Brazil is a peculiar combination, simultaneously old and young. "Old" in the sense that, though charted and colonized by Europeans at roughly the same time as North America, European civilization took root faster and flowered far earlier here. While Virginia Company adventurers starved to death on the James River and Massachusetts Bay colonists subsisted in rude huts clustered around a single narrow church, Brazilian cities like Salvador and Olinda boasted paved streets, walls and houses of stone, and high cathedrals gilt with gold. "Young" because Brazil as a country did not achieve independence until 1822, and didn't throw off the monarchy and proclaim itself a republic until 1888. In today's Brazil elements of old and new coexist in every aspect of society: architecture, technology, culture, festivals, food, business attitudes -- all mix the most modern with the most tradition-bound.
