General Update - Capoiera, School, Gym, Weekends

I worked on this for a few days in a row, so some of the stuff might seem a little out-dated or weird. Sorry about that. Hey, at least I finally got it posted, haha. This pic is from a churrasco with some of the Brazilian ex-exchange students and current exchange students - there were more people there, but I liked this pic.

So the other day I saw a car with plates for Paraguay (which is kinda like how it’s cool to see Alaska plates, except a little cooler, haha), and I thought, ‘how neat – I need to put that in my blog,’ and then I realized that it has been like a month since I have even written in my blog – SORRY GUYS. Thus, you will be getting a less detailed post than usual, which is fine, anyway. We actually don’t have internet at the moment, which is killing me, so I am doing this in good old Word 2003; it’s mad at me, though, because it speaks Portuguese and I am writing in English (obviously). I think I will try to fix that. Ah, much better – far fewer squiggly red lines. It finally started raining for real, which has been just lovely, in my opinion, but the down side is that it somehow knocked the internet out. Hopefully we will get that fixed soon, because I actually have some things to take care of other than chatting (mainly in Portuguese, of course, although my written Port. Is not so great).

There are only a few main things that have really been going on lately, and they are as follows (we’ll do this 10th grade thesis statement style): I started going to the gym and Capoiera regularly; Gerardo moved schools, so I am now alone in my class, and that ended up being way better; good weekends and bad weekends; getting geared up to go on the big trips – SOOOOO EXCIIIIITED.

Capoiera: I feel like I need to explain this a little bit before I get into it. Some of you know what it is, and some of you have no idea, I imagine. Capoiera, in short, is a Brazilian martial art that originated in Africa, and was brought over by the slaves and converted to look more like a dance than a martial art, as they were forbidden by their masters to actually practice martial arts. It looks a bit like break dancing, actually, but we listen to the traditional music in class, which is drumming, singing, and playing this instrument that looks like a bow (bow and arrow kind of bow) and makes a sort of twangy sound. There are tons of Youtube videos, which I think I said in my last post. The movements and stances are very different from Kung Fu, so it has been a little bit hard for me to shake old habits in terms of body placement, etc. In fact, sometime the teacher just yells at me, “AI, Alanna, você está pracicando o Kung Fu - Isso é a Capoiera, não é o Kung Fu!” or something like that (ai alanna, you are doing kung fu – this is capoiera, it’s not kung fu).

The teacher’s name is Delei, he’s 20 or 21, and has been doing Capoiera for 10 years, and he doesn’t speak any English, really, so he makes fun of me for saying ‘ok’ when he’s showing me something (they say ‘ta’ or ‘ta bom’); he isn’t the real teacher, actually. The real one only comes Fridays, I think (that’s the only time I’ve seen him, but I’ve only gone once), which are special because we run class differently, and I have only met him once. He is probably like 30 or so. Everyone there is very like-able, and very good. Almost all the people in my class are right around my age, and have been doing it for multiple years, but they are cool about it. Brazilians are just cool in general, really.

I go to class on Mon, Weds, and Fri. Mondays and Wednesdays are more like training days, where we learn new things and practice them, and Fridays are solely for ‘fighting,’ although a lot of the time we fight for a few minutes at the end of the other classes to. I say fighting, but it’s really not like fighting. They use the verb for ‘play’ when they talk about it, but it’s not really like playing either. It’s like play-fighting. The point is to learn from the other person and practice the movements. It’s like a slower version of the sparring we do in Kung Fu, but it keeps going, and people step in and out about every 30 secs to 1 minute, and pick one of the fighters to challenge. I hate that part because I am shy anyway, and because I don’t know very much, and because when I am actually looking at someone I tend to forget the little that I’ve learned. I will get there eventually, I suppose, but I like the system we have of randomly selecting fighters in Kung Fu because it takes the pressure off me.

Fridays are cool because the real teacher, Nelson, comes and teaches a Samba class to old people, which is rather entertaining, we play the instruments ourselves (the beat is really simple, so I can play the drums and tambourine, but not the weird bow instrument), and it is nothing but fighting, which is neat to watch. I took some pics last Friday, and posted them on my Flick. I took a lot of Nelson and Delei because they are the best, so they do they do the coolest stuff. Once I get more used to it I will have them take some of me so you guys can see.

I don’t know that I’ll actually test to get belts or anything – probably not. They have some sort of belt system, but I don’t really know how it works. I should ask… haha. Anyway, that’s about it for Capoiera. Any questions?

In addition to Capoiera, I have been going to the gym most days of the week. I do both at an “academia” called Tênis Club, which is like a YMCA. They have a lot of academias here, but I go to Tênis because it is the most popular, and because I was able to get a membership with a family from my Rotary club. I pay about $15 a month to go to the gym, and had to pay an extra $15 for an initial exam. With that, though, you get a personal trainer who assesses you and makes out a personalized schedule, so that when you go in they tell you everything you need to do. There are a few that work there, and they split up the people who are there at the time, so you just ask them what the next thing on your schedule is and they tell you. Not everyone uses them, but I am happy to, because I really would have had no idea where to start. I have a different schedule for Capoiera and non-Capoiera days, which differ in the intensity of the leg workouts, since doing Capoiera is a lot like doing squats for an hour and a half.

They told me after my exam that to be ideal I need to lose 9kilos, which is almost 20lbs. I think that is pretty much BS, but I have lost 2kilos (2.2lbs) so far (the 2 that I had gained from the first month here), and I think like 3 or 4 more would be nice. I think they told me 9 because the girls here tend to be a good bit smaller than I am in build and muscle mass. I have rather big legs and broad shoulders according to their standards, but I am a real, live “loira” (blonde), which is rare, so at least I have that going for me, haha. It’s weird, because I think that their dark color and long black hair is really beautiful, but I am finding out a lot of them tend to like people who are blonde with light eyes – I am exotic for them, I guess, haha. It’s like opposite from home, where everyone thinks exotic, dark women are beautiful. I was talking to Aunt Melissa and the family one day, and I was telling them that was going to get a haircut, and they said not to get some crazy brazilian do, to which I replied, “Well, the brazilian ‘do’ it long, straight, and black, so I don’t think there’s much danger.” I’m not really a blonde, as you know, but here anything that’s not black is blonde, haha.

