Adventures of a Gringa

The Greatest Gift

There are few things I'm truly proud of, things that took years of hard work and determination and effort. One of those things are my language skills.

It's hard for me to imagine that just four years ago, I could barely speak Portuguese. I took a course while studying abroad in Buenos Aires, but it was hard to learn much while being immersed in Spanish and only having one Portuguese class a week. I struggled a lot, and since I was the only American in the class, I was an instant target for the teacher, who especially enjoyed picking on me. During the final exam, I was lost for part of the written test, and I was a complete disaster during the oral exam. I couldn't help but spew a terrible amalgam of mostly Spanish with a few Portuguese words thrown in. The teacher gritted his teeth as I stumbled over my words. I just barely passed.

While traveling in Brazil shortly after, my friends and I had a rather unfortunate incident involving crossed wires and misunderstandings (though not on our part), which forced me to speak as much Portuguese as I could possibly muster. And though it was miserable and completely minimal, we communicated, and finally worked things out. It was my first triumph em portugues.

Now, my Portuguese is as good as, if not better than my Spanish. Every job I have had since graduating from college has depended on my language skills, including the jobs I have now. I listen to music, watch movies, and read books in Spanish and Portuguese. I can occasionally fool people into thinking I'm a native speaker. I have served as a bridge between people and countries. I even help others learn Portuguese. And while I'm still far from perfect, I love the challenge of learning new words and expressions.

There are so many great quotes about languages, like that a person who speaks one language is worth one person, but a person who speaks two languages is worth two people. There's Karl Albrecht, who said, "Change your languages and you change your thoughts." There's Federico Fellini, who said, "A different language is a different vision of life." And there's a Czech proverb that says, "Learn a new language and get a new soul."

Speaking Portuguse (and Spanish) is one of the greatest gifts I could ever receive, gifts I worked hard to earn. I would be lost without them.

Flashback: Cachoeira, 2006

Since I was staying with one of my half-Brazilian friends in Salvador, who goes there every year to visit family and has seen all the sights a million times, we decided to go to Cachoeira, a tiny historic town nearby where she had never been.

We took the bus out of the city, into the countryside, one of my favorite things to do any time I travel. I sat glued to the window, watching farmland roll by.

When we got to the rodoviaria, I thought we might have gotten off at the wrong stop. It seemed there wasn't really anything there. So I went for my dog-eared Lonely Planet to see what there was to see. The online Lonely Planet reports the following:

Cachoeira, affectionately known as the jewel of the recôncavo, is a sleepy place, full of colorful, mostly preserved colonial architecture uncompromised by the presence of modern buildings. The town sits below a series of hills, strung along the banks of the Rio Paraguaçu in a face-off with its twin, São Félix. A steady trickle of tourism flows through the area, attracted by Brazil’s best tobacco, its reputation as a renowned center of Candomblé and a strong wood-sculpting tradition. If you get an early start, Cachoeira and São Félix make a great day trip from Salvador, or stay the night and explore at a more relaxed pace.

Since it was the only colonial town I visited in Bahia (other than Salvador), with a really interesting and somewhat disturbing history, I was eager to explore.

Read the full tale with photos after the jump.

Flashback: Salvador, 2006

Even after living in Rio for two years, when I think of Brazil fondly, with saudades, I also think of Salvador. I'm not sure I could live there, but of all the cities in Brazil I've been to that I really want to go back to, Salvador is at the top of the list. I love Latin American cities with a strong African influence (hence my love for the Caribbean), and this city just breathes Africa.

Flashback: Castelo das Pedras, 2006

This continues the Flashback series about my first experience in Brazil, when I traveled there in 2006.

Like any hostel tourist, I took the advice of the staff about what was a "must do" in Rio, and they suggested going to the legendary Sunday night funk party. So my friends and I signed up, and the next night we found ourselves in a van heading west.

Two hours and a pit stop later, we ended up in a favela somewhere off the highway near Barra. The guide led us into what appeared to be a massive warehouse, while lines stretched down the block. Music throbbed inside.

We were led through an enormous crowd on the ground level up to the upper level, where they herded the tourists and were serving R$1 beers. I made my way to the edge of the balcony. The space was filled with not hundreds, but thousands of people, dancing to a strange type of music, heavy on the bass and percussion, not quite hip hop, not quite American funk, not quite enjoyable on the ears. I gaped.

Eventually, my friends and I decided we'd had enough of the gringos and made our way down to the main dance floor with the locals. I was thrilled when the DJ played some funk songs I actually knew, some very pop-y ones popular at the Brazilian club I'd frequented in Buenos Aires. I was shocked and somewhat confused to see some of the favela boys dancing provocatively -- with one another. "Isn't this a macho country?" I wondered to myself. (I'd just come from living in Argentina, where men kiss to greet each other but would be horrified by grinding with one another.) I marveled at the other groups of guys doing sets of steps together, choreography that seemed almost like a line dance. I laughed during the dance contest, led by a hilarious flamboyant guy I later learned was David Brazil. I spent the night feeling like I was in a weird dream.

