5 things to know before you start teaching English in Brazil

Brazil is a big, boisterous, culture-rich cut-out of South America that offers electrifying megacities and wild swathes of nature. This guide gives a few insights for the budding teachers heading this way after finishing their TEFL course…

Brazil is MASSIVE

Don’t head over to the carnival-mad country expecting to see it all in a single weekend. The Federative Republic of Brazil doesn’t just have a long official name, it also has a mega-long coastline of over 4,600 miles, along with a multitude of climactic zones, from lush jungles to balmy deserts. The country is the biggest in all of South America and Latin America combined. It encompasses a formidable 26 states and ranges from the Atlantic Ocean to the Andes. To put it another way: You’ll need weeks and weeks and weeks to see all the mainstay attractions and explore the four corners!

Lunch is taken very, very seriously

If you’re used to guzzling down a soft drink and devouring a sandwich at high speed so you can get back to work ASAP, Brazil is bound to be a shock. Lunch in this part of the world is nothing short of a ritual. It’s usually a sit-down meal of multiple courses that’s enough to feed a small army of TEFL teachers, let alone just one. Lunches can last an hour or more, while it’s even common – especially in more rural areas and in smaller towns – for there to be extra break time set aside after your meal for a good old relax and a siesta. Nice, eh?

There’s no ‘one’ Brazil

We know that South Africa is the official Rainbow Nation, but that could just as well apply to Brazil. There’s such diversity in the people here that it’s almost impossible to pin down precisely what being Brazilian really means. Influences come from Europe – just check out the age-old colonial relics of places like Paraty and Olinda. There are others from the Caribbean – wait for the samba-mad processions of carnival in Rio. But there are also indigenous ethnic peoples residing up the snaking Amazon River. And then you have all sorts of minorities from Uruguay, Paraguay, Argentina, and others, each with their own unique traditions and cultures. Melting pot doesn’t quite do it justice!

Visa struggles are real

We won’t lie: Visas are one of the major headaches for would-be teachers of English in Brazil. There are lots of reports of teachers entering the country and working on tourist visas, which seems to have been routinely ignored by the authorities in the vast majority of cases. The reason for that is the Kafkaesque level of bureaucracy that’s needed to get a bona fide working permit. You’ll need to be sponsored by a school, but often the process is simply too demanding and expensive for many institutions to follow through with. Our advice? Contact to the Brazilian embassy where you live and ask about the proper way forward.

Adventure is easy

The cities of Rio and Sao Paulo often hit the headlines in Brazil. But it would be a shame to stick only to those on your adventures. There’s a whole wonderworld of sights and reserves and amazing places to get stuck into beyond the jazz bars of Ipanema and the boulevards of the capital. The Amazon is the obvious place to start. Travel that mighty riverway and you could spot piranha fish and jaguars, sloths and poison dart frogs. Then you’ve got the roaring Iguazu Falls and the incredible wetlands of the Pantanal. And we’re only really scratching the surface.

Are you a veteran of teaching English in Brazil? We’d love to hear if you’ve got anything to add. Just drop your comments below the line. Alternatively, if you’re ready to get TEFL qualified, head over to our courses page and enroll today…