School is still pretty crappy, but it has improved because Gerardo, who was the Mexican guy in my class, moved houses, and had to move schools. I was scared at first to be on my own, but it ended up being a real blessing. Literally the day after he was gone some of the girls came up to me and asked me to sit with them, and since then we talk everyday at school, and I have gone out with them a few times. There are a lot more girls than guys I my class, but the guys that are there definitely make their presence known. As I said, I am in the slacker class, so most of them are really loud, class-clown, types, and they have started picking on me more, which means they like me, haha. It’s not like we’re good friends, but it’s sort of an acceptance thing. One bad thing that has come from it, though, is that there is this guy in another class who wants to take me out on a date or something, and he comes in like everyday and bugs me about it. I have told him no over and over, but he just keeps re-phrasing the question. It’s really getting on my nerves. Of course that has been a subject of abuse by the guys in my class – they told me I am “conquistando coracãos” (conquering hearts – an expression), and they are like “alanna and eeeeeelvis” (his nickname). Anyway, that’s a thing. If nothing else I am leaving to go on the trips soon, so he won’t be around to annoy me.

Oh, I figured you guys might think this is funny: I was talking to Johanna the other day in English (the other ex. Students and I try to speak Port. with each other as much as we can, but sometimes we cheat), and she was like, “From you I am learning to say this word, ‘like’ all ze time. It is good for me because when I don’t know what to say I can just say ‘like’ like you do.” Haha, I didn’t think my habit was THAT bad, but apparently it is.

I have obviously done a lot of hanging out and going places sine I last wrote. I went to a wedding with my host parents one Saturday, just to see what it was like, and that was pretty exciting. I lied. It wasn’t. It was like going to a catholic wedding that you can’t understand and with really cheesy American love songs in Port., haha. It was just one, though, I’m sure they aren’t all the same. Plus I didn’t know anyone, so I just hung out with my host parents the whole time. It was nice to see, though; the family was all weepy and hugging each other all over the place – the men were crying just as much, if not more, than the women - and the noivos (bride and groom) were young, smiley, and cute together. The really big difference between weddings here and there is the timing. They get married at night, rather than in the daytime. My host mom said it’s because they like to wear things that are sparkly (tiaras, etc.), and that’s not as beautiful during the day, but I suspect it has more to do with the fact that it’s really hot, haha. They also had a live band playing a style of traditional Brazilian music called sertaneja (I think that’s how you spell it), which is like the equivalent of country here. My host mom doesn’t like it, but I do. It really just depends on the person. It’s fun to dance to, even though I have failed at every attempt, haha.

I went to a costume party last weekend. They have Halloween here to a small degree. They are having Trick-or-treat (like no one came – only a few kids and Paula’s - my sister - friends), but it’s not as big of a deal in terms of everyone dressing up and having parties, etc. I think it has been getting more popular in the last few years, but it’s almost 100% generated by American movies and culture. The party I went to was a birthday party, actually, and I didn’t know very many of the people, but it was still fun. I went with some of the other exchange students, and since we didn’t want to rent costumes we just used our own clothes and the stuff my host sister has from ballet. It had to be a costume from a movie, so Tania and I went as Moulin Rouge girls, and Annia went as a Disney fairy. There was a little less dancing going on than we would have liked, but hopefully we will make up for it this weekend.

Oh, speaking of movies, there is this really awesome Brazilian movie that you should try to see if you can. I don’t know that it will come out in the states, but in English it is called Elite Squad, and in Port. it is called Tropa de Elite. It is set in Rio, and is based on true events surrounding the federal police in Brazil and how they deal with the drug trade and favelas (ghettos) in Rio. It is very realistic, and very intense. To me it was sort of like a somewhat more docile mixture of Children of Men and Full Metal Jacket. It was excellent. The version I saw was pirated and had no subtitles, so I only really understood what was generally going on, not the dialogue, but I am going to see it again when it comes out in the theatre, I hope, (yea, they all have it already even though it hasn’t come out yet – people here tend to have more downloaded movies than real movies), so hopefully I will understand it a little better.

I have had mostly good weekends lately. It’s sort of annoying, because they don’t care as much about making plans and schedules and things as we do, and, as last minute and disorganized as I tend to be, it’s a little trying when you are trying to figure out what to do. Like we were invited to do stuff, but then they aren’t sure if they still want to do it, and then they will call you back in an hour and they don’t, so it takes a few hours to even figure out where you are going. It wouldn’t be too bad, except that our parents are more protective than theirs, so they want to know early what we are doing etc, and we are limited on means of transportation.

I went to another concert Thursday night because Friday was a holiday and we didn’t have school. It was not really a big deal holiday – it was like Memorial Day or Dia dos Muertos – a day to honor those who have passed. Dia dos Muertos is a really big deal in Mexico though, so the Mexicans were missing it like I was missing Halloween. Anyway, the concert was a type of music called Pagode, which was bouncy Brazilian music about kissing and love, etc. The guys in the band were all young, and they played a whole slew (am I allowed to use that word?) of instruments – lots of drums, trumpet, trombone, guitar – and bounced around the stage. It’s kinda like a version of Samba, and it’s a lot of fun to dance to. My feet were killing me by the end, which has a lot to do with the fact that they are already all covered in Capoiera blisters and I wore a pair of my friend’s high Brazilian platforms.

Tuesday evening I went with a guy named Tiago that I had met at a party, and who Johanna knows from church (I will talk about this in a minute), to one of the universities here. There are 4, I think, and this is one of the big ones. I don’t know how many students it has – I would guess around 5,000 or something like that. Maybe more. He goes for Educação Física (Physcial Education), which is a common major here, but it’s hard to make much money doing it because the personal trainers make nothing, as well as the teachers. The campus was a lot like an American college campus – lots of big ugly buildings, people hanging out all over the place, and a little area in the middle with places to eat. The classes were more interesting than the ones at my school, and his started at 7. I really want to go to college here, not high school. Lucie, the French girl, goes to college, as well as a few others in other cities, I have heard, and my next host brother is in his last year of high school now, so maybe if he goes to school here next year I can go with him. I am supposed to just go to the 3rd year of high school again next year, but college would be sooo much better. I am going to inquire. We shall see.

About the church group thing – Johanna knows a bunch of people from church because she goes there with her sister every week, which is funny, because she thinks she’s atheist. I went last night because Tiago had invited me, and I thought I’d try it out. On Friday nights they have like a youth mass thing (it’s Catholic, of course), and it was a lot of singing and hopping around to music some of the kids played. Tiago talked the whole time – I don’t know if he always runs it or not – about faith etc, which was rather interesting. He was very good, I think, although I didn’t understand all of it. The fact that he could stand up there and talk for like 40 mins, though, is pretty impressive.

