A Rant and a Sunday Night Rave

Well, that didn't last long, did it? I said I was going to be updating every Sunday and here I am on Wednesday night, writing the blog entry that should have been written three days ago. No excuses, just laziness. But here I am, ready to describe a few details of my ever-changing life down here. Let's get started.

There are countless English words that have seeped into the Portuguese language. There are many words like sanduíche, picape (pickup), site, internet, email, business, marketing, and flyer, not to mention countless mispronounced titles, names, places, and greetings. But of the innumerable English words that we use here in Brazil, none stands out as glaringly as the word shopping. I partly say this because it is so clearly NOT a words of latin descent, and partly because it is used outside of its original English context. Here the word means "mall". It means "the mall". As in "I'm going to the mall," in normal English. But in Brazilian Portuguese, we say "I'm going to the shopping." All the native English speakers I know here find this as amusing as it is confusing. I find it a little irritating because it's a constant reminder that English is and always will be inescapable. Here I am, minding my own beeswax, trying to learn an exotic new romance language when BAM! Here comes the ol' English-mobile, throwing out linguistic treats for all the little girls and boys. Seriously, half the television shows are in English with Portuguese subtitles, nearly all the names of the stores inside the shopping are in English (Surf Shop, Authentic Feet, China in Box), over 80% of the movies in the cinemas are imported from the US, AND everyone is dying for an excuse to practice their English on a real live natural born speaker. Gah! Leave me alone, you wretched, invasive language of mine! I'm seeing someone else for a while! Her name is Portuguese and she's way more interesting than YOU ever were! I feel like Wayne Campbell sitting in that diner while his ex-girlfriend, Stacy, keeps making eyes at him and eventually comes over and gives him an entirely useless gun rack for their would-be anniversary. Just leave me alone you intrusive wench!

Alright, where was I going with that? Oh right. Shopping. So I went to the Shopping ABC last Wednesday with a few of my exchange student friends, since there isn't really a good place to just hang out around here. A couple of my Brazilian friends came too because they heard there were going to be a few Mexican girls there. Well, they weren't disappointed. We didn't know what to do for a while, but in the end, the girls just went around shopping for bikinis and shoes while the guys sat around on the couches that they have in the hallways. It all seemed a little pointless, but it was really fun. The whole thing was a serious mental workout with all the switching from English to Portuguese. Plus, I'm always thankful for something to do in the afternoon. Brazilians don't really get the concept of hanging out-- just going somewhere to do nothing in particular with some good friends-- so it's hard to know what to suggest when you want to hang out with your friends.

That night I went home and got really sick. It only lasted for about twelve hours, but I was seriously shaking and cold when I went to bed, and then woke up burning hot with a terrible headache and aching all over my body. I just lay there for the whole night, sleeping 20 minutes at a time. When I finally managed to drag myself out of bed to ask my mom for some good pain medicine, she insisted I was feeling so bad because I had eaten next to nothing the day before. I was irritated because all I wanted was a pill and some mass sympathy. Plus, as confirmed by my American mom, you can't get sick like that from just skipping a meal. But Sandra is Brazilian and knows everything, so let it be. Afterall, she takes good care of me, even if she's a little too pragmatic at times.

By Friday, I was feeling well enough to go to my last day of school. It was really chill, with minimal lectures and a heightened amount of conversation. My math teacher walked the classroom through their weekend leading up to their test on Sunday and I got nervous even though I wasn't even going to be taking the test! He made it a big dramatic event that included special diets, an altered sleep schedule, and literally smacking the test on Sunday to show it who's boss. In the end, we all got in a circle, held hands, and he led us in a shouted prayer about our futures. It was seriously hilarious.

I skipped my last class with all my friends to play around on the athletic courts. It was my class, 3C2, against our friendly rival 3C5. First we all played capture the flag, which was full of creative tricks. At one point, about five of our guys crowded around the flag and then ran off in separate directions. Most of the guys were caught, but none of them had the flag. Then Artur crossed over to our side and pulled the flag out of his shirt, gaining another point for our team. Apparently, anything goes in Brazil. Unfortunately, the next time Artur tried to get creative, he ended up falling about ten feet onto his back. He grabbed the flag, and then scaled the wall to a metal bar that ran parallel to the ground. After shimmeying for a few seconds toward our side of the court, the bar just broke and he came tumbling down with it. The game stopped and just about all of us were crying with laughter. That's when we decided to switch to dodgeball. Well, we should have stuck with capture the flag because 3C5 finally got the best of us, winning 2 out of the 3 games. But it was still some of the most fun an intense dodgeball I've ever played.

