Most excellent news...

The quest is complete. My good looks/charm won out, again.
Check the employed box for me.

A letter to Hana

Dear Hana,

So, after getting some disappointing responses from schools last week, all citing december as the time for teacher hirings, Mari told me that one of her co-workers teaches English. She said she would ask.

The following morning (Friday), I get a call from Mari saying there is a school hiring English teachers. She gave me the address, told me my resume` looked great. I finish my coffee. Cough. Put some water on my face. Look in the mirror for 20 minutes. Put on a nice shirt. Waste more time.

I look up the address. Grab my bag and go. Hop on the bus. Get off at Jirdim. Walk north. See a Japanese Tea House. Walked north. Walked East. Saw a road that I recognized. Walked north. Checked Directions. See destination.

Cough. stand. Walk in. Go to reception. "Desculpa, não falo portugues. Eu estou procuranda Cara." She stared at me and the right half of her lip curled. "Eu não sei. uhh" I looked for my phrase book. She said "Do you speak English" "Yes" "Oh, I speak english" "Oh, sorry, I'm looking for Cara, I just moved here and I heard there is a position for an english teacher." "Okay... ... were you speaking Portuguese?" "Um...trying to" She laughed really hard. Then went upstairs.

A woman introduced herself to me. She had read over my CL and Resume`. She was first wondering how committed i was to staying there. I told her how I'd sold my car. I told her how i'd emptied my savings. I told her how I'd left the band I love(d). She seemed convinced. She then told me about the school. They don't even NEED to advertise, because they have a hold on businesses in the area who need to train their students. They are international. They have a major news organization giving them TV spots to analyze for their students. They have my favorite children's show as their sponsor.

Needless to say I was impressed. We set up a presentation time for 9:30 am on Monday. Afterwards, hopefully, an interview will be scheduled. Then, I find out. And it's a full-time gig. If I get this, it's like an affirmation that I'm not entirely stupid.

Hope Virginia treats you well.

Your friend,
Ben

Update of sorts...

So, I'm going to write a longer post about this week, and I'm about to go hit up some tourist spots...

but come Monday I'm going to have some good or bad news. Hope for the former.

It's not test results or anything. :)

In case you were wondering...

Karate Kid is just as good in Portuguese as in English.
-BM

And so Curitiba is illuminated...

You have watched 72 minutes of video today.
Please wait 54 minutes or click unlimited use of megavideo...

And so it is, Megavideo. I have 54 minutes before I find out what happened in Mad Men. So I'll update this past weekend.

Surprisingly, there is more to Curitiba than the triangle pathway I've taken to the supermarket on most days. More to it than the Shop Curitiba! shopping mall.

Friday night, Bela and Mari get home. They work a lot. I work less than the homeless here. Studying Portuguese with free online Web sites and phrase books and dictionaries, it is what it is. But, this was the weekend, and that means whatever work you do do, you eliminate it and enjoy yourself.

Bela needed to go to the store to pick up food/beer for her friends coming in for I will describe later. I went with to get out of the house. Friday was abysmal. Rained for 6 hours straight before I stopped counting. Supermarket, 2 bottles of wine, 12 pack of Sol beer, bread, cheese, I'm rollin. We get back and make dinner, open up the bottle of wine. Mari assigned me homework, to watch the soap opera and find five words and use them in sentences. We were 40 minutes late. The entire show is incredibly slow flash backs. The show is on 6 times a week in prime time, so I guess they create that many episodes by this incredibly beautiful woman lead just having flash backs of twirling around in the ocean in Rio. It's a good business strategy.
One bottle of wine down.
Mari goes to bed because she's working on a Saturday. A Saturday.
2nd bottle opened.
We start watching Panico TV, a bunch of sketches, the best one being two Brazilian dudes trying to get autographs on their Brazil passports from the Argentina futeball team after they were defeated in the WC qualifiers.
2nd bottle finished.
At 12:30 am, or 00:30, her friends arrive. "Do you want to go out?" "Sim."
We get in the car and go, park, get out, okay, it's a strip of bars. Over there is the Irish Pub. Ahh, the American bar. A Japanese bar...and the one we were going to...I don't know.
I felt safe though because when we walked in they took a metal-detector wand to me. No guns in here! To the right of me was a bunch of...ticket booth things. Didn't think much of it. They handed me a sheet of graph paper. Didn't think much of it.
Walk in and it's crowded. This is a Lincoln Park bar, I quickly realize. No...no it isn't that bad, sorry. But I walk in, to the right side, separated, is a dance floor, stage with a live band. To the left is the bar, with the dozens of bottles of Johnny Walker. I'm introduced to several Kraft employees. Say my hellos and make my way to the bar. "Uma Bohemia por favor" NAILED it.

