Danielle in Brazil

The Entry in Which I Get My Life Back

2012-01-27T22:53:00.001-02:00

Thursday

We moved today.
Yesterday was Alexandre’s last day in the military.

I spent the days before the move doing most of the packing, since Alexandre still had to work. Gatinha was a helpful assistant.

By “helpful,” I mean “often getting in the way because of her fascination with suitcases and boxes and being inside things but with a cute face that prevents anyone from getting annoyed with her.”

Thursday morning (today, though it feels like so long ago), we woke up very early to finish getting things ready for the movers. Then I walked up and down the 3 flights of stairs of our building, maybe 30 times or more, carrying the lighter boxes to help speed things along. Eventually, all the loading into the moving truck was done, and we said goodbye and good riddance to the crappy beach town.

Gatinha's hot pink cat carrier. Alexandre was not pleased when I came home with it. heheh

The new building has an elevator, so the move into the new apartment was significantly quicker. To be lazy and avoid helping with the move into the new place, I left to pick up some sandwiches from a restaurant nearby for me, Alexandre, and the movers, and once the guys left, Alexandre and I ate on desk chairs on the balcony, since we don’t have a dining room table yet. We enjoyed the smell of cookies and rain and mato and newness and we enjoyed the precious silence. Gatinha was spooked and hid in the closet, but I was finally safe and calm and at peace.

After much-needed showers in our gorgeous, white-tiled bathroom with the shower door made of glass, we went to copy keys at a super fancy mall. I spent a better part of the day negotiating over the phone with the boss of the English “school” I interviewed at. (Remember it’s not exactly a school, more like a broker between students and private teachers.) He has a few students that he’s trying to set me up with, and we were working out the details. One accepted all the terms, and I meet her tomorrow! My first student in our new city. :) Let’s hope the others get on board, too.

Alexandre and I also went to a great store like Sam’s Club that requires a membership and everything. We bought few things that we needed and lots of treats that we didn’t. We bought wine to celebrate but fell asleep before we could drink it. Moving is tiring.

My new bedroom is like a cave. It’s cool and small and dark. Last night was nice and chilly. The cat curled up between us and we slept under a comforter. The rain pattered against the windows and it was the only sound around. Though the cat is still on Alexandre’s military time (get it? Military time? har har) and woke us up by crying for food at 6:30am on the dot, it was still the best night of sleep I’ve had in recent memory.

Friday

Today I had my first student from the school and a meeting with the boss guy at his office. Both went smoothly. The city is big but so gloriously organized. Every street I needed had a sign, which, as those of you living in Brazil know, is a rare gem in this country. The GPS worked flawlessly and the other drivers were civilized. The buses have their own lanes and no one almost killed me and I didn’t yell at a single passing car. This place is another world.

This city is richer, there’s a strong middle class, and in general, people are more educated. That means the employees at the supermarket and the lady selling the city bus cards could actually carry out proper, helpful conversations about the services they offered. It means sushi is reasonably priced. I think these factors may also explain the relative quality of the roads and transit. (Did I mention all the useful signs?)

I made a professional Facebook profile, and a guy studying at the local university already found me and asked for classes. He and a friend are coming to the apartment on Tuesday to meet me (and Alexandre, who will stay home to make sure they’re not weirdos) and hopefully sign contracts.

We drove to the in-laws’ house for dinner, because it’s close by and we could.

And now I’m back to being alive again, and the year of living in a dingy apartment under a dirty raincloud is finally over. I’d almost lost myself back there. I think the thing I’m most proud of is having resisted the ease and temptation of becoming an alcoholic. I’m in the clear now; there’s no more risk of that happening. It’s only been 2 days but it’s already evident that things are changing drastically, and for the better.

I’m ready for you, new city! Let’s do this.

Moving: the Fun Part

2012-01-24T08:30:00.000-02:00

So this week, I've been been busy busy busy! We got our keys to the new apartment, cleaned it, moved the first round of stuff, and started the best part: furniture shopping!

Luckily, we will now live only about 20 minutes away from the in-laws. It's really going to be helpful to have their support and company. They have answers to everything! They already know things like where to find a good plumber, the best place to buy vegetables, and, ahem...a good place for dinner on nights that we don't feel like cooking. :) I've given up on getting anything more than passing cordiality out of Alexandre's brother and sister, but I think living so close will help me bond more with Alexandre's parents. I'm totally going to step up my Brazilian-ness this year, because we will be having weekly Sunday lunches at their house!

Anyway, the mother-in-law has been extra helpful with turning our new apartment into a home. She treats interior design and decorating as a hobby. She reads design blogs for fun. She subscribes to housing magazines and buys these kinds of magazines in other languages when she goes on vacation. So we asked if we could "hire" her on as our official interior designer. She was bowled over! I think she's designed the you-know-what out of her own house and is itching for a new project.

She took our request very seriously. This weekend, she and I sat down and she showed me a million blogs and websites with pictures of apartments. She asked me what I liked and didn't like about the different pictures until she could establish a name for my "style" (clean and contemporary, she called it). Then she showed me a bunch of color pallets with color themes, and I picked the one I liked the best (earth tones: bright green, dark brown, charcoal, and white). The next morning, we went over to the new apartment and measured a bunch of stuff to get an idea of what sizes furniture pieces we needed.

Overall, she's been more helpful than anything. Of course, she has a slightly distorted idea of how much furniture should cost ("Etna is a cheap store!"), and then I had to give her a rule that we're not going to buy anything just for the sake of decoration: everything needs to have a function (that means no vases and no puffs, which is the Portuguese semantic shift word for footstool. She thinks these footstools, which are all the rage right now, are a great way to add color to a room...? Nah). But in general she's really giving us direction and good ideas.

The three of us went to the mall in the new city to try furniture shopping, except everything was crazy expensive and I'm suffering from a bit of sticker shock. I mean, I know prices in Brazil are high, so I guess I shouldn't be surprised. But still! I think Alexandre and I will end up avoiding these big mall stores and trying the independent furniture makers (carpenters and ironmasters) in the interior.

Our first success with that was for our new couch. The living room in the new apartment is small, which means it needs a smaller-than-average couch. (The owners/previous residents had a big couch, but it blocked part of the door to the balcony and the TV was right in the sun. We're using another space.) Anyway, Alexandre's mom knew about this store that only makes and sells its own brand of couches. It's family-owned and operated, and everything's local. The best part is that they offer customized couches! The super knowledgeable salesman showed us a whole bunch of couches they had around the showroom. We told him which elements we liked and didn't like. He helped us choose the best cat-proof material. Then we got to design our own couch based on all the things we liked! The couch is perfectly tailored to our preferences and needs, and it was still cheaper than the crap we saw in the mall stores. Yay!

I'm hoping we can take the same route for the dining room table, because there's no way I'm paying upwards of 1,000 reais for a base and a piece of glass.

But have I mentioned that our new apartment is infinitely and immeasurably better than where we're living now? Some highlights:

*Civilized neighbors!
*Relatively few neighbors with healthy amounts of space between apartments and buildings.
*Our own parking spot- no more sharing a spot with 3am phone calls to move the car.
*A 24-hour doorman service (that means no wierdos or gas salesmen calling on the intercom...or friends of people in other apartments whose friends won't answer and clearly aren't home, or the mailman calling for other apartments because he doesn't want to come back, or private delivery men (think FedEx) delivering something at 6am)
*A cookie factory close by that periodically fills the air with the sweet smell of cookies!
*Strict sound and cleanliness rules!
*An on-site admin office, like a sort of HOA office (a.k.a. a place for me to tattle on neighbors behaving badly)
*Recycling
*A pool and party area
*A big, gorgeous balcony with its own built-in barbecue (I know I told you that before, but just thought I'd remind you because it's so awesomely awesome)
*Big doors and windows that let in lots of sunlight
*An elevator <3
*Ample guest parking
*Hardwood floors (except for the bathroom and the kitchen, which have nice sleek tile)
*And, most importantly, peace and quiet.

And remember I told you that there's a big supermarket close by? We also discovered that this group of buildings within walking distance is actually a sort of open-air mall/business center. It has restaurants, a convenience store (minus the gas, though I think the supermarket sells gas), a branch of our bank, a lotérica to pay bills (woot), and best of all, a super amazing gym! All within walking distance. We went into the gym and they offer discounts for people who live in our apartment complex. It's super fancy and I can't want to start there.

I also had a job interview over Skype last week. It's a company in the new city that offers English classes at people's businesses. I go to people's jobs and have the option of offering that people come to my apartment. The school provides most of the material. I think it's better than a traditional school because I'll be out around town, meeting my students' colleagues (a.k.a. potential new students). The interview went well, so I'll be going in to meet the boss guy in person and see the material this week. Some of the students are Korean businesspeople and their families who are working in the new city. I've really missed having Korean students! It should be nice to talk crap about Brazil with them. hahaha.

So, hooray! Big changes! Oh, and I totally haven't mentioned in the blog that we're going to the US in February. (How lucky am I?) Soon after the move is squared away, we'll be on a plane to Californ-i-a.

That rhymed and this blog entry is annoyingly written. I'll stop now. Lots more cleaning and packing to do, anyway!

Caught Being Good: Supermarket Justice

2012-01-19T22:38:00.003-02:00

Good news! It's been a while since I've posted a Caught Being Good award for anyone, and since we're moving in 6 days (SIX! Yeah, it got moved up a bit), I had just about given up on this crap town.

But today, I need to give an award to the last establishment that I'd ever expect to give it to (well, second-to-last; we can't forget evil, evil Telefónica). Today's Caught Being Good award goes to...

An employee at Extra Supermarket!

I know, right? Extra?! I'd actually decided to boycott the one closest to my apartment, partly because of the clientele but mostly because every single time I went there, something ridiculous happened.

But then todaaaay I caved in. I was in the middle of making this AND this for dinner (not a traditional combo in theory, but it worked deliciously), and I realized that my lentils had bugs in them! Ugh. But it happens, am I right, Jim? So I decided to just suck it up and run over to Extra and buy some lentils and hope the employees didn't close their registers with 4 people waiting or let their friends cut in line again.

I quickly found the lentils (above some other product's price tag and without their own price tag in sight, but I digress) and headed over to the quick checkout line, which in this store is for 20 items or less.

When I got in line, I realized that the guy in front of me clearly had more than 20 items in his cart. I decided to count (I was in line; what else was I gonna do?) and he actually had more like 35 items. It wasn't even a "ehhh....let's ring up all those beers as 1 and let you slide" kinda deal that the 20 items or less cashiers allow for. It was just a blatant disregard for order or respect. The guy was about 30, and was dressed in overpriced jeans and a overpriced and overly-thin polo shirt that had some nonsense English babbling about Australia on the back (the back, not the front, because that makes him cooler, right?) He clearly had this attitude of "I'm richer than all of you and I make sure you all know so that you'll be pressured to agree that rules don't apply to me."

I considered saying something. I wanted to say, "It's surprising that someone with enough money to waste on clothes like that still hasn't learned how to read," and then point at the giant "20 ITEMS OR LESS" signs above his head. But I was worried that my sarcasm wouldn't work in Portuguese (it never does) and that he'd scoff at me and my accent. Then I remembered this little story I read on the internet once about some woman who tried cutting in an American 10 items or less line. The cashier said to that woman, "OK, so which 10 items would you like me to ring up today?". I fantasized about the Brazilian belp cashiers having that kind of snark. The man caught my eye, and I mustered a disapproving glare, glancing back from him to the cart and back to him again. He quickly looked away. Douche.

Eventually, it was the man's turn. The cashier called out próximo! (all you really hear is the ó) and the man sauntered up with his cart full of groceries. The cashier was bent over fixing something on her register and didn't immediately see the man. He quickly started loading his stuff onto the conveyor belt, hoping to pressure her into ringing him up, or maybe betting that she didn't know how to count (not an unreasonable assumption). But. Get this:

The other cashier next to him TURNED AROUND, tapped Mr. Playboy on the shoulder, shook her head and gave him a firm NO.

"You've got too much stuff. This is the 20 items or less line. You're gonna have to go wait in the regular line." She pointed up at the signs, then pointed over at the regular lines.

The man tried to play dumb. "Oh, really?" he said, in way too high of a voice. "Oh, wow. I didn't know. Oh, I've already put my stuff up and everything." He tried giving her the puppy dog eyes that he must use on his mother and dumb girls at the bar.

The woman just stared at him menacingly until he took his things off the conveyor belt, put them back into his cart, and walked sheepishly away.

Whooo hooo!!

In my mind, I was dancing in place, and shouting, "haha! In your FACE, caralho!" And pointing at the yuppie guy with glee and both index fingers. But instead I just smiled at him sweetly in the off chance that he caught my eye again. He didn't.

At that moment, the Caught Being Good winner called out for the next customer, too, so I went to her line and the lady behind me went to Mr. Douchebag's line. I was happy I got to talk to her.

"Congratulations!" I said. She gave me a small smile. I wanted to say, "You're so going to get a Caught Being Good award on my blog!" but of course I didn't.

My words were not necessary today. The Extra employee gets a Caught Being Good award for being awesome and bringing justice to the checkout line and, ya know, for doing her job.

I still consider this a fluke on the part of one lone Extra employee with some sense, and I don't plan on ever shopping there regularly, but I've got to give credit where credit is due!

Rio de Janeiro, Again!

2012-01-17T17:30:00.002-02:00

Yay! So Alexandre and I went to Rio this weekend! It was a totally spontaneous thing. I was cleaning and found one of the tickets that Alexandre never used from July, when he was going to go to the blogger meetup and he got pneumonia. I'd totally forgotten about it! I used one of his two tickets when I went to Rio the second time, but I hadn't been able to use the other one because it was already in Alexandre's name and the manager wasn't there to sign off on a name change.

Anyway anyway. I called Lindsey up to suggest a visit! It would be our last chance to use the ticket before the move. Lindsey approved and the trip was a go! It was Alexandre's first visit to a new place, just for fun and not for work, in more than 2 years. His first real vacation in a while!

Yes, so everything worked out and on Friday afternoon, we were on our way.

views from the drive up the serra

We got to Lindsey and Ro's apartment late Friday night, where they had wonderful Domino's Pizza and beer waiting for us! Yum yum. Lots of chatting and catching up ensued.

Saturday morning, we joined Lindsey on her weekly trip to the local farmer's market. Alex and I ate some tapioca (Flavors of Brazil explains tapioca here). More yum.

Lindsey buys her greens from the greens guy

After the feira, we braved the 100-degree sun and the three of us went to Pão de Açucar: the famous Sugarloaf! (I use that word begrudgingly; I still think it's weird.). I finally got to experience this Brazilian icon. Before going up the actual mountain, we explored the base area, with its hiking trails and pristine beaches.

The water looked so wonderful and inviting, and Lindsey and I couldn't resist going to put our feet in it. However, we foolishly failed to anticipate the 100-degree sand:

ouch ouch! hot hot!

Luckily the water was ice cold (as in, it really felt like it had ice in it!). Totally worth it.

Did I mention it was hot outside? It was. The water looked so refreshing from our place on the hiking trail. Too bad we were too high up to jump in:

Yes, so then we went into the actual entrance area of the monument so we could get in line for the cable car that goes up Pão de Açucar.

HALT! haha I love his "O" face

After less waiting than I expected, we got into the first cable car and made our way up the mountain! We got off at the first level/lookout area, explored the terrain and took some pictures, then got into the second cable car and went to the top! Wow! Amazing views of A Cidade Maravilhosa. See if you can spot the Christ statue in the pictures:

har har

new friends

Poor Alexandre is scared of heights, but he was a good sport about everything. We were going to eat a late lunch up there, but things were insanely overpriced (6 reais for a coxinha! What is this, Disneyland?). But yes, I'm so happy I finally went to Pão de Açucar! Famous image around the world, and all that.

We'd planned to go up to the Christ statue AFTER Pão de Açucar, but with the heat and the lack of a proper lunch, we decided to ditch Jesus (he's with us in spirit, right?) and drink on the beach instead. WIN.

Lindsey, Alexandre and I walked to the famous Copacabana beach, and while Alexandre slept on the sand, Lindsey and I braved the frigid waters, again a wonderful contrast to the oppressive sun. Can any oceanographers explain how the sea is so cold during such a hot, tropical summer? I often ditched my earth systems science class in college.

The sun started to go down, so we made our way back to Lindsey's place and got ready to go to dinner at Lindsey's husband's restaurant. We were planning on making it a quick meal so we could go over to Lapa, a famous nightlife neighborhood in Rio, for late-night drinks and samba dancing. But after a caipirinha each and a ton of food, we all gave up on our hopes of being able to stay up late enough to go out drinking and dancing and decided to go home and play video games instead. I'm getting old. What I mean by that is that I'm so happy that, as I get older, it's getting more and more socially acceptable for me to prefer drinking at home and playing video games to bar hopping and paying too much for alcohol.

Needless to say, we had a great time staying in! I (accidentally) beat Lindsey (the Canadian!) in an ice hockey video game, and she and Alexandre battled it out in some gladiator game. Ro even joined in for a while after work, and we went to sleep at a reasonable hour.

Focus! Determination!

Sunday meant a trip to a famous open-air market called the Feira de São Cristovão, which is held in a sort of stadium and which is home to booths and restaurants celebrating and selling the culture of the Brazilian northeast.

Lindsey was ready for action!

the giant decorations at the entrance

The feira was a lot bigger than I expected and I was a little overwhelmed at first, what with the drunk crowds and the loud music and a power outage and the rain, but we met up with some of Lindsey's nice fellow ex-pat friends and we ate and then I felt better. (However, the feel-better benefits of this food were temporary...)

Inside the restaurant

A big attraction of this market is the forró bands and spaces for dancing. (You may remember when I tried to learn forró and the teacher quit on me.) Anyway, being a spectator of older, experienced forró dancers is much more fun than trying to learn it, in my opinion. The feira was such an interesting experience. It really felt like a different Brazil, an unassuming subculture that adds to Brazil's colorful identity.

Everyone was so good, and they were having such a good time!

Some people had more fun than others...

Getting to and from the Feira de São Cristovão took a while, so we didn't have much time for anything else before our bus ride home. Oh, we stopped at KFC so Alexandre could buy a disgusting chicken and bacon "sandwich" that was advertised all over town. (I use scare quotes because they use pieces of fried chicken as the bread.)

Gross. I don't miss this part of American culture. And by that I mean I totally do sometimes.

We were so sad to leave after having such a good weekend! But little did I know what was in store for me...

About an hour into the bus ride, I started feeling really queasy. I got food poisoning earlier this year, so I knew what was coming. Oh no, oh no!

I spent the rest of the 8-hour overnight bus ride throwing up and, well, you can imagine what else, in the tiny, dirty, plastic port-o-potty box that is a bus bathroom. It. was. horrible. Dare I say...wretched? Har har. No, but seriously, it lasted the whole trip. I learned helpful information, like the fact that bus bathrooms must have some kind of reserve of water for flushing, because there is a limit to how many times you can successfully flush the toilet before it stops working. When we got into town at about 6am, I had to push past people who were trying to get off the bus so I could puke in the street. I really can't think of a worse time or place to be sick. There was no escape, no access to medicine, no cool tile to lay my face on, and no way to lie down or sleep properly.

Once we got home, I was able to take a shower and brush my teeth (relief) and also take some medicine, which eased the stomach pains enough to let me sleep for a couple of hours. I spent Monday with only enough energy to migrate from the couch to the bathroom to the bed, and to whine a lot. It was a sucky end to such a fun trip, that's for sure! But I will still recommend the food at the São Cristovão restaurants. Why not? It was delicious, and I was the only one from the group who got sick. Besides, my last food poisoning episode was the result of a 70-real sushi dinner, so it's a crap shoot. (Get it, crap shoot? I'm on a roll today.)

But hooray for visiting Lindsey and Ro! Hooray for Rio de Janeiro! Alexandre fell in love with the city. You know how most Brazilians get a month of paid vacation for work? Well Alexandre decided that we should spend one of those months subletting an apartment in Rio and really getting to know the city. One day, one day...

Thanks again, Lindsey, for being such a fantastic hostess. :D

Old Ladies on the Bus

2012-01-10T23:12:00.007-02:00

So even though we have a car, there have been a few cases in which it's been necessary or easier for me to take a bus around town, both here at the beach and back in Caipirópolis. I've also taken city buses in Sao Paulo and Rio de Janeiro/Niteroi.

Let's talk about a phenomenon on Brazilian buses: chatty old women.

(Disclaimer: I love my grandma. I love you, Nanny! This blog post does not apply to you. I had to have learned my preference for anti-socialism in crowds or public places from someone.)

So today gave me a perfect example of this phenomenon. I had to take the city bus, and when I climbed up the stairs, I was relieved to see that there weren't many people riding it. There were plenty of seats for me to choose from, and that's when I made my first mistake: there were two seats empty next to each other, and I took the window seat and left the aisle seat open. Let's explain this seating situation first. While leaving the aisle seat open is bus etiquette in the US (and therefore a hard habit to break), it's much more common for Brazilian people (especially women) to take the aisle seat and leave the window seat empty when faced with this decision. A fellow bus rider explained to me once that women do this to make it harder for either a creep-o guy or a thief to sit next to them and trap them in the window seat. I'm not sure how frequent silent bus robberies are, but they're apparently common enough for do-gooders not to be offended when they have to ask some woman to stick her legs out so they can squeeze into the window seat.

Anyway anyway. My erroneous decision to sit in the window seat also left me vulnerable to another bus "threat," one which that helpful passenger had failed to mention: the needy senior citizen. You see, Brazilian buses have a percentage of female riders over sixty-five that seems to be disproportionate to their percentage in the population. It's either that, or they just stand out more because they're so damn talkative. In any case, they, too, can hold you hostage in the window seat.

I just want to add in one mini-rant here: my generation gets a bad rap for sharing every fleeting thought, emotion, or action with the world, whether it's via Facebook or Twitter or text message, but I would like to argue that old Brazilian women are ONE MILLION times worse. They cannot seem to just keep things to themselves. They are compelled by some strong, almost Biblical force to say every damn thing that comes to mind.
"My, is it hot/cold/windy/stuffy in here."
"Mmm, mm. Now, that really was a nice sandwich."
"Oh, would you look at that? That store on the corner is having a sale."
"Ugh, my knee is acting up again." etc, etc.
THEY DO NOT STOP TALKING, especially about Jesus, and especially if there are two of them sitting together.

Right, so back to my bad luck bus ride. Soon after I got on the bus, an elderly woman made her way up the big yellow steps and waved her ID card at the driver, which apparently waived her bus fare (you liked that homophone, didn'tcha? ;). And even though there were SIX empty seats in the front reserved just for her, she decided to pass them all, to pass the pair of empty seats in front of me, and to sit right.next.to.me.

After my previous bus riding lesson, I imagined that she chose to sit next to me, in part, to prevent any wackos from sitting next to her (I guess she saw my angelic face and thought I'd be a safe bet), but I really do think that she also sat next to me because... she just wanted someone to talk to. That's been my previous experience with older women sitting next to me, anyway. So this time, I was prepared. I already had my book out, so I tried to hold it in such a way as to look thoroughly absorbed in it while hiding the English text. (If she'd seen that the book was in another language, then she'd have found what would be, in her mind, a perfect excuse to start talking to me.) I let my hair fall into my face a little. I made a point not to so much as glance toward her each time she fidgeted and sighed.

But, unfortunately, I let my guard down for just an instant. There was a bit of a commotion when a woman was trying to get off the bus with her toddler (who was resisting), and the bus driver didn't see them, and he started to drive away from the stop. The woman and a couple of other passengers started to call out to the driver, and that's when I looked up. MISTAKE. The old woman next to me saw her chance.

"Cute little kid, wasn't he?" She turned to me and asked with a smile.

Blast! Should I just pretend I don't speak Portuguese?
"Mmm." I smiled politely. I decided not to say explicitly that I didn't speak Portuguese (a trick I've begun to use with the obnoxious muamba-peddlers on the beach), but to only give off the impression that I may not be understanding. It wasn't enough.

"Whoo. It sure is hot today." The woman tried again.

No elderly woman has ever said that on the bus before.
"Mm-hmm." I quickly turned back to my book. I even made a dramatic show of turning the page.
I'm focusing on this interesting book, and not on you. I will not be pulled in!

"Yes it is," the old woman responded to her own statement. "Hot and raining. Makes the bus so uncomfortable."

You'd be a lot more comfortable if you'd sat in your own seat and given us both some space. This is a battle of wills, and I WILL PREVAIL.
I smiled half-heartedly through my hair but continued to keep my eyes on my book. I felt the woman staring at me, looking me over, waiting expectantly for me to humor her, to say at least a few words, enough to give her what she would deem the green light to tell me about everything else she'd been thinking that day.

Then, by some miracle, she correctly read my social cues and gave up. She harrumphed a little to herself, ever so quietly, and kept her fidgeting to a minimum until she pushed the "stop requested" button and got off the bus.

I won!

You may be thinking at this point that I'm some cruel and heartless "ageist" who doesn't respect the wisdom of our elders. That's just not true. It's simple: I don't think that, just because I'm younger, I should be forced to listen to these women's disjointed and self-absorbed conversations about their children and their physical ailments.

You may be thinking, "that's terrible! These women are probably lonely!" which is also unfair. Um, hello! This is Brazil, a country whose citizens do not send their senior citizens to retirement homes if they can help it. Most of these women live with their adult children, and even if they don't actually live with them, they talk to them on the phone all the time and probably have lunch with them at least once a week. These beach towns also have a high percentage of senior citizens, which results in way more social activities for them than for my age group. There are social clubs that have little kiosks on the beach where the terceira-idades can meet up to play cards and gossip; there are morning workout clubs both downtown and at the lifeguard stations (retired people can choose between tai-chi and aerobics); there are way more street corner butecos than there are bars for young people; there are elderly volunteer groups that wear matching shirts around town and serve at government day care centers as one of their activities... and those are just the things that I, as a young foreigner, know about. There's nothing like that for twenty-somethings! Plus, my friends and family all live far away. So if anything, I'm the one who should be starved for attention, keeping some defenseless retiree trapped in her window seat while I complain about my sad, pathetic life.

