I know of an elderly lady who looks after her granddaughter that live in a closed condominium that were badly robbed for junk imitation gold jewellery!The elderly lady was and still is a frequent lover of anything that looks gold ,but isnt!

At 5 am during the week ,she was woken up with 2 men standing over her bed ,they dragged her out of the bed and tied her to a chair ,gagged her mouth ,woke her 9 yr old grand-daughter and also did the same ,ramsacked the house and ran off with the imitation jewellery .Fortunately,she managed to raise the alarm and could recognize the voice of one of the robbers,who turned out to be the security guard of the condo.He was quickly arrested and her jewellery was returned and she still parades around in it!

People are very nice here,housekeepers,gardeners,builders,whatever ,but there really is a lot of poverty in Brasil where there are millions without food and if the need be(as Lula never gave the families their promised family social allowance)steal from you through sheer desperation ,then people will.Never give cash , but always give food and clothes
and keep your eyes truely open and be as simple as possible and not go around with a full head and then you will get along fine in Brasil !