Trying to Figure out who this is…

Boy, this is a hard one!

English side –

To my good friend James, for remember to me (basically to remember me by)

The Samey? or Samy?  I can’t figure out the last part of this one.

The Portuguese side says pretty much the same.  I can’t make out the last two lines of the Portuguese.  Dated Sept 27, 1943  Egypt

The name on the picture I can’t read the first name maybe Omar? the last name is Para.

Very cool WWII memorabilia!!

Seems to be a captain of a merchant ship; name of the ship maybe starts with a B. Could be Brazilian- they declared war on the Axis November 1943 after a number of their merchant ships were sunk by U-boats.

The first word in the ship’s name looks to be an abbreviation, maybe for Comandante.

The last two lines are something about addressing James (I think) as a comrade aboard the S/S COMANDANTE PESSOA, a 390’ steam turbine registered to Brazil, home port Rio de Janeiro. (The “O” in Pessoa has an accent mark.) So the uniform is presumably Brazilian merchant marine, though I don’t recognize the shoulder boards. It looks like there might be a lightning bolt on them, which would indicate he was a radio operator. A full officer would usually have straight stripes and no anchor so perhaps he was a cadet or assistant. The captain would have had four full stripes. I think the name on the photo is the photography studio.

COMANDANTE PESSOA made it through the war but sunk in 1954 while being towed to Brazil after being holed striking a rock. It is now a popular dive site near Natal, Brazil.

I’m not getting anything from the signature on the right side. Seeing “The”, I think perhaps it was a nickname? Radio operators are often known as “WOP” or “Sparks” but neither of those work.

My sister married into a Brazilian family. I sent her the photo and asked if the family could help. This came back:

Portuguese version:

Ao bom amigo James uma lembrança de nossa camaradagem a bordo do navio …”
Comandante Pereira…. 27/9/43 Egypt

English version :
To my good friend James, memory of our friendship on board the ship…
Commander Pereira… 27/9/43
Egypt

The signature looks to me like it says “The Family.”

Perhaps the two of them served when the ship was in Egypt during WW2

Maybe the SS Comandante Pessoa was berthed in Port Said (the port at the Mediterranean end of the Suez Canal. Our Brazilian chappy could’ve popped into Cairo for some r’n’r. I gather the city was humming in the 1940s.