We're also forgetting one important factor: it's really hard to understand old people when they talk in general, and it's even harder when they're speaking your ~~second~~ third language.

Then, of course, there's the fact that, as soon as the woman realizes I have an accent (it takes the elderly a bit longer to pick up on it), she'll immediately start interrogating me about my seemingly inexplicable existence in Brazil, and we all know that my daily goal is to blend in and avoid telling my life story as much as possible. Am I a terrible person for wanting to be able to enjoy a book on a bus ride in peace? Maybe only a little. But at least, today, I got what I wanted. I also learned to sit in the aisle seat.

Gorgeous Pictures of Brazil

2012-01-07T09:09:00.000-02:00

Fellow blogger and Californian Tiffany put up some of her pictures from her stays in Brazil with her Brazilian husband. They're amazing! She deserves an award, or money, or something.

Check out her beautiful pictures here. While you're there at her blog, you'll also find a lot of cheap, easy, and healthy recipes.

Enjoy!

Hey Hey Hey, the End is Near

2012-01-05T23:07:00.001-02:00

Moving day is the 21st!

Karine's Visit and New Year's Eve

2012-01-01T23:14:00.001-02:00

So I know I mentioned that Alexandre and I were going to try to go on a little trip between Christmas and New Year's. That didn't work out for a number of reasons: since he wasn't going to the US, he couldn't get the days off at the military; the friends we wanted to visit with were busy; my friend Karine wanted to come to the beach for a few days after Christmas; and we had to run around to collect paperwork and turn it in at the leasing office for our new apartment before they closed for the new year.

But things worked out okay; I got a little at-home vacation with Karine, and and Alexandre and I will save the money to extend our US trip a bit.

Karine and I got back to the beach town on Sunday night (Christmas day), and I got to enjoy her company until late Tuesday night, when she got a bus back to Caipirópolis.

Unfortunately, we were rained off the beach all day on Monday. So we used the day to walk around downtown and explore the mall (Karine bought some clothes). We went to the grocery store. We ate some açai. I took my broken watch to a jewelry store and we made friends with the aging watch repair man, because he perked up at my mispronunciation of relógio and informed us that he had immigrated to Brazil from Spain long ago.

We went home and made an early and extravagant enchilada dinner (I typed up the recipe for the neglected cooking blog; check it out here!). Then, we did the only sensible thing there was to do on a rainy evening on the beach: sat at one of the covered beach kiosks and got piss drunk in the rain. It was great fun. We gushed about how happy we are to have each other as friends. Karine tried to speak English with the guy in front of us at the store, where we stopped to buy ice cream and more alcohol. We came home and pestered Alexandre, then quickly passed out on the pullout couch-bed before we even ate the ice cream. And good times were had by all!

We woke up hungover, but there was no time to waste! The sun was finally peeking through the clouds a bit, and we needed to make the most of it. Down to the beach we went!

We saw a little egret catching a fish:

We enjoyed coconut juice/water:

That's right. I censored my own picture. The angle was way too revealing. Have a gander at the nice piece of ass behind me instead. Yum yum!

We went home and ate leftover enchiladas for lunch, then we went for a looooonnng walk on the beach, one that rivaled our marathon walks back in Caipirópolis:

We went out and had sushi for dinner, and just like that, Karine's trip was over! So sad! :( At least we'll live closer together again once I move back inland.

Even though it felt like I'd just gotten home, on Thursday we had to go to deal with new apartment bureaucracy, and then we just continued on to the in-laws' house and stayed there until New Year's day. (That meant I spent 4 out of the last 5 weekends at the in-laws' house, for better or for worse!) We got all the apartment stuff squared away, and now we're just waiting for the keys. :D (The military is dragging their feet a bit [surprise] about giving Alexandre word on when his last day will be, but it's probably going to be around the 20th.)

We did almost nothing the whole weekend at the in-laws' house, and I was going a little crazy with boredom. I did manage to read the ENTIRE book World Without End this week. (In case you don't know, it's over 1000 pages. Beautiful sequel to the Pillars of the Earth!). Alexandre and I also went for a run one day and for a walk the next. But other than that, we just lay around the house like the spoiled slobs we are.

We did, however, manage to get ourselves all dolled up for New Year's Eve. We just stayed at home with the immediate family (so nice -- no maids or weird aunts), but we made ourselves pretty to please Alexandre's mom. She even helped "decorate" me with a colorful necklace, and then insisted on taking a bunch of pictures (OK, I kind of insisted, too).

the birds and I match (the MIL bought some of those paintings for our new apt, too, by the way. I'm excited!)

Guess who was sick of taking pictures?

The food and company were pleasant as always, but the highlight of the evening was DEFINITELY getting Alexandre's mother drunk on wine and champagne and watching her dance around the house, trying to translate and sing her own English rendition of Michel Teló's "Ai Se Eu Te Pego":

For God's sake, those girls! Quite possibly one of the worst songs ever produced, in English or in Portuguese. I don't even know why I'm embedding it.

Then, once the (Globo TV) clock announced the new year, the MIL ran around the house shouting "Happy 2012!" in Portuguese and insisting that she, Alexandre, his sister, and I make a sort of dancing conga line train down the halls in order to announce the new year to the sleeping relatives. PRICELESS. I really wanted to record her, because I think her getting drunk is a once-in-a-decade event, but I was too worried I'd break the spell.

So now it's 2012, and while 2011 had its good points and gave me a lot of learning experiences, it kind of sucked for me in general (mostly because my grandpa died and I had to live in this shitty town for Alex's military job). I guess that means things can only get better, right?

Happy New Year!

Christmas in Brazil - 2011

2012-01-01T12:02:00.000-02:00

So as most of you know, problems with my visa (now seemingly resolved, at least) kept Alexandre and me in Brazil for the holidays this year. It turned out to be nice (but I'm still really ready for a visit to California in February!).

Alexandre had to work on Christmas (sad), so I went to his parents' house alone. I went to their house on the 23rd so that Alexandre's parents wouldn't have to find time to come pick me up from the bus station during the hustle and bustle of preparations on the 24th (when Alexandre's family celebrates Christmas).

On the 23rd, alone in Alexandre's room while his slightly antisocial family members were each locked away in their own "wings" of the giant house, I read Lindsey's post about maintaining some traditions in Brazil. I had my moment to pout a little over how it was the third holiday season in a row that I was missing with my California family, and how Alexandre's family just wasn't interested in the least in trying any of my American traditions. ("Why would we bake cookies? The maid is making the desserts." etc.) I realized how Alexandre's family is very good to me, but what I was missing from the season was the idea that we worked on something together for the holiday, as a family, whether it be making the food, or buying and wrapping presents, or even cleaning up. On the holidays, my California family and I have intimate time together (we can wear pajamas to the table, and there's no one standing around the table serving us and listening to our conversations) and we share common goals, even if they're simple ones. Lots of you in the blog world wrote about how your Brazilian family does a secret Santa exchange. The irony is that my California family does that, but my Brazilian family isn't very interested in the present part of the holiday. (Alexandre's mom just buys something generic, like soap, for all of the guests.) In one way, it's kind of refreshing that the focus isn't on consumption, but it's disappointing when that focus isn't necessarily replaced by some other quality-time tradition. Alexandre's mother puts on a beautiful show, and everything in the house (decoration-wise) is just right. The result, however, is that things can feel a little stiff and stuffy.

So yeah, I used the night of the 23rd to feel sorry for myself a little bit and get that out of my system so I could be ready to make the most of things on the 24th and 25th. I talked to Alexandre about it, asked him what his family would be interested in doing in terms of bonding over the holidays. He told me that his sister usually bought presents for their parents, and to ask if I could go with her, and that his mom actually buys gifts and food for a women's shelter in town and delivers them every Christmas Eve. He said she's been doing it since he was a kid, but she never mentions it to anyone anymore because she assumed no one felt like being a part of it (!!). Well. That just wouldn't do.

So on the morning of the 24th, I talked to the sister-in-law about her present shopping. She said she was planning on going but had no idea what to get, that she was just going to walk around the mall and would probably settle on perfume/cologne or something. I offered to go with her and even supplied some successful gift ideas. (A history book for the FIL -- I'd heard him talking about it with Alexandre -- and shoes for the MIL -- I'd gone with her to a shoe store a couple of weeks before, and there was a pair of shoes she'd wanted that was sold out in her size. We went back to the store and they had gotten an order in!) So we got to do that together, and I felt a little better.

Then my friend Karine from Caipirópolis showed up in town! I was so happy to have her there with us for Christmas. Alexandre's brother drove me to go meet her at the bus station.

After picking up Karine and getting the OK from her, I offered Alexandre's mom our afternoon to help with her gifts for the women's shelter. She seemed quietly pleased that other people had taken an interest. (My guess is that she'd tried to get her kids involved when they were tweens and had gotten such negative responses that she'd just accepted it as her own, almost secret project.) She'd bought some little gifts, like toiletries and hair products, and Karine and I wrapped them. She'd asked the maid to bake a cake, so Karine and I helped decorate it. Then we went with the MIL to the shelter. It's a really good place. It's a different idea from the traditional American women's shelters that are kept in a secret location and all that. (Those must exist here, but this wasn't one of them.) The idea of the place is to help pregnant women and new mothers get on their feet so they don't feel obligated to give up their babies for adoption or try to find some shoddy, illegal abortion. The women can live there with their kids. The shelter helps them find jobs (usually as maids) and offers daycare while the women are at work.

There weren't a lot of women there when we got there (Christmas eve day is a busy time for maids, so most of the moms were working), but apparently the ones there were expecting us. The gifts from the MIL have turned into a tradition for the shelter, and they were excited to see what she brought (the kids were especially eager to eat the cake). Alexandre's mom is an OBGYN, so while Karine and I entertained the kids, she sat down with the two mothers who were there to ask them about their babies' births, their breastfeeding, and general health issues, and to answer any of their health questions. Help like that is invaluable, in my opinion. I'm terrible with babies, so I let Karine handle the youngest ones and I chatted up the kids with more developed frontal lobes. They tried to convince us to stay for their Christmas party that night, but heartbreakingly, I had to deny them. All in all, it was a really important experience.

I was long over the pouting phase by dinnertime, and I really enjoyed myself. There was some silly family drama, and Alexandre's parents offered holiday sanctuary for Alexandre's cousin, who was in the right in the dispute. She and her boyfriend came to dinner, and the person in the wrong didn't. The result was a beautiful night with engaging conversation, lots of laughs, delicious food and drinks, and -- wouldn't you know it -- good, quality time together. I give it a 9, because we needed Alexandre there to make it a 10!

The tree and the plates, ready for guests and dinner

me and the buffet (we became very close that night)

the present my family sent to Alexandre's mom

Karine and me, all dressed up!

Enjoying Sergio's story

Candid smiles

fancy fruit: cape gooseberries from Colombia and American-style blueberries (from the South of Brazil). Sorry, but I'd take a mango over these any day!

Chocolate-covered cherry truffles...now we're talkin'!

So it took a little extra effort on my part, but all in all, I'd call the holiday a success. :)

Beach Madness

2011-12-30T23:42:00.000-02:00

This is a picture from the newspaper of our city today, the Friday before New Year's.

I'm so thankful the in-laws live inland!

Happy Holidays! More blog entries to come.

Class Classifications

2011-12-20T15:51:00.004-02:00

So Rachel started an interesting discussion on her blog about income classes and their relative definitions in Brazil and the US. Feel free to read it here before you read my entry.

I decided to put in my two cents in my own blog, 'cause, you know, I can do that. Here's my take on all this class stuff: it's far too subjective and relative for us to put these labels on people, labels like "upper middle class" or "Class B" or whatever. Individual people's definitions of "rich" and "poor" are very different and depend a lot on what they've grown up with. Different countries define their own wealth and the wealth of others in different ways. There are different theories on how to define social classes, how to divide incomes, how to compare incomes and wealth between countries, etc.

Then, of course, all of these class discussions get clouded by judgement. Both "rich" and "poor" get treated as dirty words; people place judgement on whether others "deserve" to have the income they have and to use it the way they do. Some judge the poor for being poor; some judge the rich for being rich. Income and social class starts to turn into a question of character, but in many cases, it's only because those who are being judged feel the need to defend themselves.

It all just feels so useless to me. I think each country needs to define its own poverty line and offer social services according to it, and I think that can be pretty much the only concrete data we have.

As a foreigner from the "first world" living in the "developing world," it's almost certain that I'm "richer" than many people in my new country. But I'd like to share how I define rich: in my opinion, someone who is "rich" is able to live their life according to their own values. There are many people who have relatively high incomes in their society (or compared to other societies) but who may not know what their values are or who, for whatever reason, are unable to live by their values.

I'm being very general. What I'm trying to say is that I've had to really grapple with thoughts like these this year, because I'm living in a place where I am "richer" than most of the community. I mean that Alexandre and I have an income that's higher than that of most of our neighbors', but I'm also sticking to my definition in that we're able to live our lives according to our values. We're "rich" because we have choices. We're able to choose to do/buy things that make us happy (or to choose not to do or buy things). Sometimes, it's because we have the financial means to do so, but other times, it's because we're lucky enough to have the education and life experience to know what we want and what's good for us, personally. I used some important words in that sentence: luck, education, and life experience. I believe all of those things also define someone as "rich".

If you realize that you don't value the things that people with more money than you value, then you won't feel bitter toward them for having the financial means to acquire things that you don't have the means to acquire. I'm not saying people necessarily need to lower their standards. I'm saying they need to truly evaluate their priorities. If you're one of those people leaving nasty, bitter comments on Rachel's blog because she and her husband choose to pay for a maid or have their groceries delivered, you need to sit back and ask yourself what it has to do with you, what the alternative is, what you really want for you, and how you can get it.

I know people (most of them, here in Brazil) whose salaries are 4-5 times what Alexandre and I bring in together, but whom I don't consider rich because they are so lost in terms of values and priorities. They're so busy chasing what they think they're supposed to want that they don't even stop to question whether they do want it or to what extent these things will improve their lives. I know people who are "poor" because they're unhappy and can't figure out how to fix it, and this definition of "poverty" is true for people with high salaries or low salaries (also relative terms). I don't like to be around these kinds of people. It's painful to see.

I know people with these same high salaries who are completely satisfied with their lives and their life choices, even if they've chosen things that I wouldn't have necessarily chosen.

I know people who have much less money than I have who are happier than I am at this stage in my life. I consider them "richer" because they have access to things I currently don't have access to: friends in town, a rewarding job that fills their time, and kinship and camaraderie in their day-to-day exchanges with people. But I have the perspective to see that these are things I value and that these things, not more money, will make me happier.

I also think I'm "rich" because I have the perspective to know that things could be a lot worse: they have been, and I feel grateful and lucky every day for coming as far as I have in my life. I don't judge others who may have faced obstacles similar to mine and who didn't get past these obstacles, because there's no way for me to know what held them back and not me. It always comes back to luck in my mind -- luck that I had resources and that I recognized them as such when they came to me.

So in general, I feel very rich here. I feel rich because I have had so many amazing experiences in my life and because I'm able to recognize that; I feel rich because I have the education necessary to solve most of the problems in my life (and also to prevent many others); I feel rich because I know myself and the concrete things I value. I feel guilty when this "wealth" isolates me and when I consider that even giving all of my salary away and living with less financially would not really make anyone else's life better in the long run.

None of us are going to single-handedly change the income gap in Brazil; we're probably not going to see much of a change in our lifetimes, either. If this disparity bothers you, you can do what makes you feel better about it, whether that's voting for social programs for the poor, or volunteering, or donating your own money, or buying less, or working less, or working more, or hiring poorer people to work for you, or not hiring poorer people to work for you. You have to sit down and think about it by yourself.

But I just don't think there's any productive space for judgement in this discussion. (For some of us, that means we can't judge ourselves, either.) But there's no point in criticizing people for minutiae, like whether they send their kids to private school or not, whether they have a maid or not, or what neighborhood they live in. There's no need for us, when dealing with each other on a daily basis, to try to fit ourselves or each other into class classifications. I think all we can really do is try to be nice to people and be patient with each other.

Feel free to continue the commenting on Rachel's blog rather than mine.

New Apartment!

2011-12-19T14:58:00.003-02:00

Yay! This weekend was a big weekend.

We went to the city we're moving to to find an apartment. We had much more time to look for one than we did when we moved to this beach town, so we used that time to our advantage. Last month, we drove around our potential neighborhoods and talked to people at leasing offices. (That's the way to go in Brazil -- from what I understand, renting directly from the owner, Craigslist style, is usually reserved for the poorest people here.) Anyway, the leasing office people gave us tips on what to look for and what neighborhoods would be good for us. Luckily, most of the offices in this city have websites where they post the details about apartments that are available for rent. So all month, we've been checking those websites and calling the agents if we saw an apartment that we liked. There was one posted online that was extra, extra great and it became our first choice. Of course, we had to see if the pictures were too good to be true.

We made appointments with some agents to see the most promising apartments on Saturday. The in-laws live kind of close to the new city, so we stayed at their house on Friday night and then got up bright and early Saturday morning to drive on over.

We gave up on the house idea, mostly for budget and maintenance reasons. So our big debate was deciding whether to go for "centrally located but small and noisy" VS "away from the hustle-bustle part of town and quiet but a bit harder to get around". This is a quintessential housing decision for a Californian, so I sat back and evaluated my various housing experiences in my adult life and whether I'm happy being "in the middle of it all" or a bit farther off. I realized that I've been consistently happier being a bit farther off if I can come home to somewhere nicer and quieter and relaxing.

So we saw two apartments that were really close to Alexandre's hospital, with restaurants, stores, and a main avenue close by, but the apartments themselves were old and not in great condition, parking was a challenge, and it was noisy. We saw one that was within biking distance to the hospital and the building itself was really fancy (gym, pool, etc), but the neighborhood around it was kind of shady and there were no buses and not much was in walking distance.

Buuuuuuut we saw our first-choice apartment, which turned out to be a little farther away (Alexandre will need to drive to work). However, it's in a gorgeous new apartment complex in a much quieter, safer, cleaner neighborhood, with a lot more nature around (nice trails to run and walk on). The apartment itself is beautiful. The current owners haven't lived there long, but they're moving for the husband's job and are renting it out. They've kept it in great condition.

So yes, our first-choice apartment worked out, and we signed papers on Saturday! We get the keys the first week of January, but we won't be moving until later in the month (still no exact date... thanks, Brazilian military!). I'm so relieved and excited and optimistic. There isn't much within walking distance, but there are 3 different buses that pass by the complex, and then it's just a 10-minute walk to a big supermarket (hipermercado!) that is accessed by a whole bunch of buses. (It also has a bakery, a pharmacy, and a place to pay bills, which covers most of my basic day-to-day errands.) Since I don't even have students in the new city yet and since I'll probably have students in different places around town, it was impossible for us to try to find something that will be close to my job. But I think this bus situation will be totally doable. (Of course, Alexandre and I will also have the option of alternating bus/car days, depending on our schedules, and I'll have the option of inviting students to have class at our apartment for a cheaper rate.)

So I know you're dying to see it, right? I stole some pictures off of the leasing office's website. The apartment is furnished in the pics but it won't be when we move in. Have a gander, and try not to drool or squeal in jealousy:

Isn't it adorable? It's a little on the small side, but it's organized in such a way that it doesn't feel small and the space is useful. As you can see in the picture, it has a good-sized balcony. What you can't see is that the balcony has its own little built-in barbecue, plus enough room for a table and/or a hammock (you can see them if you look really closely in the second picture!). Then, of course, there's the hardwood floors and the brand new tiles in the kitchen and bathroom, along with a door separating the kitchen and the laundry room so your clothes don't smell like fried meat (no, that doesn't happen to us in our current apartment, all the time...).

Then there's also the apartment complex itself. I know it's hard to believe, but I promise these pictures are from Brazil, not the United States! In them, you'll see the pool and barbecue/party area, along with the tennis courts and the little area that I've dubbed "the social gazeebo thing" next to them. :) (We don't play tennis, but we can learn if we want to!) You won't see the 24-hour doorman or the electric gate or our own individual parking spot (so no more neighbors calling us at 2am to move our car out of the shared one, and no more people blocking our car and then leaving on foot!). You also won't see the signs posted on the doors of each building that said "RESPECT SILENCE LAWS, ORDINANCE § 95636589" and had a list of annoying sound-related things that neighbors can't do. FANTASTIC.

Can you see the pool? You can also see a bit of the party area to the right of it.

There's the tennis court plus the little "social gazeebo thing".

And here's our apartment, which Alexandre has so helpfully pointed out for you:

Yaaaaaayyyyy! I'm sure we'll eventually discover some minor annoyances, but I don't think things can get any worse than they are where we're living now. Heck, I don't think things will even come close to this current craphole. (I'd go out and take pictures for you to compare if I weren't afraid of some crack addict stealing my camera.)

But hooray! We're movin' on up.

So!? Who's gonna come visit?? :D

Drinks and Snacks

2011-12-13T19:26:00.001-02:00

So here's a little cause and effect list about my life for you all:

1. I work very little. Therefore;
2. I'm bored; Therefore;
3. I go to the gym a lot. Therefore;
4. I'm hungry all the time.

HOWEVER.

I don't go to the gym enough to alleviate my boredom. That means I'm hungry and bored a lot. THIS IS NOT A GOOD COMBINATION. It totally undoes all of the time spent at the gym.

Though I've been in Brazil for almost four years now, I still haven't really mastered the art of Brazilian snacks. What can I say? You can take the girl out of Taco-Bell-infested California, but you can't take Taco-Bell-infested California out of the girl. The point is, I crave over-processed bean burritos all the time, but I clearly need to find some other substitute. Neither brigadeiro nor coxinhas is a good idea. (Hell, neither is Taco Bell, but that is beside the point.) Today has reminded me that snacks from beach stands aren't a good idea, either. That's because beach stand waitresses (never the waiters! They're too enamored) see me alone and hear me talk and decide to super overcharge me with the gringa price for my snacks. Sorry, bitchy beach waitress: just because I have an accent, it doesn't mean I ordered or ate a chicken dinner for four people. I ordered the tiny appetizer porção, and you can charge me for that or you can charge me nothing. That's right, I caught that on the receipt. Eighteen reais is a far cry from 48 reais, and no, just because my fancy-looking book-reading machine makes you think I'm rich, it doesn't mean that I don't look at receipts. You and your cook can play dumb ("Yeah, that was a plate for 4 people!") but I'm not paying for it. That's right. Slap down that ATM machine in irritation. I win. It's called having a brain. You should try it sometime.

Anyway. Knowing what I shouldn't do about snacks doesn't tell me what I should do. What's a healthy but filling Brazilian snack? How do I not have an answer to that yet?

FYI, alcohol is not a good idea for a snack, either. The biggest problem is that it makes it impossible to go to the gym. The second biggest problem is that it makes it impossible to deal with people. See my graph for reference:

So, as you can see, I'm in a couple of different small predicaments. High metabolism; no creative ideas for snacks. Desire to be out on the beach; disdain for my fellow man. Desire to drink more to ignore all the Crap; displeased with the effects of too much alcohol.

I'm listening to an audio book right now called "Thrive: Finding Happiness the Blue Zones Way." In it, the author talks about research that proves that a big obstacle to happiness is living in a place with huge social inequality and income gaps. Many research studies prove that the wider the gap between the rich and the poor, the greater the lack of a middle class, the more unhappy a community tends to be.

Duh. I could've told him that.

In the meantime, I'd like to maintain my weight loss from the gym without fighting with my newfound metabolism levels all the time. Any ideas?

If there is a lack of comments, I'm just gonna stop going to the gym. PROBLEM SOLVED.

Danielle's Reading List 2011

2011-12-09T09:03:00.005-02:00

So one benefit of this year here in the crappy town with exorbitant amounts of "alone time" is that I've been able to read a LOT of books. (This ability is mostly thanks to having a Kindle, which seriously saved me this year, but it's also thanks to fun friend Bianca, who lent me paper copies of books to read on the beach.) Quite a few of these books were recommended by my friend Kristin (you may remember her from such posts as the one when a bird attacked me in Foz do Iguaçu, and our trip to Ushuaia, where we saw penguins up close. Heck, she's in all kinds of posts!) Almost all of the books I read were new to me, but I re-read a couple of old favorites with older eyes. I took advantage of Amazon's free and cheap classics for the Kindle when I could. The list is heavy on historical fiction, because books I most enjoy tend to be from that genre. Since we're coming up on the end of the year, I thought I'd share with you just how many books I've read, and which ones I'd recommend.

Danielle's Completed Reading List 2011
More or Less in Order of Favorite to Least Favorite

Beneath the Lion's Gaze - Maaza Mengiste
An absolutely gorgeous book about the rise and fall of the dictator in Ethiopia in the 1970s. I cannot explain the shocking beauty of this book. I think it's important for people living in Brazil to read it. It reveals a lot about the horrors that happen under a dictator and also how people think and react, as humans, and as families.

Good quote: "Hope can never come from doing nothing."

Island Beneath the Sea - Isabel Allende
Another historical fiction novel about the slave uprising in Haiti. The different characters' perspectives are enlightening, and the beauty of the story is the focus on the almost saint-like humanity of the slave protagonist.

Good quote: "Zacharie and I now have a history; we can look to the past and count the days we've been together, add up our sorrows and joys, that's the way love grows, no hurry at all, day after day. I love him as I always have, but I feel more comfortable with him than I once did."

How to Be a Woman - Caitlin Moran
Hands-down the best book available on modern Feminism. It's funny and accessible but still critical and informative. Moran discusses and defends The Big Ideas very intelligently. Humor and academic arguments are well mixed, here.

Good quote: "When I hear women talking about how their wedding is going to be / was the best day of their life, I can't help but think, You just haven't taken enough MDMA in a field at 3am, love."

The Thousand Autumns of Jacob De Zoet - David Mitchell
More historical fiction! It took me a little while to get into this book, but I'm glad I waited out the slightly confusing beginning. (It was mostly confusing because of my lack of historical knowledge.) A story about the eighteenth-century presence of the Dutch East India Company in Java and Japan, it was engaging and had lots of focus on the life of a Dutch scribe-turned-translator and his linguistic, romantic, and political challenges. The book was written by a young linguist who went to teach English in Japan and married a Japanese woman. If he can do it, I can do it! (On a smaller scale, of course.)

