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Balneário Camboriú, Bates Motel and a riddle

BRAZIL | Sunday, 8 September 2019 | Views [652] | Comments [2]

September, Monday the 2nd 2019

Such a silly thing to do is to get hooked on a TV show like “Bates Motel”, right after finishing being entertained by “The Marvelous Mrs Measel” why isn’t there a 3rd Season and why then even tell me it’s “coming soon” but not in my location? So, we are stuck watching “Bates” and got hooked. Though it gives me the heebie jeebies - I get itchy under my skin. Not sure if it is the actual content of the show or the affect of the screen while binge watching (oh, this one has 5 seasons with each 10 episodes). Watching movies or series on my iPad in the tent or anywhere is the new kind of traveling. It’s cozy, it’s weird, it’s familiar, it’s a little home it’s something to retire to when we are not social with who ever we are staying with.

Ok, back to “our” reality....... we were also weirded out by the skyline of Balneário Camboriú

 2019

above is a before and after picture (1945 -2010)

but our WS host in this town is in love with it, yes, it is her Paradies as she waves her hand and proudly invites us to walk on the beach while we hear stories about this place and how “money laundering” makes it possible for rich people to stay rich or get more of what they think makes them happy with “dirty money”. 30% of these high rises are empty, cluttering the shoreline to make their money legal. Underneath all that weirdness, there is something fascinating in this picture for me. Humans and what they do for what ever their motivation is, they do. Selfishly ...fishy is part of the word. Still, I look at it and I am part of it...in it...deeply, if I like it or not and so it is!

It’s a jumble of blocks - each one a different color, each one a little different...looks like it’s put together by a giant kid playing . And happy people live here too who are not part of the laundrying! Working “real” jobs doing their thing. There was a little beach around the corner at the end of the long lined up building on the left behind

some rocks that looked like giant frogs....

and I fell asleep in the sand exhausted from walking (and not cycling!) and from looking up to see the end, each top of the cloud-scratcher while getting dizzy. The waves played their ancient song and lulled me into forgetting where I was ......just for a little while.

Beach sand on my hairy legs..is what that is!

 

Comments

1

I still don’t completely understand how money laundering works. How can building towers that are 30% empty make money? Or clean it? Seems like a strategy for losing money. So strange to have a place like that based on money laundering!
Have you watched Schitt’s Creek? I binged that after my knee surgery. I think you would like it.

  Anne McClain Sep 9, 2019 3:11 PM

2

Hi Anne! I found this a helpful explanation: https://www.investopedia.com/terms/m/moneylaundering.asp
Leaving the apartments empty doesn’t generate money, but it puts the dirty money into the system and eventually they (the apartments) can be sold...is how I understand it.

  Margit Pirsch Sep 10, 2019 3:19 AM

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