Guest Post: Brazilians in Britain

Today's guest post is written by Anna, a Brazilian who splits her time between Sao Paulo, Brazil and Norwich, England (imagina!). She writes Mistral Gagnant and was kind enough to write the following post for me.

Ten things that will happen to a Brazilian ex-pat in Britain

1. No matter how many layers of clothes you decide to wear, no matter if you are from the coldest region of Rio Grande do Sul: you will always feel cold. And you will always be the odd one out: you'll be the one with a snow coat in the middle of March (when the weather is supposedly getting warmer).
2. You will miss your pressure cooker very much.
3. You will be infuriated by the fact that limes and bananas are worth their weight in gold in Britain, while they are extra cheap back home. Also: you will miss pão de queijo. Even if you didn't like it back home.
4. You will try to make sense of the soap operas. Give up: they go for twenty years or more and nobody - not even the British - can tell the story from the start. 
5. You will be able to discover the age of the person talking to you depending of which Brazilian football player he/she remembers (the youngest talk about Robinho and Ronaldinho;  mid-twenties, Ronaldo; thirties, Romário and Bebeto; forties, Falcão and Socrates... and those who remember Pelé playing in 1958 will probably not want to disclose their age!)
6. You will discover that the difference between a gentlemen and a hooligan is two pints. That, or when you try to disrupt a line. Lines are sacred to the British, as sacred as tea time.
7. Tea time is not at five o'clock; the trains and buses are late more often than not and a drunken Brit can talk more than an ordinary, sober Brazilian. Be aware.
8. You will almost be killed when trying to cross the road. That's very typical. But don't try to argue that they are the ones driving at the "wrong" side of the road, unless you want to see a gentleman becoming a hooligan. 
9. You will take six months to discover where your neighbour works, but six minutes to discover if he is a football person or a cricket person. And you may die without knowing his wife's name. They are not "cold" - rather, we are too "warm." Be prepared to be known as the local chatterbox, even if you believe you don't talk all that much.
10. When on a beach (supposing the weather is nice), you will draw attention to yourself. Blame the Brazilian swimsuits - even the modest ones will look like they've shrunk compared to the British counterparts.

And a few extra tips: don't bother about trying to figure out the cricket rules, the electoral process and the tabloids' headlines. Those are for locals only...even if you live there for thirty years!

Comments

[Silvia]

Hehe, number 8 reminded me of the time I went to Ireland on one of those one month English courses. They had the words "LOOK LEFT" or "LOOK RIGHT" painted in colossal letters on the crosswalks near our school, I wonder why... (It was pretty effective, I must admit)

[E]

In the last 6 months I've had 3 close Brazilian friends move to Great Britain. Why the BR->UK immigration?

[Thaddeus Blanchette]

"You will discover that the difference between a gentlemen and a hooligan is two pints."

There's an old carioca slang term from the 19th century that expresses that essential divide: "o inglês das 9 horas".

It means that your English boss expected you in at 9 o'clock, on the dot, no excuses, no wheeling and dealing. It also meant that by 9PM, he could usually be found in one of the many pubs of the old centro, pissed to high heaven and more likely than not causing a public scandal.

[Liesl78]

I beg to differ. I am 30 and remember Falcao & Socrates :)

[Greg]

6. "You will discover that the difference between a gentlemen and a hooligan is two pints."

You must be mixing with real light-weights then.

Perhaps more importantly, A Brazilian will go into a pub, sit down at a table and wait to be served (and expect the bill when ready to leave). That ain't gonna happen..... we go to the bar, order our drinks and pay for them when we get them... and only then sit down at a table.

Of course the advantage of this is a) you can't "spend" more than you have on you, and b) when you are ready to leave, you just get up and go - no waiting around for 15 minutes trying to attract someone's attention.

[Eduardo Sant'Anna]

Hum... sei.

As a Brazilian living in the UK I must disagree with at least numbers 2 and 8.

First of all, you can find very good pressure cooker for example at John Lewis. Check out here: http://www.johnlewis.com/8945/Product.aspx

By the way, they are much much better than the popular ones we have in Brazil: easy to use and there is no weird "rubber band" that falls out of place and eventually needs to be replaced. I not only don't miss the brazilian ones but also will send the John Lewis one to my mom!!

Regarding crossing the road, hold on: people in the UK drive extremely more calmly than in most of Brazil. Even if you are not used to it and don't look to the right side while crossing, drivers will tend to give way to pedestrians. Always look to both sides and you are ok. It is still much more likely to be killed when crossing the road in Rio for instance where it is caos... even if the lights are red for vehicles and you are using the pedestrian crossing you gotta be extremely careful in Rio!!

The other points are ok, although most of them depend on personal experience. For instance, I'm already the one walking around in T-shirts in March!! And I'm a carioca! :-P

In addition, I don't care about soap operas, don't care about the price of bananas and limes (as they are still affordable) and don't miss pão de queijo anymore since I found where to buy it (Brazilian shops). Btw, it's also possible to make it at home!

Oh well... I'm afraid not even half of the "10 thinks that WILL happen" actually happen to me. LOL

Cheers,
Ed
http://vidanoreinounido.blogspot.com

[Ray Adkins]

Hey Ed,

With all the respect, you sound like you are trying really hard to convince yourself that leaving Rio was actually a good a idea when it wasn't...
Just my impression!

Cheers

Ray

[Eduardo Sant'Anna]

Not really Ray.

I just think it's better to try and adapt to your new home - which most of us opted to go to, as opposed to being forced to move - than to keep complaining the old one was better. Particularly when with just a bit of effort (or research) we can solve the 'problem'. The pressure cooker thing is a good example.

Although I respect the post and the author's opinion, I think part of it is not exaclty showing what most Brazilians ex-pats actually notice or complain about. I think most of us (including me!!) are missing much more not having some good tasty meat (hum, picanha!) from Brazil/Argentina readly available in regular supermarkets then being infuriated with the fact that bananas cost £0.66 per kg (which is pretty accessible!! it's about 1 US dollar) instead of R$0,66 or whatever it costs in Brazil these days.

That's all.

The post is funny and well written though... I just don't feel that much connected to it. But maybe I'm the odd one out! :-)

Cheers,
Ed

[marcelo]

As a brazilian living in London I found the post very funny and insightful. Well done! The same phrase Gringa used to Ny-Rio I use here: Viver em Porto Alegre eh uma merda mas eh bom, viver em Londres eh bom mas eh uma MERDA! hehehehe