After that they had a party, so I went. They taught Johanna and me to dance Aché, which is very lively and bouncy with some weird specified movements depending on the song. The Babado Novo concert I went to was Aché. It’s about the easiest form o Brazilian dancing there is since all you really need to do is keep bouncing and follow along – they just like to be in constant motion. I am starting to get Samba a little bit too, but it still needs work.

Ok, I think that’s about enough. That’s a lot. I think I covered enough about little pieces of the culture to suffice.

I am leaving for a week in the Amazon on November 8th, and then we will travel North Eastern Brazil, which is mainly beaches. I don’t remember the last time I was this ecstatic. I can’t wait. We had a meeting this week about it, and I couldn’t keep from smiling the whole time. I am soooo ready to leave. The guy we are going with is a Rotary official, and he will be posting his pictures as we go on some website. I will put the link on here if he ever send it to us. He is also supposed to send a list of links to hotels and cities we will be staying in, but he is infamous for his lack of communication, so we’ll see. I will post them on here when/if he does. I, myself, am eager to take a look.

I doubt I will be updating while I’m gone. I might put a few little ditties up when I stop at internet cafés and such, but I have no doubt that there will just be wayyy too much to say.

As of now I know that the Amazon trip will consist of 3 days living on a boat, sleeping in hammocks, showering together in river water, stopping off at a few native villages (with a tour guide), seeing freshwater pink dolphins, and eating grubs out of coconuts. Sounds perfect. The Northeast trip will be traveling around to various cities, mainly touristy, doing fun stuff like parasailing, and going to beaches and lots of famous sites like Christ the Redeemer and Copacabana in Rio.

It should be incredible. I’ll let you know. There are 24 of us going to the Amazon, and 35 going to the Northeast. I will be stopping at internet cafés to check my e-mail and such, and a few of my friends have laptops that should work in most of the hotels, but I still won't be around all that much.

Just for those of you that don't know - my mom's pregnant! I'm excited, so I'm telling everyone. I will have a 3 month old brother/SISTER (I hope) when I get home. That will probably be my biggest motivation for coming back, actually, haha.

I am great. I hope you all are too. I know this was a long one. I know I am bad about updating. At this rate there will only me like 15 posts by the time I go home.

E-mails and comments are always appreciated, even if not responded to :-D :-P.

New pics are up at: http://www.flickr.com/photos/alannainbrazil.

Muito Amoooor

Alanna

Starting to Notice a Language Improvement and School

Òla, tudo mundo! (Hello, everyone - literally 'all the world.' I like that phrase.) I hope that everything is well in the Northern Hemishpere. Down here it is still very hot, the toilets are still flushing the normal way, and I am still just lovely...

As always, a lot is going on. It's really weird for me to think that it is almost October already! Time here is sort of strange for me; I tend to feel restless and in a rush if I am not doing something, but at the same time that I really have all the time in the world. I figure one of these days, or one of these months, it's really going to hit me that I don't have all the time in the world - just like it did before I left - and I am going to freak out, but for now it's all good. I am getting concerned, though, because my mom sent my new bank card like 3 weeks ago and I have yet to receive it, and I need my insurance card in my hands by November 9th or I don't go on the trips and we don't get our money back. I am trying to be as on top of those things as I can, but really all I can do it wait. It's sort of frustrating. No, it is frustrating, period.

I have tended to feel a little bit more in limbo these past few weeks than I did before, and I think worrying about that stuff has a lot to do with it. Whereas for the first month I felt pretty much 100% disconnected from my former life, now that I am settled in here, I tend to dwell on it a little more, especially when something here is bothering me. I have some trouble here because I do not like living under such strict rules. I really like my host family, and I am grateful to have gotten them - It's all just luck, and I know some people with pretty bad families - but I do not necessarily like all the rules and the curfews. They try to treat me like a member of the family, which is what I want, but it also means that I don't get to live this year as I would like because I have to conform to their schedule and their concerns. I understand the rules and why they are there, and because I don't want to cause problems with my family I accept them, but I really don't like them. I have said all I can, though, I think, so I just have to live with leaving the parties early. I found out that I have 2 more host families following this one - both in the same neighborhood, so it will be interesting to see the change in family dynamic. I am very fond of my current family, but I think I will like the change, and since it is close I can/will still see them if/when I want.

Hmm, what have I done lately? I have hung out with the usual people, for the most part. The last exchange student finally got here (we have 10 in my city, now, which is all we will have until January when we get an Australian - they run on a different schedule because of their school year). He is from Taiwan, and his name is "Jack," which pretty much doesn't resemble his real name at all (he told it to me, but I forget what it is, exactly), so I am wondering how they came up with it, haha. I don't think I have mentioned that it is common for exchange students to have nicknames because it is hard for the people in the country to remember/pronounce the names. For instance, Johanna's family just calls her Jo ('yo'). We all have relatively simple names, here, though. My name is the same, but they pronounce it differently - it is very nasal. I can't really reproduce it - it's kinda like al-uhna. I actually think it's weird now telling people my name becaue I am not used to hearing it said like I say it, if that makes any sense, haha.

We watched a really good movie the other day called "If Only". I forget what the name was in Portuguese. It's funny, we are in Brazil, but the best thing we can come up with to do sometimes is watch a movie. It's really all a matter of transportation, though, and we try to get out and go to the park and stuff as much as we can. It's actually good for us to watch movies, though, because it helps with the language. When we are all together we watch them in English with Port. subtitles so that we can read along. It really should be the other way around, but they have too hard a time reading the English so fast, and I really have no room to talk so I give them a break, haha. When I am alone, though, I watch movies in Port. with Port. subtitles, and I understand them, yay. I have a hard time without the subtitles, but it's getting better. The other day, though, I was watching Mission Impossible 3 without subtitles, and I had like no idea what was going on, haha. I still don't cheat, though, and I think it helps to at least be paying attention.

I have noticed an actual difference in my ability to talk to people, lately, which is encouraging. One afternoon last week the teacher didn't show up for the last class of the day, so we were allowed to leave, so Gerardo and I went to the little place across the street where a guy sells churros he makes at his little stand (they are like fried, hollow, bread with caramel cream - dulce de leite - or chocolate in the middle, covered in connamon sugar, yum). There was another guy there, and he talked to me for like 15 minutes, and I actually pretty much understood all of what he was saying to me, and sort of talked back (he, like most Brazilians, didn't need much encouragement to keep going, haha). I had no answer when he was asking why the women's U.S. soccer team is really good and men's isn't, though, haha, so I told him it was because women are just always better than men :-D. A friend of mine told me that once I can cut out all the Spanish I will be one of the best speakers here, and that made me happy. I have been here for less time than a lot of them, too.