Good quote: "The purest believers are the truest monsters."

Freedom - Jonathan Franzen
This book is, in general, about the rocky life of an American family from the 80s to present-day. The plot doesn't get much past the general: the point of this book seems to have been a way for Franzen to go to town with some serious character development. If deep and detailed character analysis is your thing, then this book is perfect for you. It typically isn't my cup of tea, but I really enjoyed this book. (Oh, also, the main character works with birds. So that's nice.)

Good quote: "She now sorely regretted the hard time she'd given him about his crusades for other species; she saw that she'd done it out of envy - envy of his birds for being so purely lovable to him, and envy of Walter himself for his capacity to love them. She wished she could go to him now, while he was still alive, and say to him plainly: I adore you for your goodness."

All the Pretty Horses - Cormac McCarthy
It's Cormac McCarthy. (If that isn't self-explanatory for you, then it's a book about the lives of men set in the American/Mexican deserts in the 1800s. The writing is amazing and life-changing. I did write about this book once already in the blog. The good quote is there.)

Gang Leader for a Day - Sudhir Venkatesh
This non-fiction, first-person report is about the experience a grad student sociologist has when he integrates himself into the culture of an American housing project in Chicago. I highly recommend it for those of you living in Brazil and trying to make sense of the jeitinho culture. He analyzes the decisions that people make in the absence of resources and government support/protection, and he does it in an open-minded and non-judgmental way. I saw a lot of parallels between the housing project he works in and Brazilian favelas. I learned some helpful and insightful takes on this situation.

I didn't take note of any good quotes in this one, sorry! It's worth reading, though, I promise.

Major Pettigrew's Last Stand - Helen Simonson
Such a lovely book. It's about a sweet old man in England who's trying to come to terms with his wife's and brother's deaths and the speed at which the world is changing. I read it right after my grandfather died, and it made me feel more peaceful. That description makes the book sound cheesy, but it's not. I'd describe it delicate but steady.

Good quote: "He was conscious of tightness around his head and a slight burn in the throat. This was the dull ache of grief in the real world; more dyspepsia than passion."

Summer - Edith Wharton
It's Edith Wharton. (OK. I'll stop doing that.) It's a well-written dose of subtle and old-fashioned feminist commentary through the story of a young girl in a small Midwestern town in the 1920s or 30s (not sure). The girl meets a young man and "becomes a woman" (you know what that means), and then subsequently gets screwed over, because that's what happened to young women all too often at that time. The Kindle version is only 2 bucks on Amazon, which I think gives this book the best cost-benefit value on this list.

Good, Wharton-esque quote: "She felt instinctively that the gulf between them was too deep, and that the bridge their passion had flung across it was as insubstantial as a rainbow."

Bossypants - Tina Fey
Did you know that Tina Fey wrote a book? It's exactly what you'd expect: a hilarious report of important events in her life. It reads like an episode of 30 Rock. It's just as self-deprecating, except it's peppered with more girl power.

Good quote: "Once I moved to New York in 1997, I discovered the joys of the quickie Korean manicure...You enter, smile, and nod at the manager.
'Manicure-pedicure?'
'Pick color,' she chirps back in her Korean accent. You pick out a couple of the three hundred shades of off-white.
'This for manicure. This feet. Magazine okay?' Why are you talking like that?
Now that you've racially embarrassed yourself, you are ready to squeeze into a seat at a tiny table and basically hold hands with a stranger for twenty minutes. That really is the craziest thing the first few times you go, getting used to passively flopping your hands into another woman's hands. It's like something the'd make you do at summer camp as a trust-building exercise, I assume."

Poor Economics: A Radial Rethinking of the Way to Fight Global Poverty- Abhijit Banerjee and Esther Duflo
I thought this book would also give me some insight into how to think about poverty here in Brazil. It was helpful and I even wrote some sort of academic essays for myself while reading it (because I wanted to organize my thoughts and because I'm nerdy like that), but overall it's a really technical book and it's slow-going if you're not an economist. (I was also annoyed that I coughed up like, 16 bucks for it on Amazon and the charts and graphs were still messed up in the Kindle version.) I thought it was also kind of a cop-out of them to not to commit to any definite, concrete solutions to world poverty. The ending was basically like, "yup, poverty IS complicated! Lots of things work and don't work!" But I will say that their research seems to really get to the heart of the way poor people make decisions with their money, like the psychological aspects of those decisions. Oh, and they really, really criticize the corrupt governments of poor countries and put a lot of blame on corruption to explain world poverty today. Bravo.

Good quote: "We are often inclined to see the world of the poor as a land of missed opportunities and to wonder why they don't put these purchases on hold and invest in what would really make their lives better. The poor, on the other hand, may well be more skeptical about supposed opportunities and the possibility of any radical change in their lives. They often behave as if they think that any change that is significant enough to be worth sacrificing for will simply take too long."

Heart of Darkness - Joseph Conrad
Better than how I remembered it. Fun to re-read after having lived in the tropics. Also, did you know that Conrad was not a native speaker of English, and he still managed to write that well? Jealous.

Good quote: "Going up that river was like travelling back to the earliest beginnings of the world, when vegetation rioted on the earth and the big trees were kings...you lost your way on that river as you would in a desert...till you thought yourself bewitched and cut off forever from everything you had known once -- somewhere -- far away -- in another existence perhaps."

Zieitoun - Dave Eggers
Not my favorite Dave Eggers book, though that's not saying much, since his other books are so monumentally spectacular. It's about a Syrian immigrant in the US who survives hurricane Katrina and stays in town to help his community, only to be unconstitutionally arrested and held in inhumane conditions without a trial, all because of a misunderstanding in the chaos after the hurricane. I guess the only reason I didn't like it that much was because the first half read like his other books, but then the second half was just long and painful non-fiction criticizing the war on terror. I just wasn't expecting that. But since you are, now, maybe you'll like it more than I did.

Good quote: "Usually you needn't risk so much to right a wrong. It's not so complicated. It's the opposite of complicated."

The Other Side of the Story - Marian Keyes
Marian Keyes -- my guilty pleasure! Her stories are like book versions of Sex and the City (and Irish). Slightly stereotypical and very predictable, but super cute and entertaining. Oh, it also gave me a lot of insight into the publishing industry.

Death of a Salesman - Arthur Miller
Not as good as I remembered it! I was surprised! But we can still value it in the context in which it was written.

Kitchen Confidential - Anthony Bourdain
Lots of this book is like, "Anthony Bordain's Wild Ride". Ya know, written for shock value. But some parts are funny. I guess I just expected it to be more well written because his narration on his show is so well written. But if you're interested in the restaurant industry or in being a chef, I think it'd definitely be a good read for you.

Squirrel Seeks Chipmunk - David Sedaris
I loooooove David Sedaris, but this one was a little disappointing! So short! Cute and tongue-in-cheek, but it kind of felt like he was just churning something out to meet the book requirement for his publishing contract.

In Defense of Food - Michael Pollan
This book was really popular this year (and maybe last year, too? I don't know). I'm glad I read it to know what people are referring to, but I don't really agree with the guy. He has some helpful rules on how to choose healthier food in the grocery store, but his focus is on conspiracy theories and his conclusion is that Americans just start growing all their own food in their front yards and on their window sills and, you know, get back to the land or something. If his goal is to get busy, working-class, 21st-century city dwellers to eat healthier, I don't think these ideas are very practical or convincing.

The Brightest Star in the Sky - Marian Keyes
More Marian Keys! See above.

Talk of the Town - Lisa Wingate
This was the free featured Kindle book of the week on Amazon the week I got my Kindle. It's a Christian allegory wolf in chick lit's clothing. Barf. OK, I'm being harsh. It wasn't actually that bad. I read the whole thing and I was entertained. I didn't realize it was a religious-themed book until the end. Cousin Ashleigh, you would love it.

The Heart is Not a Size - Beth Kephart
I read this to help my teenage cousin with her homework. It's for teenagers. It's touches on some heavy issues, like anorexia and poverty in Mexico and volunteerism, so good book for teenagers. But it's still for teenagers.

Here Comes Trouble - Michael Moore
I was skeptical when I saw that Michael Moore had written memoirs already. But I tend to agree with Michael Moore. Then I read reviews of this book and it seemed like it would be about ways in which Michael Moore stood up to small injustices. The week I read the review, that sounded appealing, and I hoped I'd be inspired. Instead, it was pages and pages of Michael Moore talking about how awesome he is, even though he reveals that he essentially chooses to do things that will (a) piss his enemies off, just to be difficult; (b) bring him attention; or (c) make him rich. The few phrases he throws in to feign modesty are actually a bit insulting. The only reason I finished reading it was because I'd shelled out the full, new-release price for it.

The Old Testament
That's right. I had to slowly sit down and read the entire Old Testament for a translation that I did. (It was a translation of a "modernized and snarky version of the Old Testament.") The Michael Moore book was actually worse. I'm putting the Bible at the bottom of the list just to be spiteful. I'm actually glad I read it. I got to see just how ridiculous some of the ideas are when applied to modern times. I guess I can see how someone can be trained to read this from birth and be convinced that bigger moral ideas are at play and applicable, but reading it as an adult, it just kind of reminds me of those American Indian folktales we read as American public school children. You know, those ones that are like, "How the wolf got its tail", the ones that totally insult and simplify Native American religions while trying to insist that they're just silly stories, while the Christian Bible is truth.

No, but all meanness aside, I'm also glad I read the Old Testament because it was very interesting from a historical linguistics perspective. It gave me a deeper understanding of Middle English and the changes between it and Modern English (you know, an understanding that I'm sure you're all dying to have). It also helped me understand a lot of Cormac McCarthy and Joanna Newsom references and vocabulary choices. Worth it? I think so.

EDIT: I forgot one! The Pillars of the Earth by Ken Follet. It was lovely! It deserves to be up toward the top. Thanks so much to Stephanie for recommending it.

Phew! What a long list!

Your turn! What have you read this year? What do you recommend? What do you recommend that we avoid! Share, share!

Bianca and I are going on a self-imposed 100-book challenge. We want to each read 100 books between now and the end of 2012. (We're giving ourselves a head start to take advantage of valuable reading time during our vacations.) So I'm not sure if I'll type out a long list like this next year. :) But do join us on our challenge, and give us some ideas of what to read.

Some Good Points

2011-12-08T14:46:00.000-02:00

My last posts have been so blah and I need something to look forward to, so here are some more positive updates:

*We're currently apartment hunting (via leasing office websites) in our new city. We've seen sooooo many nice apartments, and they're cheaper than what we'd budgeted for. We've been emailing and talking on the phone with agents to get more details about certain places, and we're going there next weekend to hopefully pick one out.

*I found a Facebook group from the new city. There are a lot of foreigners in it! The page is used to announce cultural events, meetups at bars, day trips, etc. It seems really promising. There are so many more interesting people our age.

*There seems to be such a bigger market for English classes in the new city! It's night and day from where we live now. Also, the going rate for private teachers is SO high! It's going to be nice to live next to a teaching hospital again, with students who care about their classes.

*We're not going to go to the US for Christmas. :( It's due to problems with my permanent residency card here in Brazil. I know some of you are curious, but it's such a long and ridiculous Murphy's law kind of story and typing it all out will just make me more annoyed. But the long story short is that we can't go to the US until February. I'm sad to miss Christmas with my American family AGAIN, but the benefit is that we can stay longer in February. More importantly, the Christmas holidays won't be as stressful; we won't be squeezing in a trip to the US in between my students, Alexandre's work schedule, planning a move, and sorting out my visa crap. Now, the fun part is deciding what to do for the few days Alexandre has off between Christmas and New Year's. We might go to Paraty, or to Ubatuba, or we might just relax at the in-laws' beach house with a wonderful couple that we're friends with. It will be a MUCH-NEEDED break away from this craphole.

*I'm going to go to the in-laws' house without Alexandre for Christmas because the military only allows one holiday off, and he got New Year's. But the upside is that I was able to invite my friend Karine and she'll be hanging out there with me. :) Also, because my in-laws celebrate Christmas on the night of the 24th, that means I can head home on Christmas day and still have Christmas dinner on the 25th with Alexandre. :)

*We're going to spend New Year's Eve with Alexandre's parents, like last year. I like that New Year's is a more family-oriented holiday here.

What are you looking forward to?

Sick of Standing Out

2011-12-06T16:49:00.010-02:00

I wrote a very similar post last week. You guys don't have to bother commenting.

So I've mentioned before that I often stand out in crowds here in our poor beach town because I'm tall and white (and also, I think, because my clothes don't show my ass). Typically I wouldn't really think about this kind of thing, ya know, ethnic diversity, blahblahblah, but it's much more tiring when it's accompanied by such huge class disparities. My physical differences make me a magnet for homeless people and beggars. An example:

I waited in line at the post office for 40 minutes at lunch time just to mail a regular-sized envelope. I spent that 40 minutes stewing over the inefficiency of it all, fantasizing about President Dilma hiring me as Brazil's efficiency minister and allowing me to go into places like the post office and Banco do Brasil to clean things up a bit. Anyway, after that long wait, I decided to reward myself with a milkshake. There's a little milkshake stand close to the post office. The "shop" is the size of a closet, but they've assembled some nice benches outside where people can sit, wait for their orders, and drink their milkshakes. When long, the line to order the milkshakes will run in between the benches.

Anyway, so I'm in line for my (what I considered) well-deserved milkshake (it's the little things! I try to give myself little pleasures in exchange for little annoyances). There's one person ahead of me, two behind, and a handful of people on the benches. A tiny homeless guy comes up, bypasses all the (who he apparently dubs "normal") people on the benches, and makes a beeline straight for me, the tall and obviously gringa woman whose purse must be filled with lots of money for him. He proceeds to poke me in the ribs (akin to the little kids who beg for money). When I turn to look at him, he cocks his head to the side and makes the saddest face possible and puts his hand out, then utters some unintelligible sounds that I'm supposed to interpret as "Can you spare any change?" (apparently he's so destitute that he can't even form complete words).

I look around and I'm convinced that people are looking at me expectantly, but I don't really know if they are. I look back to the man and say "No, sir, I'm sorry," and turn back to the line. He lingers for a bit next to me, I guess hoping I'll change my mind, and then walks off without asking ANYONE ELSE for money.

Then I feel all lame and guilty, like I'm sitting here buying a milkshake when that guy doesn't have money for food. But I feel anger, too. I mean, everyone else there was buying milkshakes, but none of them are expected to give beggars money. But then I wonder if the other people think I'm "expected" to do that, of it's just some complex I've built up in my mind. I mean, what's richer ENOUGH, ya know? How much lower would my salary have to be for the beggars to decide, "ah, OK, well, you clearly deserve to keep your spare change and buy yourself some treats once in a while..."?

I'm not trying to come off as like "poor me, my life is harder than that of the homeless guy, I'm suffering, too." It's obvious to me and you that I'm better off than he is, and even though the exchange was disquieting, I still got my milkshake and I still went home to my comfortable life. But I guess it's the simplicity in thinking that annoys me, it's his assuming, just by seeing the color of my skin, that I'm the one who should give him a handout. It's my having to wonder if the people around me were judging me for not giving him anything, which would be easy for them to do as bystanders who were not asked in front of a group of they wanted to be generous. It'd be easy for them to think, self-righteously "oh, well I would have given him some change," when they weren't actually put to the test.

I don't want to go as far as saying that, ya know, he had as many opportunities as I did and he must have made mistakes and all that. There's no way I can know that and it's not my place to judge (also, I'm a Democrat). But I can't help but feel a little bit defensive.

Another quick example is that on Sunday afternoon, I was walking down to the beach to meet up with Alexandre after the big soccer game. (He was there watching it with a friend and there was going to be an unrelated and live blues show afterwards.) On my way there, I passed a homeless man who was setting up a little bed for himself on a closed storefront.

As I passed, he called out, "good afternoon, moça. Do you have 1 real for me?" He was really tall and big and seemed either drunk or mentally ill, so I just mumbled, "no, sorry," and kept walking.

"Well, I SAID 'good afternoon'! At least say 'good afternoon,' DAMNIT!" he shouted, much more aggressive this time.

"I said 'good afternoon!'" I lied. I made sure to reply in a strong, 'Don't try giving me any of your crap' voice. It seemed to work.

"Well, all right then," was all he said in response. Luckily he seemed to have lost interest and he didn't try to follow me or anything.

I guess at the end of it all I just feel crappy for being singled out, for feeling isolated, for being reminded that I'm different, for having to question myself and whether I "deserve" to use the money that I earn on things that I want, even though there are others in the world who have less. I've obviously spent a lot of time thinking about this, and I think I've mentioned before that I don't give change on principle (because I don't think it will solve the bigger problems, and the economic problems in this city and country are much bigger than even my entire salary could solve).

But no one likes feeling guilty. I think we all feel like we try to be good people and try to do our part to help others.

It's also the aggression that bothers me. It makes me feel unsafe. It's the hostility and anger that people give me (like when I gave change to the girl and she threw it in my face because it was only 10 cents). These beggars must think they're the only homeless people in town, and must also believe that they were the only ones smart enough to try asking the pretty white lady for some money. Of course they don't think about the possibility that they're the 4th or 5th person that day to tell me a sob story and ask for help.

I agree that their situations suck and I want to have sympathy, but I think I'm allowed to say that living around here isn't exactly peachy keen for me, either.

Sorry for all the negative posts. (Check back in six weeks if you're tired of them.) I hope I got my point across and this didn't come off as "poor little rich girl." I'm just burnt out.

The Typewriter Mystery

2011-12-05T21:46:00.000-02:00

So the evil wretched neighbor below us who is, for some ungodly reason, STILL HERE, has turned out to be the owner of the typewriter I've been hearing since soon after we moved in. Yes, a typewriter. That she types on. All the time. But only in short bursts.

I was convinced she didn't even know how to read, so now I'm left to guess what she could possibly be typing. I've come up with some theories:

1. She's writing the next great Brazilian novel, exposing the plight of Brazil's urban poor;
2. She runs a carrier pigeon agency (this would also explain all the pigeons on the building every morning);
3. She's applying to be the national poet laureate and writes genius haikus during moments of inspiration;
4. She's drafting letters to her local congressmen to complain about the sorry state of our neighborhood;
5. She's composing love letters for her abusive common-law husband (ones which apparently seem to draw him back for short periods of time)...

Those are all fine ideas, but I think the following scenario is the most likely:

6. Crazy wench neighbor saw a typewriter at a second-hand store and was fascinated by the sound the buttons made. Now she hacks at the keys periodically in fascination, but then quickly loses interest when she's distracted by yet another Queen song on the radio, or perhaps by talking animals on TV.

Any other possibilities that you guys can think of?

Stickin' to My Roots

2011-12-05T09:37:00.001-02:00

When I moved to Brazil, this "Créu" song was insanely popular. It is accompanied by a super slutty dance, akin to the macarena in a strip club or something. (You don't even need to watch it to get the idea. The screen cap preview is enough, but you can watch at your own risk.)

Anyway, there's a new video floating around the internet. I swear this girl saw me dancing to créu once and decided to copy me, because I totally did this at Alexandre's college parties:

hahahahaha

The Belps

2011-12-01T23:39:00.002-02:00

So I've made a different sort of post, à lá Hyperbole and a Half and Pernambucano Gypsy combined. You'll see that, on a scale of 1 to 10 of computer graphics skills (1 being blind and in a semi-vegetative state and 10 being professional), I'm about a 2. But I needed a way to get my energy out somehow. Enjoy.

The BELPS

So Brazil is a sort of vortex. Foreigners get sucked into this vortex, drawn like helpless pale grains of sand into the beautiful beaches and even more beautiful people.

But because it’s a vortex, you’re stuck once you get pulled in, and by then, it’s too late to escape Brazil’s biggest secret: The Belps.

The belps are a class of robots developed by the Brazilian government. They were made to fill clerical jobs in an attempt to give the image that capitalism abounds rather than an undying feudal system. Some political higher-ups figured it’d be cheaper to churn them out regularly than to pay for education, safety, job training, healthcare, and housing. (They also thought it’d be more effective than using the stray dogs running around the streets, because at least the belps would be designed to pee in designated places, but one of the IT guys made an error and that has turned out not to be the case.)

Belps were made in all different colors, partly because the government wanted to reinforce their campaign that “Brazil has no racism.”

Their eyes were inspired by goats and cows, whose gazes the developers thought to be serene.

The belps are trained for basic functions like sitting in a chair and pressing color-coded buttons. Newer models have been trained to literally push paper. They’re also very good with rubber stamps.

The government wanted to save on costs, so belps were not properly trained for human speech (other than the word “no”), nor were they programmed to understand basic math, relativity, or critical thinking.

Because the belps’ system is basic, outdated, and underfunded, it still has a few kinks.

Another glitch was the lack of banking abilities, which the developers simply forgot to install. Beta testers allowed 1.0 belps to watch American westerns for ideas on how to run banks. What they saw seemed to be work well enough for John Wayne, so they adopted it, and newer belp models have yet to be changed.

Normal Brazilian children are brainwashed while growing up. Their teachers and families insist that their country is filled with smiling, happy people, and that their adult lives will be nothing more than carnival, soccer, and barbecues with their smiling, happy families. Then, normal Brazilians become adults and are disappointed to learn that this is not the case. However, normal Brazilians are exposed to belps at a very early age, so they consider them a slight annoyance but a relatively unsurprising concept, the way Americans feel about traffic in Los Angeles or Jehovah’s Witnesses.

Because the belps' programming is limited, problems that arise from a foreigner’s presence (which perhaps would require the pushing of two color-coded buttons rather than one) can easily make the belps' systems short-circuit or overheat, causing them to just utter the word “no. no. no. no” repeatedly when their motherboards freeze. Luckily, they are calmed by shiny objects, bright colors, fireworks, cheap computer graphics in D-list movies, and scantily clad women, especially if said women are dancing in sparkling bikinis with clowns on a big-screen TV.

Another belp favorite:

(Swear to God I made that up and then decided to search on YouTube for it. The search invariably produced results. N.B., the breasts should tell you that this show is meant for adults.)

Another technique to dealing with belps is saying something positive about the soccer team from the city in which the belp has been placed. Luckily, all belps are programmed with the following algorithm:

Me Belp.
Belp from Base.
Soccer team from Base = S_Base
S_Base = good = love and happiness for Belp

So by saying something as simple as “Your soccer team. Good,” you can often trigger the use of this algorithm, giving you temporary abilities to convince the belp in question to agree with you.

Unfortunately, there are no easy solutions to the problems caused by belps. They’ve learned how to reproduce and have infiltrated almost all parts of the Brazilian job market. They’ve also evolved into excellent buck-passers. Not even the managerial class is safe.

The country’s saving grace is that alcohol is often cheaper than water. It’s a good thing, because this is really the closest to a solution that you're gonna get:

Do this, and hope that your problems will disappear or solve themselves or slip through the cracks and go unnoticed by the belps that tend to cause them in the first place.

Bank Account Question

2011-11-30T13:36:00.000-02:00

Fellow foreigners,

Did any of you open bank accounts here with your Brazilian partners before you got any Brazilian IDs or proof of salary? Like, were you able to register as a dependent on your Brazilian partner's account with only your passport, CPF, and a bill in your name?

If so, was it a savings account or checking account?
And which bank did you have any luck at?

Last question: Can someone sedate me before I go postal on all the bureaucrats in this country? Thanks.

The Brazilian Family Steps it Up

2011-11-28T17:14:00.006-02:00

So this weekend Alexandre and I had a spat. I'm simplifying things but the point is, we were in each other's hair and at each other's throats and I needed a break. I decided to try a new route of dealing with our problems: I pulled out the big guns, a.k.a his family, for reinforcement.

His mother insisted to both of us separately on the phone that we would be fine, but we just needed some breathing room. We weren't so sure. She encouraged me to come to their house for a couple of days, reminding me that I could continue my Skype classes using their internet. Typically, my in-laws were the last people I'd want to involve in an argument with Alexandre, but I was kind of desperate to talk to people who know him (almost) as well as I do. Sleeping in their giant house in their quiet neighborhood and having the maids cook for me and clean up after me for a couple of nights didn't sound too bad, either.

I checked with Alexandre that he wouldn't feel like I was imposing by hijacking his family during the argument, but he was in grouchy boy mood and was indifferent. (Back story: Alexandre's a Brazilian guy and is therefore very close to his parents. When I first moved to Brazil and when Alexandre and I came to visit his family for the first time, I was very bothered by this weird thing that the ~~kids~~ adult children in his family do: his parents have a giant bed, and it's not uncommon for the parents to each lay on their side of the bed after lunch or whatever, and for Alexandre or his sister or his brother (though less so) to lay in the bed between the parents and have heart-to-heart chats. I'm not against parent-child chats, but I thought the whole "everyone lying in bed together" thing was a little too close to pillow talk for my comfort.)

OK, so on the bus I went. Because of people-leaving-the-beach-on-a-Sunday-night traffic, the bus took quite a while, and I didn't get to the in-laws' house until almost midnight. But they were ready. Even though they all had to get up early to go to work, they were sitting at the dining room table waiting for me -- even the typically insuportável sister-in-law! -- with dinner leftovers heated up for me and some juice and water and cake.

It didn't matter that they were tired, or that they had to work in a few hours, or that Alexandre is their first-born son and therefore can do no wrong. I was there and I was in pain and I was clearly in need in some good-old-fashioned family gossip and analysis. Obviously, while they reminded me to empathize a little with Alexandre, they agreed with everything I said on the whole, interpreted Alexandre's behavior the way I did, and reminded me that I'm not crazy and also that he and I do love each other very much and that spats among married couples are normal. The three of them each had helpful things to say, most of which included the fact that our current living situation isn't exactly conducive to a happy, healthy relationship. I went to bed much calmer.

This afternoon around lunch time, I got a call from Alexandre, who'd seen the error of his ways and asked me to hurry up and come home. I said my apologies too, and of course cried a little, because I cry easily. He informed me that he'd already checked into the bus schedule and that I could get a bus home at 7pm and that he'd pick me up from the bus station and could I please come back now?

