Brazil golf resort guests beware: A Speedo, or sunga, could be in your future

Here at the Catussaba Resort in Salvador de Bahia, Brazil, finding golf is no easy matter. There’s just one golf course – a 9-holer – and golf really isn’t the main draw in this sun-drenched city.

What is easy to find is men in sungas. What’s a sunga? Well, in the U.S. it goes by it’s more commonly known company moniker – the Speedo.

Yes, here in Brazil, the men join the women to wear the least amount of clothing possible at pools and beaches. And because I’m a “Do as the Romans do,” kind of guy, I am sunga-ing my little … whatevers off.

It’s not like anyone stares, or even cares, really. It’s a cultural thing here, and many other continents. Men just have a thing for displaying every possible body hair to the world in these places. The man-kini is freedom, I suppose, especially when you see some guy in his 80s wandering around with what looks like Dr. J’s head, circa 1974, sticking out of his sunga.

That it’s completely and totally anti-American goes without saying. In the U.S., the rules demand that men wear swim trunks that preferably go from armpit to ankle. Otherwise, endless ridicule is to be expected, if not outright violence against the sunga-wearer.

I had a plan to post a picture here of my sunga-clad body, and I still might. But trust me, that’s the sort of thing that requires a public warning shot. Should I? Shouldn’t I? It’s all up to you whether I decide to show more flesh on the Internet than Natalie Gulbis.

Regardless, I’ll have more stories and features about Catussaba Resort in the coming weeks.

–WKW