He then looks at me and says something. I repeat what I said. He makes a square thing with his hands. It's hard to explain how uncomfortable not understanding service people makes me in Brazil. It's the worst. I look around for something of a clue. Other people are handing him the graph paper. It's a tab. You pass them the tab and they mark it. I already had a 30 mark on it, because dudes were charged $30 reais. Sexism has not cured itself from Brazil, I see.

Then, I get introduced to more people and then Bela waves to follow her to the dance floor. I maneuver my way around. and follow what I think are people I know...and then we get to the part where all you have is a strobe light. Following people in a strobe light is bullshit. At first I thought it would be easier because it's like you are moving in slow motion, you know, but really everyone just looks like the crowd in NHL '94 and your mind can only process things in binary code.

Flash, flash, 1, band starts singing pink, look for heads, 27s, god dammit. Band starts singing No Doubt. god dammit. 110110101010101 I shield my eyes and just start repeating "excuse me" in Portuguese and back up into the light. I decide to just wait there. I'm not going back to that hell.
Bela finds me. More beer, this time, flawless. Then the bartender says thank you. In English. Bastard.
So then back to the dance floor. It's hard to explain just how much this cover band was like being in guitar hero. They were singing guitar hero songs, they had chosen the girl singer, the bald guitar player and the black bassist. The drummer was playing behind, plexiglass or something. The lighting was the same. The stage was the same. Uncanny. red blue blue green 100101101
I started talking to some dude from Rio who studied at UNC. We talked about how much I hated southern people. He didn't relate, but he did say they kept asking him where Brazil was in Africa. I then started talking like I knew something about the Baile Funk movement in Rio. I must've been convincing. He offered to take me to Rio and show me around. Plans are so much fun to make with people you'll never see again.
We left and were at that checkout ticket counter. Passed them my tab. $75 reais. I was miscalculating what he was saying because I don't know what the hell anyone is ever talking about. Because instead I watched Band of Brothers all summer. Which is a great series, perfectly cast.
And then we're driving and we stop and I'm so ready to sleep but hey hey were at a sushi restaurant. Except it was just raw fish in some like seaweed cone with rice. And I ate it. And then I sat there while people talked and couldn't even think. We get back as the sun rose.

When I woke up the room was spinning, and I wondered if it was spinning counter what it would in the US. I closed my eyes. I opened them and watched the TV drift away.

We had lunch at Habibis. It is a fast food chain here specializing in Arab food. The mascot was a very arab, very mustached man in a fez hat. I couldn't help but wonder how awesome this place would be to place next to a southern Baptist Church.

The ordering process was difficult because everyone was ordering more than one thing. I didn't bother with that. "Beirut, por favor" Unsuccessful. how do you miss pronounce Beirut? I don't know.

So then the reason for buying beer this Saturday was a festival being held by Bohemia beer, product of inBev, where they asked the bars to compete for who had the best food to eat with Bohemia. Think taste of Chicago for a one night launch, targeted to adults, on a smaller scale. That's the best I can come up with. It's kind of like something where there's music, beer and food. Something...

But so pregaming begins. And everyone is speaking Portuguese. For the first half hour I try to focus on words that I could learn, or expressions. Then I just started creating conversations for them based off of gestures. "I just caught a big fish! This big!" "Where's Francisco? There he is! Where's Francisco? There he is!" etc.

So then a cab ride and we're in a big warehouse lined with tiny food vendors, a huge stage with some ... Brazilian music acts. Go to a place where you give them money and they give you tickets that say $2 $3 $5...and if anyone can explain to me what his does, I'd really be pleased. Is it just to make sure things move faster at the actual vendors because they don't have to give change? Is it just a needless that one person did and then everyone copied for no reason?

I should mention that at this huge collection of people the reputation of Brazilian women, for me, was realized. Everyone was beautiful. And especially not homogenous. Blonde and brunette and tall and short. And medium. You could look anywhere and be entertained. Ordering anything was easy because every vendor had just one item. All I had to do was point. And point I did.

I spoke to a lot of people that night. One man was from Chicago. We had little in common. The conversation was short. I had women to look at, and this guy...was a man.

Mari translated some Samba songs for me...all I remember was "I am an only child, I have to go to my home and mind it" or something. It was Chris Martin quality.

I danced some dance with one of their friends. I was awful. In gym class in my youth they taught us some dances. The macarena was one. They were trying to teach us social skills. The electric slide. The waltz. None of these dances was this dance. U.S. public school fail :(

And then a couple more fried items I knew not what, a few more beers spilled on my shirt, and we are taking a cab ride home. And I slept.

