Your Portuguese is better than my English

 

We engage in a friendly struggle with most of the English-speaking Brazilians we meet. The struggle is that we want to use our Portuguese and they want to use their English.  Usually whoever can speak best wins. As might be expected, we have had a lot of conversations in English but that is beginning to change. We have a neighbor who was clearly excited to practice his English the first time he met us. Carol chatted with him again this morning and he agreed that her Portuguese was the better than his English and they carried on in Portuguese. It hasn't happened to me yet but I'm proud of Carol and her perfect pronunciation and well-tuned ear. It was just the first of many future conversations in Portuguese with English-speaker and I'm sure that I too will start having these kinds of conversations soon. 

We killed a snake

 Neither one of us wanted to do it. We first saw the snake, or one like it, in the garage. We showed the picture around and learned that it was a jararaca, and venomous. Then last night there it was coiled up on the stairs, inches from where Carol was standing. We shewed it away and did our research; 52% of snakebites in this country are attributed to the jararaca and they can be deadly. It was back this morning, curled up on the porch like a kitten. We shewed it away more forcefully, let the landlord know and did some more research: likely venomous, don't approach. It returned to the porch again and was shewed it again. The third time it returned to the porch, we didn't shew it. I dropped a rock on it and now it is dead. We aren't sure we did the right thing. We probably didn't. We like animals and it was a beautiful creature but we have a dog and he is a beautiful creature too and we are responsible for him. I wish moving to Brazil came with a handbook that provided some guidance for times like these. 

Just for fun

 

We chatted with a young German guy who's been going to our school. When we came to the part about why he wanted to learn Brazilian Portuguese, he had the greatest answer. He said it sounded fun. He thought it would be fun to learn and fun to speak. He already had German and French and Spanish and English, so why not get a little entertainment out of the next one, Right? He explained this to us in slow and careful Portuguese, which, after a semester in college and a week and a half at our school, he was mastering. In times of linguistic trouble, I want to channel this boy and to remind myself that this is fun. It totally is. We get to say words like paralelepípedo and yell "sextou!" on Fridays and we get to meet fun people. When you get right down to it, you'd have to hate fun not to learn Brazilian Portuguese. 

How to phone

 

When we moved here, figuring out the cellphone/data thing was challenging.  We ended up getting a Google Fi plan and I got a (very cheap) Google Fi phone. With Google Fi our phone service was cheaper but essentially unchanged plus we could use data from wherever we happened to be in the world. After about two months, I got an email informing me that if I wasn't back in the US in 30 days the fees would change and my data would be cut off. So, that was a bummer. The solution was a SIM card, which sounds like a no-brainer but in Brazil you need an identity number with the federal government to get one. Plus, you have to be really good at filling out forms. So, they cut off my data and eventually I figured out the SIM card. It works great, for about $10 a month I get all the data I need but I have to use a Brazilian phone number. Carol spent a little more for her phone and hers is eSIM compatible, so she got to keep her US number. So, if anyone is looking for advice, go with the Google Fi, just make sure your phone is set up for an eSIM and know that you will have to buy a (cheap) data plan when your international access expires.

gringos in floripa

Carol got hooked up with with an online "gringos" group and planned a beach weekend away. I complained that I wasn't super stoked to hang out with a bunch of Americans but I went anyway because that's what you do.  Turns out I was wrong of course. The gringos weren't a bunch of Americans, the common thread was that they were people who spoke English. First we picked up a French Canadian most recently from Cambodia. Then we met up with Two Brazilians, two Germans  and a partridge in a pair tree. Kidding. And a person from Lebanon and a person from Norway, plus there was me and Carol and someone else from the US. The multi-cultural event featured two days of pouring rain (pictured) so we got to spend a lot of time together and it was great because shooting the shit with diverse people isn't something we've done a lot of. It should be though because people from other countries are super interesting and have amazing stories and just talking is a way to learn and gain perspective and challenge prejudice.