That evening was a fun night of barhopping with some of my best friends. We started at a birthday party, and then worked out way down the main social strip of Santo André. The last bar was the funnest, with endless toasts to my nationality, my president-elect Barack Obama, and my pullover. I had chosen this night to make my self-conscious debut of my awesome argyle sweater vest, and it was noticed by all my friends. No one here wears sweater vests, so I stuck out a little more than usual. Luckily, they all just thought it was cool and American, so all the comments were impressed. Phew. We got home at about 2 AM and I had a lazy Saturday while all my friends were studying for the test of their lives that would be on Sunday.

After the test on Sunday, I went to a party put on by my school for all the seniors that were finally done with the Fuvest. It was at a pretty cool club in neighboring São Bernardo. There were a ton of people from all over the city, and the dancing got really fun and rowdy. Most of the music was played by the DJ, but the main headliner of the night was a band of teachers from Colégio Singular. There were five of them. Three of them I didn't know, but my math teacher, Marco Polo, would be playing drums, and my exceedingly dull and adored history teacher, João, would be on vocals and lead guitar. I thought it would be interesting, but apparently my expectations were low, because it ended up being the best part of the night! They played all kinds of music, and everyone was so excited to see them perform. And they were actually really good, too! João freaking ripped it up on the guitar and his voice didn't resemble his normal drone at all. I got some fun photos, but I had to leave early. I was getting up really early the next day to take a day trip with some other exchange students. But more on that next week. I'm supposed to be posting these on Sundays remember?

Anyway, here are a few photos for you to enjoy. Please excuse any terrible typos or spelling errors for now. It's past midnight and I don't feel like going through and editing my work right now. Maybe I'll get around to it tomorrow. In any case, Happy Thanksgiving! Eat some delicious turkey and pie for me.

Love you all.

Kevin

One of the numerous Christmas displays at Shopping ABC. It's been up since October!
My friend Lucas juggling a soccer ball during the break at school.
My friends Camila, Renata, Eliza, and Flávia from school
Capture the flag! (Pegue bandeira)
Some guys from 3C2 with our beloved João. The chalk represents the cigarette that he always has in hand when he's not in the classroom. I was actually a little cold that day. Weird...
João playing his guitar and wailin' his sweet voice on Sunday night. This was awesome.
And the crowd goes wild!
Me, Everton, two girls I don't know very well, and Bia on the right. Don't mind the weird look on my face.

Turtles are seriously cute

Milk! Oh, how I miss thee. I never realized just how much of a milk person I was until I came to Brazil. Of course milk exists down here, but it's rather nauseating. Are all of you familiar with the abbreviation "UHT"? If not, kindly follow this link. It will tell you all you need to know about the only type of milk available in Brazil. There's just something terribly unnatural about a carton of milk that can sit at room temperature for months and never spoil. I have found it mildly palatable only when mixed with Toddy, a powdered chocolate nutrients supplement, pretty similar to Instant Breakfast. In the end however, I can think of only one word to describe UHT milk: Bleh.

Other than my liquid adversary, things are still treating me pretty well down here. I've had a short week of school because of all the testing. This week we only had four classes a day instead of the usual six because the seniors use the last couple hours to take their finals. The other four classes aren't usually more than role call and then sitting around studying or chatting. Wednesday was the English final, which ended up being pretty fun for me. Everyone was asking me about vocabulary and grammar all day. It's strange when I can't always answer their questions! There's a big difference between studying a language and just speaking it naturally. But I like to think I was of some help to some of my friends, anyway. The English final was the only test I actually took, and I think it went pretty well. It seems like it would be easy, but all the questions are in Portuguese and many of the responses have to be as well. So it ended up being a test of both my English grammar skills and my Portuguese proficiency. I wouldn't be surprised if some other students did way better than I did! I couldn't think of the Portuguese word for "stage" for the life of me, and I had absolutely no idea what "indirect discourse" was. Oh well. At least my diploma doesn't depend on it.

On Friday was the Prova Geral which lasted the whole day, so I didn't even go to school. But I was invited to a churrasco afterward to celebrate the end of all the tests. I got to skip the test but was still invited to the party? I love being an exchange student! It was a pretty sweet, too. My friend Luiz Felipe hosted it at his apartment building and a lot of my good friends from school were there. We played futsal for a while, and I even scored a few goals! It was a pretty easy-going game, so everyone scored a few times, but still. I'm just glad I didn't make a fool of myself! The rest of the time was just spent hanging out, eating meat skewers and snack food, and taking turns playing DJ. My favorite part was when Everton switched it to Colt 45 by Afroman. I felt like I was back in Anacortes!