Last Thurday the other ex. students from here (excluding 2), a few rebounds, and I went to an English school to talk to a class about our homes and show them some stuff. I think they only understood about 30% of what we said, but they were really excited anyway (they were like 5-14 yrs old) , and the teacher translated the harder stuff. I took my WV flag, some large versions of coins that I have, and a map of WV, and they all really liked the coins in particular. I had to go around and show them to everyone and explain them. Oh, hahaha, this was so funny, I was showing them on the map that we live close to Washington D.C., and after I showed them the border states one boy asked where Count Dracula's Castle was because he though I said Transylvania, not Pennsylvania. I felt bad for laughing (we were all laughing really hard), but it was seriously one of the funniest things I think I have ever heard. I am laughing now, actually, just thinking about it. Poor guy, he was like 6 and 100% serious, but he took it well. They had all made Brazilian desserts for us, so after we talked for like 2 hours we ate for like an hour. It was a good time. The pic I put up is from the class - I guess I will name the people, just in case you care... ok, left to right on the top row is Jack (Taiwan), Ryan "Shaggy" (like from Scooby Doo, haha, from California), Gabriel (went to Lake Tahoe, CA last year), the teacher, Tania (Mex.), Diego (went to Thailand last year), Gerardo (Mex.); second row is Iván (Mex.), two Brazilian girls whose names I forget (they both went to the US last year), Johanna (Germany), Annia (Mex.), me, Guilherme (went to South Africa last year - Gabriel's twin). The rows kind of merge, but I think you can figure it out...

Last Friday I went to one of the other schools here, it was called Christo Rei (Christ the King), and was, obviously, a Catholic school. It was quite a bit different from my school, and I actually liked it a lot better. My friend Dayna (Canadian) came in Thursday night, and we stayed at a friend of her's house. Dayna stayed with me for the whole weekend, actually, because she lives in a tiny little town with a crappy family, which was cool. Her friend Adrielly, who we stayed with, and her friends are really cool; I liked them a lot. They are a little younger than me, but that doesn't matter so much here. School itself was school, but we got to go meet the principal and take a tour, so they, naturally, wasted as much time as possible. It was a nicer building, and it had a better atmousphere, I though, than my school. When I started school they never bothered to show me around or introduce me to anyone, they just sent me to class with my cousin, which, to me, was very rude. Gerardo didn't care, but I did. Plus, our class doesn't really care about us, and the class at Christ Rei was a lot more friendly (partially because they had a group English test that day, haha, so they kept whispering to us for help).

After school we ate at Adrielly's and then went back and has a little surprise party with her friends for their theatre teacher. It was just nice, clean, fun. There were some nuns there, which was kinda weird, but they were cool. They have a pool there, so her friend went and got us some shorts, and all the girls played water polo in the pool. We were all locked in the pool area and walled off, which made it more fun - very giggly and all that, haha. After that we watched the guys play basketball for awhile, and then went home. Did I mention that Brazilians can't play basketball? They can't, haha, but they kill us in soccer, so it's ok.

Saturday we went to Tania's and swam for the afternoon, and then Gerardo came and made everyone Mexican food. We were planning on having a party, really, but more people kept showing up, so we did. Tania's mom tried to teach her and me to Samba, which was somewhat successful, haha, but it's very difficult. Tania is better than I am, and Annia is better than both of us. She got there later, but picked it up a lot quicker. I am just really stiff, so I need to practice. Hopefully I will get it by Carnaval. Tania's mom is an excellent dancer, so we will have to practice some more. The Mexicans also taught us a dance of theirs, which is kinda like their version of the electric slide, but a lot faster, and you can do it with two people instead of just one. They also taught us how to dance 'banda,' the typical, trumpety Mexican music. We basically had a goofy traditional dance party, and ate food, and hung out. I had to leave earlier than everyone else, of course, but it was really fun. By about 10 it was Tania, Annia, Gerardo, Tania's parents, her sister, Johanna's sister, Julio, his friend Julianna, Dayna, and me, and the next day my feet were sore from dancing, haha. I got a bunch of videos, but my camera doesn't record sound, so it didn't really capture the effect.

I went to the neighborhood churrasco Monday, and I met one of my next host brothers, and he seemed nice. I think we will get along. In my next family I have 2 brothers, who are 17 and 18 (I met the younger one), and in the one after that I have a sister who is 17. I am moving to the next house after Christmas, and I think I will be there for like 3 and a half months. Sorry, I am thinking of random things to write on here - It's hard to keep everything straight.

Friday of this week Gerardo made us Mexican food again at my house (we are trying not to waste the tortillas his mom sent), and Tania, Johanna, Julio, Ryan/Shaggy, and the twins (his host brothers) came over to hang out. We played cards for a fwe hours and then went to their house and hung out for awhile with some more people. Playing cards is funny because we teach eacother games, and we are trying to explain in a mixture of 3 languages, haha. It took me a few hands to finally understand the Brazilian game we played, but I got it eventually.

Julio's birthday was Thursday, and last night he had a party at his friends house. I could only stay until 9, but it was fun nonetheless. He works for his uncle's company as a full time job, but he organizes parties professionally on the side. This wasn't one of his big parties, but he still knows how to do it. His last real one was in August before I got here, and it was almost 900 people at $15 a head. They, of course, had to buy ridiculous amounts of beer, but that's still pretty good. He has friends in London and Madrid who do the same thing, and he is planning to move in with one of them within the next year or two when he can get it together. I'm pushing fo Spain, myself, since I fully intend on sleeping on his couch, haha.

This week has been kind of weird because my host dad and most of my host mom's family have been in São Paulo for a big music festival thing. It's a musical instrument festival, really, and their business is selling musical instruments, so they all went to try and do that. My host mom said that my host dad was very pleased with the amount of sales, but that it's a very long weekend. The festival itself lasts for 4 days, I think, the first two are just for shop owners, and the last two are for the public - those are the bad days. My host cousin, Gustavo (Gu), who is 6, has been staying at our house some days, and at my host mom's parents with her mom the other days. He is fun, I like him a lot, but he is a little tiring, haha. We went to the mall the other day, and he told me like 5 ghost stories - it was really adorable, but I only understood about half of it, and by the end I was really tired, haha. Kids are so hard to understand, it's crazy. He's very patient with me, though, and if nothing else he's usually happy with a smile and a "nossa!" ("wow" - noh-sah). It's fun to have him around, though, I like him a lot.