Animal farm

 

We have lived in four houses since we started this journey. Each of them has either abutted the Mata Atlantica rain forest or been square in the middle of it. The current place is square in the middle of in. Because we've lived in or near the forest, we've seen a fair number of animals in and around the house. It's super cute that the Brazilians refer to things like cockroaches, centipedes and bigass ants as animals. I think American's tend to use "animal" for furry things, like monkeys or donkeys or dogs. These animals around here, from the venomous snake in the garage to the seven thumb-size spiders hanging over our Christmas patio, are part of our life. We tell our people when they visit that it is a buggy place and we send them back on the plane with tubes of hydrocortisone cream. It is at the very least a buggy place. Our next house is going to be in the middle of a town and I expect we will have fewer animals. I know we will miss the forest terrible, it remains to be seen how much we miss the animals.

Losing our shit

 

In retrospect, we should have left most of our fancy American stuff in the US. It doesn't fit in here. Our fancy fibers get ruined by the wet and the mold and the salt and the sand; we lose random articles in all the moving around; our $300 Goretex jackets are useless when it is 90 degrees out; and we look goofy because you can't buy the same things here as you can in the US. Lately, we have lost some of our lux items by leaving them laying around. We left our high-end dog leash at a restaurant and our Black Diamond treking pole at a campground (pictured) and both were gone faster than you could say "finders keepers." It's one of the rules here. With the exception of The Language Club who collectively returns my Yeti coffee cup every single time, if you leave your stuff laying around, it ain't your stuff no more. Nothing personal, it's just the way it is and it may be one of the reason for all of the fences and walls around here.  

The worst in the world

We kind of have something against Brazilian pizza. It's gotten better since we found the Artesenal pizza place in Lagoa, but we are generally wary. So we surprised ourselves when we opted to buy some cheap frozen pizzas like we used to in the US. Mine was surprisingly good but Carol's, oh my. The sauce was catsup-y, the peperoni was some kind of fatty wurst and the cheese was processed, but it was the crust that made it blog-worthy. The crust was made of pão de queijo. We adore pão de queijo but it does not make a good crust. It makes a rubbery crust, a very rubbery that tastes weird. After one bite it was deemed disgusting but we thought we could rescue it by frying it on the stove. We fried it up and Carol took a bite and almost peed her pants laughing so hard at how bad it was. She made me take a bite and after a I was able to swallow I laughed hard too and agreed that it was the worst pizza in the world. No comment from the pizza (pictured).

Spaced in

We noted in our last post the pragmatic generosity with which Brazilians share their public spaces. Paradoxically, private spaces are tighter than pants after a holiday. If you drive through pretty much any residential neighborhood in Brazil, you will see rows of walls and fences. You will not see cars parked on the streets at night and you will rarely see a front door. This is true in high-crime areas and in low-crime areas, in cities and in towns. We have heard different explanations. There are theories about Portuguese architectural influence and Brazil's agricultural roots. A trusted friend told us that locking something up is simply a sign of ownership, like putting a collar on your dog. Whatever the reason, the walls lend themselves to the street art, which is absolutely fantastic, and, as a happy bonus, the chickens like to sit on them.

Spaced out

In the US, we like to give about three feet distance when talking to strangers and two feet when talking with friends. In Brazil, complete strangers often stand face-to-face and even touch when talking. In the US, we expect a two-way street to have enough room for two vehicles to pass, plus a little room to spare. In Brazil sometimes one vehicle has to back up a little, or tuck into a driveway. Similarly, standing in line in Brazil involves a little bodily contact and if you find yourself in a crowd, like we did during Carnival, you might literally be carried away by the press of bodies.  In general, there is a whole lot more reaching around, squeezing through and inadvertent touching than what we are used to. Often this reaching, squeezing and touching comes without apology or even an "excuse me." Not because Brazilians are rude (they aren't!) but because there is literarily nothing to excuse.  It's just the way it is. In fact, we are the rude ones with our gimme attitudes toward space and stepping back from friendly conversation as if we are afraid of catching a disease. As with everything, we are slowly adapting. We are standing closer weaving through, and blurring our notions of personal and intimate space. I'm sure we will have a lot of fun with that one when we return to the US.

