be an interesting experience, anthropologically.
Finally, and this example shows the problem is probably not Roraimense but national, a friend of our recently bought tickets for herself and her six-year old daughter to fly on Gol Airlines from Brasília to Manaus. There she would spend time with a relative and then fly to Boa Vista, a segment which is a ocntinuation of the flight from Brasília to Manaus. Her relative ended up not going to Manaus, so our friend bought tickets for the Manaus-Boa Vista segment. When she arrived to check in for the flight in Manaus she was told that the computer system would not allow them to combine the segments and check her in for both segments. She would have to get off the plane in Manaus, collect her luggage and re-check-in for the flight to Boa Vista. At midnight. With her sleepy six-year-old. They assured her there would be time. Of course, by the time she got her bags and ran out to the ticket counter, check-in had long closed (it had clossed even as they were telling her she had plenty of time) and they refused to let her on the plane. She called the police, threw a fit, threw some suitcases, all to no avail. She had to spend the night in a hotel, return the following night to fly to Boa Vista, and - get this - pay a huge fee for having MISSED THE FLIGHT TO BOA VISTA the night before. She, a lawyer, is suing.
All this gives me the impression that business in this country has gone bonkers. Access to the courts is so limited, the consumer protection agencies so under-funded and ineffectual, and competition so anemic that there's not much pressure on companies to improve their service.
Posted by johnn at 01:32 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
Pitzerites in Roraima
We've been here since late May (Leda)/early June (me), engaged in (in no particular order of time and energy):
1. getting me permanent residency
2. getting me a research visa (possibly, maybe, please god, superceded by #1)
3. getting Leda a green card
4. orienting the Pitzer students (Tara & Marcus) who arrived in July to start the first year of Pitzer in Roraima
5. taking care of baby (see pics here)
6. building an addition on our house (see pics here)
7. trying to start research of our own
So many things to have blogged about. So little time, online anyway: by the time I reach a connection the pique has passed :-( .
Still, lots going on and I hope to post more soon.
Posted by johnn at 01:06 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack