'La isla bonita': Morro de Sao Paulo, pt 1

Hey!

A few weeks ago I began writing some stories and impressions of mine from the trip to Bahia that Bryley, Yuen and I went on last August (yep I know it's been a while! Time flew by). When you arrive in Salvador, the grand capital of Bahia, it's inevitable to be struck by its natural environment (i.e. the sea, beaches and palm trees), its colonial architectural beauty in Pelourinho, its confident, attractive population; as well as its modernity and poverty, both of which stare you straight in the face. Salvador is, similar to Rio (though perhaps not to the same level), full of such contrasts, where the streets of the city are home both to great cultural heritage as well as many homeless people the society seems to turn their face away from as they pass. The city is a popular tourist playground, and you can find gringos from everywhere all year round. It's a place worth visiting, but perhaps one you have to prepare yourself for beforehand.

Salvador - Valenca - Morro de Sao Paulo

As we happened to go to Bahia in the depth of the Brazilian winter (read: it's still close to 30 degrees during the day but sometimes it rains and gets just a tad chilly at night), the place we headed to from Salvador was far less busy in that period, also as the winter holidays just ended, but would normally also be bustling with tourists - the beaches of Morro de Sao Paulo on the island of Tinharé. It's pretty quick and straightforward to get from Salvador to Morro de Sao Paulo if you take the more expensive, smaller boat that makes a direct journey in a couple of hours (but apparently is likely to leave you quite sea-sick). Instead, the three of us girls and our new friend from the hostel Silvana (resident of the actual city of Sao Paulo), took the cheaper, sea-sick-free, but longer and more complicated journey which involved getting a big ferry in Salvador across to the island nearby, where we were lucky to just catch the bus heading for a town called Valenca, where we arrived an hour and a half later. In Valenca, we had to wait a half hour to an hour for the speed boat to take us and a few other tourists to Morro de SP. I can no longer remember how we actually managed to figure all this out!

So, the journey took a little longer but I have to say that the bus ride from the place which name I no longer remember to Valenca was really interesting, because it went past beautiful countryside, with lush tropical green on both sides; and at the end of the bus trip we drove through what seemed like the central street of a small village, where you see somewhat depricated houses on your both sides, with elderly people sitting out beside their houses, and children running in the street; in other words, a place full of local life, and where everybody knows everybody else (as well as all the latest gossip ;-)). I suppose the kind of picture you would imagine to encounter in the countryside of a big, quickly developing nation... It must have been Valenca itself, even though from the tourist guides it would seem like a bigger, more modern place. Something to look into! In any case, Valenca is a proud host of a small local port, where we got on the speed boat to speed us off to the island. Heading for the same destination, we shared both our bus and boat with a Dutch family, which proves that you really do find Dutch people everywhere. And perhaps a funny detail to add is that the family consisted of one of those ultra-cool Dutch women in their forties with a pre-teen child and a younger boyfriend. Haha, awesome.

Yuen and me on the boat from Valenca to Morro de SP: it got so windy! :p



An hour or so later, we were on the island, a pretty little thing in the midst of the deep blue sea around. Ok, Tinharé is not actually that little, and we only visited a small part of it probably, the four (or five? six? help!) beaches that make up the now famous Morro de Sao Paulo. Or in any case, gathering that fame at a fast pace. From the shore, we had to climb up the steep but luckily short hill to reach the central square of the area, which leads on to the beaches so simply and unpretensiously named beach one, beach two, beach three, beach four... haha. Each has its specific characteristics and may appeal to various visitors in different ways, from what I remember beach one was kind of a normal beach with some bars and shops, beach two was the party beach, beach three quieter and more relaxed, and I don't even remember about beach four anymore. I do remember visiting all four of them, though our pousada - bed and breakfast Brazilian style, basically - was near to beach one, so pretty much at the 'front' of the island when you arrive, so to speak.

Oh yes, I was talking about climbing up to the central square: so that's the first thing you see when you finally get up with all your luggage (a small Eastpack, lol... but there are also lots of island boys who earn money from carrying tourists' luggage up and down the hill). The square is suuuuper cute, with a sort of Caribbean atmosphere, beautiful, colorful houses around, bars and restaurants, and in the evening it was full of life, with women selling lots of things such as jewellery, and children running around joyfully, while we sipped at our capeta's... oops, I got a little fast-forwarded there ;)

The pousada and the capeta

From the square, as a visitor you are likely to take one of the two ways, one along the 'main' street between mostly restaurants, hostels, pousadas, and shops; or the street parallel, which is basically the beach. Yes, one, two, three, four, one following the other. Life on a island is simple, isn't it? :*** As we first had to actually find a place to stay, we took that first option, and quickly found ourselves staying at a really cute pousada owned and run by a nice Brazilian couple in their thirties or early forties, where we had lots of space actually, as we stayed two to a room, with a whole terrace (including awesome hanging lounge chairs and a hammock) which we shared only with one other couple from New Zealand during our two-three day stay on the island. For some reason we were doubting at first how long we were gonna stay at this pousada, but I don't know anymore why, since it was actually pretty royal. Also, one of us mentioned that the pousada owner said that after we see the breakfast, we won't wanna change to another hostel or whatever, and that's so true. The breakfast was the most f* amazing I've had in Brazil, hahaha. But about that a little later.

