I spent most of last month on vacation with friends in Brazil, which is not a country so much as it is a Victoria’s Secret catalogue exploded to life. It is where your body-image issues go to discover themselves, and where your self-confidence goes to die. Brazilians are so beautiful that if you try to Photoshop a picture of one, your computer explodes and melts your face off as a lesson in the perils of hubris. Brazilians are also tremendously warm and friendly people, unless you mention the words “World Cup” and “Germany” or “Vengaboyz” and “Brazil” in the same sentence.

I’m not even the most rock-n-roll person on Earth, and yet, there’s something especially dismal about how you put your hands up when the DJ tells you to, and you jump when the song implores you to. Representation pic/Thinkstock