by GABRIEL ELIZONDO
In the northwest Brazilian Amazon town of Brasileia, population 20,238, there are almost 1,200 Haitians.
They often mill around during the day, clustered in groups in the shade trying to keep cool from the steamy heat, waiting for weeks for their work documents to be processed so they can get a job in another part of Brazil.
But on Tuesday it was the two other guys sitting alone who caught my attention. They could have been Bolivian perhaps, or even Brazilian. But I knew they weren’t.
“We are from Bangladesh,” AHM Sultan Ahmed, 36, tells me with a smile when I approach and ask to talk with them.
His friend, Abdul Awal, and my photojournalist, Maria Elena Romero, and I, all sit together on the grass and begin to chat.
They are from Dhaka, and arrived in Brasileia the night before. They slept on the ground in the main plaza, having nowhere else to go. For obvious reasons, they look tired, but still muster the energy to smile wide and often.
Why did you come to Brazil?
“I heard Brazil’s economy is growing, and that here is good for us and good jobs,” Ahmed says. “Soon we can hopefully get our papers and find a job. I am happy”
“I think there is a lot of work in South America now, and a lot of people from my country are wanting to come here now,” he continues.
Neither has been to Brazil before, nor speak a word of Portuguese.
Ahmed tells me he is a trained painter and once worked in Greece. Awal, who worked in Malaysia, is an electrician.
Al Jazeera for more
(Thanks to Robin Khundkar)