a time on my mission when we found a dead body. We were walking down a kind of alley and saw someone laying face down right in the middle of the road. We went over to help, but he smelled really, really bad and didn't appear to be breathing. We figured he'd been murdered (since that's not super uncommon in Brazil). We went and found a policeman and told him we'd found a body.

He came running and followed us to the body. Upon seeing it, he cussed a little and then went up and began kicking it. My companion and I were appalled, but then the body kind of moaned a little and started moving. It turned out it was just some local drunk whom the policeman already knew. I guess his breathing was just shallow enough that we didn't notice it since the smell kept us from getting too close.

It was definitely a surprising moment watching a policeman kick a murder victim, though.