The Samba, the carnival, soccer, and the beaches of Rio de Janeiro. For years, this has been how the world saw Brazil (with its area of 3,286,469 square miles): beautiful girls, music and the city of Rio protected by the statue of Christ giving His blessing from the top of a mountain. But Brazil is no longer like that; or rather, it's more than that. Like all the South American countries, it has gone through a period of military dictatorship and been humiliated by unprecedented social inequality, but the Gentle Giant has now raised its head and reacted. Nowadays, despite the death squads, the street children, the favelas (cities of the destitute in cities of the rich) and the disgraceful distribution of wealth, things are beginning to change. Artists, intellectuals and politicians are endeavouring to construct a new Brazil, embarking on the difficult task of economic and social reorganisation. As demonstrated by the magnificent photos in this book, one aspect of the reconstruction is the preservation of a unique cultural and environmental heritage, ranging from the colonial towns of Minas Gerais to the endless Amazon rain forest, from Brasilia, monumental city of the modern era, to Salvador de Bahia, whose ancient splendour is being recovered as a result of restoration work still in progress, from the Amerindians of the forest to the hundreds of races (European, African, Asian, Arab, etc.) who live in the country - a long voyage that began one fine morning in April 1500 with the arrival of the Portuguese explorer Pedro Alvares Cabral.