Once we settled in at our pousada we explored the nearby area a little, though it was already getting dark, and then decided to have dinner at our own pousada, which has a small balcony, and seemed like a good option for the night for four hungry travelers. It was so funny when we got there because on that same balcony was an adolescent couple busy admiring each other, who looked at us like we were a little crazy when we arrived, as if they were thinking, 'someone actually came for dinner? ooook...' So they had to retreat to the neighbouring kitchen and start working, and the guy was our waiter for the evening - the restaurant was pretty much to ourselves during that time, as it's really small, pretty much just the balcony from what I remember. The food was really good though, with some of that Bahian-style palm-oil prepared sea food (why didn't we take a photo??), yum.

The pretty square at Morro de SP, bustling with local and tourist life


When we left to go to Bahia, Mariana, my host sister, tipped us off to try the Bahian capeta cocktail, which consists of vodka and liquid chocolate I believe, and proudly and justly bears the name 'little devil'. As we sat down after dinner at the aforementioned square to admire the evening atmosphere around, we couldn't miss the opportunity to try it :p It was very devilishly good, hehe.



Enjoying the Bahian capeta's

Well for now that's it as I don't want to make this post so long you won't get to the end, and I will write more about Morro de SP in part two soon!! :) (And the promised story of the breakfast and the 11 caipirinhas, which will leave you hungry and thirsty, hahaha).

Thanks for reading!

Beijos!

Quando na Holanda... about receiving Brazilian friends in Holland :)

Oi oi!

I guess when it comes to seeing the wonderful friends I made in Brazil again on this European side of the ocean, I'm quite lucky. In December and January I played host to my lovely Brazilian host sisters Mariana and Cacau for two weeks (including the trip to Paris), and was sad to see them go - it seemed so weird not to have guests in the house anymore! Someone to take care of from morning to evening, hahahhaa... never thought of myself as a house wife per se (still don't), but I guess I don't make such a bad (host) zusje. Yay for that! :-)

And just a couple of weeks ago (actually, I'm a little lazy and late with this post, hehe) another very special friend from Brazil came to visit me in Holland, Vico. Though he was only here for two days (despite my very elaborate but unfulfilled plans to detour him from getting his train back to Paris...), it was enough for him to fall in love with the country, so now I'm sure he'll be coming back again before too long. There's so much more to still see and do! I'll be waiting =)

In these two days, I was happy to receive Vico at my house too, where he could meet my mum and speak some Russian, take in all the Matryoshka dolls around and get comfortable at my 'cute house' as he called it somewhere on facebook (I spied it in Portuguese, lol). After a little misunderstanding beforehand, he realized once he was here that my house actually isn't in some far off strange place (as it seems I described it, haha), but is actually in quite a nice neighbourhood, hehe. It's no surprise that after seeing my house, taking a tour of Leiden under the almost-professional guidance by Bryley, and a night- and day take on Amsterdam, Vico left so enamoured with Holland ;-) The two days flew by so fast, it was like lightning. Luckily, we had some time to explore many charms of Amsterdam both at night (including the Red Light District :p) and during the day, when the sun was so kind as to shine for us the whole day. That was beauuutiful!


Together in Leiden, with the key image of Holland in the background: a true-life Dutch windmill!

Although Vico was only here for two days, it seemed strange at first after he left to go back to the normal routine (though a couple of days later I started a new job, so not completely the old routine actually). I had the feeling again as if there is something missing from the picture - where the Brazilian friend to take care of? Haha. *Sniff*!

And what was also really great is that Vico got to meet some more of my friends - and vice versa! Now when I keep talking about Brazil to my friends as well as my mum, at least some of them will be able to put the actual person they met to the story I'm telling. Particularly as all my friends who met my Brazilian friends liked them all, and the other way around! (And it was so hilarious because Vico spent a month in Russia before this visit and so he kept putting in phrases in Russian into his conversation that he learnt there... while my friends in Holland are more or less hopeless at understanding it, hahaha).

Now there's been three Brazilians who came to visit - so I hope the number will keep on going up, and those who've already been will come back again. As for me, life has once quite unexpectedly sent me to Brazil, so let's hope it will do so again soon enough! To help me with my Brazilian saudade, Vico also kindly brought me some gifts from Juiz de Fora, which warm up my culturally-torn heart, while they decorate my table and play on my iTunes. Rsrsrs :)

(NB Hahaha, that stands for risos, which means 'smiles' in Portuguese, and is one of the ways Brazilians express their emotions on internet lol. I thought it was weird at first too.)

