Brazil on Og Maciel's Journal

Confessions of a Teenage Emblem Thief

Tue, 02 Dec 2025 00:00:00 +0000

Confessions of a Teenage Emblem Thief

“The Big Score” by Og Maciel

I was fourteen when I first heard about people who “harvested” car emblems for the thrill of it. Nobody in my small coastal town had even imagined such a thing—which, in my mind, meant I had the advantage of being the first to try. Over the next four or five months, I taught a handful of trusted friends the quiet finesse required to pry an emblem loose without leaving a scratch. I became something of a connoisseur, only going after the really special ones—novelty emblems, rare designs, or the irresistible shield-shaped badge on the Ford Del Rey Ghia. I could never have too many of those.

The Day I Was Rescued by Firefighters

Fri, 07 Nov 2025 00:00:00 +0000

The Day I Was “Rescued” by Firefighters While Learning to Code

Photo by Nik on Unsplash

I guess I must be going through a nostalgic spree or something, because yesterday, as I wrote about keyboards and my experience with Linux — and even the project I’ve been working on, trying to write a few words every night — is also part of a memory from my childhood. And today, I find myself thinking of the day when I had to be, quote-unquote, rescued by the firemen after being stuck in a hotel room once.

Why Christmas Music Gets Me Every Time

Tue, 28 Oct 2025 00:00:00 +0000

I know it may sound weird to start talking about Christmas when Halloween hasn’t even come up yet. But last night, while my oldest daughter was making dinner, she put on a Christmas station on Pandora—and just like that, I was transported straight into my first Christmas memory.

I must have been maybe five or six. And when I say I “remember” it, I’m not 100% sure if it’s a real memory or something I pieced together from old photos—but it feels real. Someone dressed as Santa Claus came to our house. To this day I don’t know if it was my dad, a friend of his, or someone my parents hired—but “Santa” showed up. And to my absolute shock, I got a G.I. Joe dressed in full camouflage, plus a yellow helicopter and a Jeep with some kind of weapon mounted in the back. This was the early 80s, so getting war-themed toys was totally normal. That’s the first Christmas I can truly recall.

A Book, a Backyard War, and a Lifetime of Friendship

Fri, 24 Oct 2025 00:00:00 +0000

Photo by Anna Samoylova on Unsplash

Reading has always been part of my family for as long as I can remember. Some of my earliest memories are of my parents buying books from those traveling salespeople who used to go door to door selling encyclopedias—Brittanica, Barsa, Larousse, you name it. We always had a room dedicated to books, where we kept the dictionaries, classic literature, and those giant encyclopedia volumes that made you feel smarter just by being in the same room with them.

The Gift

Sun, 12 May 2019 00:00:00 +0000

It was June 8th,1974 and on a warm evening in the territory of Amapá, now a state in the northern part of Brazil, a baby boy was born. Other than being a couple of months premature, the one thing that made this birth a bit more interesting than any premature birth was the fact that this baby had its hands and feet completely bent inwards, almost fused into his arms and legs.

Back from the Tropics

Thu, 05 Aug 2010 00:00:00 +0000

It’s been a while since I last posted anything new. That’s because I took some time off from work and headed down to my old stomping grounds… Brazil! It had been 5 years since I visited my friends and relatives and since I couldn’t make it to GUADEC and take my family on vacation at the same time, we hoped on a straight flight to Rio de Janeiro from Charlotte's international airport.

Bota água no feijão!

Mon, 12 Jul 2010 00:00:00 +0000

Depois de quase 5 anos estarei voltando à pátria amada! É isso aí! Como não vai dar para ir na Holanda na conferência GUADEC 2010 (muuuuito caro) este ano, vou então com a família toda para o Brasil.

Vou ficar no norte do Espirito Santo por quase 2 semanas, vegetando e apresentando os primos, tios, tias, avós, etc para a minha filha mais nova (a minha esposa e filha mais velha já estiveram no Brasil antes).

Olé, Olé

Tue, 29 Mar 2005 00:00:00 +0000

An interesting read (sorry… free registration required) about Brazil’s involvement with the Open Source movement. It seems that Linux has joined Soccer as this country’s passion. The New York Times says “Brazil: Free Software’s Biggest and Best Friend”.

Looking to save millions of dollars in royalties and licensing fees, Mr. da Silva has instructed government ministries and state-run companies to gradually switch from costly operating systems made by Microsoft and others to free operating systems, like Linux. On Mr. da Silva’s watch, Brazil has also become the first country to require any company or research institute that receives government financing to develop software to license it as open-source, meaning the underlying software code must be free to all.