And I woke up, and watched the TV drift away.

Oh...

pre-sale for pavement tickets is already sold out. But, perhaps I shouldn't make plans of going to New York in over a year.

But while I have you, my friend Steve Targlione has a lit web site that has some great, oh, ALL great, stories and articles. I'd suggest it. Knee Jerk Mag

And my friend Hana wants you to send you 10 word stories for her blog tellmequick. But, she will put yours up there when you thought you were just ... well nevermind.
Tellmequick

Lastly, in case you were wondering "When does the next Value Voters Summit happen?", you might be too late, because it starts today. So, you might have to wait until next year to hear about how Christmas is trying to be silenced by Godless heathens (democrats), how illegal immigrants are stealing your jobs, how health care reform will leave you drowned in your own vomit dead in a ditch after you couldn't celebrate christmas and then lost your job to an illegal immigrant and then just needed some penicillin but it was rationed to illegal immigrants and welfare moms who just had an abortion, and finally, what's this new 21st century man look like? (Not married to another man, right?)

And, so what's going on in Brazil? THE WEEKEND!!! Wooo! Better pick out my outfits!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

It gets better...

It's more than one and done...
Pavement world tour

How you holding up? etc.

Realizing the majority of my posts have been about the 4 day excursion in Indaiatuba/Campinas, I feel a need to let you know what life is like in my semi-permanent home of Curitiba. But that's hard. Life slowed down a lot. The reality of what I'm doing pushed to the forefront. After getting picked up on Sunday at 6 am at the bus station, a lot of it has been at this computer. I wake. I use easyportuguese.com, a dictionary and a phrasebook and study. I write, I read, I talk to friends, and at dinner time my roommates come home and we talk and time passes and somehow another day is near.

So it's slowed down, but not a waste. I'm closer to autonomous now. I'm not hanging out with Carlos taking me around. I have about 18 free hours on my own. So I am building up my confidence. This isn't Europe. This is a big city, and obviously has some experience with tourists/foreigners, but not really. So the struggle is larger without the language, and it does get frustrating.

But it's nice. It's nice weather. It's got good transport. Things are still interesting, I mean, I haven't discovered everything yet. Today I was walking past a car repair shop and there was a donkey. This country is addicted to soap operas, which run in primetime, 6x a week.

And, so, this week is when I realized I was here, and it's not really a vacation. So, I guess it's success that I adjust so quick? Or does everyone. How long do you spend each day caring about where else you could be? I mean, this was remarkably easy. With quite a bit of help, granted, but, you can sell your valuables and move to a different country without falling into crippling depression. As I look out the window, there is a sky of lights, below a sky filled with lights, and it's not shocking.

Is it more fun? I don't know. Is it difficult? At times. The differences are just gimmicks. Milk is in cardboard and not refrigerated. The cups are small. So, Brazil as compared to America is incredibly interesting in the eyes of a food consumer.

But the people are very similar. Our personalities more alike than not. We are both loud, go out the way I think of it, these things.

The more you are prepared to shake things up the more likely you are to find it wasn't that extreme after all.

Views from the Window, etc.

So, big deal. I have batteries. Took some pics of what it looks like outside the apartment.

Pretty cloudy, yeah? It stays pretty cool, as well, probably around high 60s/low 70s Fahrenheit. Something celsius. So, today was a good day. I wake up, check twitter, see rumblings of a pavement reunion, then it's confirmed.


In other news, blockbuster is closing 950 stores. And somehow, the AP still exists.
I'm about to take a Portuguese test I've created.
-BM

What it's like navigating through Curitiba

-BM

Friday night cont'd, Saturday

*I edited this story, Mari said not clubs, but clubs that play pop music*

So, I forgot some happenings from Friday nights return trip. We get in the car and start heading home, making our way onto the highway. Carlos points to a grouping of buildings ahead in the distance, and says “Over there is where lots of prossistutes …?”

“Prostitutes?” “Yes, prostitutes, that’s where they stand” “We call that our red light district,” I said. I thought that was that.

The car took the exit and I assumed he was going to the gas station. But when we again veered to the right, I found myself in a car driving through Campinas’ Whoreville. It was a series of clubs that looked like abandoned olive gardens and boardwalk tourist shops. Each one blared American pop music: Rihanna, Black Eyed Peas, and most fittingly, Lady Gaga (If you are into that stuff). Two days later, when having lunch with Mari, she mentioned how she hasn’t found clubs in Curitiba that play American pop music, and I stopped myself from asking if she’s checked its red light district.

