Carrying on with the habit of commenting on breaking news stories in Brazil weeks after they happened and after everyone has lost interest I thought I would write something about a girl named Mayara Petruso, although she probably wishes I didn’t.

You see, not at all happy that her favoured presidential candidate José Serra had fallen at the last hurdle, Mayara vented her anger on Twitter and Facebook at the half of the country she thought responsible for voting Dilma Roussef into power. Little did she know she was to become symbolic of the worst of Brazil’s age-old north south divide and a very unwilling celebrity.

With Lula soon to hand the keys to Brazil over to its new president-elect Dilma Rousseff, I’ve been getting a little nostalgic and casting my mind back to when he was in the same situation himself.

Contrary to what it says in the little blurb next to the picture of my serial killer eyes, I didn’t first step foot in Brazil in 2005; it was just more convenient to put it that way. I’d actually already burnt my feet on Brazilian sand a few years before that when Lula hadn’t yet made it to president and mobile phones still used to have aerials.

It was all a very long time ago now and I’ve even had to dig out my CV to make sure I’ve got the dates right, but it all goes back to a split-second decision I made whilst I was on an exchange year “studying” at the Universidad Autónoma in Madrid. A decision that ended up changing the entire course of my life.

Back in the days when I was teaching English in Belo Horizonte, I had to deal with more than my fair share of early mornings. A lot of people through choice, or most likely lack of option, would decide to have their lessons first thing in the morning before they went to work. And I, through no choice of my own and purely down to lack of option, would be required to teach them.