I went downstairs to tell his parents, who had come home from work for lunch and were now relaxing in their bed and talking. I stood in the doorway and explained that Alexandre had called and had calmed down, too, and was asking me to come back. They smiled and said happy things.

Then his mother patted the middle of the bed, in the wide, white space between them. "Come on," she coaxed, "lay down right here!"

Me? Part of the in-bed chats? I hesitated, but then admitted how comforting it looked. I squeezed in between them, cautiously, but soon realized that it was quite a nice place to be, perhaps how kangaroo babies feel in their mother's pouch on a sunny hopping stroll, and I soon found myself lying on my stomach and merrily kicking my legs in the air.

Alexandre's mother suggested that I stay another day anyway, trying to lure me with visions of shoe shopping and Italian food for dinner. I said it would be better for me to go back sooner than later so Alexandre and I would be able to talk properly, after having had some time to think on our own.

They were so good to me. This isn't a method I'll employ for just any old reason, but it's comforting to know that they'll treat me like family if I need them to.

And, come on, I tattled to the mother-in-law AND I shared a weird in-bed-bonding moment with the parents. Am I Brazilian yet?

Alternative Sao Paulo Meetup this Saturday!

2011-11-23T19:51:00.000-02:00

So the blogger meetup in Sao Paulo that I tried to initiate is on hold, but Diego from Inside São Paulo is organizing an even bigger and better one, and he's holding it this Saturday, November 26th.

Get discounts and drinks at a restaurant called Estação SP. Diego has worked with the restaurant to offer a really nice experience for anyone who can make it -- bloggers, foreigners, tourists and visitors, "gringo sympathizers" (that means you, friendly Brazilian readers!), and everyone's friends and families. The more the merrier! I encourage you all to go. If anything, Diego's really cool and you'll enjoy talking to him!

Get the details of Diego's Sao Paulo meetup by clicking here. I won't be able to go, but I hope you guys can check it out!

At a Loss

2011-11-21T23:47:00.004-02:00

This town is really, really getting to me, and the fact that Alexandre's gone for work all the time doesn't make things any easier to deal with.

As some of you may know, there's a cultural phenomenon (bane?) in Brazil called the flanelinha. The most common type of flanelinha I see is the guy who stands in a parking lot or on a street with a lot of street parking. When you get out of your car, he calls out to you using gibberish sounds and gives you lots of thumbs-up signs. This means that he will "watch your car" for you and supposedly protect it from hijackers. If you acknowledge him, that means you enter into this contract and will give him your spare change when you come back to your car. If you refuse to acknowledge him or deny his services outright, you run the risk of him keying your car out of spite.

I detest this forced, mafia-like "agreement" and it annoys me that police do not intervene and shoo these guys away. I feel like my car is safer when these guys are not there. I mean, really? What are they going to do if a thief comes up to my car? Risk their lives to stop the guy because I agreed to give them 50 cents if I see them when I'm leaving the restaurant?

Peace-down-to-his-core Alexandre has long since accepted these guys. He is always friendly with them, and he always gives them change if he has any, even if the guy wasn't there when we pulled in but comes running up to us on our way out, insisting that he'd been "protecting our car" the whole time.

Personally, I'd rather the guy just ask me for money directly than force me to play along in this act. When I'm alone, I return the thumbs up but then avoid them on my way back out to the car. I lived in Berkeley AND San Diego, so I've pretty much become desensitized to people begging for money. You can think it's heartless if you want and I'll understand you. I just had to decide a long time ago, "well, you can't give everyone a dollar, so you might as well not give anyone a dollar." I was stopped and asked for money by five different people, just today. I've gotta turn myself off to it or I'll go crazy.

Anyway, back to the flanelinhas. I was pulling the car out of a parking spot today and a flanelinha woman came running up to me. (I was surprised; they're usually men.) I was already out of the parking spot, but she was waving her arms around and pretending that she was helping to guide me out onto the street (where I already was). Then she ran up to the car window with her hands out, expectant.

My purse was in the backseat and I was starting to block traffic, and it's not like she'd done anything anyway. If she'd just come up and asked me for money at that point, I would've said no because I was now driving, not stopped or anything. I looked down and saw a coin in the ashtray. I quickly gave it to her and then put the gar in gear. I didn't even look at what coin it was-- turns out it was a ten-cent piece.

Well. This woman was apparently offended that I gave her only ten cents for all of her hard work. She THREW THE COIN IN MY FACE and started yelling at me, stuff I couldn't understand but something unintelligible about how I could just keep my spare change for myself. I hightailed it out of there before things could get any worse.

The exchange just didn't really make any sense to me at all, for all the obvious reasons. It just reminded me of how I'm just so over living here in this town.

On a social level, I'm isolated because my life experiences, my values, my social rules, my hobbies, and my appearance are different. Being poor in the US is not the same as being poor in Brazil, so just because I grew up in a working-class American family, it doesn't mean I identify with it today, and it certainly doesn't mean I've moved into this developing world urban sprawl and fit right in.

On a more practical level, my Maslow's hierarchy of needs isn't really being met. (I don't feel safe and I don't sleep well with all the noise and basic daily tasks are stressful.) Things are tense and chaotic around here and this weird run-in with the flanelinha was just another example.

Just a couple more months to get through. In the meantime, I'm hoping Pernambuco Gypsy can write a funny spin on phenomena like these to help make them a little more bearable.

Gender is not Gender (Nerdy Hour, Kind of)

2011-11-20T20:07:00.002-02:00

All right. Most of you know (from being my real-life friend or from deducing it from the blog) that I consider myself a feminist. But there's this new trend in Portuguese that's really got feminist ideals all wrong, and it's breaking linguistic rules and really bothering me. Allow me to explain.

Portuguese is a language that has grammatical gender. In linguistics, the word gender just means "different categories of nouns that provoke agreement with other words." Read that again. In language, the word "gender" just means "different categories of nouns." Lots and lots of languages have gender. It's no big deal.

Most of you either study Portuguese or have studied some other, non-English language in your lives, so this concept is probably not strange to you.
Examples:

A mesa está limpa. = The table is clean.
O ventilador está limpo. = The fan is clean.

The English sentences don't reflect it, but, as you can see in the changes to the Portuguese, the words mesa (table) and ventilador (fan) are in different noun categories. They have different genders (grammatical genders!). In Portuguese, a mesa (the table) is a feminine noun, while o ventilador (the fan) is a masculine noun.

The problem comes when we start talking about people in Portuguese.
Examples:
A garçonete = the waitress
O garçom = the waiter
As garçonetes = the waitresses
Os garçons = the waiters OR a group of waiters and waitresses

As you can see above, when you talk about plural groups of people that include both human genders, you choose the masculine grammatical gender. So for example, the word for "parents" and the word for "fathers" are the same word (pais, literally "fathers") in Portuguese. The word for "Brazilians" and "Brazilian men" is the same (brasileiros).

It's just so unfortunate that someone in the history of linguistics decided to use the words "gender," "masculine," and "feminine" for this phenomenon, because people are getting things all mixed up. Some Portuguese speakers have decided that grammatical gender is sexist! President Dilma (a woman) refuses to use the masculine grammatical gender to refer to women, so she says things like "brasileiros e brasileiras" "senadores e senadoras" and "professores e professoras." It was witty the first, ya know, 4 times. Now it's just cumbersome (and ungrammatical!). And now, it's all the rage in the blog world to write words like this: brasileir@s; sendaor@s; professor@s and the word tod@s for "everyone".

SIGH.

As you can see in the title of this blog entry, GENDER IS NOT GENDER. The fact that the masculine gender is used for groups of people has nothing to do with human gender or sexism or oppressing women or anything. It's a coincidence!

It's not like some proto-Indo-European-speaking cavemen sat around their fire and said "let's talk about people in the plural as men! It'll be a great way to subconsciously convince women that they should quietly fade into the background if men are present!" I mean, really. I want people who buy into this whole idea to really think it through. The word for "person" (a pessoa) is grammatically feminine. Does that mean we insult a man's masculinity by calling him a person? A group of children (as crianças) is also grammatically feminine. How do we fairly account for the boys in the group?

Oh wait. we already do. Because the word is plural, and it means "a group of kids that may be all boys or all girls or a mixture of the two human genders and we know from context because that's how our language works".

And what about our good old friends, the table and the fan? Should we stop saying a mesa because men eat at tables, too? Should we stop saying o ventilador because women use fans?

Grammatical gender is arbitrary. As my friend Bianca has so kindly informed me, German and Italian default to feminine nouns when they're plural. Does that mean Germany and Italy have got all of their women's rights issues covered? Is Italy less misogynistic than Brazil? Or is the US less so because English grammar doesn't have this issue at all? Plus, German has 3 grammatical genders! What are you gonna do about that? As you can see, this notion of gender neutrality in a language with grammatical gender really is ridiculous if you think about it for more than five seconds.

So, to the @ people: I'm with you on the feminist movement, but this is not the right way to go about it. You're just making communication more difficult. If you want to get back on track with helping fight the good fight as a feminist, read this book. You're welcome.

Birds in the New City

2011-11-18T20:53:00.001-02:00

So a couple of weekends ago, Alexandre and I went to the city we'll be living in next year for a visit. (In case you forgot, we're only living here in the poor beach town [which seemed much nicer in the pics from Google Images] until the end of the year, when Alexandre finishes the military service and starts his residency.) I'm not going to say the name, but I'll say we're going back to the interior, but not nearly as far inland as Caipirópolis was. São Paulo is only a (kind of) short bus ride away (far enough to make the rent prices a little more accessible!).

Anyway, we decided to start our apartment search in our new city. (Once I move there and learn more about it, I'll make up a funny name for you guys.) It's a little early to look for a place, but we mostly wanted to at least get an idea of the neighborhoods that we can consider. (We're also considering renting a small house, if I can talk Alexandre into it and if I can work with the leasing office people to convince him that we're not going to get robbed/pillaged/left for dead. I think apartment living is a false sense of security! Thoughts?)

Anyway, holy cow. It's a whole other world. It's one of the bigger cities in the state and it has a high standard of living. I'd been there before but not looking at it with "where do I want to live in this place?" perspective. The poverty of this beach town and the stress and chaos of our neighborhood are really, really getting to me. So is not being able to work very much. This visit was nice because it gave me some freakin' hope.

Blog reader-turned-buddy Bianca is actually from this city, and was kind enough to take us around to show us some nice parts. She took us to a lake/trail area and I got to see soooo many birds! I've missed my feathered friends! I didn't have my camera with me (drat!), so Wikipedia pictures will have to suffice:

I FINALLY got to see a green kingfisher (because it was the male, its chest was actually red, not green) and got to sing the Joanna song and stare at it for a little while, much to Bianca and Alexandre's dismay. But I enjoyed the moment. I'd been waiting for it ever since I bought my bird book in Foz do Iguaçu a couple of years ago.

"Kingfisher, sound the alarm!" (credit)

We saw a green ibis (a.k.a. coró-coró):

And also a lineated woodpecker, which is called pica-pau-de-banda-branca in Portuguese. Man, we were SO close to it. My picture would've been amazing, but here's one from the internet:

Then of course we saw some smooth-billed anis, but those are old hat:

the name in Portuguese is anu preto. Read Bittersweet's beautiful post about them here.

It's a good chance we'll end up living close to this reserve where all the birds were. I can't wait!

Don't Suck Out that Baby!

2011-11-10T22:45:00.009-02:00

So recently, Alexandre had to go to the illustrious city of Cubatão for some work stuff. I know that Alex from Bossa Breezes is familiar with it, but for those of you who have never heard of it, you're missing out! It's a real gem. You know, a testament to the industrial revolution. Go ahead and do a Google Images search to see how pristine and clean it is. It's famous for being one of the most polluted cities in the world, so much so that babies started being born without brains. (Read more of the fun on Wikipedia.) Supposedly it's better now, but I've driven through it. It's not pretty.

Anyway, Alexandre was handed an anti-abortion flyer from someone from "the Association in Defense of the Source of Life and Family". From Cubatão. I FIND THIS EXTREMELY IRONIC.

I'll let you bask in that irony for a bit.

Now I'm going to show you the flyer, which Alexandre saved for the specific purpose of my sharing it with all of you. (He's so good to us!)

Here it is, in all its glory:

I don't want to translate all of it; I think the pictures are really what make the flyer what it is. Notice the tiny little baby in the adult man's hands at the top. And then there's the tiny little baby under the side that says "VIDA SIM!" (Yes to life!).

Above it, it says, "the baby's tiny little heart starts beating at approximately 20 days." Then, the baby, which apparently can already crawl in the mother's uterus, says, "I'm completely formed, but I have to wait until it's time to be born!" This is the baby's status at the 12-week mark, according to the flyer. (Damn, I thought I was a cool baby for walking at 9 months, and for thinking at 1 year!)

Then there's the little fetus crying. It says, "I'm innocent, and I've been condemned to death. I can't cry. I can't run. I can't call for help. Won't you do anything to defend me?"

Then, under the part that says "ABORTO NÃO!" (No to abortion!), the pictures of how abortion happens are even better.

I mean, look at that one of the baby getting sucked out of the uterus and broken up into tiny bits. Look at its little face of panic!

And when the abortion occurs through "curreting" (#2), it seems as though the baby's suffering face is left for last, and the baby can still feel pain, even when the rest of its body has been chopped up.

Oh yes, and apparently, babies cry when they're aborted. And according to type of abortion #3, which is "a c-section to kill the baby," "sometimes, the baby comes out still alive and is murdered afterwards."

I don't want this post to turn into a debate on abortion. I think my opinion is pretty clear here, and that's not the point. My first point of this post is to entertain you with the flyer's over-the-top nature. My second point is that this flyer is ineffective, because the few people whose sympathies would be swayed by a flyer like this (evangelical grandmothers) are already against abortion. I doubt that this misinformation and this oversimplified attempt to humanize a fetus are going to convince anyone new to join the pro-life movement. Try appealing to my intelligence rather than drawing and photocopying cartoons, ya know? I mean, try telling me something logical, rather than insisting, "but the poor little wittle baby's little wittle heart is beating and the wittle baby's gonna just be so saaaaad!"

Um, also, Cubatão? You're anti-abortion? Really? Because forcing all babies to come to full term has proven wildly successful for you in the past...?

One more point: Abortion's already illegal in Brazil, so this flyer is moot. Shouldn't the other side be the one making the flyers? I'll bet I'd be able to find some nice and gruesome pictures from this "Valley of Death" showing what happens when a woman isn't allowed to get an abortion, even if doctors know early on that her baby is going to look like this. Because that's the law right now in Brazil, and that's much scarier than anything this Christian cartoonist could think up.

I'll go ahead and publish all of your comments on this one! Just know that if you try to use my blog comments section as your soapbox, it's going to be about as effective as this flyer was on me. If you're offended, then please, by all means, call up the organization in Cubatão to offer your support, and stop reading my blog.

Bad Words

2011-11-10T10:36:00.003-02:00

So I can't figure out why Brazilians are surprised when I know and say bad words in Portuguese. When I've sworn, quite a few people have asked, "how did you learn that word?!!?!"

I really, really don't understand this question.

Brazilians are people; that means they use bad words (except, of course, for the Catholic grandmothers who believe that words have power to call up demons or something). I live here, so I hear them. I memorize them because they're useful ways to translate the typical cornucopia of vulgarity-mixed-with-formal-English running through my brain.

I would understand if people were surprised that someone as seemingly sweet and innocent as I would use these words. I would also understand if they were amused by hearing bad words from their native language spoken with an accent: it's a centuries-old source of human entertainment. But what I don't get is how people are confused by where I could've possibly picked the word up.

Umm... I have 4 words for them: Alexandre. X-Box. FIFA 2010. (Let's count the year as one word.)

One of my favorite bad words in Portuguese is biscate. It means "slut." (I prefer "whore" in English, but the translation [puta, an easy one for you Spanish speakers] is just too literal in Portuguese and doesn't work as well.) Unfortunately, biscate seems to lack an adjectival equivalent ("slutty"). My friends back in Caipirópolis did not ask me this strange question about my swear word acquisition (they knew I'd learned at least half the words from them). They were, however, bemused by my attempts at using the word biscate as an adjective, putting it into phrases like Ela falou uma coisa meio biscate. Not correct, but the girls got my drift. They also approved of my correct deduction that led to the word biscatinha, which translates to "little slut" (usually in the porno way to use that term) but which I prefer to use to mean "just a little bit slutty" or as a term of endearment for a friend who is acting like a slut (it's OK, she knows who she is).

While Mary was here, she heard the ever-popular puta que pariu, which functions as a slightly stronger form of "god damn it!" but which literally translates to "whore that gave birth!" Once I supplied her with that translation, I realized just how ridiculous the term is, and now it's hard for me to take Alexandre seriously when he's mad.

Don't feel bad for him. He laughs at me every time I say "piece of shit!" for the same reason. He also laughed at me when I tried to really dig in an insult by translating it, saying Isso é preguiça paRA caralho! instead of pa' caralho. I failed, clearly. My mistake was akin to that of a foreigner saying "I'm piss-ed off!" and clearly enunciating the -ed.

But my conclusion is: bad words are fun and necessary in the right time and place. Sociolinguistics dictates that informal language is not wrong; it's just wrong in the wrong context. So that's fine if you're one of those people who say, "Oh no, I never use bad words! 'Fiddlesticks' is as far as I go!" but just so you know, you're distancing yourself from all the cool people that could be your friends and no one will even realize why. They'll just think something like, "man, that girl's not very accessible!" Scientific fact.*

*That second link quotes that, when used in the right context and not to express aggression or violence toward someone else, that swear words can "promote social harmony or cohesion."

Sao Paulo People --

2011-11-06T19:55:00.000-02:00

Hey, so. I think it's high time we organize a São Paulo blogger meetup before people start dispersing for the holidays. This meetup would include all of you ex-pats living in and around São Paulo, plus the handful of Brazilians with blogs / ties to the US / an interest in meeting people and speaking English and having a good day, plus anyone else (ahem LindseycomevisitagainfromRio), plus everyone's kids and partners. The more the merrier!

Thoughts? Would you go?

If you're shy and/or wary of the idea, read about the success of our Rio blogger meetup here and here.

If you were feeling shy and/or wary but went to the Rio blogger meetup anyway and had a great time, say so in the comments to encourage your fellow hesitators (not a word).

So?

Mary's Visit (belated post!)

2011-11-03T18:26:00.001-02:00

I know, I took way too long to write this post about Mary's trip! It doesn't mean I didn't have a great time -- it means I've just been busy since she left.

Mary was only able to come for a week, but we definitely made the most of it.

We went straight from the airport to the in-law's beach house.

Barbecue, beach, and books in hammocks!

(yeah, I kinda burned that garlic bread a bit. The perils of barbecuing without Alexandre!)

Mary had her first taste of fresh coconut ~~water~~ juice...

...and her first caipirinha:

We used one of the cloudier days to explore the more untamed parts of the fancy beach town. It sure was some gorgeous greenery.

anyone know what this plant is called? I've seen it in a few different places, but I don't know the name. It's so cool. Its "leaves" (?) fill with water and other plant debris when it rains.

What about this one?

We got this picture of the creepy Snow White figurine phenomenon, just for my buddy at Born Again Brazilian:

On our hike, we also literally stumbled upon a squirrel cuckoo, as in, practically stepped on its tail and didn't notice it until it flew up into the tree next to us! (I explain that to make sure you know that I know how to use the word "literally" correctly.) The whole thing was so fast that we couldn't get a decent picture, but luckily I recognized it from my bird book (its giant tail and beady red eyes make it unique). Here's a picture from UNESP's website:

They're actually good-sized birds, and they're so elegant. Fun fact: their name in Portuguese is alma-de-gato, which means "cat soul". Anyone know why? I don't, and I'm curious!

Speaking of birds, we were pretty lucky with our sightings during Mary's trip, what with spring and all. We didn't see as many different birds as Jamie and I saw during her trip during the summer, but Mary did get to experience...

a whole bunch of Brazilian tanagers, often collecting nesting materials with their frumpy mates

A lot of rufous-bellied thrushes doing the same thing (I took those pics! Click to make them larger)

southern lawpings (quero-queros) and their babies (see the little baby?! eeeeee)

a blue heron (I was excited by how close we got, obviously)

and some black skimmers (a.k.a. talha-mar), which I've seen around our beach town since we moved here but which I never knew the name of until now -- this picture is from Wikipedia

So we I definitely got some bird time in during the trip. :)

After the beach house, we went back to my apartment. Not much to do around here, and it was raining, so that limited our beach options. Mary got to meet Gatinha and try real açaí for the first time (much better as a fruit than a supplement):

Then we took a boat ride around the bay. Because of the rain, it was only us and a bunch of kids on a field trip. They were very interested in / confused by Mary's height and inability to understand Portuguese. But they took to her once she won the captain's raffle and passed on her potato chip prize to the kids next to her.

Even with the rain, the boat ride was really pretty. I learned that there are some pristine isolated beaches just a boat ride away from my apartment! Now I just need to find someone with a boat to take us to them...

my smile looks innocent enough, but I'm secretly plotting a way to get on that beach behind me

To entertain the kids, the captain played some Justin Bieber and Lady Gaga. He also tried to get a laugh out of them with "My Heart Will Go On," but it kind of went over their heads. We adults on board enjoyed it, though.

During Mary's trip, we took her to an obligatory all-you-can-eat sushi dinner:

shaky pic courtesy of the waitress, who was too busy obsessing about the fact that Mary spoke another language, telling Alexandre "Make her say something in English!" and then gawking in amazement at their mutual unintelligibility to get a good picture.

Oh, and Mary got a stealth picture of that "Gonna!" store:

And we went to the big farmer's market by my apartment. Mary got to try all kinds of Brazilian fruits, like caju, pinha, jabuticaba, and, of course, perfect, fresh mangoes.

After a couple of nights in our apartment, Mary and I went off to Sao Paulo for her last day before going home. Again, more rain, but luckily Mary is enjoyable and optimistic company.

We went to a "Museum of Brazilian Art" (the FAAP Museu). Don't go there. It's 2 rooms of BS. There is so much better Brazilian art out there -- don't let this place give you a bad impression.

We walked up and down Avenida Paulista. We checked out the botanical garden. We had lunch at a simple yet tasty per-kilo place. We got some fancy coffee.

It was a nice final day for Mary in Brazil. She got an idea of the world's second-largest city (mostly by spending half of the day on transportation of some sort).

I was sad when she left!!!!

Bouncy Mouse

2011-10-30T23:15:00.001-02:00

I know, I know, I'm so behind on blog posts. I have like, 5 that I want to get up this week, including the details of Mary's visit, an..."enlightening" anti-abortion flyer that Alexandre received and saved especially for me and you, fine readers, and also a post with more fun grammar stuff.

But really quick I just have to tell you guys about this game that Alexandre has on his cell phone. It's called Bouncy Mouse and it cracks me up! It's so sickeningly cute and it looks like it's meant for toddlers, but Alexandre insists that it actually is a challenging game. (I couldn't get past the first level. My fingers are too fat for touch screens. That's my story and I'm sticking to it.)

The point of the game is to launch this adorably adorable mouse-in-the-shape-of-a-ball around a Mario-Bros.-looking level until you get to the end of the maze thing. But along the way, you pick up cheese and avoid bees (...? a common enemy of the mouse?) until you successfully reach the cat at the end of the level.

But just look at this thing!

Look at that little face!

When you beat a level, the mouse makes this RIDICULOUS little squealing sound. The more points you've garnered, the longer the mouse squeals. Alexandre and I have started making this sound during conversations. We use it to mean "yay!" or "that is exactly what I wanted!" You can hear a short version at the end of this video:

Isn't it hilarious?!?!

But by far, the best part of the game is that the mouse seems to win hats when he accomplishes certain cheese-collecting tasks. We're not sure if all of the prizes are hats, because Alexandre has only won one so far.

Well, according to this picture, some other prizes (a.k.a. 'secrets,' a.k.a. 'a bad collocation translation from Chinese to English') include another hat and maracas. But look at that! A ball-shaped mouse in a sombrero!!

I CAN'T STOP LAUGHING.

I dare you to get through this video without at least chuckling to yourself a little bit:

So much cheese! So much bouncing! Rainbows coming out of the mouse's tail!!!!

Your Bilingual Brain: Nerdy Hour #2

2011-10-19T16:28:00.009-02:00

This is going to be one of those nerdy posts about linguistics. Go ahead and skip it if they bore you (though you may be missing out!).

So I know I said I'd try to do these Nerdy Hour posts every week, but they require more time than I imagined, so clearly that didn't happen. I also said I'd be researching ESL-related topics for us to discuss, but I decided to look into something more relevant for us foreigners living abroad rather than for our students.

You see, when my friend Mary was here visiting last week, I realized just how much Portuguese is affecting my English. There were countless times when I couldn't remember an English word, or when I used the wrong word, or when I used some weird Portuguese-based grammar.

Instead of getting too embarrassed about it, I decided to research why the heck my brain is letting Portuguese run the show so often. I remember learning in college that when students start to learn a new language, they'll temporarily "turn off" their first language (a.k.a. Language 1, or L1). This process, called inhibition, was proven by studying word recall in students just after they got out of their foreign language classes. After an hour or two of Spanish class, it was harder for the English speaking students to remember English words. But I never learned anything about the long-term effects of L2 fluency on the L1.

So for my research, the terms I used to find articles were "language immersion" "effects on L1" and "L1 inhibition." I found some interesting stuff. The short story is that learning a second language changes the way your brain is organized, so sometimes you can't remember where you put things!

First, I learned from this article that you can learn things from a new language using two methods:

1. Associating the new word or grammar with the L1 word or grammar (pure language translation)
OR
2. Associating the new word or grammar with the more abstract concepts that represent them in your brain

As you become more fluent in a L2, you start using method 2 a lot more. Basically, you stop relying on your first language for translations, and start associating new words and info with concepts. This is important because language information is stored in one part of your brain, while ideas and abstract concepts are stored in another. So as you become more fluent, you start "saving new information" to a different part of your brain.