In front of each club was a grouping of several courtesans, well, looking at the clientele, I guess strumpets fits better. Hos. Actually if there is ever a word to look up in Oxford English Thesaurus it’s prostitute: Tart, Moll, fille de joie, scarlet woman, camp follower (awesome), cocotte, trollop, woman of ill repute (which is usually best seen in reference to Andrew Jackson’s wife), and, finally, wench. I used to say wench a lot when I was little because of the movie “The Cable Guy.” It seems it was inappropriate.

If I were to rank these prostitutes attractiveness to those in HBO specials, I suppose I’d give the nod to Brazil. All are over-makeup’ed, covered in a minimal amount of leather (understandable) fashioned in a cowgirl fitting (inexplicable). I wondered if prostitute fashion in the cinema classic Pretty Woman was art imitating life, or if the movie set off a whole new wave of prostitute fashion.

It’s hard to gauge what I was feeling driving through. It seemed long. It was probably 7 or 8 minutes. Carlos pointed and laughed at them. I was scared to make eye contact, I was nervous about having my window halfway down, and any time we were stopped because of traffic, my heart started pounding. I don’t know Portuguese! If they come up to the window how will these trollops know I’m rejecting them? I should’ve brought my knife.

The buildings were eventually closer than they appeared, but alas were now in my side mirror.

“I don’t like prostitutes,” Carlos said.

I decided I didn’t either.

We hit the side road, those wonderful potholed roads in the middle of nowhere, as to avoid the insanely expensive tolls. Halfway through, Carlos pulls over, “I pee”. Great idea, I was about to burst. Let me say, you haven’t relieved yourself until you’ve relieved yourself on a dirt road in Brazil looking up at the sparkling sky. Zero light pollution. Satisfaction in peeing somewhere you’ve never peed before. What a country.

Saturday was now my last day in Indaiatuba. I woke up, and Ana’s mom was leaving for Campinas for the weekend. She said her good byes, told me this was my home and if I ever needed her to call her. Carlos took me to a bakery for breakfast. The coffee seemed like it was cappuccino. The bread was delicious. A crispy, toasted ham and cheese sandwich, bread and butter and pao de quiejo.

We then were going to head to Bracas, but I’ll double check the name. It was two hours away, and apparently very, very beautiful. I would confirm this later. Ana’s mother started fake hitting him because she was jealous she couldn’t go. I was excited. We first headed to Campinas and picked up his girlfriend. Then made our way. En route, I tried to think of the best way to describe inland Brazil. The strangest part is it always seems like at the tallest part. You can always see for miles, in a cool way. Not in the Kansas-I-can-see-for-30-miles-but-you-can’t-tell-the-difference way, but seeing many rolling hills, some of them covered in farmland, some covered in houses. Palm trees sprout up in collections, and the occasional orange grove is passed.

We entered Bracas, a really charming small town with cobblestone roads and many shops in it’s downtown. It seemed in a valley of a bunch of farmland. Carlos walked in to a shop. It was a nature adventure shop, I guess. Zip lining, rafting, and kayaking. He came out and asked if I wanted to go rafting. Of course I did. I mean, I was a bit nervous only because I’d been rafting before. A key component is the dialogue with the other raft-mates and river guide. I wasn’t going to be able to hear the story that follows “when did you start doing this” and the tour guide speaks of working a 9-5 job before giving it all up to get back to nature. I was going to be sitting in silence, like an asshole.

We get on the bus. It was rowdy, laughter and jokes, I assume, erupting from the back. Carlos was talking to one of the river guides. His girlfriend passed me the bug lotion. Thank God, looking back. Some of the pot holes this bus had to go over reminded me of the Simpsons monorail episode written by Conan O’Brien, where Marge wanted to fix up main st., and it cut to a scene of cars just driving into a gigantic never ending pit. But somehow only ¼ of the bus fell in every time.

I step off the bus and acknowledge a thick collection of forest west of me that is likely where the river is. The aforementioned rolling Brazilian hills surround me, but this time more pristine. These hills seem to take on different colors from the sky. An assorted mix of trees I’d never seen before. Shaped like conifers, instead of needles, puffs of tiny heart shaped leaves burst out of the branches.

The river guides went through a long speech on safety I didn’t understand. We then had 10 minutes of calisthenics. Not sure why. Then we got in the raft. It was beautiful. The water was clean, trees and vines hung over. As opposed to Colorado white water rafting, in the middle of mountains and with many rocks as obstacles. The rapids here were just tiny waterfalls, a quick drop off. Still fun.