As I promised before, there's still more to write about my experiences in Juiz de Fora and traveling in Brazil, with Morro de Sao Paulo in Bahia as the next story destination. I haven't forgotten - and I hope you won't forget to check it out, because it's coming soon!!!

Beijo!

O que o baiana tem?

Hello there! :)

Last Sunday I saw a performance by a Brazilian singer called Alessandra Leao at the Tropentheater in Amsterdam. Coming from the state of Pernambuco in the Northeast of Brazil, she gave a great show with the support of three percussionists and three guitarists, and, not to forget, her amazing voice. Her music is meant to combine the traditional and modern elements of the Northeastern Brazilian music, and gorgeous as that theater is, I wish I could just dance to her music, I think I wouldn't have sat down for the whole hour and a half.

I've never been to Pernambuco, though I would love to travel through more of the Northeast of Brazil, but till now the closest I got to there was Bahia, just to the south of Pernambuco. It would be difficult for me of course to draw comparisons between the two states as I haven't been to Pernambuco or the rest of the Northeast, but I believe that having sampled some Bahian culture I can imagine a bit of what lays in store if you venture up north from Salvador, the capital of Bahia. Alessandra Leao's performance being the starting point for this post, I would actually like to talk a bit more about Bahia, which is an extremely popular place to visit among the travelers to Brazil, and I've been lucky enough to be among them.

Salvador, the fast-beating heart of Bahia

Salvador da Bahia is a city that leaves a lasting impression, similar in that respect to Rio de Janeiro. It has fascinating history as it was the first place in Brazil to have been colonized by the Portuguese, and for many years it was the center and capital of the newly emerging country under European colonial rule as well as the center of the slave trade. The majority of the residents of the city have African roots, and the city is bursting with the Afro-European influences of its past. It has a beautiful, extremely colourful city center called Pelourinho, with the buildings and churches built in Portuguese style adorning the steep cobbled streets. (They are so steep and cobbled that walking up and down wearing even havaianas was a challenge, let alone the heels the Brazilian girls fancy so much). Pelourinho is famous for its Tuesday party nights, when the best percussion band in the world, Olodum, takes on these very steep cobbled streets to beat out the kind of rhythms on their drums that won't leave you standing still (despite the cobbles). Olodum are accompanied by a couple of dancers who show the rest of the crowd how to dance to the music, and there are several lines of locals and tourists following them. Do you remember Michael Jackson's video for 'They don't care about us?' Yep, that's Pelourinho, and it's Olodum.

Salvador is no less famous for its amazing shows of capoeira; one night we went to see a Bahian folklore dance show in Pelourinho, and it was absolutely smashing. It wasn't just capoeira, but also candomblé, which is a popular Brazilian religion (like a cult I suppose), and some samba too, I believe. But omg, the dancing was amazing, and so was the capoeira. And well, those young capoeira guys sure know what they're worth, which was easy to tell just by the way they stood outside after the performance. Tall, dark and handsome (literally), and amazing dancers in addition, their testosterone levels must be particularly high after each performance, especially as they can see the girls eyeing them afterwards. (As a note, the guys perform without shirts for much of the time. A week later, when we were back in Pelo, our hostel owner kept encouraging all the girls to go see the show because of all the male performers).

Yes, Bahia is a magnificent center of culture, music and dancing. Quite a few famous Brazilian writers and musicians come from Bahia, including Jorge Amado, one of the best known Brazilian writers (whose most well known work 'Dona Flor and her two husbands', which takes place in Bahia, is waiting on my book shelf for me to be read), and Ivete Sangalo, the queen of Brazilian axé music, and as many of you would already know, one of my favourite singers now ;) Ivete's music is known to boom out at Carnaval, and I could honestly dance to her music for four days straight, as they probably do in Salvador, to which she seems quite faithful when it comes to Carnaval. Some of her songs, too, specifically refer to Salvador, especially with relation to Carnaval and dancing at Pelourinho; for instance in one song she sings, "Come, my love, come to Olodum, and let's dance together at Pelo"... can you guess that she's a proud baiana (Bahian woman)?

Somewhere I heard, or read, that except for Rio, where samba is the deal, the rest of Brazil dances Carnaval to axé, so it's no wonder that Ivete has such musical status in Brazil. Some of her music plays in the Brazilian film Ó Pai Ó, which takes place during Carnaval in Salvador, the film I saw at the Amsterdam open-air film festival in August last year, a week after I was back from Brazil, and only recently after the trip to Bahia. Imagine what it was like for me to watch that film, recognizing all those cobbled streets and colourful buildings in Pelourinho, with all that music and dancing...