Some really amazingly fun and awesome neurolinguists decided to study exactly how and where this happens in the brain. In their study, they made some helpful conclusions:

*There are 2 distinct parts of your brain: parts for each language.
*There are also communal regions of your brain that are shared and activated by both languages. (I think this refers to the concept regions that the other article talked about.)
*There are more parts of the brain that are for your L1 than for your L2.
*A lot of these L1 regions are set at a very young age. They don't change and your L2 cannot affect them. It's as if your brain marks off part of itself just for your first language.
*In bilingual kids, the regions that are distinct in adults overlap. Basically, bilingual kids have fewer distinct parts, and fewer regions reserved for only the L1.
*The older the participants were when they learned their second language, the more variety the researchers found in which parts of their brain they used to "store" the L2. So basically, when you're younger, you use predictable parts of the brain to store your L2. But the older you are when you start learning, the more "creative" your brain has to be to save the new language information.

So I combined the information from these two studies and thought of a helpful metaphor. You see, I think that we can imagine our brains as a series of buckets. We've got a bucket for our L1 (English, for most of you), and a bucket for our L2 (Portuguese, for most of you). At first, when you start out learning your second language, it's easy to keep the buckets organized. Sometimes you have to cover up your L1 bucket so the contents don't confuse you. As you start seeing connections between the languages and start understanding words and ideas as abstract concepts rather than just words, you start throwing things into a giant mixed bucket.

Kids are great at keeping their buckets big and organized. But for us, as adults, after a while, that shared concept bucket can get pretty disorganized. So sometimes you have to frantically search around inside it for something (See my little stick figure, frantically searching? :). That's when you forget a word. Sometimes you pull out the wrong thing on accident (like "the beach was filled of people"). But all in all, these mistakes are a testament to your fluency in the new language. Don't despair. All of that searching and organizing makes you as a bilingual better and faster at solving problems, paying attention to things, and resolving conflicts. So next time you say some funny thing in your native language that's clearly the result of your second language, feel better knowing that this little slip-up means you're making your brain more awesome and more complex.

I think there's another factor that causes us to make mistakes in our first language, especially for those of us married to people who speak English as a second language, and for those of us who teach English. It's simple: You hear consistently different English all day! You're essentially hearing a different dialect of English. Imagine if you were an American who moved to England. After a couple of years, you'd certainly start to pick up lots of British slang and even some British grammar preferences. I'm arguing that the same thing happens to us, who hear "Brazilian English" all day. If you hear people use the verb "to combine" instead of "to schedule" 50+ times, you might, eventually, start to say it, too.

So yay, your turn! Is your second language messing up your first language? Any funny mistakes you've made? Comment away!

A Beautiful Moment

2011-10-17T23:38:00.006-02:00

Guess what guys? I'm pregnant!

No, I'm not, just kidding. It's just that two other bloggers announced their pregnancies this week and I wanted to make you all gasp at the possible coincidence. Haha. :) :) Congrats to Nina and Meredith!

OK, but the real post today is a little about my last week, which was super great because my friend Mary came to visit from the US (hence my disappearance from the internet world). I'll write the full post once I've got all of her pictures, but I just wanted to tell you all about a nice morning Mary and I shared while she was here.

I hope Mary doesn't mind me telling you a little bit about her. When she was seventeen, two years before we met in our literature classes at Berkeley, she had a skiing accident that caused a lot of damages to her back and everything below, mainly her spine and her feet. The road to recovery has been long, and Mary's still on it, but she's the most adaptable and resilient person I've ever met. She's one of those rare people who learns a lesson in optimism from a serious trauma, who realizes the value in making the most of life and who really does put that idea into every one of their actions and decisions.

Mary and I spent a few days of her trip at the in-laws' beach house. On our last day there, the weather was cool; the sky was cloudy and it was raining just a bit. But Mary came down the stairs in her bathing suit and a dress and had decided that she wanted to go swimming in the ocean anyway. I was feeling cold and lazy but wasn't going to say no to her polite enthusiasm.

Mary's step is still a bit slow, so we took our time walking down to the water. When we go to the shore, we left our towels and dresses on the sand to be made muddy by the drizzle. We stepped into the water tentatively. I thought it chilly; Mary, traveling here from her new home in Oregon, rejoiced in the ocean's relative warmth. After only a minute or two of wading, she was ready to dive right in. I held back a bit, futilely wiping the raindrops off my glasses and mentally preparing myself for the rush of chilly water reaching my abdomen.

And there, in the choppy ocean, in the inseparable spray, was Mary: a mermaid, a dolphin, a woman celebrating life. She wasn't one to waste an opportunity: it was her last chance on the trip to swim in the open ocean of the tropical Atlantic, and she wasn't going to pass it up. While I frowned at the frigid splashing, she said thank you to the sea and the sky for their union; she said thank you to her muscles and her bones for theirs; and she swam.

I couldn't help but be inspired. My dear friend showed me the beauty of the moment. I gave in, held onto my glasses, and went under. We frolicked like a pair of otters, and happily tired ourselves out. When we walked home in our bathing suits, in the rain, it didn't matter that we were wet or that our clothes were wet or that our towels were wet because it was just water and water makes life cleaner and smoother and the day was gray but gorgeous.

Thanks for being great, my friend!

Updates!

2011-10-04T00:14:00.001-03:00

So my gnat-like personality causes me to leave a lot stories unresolved here on my blog. I tell you about something crazy that happened and how I'm not sure how I'm going to handle it, but then I never tell you the conclusion, even though so many people leave me so many helpful comments with advice. Since I've got some free time tonight, I thought I'd fill you guys in.

The horribly embarrassing aerobics gym class: I've kept up with the gym (and even started running, can you believe it?), but I never did go back to that class. The main reason was because the gym membership was half the price without it. But it was also because the people in the regular workout room (the place with the treadmills and bikes and weights) are way cooler and more down-to-earth than the gym bunnies in the hardcore "look at my sexy body" aerobics class. I've been able to go at my own pace and therefore I've felt more successful and I've more or less made it into a routine.

The crazy Mormon guy: The younger boys from the church eventually did call me and ask me when I was available to come back and observe their basic classes. I mentioned the encounter with their boss and asked if they'd heard about it. The boy on the phone informed me that he had, in fact, heard about it, and then told me, "yeah, Steve felt really bad about it, but then he said you could come back only if you agreed to stick to the basic classes." This conversation annoyed me. They made it sound like they were doing ME a favor by "allowing" me to volunteer. So I effectively "broke up with them" and said it just wasn't gonna work out and good luck. Too bad. No more attempts at volunteering through religious organizations.

That crazy one-day maid who took all day: She had only planned to come that one day because of her surgery, and she never called to ask to come back, and we never called her. I've been keeping up with the cooking and cleaning; I talked Alexandre into helping more (a miracle!), and a lot of the translation work dropped off, so it's been working out OK. I'm guessing that she decided that our apartment was too much work and blamed the apartment rather than her own abilities for the delay.

That crazy Anti-American guy at the gym: Luckily, I haven't seen him since that fateful day, since he usually goes to the gym late at night. Alexandre has run into him a couple of times since that day, and both times, the guy tried to pick fights with him, even though Alexandre told him that he was my HUSBAND, that he's been to the US and that he's MARRIED to an American. My conclusion is that crazy gym guy is a very angry and unhappy man and his "perpetual irritation," as Alexandre describes it, is much bigger than some hatred for the US. So now I just kind of feel sorry for him.

My students on Skype: This has worked out really well. I have a handful of my students from our former town on Skype, and it definitely saves me when bill paying time rolls around. There are a lot of benefits, like the fact that they already have the material and that we've already developed a rapport; there's also the benefit that I don't have to clean my house or take a shower before classes start. Haha. The only problem is that the internet tends to cut out a lot, and I'm not sure if it's because of my internet connection or theirs or both. So I think when we move in January for Alexandre's residency, it'll be worth it to invest in a higher-speed internet.

My Portuguese teacher: After receiving so many generous offers from people (thanks, everyone!) I did end up finding a teacher, and we had our first classes last week. It's a fun challenge to teach someone so advanced, and it's really satisfying to have someone sit with me for a WHOLE hour each week to talk about my questions about Portuguese grammar. It seems promising so far! :D

I think that's everything that I've left unfinished. I hope this post was more hopeful and interesting and less self-indulgent. Have a good night!

Museum Day with Alexandre

2011-10-02T20:57:00.003-03:00

So Mr. Alexandre, who has been working like a crazyperson, finally had a WHOLE day off today and promised we could do whatever I wanted. So we went to check out historical downtown Santos, which has a bunch of museums and old buildings and stuff. When I told people I was moving to the Baixada Santista, everyone told me to go see the trolley cars and museums over there.

So, OK. Sunday is not the best day to go to the historical downtown area of Santos. All the commercial buildings are closed, and it's right up against the backside of the port, so that means it was just us, a couple of fellow wandering tourists, and crack addicts. Not ideal. But we didn't know it was like that until we got there.

Our first stop was the Museu do Café, or the Coffee Museum. If you don't live under a rock, you know that Brazil is one of the world's largest exporters of coffee, and that Brazil has a huge coffee culture. Mm-mm. The museum is housed in what was once the Edifício da Bolsa Oficial de Café, which I guess we can translate as the Coffee Stock Exchange Building. Basically, it was the big beautiful building next to the Port of Santos, the largest port in Latin America, where coffee traders and brokers met to do their buying and selling.

the old-timey trading floor, with chairs for the brokers from each brand or strand or whatever

The museum focused on the history of coffee trade in Brazil and how coffee was harvested, made, and exported before modern methods were used. So there were lots of paintings of Santos when it was first founded (you can see one in the background of the picture above), and lots of rudimentary tools that slaves had to use out on the coffee plantations.

If you're really interested in the historical facts (Ray), you can find them online, or you probably already know them. So I'll show you the fun stuff, like the high-quality translations:

Oh, the perils of cheap dictionaries with one-word translations

680 millions of dollars in revenues!!!

(haha, I know this is just a small and common mistake, but it's still entertaining)

There was also a man trying to carry really heavy coffee all by himself, so I had to help him out:

The poor guy's been at it for like, 100 years

And then Alexandre decided to personify him:

And here's a picture showing when the canals in Santos were inaugurated, and how the streets around them are absolutely not made for modern-day cars (hence torturous driving experiences whenever we try to drive in that damn place):

See the horse buggies on the left? That space today is now supposed to be for 2 lanes of cars. Except people use 1 of the lanes to park, and then buses take over and push you into the driving-turned-parking lane, and motorcycles cut in between. The same thing happens going in the other direction on the other side. It's madness! I say we go back to the horses.

And here's a cool map of Brazil made out of non-roasted coffee beans:

And here's me, pouting because Alexandre insisted on taking a picture OF me instead of WITH me:

next to me is a cool old building that was converted into a nightclub, and behind me is part of the Port of Santos

And here's me and Alexandre together, and I'm happier because my pouting worked:

Before leaving the coffee museum, we drank obligatory espressos in the museum's café. They tasted like overpriced Brazilian espressos.

Our next planned stop was a place called Monte Serrat, which has a sort of tram car that goes up a mountain, akin to that teleférica that I went to with Samia a couple of weeks ago, except this one is on the ground. But on our way there, we stumbled upon another old-building-turned museum. This one was dedicated to the engineer Saturnino de Brito, who designed all the canals and sewer systems in Santos. Turns out the port used to be this nasty cesspool. You see, Santos is technically an island, connected to the mainland only by a system of swamps and rivers. All the different people coming to the island, whether to dock or to live, brought and died from lots of diseases, like yellow fever and cholera. Anyhoo, this engineer guy realized that a huge part of the problem was the fact that people were crapping everywhere and leaving their rotten food in the streets and all that. So he put in some canals and some sewer systems.

The focus of the building-turned-museum was on a new partnership between Japan and Brazil called Onda Limpa (Clean Wave), in which Japan is helping the Sao Paulo coast clean up its crap better. The guide in the museum showed us this fancy light board. It had a map of the coast and the different projects that Onda Linda is developing, and where the water's being treated, and where it's going to go. (Here's the website about it.) Anyway, it was cool stuff! It's really going to modernize the region.

If I had to put this museum's theme into words, they would be "the ongoing struggle between nature, government, and citizens who don't give a shit about, well, their shit." It was basically a history of how the environment makes living down here difficult, about how the people don't care about the environment or about making a mess, and how the government is always trying to combat the two challenges. A pretty government-friendly message, if you ask me. But it was interesting information (who knew there was so much to know about a city's drainage system?), the guide really knew his stuff, the building was pretty, and best of all, it was free!

So that enlightening tour took much longer than expected, and it was well into lunchtime by the time we got to the little trolley car thing at Monte Serrat.

It looked cute and all, but it was freakin' 20 reais a person to go up! We figured that money would be better spent on food. So we stole a picture from the bottom (you can see the top from the bottom anyway -- not that exciting) and went to find a restaurant.

Since most everything in the downtown area was closed (too bad! there seemed to be some promising vegetarian and por kilo places), we drove down toward the beach and found a friendly little Italian place. Our chatting with the waiter revealed that this Monte Serrat business is not actually THE famous Santos trolley, and that there is apparently another bonde, or cable car, that the city is known for. Whoops.

We'll have to save that cable car trip for another day, because by the time lunch was over, it was pouring down rain and we were pooped (get it? pooped? after a visit to the sewer museum? har har). So we made the trip home.

What a fun little date! I can't wait 'till Alexandre's work schedule eases up a bit so we can have more of these.

Most Optimistic Post Ever

2011-09-23T00:41:00.003-03:00

This one's long, but worth it!

OK let me start off this very optimistic post by saying thank you and showing my happy surprise at what a great response I got to the Portuguese teacher problem. Things are in the works and I'll keep you guys posted!

But that is not the focus of this post. The focus of this post is that I'm starting to feel as though I am single-handedly changing Brazilian culture -- or at least my experience in it.

Here's the thing: as some of you may know, it is not standard in Brazilian culture to complain about stuff, or to express your dissatisfaction with a service. Sure, Brazilians are humans, so they complain -- but they scoff at injustices when in the company of friends; they rant to their partners over dinner; they lament -- but complaining directly to the source of the problem, especially at a place of business? Rare indeed! Have a bad experience at a restaurant? It's practically unheard of to say something to the waiter or the waiter's boss (if the waiter was, in fact, the problem). A hotel with lots of problems? Complain about it to your friends later, but don't fill out that little survey card they leave for you in the room!

I've gone along with this for long enough. This year, the frustration and the feelings of hopelessness have become stronger than the desire to follow social norms, especially social norms that are the scars of a dictatorship and which need to be questioned. I've begun to take a stand!

Because Brazilians seem to be more forgiving of written grammatical errors than they do of spoken accents, my main method of complaining and calling businesses on their shit has been in writing. Did you know that most Brazilian company websites have a complaints section?

So I'll give you a list of some things I've complained about, and then I'll tell you the most amazing story. (It seems to good to be true, but it's REAL, I swear! It will give you hope for the country, it's that amazing.) My complaints are not rude, and I try to be as formal and direct as I can: "Your business practice makes me not want to give money to your business anymore." (Sometimes I can get a little grandiose, saying things like, "it's in YOUR hands now!", but I'm not offensive.)

OK so first, here are the things I've complained about and stood up to this year:

*The local supermarket -- they pay some car to drive around with a giant speaker playing their radio commercials. This car drives around our neighborhood on Saturday and Sunday mornings. It's only come by once since I wrote the letter. Coincidence? I like to think not.

*The crappy hotel where we stayed when we went to Ribeirão Preto -- you bet your you-know-what that I filled out that customer satisfaction card.

*The interstate bus company that I used to go to Rio -- the driver was smoking the whole trip home, and I was in the seat behind him! This company's site actually had a live customer service chat that I used to report the driver.

*The post office -- they're way late on getting a package to me from the US. Turns out it's because they're on strike. (Thanks to Stephanie for informing me of that, since the customer service rep at the post office somehow failed to mention it.)

*Melissa shoes -- those sandals gave me blisters!

*A local salon -- the only time I paid to get my nails done since moving to the beach town, the lady was totally grouchy and way too aggressive. Lindsey is OK with the aggressive manicures, but I'm not. After asking the manicurist twice to be more gentle, and after having to take the clippers out of her hands and finishing myself to prevent any more bleeding, I complained to her boss on my way out and showed her my cut cuticles.

*The language school that tried to charge me 100 reais an hour for Portuguese classes -- they got an email response with a piece of my mind!

*The Brazilian animal protection agency when I saw that endangered parakeet in a cage on someone's balcony.

You call it annoying. I call it a squeaky wheel who gets the oil! If you don't say anything, there's a 100% chance that things won't change. If you alone say something, there's a slightly greater chance that things will change. Imagine if everyone said something! Be the change you wish to see in the world!

OK guys, so after building up my confidence with all of those events above, I brought out the big guns today. You may remember my stories about the crazy smoking neighbor who loves to play insanely loud music. I wrote that she moved out, because it seemed that she did, but Alexandre's eavesdropping on their fights has revealed that, actually, the husband got in a fight with the wife's brother and won't let him in their apartment anymore. So now she spends a lot of her free time at her brother's apartment, instead of him spending his free time in their apartment. So that explains why she's still living here but there is much less cigarette smoke seeping up into our place. I'm going to tell you about the events in the order that they happened today, even though things were not clear to me in this order:

1. Gross neighbor starts her morning onslaught of offensively loud music presumably before heading off to her brother's apartment (shack?) to smoke.

2. In my frustration, I research Brazilian noise laws, and discover that it is, in fact, illegal to play music this loud in Brazil (proof here!).

3. I call 190, which is the non-emergency police line. Rather than assuming that it's a prank call because of my accent and hanging up on me, the dispatcher is amazingly friendly and understanding, and actually laughs at a joke I make. She confirms that excessively loud music is illegal and says she'll send over a police car. Because Brazil is notorious for shoddy police officers, I don't believe her, but give her a polite thank you for her efforts and friendliness nonetheless.

4. Ten minutes later, I hear the neighbor's intercom phone ring. I look out the window to see a police car parked in front of the building! It's a police officer calling the neighbor.

5. Because our intercom is broken, gross neighbor is forced to go downstairs to talk to the cops, which works out in my favor because I can eavesdrop through the window. Cops scold her for her noise and inform her of the law and say other things I can't understand. Gross neighbor has the nerve to be testy with the cops, shouting things like "who was it, huh?! Who called you?" They are not having it and are stern with her until she backs down. I do a little dance from atop the closed toilet, where I am standing on tip-toe to be within hearing range.

6. Gross neighbor storms back upstairs, shouting nonsense in the hallway that I can't understand. I have long since locked my door, planning to pretend I'm not home in case she suspects me and tries to retaliate. Lucky for me, she doesn't. She apparently realizes that the police are on my side.

7. Gross neighbor goes back into her apartment and spends a good 10 minutes arguing with her husband. I can't understand, but I later come to discover that he's likely now scolding her for causing problems with the neighbors and tells her he's going to sell the speakers, probably because they can't afford to get kicked out of their place that they're likely living in without proper documentation, since neither of them work.

8. Gross neighbor insists on one last hoorah with the music, blasting, in a beautiful irony unbeknownst to her, the Motown hits "R-E-S-P-E-C-T" and "Ain't No Mountain High Enough." Swear to God.

9. When Alexandre comes home from work later that evening, he pulls into the parking area and sees Gross neighbor's husband selling giant speakers to some Japanese guy. With no idea that he's totally rubbing it in the guy's face, he tries to make manly small talk by saying, "wow, those are some big speakers, eh?" Glorious.

10. Alexandre comes upstairs to tell me that he just saw the guy from 202 selling speakers to someone, and asks if I think that means they aren't going to play such loud music anymore. I cackle in hysterical happiness and tell him about my day. We high-five.

So reporting something to the police totally worked; the police did their job; the evil neighbors learned an important lesson on living in a society, and I feel hope for this country once again.

Join me in the crusade! Or revolution! Or protest! Or whatever metaphor you prefer! Speak up!!!!!!!! It just might work. I'm living proof.

I Want a Portuguese Teacher

2011-09-21T18:33:00.002-03:00

So I am frustrated about something that perhaps may be troubling some of the other Portuguese learners living in Brazil.

I've never had consistent Portuguese classes. I've written in other posts about how I tried a few teachers, but how it never worked out, for different reasons. I've had about 8 hours total of Portuguese classes. Eight.

My Portuguese is strong, but I'd like it to be closer to fluent. I'd like practice with formal Portuguese. I'd like to learn how to spell. I'd like to learn more expressions that trip me up, things like "para seu governo" or "tenho para mim" or "estou nestes dias." (These are examples of things that I've heard that have caused a breakdown in communication, the last one being especially embarrassing.) I'd like a Brazilian teacher who knows about their native language from a linguistic perspective, and who doesn't tell me that things I hear Brazilians say every day are "wrong."

The problem I'm having is that Brazilians think they're espertos. Oh, all gringos here in Brazil must be rich, right? By virtue of being from the US, I must be swimming in money. My family must send me the dollar bills that grow on the trees in their backyard. I must be in Brazil just to take advantage of all the poor people. So Brazilian Portuguese teachers come to this conclusion and charge exorbitant prices for Portuguese classes.

HELLO! Many of us living here are teaching English. We know how much private language classes go for. More importantly, that's how much we make! I just tried negotiating private classes with a school that wanted me to pay 100 REAIS an hour for Portuguese classes, and I'd have to go all the way to Santos for them (a looonnng bus ride when Alexandre has the car). I would also have to make the commitment before seeing the material or meeting the teacher.

Um, here in my poor and small beach town (and I had to give my zip code on the company's site, so they know where I live), I'm lucky to get people to pay 25 reais an hour for English classes. The economy here is not strong. As a couple, Alexandre and I are not as poor as my students, but my own personal salary is pretty damn low because of the region, much lower than it was where we used to live. So, no, I'm not going to pay 4 times what I charge for classes in the same damn area.

I just really, really want a decent and affordable teacher, who isn't going to so drastically take advantage of the supply-demand situation of the market. Yes, I know there are more English teachers (and a LOT of bad ones) than there are Portuguese teachers, which is going to make the price a bit higher. I know that my specific neighborhood is unusually cheap. But there has to be some middle ground. I know from talking to Lindsey and her friend that even in a city as expensive as Rio, Portuguese teachers are charging 75 reais an hour. (Based on what the girls said, that's only slightly higher than what most of the private English teachers charge in Rio, so it seems fair.)

So now I'm sad. I'd be a model student. OK, I'd be a challenging and difficult and picky student, but I'd still be a GOOD student. I would do all my homework and learn fast and ask good questions. But I can't seem to find a good fit.

Does anyone reading this want to be my teacher? I'm serious. I would be so happy if we just read articles from the Brazilian newspaper that you choose, and then I have to write about them, and you correct my writing and we discuss my mistakes, and then we discuss the topic of the article, and I get to learn cultural controversies from the article, as well as Portuguese. It doesn't require that much prep on your part (just choosing a good article, thinking of good discussion questions, and correcting my writing), but it requires a really strong understanding of your native Portuguese and also a decent understanding of English, to understand where my mistakes are coming from.

(I've been trying to do this on my own and sneakily making Alexandre be my teacher, but he's catching on! Also, he doesn't know how to explain the things that are difficult for me.)

I'll pay you if your price is reasonable, or, better yet, I'll trade you for my high-quality English classes. It can be over Skype. My Skype classes with my students from our old town have been going very well. I've learned a few cool Skype tricks, and I can show you.

So? Anyone up for the challenge? I want to learn!

EDIT: Thank you so much for all the offers! I was flooded with generosity. I did find a teacher, though, so no need to offer anymore. :D

Samia's Visit

2011-09-21T15:20:00.000-03:00

So some of you may know Samia, the blogger who Lindsey, Marc, and I met at Cambridge Day. We got along so well in São Paulo that she came to visit me here at the beach! Lucky me. :D

We spent most of her visit in my kitchen, so I'm not sure how much fun she had, but I sure had a good time!

She got in late Saturday evening. On Friday I had bought a fresh whole chicken from the farmer's market. (I've since learned that you can ask the butcher to take out the head and organs and feet for you. He's happy because he gets to re-sell them. You're happy because you don't have to pull a chicken's head out of its abdomen or throw away edible parts. Everybody wins!)

So Saturday night, Samia and I roasted that baby up! I didn't take any pictures, but this is the recipe I used. I also made my own stuffing by cooking butter, chicken broth, onions, oregano, and toasted bits of French bread together. Yumyumyum.

Then we made a fabulous dessert reflecting the benefits of globalization:

That's right. It's banana blondies with brigadeiro and vanilla ice cream. Only 5 million calories!

Saturday morning we went over to the teleférico (tram / ski lift thing) that I went on with Karine when she came to visit. It's a big hit with the tourists.

From the top of the little mountain, you can see great views of Santos, and because it was a beautiful Sunday morning, we got to see lots of paragliders:

After enjoying the view from the top, we went down to the beach for some fresh pineapple juice -- just for you, Ray! It was from a kiosk, not a cart, but it was tasty nonetheless.

The beach by the teleférico is really nice. There were a lot of families and people playing sports.

We went home and made garlic and potato soup, and then added the leftover chicken and potatoes from the night before. It was so great to have Samia there. An extra mouth to feed meant that Alexandre and I didn't have to eat chicken leftovers for too long! :)

But I had a really nice weekend with Samia, talking about books, about teaching, about moving to another country, about cross-cultural partners, and about all kinds of other good stuff. I hope she comes back to visit soon! I promise I'll have the food ready next time. ;)

Blister!

2011-09-20T23:18:00.003-03:00

So you know how people say something like, "you don't know someone until you walk a mile in their shoes"?

Well, if you walk a mile in Melissa's shoes, you may come to know her very, very well. And, if your situation fares as poorly as mine, you may soon loathe whoever the "Melissa" was that invented such a crappy shoe brand.

I tried wearing my adorable new Melissa sandals down to the beach -- the walk to the nicer beach takes less than 10 minutes! -- and by the time I got there, the shoes had done enough damage to cause a huge blister to develop on the bottom of my foot.

Don't let the adorableness fool you. They're horrible torture devices.

It hurt so bad that by the time I decided to leave the beach, I was in too much pain to walk home, and I had to pay a bus to take me 5 blocks. Ridiculous. (Whine whine whine. This sounds like a case of first world problems.)

