[dhughes]

Could it be culture?

I used to know a girl (surname Britz) from Porto Alegre and her family was of German descent and seemed like she had no Brazilian features from what I could see.

When I see pictures and video of people in Rio it's like different country.

[kroger]

Brazil is such a big and diverse country that any state seems like a different country. We have influence from Portugal, Holland [1], France, Germany, Italy, Africa, Japan and many other places. Some would argue that there's no such thing as a "Brazilian feature". That's one of the reasons I always have trouble filling the "race" form when I travel.

[1] The Dutch actually invaded Brazil for a few years: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dutch_Brazil