Okay, I think I have hit all the high spots, haha, now I am going to explain the school system in more detail, which is very, very different.

School is only compulsary until, I think, the age of 14, and after that they can quite if they have to or want to. The publis schools are not very good at all, so most families try to send their kids to private schools. The one I go to is part of a system that is rather widespread, I think, it is called Anglo, and it is like $150 a month, I think, although for me it is free. My host mom said that they have a very good secondary school system, but it is not so good for the younger kids because they just started a year or two ago, so Gu goes to a different school. They don't have separate elementary, middle, and high schools here, all ages go to the same school, although I think a lot of the time the schedules are slightly different. The private schools are independently run, and, as far as I can tell, don't really work with one another in terms of scheduling and whatnot. They are similar, though.

My school starts at 7:20, and ends at 12:20. We have 6 classes, with 5 minute breaks between them, except for the long break in the middle, which is about 15 minutes. They do not have any options when it comes to classes - they all take the same things with the same teachers. Instead of changing classes we all stay in one room, and the teachers change at breaks. I honestly can't even tell how many subjects we have because the schedule is somewhat erratic. We have each subject 2x/week, so, lets see, if I have 3o classes then I have 15 subjects, right? It might not be. I'm really bad at math, haha. Speaking of math, I would say that math and science are about 75% of the curriculum, and history, geography, economics, literature, and Porttuguese share the rest. Monday is my favorite because it is almost all fine arts.

They don't have textbooks here, they have workbooks that are distributed and bought at various times during the year; I think we are on the 7th one right now. They have all the subjects in them, and the lessons are layed out for each day, including the homework and examples. The teachers do not spend more than two classes on one subject before they are moving on, which means that school here is harder. They have to cover all the material at the pace of the entire system, rather than their own class, so they can't afford to waste time. The students are largely responsible for making sure they inderstand what they are being taught, so they usually study for at least 3 hours after school if they are in their final year of school, because looming at the end is the dreaded Vestibular...

The Vestibular is the test every Brazilian has to take to get into college, and it is, from what I have heard, very very hard. The Vestibular determines whether you get into a public universtiy, which is what you want, because they are not only better, but they are free. The private schools here run at about $2,000/month, and they are not all that great, but anyone can go. The public schools are very competitive. I think only like 24 people from Anglo get to go, and there are proabably about 100 who will graduate. It's even harder if you have been an exchange student because you leave halfway through your second to last year and return in the middle of the next year, so you miss a year's worth of material. I don't think I would want to do that - not with so much at stake. If you don't pass a particular subject, though, you can re-take it the next year, so sometimes we have people i random classes because they have to test again on the subject. When you do get accepted to a public school there is a big party, and if you are a guy your friends shave your head for you. My cousin Pedru, for example, has his head shaved because he took the test early and passed.

My school is relatively large compared to a lot of them, and my grade is divided into 4 classes, which are A,B,C, and D. I am in the D class, which is the class of people who have the lowest grades. I don't like my class particularly well. There are some cool people in it, of course, but for the most part people sleep and don't bother to talk to me. I guess it's my job to talk to them first , but it would be nice if I were in a class like Tania, Annia, and Johanna, where everyone wants to know them. Oh well, I have made other friends, and I will be gone for a month anyway. When I get back this school year will be almost over, and we will have vacation then a new class, so I am looking forward to that.

They have some sports after school, I think, but school spirit really isn't a big deal, and the building is very austere. They have a sheet that everyone signs during the first and second classes to do attendance, and a hall monitor who is always there to keep track of people. She's mean, haha. They call the teachers by their first names, and they dress in nice looking jeans and a blouse or t-shirt and cuss in class (depending on the teacher). Needless to say, it is less formal. Whether a class is boring or not still depends on the teacher, but almost all of them just ignore people who sleep through the class. There is one guy, though, who just screams randomly throughout the class; like he'll be teaching and yell a word really loud to wake people up then laugh and keep going. Oh, and there is this other teacher, named Ademir, who says, "bom dia" like 10 times at the beginning of class (good morning), and he kisses girls on the hand or the head (namely ex. student girls, as the others and I have figured out), and he is always using people's arms or heads or whatever to talk about geography. He carries around this metal stick that he uses as a pointer or to whack desks with when he makes a point, and he is always punching the board while he talks. He is really weird, but I like him. He is like 5'3" and has a very impressive mustache. They even have a group on Orkut, which is the Brazilian and Asian/Middle Eastern version of Myspace and Facebook, for people who "love Ademir's bom dia." I'm in it, haha.

We don't have to do anything in school, and it's unsufferably boring. Gerardo has the newest workbook, and I asked him to give it to me so that I can have something to do other than pass notes/stupid drawings with him, read, write letters, and sleep. It took me awhile to get used to sleeping in school since I have probably only slept in school like 5 times in my life (all of which during Latin, haha, oh, no, I remember falling asleep in science in 10th grade once too), but all the people in my class sleep too, so oh well. I don't blame them, either, because all it is is lecute and note-taking. There is no class involvement and almost no interaction unless it's one of the cool teachers who teaches half the time and just hangs out with the guys half the time. I always pay attention in the calsses like geopraphy and history because I can understand them almost all of the time (they write the notes on the board while they lecture, which helps), but the physics and chemisty looses me, haha.

I think that's about it. Oh, quick funny story:

Today I went to the bakery with my host mom, and when we got back she got out first and yelled to me not to get out of the car. I was like all worried because I didn't know why, and she told me there was something there that I didn't understand (I didn't know the word), so I was all nervous. I looked and didn't see anything, so I asked her what it was and she said a little animal (uma animalzinha, haha), so I got out slowly, and there was this tiny little frog stuck on the wall by the door. I thought maybe it was poisonous because she told me to come to the other side of the car with her quickly, so I asked if it was dangerous, and she said no, it would (some word I didn't get), and then started making hopping motions with her hand, and I figured out that she was just really scared of frogs, haha. Then she threw rocks at it, but it didn't move, so we had to spray it with the hose out of the garage so we could go inside. It was really funny, I thought, but she was feraked out, haha.