You know how you also learn lots of Portuguese words when you need them? Like how you learn that sink is pia when it breaks, or that you need to say estou rouca when you've lost your voice, or that the word bomba is not only "bomb," but also something like "water pump," which means you don't have to freak out on your neighbor when he tries to explain why the water turned off in the building? Well, now I know the word bolha. It means blister. And according to Alexandre, I should not "open" it. I should just suck it up and stay off it when I can and wait for it to heal.

And Jim can't even give me crap about buying cheap shoes, because these shoes were expensive!! Sixty reais for a freakin' pair of flip flops! Also, Melissa shoes have a reputation for being very comfortable, but I don't get it! I wrote a complaint on the Melissa website saying how they cannot charge such high prices for shoes if they aren't even testing them out. (Writing complaints on websites for Brazilian companies is my new thing, by the way. After seeing the horrible grammar mistakes in the notes that my neighbors put up on the building to complain about the crazy neighbors, I figure my grammar mistakes are forgivable). Anyway, I told those biatches at Melissa.com.br that I'm switching back to Havaianas. You can't go wrong with rubber (that's what she said), though you can, apparently, go very, very wrong with PVC plastic.

I'll never leave you again

Are you on Team Havaiana or Team Melissa? Have you had similar experiences with shoes? Any ideas on how to still wear my cute Melissa shoes without getting blisters? I think I may have to resort to just carrying them in my purse with me to the beach, so I can put them on and still get tan lines in the shape of birds. That was my main goal, after all.

Be a Food Critic in Sao Paulo!

2011-09-15T20:09:00.000-03:00

So Diego over at Inside São Paulo just put up some great information:

If you live in the city of Sao Paulo and want to be a secret food critic for "The Palate Awards," put on by a Sao Paulo newspaper called Estadão, they'll pay for your meals at fancy restaurants in exchange for reviews!

To apply, you have to write a short sample review about a good dish you've eaten recently at a restaurant. You can even write it in English, so foreigners are welcome to participate!

At the end of the competition, the winners (and the judges) are revealed at a ceremony.

Check out the details in English at Inside São Paulo and the newspaper's official webpage on the event here.

This sounds so great. I wish I lived in Sao Paulo! I can write well AND I love food. Free food? An excuse to write fluffy and dramatic food critiques? Sounds like a dream.

Rio Getaway and My First Samba School

2011-09-12T22:17:00.002-03:00

I have a confession. This holiday weekday-turned-weekend, I escaped to Rio de Janeiro. I didn't mention it on here because, honestly, I wasn't in a blogger meetup mood. I was more in a "let's take a break from the annoying crap of life and rant about said crap with a friend" kind of mood. So, after some last-minute planning, I hopped on a bus to Lindsey's house (and by house, I mean her amazing new apartment!). Saturday night was totally omg amazing, so I'm going to hurry up and try to get through the other parts so I can tell you about it.

We didn't do a whole lot the first night or the first day. We just enjoyed each other's company and played with Lindsey's kitties and rested and ate copious amounts of Domino's (no, we did not order it two nights in a row...what?...). We went for a run along the gorgeous bay. We explored the Rio Sul mall and all its fancy stores. I bought two new pairs of shoes. One of them is a pair of Melissa-brand sandals with obnoxiously large rubber birds on them:

The red style on the left! whoo hoo! haha

Saturday, we went to Rio de Janeiro's botanical garden. It was gorgeous! I got to reunite with some toucan buddies and I think I got Lindsey to appreciate our feathered friends a little more. :)

quintessential Rio botanical garden picture

looking for the toucans

and back to normal. Yeah, we look a little related. The unintentionally matching blouses may or may not contribute.

After the walk around the garden, we had to rest up. Why?

Because we went to the Mangueira's Carnival rehearsal, that's why!

If you don't know what that means, then you're probably not thinking, "oh, cool!" right now. So I'll explain. But first, some background on Carnival that I learned this weekend (please correct me if I'm wrong). Let's put the following paragraphs in the category of "things I should've learned about and done much sooner as a resident of Brazil":

In Rio de Janeiro, many slums have their own "samba schools." These samba schools form the groups that compete in the giant famous Carnival parades. Every year, each school makes its own float and writes its own song. Then the members dance and perform on and around the float during the parade. The whole point of the parade is to see which samba school has the best performance. At the end of the parade, someone (who? a committee? I don't know) votes on the best school.

The samba schools (and the residents of the neighborhoods that house them) spend the whole year preparing for this event. It's a major hobby and passion for a lot of people.

To earn money and to garner publicity for their neighborhood, school, and annual song, some (maybe all?) samba schools open their doors for public rehearsals. So you can pay to go in and watch the rehearsal.

That's what we did! We went to a rehearsal at the cultural center of Mangueira, the name of a slum and of its samba school inside. It was the first or one of the first rehearsals of the year, so it was a ceremony in itself.

Some of Lindsey's friends invited us. I didn't really know what to expect. Lindsey had gone to one before, and she said, "you're gonna get sweaty, so dress accordingly." So all I knew was that I was going to a favela for the first time, that I'd be in the middle of a big crowd, and that I'd probably be required to dance.

The samba school wasn't deep in the favela or anything. It was right on the edge, next to the main avenue, so it wasn't necessarily dangerous. But I'll admit that, try as I might not to be indoctrinated by the prejudice opinions of the Brazilians I roll with, I was scared out of my mind for just an instant when I got out of that taxi. Then I took a deep breath, shook it off and started walking.

(I'll add here that I recently read a book called "Gang Leader for a Day" by Sudhir Venkatesh. It's about American housing projects, but the parallels gave me a lot of insight into how slums in Brazil operate and why I don't need to be scared going into one, especially for something like this.)

We paid at a little wooden ticket window and walked up a large staircase into the Mangueira cultural center. It's essentially one giant room with second story balconies akin to the mezzanine section of a theater. The front wall and its balcony were set up for a live band. A sort of opening band (not the main members of the samba ensemble) was playing classic samba music when we arrived. Everything was painted and decorated in green and pink, the samba school's official colors, and, as it happens, my two favorite colors. (You can probably imagine by now that this samba school is going to hold a special place in my heart.)

In typical foreigner fashion, we got to the event only 20 minutes after the technical starting time, and that was too early. We were some of the first people there. The benefit of our early arrival was our ability to find a table. We bought a round of caipirinhas from a booth and sat down to watch things start to unfold.

As the night went on, more and more people started to arrive, and more and more started dancing casually, in pairs or small groups. A woman with beautiful and big curly hair dyed blonde came to our table and insisted on teaching us how to samba.

"It's very easy," she told me with a larger-than-life smile. She was the first of many people to tell me this. She then proceeded to show me one of the many variations of foot moves that make up the samba steps. As you can imagine, I was terrible at it. The music wasn't that loud yet, and I wasn't drunk, so I kept just shaking my head to say "no" and stepping out of the circle a bit to let the better people do their thing.

Soon, things started to get louder. The excitement was building, and the caipirnhas were kicking in. The crowd was growing, and we were soon getting whistled off the dance floor and onto its peripheries.

There were sudden waves of of neon green and pink and what felt like a great and wonderful explosion to the senses. Then, at that moment, came the crashing of the drums.

As the samba school members came thundering out onto the dance floor, led by the retired dancers in pants suits, the pink and green curtains covering the balcony over the stage opened up to reveal rows of live band members. They were packed into the bleachers and moving their metal instruments to the rhythm they were making. The lights and the colors flashed off of the silver and gold. The sound was all-encompassing.

And with drums and cheering and stomping and blaring like that, there's only one thing you can do.

You dance.

The love was so big and the sound was so loud that it suddenly didn't matter if my samba steps were right or if my hips were shaking just so. Some people were just straight up jumping up and down, and that was okay, too.

The pride was almost palpable. The people in that room were proud to be from Mangueira. Proud to be Cariocas. Proud to be Brazilians. Proud of their mixed and shared heritages. And, of course, proud to be damn good samba dancers and musicians.

At one point in the celebrations, our group of foreigners (there were SO many of us! And we seemed to be pulled together like magnets) was in a circle with the woman with the blonde afro. She was showing us more steps when suddenly, a woman we've dubbed the samba goddess came in to the circle. The former teacher immediately yielded the floor to her.

She pretended to teach us for a minute, but she was really just there to show us just how good sambistas can be. She was at least 6'5'' and moved like a gorgeous machine. I literally bowed at her feet. I didn't know how else to show my respect.

We were graced with her presence for only an instant, and then she was gone, whisked off in a swirl of gold and pastels.

The festivities probably continued long after we were too pooped to move any more and four of us shared a taxi back to the southern part of the city. We were just tiny fish in a huge sea of history and tradition and joy. It was a side of Brazil that I took far too long to get acquainted with, and I feel like I know her and can love her much better now.

Two Crazies in One Week

2011-09-06T19:07:00.003-03:00

How did I get so lucky? Two crazies in the course of four days! I suppose you are the lucky ones for getting two funny stories.

So Alexandre and I went to the gym this evening. Some gym addict (a short guy trying to compensate by building gross oversized arm muscles) came up and I actually realized for once that he was trying to flirt with me. (He apparently hadn't seen Alexandre and I come in together, spend the whole time chit chatting, etc. Actually, most people at the gym think we're brother and sister. Anyway.)

"We can't look this good if we don't work out, am I right?" Gym Guy said with a stupid little smile. Well, he something like that. I didn't totally understand.

"I don't understand," I said. Because I didn't.

He repeated himself exactly the way he'd said it before, the way a kid does. Then he tried lounging on my exercise machine a bit.

Alexandre piped up from the machine across from me, forcing the guy to turn around to face him. "Yeah, definitely requires a lot of effort!" Alexandre's non-aggressive tactic was to engage the guy in conversation himself so that the guy would stop talking to me. Alexandre left his machine and pretended to be interested in the one next to mine.

"So you've been coming here for a while, man, right?" he asked the guy. "I've seen you around here."

"Yeah, about five months," the guy drawled. "But I'm taking a lot of supplements, you know, protein and whey. That's when I started seeing results."

Alexandre has been entertaining the idea of taking supplements, but I'm against it. He tried it a couple of years ago but didn't like the idea of replacing or reducing meals. So that meant a lot of extra calories and not the results he wanted. So now it was my turn to butt in.

"But you have to really control your diet with those, don't you?" I asked.

"Oh, yeah. I mean, I guess I eat really well," the guy said with a fake modesty. "Lots of vegetables, salads, that sort of thing."

"So no McDonald's?" Alexandre joked.

"No no. I don't eat there on principle," the guy said sharply. I thought for a moment that we would be on the same page -- you know, against really unhealthy fast food, against supporting a place that essentially serves carbs and chemicals, not to mention its ridiculously high prices in Brazil. So I said, "I agree! I don't eat there either."

"Yeah, she doesn't like it," Alexandre added.

Gym Guy apparently thought we were on the same page, too. "Yeah, no way I'll eat there. I hate the United States! I'm a philosopher, you know? I support Osama Bin Laden."

Alexandre gave me a huge malicious smile behind the guy's back as if to say, my work here is done. Then he walked away, confident that Gym Guy wasn't going to get within 500 feet of flirting range now.

"Really? Is that so?" I asked.

"Yeah, for sure."

"Well, you know I'm American, right?" I couldn't help it. But I was wrong to expect him to, you know, apologize. Or be embarrassed. At least a little. I mean, it's a week away from 9/11, for Christ's sake.

"You are?" Short little Gym Guy tried to bulk up his shoulders a bit. I could tell he was already feeling defensive. Then, following suit of the crazy American guy on Saturday, he asked some completely random question:

"Haven't you ever read Jean Jacques Rousseau?"

"The old philosopher?" I asked, confused.

"Yeah. Well, he went to the US when it was still a colony under England, and he said it was a bad place. He said, 'if you meet an American, first they will try to convince you, and then they will try to buy you.'" [let me note here that the translation of this into Portuguese is "cute:" primero eles tentam te convencer, depois eles tentam te comprar.]

I didn't remember any America-bashing in Rousseau's texts, but you know, since Gym Guy said he was a philosopher and all, I went with it.

"Well, even if he said that, you know, that was like, 300 years ago. It's a different world now. It wasn't even the US yet."

"How can a people [um povo] be good if they vote for George Bush for two terms?" the guy asked quickly. It kind of felt like he'd been saving up these arguments, or that he'd written them out once on a Geocites webpage or something.

"Well, I don't think you can say ALL of the people are bad just because YOU didn't agree with the president. Besides, every country has good and bad things. I guess that's what's important, right?"

Sign of crazy: completely disregarding my comments and questions.

"How can a country be good if they don't have public health care? If a person gets sick in the US without healthcare, they die," Gym Guy tried.

"I agree with you. I think healthcare is a big problem in the US. Brazil's doing a great job with that. But I just think it's wrong to say that you hate a WHOLE country, a WHOLE culture, a WHOLE group of people, when you've never been there or never met anyone from there. Well, anyone else, probably, besides me."

Gym Guy was scowling now. "No, see, because here in Brazil, we CARE about our citizens."

Now I was starting to get annoyed. Is that the game he really wanted to play? Because if I were as rude as he was, I'd win that one.

"Really? You do?" I asked. "Because Brazil, like the US, is a great country, but like every country, it has some problems. I mean, education is a huge problem in Brazil. Corruption is a huge problem. But that doesn't mean Brazil is a bad country, just because it has problems."

"No. I just think that America thinks it's so great, just because it's the biggest world power. But it's not that good." He obviously did not see the disconnect in his statement here.

"I don't really think that's relevant here. Don't you think it's just kind of ignorant to say you hate a WHOLE country?"

"NO."

"Well all right then. I just think it's kind of offensive to talk like that to someone about their country straight to their face."

Gym Guy mumbled something nonsensical about democracy and left in a huff.

Well, if he didn't like Americans before, he certainly isn't going to like us now, after some lippy woman (a woman!) had the nerve to call him on his shit.

And he can say all he wants about the US, but there are very few Americans who, after getting caught with their foot in their mouth like that, would not apologize and be embarrassed for saying something so overgeneralized and insensitive. This guy was just dumb-crazy on so many levels. Ah, so many arguments, not enough time.

We'll leave this on a happy note: my accent in Portuguese is apparently so native-like now that Gym Guy didn't even realize I was a foreigner. Let's end this with a Danielle FTW.

Let the Summer Begin!

2011-09-04T22:34:00.002-03:00

Today marked the first weekend of summer for me! I know I wrote about it last weekend, too, but I didn't do any summer-y things last weekend (unless you count complaining as a summer-y thing. I think it's pretty year-round for me). I also know I'm stretching it a bit, since it's still kind of chilly outside, but hey-- it was warm enough for a dress and leggings at the beach today!

So here it is! Summer's here! I live on the beach! So this is what summer is for me, at least this year:

*Sun! Sun! Sun!
*Nice and warm mornings
*Sand all over the apartment
*A beach bag
*Use of my wonderfully tacky macaw towel courtesy of Alexandre's mom:

finally!

*Sand-covered bars of soap in the shower
*Slight and haphazard sunburns
*Blonde hair
*Sunday late-afternoon naps -- Laying around in the sun all day is surprisingly tiring!

*And, finally, serious declines in my levels of productivity (but, on the upside, increases in levels of Vitamin D, right?).

I am also determined to convince Alexandre to play with paddle ball with me. So far he is against the idea because SOMEONE lacks coordination (I'll let you figure out which one of us that is). But once I convince him and then after I buy them from some guy walking around on the beach with a sort of cart full of beachcrap for sale, this is totally gonna be us:

complete with my amazing legs and Alexandre's chiseled back and speedo, right? Right...

Oh, and today, I read my Kindle inside of a magazine, as recommended by some readers when I had an incident with the Kindle at the beach. I think it was still pretty obvious that I had the Kindle. I'm not sure. I think the real solution is to read at a table at a beach kiosk with lots of other people around, and preferably in a nicer part of town, and ideally with Alexandre at my side, as opposed to alone at the beach in our shady neighborhood on a Wednesday afternoon.

But...summer! Hooray! Hooray! I can come out of hibernation. Today was a great day, full of much-needed tranquility and happiness after all the ugly, mucky feelings yesterday from the encounter with the crazy American guy.

But we've got to go toward the good! What is summer for you?

More Mormon Madness

2011-09-03T13:32:00.005-03:00

Long Post. Sorry.

So today was the first day that I went to "help" the Mormons with their English classes. The boys who had come over for dinner had told me to come today so I could see how they did things and offer my input. Let me just point out here that this was their idea and their tactic, not mine.

When I got there, the boys who had come over were at the door, along with three other American boys, all about 20 years old. They were friendly and nice to talk to and everything, of course.

The classes were set to start at 10:00, but they were waiting for the last American (let's call him Steve) to show up. Steve was the middle-aged man who was apparently the American in charge of the missionaries and the teacher of the advanced English group. He came rushing in, disheveled and with a toddler at his heels, at 10:10. The boys tried to introduce me to him, but he didn't even look at me. I quickly noticed that Steve had no notion of conversational skills, and that he had a habit of not responding to anything anyone said. People asked him questions or said things that required a response, and he just kept talking as if he were the only one in the room.

The boys were eventually able to shuffle everyone into the chapel, where they had quick announcements and a prayer. They also introduced me and told the group (and me and Steve at the same time) that I'd be helping Steve with the advanced group.

After their announcements, I asked the boys who had come to my house what I was supposed to be doing, exactly.

"Do you want me to just watch, and talk to you later?" I asked.
"No, no. Teach with Steve. Help him out. He doesn't speak Portuguese, so go ahead and explain things if the students don't get it."

Based on what I'd seen of Steve in the last few minutes, I had a feeling that wasn't going to go over very well.

After that worrisome exchange, one of the other boys led me to Steve's classroom, since Steve hadn't bothered to wait for me or anything. There was another missionary in the classroom with me (so the Americans in the room were me, the missionary, and Steve). The missionary had just gotten here to Brazil from New Jersey. He was really good to talk to.

Steve spent a few minutes arranging things for the toddler to do. The toddler turned out to be his son. After the kid was settled in with some toys and chairs, Steve finally acknowledged the class. It was 11:20 by this time. He plopped himself down in a chair and didn't get out from it until class was over. He was sorely unprepared. The room had a chalkboard, but he didn't have any chalk with him (not for lack of resources -- I discovered later that the other rooms had chalk). He eventually explained that they'd be continuing their group reading of a religious text, but that he didn't bring any copies for the 5 or 6 new people, so the group of 12 or so would just have to share the old copies floating around. The result of this was that 3 or 4 people didn't have the text or even any way to look at it over someone's shoulder.

Steve then asked everyone to go around the room and introduce themselves. Since he and I hadn't even properly met yet, I explained why I was there.

"My name's Danielle. I'm an English teacher. I'm living here because my husband is Brazilian. The missionaries asked me to watch the class today to see if I can help."

As per usual, Steve didn't directly respond to anything I said. "Are you a member of the church?" he asked.

"No."

Again, with no answer, he turned to the woman next to me, who was a student. "Who are you?" he asked, apparently just planning to continue on with the introductions.

Before getting into the lesson, though, Steve first spent about 15 minutes babbling about how his shower broke a few days back and how he tried to buy the parts to fix it but how it "lit up like a menorah on Hanukkah," a dumb joke that the students clearly didn't understand. In fact, Steve was clearly making no effort to modify his speech in any way for his students, or, heck, to even follow a single train of thought. The students were totally lost, but he didn't seem to notice or care.

Imagine trying to learn Portuguese from some old drunk who sits at the street corner bar and shouts nonsense at people who walk by. It was kind of like that. I know he wasn't drunk, but he clearly didn't have all his wits about him.

Eventually, one older man picked up on what he was saying, and explained to the group in Portuguese, "o chuveiro dele queimou" -- "His showerhead blew out." One of the guys in class was an electrician, and he offered, in Portuguese, to help fix it. The older man translated to Steve that the guy would help, and then they spent the next few minutes hashing out the details of the repair, while all of the other students, bless their hearts, waited silently and patiently. (It was also a big red flag that the electrician was in the "advanced" class but that he didn't even speak English to offer to help with the shower.)

After that, Steve said that the text he'd chosen was some speech that a Mormon bishop gave once. I imagined that he would read it and discuss the ideas with the students, but there really weren't any ideas to discuss. The text was just as disjointed and nonsensical as Steve was.

Steve's system was to have people with copies of the text read one sentence at a time. Then he went through the sentence "explaining" it word by word. By that, I mean he said things like this:

"OK, what about this sentence? 'The attendant gift of the baptism sets us apart from other churches.' What's that about? Anyone know? Anyone know? What's 'set us apart' mean? Set apart? Set apart? OK? Anyone know? What are some things you can set apart? Huh? What can you set apart?"

As you can imagine, the whole thing was painful to watch.

The students were being so polite to a man who clearly had no interest in teaching them anything, whether it be English or LDS beliefs. It seemed like his only real interest was getting his shower fixed.

Because the boys had told me to help, I waited until things were really unbearable before I spoke up.

"Well, maybe we can stick to the meaning of 'set apart' in this context. It's different from the physical 'set apart,' so that question might be confusing," I said quietly to Steve. "I think, here, it's like 'make different'." Then I turned to the students. "Does that make sense? The verb 'set apart' means 'make different'."

Absolutely not the way I like to teach, but I was doing my best to salvage something of the hour.

Steve was NOT PLEASED with my interjection. "My students are not confused," he said hotly. "Confused? Anyone confused? You guys got that? Huh? Any other words poppin' out at ya?"

No responses, obviously. Steve took that to mean that they were clearly not confused, so he repeated his question.

"What are some things you can set apart? Huh? What can you separate?"

"I do not separated from my wife," one student tried.

"Right, great!" was Steve's response. That's about the time I started imagining myself butting my head against the wall. I turned to the guy from New Jersey, who also had a pained look on his face.

"Is this your first time in an English class?" I whispered to him.
"In Brazil, yes," he whispered back. "But I helped teach English in the US."

New Jersey guy was doing his best to speak up when he thought he could be helpful. Mostly he just tried to put Steve's ramblings on hold to ask, "Questions? Does anyone have any questions?" I mean, there wasn't much else we could do. Things were out of control and there wasn't much time left in the one-hour class anyway, since Steve had wasted so much time on his son and on the business with the shower.

I took to taking notes of things that might be helpful advice for Steve. I wrote down things like, "controlled English for lower levels," "focus on student speaking," and "more board support."

The boys from dinner came in at 11:00 to announce that the class was over. The came to me eagerly to ask what I thought.

"Oh, well..." I hesitated. "I took some notes about some things that might help the students speak more. I don't know if you want me to go over them with you, or with Steve, or what..."

The contrast between the boys' faces and Steve's face really was incredible. The boys were nodding excitedly like bobble-heads, while Steve had a look of stone that was clearly saying, "How DARE you question my way of doing things!"

"She and I can talk later, another time," Steve butted in. I took that to mean that he was obviously not interested in any advice, that there had clearly been some miscommunication between him and the missionary boys.

So while Steve stayed in the room to chat with a few students, the boys and I talked outside the door.

"Ugh, my class was beeeeeewwww," one of them said sadly, while making the motion of a plane crashing with his hand. "I just have no idea what I'm doing!"

"Well, maybe Danielle can sit in with you next week and help you out," the other one said.

"Yeah, I'm not sure...I mean, only if you guys want. I'm just here to help, I don't want to impose..." I was feeling pretty crappy after that whole drama with insane Steve, and not sure if I was up for another hour of watching that, just to have my help be rejected.

Before we could decide, Steve came barreling out of the room and waved his hand at me. "OK, let's talk now," he said, motioning for me to enter into another classroom (at which point I saw that the chalk was in full supply). He'd apparently had a change of heart.

"So what? What do you want to say?" he asked quickly and distractedly.

"Um, well, I mean, the boys told me to give you some advice to help your classes, so I wrote down a few things." I took out my notebook from my purse. "For example, it's hard because the students are supposed to be advanced but they really aren't. So I think it would help if your English was a little more controlled, you know, with less slang or not so many jokes, so it would be easier for them to understand and follow the class."

"No no no," Steve said quickly. "Look. I am a professor of English. My forte is conversation. So that's what I do. I have conversations with them. If they don't understand me, it'll inspire them to study more. They'll go home up and look up the words I used. They'll be inspired to read good literature. Then they'll learn."

It was at this point that I realized there'd be no way I'd be able to have a rational conversation with this guy.

"OK then, well that's fine. I mean, if that's the way you do things, then that's fine," I said.

But Steve apparently had more to say. "So there are lots of English schools in town. There's the schools teaching, there's you teaching, and you may think that you know how to do things, but that doesn't mean you do. I'm not going to change my English just for them. I am who I am. As I always say, there's business English, and there's poetry."

This made no sense, and I said so.
"I don't understand what you're talking about."

"Don't you read e.e. cummings?" he asked. Illogically.

"I don't see what that has to do with teaching English to foreigners."

"Because there's formal technical English, and then there's slang. Poetry is slang."

"OK, well I have a Master's in ESL," I said, exaggerating a bit, since I didn't finish my Master's, "so for me, those two things are not the same thing at all."

Steve clearly did NOT like the fact that an educated woman was trying to tell him what was right and what was wrong. At this point, he got very defensive, and was even more rude than he was with his last comment. "You can have a PhD for all I care, but our students are never going to get PhDs, so that's not going to help them. I may not have a fancy technical degree, but I know what I'm doing."

"Then clearly this conversation is useless, and I can just leave," I said directly, not bothering with polite pretenses anymore. "There must have been some miscommunication here, because the boys specifically asked me to come in and give you some tips, but you're telling me that things are fine just the way they are, and you're happy with the way you're doing things. So I'm disappointed, but I'm not going to waste anyone's time."

I picked up my purse to leave, and skitzo Steve seemed to have some kind of moral crisis / personality shift. "Look, I'm sorry," he said, sticking out his hand as a sort of peace offering. "I guess I just got defensive. But it really is nice to meet another American. You'll definitely be a good resource here. Just stick to the basic classes. They need you, since you speak Portuguese."

I walked out. This guy was an idiot at best and a crackpot at worst.

The boys were chatting at the entrance to the church, so they didn't hear my conversation with Steve. They asked if we could meet up this week to talk more about the classes. I told them to call me and that we'd set up a time.