The best was an area where the rapids were shallow; you could lay on your back and slide down through them. And we did. And then to the right of this was a large waterfall through the trees. And above the waterfall was a family of monkeys, you know, swinging through trees. And above them, toucans flew into the tree. It was overwhelming. Brazilian waterfall in the middle of a jungle with monkeys above that and then toucans appear. It thought King Louis might just jump out too! Hahahahahahahah

One somewhat creepy thing, was though we were seemingly in the middle of nowhere, twice there were just men crouched over on the riverbank staring blankly. One in a pair of Chinos and blue-and-white striped polo, the other in what appeared to be scrubs sponsored by Viagra.

They put up the rafts, and waiting for us was not only a sunset behind the hills, but a bottle of cachaça. Carlos’ girlfriend, who did a wonderful job translating for me on the raft, got me a tiny Dixie cup full of it. It was warm, and strong going down, but it tasted accomplished. There was something perfect about a ritual of a group of strangers coming together over a bottle after a trip down a river, in the middle of a sunset. We headed on the bus, the river guides refilled everyone’s cup. And the back of the bus sang, hit it:

Glory Glory Hallelujah

Glory Glory Hallelujah

Glory Glory Hallelujah

Dyah blah dyah dah bah vahhhh

(Scattered laughter)

Just for the record:

I didn't mean to follow my own blog. But I can't figure out how not to. My mistake. Thought I was reciprocating following you all.
Wellp.

Thursday/Friday

*A lot has happened over the weekend, and little time to get internet* *Also, camera is needing batteries, none seem to work*

Thursday was the day after Wednesday, the first day that I arrived in Indaiatuba. It was only one day.
I woke up late, when Ana’s mother was to leave. She’d gotten back at 9 am from the hospital, and had stayed up the entire time I was sleeping. It seemed she hadn’t slept the entire time I had gotten there. She made me a map of Indaiatuba and left me keys to get back into the house. After writing my first blog and then wasting time, I finally headed out. First, I was to go to the supermarket. Saopaolisto, I think. I wanted batteries for my camera. Walked out, made a right at the first street, saw it. Pretty standard. Walked in, found batteries, paid them, left. K. Walked back to the house, then to where she said downtown was.
Downtown was at the same street that the house was on. 6 blocks later, I was at what seemed to be downtown. Brazil isn’t so hard. Sure, when you cross the street, you’ll probably get hit by a car…actually I can’t justify that. Fun fact: red lights don’t necessarily mean you are gonna be stuck until green. You roll up to that red light, you look to your right and left, and you go through it if no one is coming. Better yet, you just go fast enough that no one will hit you.

That night, a meal of wonderful leftovers. Rice, chicken, Guarana, muito bom! Pao de Quiejo. Mmm… Carlos came over halfway through the meal. He asked me if I wanted to go out to a youth club. That sounded just fine. He asked if I wanted to drink, and that sounded just fine, too.

We head to Campinas in his Peugot, and everything feels so much faster when the speedometer reads 130, I don’t care if it’s in kmph. Now, when you arrive in Campinas, you're probably half way there. The city isn’t on any sort of logical grid. Every time I went through Campinas with Carlos, I thought he was just continually lost, but really, you need to take 4 lefts to do what going straight does in America. Millions of turns to get where you want to go.

Carlos gives me a cd of Nacao Zumbi, a band I had liked on the ride back from the airport. Obrigado. We pick up his friend. He doesn’t speak much English, and I say I don’t speak much Portuguese. He knows much more English than I do Portuguese. We drive to the gas station and get a beer while his other friend gets ready. In the gas station, we get two Pilsners in bottles. Open them up, hop in the car, drive away. Brazil. No consequences. We park in front of his friends apartment tower and finish the beers. A homeless man drinking cachaça walks up to us. Carlos and his friend speak to him for a while. They tell him I’m American. Onsi de Septembro? Bombo. He was telling me of September 11. It was the next day. Amanha. How could I forget! He then continues to ask if I was Iraqi. Carlos says I’m an Iraqi American.

He wanders off. Carlos tells me that these alcoholics, they have big hearts.

Off to the bar with his other friend. The beers are in what I imagine to be 22 oz. bottles and used like pitchers. 4 small glasses are divided up between us. In addition, we order cicaixu, sic. Essentially, in the middle of this ball ,of what I imagine to be corn meal, is, in our case, gorgonzola cheese and shredded chicken. It’s fried up, and is fairly large. You grab a napkin, grab the bottom (shape is reminiscent of a hershey’s kiss) and bite into it. Add some hot sauce. It’s heavenly, and perfect drinking food. They had probably 40 different varieties, with different cheeses, different meat.

