Sergio Perelberg obituary

My friend Sergio Perelberg, who has died aged 80, was a civil engineer who led infrastructure projects around the globe. He was larger than life, kind, gregarious, political – and always involved in the world around him.

Born in Rio de Janeiro, he was the son of refugees who had fled to Brazil to escape the anti-Jewish pogroms in eastern Europe. Sergio’s father, Manoel, ran a construction business; his mother, Clara (nee Pochaczevsky), was a child psychiatrist, one of eight women in a class of 300 medical students. On weekdays, she worked in a public hospital in Rio; on Saturdays, their home was open for free medical consultations. Sadly, Sergio lost his mother when he was just 15, and his younger brother Mario (also a doctor) died at the age of 25.

After attending the Pedro II school in the state of Rio de Janeiro, Sergio won a scholarship to the Pontifical Catholic University to study civil engineering, but, like his mother, he was deeply concerned with social issues. As an undergraduate, he became involved in the educator and philosopher Paulo Freire’s project to teach poor people in Rio to read.

Freire believed that “education either functions as an instrument which is used to facilitate the integration of the younger generation into the logic of the present system and bring about conformity, or it becomes the ‘practice of freedom’”. Ordinary reading books say “A for apple”, “B for ball” and “C for car”; Freire’s said “T for trabalhador” (worker), “E for exploitation” and “F for freedom”. Sergio became deeply involved with this work, taking time off from his studies to immerse himself in it.

Sergio arrived in the UK in 1976, to study for an MA in soil mechanics at Imperial College London. In later years, he displayed an exceptional ability to navigate between cultural frameworks. Working on infrastructure projects in Africa, North and South America, Asia and Europe, Sergio built ports, bridges and roads in 23 countries.

The projects he led for the World Bank and the EU had important economic and social implications. One project in Guinea aimed to link that country’s underdeveloped tropical forest region with its capital, Conakry, and the border with Ivory Coast, an important trading partner. Sergio arrived to be confronted with heightened tension between three teams, British, Brazilian and Guinean. All communication was confined to written memos, despite their offices being 100 yards apart. His first action as “chef de mission” was to ban all written exchanges, and insist on face-to-face communication. Building bridges was Sergio’s forte.

Sergio is survived by his wife, Rosine (nee Jozef), whom he married in 1969, son, Daniel, a large extended family and many friends around the world.