One of the central, and steepest, streets of Pelourinho :p


There is a lot to say about Salvador, Bahia, and our trip there in general, and I don't want to sound like a tour guide. But certainly, this is a place worth visiting in Brazil, though as a foreign girl you have to prepare yourself, because it's not just the handsome capoeira boys who show off high testosterone levels in Salvador. At times the male attention was quite intense, actually, even though there are so many other gringa's around, as the place is such a tourist bomb, that you'd think the men wouldn't bother you much. Not that I was particularly bothered, but after being touched by random men in the streets a few times, with the accompanying 'Ei, lindaaa' (hey, beautiful), you think, huh. In another place, like Holland, I'd be like, 'why are you touching me??' but in Brazil, after a while I just kinda got used to being ready for almost anything of that sort ;)
In Brazil, you can expect much attention from men as a girl, and in a city like this it is particularly true as the men did seem to think quite a bit of themselves, hahaha. Oh, and did I mention that their women are really beautiful, and their curves would make even Beyoncé jealous? One of the most culturally rich states in Brazil, no wonder there is a saying that goes along the lines of 'Que o que o baiana tem?' (What oh what does a Bahian have?)

About playing 'fortress' on the beach

And of course, there are the beaches in Salvador, too :p It's a big city, with at least a million people, and Pelo is just a small part of it. Much of the city is very modern, surrounded by beaches as well as high-rises in addition to the old colonial center. One afternoon, we took a bus along the city coast in the opposite direction from the city center, to check out this apparently great beach an hour's ride away. I suppose the beach itself was pretty great, but once we actually arrived there after an hour on the bus, the darkening skies have opened to leave us little choice but try to find a place to hide in one of the beach restaurants. As you can imagine, many people had the same idea, and Bryley, Yuen and I ended up fashioning a little beach umbrella fortress out on the deck of the restaurant, with the kind help of one of waiters. And actually, that was fuuuun, like playing house, or in this case house caught up in a (small) storm on the beach, as little kids :) And since we haven't had lunch yet, this was the perfect time for it, so we ordered this huge oven-prepared fish with a bunch of side-dishes. It was a pretty good afternoon given that we rode out to this beach a million light years away from the city, got caught in the rain and didn't actually get to lie on the beach or swim. And the trip back on the bus was also accompanied by rain. But I did enjoy the trip there anyways, because most of it takes you along the seaside, which is a great way to see more of the place.


Our awesome little fortress on the beach!! :)


Caipirinhas vs. football

Bryley, Yuen and me traveled to Salvador with the three of us and first stayed in a hostel near the beach in the neighbourhood called Barra for a few nights, including a forró dance party at a club we went to with a bunch of people on a bus they arranged (I don't remember anymore exactly how they arranged it or who was in that group), which was fun but ended up with two of the super-drunk French guys leaving the place before us and there was this whole issue at the door because the security wouldn't let us leave because of it since they hadn't paid. Luckily we could go before it got too long, and the next day the guys turned out to still be alive and unharmed after all (as they stumbled out so drunk and just went off in a random direction at night in Salvador, which isn't recommended).

By the time we got to this trip, I had developed a sort of habit of having a caipirinha almost daily (at least when traveling!!), without which something seemed to miss from my daily ratio (oops!). But think about it, it's like the French and wine, isn't it... hahaha. Don't worry I've dropped the habit a long time ago. But in Salvador, too, we went out with the three of us girls to have some cocktails at a bar in a whole bar-party area a walking distance from our beach hostel, where we joined all the many Brazilians whose eyes were on the game between two Brazilian football teams. I remember having a caipirinha with strawberries that night... OMG, so good! And it's just so much fun to be out at a bar sipping your caipirinha during a game, with all these Brazilians going crazy supporting these - to me, random - teams. Somehow I never have this feeling when there is a TV on with a football game at a (usually Irish) bar in Holland.

Oh, and there was this random party that we ventured into one of the nights, where the thing that springs to mind first was that one of the guys that was circling around us wouldn't believe I was from Minas Gerais, because apparently I 'don't look Brazilian'. Whatever happened to the Brazilian ethnic and cultural variety? Melting pot, and all that? Boo. Oh well, haha.

We spent a few days in Salvador after which we headed to a nearby island called Morro de Sao Paulo with our new friend Silvana, returning back to Salvador for a day at the end of our trip. But I will tell you about Morro de Sao Paulo next time, as well as the night of eleven caipirinhas... as a result of joined effort, mind you! Haha ;)

Beijo!

About the diversity of writing

Heya!

In one of my previous posts I wondered about travel journalism (after musing about the abundance of international experiences nowadays), which is a very sought-after job, though it can't be as easy as it seems. And it's definitely not easy to get, because how many writers (and even people who aren't even interested in that) would refuse a paid-for trip to another part of the world? Not many, I suppose. Take a look, Elizabeth Gilbert wrote a book based on a whole year of traveling around the world, which her publisher was willing to pay for her in advance. Now that publisher is probably counting up the big bucks from the sales of the book, but there's something almost fairy-tale like about this story, as the sceptical ones among us will point out, as it's not so easy for most people to just take off exploring the world for a year. But hey, I read the book, it made for some good entertainment one way or the other.