His two friends get up and leave the table, shake my hand, say they’ll be back, they are going to meet a friend. ‘I don’t know why they said that, they are going to smoke up outside.’ Carlos said. He orders me a straight Cachaça of a name I don’t remember. It was malty. It was strong. I drank it. He orders one for himself. Cheers. He orders a second one, the first was dark, this was clear. Somehow I knew it was going to be vicious. He takes half of it, passes it to me. No flavor, all burn. Now, food. Fried up fish. Fresh and all, shaped like a stick, obviously it was great.

His friends come back. “Chicago Boolls!” “yeah Michael Jordan” This lasts for a while. And, it’s just amazing what a little English, a lot of alcohol, and a sports icon can do for stunted conversation.

Friday.
I don’t wake up hungover and question if I ever did get drunk. I’m drinking about ¼ of a pint, and that 22 oz bottle? It’s split among 4 people. So, ¼ of a 22 oz bottle is less than a bottle of beer, so, even if it seemed like there was a lot of bottles last night…I don’t know. This day, a more reasonable wake up time of 9:30. The house is empty. I make a glass of milk and a cup of instant coffee. Butter spread on bread. An hour later, Carlos comes in, he had washed his car. “Are you hungry?” “No, it’s fine. I just ate” “We go to Campinas, we play tennis and then we’ll Portuguese and then we’ll barbecue, you like?” “I like Barbecue.” We drive to Campinas and go to his apartment that he shares with his father, Ana’s father. It was a short introduction, more was to come. And into the car, zooming in circles like a penny in a funnel game. The club is out of town a ways, in a town that in many ways reminds me of the Italian village in the special episode of Everybody loves Raymond, where they go to Italy. We walk in, tropical plants, trees, clay tennis courts. Futeball field. Pool. Place for parties. And rows upon rows of grills and picnic tables. It was here I met Antonio.

Antonio, Carlos’s friend, introduces himself saying he doesn’t speak much English, but unlike me, and unlike the others I’ve met, it doesn’t stop him from trying to converse, be it in any language. He’s starting the grill. At the bottom, an opening where they place wood charcoal. A number of slots with handles you can place on different levels. They’d bought picanha, a large slab of beef I’d say is likely a tenderloin cut in America. Shishkabobs of beef cuts, garlic bread (pao de onho), coke and guarana. And bacon, cut really, really thick.

To season the meat, it’s just a light coating of coarse sea salt. The fire started and the meat placed on it. Over 4 hours, different meats would finish, and we’d constantly be eating. When it would be a while before meat, the pao de onho would be put on the grill.

I liked Antonio. He was 23, a computer programmer going back to school. He walked me to the pool. He said he had a girlfriend but showed me a ring on his ring finger. I asked if it was his fiancé, and he just put his hands to his throat and made choking sounds, spitting out Portuguese phrases that I assume meant he would not get engaged. He paused, waved me over, and showed me this gigantic bird I imagine is a duck. A black head with an orange beak, the black spreads like a Rorschach test on it’s otherwise white coat. “I don’t know if, eggs” he said. He then described with his hands, expressions and some English how much he liked the river adjacent to us, the trees, etc.

It’s worth noting here, Brazil has many otherwise beautiful places that are incredibly polluted. Not stinking and miscolored only, but filled with trash. Waterfalls foaming from chemicals as it stirs a cocktail of trash in a whirlpool below. This place was clean, and beautiful.

Antonio asks me where I’m going. I tell him Curitiba and I want to visit Florionopolis. Florionopolis is a beautiful coastal town. His response was almost a dance of violent pelvic thrusts, wild hand motions of blowing kisses and then curling up all together and croaching before he springs up again. “Oi man the women (kiss) there are so beautiful oh my god!” Everytime I would mention Florionopolis from here on out the same reaction, same speech, would be delivered.

Antonio liked history, he went on a long speech in Portuguese directed at me of everything he liked. I could only gather Machu Pichu and the sphinx, but it was 15 minutes long, so I assume the other 5 wonders, or 6, or 7, not sure what the wonders of the world are, were mentioned. The best discussion was on the BoP of Rio. They are the SWAT of the favelas. But seeing as how the favela’s are armed like a fortress, they are essentially marines. “I believe in my heart of hearts,” Antonio said, “That Swat could not control favelas like Bop” I guess I tend to agree. To bring you into the conversation, SWAT is used to precarious situations of a man or group of men who are holding something that must be kept safe. A hostage, holed up in a building. They typically aren’t going into, say, Davidian compounds. And in the movie SWAT, when they were ambushed by the gangs fully armed, they got destroyed.