I was so irritated and disappointed. I don't know if it's worth still trying to help the boys. You are only able to help people who want to be helped, and it was very, very clear that psycho Steve didn't want to be helped at all. I'm not sure if the boys are going to respond in the same way. I'm guessing they sent me into Steve's class because they know he's bad, but they should've predicted his response and at least prepared him (though, who knows? They could have very well told him beforehand).

I mean, I was hoping we'd all overlook the fact that I am not Mormon. I was hoping they would respect the spirit of my intentions, which involve biblical teachings of loving thy neighbor and giving to the less fortunate. I thought we had the same goal, which was to teach English well, but I'm not sure that's the case, at least not with Steve.

So now I don't know if I want to go back. The climate I left in (and left Steve in) was angry and uncomfortable, and frankly, I'm a little scared to have to interact with him again. I also don't think I'm being unfair in expecting to be receive politeness and to be treated with respect as a volunteer. Even if the boys are sincerely open to improving their teaching, I don't know if I want to go back to that climate again.

I'm so disillusioned. I just wanted to do something Good, but I don't think this is the right way to go about it.

Nerdy Hour: Part 1

2011-09-02T20:36:00.000-03:00

All right. So I gave myself this new weekly task/goal to read one ESL research article per week, just to keep my brain working, to keep myself updated on research in the field, and ultimately to make myself a better English teacher.

It turned out to be so fun that I decided to take notes while I was reading and share them with all you fine readers. I know that 90% of you don't like my nerdy linguistics posts, so if you see a post titled "Nerdy Hour," you can go ahead and just skip it, OK? :) But hopefully, for those of you who do decide to read these, we can generate some nice discussions in the comments.

The article I found this week is called "Portuguese in the EFL Classroom?" by James Corcoran, published in the BELT journal in Brazil.

If you want, you can read the article by clicking here.

I understood the basic arguments to be:

1. It's OK to use Portuguese (the L1) in the classroom, especially if it's the teacher using it, and especially if the teacher is using it to explain logistical things about the class (syllabus, scheduling) or grammar differences between the languages.

2. There are benefits to using Portuguese in the classroom for all age groups.

3. The Brazilian English schools studied preferred not to use Portuguese in the classroom.

4. Many private English schools in Brazil resist teaching grammar explicitly or using Portuguese in the classroom as a reaction to the Brazilian public school English teaching methods, which are very grammar- and theory-based and in which very little English is spoken by the teachers or the students.

5. English teachers at the Brazilian schools studied were consistent in their beliefs that there were more benefits to using Portuguese in the classroom at the basic level than at more advanced levels, and more benefits to using it with adults than with children.

6. The author makes the conclusion that English schools need to be more specific about the situations in which teachers can use Portuguese and when they can't. He argues that there are specific situations in which using Portuguese can be beneficial, which contradicts this widespread belief: "the less Portuguese spoken, the better."

----------------------

I essentially agree with the following quote from the article, that states the main benefits of using the students' first language in the classroom:

Auerbach (1993), a fierce critic of exclusive TL use in the adult ESL classroom, attacks a monolingual approach for being “rooted in a particular ideological perspective, being largely unexamined and reinforcing societal inequities” (p. 9). Overall, these studies point to the potential of the L1 to be used as for reducing student anxiety, forming stronger teacher-student bonds, affirming student identities, and as a tool for meaning-making.

It's unrealistic to think that adult learners are not going to always “translate” from Portuguese to English. So rather than pretending to ignore this translation (and therefore making students feel unsuccessful when they can't not do it), it's important to teach them to “translate better,” to teach students certain tools of how to learn and memorize and understand a new language so that they can translate better. For example, I think it's important for basic students to understand the following concepts when learning English:

(1) Verbs (especially basic verbs) must be memorized as collocations rather than as individual words. They need to simply memorize and accept that fazer bolo is “make a cake”, but that fazer aula is “take a class.” Many students resist this concept and want one-word translations, but it helps to give them Portuguese examples: dar aula is not the same as dar uma caminhada, which itself differs from dar in the expression dar certo. There's no connection between dar in these collocations – dar is just a base verb in Portuguese whose meaning can be somewhat arbitrary sometimes.

(2) Some translations need to be based on a situation or a context, and not on words. Students need to understand that in Portuguese, a polite and common way to greet someone is by saying boa noite, but that it's not necessarily common for people to go around saying “good evening” to their friends all the time in English-speaking countries. So instead of getting confused by the fact that the English expression “How's it going?” does not use the same words as boa noite, it's helpful if students simply understand that, when they want to greet someone in a friendly way, they can say, “How's it going?”. So they base their word choices on the situation rather than on the words they would use in Portuguese.

In both of these explanations, Portuguese is required. But like I said, in my opinion, this is the realistic way to teach.

I disagree with the author's opinion that using Portuguese is beneficial when teaching children, too. I have very little experience teaching children, but I found that the only time it was good to use their first language was when we first met and when they were upset. The kids I taught were Spanish speakers, and I found that if I used Spanish with them in other contexts, they usually only spoke Spanish with me. But maybe those of you who have more experience teaching kids (or who have kids that you're raising to be bilingual) can share your thoughts.

One thing I did take away from the article was that I need to be more consistent with my code-switching and when I use Portuguese with my students. I've gotten so used to haphazardly mixing English and Portuguese with Alexandre that I find myself doing it with my students sometimes, too. It's sloppy of me. So based on the arguments in this article, I'm going to use Portuguese only in the following situations (some of which I already do, but not always consistently):

1. When negotiating the conditions of the class (admin stuff)
2. When explaining the lesson/activity (in the case of basic students)
3. When explaining a new grammar concept for the first time
4. To show the reason for a student's mistake (though, if possible, this can be explained in English)

I will actively encourage students to speak only English with me, except when they are talking about admin stuff or when they are asking grammar questions. I've developed a sort of dog-clicker system with my students in which, when they start speaking Portuguese unnecessarily, I say "buhp-buhp-buhp!" which is ridiculous and which makes them laugh, but which also reminds them to switch back to English. I explain it explicitly the first few times I make the noise, but then after a few explanations, I just make the noise, and they figure it out. It's quite entertaining.

OK! Your turn! Do you agree or disagree with the article? Do you think it's beneficial to use the students' first language in the classroom? If so, in what cases? What about in the case of children? When do you use Portuguese with your students? When do you allow your students to use Portuguese?

Have at it!

Cracked.com Understands Us

2011-08-30T11:32:00.002-03:00

Here is Cracked.com's take on why it's hard for an American to move to another country. Hilarious as always. Enjoy!

http://www.cracked.com/article_19363_6-reasons-your-plans-to-move-abroad-might-not-work-out.html

The Farofeiros are Coming

2011-08-29T10:14:00.003-03:00

So this weekend has been the first truly warm weekend since all this winter nonsense started. Here in beachtown, that means that this weekend announced the first wave of farofeiros. Farofeiro is a wonderful Portuguese word that's nice and offensive, so don't use it to describe yourself, and don't use it to anyone's face. It refers to poor people who come down to the beach from out of town just for the day, bring all their own food from home (including farofa), and eat it on the beach. They only stay for the day because they don't have money for a hotel, and they bring their ice chests because they don't have money for food or drinks at restaurants or even the cheap beach kiosks. The Americans reading this might be thinking, "what's wrong with that? That's what everyone does here." There's nothing wrong with a day trip at the beach like that. But the image of farofeiro also carries with it the idea that the people (illegally) pack lots of family members in old cars and that they bring their general bad-mannered way of life with them down to the once-peaceful coast.

I have become such a snob. But I think that, as a beachtown local (albeit a temporary local), I'm allowed to scorn the tourists. Take yesterday (Sunday), for example. I had to pop into the shop (as my grandma would say) to pick up a couple more things for lunch. The grocery store was bedlam!! Aside from the stupidly long lines, here were just a few things I saw:

*The retired women walking around the store in their bikinis, just lettin' it all hang out.

*Old men in speedos. No, no, no!

*Men without shoes buying huge bottles of cachaça (perhaps they should reconsider their priorities)

*A woman walking around the store in a dirty dress drinking 5-real Dom Bosco wine that she'd presumably opened before paying for (I love the stuff, but at least I have the sense of shame to drink it in private)

*Little kids continuing their soccer game, sand and all, in the store's aisles while Mom and Dad stock up on more beer.

That's what I didn't get, either. It was Sunday at 1:00pm, and yet everyone was buying alcohol! Isn't that the time when the drinking needs to start to die down?

These weekend tourists are annoying. They j-walk suddenly and dangerously and unnecessarily. They park their cars ON the beach avenue (like, they just stop where they are and give up searching) when they can't find a parking spot. They cover the beach in trash, which then calls the attention of hundreds of vultures. Alexandre and I went for a run yesterday around sunset, and the beach looked like a freakin' landfill! Gross.

Oh well. I guess I actually like the arrival of the farofeiros. It means that summer's finally here! No more ice cold nights that linger all day! No more using lights in the apartment at 2pm! Weekday mornings at the beach -- today was Day 1!

EDIT: How dare I say bad things about Brazilians, especially ones who don't respect laws or sense of community!!! No no, American. You are not allowed to complain about the city you live in, or the people in it!

Gonna!

2011-08-25T13:09:00.001-03:00

So there's some nameless boutique downtown that I walk by almost every time I go there. It sells a bunch of random clothes, whatever. One day, I noticed that a lot of the shirts randomly have the word "gonna" printed on them. After passing the store a few times, I realized it was some kind of brand (though I can't find anything online). So the shirts have words like "Trekking" printed really big in the middle, and in the bottom corner, they said "GONNA." Then some just say "GONNA" alone, usually in all caps like that.

Lots of Brazilian clothes (and restaurants, and billboards, and English schools...) use English incorrectly. This is nothing new. But this "gonna" one took me a while. One day, a new shirt in the store had "GONNA!" with an explanation point. And then I got it.

Some poor soul thought he was saying "vai!" when he made up his brand name. And I mean, he's not wrong. Except he's totally wrong.

I can't decide whether to take a picture or tell the employee or both or neither.

Mormons and the Military

2011-08-23T22:52:00.001-03:00

All right folks. So my English career has led me to working with two groups I had planned to avoid eternally: Mormons and the military. Here's the story:

Word got around at Alexandre's base that he's married to an American who's also an English teacher. The base apparently had an English teacher last year who left (perhaps she defected) and the guys liked the prospect of having another one.

Well, because the military base is made up of about 99.5% men, it took a while to get the ball rolling and for things to get organized. I'm in my second week, and it's going pretty well. It's what you'd expect for a job on the military base: lots of restrictions on what I can wear (no shorts or skirts, no open-toed shoes), lots of check-ins and signing of things (sign here because you walked in the gate; sign here because you got a visitor's tag; sign here because you borrowed the key to the classroom), lots of sexist and ignorant comments that must be deflected and questioned politely but sternly.

I tried to organize the two groups based on level (beginners and slightly better than beginners), but they decided to organize themselves based on title (lower positions in the beginners' class, captains and higher-ups in the "intermediate" class). The result is that all of the extra arrogant guys (who are also Alexandre's bosses) are in one class together, feeding off of each other's machismo. I had to lay the smackdown a bit and quickly cut off their comments, but they learned on the first day that I wasn't going to let the comments go just because they're my husfriend's bosses. Now they are respectful. The basic class, of course, are the 18-year-old recruits who were already scared of me, so no problems there.

The crazy book translation work has dropped off a bit (for better or for worse), so these groups make up the majority of my workweek now. I was feeling a bit down and not useful, with too much free time. One of the reasons I've had a hard time finding private students is because there's a Mormon temple relatively close by that offers free English classes with the American boys on their missions. Well, why are poor beachtown folk going to pay for a native speaker teacher when they can have one for free? If someone is a native speaker of a language, they're automatically a good teacher, right?

At first I was annoyed with the Mormons for weakening the already difficult private class market, but then I decided to just go with it. I have free time, and they probably needed help, I imagined. This isn't the focus of my blog, but I'm Atheist. However, I figured I'd be hypocritical if I didn't help them just because we don't share the same beliefs.

So I decided to offer my assistance. (That doesn't mean I can't make fun of them here, right?)

I went over to the church, and was given a phone number for one of the boys. He answered with a nice and gringo-y "boa taRde", so I knew I had the right guy. We talked, he was excited by the idea of collaborating, and he asked if they could come over to meet me and Alexandre and discuss the classes. He asked if they could come over at 8pm -- right at Brazilian dinnertime. This put me in a bit of a quandary. Let's go ahead and blame my grandma for the fact that it's physically impossible for me to have someone at my house at a mealtime and not offer them food. So even though I was a little bit annoyed, I had to ask, "well do you two want to have dinner here then?" to which he responded, "that'd be great, thanks!". Right. I'm the one offering to be a volunteer, but I have to cook for you?

(Alexandre reminded me that I didn't HAVE to cook for them. I reminded him of the grandma-food complex.)

So the boys came over at eight o'clock sharp (so refreshing). They were pink and blonde young lads who refused to tell me their first names and who insisted that I call them "Elder" and their last name. I asked, confused, if "elder" was some kind of title. This should have revealed that I was not Mormon and that I could just call them by their muggle names, but nope. They simply confirmed that yes, "elder" is their missionary title. Fine.

They came upstairs, spoke amazing Portuguese with Alexandre, and we talked about their classes over dinner. I learned that they offer their classes on Saturday mornings, so I insisted that I be more of a behind-the-scenes helper rather than a teacher (NOT committing myself to any Saturday morning unpaid work). They were perfectly happy with that. Their class layouts were decent for 19-year-olds with no teacher training, but we're going to revamp their system a bit. Right now they've got groups of like 60 people that they break up into smaller groups after a few weeks. It's kind of a mess, but we got some good ideas going and it should turn out really nice.

Alexandre asked them about how they chose Brazil as their location for their missions. They explained that they didn't choose, but that God chose. The story the boys told us (and believe) is that they submit their applications to the head of the church, and then the leaders pray over the applications. The leaders then have a big map of the world on a TV screen, and God apparently "inspires" them to place the missionaries in a given country.

OK.

I highly doubt that an institution as lucrative as the Mormon church is going to leave such important and expensive bureaucratic decisions up to a divine game of eenie-meenie-miney-moe, but I can see why it would be necessary for the boys to believe, on a bad day of life in a Brazilian favela, that God chose them to live in that place and that he has a bigger purpose for them, that they just need to figure out what it is.

But in general, the boys were polite and friendly and nice to talk to (as all Mormons I've ever met have been). We share a common goal of wanting to teach English well in our community, however temporary it may be for all of us. They only raised their eyebrows a little bit when we explained that we weren't religious but that they were welcome to say a prayer before we ate dinner. So if they're OK with our differences, then I'm OK with our differences. I doubt we'll all become the best of friends, but we can hopefully do something good together.

So yeah, who knew? I'm going for character building here. I think, after these experiences, I'll be able to teach anyone, anywhere.

Time-Traveling Epiphany

2011-08-18T23:57:00.001-03:00

OK guys, I have big news! Do you feel like you're having a hard time adapting to life in Brazil, especially to the class differences and the maid situation?

Well, I've figured out why. I'm watching the movie "The Help" that just came out in the US. It's about these very problems in Mississippi in the 1960s. It's so much like present-day Brazil!!!

So ladies, we didn't move to a new country. We just went into time machines, and now we're expected to be 1960s housewives, and it's supposed to be logical to have maids, to make them use separate bathrooms and to eat at different times and/or at different tables, to insult them and other black people while they're in the room, and to revolve our whole lives around our husbands.

NOW IT ALL MAKES SENSE.

Maid...?

2011-08-17T22:13:00.001-03:00

So, I'm sure most of you are aware of my stubborn insistence on cleaning my own apartment and not having a maid. All right. I think I did really well. I lasted 5 months. This is the second time I've gone through this cycle (here's the first). What cycle, you may ask? This one:

1. We move.
2. I rejoice in letting the maid go.
3. I insist that I can keep up the chores in the new place by myself. I make up reasons about how the apartments are different and how this time will, too, be different.
4. I spend all my free time cooking and cleaning.
5. Alexandre does nothing, because he is a Brazilian man who grew up with 2 full-time maids at home (fatal combination).
6. We bicker about how he does nothing.
7. He offers to pay for a maid.
8. I am resentful that he will not embrace this part of my culture.
9. He reminds me that we're not living in my culture, and that, here, a maid once a week would cost us about 4% of our combined monthly income.
10. I give in to hiring a maid to stop the arguing and to (slightly) curb the resentment and insist that he'd better start preparing himself, because as soon as we move to the US, he's gonna be making up for lost time in the world of chores.

All right. So a woman in the building recommended a maid for us. Today was her first and last day. I just remembered why I hate having a maid. I'll admit that I was so relieved when I woke up this morning and realized she was coming and I could use my day for something besides cleaning (you know, something like... working). But then there were some problems:

*Turns out she works at a daycare every weekday morning. Until 1pm. She showed up at 1:15.

*She announced when she walked in the door that this is the only day she's coming -- she's having surgery next week and will be out for two months and will not recommend anyone. Sacanagem! She could've told me that when we talked earlier this week. Imagine if I did that to my students. This irritated me.

*She is a Chatty (as hell) Cathy. My attempts at telling her that I was working on a translation proved futile. I got to hear all about her family, all day. I resorted to just saying "uh huh, uh huh" and then eventually not responding at all until she got the picture.

*SHE IS SO GODAMNED SLOW OMG. My apartment is the size of an egg, as the expression goes in Portuguese. Even when I am totally inspired and decide to clean the entire thing from top to bottom AND iron all the clothes, it takes me a maximum of 6 hours. I had a Skype class at 8pm, so I sent her home, even though she hadn't even touched our bedroom (THE ONLY ROOM) and even though she hadn't finished ironing the clothes. What could she possibly have been doing for 7 freaking hours!? Well, in the time it took me to eat my whole dinner, she didn't even finish ironing ONE shirt. Didn't. Finish.

I ate dinner standing up in the kitchen because she was using our table as the ironing board and because she said she didn't want food and because I was too embarrassed to be eating in front of her without giving her any. And while I was standing there, eating my dinner, I was getting more and more frustrated about how I just don't know how to navigate the social rules of having a maid. What am I supposed to do when she takes that long? Is it her fault or mine? Did I leave her too much to do? Are there rules about that? (But aren't there some limits to just how messy a 300-square-foot apartment can get? Our last apartment was like, 3 times the size, and the maid cleaned it in 4-5 hours.) Was I supposed to wait for her to finish, even if it took all night? Or was I supposed to ask her to come back to finish? Or pay her less? Or pay her more? I HATE THIS.

So now I'm stuck again. I definitely don't want to go back to this woman, mostly because she takes too long but also because she was sneaky and dishonest about the schedule thing, and she thought that, by "conveniently omitting" the important detail about her surgery when we talked the other day, that she'd secure a job with us long-term. But then I don't know if I really want to try to find someone else, either. This shit is annoying. But so is being the only one who cleans. I can't win.

Update on the Neighbors

2011-08-17T21:57:00.000-03:00

So I'm sure you're all dying of curiosity about whether the crazy neighbor(s) really left or not. (Oh, you weren't dying of curiosity? Well, I'll tell you anyway.) So here's the latest:

It seems like the woman either came back, or never left at all. BUT. There have been some big changes in the building -- specifically, in her apartment. I gossiped with the de-facto building manager (the guy who used to be the building manager and who still is for all-intensive purposes, because the new one is never here).

He told me that crazy lady had the nerve to try to complain (albeit passive aggressively) about MY requests that she turn down her music and stop blowing smoke onto my clothesline. She apparently passed the building manager in the hall and started mumbling hostilely, something like, "People in this building sure are folgados. They seem to think I can't even smoke or enjoy my music, even in my own apartment!"

Well, Mr. Building Manager put her in her place. He reminded her that she lives in a BUILDING, not in the middle of the mato, and that if she wants to blast music at all hours and smoke in confined spaces, she should move out of the city, or at least into her own house. As we can imagine, she was not happy with that response, and started going off on him about how SHE has problems and how HE doesn't understand and all kinds of other nonsensical things.

Then, the next day, there was a sign up on the door from the building management office (the condomínio). Mr. Building Manager was as pleasantly surprised by it as I was. We assumed that other people must have been calling and complaining, too, because the sign was basically a list of "new building rules" that all referred to things the evil crazy couple does. No more smoking in the hallways; no more throwing things out the windows (feces included); no more music that's loud enough to be heard in other apartments, etc. "Someone" used their key to rip a hole through the paper sign. Classy.

But the best news is that, for some wonderful and unknown reason, Crazy Neighbor Woman has stopped smoking in her apartment. I've mused over the reasons why and come up with the following possibilities, in ascending order of likelihood:

*She had a moral awakening and realized how much of a negative effect she was having on those around her, and decided to give up chain smoking (and become a born-again Christian while she was at it).

*Her husband/son/dogs/cat started complaining about her smoking.

*One of her dogs was diagnosed with lung cancer as a result of all the second-hand smoke.

*She switched to chewing tobacco.

*She lost her monthly welfare check and no longer has money for cigarettes.

*The owner of her apartment had originally told her she couldn't smoke inside, and she was ignoring the rule. All of the complaints made their way back to the owner, who called her and told her not to smoke inside anymore.

I'm a little curious as to why (mostly because I'd like to know the extent to which justice or karma is being served), but at the end of the day, I'm just happy she stopped. I did see her one day, OUT WALKING HER DOG and smoking!! Fixing 2 problems at the same time!! It was a miracle!!!

So the dogs are still barking, but the music and the cigarettes have ceased. Let's hope it stays that way.

My Heart is Yellow as an Ear of Corn

2011-08-15T16:39:00.002-03:00

An entry in which I regret my haste and judgment

So I went back to Caipirópolis this weekend for a visit. I saw all of my old friends, winged and otherwise. I basked in the sun and the slow pace for a while. I feasted on fresh meat. I took in the season and the fresh breaths of the familiar.

I complained about that place a lot – maybe too much. Now that I've left the interior and I'm living in another Brazilian subculture – a poor beach town – I've realized something. That city had its problems, but there's something to be said for traditions, for a strong middle class, for space to think, for pockets of quiet, and for the endless symmetry of sugar cane crops. There's something to be said for local universities, for living close to where your food comes from, and for a sky bursting with stars, unburdened by soot or city lights or fog. There's something to be said for friends. They're important. They help absorb the shocks of life.

Of course, I've gone from complaining about where we used to live to idealizing it and switching my complains to our current locale. What's up with this retroactive optimism of mine? Am I the real problem? Is the grass always going to be greener on the other side? What am I going to miss about the beach town that I should be enjoying now?

Or was it just that I was so burnt out on the bad parts of our old town that I built up the beach town in my head, that I convinced myself it'd be better, even though I didn't know much about it?

Maybe the real problem is just the constant starting over. When we decided to move from Caipirópolis, I was just beginning to get a grasp on the city's collective consciousness. I was just starting to understand how people there thought, what their common values were, and how to successfully interact with them. Then we left.

Long bus rides give me lots to think about. I guess it'll just be nice when I can be somewhere permanent.

Ding Dong the Witch is Dead

2011-08-09T10:38:00.006-03:00

So I may be wrong and horribly disappointed, but evidence strongly suggests that the evil crazy wench of a neighbor, the farofeira who got lost on her way back up the serra, seems to have separated from her common-law husband and left the building!!!!!

The back story is that these two people (and practically a third guy, who may be their son and who was here all the time) moved in about 6 weeks after we did and have been wreaking havoc on our building and the surrounding buildings ever since. It's hard to say what the biggest offense has been, but I think I'm going to go with the woman's constant chain smoking, which, until last week, had basically turned our apartment into her ashtray. (When I say chain smoking, I mean that in the most serious sense, as in like, practically 24 hours a day, as in seeming to wake up in the middle of the night to have a cigarette in her bed, which seems to be directly under our bed, a mere 10 feet or so below us.) I couldn't even dry my clothes on the line under the window because they'd smell like cigarettes and I'd just have to wash them again.

She was arguably one of the worst neighbors I've ever had. I mean, the transvestite with the drum set and the meth lab in Oakland takes the cake, but she comes in at a close second.

Anyway, on this couple's list of inconsiderate behavior was their frequent screaming matches, which revealed, amid a plethora of profanities, that neither of them worked but that both wanted the other one to work and accused the other of being lazy. These matches also revealed that it was, at the end of the day, technically the man's apartment, and he wanted her out. There was lots of "vai embora!" (get out of here!) and "não vou!" (I'm not going anywhere!) repeated in circles like toddlers.

But, apparently, the man got his way, and the woman left. It's a miracle! Now we live in a regular building on a regular street again! We still seem to hear the man putzing around a bit, but just the normal noise you'd expect when you have a tiny apartment and share walls with someone, not the ridiculousness of three people (one of them crazy) and three untrained animals in a compact one-bedroom place.

I'm thinking about throwing a silent celebration with the other neighbors, including those in the buildings on each side of ours. I'll shoot paper airplanes into their windows, inviting them down to the parking area at a specific time. We'll all smile at each other quietly and sip tea from tiny cups, basking in the silence of a street without two dogs barking incessantly, a cat that always seems to be in heat and meows woefully at midnight, the laugh track of Two and a Half Men at full blast, blaring Brazilian pop and American oldies that makes the walls vibrate, and endless domestic disputes. Maybe we'll make up some kind of whispered song to say good riddance to the cigarettes, the ashes and butts in the building's hallway, the mysterious smells, and the dog poop that she threw out the window into the walkway and the parking area. Then we'll all toss our ear plugs into the air like graduation caps.

I wish I had a picture to show you. Alexandre and I enjoyed referring to her as "Brazilian white trash." She was greasy, aging, slovenly, missing teeth, and so overweight that her calves and ankles were black from blood that couldn't find the strength to circulate back up to the rest of her body. (Alexandre told me the name of this condition, but I have since forgotten.) But, by some amazing stroke of luck on my part, she's gone, and hopefully for good. Everyone else in the building is totally normal, so we're still not sure how these two characters managed to squeeze their way in (and to rent an apartment without jobs!).

It's overrrrr!

Birding Hobby to the Rescue!