Myself, I first started writing my silly little childhood stories when I was about 8. Obviously, at that age I did not yet think much of it, but till this day my mum sometimes fondly recollects how I used to sit at the table when I was a child and just write, write, write. By the time I was 12 I already had a pretty good idea that one day I would like to be a published writer. And perhaps all those pages (I mean it, it's quite a lot actually haha, I even had characters and a storyline) I filled with my Russian scribbles may not get published in their original form, I really feel like they have become a part of me during those years. I grew up with the story and the story grew up with me, and as I often tend to go by the writer's rule of 'write what you know', I based much of the underlying ideas in the story on my own experiences. And what do you expect, I was what, 10? The funniest thing is, I actually re-wrote the beginning of the story a few times, because as with every passing year I became more mature, the previous beginning I wrote just seemed so childish to me. I wonder what I would think of it if I read it now... it has been years since I've been busy with that story. And at some point, during high-school in the Netherlands, I also made the switch from writing in Russian to writing in English. Now that's probably something that not many writers actually do, but that's how it is. It's like what they refer to in music as 'cross-over' (although I'm not a big fan of that concept in the way it gets used to describe music artists).

Though they are tucked away safely in the pages of my multi-coloured notebooks, somewhere in my room, you can't say that the characters I created in my childhood (these were not imaginary friends I created out of loneliness by the way, just to make this point clear hahaha) will never experience the joy of being published and decorating the shelves of bookstores. Sure, I grew up and so did they, but who's to say they can't feature in another novel again? Those are gonna be some spunky young ladies. Hahaha.

Why all this reminiscinesce, you might ask. Actually I didn't even mean to write about my childhood writing activities, what I wanted to point out was that since my teenage years when I was already sure that someday I'd like to be a published writer and possibly journalist, too, I've been trying to figure out what aspects of writing and journalism interest me the most. Thanks to my university background, I've written academic and research papers on everything from pshychoanalyzing a famous movie character to the role of testosterone in male spacial cognitioning abilities (hmm, or something like that..), to Disney's Americanization of European fairytales. Diverse? Sure is. But so is journalism, and even after writing for a variety of school and university publications, volunteering my time and efforts to be a 'Society and Culture' newspaper editor, and courses in creative writing and journalism, I still haven't quite figured out what writing path would be the best for me, especially as an international in the Netherlands, with English as the principal language in which I write.

The case is similar for my reading interests, too. One minute I'm reading about the latest news (inevitably, often about something unpleasant), sometime later I'm looking through the articles in a women's magazine giving me advice on how to better lead my life, before I go to bed I read a novel, and in between there somewhere I might also get through a travel article, not without some jealousy, I might add. Having just a touch of nerdness in me, I've devoured many different books in my life, including those for university, with piles of published musings and research on both the US and Disney proudly taking up their space on my bookshelves. And just yesterday I thought, but what happened to all that psychology I studied at University College? I don't (consciously) use what I learned from it nowadays, but perhaps it's because I forgot much of it? So I may be fishing out those big textbooks sometime to find out what it is I've actually learnt about it, and how might I be able to use that knowledge. It can't just be me though who thinks, I learned all that and wrote all those essays, hmmmm.

Well, as the here and now goes, I'm still figuring out where my writing interests are exactly, although you might just say it's in 'diversity' (as you can probably tell from this post itself!). Whether it's in journalism and news, travel-writing, producing 'diverse' articles for various publications on an array of topics (as has mostly been the case till now), book-publishing (hopefully) or communications for non-profit organizations (also hopefully), I'm going to keep on trying to get there. By 'there' you may interpret what you wish at the moment, I've given much here for your imagination to go in all kinds of directions ;) And as part of it all, well, there's the blog you're reading. Thanks!

Beijo!

On my Brazilian hometown, pt 2

Oi gente!

There still seems to be a rather overwhelming amount to write about my life in Juiz de Fora and Brazilian travels, and sometimes I wonder what it says about me that almost a year since I left (note: left, not came back) for Brazil, I am still trying to write about all that. Ideally I would have liked to have written about it as it was happening, but on the other hand having had time and distance since my internship has allowed me to think a little clearer and reflect better about my life there. I would still encourage others to try and write as much as they can about their current special experiences and travels, but perhaps in my case I needed some time to let it settle. Besides it's also quite therapeutical to be able to write about Brazil.