My friends and I made our way out around 4am and waited for the rest of the tourists to stumble drunkenly back to the van. In the meantime, my friend asked a guy to teach her some of the "line dance" steps, and I joined in on the dance in the middle of the street. I was disappointed when we were herded into the vans to head back.

Though I'd later go back to the same club several times after moving to Rio, I never had the same experience, that rush of adrenaline and shock of amazement, the wonder and delight of experiencing a culture so vastly foreign for the first time.

Flashback: Rocinha, 2006

I was in Rio, visiting Brazil for the first time with a group of American friends. Other friends had been to Rio recently and had highly recommended doing a favela tour, so we decided to do one, too.

Oh yeah. I totally did one of those favela tours.

We went through Be a Local, and had a great guide who picked us up in a van and brought us to Sao Conrado. He briefed us as soon we got out, explaining safety precautions and how to handle ourselves (only take pictures when he said it was OK, do not talk to the guys with the guns, etc). Then, we each took mototaxis up to the top of the favela, which was undoubtedly my favorite part of the tour. I chatted with the motorcycle driver, and was terribly pleased with myself when he complimented my Portuguese.

Then we arrived in Rocinha, the largest slum in the Americas.

 

We made our way from the very top to the very bottom, making our way through the windy, narrow passageways and the steep, trash-lined paths. We visited a little art gallery, where I bought a little painting of the favela, and kids stopped us along the way, trying to sell us homemade jewelery and asking us to take their picture. We passed stores with live chickens and not so live chickens, botecos and mercadinhos, the tangled illegal electrical lines, and the only health clinic that serves the entire community of 100 - 150,000 people.

We only saw a few guys with guns, and were very fortunate we were there on a peaceful day. There were little kids everywhere, and people flying kites from their roofs. Our last stop was a daycare center, partially funded by the tour company, where we played with the kids and took pictures of the stunning view from the roof.

 

 

It did seem a little weird to be in the middle of a residential community, but then again, there are tours of super rich communities in the US, like Newport and Beverly Hills. I guess extremes are interesting. I wasn't deeply affected by the visit nor the poverty, since I'd seen even worse poverty before; in fact, I was surprised how developed some of the favela was. And I was mostly struck by the massive size of the slum.

At the end, when I was looking out over the favela, I had a weird, small inkling, like reverse deja vu, that I would be back in that exact place sometime in the future. And I would, in December that year, when I visited the same NGO and decided to spend the next six months applying for fellowships to do a service project in that same favela.

More photos after the jump.

Flashback: Rio, 2006

I'm starting a new series about my first trip to Brazil, and my initial impressions of the country and the culture. On the trip, I spent two weeks in Rio, Pernambuco, and Bahia. The first stop was Rio.

I'd been studying in Buenos Aires, where I was largely unimpressed by the culture (tango, protests, and meat), with the exception of the mouth-watering beef, and I ended up making friends with Brazilians. I took a Portuguese class and began planning a trip to Brazil after the semester was over. I had gone to Argentina from the Dominican Republic, and I missed the "tropical" culture, which I managed to replace with Brazilian culture.

So one night in July 2006, I flew from Buenos Aires to Rio on a red eye with two friends, after going to my friend's birthday party. After a night without sleep, I woke up in Brazil.

When we landed, the first thing I noticed was the Igreja da Penha, which is a beautiful church set on a bump of a hill near the runway. Ever since then, it's the first thing I look for as soon as I land or take off in Rio, like a beacon.

I had requested a transfer from the hostel where we were staying, but no one showed up to meet us. I was too tired to panic, and attempted to use the payphone. Unfortunately, I was the only one with any knowledge of Portuguese, so I was in charge. One of the pushy local cab drivers tried to help me call the hostel, and when I got through, the person announced that they had forgotten about our transfer. Sorry, tough luck. So the sleazy cab driver took us to Ipanema, ripping us all off fair and square.

On the way to the hostel, I couldn't get over how normal the city looked. It was a big city, like any other. My Argentine host family had basically told me that Rio was a war zone, and bid me farewell as if I might not make it back alive. But I have little recollection of the favelas that line the highway from the airport, but I do remember emerging on the highway near the Feira de Sao Cristovao, and marveling at the enormous hills we passed, and the tunnels we went through. "We're going under Cristo now!" the cab driver announced at one point.

We stayed at the Ipanema Beach House, which is good for one thing and one thing only: the location, a few blocks from the beach. Somehow, I got stuck in a room with eight other people, on the second bunk on a triple bunk bed. I tried to sleep once we'd checked in, though it wasn't easy with people coming in and out of the room. We met up with two other friends there, and in the afternoon we all headed to the beach, which didn't look at all like it did in "City of God." But it was stunningly beautiful, and I couldn't quite believe it was real. We bought cangas and passed out, shivering slightly in the sand.