But anyway, Antonio was essentially the Brazilian me. He described why I didn’t want to work in all hand gestures and gibberish. “Hey man blah blah blah” he mimmicks typing “oh and blahawofslk” he mimmicks handing things “Man fuck that.” Exactly.

He described how he just wanted to camp, be in nature and barbecue all day. And after tasting the barbecue, I don’t know how anyone could do anything else here.

We parted ways. I went with Carlos back to his apartment. “Mr. Ben,” Mr. Giampetro said. He then showed me how to work the shower. I’m not sure why. But anyways, I started watching TV with him. “Now you met the family. Me, her mother, her brother and my daughter,” he said. I realized how that was pretty cool. It has to be strange to have your only daughter going to different country to marry. And to know the family she’ll be around more I’m sure is comforting. As I pondered, he says “Brazil is good at two things, Soap Operas and athletics.” Now, I didn’t need to ponder that, that’s just fucking true.

We went to the bar and met Carlos’ girlfriend and her three friends. One spoke perfect English and had me sit near, the other spoke good English as well. There was a happy hour deal, $18 reais for all you can eat at the buffet of brazilian appetizer food and all you can drink of the beer. The one who speaks perfect English had went to Miami. She says she lived in Miami and elsewhere, Florida. She tells me how when she went to the beach in Miami, she realized she needed a swimsuit that covered up more, because they don’t wear those types of bathing suits in Brazil. Too tiny. For Miami. I realized I needed to find a beach.

She told me to go up to the buffet and try some of this food. They pickle a lot of things and it’s often delicious. Lots of bread, sausages. I come back with a plate of one or two of what I found interesting. The plate wasn’t full. “Oh, he’s trying to be polite” one said. They roared laughing. “You on a diet, aHEHEHEH” By not stocking the plate high, it was a sign of some form of femininity, I assume. “Is that your plate” one asked, 4 minutes later. “I think it’s hers.”

Desculpe, acabou

It was four days ago now that I woke up in a panic in the king-sized bed I’ve been staying in at my father’s house. After many months of more telling people I was going than actually planning it, my flight to São Paolo Brasil was in 18 hours. My hands shook and my stomach had made room for my heart that had dropped from under the breast plate. And then I had breakfast.

I am actually surprised how that feeling didn’t hit me again on Tuesday morning, the actual day of the flight. But I was busy dealing with paying off final debts and catching the plane to actually think about where that plane was taking me. At the airport it was just unconsciously placing one foot in front of the other, taking the shoes off the foot, placing it in a bin, and then one foot in front of the other.

I flew AeroMexico, an airline I’d heard nothing about, except that it was about one grand cheaper than any other. So I expected something below southwest. But it was great. It had a free bar. No joke. Never been on a plane with a free bar before. I finished Yiddish Policeman’s Union on that flight and tried to sleep.

I arrived in Mexico City feeling sick. I’d started feeling sick in Chicago, actually, but being in Mexico City immediately meant that I’d been infected with swine flu. I walked back and forth through the terminals. The Mexico City Airport could easily be mistaken for one in America if not for all the Mexicans. Chilis, starbucks, etc. I ate dinner at a Chili’s watching Nadal face off against some dude. Nadal lost the first set after falling behind four games to one. I don’t know how the match ended up, but I left with the feeling that his opponent was eventually going to wear down and missing these ridiculous angles he’s found so far.

They deliver me a burger and a corona. Christina Aguilera’s ‘Dirty’ is playing in the background. There is lettuce and tomato on the burger. Being a responsible traveler, I scrape the lettuce and tomato off the bun. I probably did not get all the lettuce, but my body usually respects me when I don’t act willfully naïve. And so was here. No food poisoning. When it came time for the check it appeared the waiters were done with me. There was no food on my table, no drink. I was sitting, looking around at them for about 30 minutes. The table next to me who had ordered as I finished was now getting their check. I wondered to myself whether this is what it’s like to be a Mexican in America, but then he came over and we quickly sealed the deal. 180 pesos, I have no idea how much that is.

At 23:45, my flight from Mexico City to São Paolo took off. The plane was huge, where we each had our own tv’s with a remote in our arm rest. At this point I was feeling fairly sick and could barely open up my eyes. Ana told me to make friends on this flight so that they might help me when I get there. But everyone was either speaking Spanish, or looked like losers, and I wasn’t about to get off to a bad start in Brazil. Being an overnight plane, I spent all my time trying to sleep. My arm had accidentally hit the remote and the movie Australia was playing on my TV. At 10 a.m., with my throat at its worst, they served breakfast. I ate the fruit slowly, enjoying its coolness on my swollen, hot esophagus. I opened up the dish they served and it was enchiladas. Spicy enchiladas at that. And why I decided to eat them I do not know. Any good that the fruit did, I ruined with these. Then I drank coffee to destroy any comfort I once had.
And we arrived.
It was raining.
I had not filled out any of the forms for lack of pen. When we get to customs, I had 4 forms to fill out, and rustled a pen out of my back pack. At one point it asks for a phone number to be reached, so I pull out the phone that Ana had given me, loaded with minutes, and turned it on. As soon as I turned it on I’m bombarded with phone calls.