My mom picked me up to go visit Thais, Ricardo, and Henry later that afternoon. Henry was sleeping the whole time, but that didn't stop everyone from leaning over him and exclaiming over his resemblance to his parents, his cute little hands, and the amount of hair he already has. Thais's mom, Íris, showed me around their apartment and introduced me to all their aquariums and little animals. When she took me out on the deck to meet their turtle, she got a little panicked because we couldn't find it right away. Eventually we discovered it cramped at the bottom of a foot-deep drain, just chillin' there like turtles do. I reached my arm down there and lifted it out of it's damp and depressing prison, and I was relieved to see that it was definitely still alive. As soon as I set it down it went over and started gnawing on some of the vegetation they grow out there. We covered the drain and then went inside and tried to figure out with everyone how long it must have been down there. We never came to a conclusion, but it couldn't have been that long. After all, it wasn't dead, right?

Oh! I've been forgetting to tell you guys that I finished my first Portuguese book a few weeks ago: Harry Potter e a Ordem da Fênix. I've read the fifth Harry Potter book a couple of times in English, so that made it quite a bit easier to understand in Portuguese. It was a long read, but was immensely satisfying when I finally finished! Then I read O Alquimista by Brazil's very own Paulo Coelho. It's a really cool story about a Spanish shephard who heads to the African continent to realize his destiny and fulfill his personal legend. It's all very spiritual and gives you a lot to think about. His works have been translated into dozens of languages and I can't tell you how cool it felt to be reading his literature in it's original text. Some of you may have read the English version, The Alchemist. If you haven't, you may want to consider it. It's a short read and I seriously loved it.

On Wednesday (am I a little out of order here?) I went to the mall to hang out with a couple of my exchange student friends- Brittnie from Canada and Bryan from the good ol' US of A. We decided to watch the new 007 movie- it came out a week earlier here than in the United States- and we had some time to kill before it started, so we wandered around looking at fish, getting kicked out of furniture stores for just sitting on the couches and talking, and oggling at the early Christmas decorations. I forgot to mention that, too. Christmas decorations have been up for at least three weeks now. I know! But without Halloween or Thanksgiving, Brazil is free to fast forward to twinkling lights, candy canes, fake snow, and dancing Santa Clauses. There are already giant pine trees in all the shopping malls, and Christmas carols can be heard just about anywhere. I guess it wouldn't be so weird to me if it weren't 80º out! But Brazilians are serious about their pre-fabricated American traditions. They get really into bundling up and celebrating the winter holidays in the swealtering heat of summer. Everyone tells me this is a direct import of American culture. I still don't really get it. Anyway, the movie was pretty cool. I really like Daniel Craig as the face of bond these days, even if this movie was a little lacking in both the witty dialogue and nifty gadgits departments.

Alrighty, this is the part where I post some pictures and say goodbye, but I don't really have any pitures relevant to this week's events. However, my camera functional at long last, thanks to the lithium battery charger my mom sent from home. Thanks mommy! Hopefully I'll be able to post some pictures of my friends from school. Which reminds me... I decided I'm going to continue school until everyone else is done. They told us that the exchange students don't have to come anymore. Now that finals are over, it's just review for all the students to stay sharp until the end their college entrance tests. But I'd rather be at school than be hanging out at home with nothing to do while my friends are in class. So I'll be at school for a few more weeks.

Also, I'm updating weekly now. Expect a new post every Sunday. This way I'll be obligated to write something and won't be able to put it off and put it off like I've been doing lately. So if you don't hear from me in time, send me angry e-mails! Or nice ones. Just get on my case if I don't keep up.

I'm going now. For real. I love you guys!

Até mais

Life, death, and lobsters (don't worry about the "death" part)

Hey everyone. Guess what! My cousin had a baby! He arrived right on time on Thursday while I was at school, and I went to see him at the hospital on Friday. The parents are Thais and Ricardo, and his name is Henry. Thais is my mom's cousin's daughter, so to me she's some kind of complicated cousin. But it doesn't matter exactly how we're related; the fact that we are related is good enough. Down here, family is family, and no one really takes the time to explain to me how it all works. The important thing is: Yay! New baby. Everyone is so happy and it feels great to be treated like a real part of the family. At first I was afraid I might feel intrusive and awkward, but I seem to be the only one thinking about that. Everyone is so loving and they always ask me if I really do have to change families after Christmas. The sad answer is "Yes! But I'll live nearby and we'll still see each other a lot!"