In the beginning of July, the weekend after my birthday, was my last full week working at the school. On Monday someone dropped a word that it was my birthday the past weekend, and I was sung a birthday song by the people in the lunch room, led by teacher Wagner. Haha. That week we had to finish the preparations for the South Africa cultural lunch on Friday, and the class responsible, which has such cuuute kids in it of 7-8 years old, had me (and Bryley!) to help them that week with the activities beforehand, as well as general games. The kids in that class are really fun, and there are several girls who are just crazily affectionate, they were the ones who would always run up to me in the school yard screaming during the break in their afternoon class, 'Marina! Marina!' and hang themselves off me. Aww, kids. There is nothing like their sincere affection, is there, especially at that age (before they start developing complex (pre)adolescence character traits and behaviors). I have to say though, as much as I loved the affection (and attention) they showed, when two or three of them would try to sit on me at the same time, that got pretty heavy. Just holding one 7-year-old on your lap can get pretty heavy after a while, let alone three!

This was an interesting week in a slightly different way from previous ones because I had a gringa-friend with me to show around and take along to places ;) From Saci, to my first host-family's house for a visit, to Vico's Portuguese classes, to shopping for sneakers (where we ended up getting the same pair of All Stars), to watching the Holland game against Uruguai in the semi-final, to the amazing Japanese cones at the Cone e Cia restaurant, to samba at Muzik with my Brazilian host-sisters and friends, dinner at an Arabic-style dinner place with friends, and going out at W100 with Mari and Cacau (after we waited for an HOUR in a stuffed crowd to get in) and trying those yummy watermelon cocktails, Bryley had accompanied me around that week in JF. And, of course, the two main events of the week, my Russian-themed birthday party at Vico's house (hehe, yes I'm that self-centered), and the Holland final against Spain (with that interview with the Tribuna de Minas newspaper sports reporter beforehand as well, that I wrote about in my entry on the World Cup), both in the weekend. But about that a bit later.

Introducing a friend from another country to everyone at your workplace, to your friends, host family, etc, is interesting. Oh, and helping to translate the language when you run into people who don't speak English, which happened often enough in Brazil. (Although, Bryley was quick to start understanding the language). And it's interesting for all parties involved: for Bryley to see all the people I've met, for the people I've met to meet another gringa, and for me to see how everyone reacted, and to get Bryley's reaction to everything around her that to her was new, but for me became so familar already. The newcomer's perspective on the life that you'd gotten used to is a curious thing to observe.

On Monday, we went to see my first host family, because I haven't been back for a while since I moved, and it was funny to bring a friend along. But to me, as I remember it, the funniest was to come into the house and start chatting around with my family, in Portuguese, and it was so... easy! The language, I mean; my host family is lovely, but when I lived with them I still had much of the language to learn (I still do, actually), but when I came back in July, chatting to them in Portuguese went so easily and spontaneously, it was a surprise for me too, in fact. So I wonder what Bryley was thinking as I was talking to Aninha and her parents and sister, bla bla bla in Portuguese; I turned into a true Brazilian (meaning, you don't stop talking!). I mean, I even dragged her to Portuguese classes at Vico's school, and at some point we were learning about past tenses: preterito perfeito and preterito imperfeito, which I even had trouble with. Imagine someone who just came to the country trying to keep up with all that language overload! Well, I know how that feels, actually. And, for the record, Bryley also accompanied me to a couple of Vico's English classes too, to impart her own language skills to help his students.

I remember my friend Fernanda at Saci told me that she learned quite a lot of Spanish working with the children in Ecuador; she said to me, let the kids teach you Portuguese, but it was hard for me to learn from the kids as it was my job to speak to them in English, and the little ones were actually pretty difficult still to understand. Many of the kids did figure out by the end though that I'd learned much of the language, some of the bigger ones even consciously spoke some Portuguese with me. Well, at the end of that week I even gave an almost hour long presentation about myself and my culture to about 30-40 kids of 6-11 years old, all in Portuguese! I guess that was evidence enough for them after all that I did learn it :) (Some have been wondering about it for a while, but I was often a little vague about it, should they stop speaking English to me at all, while it was my responsibility to help them progress, hehe).

I really liked my job at Saci, it was relaxed and varied, sometimes with more responsibilities and tasks than at other times, and I really liked working with kids (under the teacher's hardcore supervision!). The kids at this school come from quite well off families though, and until my last week working at Saci, I haven't actually come into much contact with the less fortunate children in Brazil. Some older students at Saci went every so often to a Centro do Promocao do Menor in JF, a kind of social organization which houses a number of children who have come to live there because of difficult family circumstances or even abuse. That week, Bryley and I were taken along with the class and some teachers, and it was so interesting and moving to visit these children. Most of them are still quite young, not older than 10, and I just remember one of the teachers, who's really good with kids (I know because I went on a school trip to Tiradentes where she was in charge), sitting among a bunch of these cute, shy kids, with one on her lap, and a few holding close. The students from Saci were standing around as Maria do Carmo (the teacher) entertained the kids with conversation. Later, the students gave out the little gift packages with candy they brought for the kids and helped the children open them up; and everyone sat around, talking or playing with different children. Meanwhile, some boys were running around the yard like crazy (boys will be boys!).