Health Care

We have gone to the doctor twice in the last two weeks under two different healthcare systems.  Brazil has a 100% assessable public system as well as a private system that takes money and insurance. We went to the latter type first because we googled and that is what popped up. We didn't have insurance so they asked for $70 and said we would be called. After waiting about 15 minutes in a clean and comfortable waiting room, a jeans-wearing MD came to get us and was soon pressing his thumbs hard into Carol's sinuses. He prescribed medicines that he took, pre-boxed, from a cabinet behind him and sent us on our way. After two weeks she wasn't better so we went to a public place. We didn't mean to but we googled and that is what popped up. They didn't mention money and said we would be called. After waiting in a bedraggled and crowed waiting room for a little over an hour, a jeans-wearing MD came to get us and was soon pressing his thumbs hard into Carol's sinuses. He gave us a prescription that we took to the pharmacy. The meds were pre-boxed and cost less than twenty dollars. So, the difference in time was a half hour versus an hour and a half; the difference in cost was $70 versus $18, the difference in comfort was moderate and the difference in care was negligible. It is challenging to consider what kind of care a Brazilian in a similar situation would experience in the US. I would hope the the care would be readily available, fast, quality and damn-near free.  

The opposite of immersion

I'm not sure what the opposite of immersion is but Carol and I have been living it. We have had company for five of the last six weeks and it has been a blast but we have become separated from the Brazilian language and culture. Our immersion reversal happened gradually and then all at once. Slowly we stopped trying to talk to each other in Portuguese, watching Brazilian news and taking classes. To compensate, we started listening to music in English, eating dinner late and discussing American politics. And then all the sudden it seemed crazy that the lady in our phone was speaking in Portuguese and what the hell is wrong with the roads in this country anyway? We got dispersed, we got detached. Somehow, we removed ourselves from the language and the culture. Ironically, this happened while we were showing what we love about Brazil to people who had come for exactly that. We are getting back to in now though. We watched a Brazilian movie last night and have set some learning goals. I'm pretty sure we will get our heads back down underneath it soon enough. 

Lots of luck in the new year

On our first new year's eve in Brazil we woke up in a tent on a remote beach and leisured our way home, by way of three caipirinhas, just in time to add one last nap to last year's tally. Then we read up on Brazilian customs to make sure we did things right. Wear white the internet said, with colored underwear selected to invite your new year's fortune. Eat lentils and pomegranate seeds. Avoid chicken. Make offerings, the internet said. Throw white flowers into the sea, or send vanity products on a homemade boat. Jump seven waves at midnight, making wishes, and then walk backwards to shore. Go to the parties, the internet said, and watch the fireworks. Out we went, wearing white, lentils in our bellies, armed with information and ready to party. We saw groups of other whitely-dressed people and watched the launching of a ship with gifts for Yemanja. We heard music coming from houses and popup tents and from the patios of closed restaurant and bars along the beach. That's right. The restaurants, bars were closed, we weren't invited to any parties and we couldn't even buy a drink. Undaunted, we returned home for lawn chairs and a bottle of Champaign and then back to the sea to hoot and holler, watch fireworks and jump waves for good luck. That's about the time it started to rain. We didn't have our jackets, our chairs were sinking in the wet sand, our dog was miserable and it was still 50 minutes to midnight with no relief in sight. Back home we went, with our muddy chairs, soggy champagne and stinky dog. We watched the fireworks from our window and jumped up and down in our little house, making wishes, wearing underwear selected to bring health and harmony, hoping for the best but unsure of what repercussions our new year's efforts might bring.