At this point my plan was to take the shuttle bus to the bus station (rodoviaria a tiete) and take a bus to Indaiatuba. Phone rings again, I’m filling out the forms – caller ID ‘Ana’s mom’. Hello! “Hello Ben this is Ana’s mom. My son Carlos is coming to pick you up.” “That’s great” (filling out forms) “You can call him, do you have a pen” I grab a pen and paper Okay! “His number is 87564534(not really his number), do you speak any Portugues?” Sorry, no “That’s okay, do you speak Spanish” Sorry No “That’s okay, you can call him and say Alo! Eu Ben” Eu Ben “Ehuh Ben” Ehuh Ben “(indiscernible) essentially for five minutes in the middle of the crowded table I’m saying EOU BEN over and over.

I walk through customs, change some Reals, and call Ana. She tells me her brother is picking me up and should have a sign with my name on it. I walk through the arrivals and don’t see him. I walk to the door and then text him. “Hi this is ben. I’m by the flores” I saw the word flores. Apparently he took that to mean I was standing with flowers. After walking back around I see him standing and looking with the sign and we shake hands.

After being prefaced that Carlos knows very little English, he knew quite enough to converse. I was once again embarrassed to be the only one unable to communicate. We step into his little Fiat and off off we go to the highways of Sao Paolo. Sao Paolo is just massive, with no organization, just sprawl. Four story buildings and housing units just everywhere. I realized I made the correct decision, as I was going to stay there originally. I wouldn’t have been able to find shit. While you are driving, motorcyclists just weave between you speeding through. A policia comes from behind, and there is no shoulder, so cars make enough room as the police speeds through, honks, and has a policeman hanging out the window waving his arms to move over and giving devil stairs.

Carlos points to the left. “This is one of our mighty rivers, the Cheetah.” He gives a look I can understand. “it’s very polluted,” I say. “Yes, very polluted, very disgusting.” The river runs through the middle of the city, is brown with trash just riddled throughout. Me and Carlos speak about music. I say the Brazilian bands I know: Os Mutantes, Gilberto Gil, Seu Jorge, Jorge Ben, the Diplo Favela remixes. He goes through how he likes Led Zeppelin and Metallica. Apparently Seu Jorge lived on the streets. He describes the band we are listening to, I’ve already forgotten their name, but they were quite good.

Past Sao Paolo we go, where the hillsides stop being Favelas and start being hillsides. Carlos points out the Eucalyptus trees. We travel on. He’s coming to America next year, thinking about Los Angeles or California in general. He points out the Wet n Wild he used to work at. He tries to describe something I figured meant detour, but in fact essentially means we are going off roading to Indaiatuba. I thought the roads were just fucked up.

The driving was admirable. There are so many potholes on this road its like driving on the moon, and you just have to pick the best one, and he’s still zooming through. It was beautiful; the road was Georgia clay red, surrounded by that hung over the road creating a canopy. A fruit stand abandoned with the colorful, rotting fruits just laying in piles being eaten by strays. We come up to a part where water covers 6/7s of the road across, Carlos picks the left side, we dip into about 3 feet of water. “Wash,” Carlos says. We pass dozens of farms growing fruit. We eventually make our way onto paved road, and here we were in Indaiatuba. We circle around a soccer stadium and he pulls in to a drive way. We open a gate and the door to the home is open, as are all other doors in the home. Everything stays open and just outside the door are some plants, grass, waterfalls, fish ponds. We make plans for tomorrow that will ultimately not come true, and I say goodbye to Carlos. Ana’s mom shows me around and tells me to make myself comfortable. She has to leave for the hospital.

I take the bed and fall asleep for 7 hours. Busy day.

My blog is better than your blog, sing it

Though, yes, currently stationed in Indaiatuba, Brazil with little to do, this first post will just be a placeholder to say, be ready.

Tomorrow, or amanha, I will go into the details of eating at a Chili´s in Mexico City listening to ´my humps`, arriving in Sao Paolo, my off roading trip with Ana´s brother Carlos, and subsequent 6 hour nap being assaulted by Frido the cat. But Wednesdays are a day of rest. Ask Frido, on my lap.

Boa noite