I spontaneously bought a non refundable one way plane ticket to South America a couple of months ago for the end of the year. After the time of my life adventuring Europe as a Backpacking Battler, I couldn’t resist the urge to see the rest of the world. This time I’m going by myself so will be the South American Struggler from now up until the day I arrive back to Sydney mid January.

I had a geez online to see what visas I would need for each country I plan on travelling to and first up, the Brazilian one seemed the most difficult to attain. It all started with the Struggler struggling to fill out a form to take to the Consulate in over the other side of the Bridge. After arriving to the Brazilian Consulate at 1:05pm, the door was locked. I kept knocking only to keep being told in sign language through the door that it was closed. I ended up arguing with the guys behind the desk telling them what a g up it was they closed at 1pm for the day. Bunch of slackers. That first confrontation didn’t put me in the most thrilled mood.

Round two. I made sure I got there before 1pm this time and hoped like hell they didn’t remember me or the fuss I made the first time. One of the blokes had a chat to me and checked out my documents. He asked me where the confirmation for my flight into Brazil was. I told him I hadn’t yet made arrangements to enter or exit Brazil. He told me that it wasn’t an issue that I didn’t have a flight out of Brazil as I had a return flight home from Chile. He continued to insist that I definitely needed a flight into Brazil to prove that I was actually planning on going to Brazil. To be honest I sat there quite dumbfounded. I said to the bloke if he could just take my word for the fact I would be entering Brazil considering I was at the Consulate applying and paying for a visa. He said it was not satisfactory. I sat there stunned and started having a bit of a chuckle at the request.

So now I have been to the Brazilian Consulate in Sydney to attain a visa twice with no result apart from the fact that I now know I need to sort my life out and pay for a very expensive flight from La Paz, Bolivia to Rio de Janeiro, Brazil.

Another waste of time and possibly a foreshadow of the things to come for the South American Struggler.