"This is heaven," I thought as I drifted off.

I didn't have the slightest idea that this ridiculously beautiful city would very soon be my new home.

You know you've lived in the Dominican Republic when...

I have left the "How it all began" section hanging for awhile, and at some point I'll get to my experiences studying abroad in the DR and Argentina. For now, I'll share this group I made on Facebook after I came back from the DR, which is the first inkling of Rio Gringa. This week, the group surpassed 3,000 members, so I thought it would be an appropriate time to share it. Just a word of warning: if you never lived in the DR, most of it won't make much sense.

For those who lived in (and loved the DR) or actual dominicans who the rest of us just aspire to be like.

You know you've lived in the Dominican Republic when...
1. You use words like vaina, chin, and jevi as a part of essential vocabulary, and don't care if other people don't know what you're talking about.
2. you've been waken up by the aguacate man.
3. you fear the dreaded news "se fue la luz..."
4. ...because you've showered with a bucket when there's no water.
5. you love the bandera. and pica pollo.
6. Brugal and Presidente did, do and will always make you happy.
7. You befriended or were friends with people who befriended street kids, street people, or schitzo street crazies.
8. e' pa' adelante que vamo'!
9. mofongo mix makes your mouth water.
10. you've contracted some sort of amoeba or parasite.
11. the sight of a white belt makes you snicker.
12. you still find yourself checking your outfit and accessories to make sure you match, down to the color of your earrings.
13. you are familiar with the term "sankipanki" and have either done it or had it done to you.
14. you loved having an inversor, or wish you had one.
15. you don't think it's unnatural to sing while traveling on public transportation, and think its weird when buses don't have the radio on full blast.
16. you know at least the basics of merengue and bachata and can burst into song of many random merengue, bachata, salsa, and reggaeton hits.
17. entonce mamita a que tu quiere
18. you know what a carro publico means and fondly remember being squished between a fat women, her groceries, and a skeevy little dominican man in the backseat.
18. in spanish, you refer to "the bus" as the guagua.
19. if you're a girl, you remember mentally prepping yourself before leaving the house to prepare for a barrage of piropos.
20... piropos have made you either extremely uncomfortable, oddly pleased with yourself, or made you burst out laughing.
21. you classify yourself as: rubio/a (even if you're not blonde), india, morena, or one of those crazy inbetween tones because dominicans just love to define race, but never, ever call themselves negros.
22. you've rode in the back of a pickup truck.
23. you've driven or been driven on the malecon in the middle of the night or coming home at 6am.
24. the colmado is the center of the universe and you desperately miss being able to get dulce de leche and limon chips and presidente at any hour.
25. you love the MOTOCONCHO.
26.you have spent a good part of your dominican social life seated in a plastic chair on the street.
27. you could always say, "i'm out of minutes" if you didn't want to call back one of your dominican stalkers. but you could always go to the colmado for a new tarjeta to call your papi.
28. you've used the "viper" method to communicate.
29. you miss the yelling cobradores on bolivar and independencia, especially the boca chica guy.
30. BON!
31. you've eaten, and enjoy, chivo. mmm.
32. your spanish lacks "s" in many words.
33. you've had first hand experiences with cucarachas, ratas and tarantulas.
34. 'ta full y ta' bueno/a make sense especially when talking about a good club or a hot guy.
35. don't be a mamaguevo. but if you're lucky you'll get a mamasota.
36. you have heard someone yell, "es un abuso!!"
37. duarte, sanchez, mella, 27 de febrero= la patria, and streets in every major city and town. george washington, abraham lincoln, winston churchill. also streets, not la patria.
38. boca chica, and other such beaches mean: pescao, platano frito, jonnycake, and cueros x 1000 with fat gringos.
39. you know and LOVE festival presidente.
40. maceta papi maceta
41. necio, nitido. chevere, chulo. concho, cono, conchole. all necessary words to communicate with a dominican.
42. you got pushed out of the way by 30 people trying to get on the guagua, but once you're on, people will hold your binder, chicken, or baby if you have to stand up and they're sitting down.
43. "vamo a hacer coro" does not mean we're going to make a choir but actually probably involves drinking and travesuras.
44. you've gone out on the street to drink with everyone in your neighborhood during an apagon, because there's nothing else to do.
45. no te quilles mami! = no estes encojonada = don't be balled = don't be mad
46. papanicolao!
47. traffic laws are purely optional, and honking at intersections at night is much more common that stopping at lights.
48. mangu: the staple of the dominican diet, for breakfast, lunch or dinner, with cheese or meat or onions on top. mmm.
49. batido de mango, lechosa, or pina. as good as sex? probably.
50. you've eaten so many platanos you practically have turned into one.

ya tu saaabe.