When The Meninas Came To Town

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Three years ago, this club was a casa fado — a house of Portugal's traditional, mournful fado music, a sort of blues-opera hybrid that weaves together vocals and string instruments. Then, about two years ago, the meninas brasileiras began to arrive in droves, lured by the common language and Bragança's proximity to the Spanish border. Soon Top Model and six other clubs opened up, becoming the town's most profitable enterprises.

One of them, a strip club called Montelomeu, opened up last year on the edge of the town's nature sanctuary, its red neon sign lighting the hillside like a carnival. Montelomeu, "M.L." for short, had an unusual feature: three dozen bedrooms ringing the dance floor. Soon it was pulling in hundreds of local men every night. A half an hour in a bedroom costs ?30, according to Portuguese media accounts. At the peak of the fever, M.L. even sponsored the local football club. "Nobody could imagine that this could happen here," says Bragança's mayor, Jorge Nunes, sitting in his office beneath an oil painting of the castle. "But there are lots of activities that people just learn to live with."

The meninas made themselves more noticeable in Bragança by sticking together. They bought their groceries and got their hair done together, always together, often gripping mobile phones and giggling like schoolgirls. Some were overweight, but the majority looked young and healthy and wore slightly sexier clothing than the traditional Portuguese women. "It caused people to talk," remembers Helena Fidalgo, a local reporter for LUSA, Portugal's national news agency. "I would go into a shop and the shopkeeper would look out the window and say, 'Oh, here come the girls.'" Shortly afterward, Fidalgo noticed a neighbor's wife move out and, the next day, a young menina move in. She asked the police chief if any of this was illegal. But he just laughed, she says. "I had nothing to write about."

In some ways, the meninas were a boon to Bragança, as one service sector fueled others — from beauty salons to taxicabs to Chinese restaurants. "In the times of vacas gordas [fat cows, or during the heyday], they used to come 17 and 18 a day, and sometimes they had to stand in line," says Ana, a hairdresser in Bragança. Which is not to say everyone welcomes the meninas, especially the ones who are black. "I'm not racist," Ana says. "But there are many hairdressers who are. They refuse to receive them in their shops."