This was a unique experience for me as it was one of the few times in Brazil when I came closer in contact with the more difficult side of the Brazilian social circumstances (as Maria do Carmo put it, if I recall correctly). Until that moment I was mostly working with quite well-off or middle-class children at the school, so I confess coming to this center made me a little uncertain at first how to behave there, how exactly to interact with the children, many of whom have had quite difficult childhoods. On the other hand, of course, children are just children anywhere, and those children just want to have affection and love as any others. There was a cute boy there who seemed to be quite fond of me, holding on to me, talking and smiling, and it's the same kind of affection other kids at Saci have shown, too. But as I said, somehow being there for the first time made me less certain how to interact with these children as many come from quite difficult circumstances, and you don't know what they are; and some children were quite shy, and it's overall a rather sensitive issue. I wish now I could have had the opportunity to go there with the school more often, so I could have become more familiar there while the children would become more used to me, too. As Maria do Carmo said, she visits often and the children are easy and comfortable with her, as well as some of the other students.

And now for something completely different! After quite a full and intense week in JF, on Saturday we have gathered a bunch of AIESEC people together at Vico's house for my birthday party, Russian style. With Russian pancakes (for which we had to freeze the Brazilian creme de leite for lack of creme freche), a birthday cake (thanks girls!), Russian souvenirs on display, drinks (including the funky Russian liquour from Ufa, the city near the Ural mountains in Russia) and crazy Russian videos with a lot of female nudity (thanks again for showing to everyone what kind of media goes around my country, Vico ;)). Aaaah, it was such a fun party. All these people around, everyone in great spirits; with a birthday song (for me! yay) and cake the girls sneaked out to get while the first serving of pancakes was ready on the table, Tammy waving around the Russian flag, Yuen sleeping randomly on the couch, AIESEC committee president Leo in full Dutch football spirit in the orange Holland sweatshirt, hugging the Russian teddy-bear for all the photos, taking lots of pictures, making a deal with Mariana that she'll come to Holland for NYE (which she kept up), and just lots of fun randomness like that (like those naked Russian videos... ahem. I didn't even know they got quite that explicit!).

Afterwards, some of us went to have some more food at an Italian restaurant, where our long table had a paper cover, which got covered by writing in various languages throughout our dinner, and no, there were no children at the table, it was just us making all those scribbles, drawings, little games. =) And I so vividly remember, when we left the restaurant, it was raining lightly outside after a very dry winter (Brazilian winter, that is) period. Huh.

The next day, it was game time at a local bar, that is, time to watch the final between Holland and Spain. As I wrote before, we have gathered quite a group (mostly consisting of not-in-Holland-living-people but actually Brazilians) to watch the game, dressed in orange, taking lots of photos and waving around the Dutch flags and wearing the orange glasses for the photos, under the curious gazes of the other Brazilians at the bar. Well, Holland lost, but oh well. It didn't stop us from going over to a Japanese restaurant around the corner from Mari's place and eating all their sushi. Or at least some of it.

Well, that's my story for today, and look I kept my promise, got over my 'saudade' and wrote more about JF. Woohoo!

Um beijo grande!

On my Brazilian hometown - pt 1

Oi!

I recall that when I held my 'speech' at my despedida (goodbye party) in Brazil, I honestly told everyone that when I first arrived in Juiz de Fora, around the area near the bus station, I thought, 'Omg, where did I arrive?' Hahaha. In my guide book JF didn't get much attention from the authors, other than being referred to as the 'ugly industrial town' on the way between Rio and Belo Horizonte, two of the biggest cities in the area. However, even though the area around the station is not so pretty per se, I wouldn't put it quite that harshly. And by the time I got to the city center and my host family's house on my arrival day, I was already beginning to quite like the city.

What's funny, before I came to Brazil, I often associated South America with Shakira's song and especially videoclip 'Ciega, Sordomuda'. It's one of my favorite songs by her, and I don't know why, but I just love the video, and to me, it has this South American (Colombian?) flavour about it. In a way, I could draw a parallel between JF and the setting for this video, not because it's visually extremely alike, but because there is this... South American feeling about them both. And when I walked down the street in JF, I always enjoyed this feeling of just being there, this continent I've dreamed of, breathing in the air and the atmosphere around me. So when you get into JF town, though it's not exceptionally beautiful, you certainly can't call the city ugly! Ok, I've seen more stunning sights in Brazil, and as a tourist you wouldn't have much to do in the city, but it's my favorite place in Brazil. First of all, because of the people of course! My friends, my host families, everyone I had met, through AIESEC, at Saci, the kids, all the people I ran into through other friends when out in the evenings. With half a million people, JF is actually around the same size as my hometown in Russia. And now it's legitimally my Brazilian hometown for sure! Though there aren't many tourist attractions in JF, in its own way it's still so beautiful. And once you have your good group of friends to spend free time with, it's great!

