Eleven small stories, loving chronicles about Rio de Janeiro and its people, written by some of the best Brazilian writers of the time.
Colonel Polidoro is the political chief of the small town of Passaroca. Near the city hall elections, he decides to help his candidate by setting up an adult literacy course. For this, he needs to find a competent teacher and decides to go to Rio de Janeiro with this function. False moralist that is, ends up falling in the revelry, meets a beautiful dancer and invites the girl to spend the carnival on his farm. Drunk, he confuses the addresses and causes his driver to take the dancer in place of the teacher to Passaroca, which will cause a lot of confusion.
The sophisticated thief Mão Leve and his simple-minded accomplice Jonjoca take from the rich to give to the poor. Their new mission is raising funds in order Mão Leve's brother can study abroad. But great care must be taken lest the honest boy discovers the origin of the money.
Two young men from Paris bring "wonderful civilizing ideas" into the brain. But, as they returned without pity, they began to call for an auction of the furniture and objects of art that garrison their "garconiére", last vestige of the passage of opulence. The great idea would be to install a cabaret in the favela for tourists in search of new sensations and also for the inhabitants of the city. On the hill, one of the boys experiences the greatest surprise: he found there, living among the humble, teaching to read to the children, Rosinha, an enchanted little princess, queen of the hill.