Oh, and another thing. Rain - or a severe lack thereof. It has finally rained a little, but only a little. It hadn't rained for almost 3 months, and in a week or two they were going to start rationing water. It is so dry, and sometimes I wake up with a soar throat because the air is so dry. We need a really big storm, so hopefully we will get it; as of now it's just been a few drizzles. It has been cooler this week too, which is nice. They keep telling me to wait until summer when I complain about the heat, but I don't even want to think about summer. I am sad that I will come home to more heat next year, haha - I want some snow!

As always, I hope you are well. I have to go because I have school tomorrow. Blahhhhh. Being here makes me feel bad for people who always hated school. I have hated it for a month and a half and it's very tiresome to wake up and go do something you hate... It makes me want to write research papers.... Well, kinda. I write my fill on here, haha.

Muito Amoooooor!

Alanna

My First Concert Here and A New View of 9/11

Wow, I need to update more... Oh, and on a personal note: Mom, can you start printing these out so that I can have them when I get back, please?

Hello, all. I hope things in the states are well. I haven't read or watched the news once since I arrived, so the White House could have burned down, and I probably wouldn't know about it. I will be very poorly informed when I arrive in time for voting season; although since none of them tell the truth, I don't know how much it matters anyway, haha...

Things here continue to go well, although I am starting to enter the phase of homesickness/cultureshock where everything stops being so exciting and I get irritable. This, of course, is just by the books, but I have been a little bit more on edge lately than I was before. I feel restless when I am not doing something, and while I feel badly about wanting to be out all the time instead of at home, there is pretty much nothing for me to do here except watch TV, read, and be on the internet, which gets old. Plus, I am trying to cut back on my internet time, and the temptation gets too strong when I sit around for too long.

I'm still happy, though, no worries. That is really all I have to complain about. My grandparents were living in the house last week, which wasn't too bad, but I was very happy to see my parents again Sunday morning (as was my host sister, but she was rather more vociferous about it, haha). My grandparents are very kind people, but I prefer the normal life, for sure. However, I had to wait another week to go to the Tennis Club to sign up, and that was a little bit frustrating. We went today, though, to get a list of classes, times and prices, so tomorrow or Thursday I think I will be going in to get a small exam (weight, height, bodyfat %, etc) in order to start going to the gym in the afternoons when my host sister goes to English or ballet. The gym is $35 reals ($17.50) for the first month and $R30 for the following months, so I think that's pretty good. I have to pay another $30 for the initial start, but I have barely spent any money in anticipation of these costs, so it will be fine. They have a long list of classes, but I still want to do Capaoiera. They have an all women's class twice a week, so I hope I can do that starting here pretty soon.

Last week I went out and about every afternoon/evening (I have to be home by 10:30, which is a little bit annoying b/c it's earlier than pretty much everyone else - we don't have to do anything in school, anyway), which included a little pool party at my Mexican friend, Annia's house (the pic is of, clockwsie from front, Caio - Brazil, Gerardo - Mex., me, Tania - Mex., and Annia - Mex. after swimming), a birthday party/watch soccer party for Iván a Mexican guy (Brazil beat Mexico despite the 4 Mex. exchangers' yelling and waving flags around, though, haha), watching Little Miss Sunshine (my new favorite movie - it's so awesome), and general hanging out mostly with other ex. students, but with some Brazilians as well. Haha, our parents go crazy because the girls that I hang out with most regularly and I go as follows: Anna, Tania, Johanna, and Alanna, so when we talk on the phone no one can tell whose name we are trying to say. Friday was Presidente Prudente's 90th birthday, so I had no school, and Thursday night was the Babado Novo concert.

It was awesome!!!

I went with two Brazilian girls who are in my class and who both studied in the US last year with Rotary, Natalia and Marina, and we hung out with a bunch of other girls that they know and I recognized, mostly from school. It was an all girls sort of night, which was cool. They took very good care of me - making sure I didn't get lost, that I knew how to dance, that I was included, that I was happy, etc. I was actually a little bit irritated earlier that night because they went to Tennis Club to hang out before and I couldn't go, so I had to wait until after 11 for them to even pick me up, but in the end I was really glad I did. They definitely showed me a good time. We also ran into a few o my ex. student friends, including a girl from Cali. that I really like, and who I have been wanting to see ever since the initial conference. I think she is going to come in for a friend of mine's party here in a few weeks.

The concert itself had a different vibe from any that I've been to in the US. There were two areas, VIP and regular. I was VIP, which meant that I was allowed to go down onto the ground instead of having to stay in the stands - it didn't get anymore VIP than that. As I have learned about Brazil, schedules and organization are generally of very little importance, haha. The concert ticket said that it started at 9, but we got there at about 11:30PM, and the "show" didn't start until 1:15AM, haha. Up until that point they played dance music, sold drinks, and tried to shove everyone into the gate; it was, essentially, like a big outdoor dance party with 11,00 people. Actually getting in was a slightly different story. Back to the point about organization, this was how it was set up: There were two open doors with guys at each taking your ticket and giving you a wristband and a bandana, which denoted you VIP or regular. In front or those two doors was a giant mass of people shoving their way in. That was pretty much it. So, for about 15minutes, the girls and I all locked arms and slowly shoved our way toward the front, totally smashed into one another and the random people around us. It would have been rather uncomfortable had we not been laughing the whole time about how ridiculous it was, haha.

After we got in we ran into 50 people we had to stop and say 'oi' to (saying hi to people gets tiresome here because you have to keep your face tilted at this weird angle to give and receive cheek kisses, haha), and then we went down to the field (which was really the blacktop area) to hang out and dance. Oh, I think I forgot to mention that it was at the soccer stadium outside of town, and that 11,000 people filled about 1/4 of it, maybe. The dance music here, might I add, is far superior to American club music/radio crap (unless they play American club music, which they do about 1/2 the time). They have this genre called funk, which is like hip hop except way better, haha. I will see if I can put a playlist on here so you can hear some of it, although, I warn you, you probably don't want to translate most of it, haha. I have very serious trouble dancing to it correctly, but I will learn eventually. I think you have to be somewhat intoxicated to really get it, anyway.