Another cause for celebration... our 44th President is going to be Barack Obama! I already feel so much more pride for my country. Most Brazilians are really happy with the election results as well. In the end, my absentee ballot never arrived. But I was able to print off an overseas ballot from the internet and send it in time to be counted. It can't tell you how great it feels to have voted in this historical election. I already had my bases covered if Sen. Obama lost though- Sandra said I would be welcome to live at her house instead of returning home. Fortunately however, I will be flying back to Seattle at the end of my exchange. Barack and Roll baby!

So last weekend was a traditional American Holiday. Halloween isn't officially celebrated in Brazil, but most English language schools have events commemorating the American tradition. And since nearly everyone studies English outside of the regular school day, everyone knows what it is. The decorations were scarce and a little strange (my school hung up gigantic ripped black banners in the main quad. Weird...), but people got the idea. Since Brazilians never pass up a chance to party, we had another celebration at my friend Nilton's apartment building. It wasn't a costume party, but everyone brought something pertaining to O Dia das Bruxas. There were lots of wigs, hats, and capes. I had been feeling a little homesick the day before, so I had gone out with my mom in search of a pumpkin to carve. Neither of us knew if pumpkins were even in season, but after a few fruitless visits to various supermarkets, we were a little discouraged. Eventually, we found a little bin with about 6 flat little Japanese pumpkins. I had never thought about different species of pumpkins, but apparent there are a lot in Brazil. But on that day, we had only one choice. So I took one home, gutted it, and carved a nice little Jack-o-lantern. I named him Toguchi, after one of my friends here who is half Japanese. At the party, everyone was really impressed, which I found surprising. Most of them had never seen a real Jack-o-lantern before and weren't sure if people actually made them. Unfortunately, the real Toguchi never showed up, so we never got to compare their faces side by side. In any case, the pumpkin was a short-lived novelty. After a couple hours of cheerful and innocent candle-flickering, my orange friend got chucked from the top of a fifty foot stair case. There was pumpkin everywhere. The humor of the situation helped me get over it pretty quickly, but the image of half his smiling face floating in the swimming pool still haunts me at times.

Yesterday (Saturday) I went to Santos again to hang out with all the Rotary exchange students and learn how to surf! The weather forecast was rather bleak all weak (rhyme!), but we lucked out and had a beautiful day of sun. We all arrived at the beach at about 9:30 in the morning and ate some breakfast. Everyone had brought some food characteristic of their own country, so we had a really strange and delicious feast. I had a hard time thinking of some particularly American breakfast items, but in the end I made a batch of Casey's wonderful banana bread. It turned out well, and it looked strange enough next to the qeusadillas and egg rolls that it even seemed a little exotic. After watching some Hawaiian dancers perform a short show for us, we ran into the water and just played in the waves for about an hour. The Mexicans were all freezing, but most of us were pretty comfortable in the cool water. The surfing lessons were in two parts: a theory session on the beach, and then an hour in the water. Not all the exchange students are speaking Portuguese yet, so the surf instructor asked me to stand next to him and shout out the English as he explained some things in Portuguese. Seriously, this language nerd felt like he had died and gone to heaven. Live language interpretation? So cool! I don't care if it was only a couple minutes- I felt like I was at the UN. Sometimes I can't believe that I'm living my life in a completely different language. I still have a long way to go, but I've come a long way since my first day. Portuguese is the coolest thing ever man.

So I wasn't that great at surfing, but I did manage to stand on the board a few times before I toppled over. It was so so SO fun. I can't wait to travel to the Northeast and surf on some of the best beaches in the country. The sun was strong and I spent most of the day with my shirt off, so despite my feeble layer of sunscreen, my skin was definitely affected. The good news? Goodbye farmer's tan! The bad news? I now resemble a bipedal lobster. Owww! Well, at least I learned my lesson. Next time I'll be sure to apply the sunscreen more than just once.

Well, that's it for now. I've got to get to bed. It just passed midnight and I have school tomorrow. This is my last week of school, did I tell you guys? Everyone else has a couple more weeks for testing, but the exchange students are out on Thursday for the summer holidays. Hooray!

Abraços!

PS: Comments, people. Comments!!

Enjoy the pictures.

Baby Henry!

Moments before the makeover

Meet Toguchi.

The exchange students, some hula dancers, and a few random people

Sean and I practicing our moves on our sand surf boards. Apparently it took great concentration...