It’s been 1month and 1week since my last newsletter. A long month, full of great times.
I’ve succesfully immigrate to Brasil, as i told you in my last post. Ever since my days have been quite full, and it’s only now that i can find some time to keep up with you.
What do you do ? I’m pro blogger.
This a question we all get often. Even more for me, since i’m abroad, and therefore i meet a lot of new people every day. I always found it hard to answer this question. When i was still working, used to answer :
- You want to know what i like to do, or what do i do to pay my bills ?
But now that i’m unemployed, my answer has evolved :
- I’m unemployed
- I’m a problogger
- I’m a nomadic entrepreuneur
- I’m a location independent worker
- I’m loving life
Most of those answers grant me an akward face from my interlocutor. Except the unemployed one, and sometimes the pro-blogger. Which is good, since that’s the two things i do the most. Well unemployed is not a job, but it’s the easiest way to justify that i can go out at anytime, regardless of the day of the week.
And pro-blogger is really thriving and challenging to talk about. I’ve started a blog, about location indepent working, and all the ways to make it happen. This is a concept which is getting quite common around the world, thanks to internet and the new technologies. But in France it’s not yet. For cultural reasons mainly. Anyway, that blog is eating a lot of my time. : Writing good content, Working on the design, getting your blog to be known, responding to comments, thinking about how to make money from your blog etc.
It’s indeed a full time job, with a lot of challenges. It’s not my first time working on a blog (apart from my personal one) but it’s the first i put so much dedication to it. I will succeed (because i’ve made that blog my primary focus) but, well it’s not easy.
Here is the address : http://www.moutonbreak.com
I also have a some other stuffs going on.
Openning Bar ? you are going to drink all the alcohol.
This is a true comment from someone i know. i wonder why he said that…
The first reason for me coming to Brasil, was to see my friend, escape from the winter, and attend the carnival.
The second reason, was because i wanted to open a business in here, namely a wine bar.
So far i’ve not made a lot of progress. It’s hard to find reliable partners, and even harder to find information. The 4 main problems i face are :
- The visa : you need an investor visa, before you can get anywhere. And it’s damn hard to get.
- There’s a lot of bureaucracy in here, so it’s gonna be a pain in the ass to open my business (2 worst country to invest in, according to doingbusiness.org)
-It’s darn expensive. The cost of life is really high, and it’s getting higher every day (thanks to the world cup). And because of that renting and employement fees are skyrocketing !
The importation taxes are horrible. To import wine you need to pay 30% importation taxes. Because of that, most wine product are out of the reach of the general population !
I haven’t gave up, but i’m trying to rethink my project. I’ll keep you posted as i have more details.
Let’s move on to more general subjects !
sometimes you need a sidekick.
i’m writing this from Petropolis, a city in the country side of Rio de janeiro. A friend has a beautiful house with a garden and swimming pool, and surrounded by mountains. So it’s a 3 courses menu : trekking, barbecue, chilling by the pool. Awesomness !
We are 7 ppl and 4 dogs. Which make quite an atmosphere. Only downside is, out of 7 ppl there’s 3 couples. That’s when you start to miss having someone on your side …
What’s next.
i’m going to spend the carnival in the north of brasil, Recife. They say it’s the best carnival in Brasil, so i had to see for myself. I’ll also take advantage of that time to visit some Natal, the city of my friend and host in Rio, and some other cities up there.
Apart from that i’ll keep working on my projects, because, this is the year i’m gonna make it happen (with the help of God). I’ll let you know when that happens of course.
This was, Faouzane Edouard Batiga, live from pretropolis, brasil. Back to you. (gimme some news people !)
The place where dreams meet reality.