Once the actual band came out nothing really changed. Brazilians are very social, and they tend to like to pay more attention to the people around them than anything else, it seems like. We only watched it about half the time. The whole thing had more of a festival feel than a concert feel, and although there were a lot of people there, it wasn't packed, which was nice. The band was very good, though, upbeat and fun, and they put on a good show. There was one dance where everyone held hands and ran really fast from side to side, and that was a little crazy, haha; I basically just held on and let them drag me. Actually a good bit of the music here has a specific dance you do with it that they tell you in the song, but, as I can't undersatand what they're saying and can't dance anyway, it doesn't do me much good, haha.

Hmm, I feel like there is more I could say, but I will stop there, I'm sure you can't get as excited about it as I can, haha.

The music ended at about 3:35, and one of the girls' dad took us al home. I got in bed at 4:20, and didn't wake up until 1:00 the next day, haha. I was sooo tired. I have been just a little bit sick anyway with a headcold, which makes me tired, so after we went and ate lunch I came home and went back to bed from 3-5, haha.

Saturday I went to a girl named Gabi's house; she goes to my school and lives in my neighborhood. Actually - I have to tell you about this real quick - I had gone to her house for lunch Tues. afternoon, and after that I went to the supermarket with her family, and it was the craziest trip to the supermarket ever, haha. There were four of us, and we each got a cart, and we each filled the cart completely, and basically ran through the store grabbing things we needed and looking at various lists and yelling to eachother in Portuguese. In the end we had 4 totally full carts and almost $R950 worth of stuff. It took us like 20 minutes to check out, haha, and the girl was about my age, so we carried on a borken sort of conversation. It was seriously insane.

Anyway, we had a little churrasco Saturday (again, Brazilian BBQ, but you better get used to the word because I go to them like 3x a week, haha) with her girlfriends and Tania, and that night Tania and a few other friends came to my house and we walked around the lake by my house and watched a movie...

Oh man, and on Sunday I blew up the glass cover on the stove! It was aweful! I didn't really think about lifting it up because I am used to glass-covered elexctric stoves, but this was most definitely a conventional stove, and you most definitely are supposed to move the glass thing, and, as a result of my stupidity, it most definitely exploded all over the kitchen. They didn't yell at me or anything, but I don't think my host dad was too happy. He spent like 1/2 hour cleaning it up. The kitchen was seriously covered in glass. It was really scary. It made this loud bang and glass pieces flew all at me. Luckily no one got hurt, though. I was the only one in the kitchen, and when my host sister came in because I screamed, we just looked at eachother with our mouths hanging open and started to laugh. I was like, "Eu não sei que falar!" which means, "I don't know what to say", so we just left and got our parents, haha.

Ok, I think I'm getting too in depth here, I know you guys just want basics and culture and stuff...

I saw my friend Dayna, who is Canadian, at the show, and she was staying in Prudente for the weekend (she lives about 1hr away), so we hung out a little bit. She introduced me to a munch of her friends, who all attend a different school, and one girl invited us to come stay at her house Thursday night and go to school with her Friday. I am looking forward to doing that - it will be cool to see what another school is like. Then Dayna is going to stay at my house for the weekend because her town is tiny and boring, haha, so hopefully we an find something to do. A lot of my friends went to a town called Londrina last weekend for a giant costume party (25,ooo people) called Metamorphosis, so there wasn't as much to do as usual. I wish I could have gone, but it was way too expensive, and we have strict travelling rules anyway.

Another quick funny story: today a few people came over and we ate a little Mexican food (the Mexicans and I all miss it soooo much, and Johanna - German -has never really eaten it), and when my friend Gerardo's aunt was dropping him off she locked the keys in the car wile it was running with a dog inside. It was really funny. We waited for like 20 minutes outside trying to get the dog to unlock the doors while her sister came with an extra key. She is Japanese, so we also got a little language lesson, haha.

Ok, now on to culture. I hadn't really thought about doing 9/11 on here, but then it came and I realized it would be sort of a neat idea.

As I said, I have not been paying any attention at all to what is going on at home, and that includes not paying any attention to the fact that it was 9/11. I never really need to know the date, so I didn't even realize it was until that evening at Iván's party. I said that it was weird for me to have gone all day and not heard a thing about it, and that it was actually kind of nice. I didn't realize how insensitive of a statement that was until the people I was talking to looked at me like I was crazy.

All the others remembered exactly where they were when 9/11 happened, and Johanna said that she cried when she saw the videos. Most of them had been let out of school, and had spent the evening at home with their parents glued to the TV. They remember it every bit as clearly as I do, and it affected them just as mush as it did me, I believe. I was the only one, however, whose principal had decided to make the whole school turn off their TVs and pretend like nothing had happened. I don't remember even seeing a video of it until a few days after it happened, and I didn't understand what it means until a few years after it happened.

We all did agree that we were too young to be overly-concerned, but the fact that they took it every bit as seriously as we do erally struck me for some reason. I knew that the world was watching in the aftermath of the attack, but I didn't realize how much it really did care - I didn't think about a bunch of 11 and 12yr olds in Germany, Mexico, and Brazil huddled around the TV with their families. They all had their moments of silence in school and their prayers in church, and they all understand what it meant just as much as I do. In fact, two of them had rather direct connections with people who worked in the World Trade Center (one is American, though, he lives in Calfi., the other was Johanna), although neither of them were killed.

Just to tell you, I know you already know this, and so did I, but just to reinforce it - the world really hates Bush. They don't blame it on me or anything, but they tell me, flat out, we all hate your government, and we all hate the war. I just tell them that I don't like it either, and that hopefully the new election will bring about some good changes. Although, just as a note, the Brazilians I have talked to here don't like their president, Lula, either - they don't like that he uses their tax money to give to poor people (sound familiar?), so he was elected becuase the poor people love him. Being American in a different country is interesting. It's like I don't feel as foreign as everyone else because everyone already knows about our problems. They've been to NYC, they follow our elections, and they love our movie stars. Sometimes I find the anonymity of being Hungarian or Swedish to be much more alluring than having to carry around the associations that come with being an American.

It's not that they don't like me, or don't like us, or don't like our country, it's just that I almost feel like our privacy is being invaded, or, rather we are constantly invading theirs. I am really not into this whole Americanization thing. I really don't miss Wal-Mart (we have none) or SUVs (I have probably seen under 150 since I've been here, and that includes São Paulo). I do appreciate our way of life, and that part of the reason we are so omnipotent is because we do a lot to help others, and that my ability to even be here is supported by the fact that everyone in the world drinks Coke, but having to watch MTV everyday in a country that has so much more to offer gets to me sometimes.