The name of the city is actually kind of funny, as it's so strange - it literally means 'The judge from out of here'. It took a few people to explain this name to me before the meaning finally stuck with me. From what I recall, initially the city grew very fast back when industrialism began kicking in: JF's location near to Rio de Janeiro, on the border of Minas Gerais, spurred that growth. But there weren't any judges in town, imagine that. So, judges from other places had to keep coming to Juiz de Fora, and were referred to as the 'judge from out of here'. And so the name stuck and the city now proudly bears this fact from its history in it. Oh I do hope I got this story right!

I lived with two host-families in JF, first with Ana's (from AIESEC) family near the city centre, in a nice neighbourhood, with a few English schools around, the fancy night club Privilege not too far from there, and the viewing point called Morro do Christo a bit further up the hill, where you can see practically the whole city before you. I used to walk down a long central street (many streets in JF are interminably long) to get into town then, passing through the Parque Halfeld, which is the center of the city and the classic meeting and hanging out point for many people. It faces the shopping street on the other side of the street, called Calcadao, which is busy day and night. I can vividly recall walking down the Calcadao; after work, in the weekend, or just passing by on the bus. The city theatre, the Teatro Municipal it was called I think, is also located right in the middle of the Calcadao.

After a couple of months, I moved from Ana's house to live with Mariana, Cacau and their mother to another neighbourhood of town on the other side of the city center. This area is full of bars and restaurants, and has a small shopping center (with a cinema), so it's always busy and full of young people hanging out. It's the hip part of town :) As many bars were close by, including the one where AIESEC'ers would often get together at, it was so easy for me to get to. The area around the bars was also where people would gather to party after the World Cup games. I loved living in this area, the neighbourhood is lively and full of activity. There was also this cool trampoline around the corner from my house, where kids would always jump up and down, and I was always jealous of them :p

There are several other places around town I would want to talk about, but I'm starting to feel a bit like a tour guide ;) There is the beautiful park Manuel Honorio, with a lake, tall slender palm trees and swans; a lot of very nice churches, and interesting streets and squares in town. There is one epic place that deserves a mention, too: the club called Muzik. What's so special about a club you might think, but aside from their great Wednesday samba nights, for me it's just full of memories, among them my host sister wearing an angel outfit and passing around Valentine's cards to people in the club.

Beijos!

How to become Isabel Allende

Well, not become her literally, of course. But you know, like in literature ;)

It would be quite a crazy ambition for me to aim to go quite that high (not impossible - but pretty crazy), but her work serves as inspiration nevertheless. As I am currently reading my signed (!) copy of her latest novel, Island Beneath the Sea, it always makes me wonder what a great imagination she must have, and how well she manages to mix it with history, all perfectly inter-woven in her deep but sensitive plotline, with a feminine heroine at the front as usual, one who is a model of a strong, independent woman despite her life circumstances. When someone at the book signing in Utrecht last October pointed out that she always has strong female characters, Isabel said 'Do you know any weak women?'

Good rhetorical question! But how do you become like Isabel Allende? I believe she began her career in journalism, but her first book, still generally considered her best, 'House of the Spirits', a fictional novel in the magical realism genre based on some of her own life experiences and rather eccentric family members, came out in the early 1980's while she was in exile after the military coup in Chile, which took place in 1973. Something like that of course has the power to change one's life forever. I suppose there isn't much point to try and 'be' like someone else, but their work and temperament (like Allende's, for now I've actually seen her in real life and thereby briefly met one of my favorite writers) can serve as sure inspiration. I can only wish that one day I can draw up, publish and sell a novel as colorful, compelling and rich in detail as one of hers! Would I be able to handle the almost military writing regime of starting at 7am, working till evening, and going on in such a way until the novel is written and ready (however long that actually takes)? Talent is one thing of course, but there's the hard work, too. It's hard, hard work to write and publish a novel, many writers work according to a similar schedule, and that's something to face up too if that's a dream to fulfill. Sounds a little nerve-racking, doesn't it?

There is a great novel by another favorite writer of mine, Sophie Kinsella, who writes in a genre very different to Allende. She is the author of the famous Shopaholic series. This novel I'm talking about is not though, it's called 'The Undomestic Goddess', about a 29-year-old woman who is one step from becoming a partner in a law firm, but otherwise has no life, really. Due to some wondrous and wicked circumstances she suddenly ends up being a housekeeper after running away from her job at the law firm as she discovers a huge mistake on her part - with absolutely no domestic skills whatsoever. As she is starting to get into her new job though, her old life of a lawyer is there again on her doorstep, and she is facing a difficult dilemma. I won't spoil it for you in case you meant to read the book, I just remembered it as an example that you can give a kick-new-start to your life at any point, really, and in the most unexpected ways.

^^