Sleeping Around by Brian Thacker Page A

Australia, because no matter where you travel in the world you’ll usually find another Australian to chat to. ‘I think I’ve found heaven,’ he said as two stunning girls threw themselves all over him.
    By 3.30 I was ready for bed. And it seemed Mariana was ready to take someone to hers. I found her upstairs making out rather zealously with a new Nunoo. When I’d told her that she would ‘find someone new’, I hadn’t meant within the hour. ‘Come sit with us,’ Mariana said brightly.
    I sat and watched a replay of some local football game on the big-screen TV while Mariana and her new beau sat next to me exchanging tongues. In fact, half the crowd seemed to be making out with a boyfriend, girlfriend, friend-friend or possibly just a random stranger. ‘I’m sorry, Brian,’ Mariana said in between kisses. ‘I’m still the coolest girl in Rio, aren’t I?’
    I finally dragged Mariana away from the nightclub at five o’clock just as the first traces of morning appeared in the sky. The entire city still seemed to be up and the kiosks along Ipanema beach were full of late-night (or early morning) revellers drinking from large coconuts and eating sandwiches. It had taken only four days, but I’d finally become one of them. I was now officially nocturnal.

    Mariana might have to change the bit in her profile where she said ‘I’m the happiest girl you’ll ever meet’. She spent most of the morning in bed sobbing and howling into the phone. She eventually crawled out of bed at one o’clock for breakfast.
    My meal times were now totally out of whack. We had breakfast at 1.30, which meant that I’d probably be having lunch at seven and dinner sometime the next day. I went to wash the breakfast dishes and Mariana said, ‘Don’t do that! My maid has to have some work to do.’ She wasn’t going to be happy with me then. I made the bed.
    Although I hadn’t actually seen too much of the bed, I gave it the highest couch rating so far:
    Couch rating: 8/10
Pro: A real bed plus an ensuite
Con: The bed was a bit short (if I’d brought home one of the Amazonian cousins—and I’m only talking hypothetically here of course—I would have needed to fold her in half).
    â€˜Would you like to come and watch democracy at work?’ Mariana asked. ‘I have to vote today.’ Voters could choose the venue where they wanted to cast their vote (school, local hall, etc.) and Mariana chose the very exclusive Leme tennis club, which had a restaurant and pool overlooking the beach. ‘I’m, how you say?’ Mariana said, turning up the tip of her nose with her finger, ‘. . . a snob.’
    On the short walk to the tennis club we were both handed a dizzying array of flyers promoting candidates. ‘We have to vote for six different positions, including the president,’ Mariana explained. Some of the candidates looked a bit creepy. Luiz Sérgio looked like Borat wearing his grandma’s glasses while João Pedro looked suspiciously like Charles Manson. The creepiest one of all, however, was a fellow in an ill-fitting business shirt, beard and a grey wig who hadn’t done himself any favours for the photo by wearing his smarmiest smile and sticking his thumbs up in the air.
    â€˜Who’d vote for him?’ I chortled. ‘He looks like a used-car salesman.’
    â€˜That’s Lula, our president!’ Mariana said. ‘He’s okay compared to some of the other politicians we’ve had.’ Those ‘other politicians’ included President Fernando Collo de Mello, who won the 1989 presidential election by promising to fight corruption. Then in 1992 he was thrown out of office after being accused of siphoning off more than US$1 billion of public funds. Another was Congressman Hildebrando Pascoal, who was arrested for making cuts, not to the budget but to a man’s