2011-08-07T16:41:00.001-03:00

So it turns out my birdwatching hobby is good for something!

Today Alexandre and I went out to lunch. We parked and were walking through a neighborhood to get to the restaurant. We passed a two-story apartment building, and on the second floor balcony of one of the apartments was a poor little golden-capped parakeet! You may remember last year when I saw these flying around in Caipirópolis and I was super excited because they're an endangered species. They're easy to identify because of their bright red heads (they also have a distinct call-- well, distinct to me, because I'm a nerd).

But the poor little guy! Some bastard was keeping it as a pet!! It needs to be somewhere reproducing to save the species! They're also birds that mate for life and get depressed if they're alone. :( :(

So you can take the girl out of America...

As soon as we got home from lunch, I looked up the information on how to report people that have wild animals as pets. I found two email addresses, one from IBAMA (like EPA) and one from RENCTAS, which is the national animal trafficking watchdog group. I also found the local phone number for the "environment police". Ha. I just love that translation. Anyway, just for good measure, I sent emails to both and also called the local department and made a report. The guy didn't sound very promising, but maybe he's just sad he has to work on Sunday afternoon when the game is on. In any case, if he flakes out, hopefully one of the emails will make something happen.

So take that, endangered animal owner!

I'm gonna drive by there again in a couple of weeks and see if it's still there. I hope the little guy is saved!

Lindsey's Visit

2011-08-05T23:23:00.003-03:00

I am so behind on this post! Dearest Lindsey came to visit last weekend, and it took me the whole week to get this written.

Anyway. She got into town late Thursday night. She spent so many hours on buses! What a strong girl. (Alexandre was still out of town for work things at this point, so Gatinha and I were the only ones to greet her.)

We had to wake up at 5:30am to get to Cambridge Day on time, which we didn't -- get there on time, that is. We somehow managed to get ourselves out of bed after 3 hours of sleep, but we didn't give ourselves enough time to get to the conference when it started. (One of the reasons we were late was because it was opening day of the new yellow line of the metro in Sao Paulo! Exciting news! It's so cool and futuristic and clean! But...we got off at the stop on the green line that merges with the yellow line, and ~~we got~~ I got us totally lost in the new underground maze of the transfer area. At least, ya know, 50 years from now, I can tell my grandkids that I was there the day the yellow line opened!)

Anyway, turns out we didn't miss much by being late to the conference. If you didn't make it to Cambridge Day, don't worry. You're not losing out on anything. I mean, one of the speakers did have some helpful general tips, like that it's important to reflect on yourself as a teacher, to take a step back once in a while and make sure you're teaching to your own philosophies (and developing those philosophies if you don't have them, which I don't). But most of the conference was just the speakers saying ridiculous and generic things ("train your students for success!") and peddling the company's books, which I guess was to be expected from a free conference put on by a publishing company.

The other problem was that it was totally geared for teachers who are not native English speakers. (The guy gave advice like "don't let your English fossilize! Make sure you keep studying English yourself! Don't teach only basic levels because you'll forget advanced English!")

But enough about the problems. The awesome part about the conference was that Lindsey and I got to meet up with Marc and Samia! Lindsey and Marc were kindred Canadian spirits, and Samia was super great to talk to, too. We went to lunch during the break in the conference, and we decided to try to brave the afternoon session. But Lindsey and I were both drifting off. The guy was from New Zealand but had a really British accent, and it was sooooo sooooooothing.... at one point Lindsey started snoring ever so softly, and then we knew it was time to go.

Of course, once the four of us got out of the lecture hall and back to chatting on the busy Sao Paulo street, we got our second wind. We went over to explore the giant bookstore on Avenida Paulista (I've written about it before here) at which point Samia and I convinced Lindsey and Marc to buy Kindles (the price of books at the store helped greatly to strengthen our arguments, along with the fact that Samia had hers in her purse, so we could display it).

After browsing through the bookstore, we went over to the adorable bar behind MASP (the art museum) for some afternoon pick-me-ups. I had a caipirinha with acerola, which was so amazinglydelicousomg. Samia's was some tropical fruit blend that I took it upon myself to sample -- also yummy! The fatigue combined with the alcohol made me practically delirious. We all reluctantly said our good-byes (we were having such a good time! We were laughing so much!), and Lindsey and I got a bus back down to the coast. We were passed out, dead asleep, by 10pm.

Saturday morning, we awoke to my crazy neighbor and her music blaring and some drama with her, which we mentioned in my and Lindsey's drunken joint post. Blah. Once I got over that, we went out to a farmer's market (not the crazy big one in my neighborhood, but one that's in the next neighborhood over on Saturdays). Our goal? To make chicken tikka masala! Result? Success!!!

We managed to find all the spices we needed at the farmer's market and the grocery store except for cardamon. I was talking about it with an older gentleman at the gym who also enjoys cooking, and he informed me that he has some because he also likes making Indian food, but he had to buy it in Sao Paulo (he did offer to give me some -- yay!). OK focus, Danielle. Here's the link to the recipe Lindsey and I used. A little time-consuming, but not difficult. Doable in Brazil, and totally worth it!

After lunch, Lindsey and I drove around the coast cities to explore a bit. We went up a mountain, saw some pretty views:

We went over to that big red statue in Santos, where we saw a surfing competition taking place:

it was actually some kind of paddle surfing thing.

I was also very excited to FINALLY get some of my own pictures of the guira cuckoo bird, which has eluded me for almost a year. They were just hanging out by the beach, and totally not caring about all the people around at all:

While I was at it, I got some newer and better pictures of a cattle tyrant (bem-te-vi-do-galo) and what I think was a double-collared seedeater (coleirinho):

After the bird-watching (me) and sight-seeing (Lindsey), we went back to my apartment for the evening. We ingested copious amounts of wine, wrote that blog post, ate the leftovers of our tikka masala, and eventually went out for a late-night food run for Ruffles (Lindsey) and a street-corner pastel (me).

The night (well, the whole weekend) consisted of more non-stop talking, from which I learned fantastic things, like the fact that Lindsey worked at a bingo parlor when she was a teenager. What a great story.

Alexandre came back late Saturday night / early Sunday morning (whatever you think 4am is). Yay! Lindsey and Alexandre got to meet! But we went back to sleep and she left a few hours later, and just like that, her trip had come to an end. :( :(

But it was so refreshing to have a visitor, to speak lots of English, to meet more people through the blog, to make Indian food, to relate, and to spend time with a new and dear friend. :) I think Lindsey and I will have to act like college students in a relationship, going back and forth to see each other on the weekends. I can't get enough of her!

OK. I'll stop sounding creepy now. Yay Lindsey! OK, I'm done, for real.

Lindsey and Danielle's Joint Post

2011-07-30T22:18:00.004-03:00

Danielle: Lindsey is at my house!
Lindsey: So! We've been watching YouTube videos for hours. In an awesome way. Really.
Danielle: I've been forcing poor Lindsey to watch endless Joanna videos --
Lindsey: Can I just say that Danielle eats beans as a snack? Who does that?
Danielle: I make lots of beans and freeze them in single portions. They are delicious with lunch. Or as a snack.
Lindsey: "And protein-filled." My idea of a snack is definitely more carb-filled.
Danielle -- anyway, I made her watch Joanna, but she made me watch Glee videos, so we're even.
Lindsey: But Glee is just a guilty pleasure! Hey! You're drinking from my wine glass!
Danielle: It's the big one! I'm gonna tell them that my only 2 wine glasses are mismatched.
Lindsey: It's true. She has one giant, well, normal-sized one, and one that's like, for dessert wines, like port or something. Yeah, it's true.
Danielle: takes a sip from her small, tiny wine glass
Lindsey: this is not a play.
Danielle: Hold on. I'm gonna make it in italics.
Lindsey: This is a good wine.
Danielle: Lindsey introduced me to -- what's the wine called?
Lindsey: Reservado Carmenere. Reservado is the brand and carmenere is the grape. Oop, that's my wine again. I need a tissue.
Danielle: Lindsey cries when she laughs.
Lindsey: Like, a lot.
Danielle: What else did we do today?
Lindsey: So, well, we, uh, we went to the feira, and we went to the beach, and we went to the island --
Danielle: I'll tell them. It's an island called Ilha Porchat.
Lindsey: -- uh, then we made chicken tikka masala! Amazing. AH-Mazing. No, AAAAh-MEI-zing.
Danielle: it was good.
Lindsey: it was soooo good. Then we made some frosting.
Danielle: I'll put the link to the recipe. Here. What else did we do? Oh, we fought with my neighbor. Well, I fought with my neighbor.
Lindsey: There was an incident with the neighbor. Yes, there was.
Danielle: She played music crazy loud at 8am on a Saturday. I tried to ring her doorbell to ask her to turn it down. She refused to answer, so I held the buzzer down until she opened it. That made her super pissed off. So she opened it and started screamed at me. "VAI SE FODER! SAI DAQUI! SAI! SAI!" Totally logical reaction. Then she tried to argue that I played my music yesterday which was why she was playing now. But yesterday we were in Sao Paulo for Cambirdge Day.
Lindsey: Oh yeah, we didn't even mention Sao Paulo, our whole day there.
Danielle: What did you think of Cambridge Day?
Lindsey: Well, I liked Cambridge Day, because I was happy to hear people speak English.
Danielle: Native English.
Lindsey: The information was sometimes OK. Sometimes it was ridiculous. Hey, that's my wine.
Danielle: I thought it was more marketing than help.
Lindsey: Except we did meet some really awesome people, which made the day all that more exciting.
Danielle: We met Samia and Marc, faithful reader, and even bumped into Leah. They were great. Ok, let's wrap this up.
Lindsey: Put a bow on it.
Bye!!!

New Portuguese Orthography

2011-07-28T10:03:00.000-03:00

If you care, read my diglossia post about the two versions of Portuguese before you read this one.

So Brazil is a country that incorporates prescriptive grammar rules into its government. That means that, unlike the US, Brazil has a part of the government that (tries) to decide official grammar and spelling rules for the country's language. This type of control goes against all theories of language change (the most relevant of which being change from below) and in my opinion, this control is just a way for the rich members of the government and society to find excuses to test (and then fail) the poor and push them out. (How will the poor ever pass a test if the rules for the language they use every day are theoretical and always changing?) But I digress.

(I'm just a little confused about the details of this part of the government -- is it the Sociedade da Lingua Portuguesa, meaning it's actually the Portuguese government making these rules, and Brazil is just accepting them??)

So this part of the government has recently decided to officially change Portuguese orthography. Orthography is the writing system: letters, punctuation, and diacritics. The focus of this change has been on written accents and hyphens in Portuguese.

When I first heard about this change, I scoffed and scoffed and hummed and hawed. People told me about it in all seriousness. "No, no! Portuguese is changing! This is the new Portuguese! You must know it and do it!"

I insisted that the government telling people that the language is changing is not how the language changes! Change comes from the people! Let's stop teaching crap like da-me-ei!!! (Am I even writing that correctly? I know that proponents of this superextraridiculous formal Portuguese try to say that Portuguese places objects as infixes in the future tense, but it's so outdated that I don't know how to use it and it's actually offensive that grammar books try to teach it.)

So then Alexandre bought this sort of Language Arts book for adults from a fundraiser at the hospital. He figured I could use it, and he could use it in the little informal classes he gives to the soldiers at the military base on slow days. It came with a CD with videos, texts, dictionaries, and activities. I figured I'd check it out. I have to at least be able to recognize what is considered the formal version of Portuguese and what is considered the informal version of Portuguese, before I can decide not to use one or the other.

So the CD had a video explaining the rules of the new writing system. I decided to watch it, mostly to feel high-and-mighty and to think "oohpoohoo, these prescriptivist grammar people have no notion of how language works! I am clearly superior! Power to the people!".

Turns out, obviously, that I was wrong, and that these changes, while logistically difficult to put into practice, are logical ways to simplify the Portuguese writing system. The first thing I'd incorrectly heard or assumed was that these new rules remove ALL accents, which is not true. Portuguese is still maintaining its beautifully logical and Latin rule that stressed syllables that are not the penultimate syllable have accents, which is very helpful to me as a language learner. (This accent rule is almost the same as the rule in Spanish, if you're familiar with that.) The new writing system seems to remove accents only from dipthongs that are already stressed, a rule which pleases me as a linguist (dipthongs are considered one phoneme! Down with accents on dipthongs).

The new accent rules also remove the umlaut (ü, aka trema) from Portuguese, because, well, umlauts are dumb. No, just kidding, Germans. They're not dumb -- they're just not really relevant in Portuguese anymore. But hats off to the language society-- they decided to leave the umlauts on proper nouns. Bravo.

The other change was with hyphens. The new rules say that you need fewer hyphens, specifically in cases where the meaning and pronunciation are obvious, even without it. So no more ultra-som (ultrasound). Now, it's just ultrasom. (English did this too, though slowly and unofficially, removing hyphens from words like to-morrow.) I didn't know that half of the words they showed even HAD hyphens, so that was cool for me.

So yes! Now I am not totally against these new writing rules. They are logical, and they are meant to simplify the writing system. (The problem will come, now, when a current high school student goes to take his college entrance exams next year, and the rules he learned all through his life will suddenly be marked wrong on the tests.)

But I want to know what the Brazilians and native Portuguese speakers think about these rules, about the fact that there are rules, and about this idea of a government linguistic body in general!

And as for you, English speakers, to whom this concept may be foreign: what do you think about this idea of the government decreeing official language rules? How would you feel if, tomorrow, some guy from the government said, "OK! We are now going to start writing the following words differently! Tonight is now tonite! Through is now thru! No more old Germanic spelling for us! And while we're at it, let's do away with apostrophes that don't change the meaning, like in dont, and didnt, and shouldnt!" Do you think those rules are good? Do you think that's even the government's job?

Come on...participate...humor me!

Lindsey's Coming!

2011-07-27T21:43:00.000-03:00

Yes, that's right. It's my turn to be the host. I hope I can follow in Jim's footsteps! They're big shoes to fill.

Lindsey will be here late tomorrow night. There will be potato soup and wine waiting for her!

Friday morning we're off to Cambridge Day. We'll be home relatively early -- hopefully in time for a sushi dinner. Then we have the weekend to gallivant around and I can show Lindsey what a smaller Brazilian city is like (though it's not hard to be smaller than Rio and São Paulo). We are also going to try to make this chicken tikka masala recipe from scratch. Alexandre's out of town for work things and will be back late Saturday night or early Sunday morning. We'll probably all have lunch together on Sunday before Lindsey is whisked away by responsibility!

How lucky am I?! Visits with friends two times in one month!!!

Bird Extravaganza!

2011-07-23T18:10:00.000-03:00

So the in-laws were at their beach house this weekend, which is also along the Sao Paulo coast and not too far from our house, so we made plans to meet up with them for lunch at this seafood restaurant off the highway.

The restaurant has a beautiful balcony with seating, and then on the other side of the balcony is a small clearing. Behind that clearing is untouched rainforest. I wanted to sit out on the balcony, but it was cold and raining. Alexandre and I got there a little bit before his parents did, so we got a table inside. We were chatting away when suddenly I heard a strange and loud bird call from the trees outside. OBVIOUSLY I went out to the balcony (no one was eating out there) and tried to get a better look. Turns out the waiters leave some fruit on a little table in the clearing to bring more birds.

THERE WERE SO MANY BIRDS!!!

I seriously started jumping in place a little on the balcony. There was a waiter standing in the doorway between the restaurant and the balcony, staring nonchalantly. I tried to share my excitement with him, to no avail.

"Look look that one has a big red and yellow crown on it's head it's soo cool omgomg" I was trying to tell him. He was clearly not interested.

"How do I go down there into that clearing?" I tried to ask.
"You can't," he said sympathetically, though he didn't give me a reason as to why not.

I tried to call Alexandre to come see, but he was too involved in the puzzle game on his cell phone and he said, "that's great, honey" without even looking up.

SIGH!

I was kicking myself for not having my camera or monocular with me. I restored to taking notes to describe the birds to remind myself later -- it was all very British-explorer-in-the-rainforest of me, channeling Charles Darwin or Richard Francis Burton. But my notes proved helpful, and, with the help of the "search by city" feature on WikiAves, I was able to identify most of the ones I saw (I did recognize some from my book, which helped):

I saw two cambacicas, which are called bananaquits in English

I saw this sanhaço-cinzento, or sayaca tanager. My bird book says it's common, so I'd always wondered why I hadn't come across it.

I also saw this couple: Their name is saí-azul in Portuguese, aka Blue Dancis

I saw this graúna, which is also referred to as a chopi blackbird

and the highlight of the sighting was this little guy, whose singing called me out there in the first place:

It's called a tiê-galo, or a flame-crested tanager. It was easily distinguishable by the big tuft of red and yellow hair on its head. Cooooooool

There were two different hummingbirds and a little yellow bird that were just too quick for me to identify. But we definitely have to go back to that restaurant! I'm totally going to figure out a way to get down to the clearing. It seemed easy enough, but I didn't want to embarrass Alexandre by trekking around in the rain in a pair of heels. But next time, I'll be prepared!

The Rio Trip! Part 2

2011-07-23T00:49:00.001-03:00

Read Part 1 here.

So let's see -- where did I leave off? Oh yes, Ipanema!

After our afternoon in Ipanema, Lindsey and I said our goodbyes to Jim and Rachel and made our way back to her place. We stopped off for dinner at her husband's restaurant, which I won't say the name of for privacy reasons but which was DELICIOUS and awesome and which had a cool setup. After our dinner and his shift, we collected him and the three of us went to their apartment.

I got to play with their kittiesssssss OMG so hyper and cute!

kitties kitties kitties

Our night at the restaurant and at the apartment also consisted of endless amounts of chatter. I can't remember the last time I talked this much.

Monday morning, I went to Lindsey's class with her because the guy said he had questions about the US, except he was totally not talkative and the class was pretty anti-climactic. Oh, students...

Then I had the long bus ride back to Niteroi. It took almost three hours, all told! But it was like a free scenic tour of Rio. The bus I took followed this highway that went along this cliff and followed the coast. Gorgeous!

Once back at Jim's, I joined him in the fajita feast he'd already started preparing. I learned that the secret to fantastic Mexican re-friend beans is to add BUTTER to them. Oh, the decadence!

Luiz came out to help us with the meat (best to let the Brazilian take over for that part!).

During our feast preparation, Jim and I took a break and went for a stroll along the beach -- you know, because we were in Niteroi, and we could.

After dinner was an early bedtime for me. Our plan was to wake up early and go to Ilha de Paquetá, but even the best intentions couldn't get us up early enough for that ferry! So instead, Jim and I slept in and then spent the morning meandering around Niteroi until I left to meet up with Lindsey.

yes, it's the same shirt in a different color

We went to MAC, the famous art museum. The quality of the "art" inside was questionable, but the building itself was so interesting. Can you see the reflection of the shore in the black windows?

The stuff around the museum was also interesting, especially the fisherman families making a living by catching fish and mussels around the bay (thanks to Jim for explaining -- he's the Niteroi expert!). I got some pictures from the museum windows (click on them for a better look):

After the museum, Jim and I had a lovely time strolling down the walking path that follows the bay.

you are so jealous

look at the color of that moss!

metonymic picture of my trip (feel free to steal)

During our walk, Jim and I had a great conversation, saw the views of Rio, and also made friends with a dog, who followed us for a while, hoping we'd buy him some food at one of the beach stands:

Oh, and we also stopped over to explore this old house in Niteroi. Jim will have to leave a comment with the name of it. It was basically a house that foreign diplomats owned and stayed in during visits to Rio. Now it's been converted into a government administration building where public employees pretend to work.

even the awnings were tiled! I thought you'd like it, Nanny :)

So yes, after that fabulous tour with Jim, I took the ferry over to meet up with Lindsey. We went to Lagoa Rodrigo de Freitas, a huge lagoon in Rio that's surrounded by fantastic outdoor activity options (like tennis courts and bike paths), as well as cute little restaurants and food booths.

So you can probably guess what we did: ate, drank, talked, talked, and talked some more. And then drank some more, and then ate some more. The place we went to served Middle Eastern food. Yum.

view of the lagoon at night from the restaurant

Lindsey and I were talking so much and so excitedly that we eventually succumbed to our nerdy teacher sides and started taking notes about things we wanted to talk about and didn't want to forget, since we changed the topic and thought of new things to tell each other every 5 seconds. After a few caipirinhas, attempts at maintaining the list proved futile, but the intention was there.

Lindsey somehow manages to get more and more glamorous and photogenic as the night wears on. I, on the other hand, obviously don't.

So, as reluctant as we were to end the night, we both had to get home, and I had to get to bed in order to get up early for my bus ride home. I was so sad when the trip was over! I really enjoyed everyone's company. Since Rio is so expensive, I think it would be far more logical for all of you to move out to live closer to me. ;P

But yes, the trip was a success! And since Alexandre didn't end up coming, and because I had to change my bus ticket because of the passport drama, we've already got 3 of the 4 tickets purchased for our next trip. :D Just tell me when! I miss you all already.

The Rio Trip! Part 1

2011-07-21T23:49:00.001-03:00

So Jim totally beat me and updated first, but now it's my turn to talk about the trip. :D I'm writing too much so I'm going to divide it into 2 entries.

First important point, I was sooooo sad that Alexandre couldn't come. I pouted and whined. I begged. I suggested that he wasn't as sick as he said he was. But when I said, "well, I'm going anyway. I'll be an American in Rio ALL BY MYSELF," he winced, but said OK. So I knew he really was sick.

Second important point: a HUGE FYI in the Brazilian land of lawlessness: technically, there is a law that, to board a Brazilian bus, you must show your ID. If you don't have an RG, it must be an original passport (or a copy of your passport that has been certified at a cartório). My Brazilian CPF, my California ID, and a copy of my passport were not enough. It was irrelevant that I've taken literally hundreds of buses around this country in the last 3 years and that I've never had to show my original passport. (When Elena and I came back to Sao Paulo on a bus from Foz do Iguaçu, the guy said a passport was necessary, but only because we were at a bus station at an international border, not because it was, you know, Brazilian law that everyone else ignores. I happened to have my original because we'd gone into Argentina, so I'm not sure if a copy would've been accepted at that time.)

The bus driver this weekend did not appreciate my argument that acquiring a fake certified copy of my passport would be MUCH easier than acquiring a fake CPF. He did not appreciate my swearing and declaration that nothing works correctly in his country. I had to change my bus time and instead get a bus from Santos to Sao Paulo, and then take the SP metro and get ANOTHER bus from Sao Paulo to Niteroi. Poor Jim waited for me until 4am!

But yes. I share this story as a warning to you all, in case you get a stickler of a bus driver like I did. I'm not mad at him for following the law-- I was mad that no one else had, ever. I told Lindsey and Alexandre that maybe it meant I got all of my traveling drama out of the way at the beginning, which it turns out I did, because the rest of my vacation was smooth sailing!

After an hour of gabbing and another hour or so of sleep, Jim, Luiz, and I took the ferry to the blogger meetup! It was so great to talk to all of you, to see you in the flesh, to hear your stories in greater detail, to make jokes and have people laugh at them (I AM NEVER FUNNY IN PORTUGUESE). I was too busy chatting to take many pictures, but here are a couple that I got:

After the meetup, Lindsey and I went back to Jim's apartment on the ferry. Ferries are fun and never get old. Oh, but apparently, Cariocas call ferries barcas. I had a bus driver stare at me blankly when I said I needed to get to the balsa. Come on! An older woman sitting in the front of the bus sensed the confusion and called to the bus driver that I meant to say barca, not balsa. Maybe we can just stick to the English "ferry boat," which is used here in Santos (though I think some people use "ferry boat" to refer to the mall next to the ferry). What a mess! OK. Focus Danielle, focus.

While on the ferry, one of us (not gonna say which) requested a picture of an attractive boy. We pretended to take a picture of Lindsey in order to get his picture. Then he turned around. And Lindsey laughed. And you clearly missed out on all the fun of the balsa -- I mean barca.

Once we were back at Jim's, we gabbed gabbed gabbed some more, shared stories about teaching English, drank wine, ate Jim's delicious tomato and ricotta pie, went for a walk and drank coconut juice (I REFUSE TO CALL IT WATER IN ENGLISH), and eventually made our way to a bar in Jim's neighborhood. More gabbing and drinking ensued, followed by my slumber party with Lindsey (defined as even more gabbing gabbing gabbing until like 3am). As you can see, there was not much sleeping on this trip! And there was so, so, so much talking. I mentioned to Lindsey at one point that it felt like I had this huge ball of yarn in my brain that was unraveling everywhere, with threads that everyone's conversations were just pulling out and all over the place.

Sunday was the sort of second, last-minute blogger meetup. Lindsey, Jim, and I went to Ipanema to meet up with Rachel. On the way there, I sang the song in my head like 100 times (except I only know that one line -- the girl from Ipanema goes walking... -- so it started to make me a little crazy).

the cool kids!!!!

We drank caipirinhas and coconut juice, watched the passersby, and chatted some more at a million miles an hour. Oh, and the bartender waiter guy from the beach kiosk complimented Rachel on her impeccable Carioca Portuguese. :D

At one point we briefly met up with Sandy, a friend of Rachel's. She and I didn't get to talk much, mostly because I was too busy admiring her fabulous apartment and the views from it:

That mountain in the picture may or may not be Pão de Açucar. Can I just say one thing that may be sacreligious to Brazilians reading this but that perhaps is not common knowledge? So Pão de Açucar (I REFUSE TO CALL IT 'SUGAR LOAF') is the famous rock formation mountain thing in Rio. But it turns out there are a ton of rock formation mountain things around the bay!! No one told me that! How the heck am I supposed to know which one is Pão de Açucar, especially from far away?! Is that something everyone else knows easily, which would mean that I'm just like, silly and uncultured? Or is it some big secret everyone keeps? I mean, I saw quite a few of these rock formations, and they all looked the same to me from a distance.

I know I was totally lame and didn't do the typical tourist things while in Rio (Pão de Açucar and the Christ statue, which I prefer to refer to as 'the Big Jesus'), but that wasn't really the point of this trip.

Ok I'm gonna stop here. Tomorrow will be Part 2: the rest of the trip!

Read Part 2 here.