I know that I am not the first person to gripe about this. Not in the least. But now that I am here to see it I am startint to fully appreciate it, I think. Well no, not fully, but I am starting to. I think I will have to join the Peace Corps before I can make any serious statements.

Hmm, sorry about that, I didn't mean to go on so much, but it's on my mind. I appreciate every one of you, even if you are ignorant Americans :-P... JUST KIDDING. Sometimes I get myself into trouble with the sarcasm here, so I just thought I'd make it clear that I don't really think you are ignorant.

Thanks for reading, as always, and dealing with my verboseness. I hope you enjoyed. I will have more pics up on Flickr soon. I am in a little bit of trouble for going out too much, so I will have all afternoon/evening/night tomorrow to do it.

Beijos! (kisses)
<3 Alanna a Americana

Finally Staring to get into Life Here and Having a Maid

Alright, it's been awhile, but I'm finally starting to be kinda busy, yay! Let's see, the last time I wrote was Aug 30, a Friday.... Wow, a lot has happened since then.

School has been the same - rather boring, but it helps me with my listening. There's another exchange student in my class who's from Mexico, but he speaks very good English because he lives on the border and has gone to school in the US since he was a little kid, so I talk to him most of the time. A few of the girls in my class also talk to me on a regular basis; however, most of them talk to me in English, so I haven't been practicing my Portuguese as much as I should. We are going on a school trip to a big amusement/rollercoaster park later this month, and that should be a lot of fun. I'm excited about it. School is somewhat more informal than it is at home (teachers are called by their first names, and the class is pretty relaxed), but the students are expected to take a very active role in their own education, I think. At the end of the year the oldest students take a big test called the Vestibular, and they have to get a certain score in order to get into college. The state schools here are better than private schools, but they are very competitive, so you have to work hard to get in. I will cover the school system more thouroughly later.

Since my last post I have finally gotten a bit of a social life, and my first party was the Saturday night following my last post. It was, for better or worse, essentially the same as a party I would have gone to at WVU, I think. The drinking age here is 18, so it's pretty much a mix of high school and college aged people. Some people drink, some people don't - you just have to hang out with the right people, and you'll be fine. I hang out with other exchange students and some of their friends, so everyone is very cool, and no one cares whether you want to drink or not. Don't worry everyone!!! I'm just as safe here as I would have been in college - actually, since my parents are pretty protective, it may be even better. The people here just want to dane, talk, and have a good time, so it's nice. There's really no pressure.

That Sunday I went out to the family farm for a traditional BBQ (the pic of me on this post is at the Currasco - meat fresh out of the grill), which is called a Churrasco (chu-hass-ko), and learned why people like to eat meat. As some of you know and some of you don't, I really am not a big meat-eater; I will pretty much always choose fish or chicken, and I have never ordered a steak. In fact, usually when I have to watch people eat steak it grosses me out. However, they have this meat here called picaña, and it is delicious. I don't know if it's the way they prepare it or what, but I ate it until I was stuffed, haha. The farm itself was very beautiful; I took a lot of pictures, which I have to post on my Flickr at some point. It wasn't that big, but it was very cozy and well-kept. They had a lovely garden, lots of fruit trees and flowers growing all over the place, and a nice view of the countryside. My mãe (mom) and her sister and 2 brothers grew up there.

I went to the Rotary meeting for my host Rotary club, which was less than exciting, but it wasn't too bad. There are a few clubs in my city, and mine hosts me, a Mexican girl named Tania, a German girl named Johanna, a German guy named Tobias (Tobi), who was only short term and left Friday, and a French girl named Lucie. The Brazilian students who went on exchange last year were also there, and we all sat together and talked, it was nice to meet everyone again. I met some of them at the big Rotary conference, but there were so many people it was hard to really get to know anyone.

One of the Brazilian guy's dad got me a membership at an acadamia (a YMCA type-thing) called Tennis Club, where they have a lot of classes and stuff, so I will hopefully start going there this week to work out and maybe sign up for Capaoiera, which is a Brazilian martial art that I would like to get into. It is half dance, half martial arts; it was created by the slaves here because they weren't allowed to practice their old martial arts for fear of revolt, so they made it look like it was just dance. You can find lots of videos of it at Youtube.com - just search for capaoiera. I'm looking forward to that, although I might have to do something else because the class is from 6-7, and my sister's classes all end at 6, so my mom doesn't want to have to wait around for an hour after my sister is done. They might have a Samba class or something that ends at 6, and that would be cool too. I'll go check it out.

The only problem is the money. I only get $50, or 100 reais ($R) a month, and to go to the gym and take a class is $30/month, which is a really good rate, but when you have to live on $50 it's a bit much. I also really want to take Portuguese classes, but that will be almost $30 as well, so I'm not sure what I should do. I'm sure it'll get worked out, but it's a little bit frustrating. Actually, I am planning to ask my pai if he can look into the Rotary clubs paying for us to take Port. classes, becuase there are about 7 of us interested in taking a class together from the same teacher, and he will charge $R385/month (about $190) that we can all slpit between us. So, if the clubs are willing they could just aplit it between them, and I don't think that's too unreasonable. I hope they would be willing to do that.

I made chocolate chip cookies last week with a few of my friends, and then I learned to play a Mexican card game that is a lot of fun. My host family loved the cookies I brought with me, but the brown sugar here is a little bit different so these didn't turn out as well. They are still good though, and I think I will make some more today to sell at the neighborhood BBQ tomorrow. They have a churrasco every other Monday night for the neighborhood, and my mãe suggested that I do that to make some extra money.

I went to a few other parties last week - a going away party for the German guy, Tobi, a churrasco that was only for ex. students, and another churrasco at a Brazilian friend of mine's house and then stayed with Annia and Tania at Annia's house (two Mexican girls), so I have been keeping busy. Last night there was a mini-music festival here that I really wanted to go to, but it was $R30, so I decided to use the money for going to the gym or Capaoiera instead, and went to Tania's house to watch a movie. She lives in my neighborhood, about a five minute walk from my house, so that's convenient.

This week my host parents are out of town for my pai's (dad's) work, so his parents are staying here with Paula and me. He travels around, and my mãe usually stays here, but I think he is just very tired and lonely. I think he hasn't been able to take very many breaks lately, so he wanted some company. Both of my parents work for their fathers' companies. My avo (grandfather) on my pai's side owns a music store, so my pai travels selling their equipment and going to fairs, etc. I haven't been inside the store itself yet, but we've driven by a few times, and it looks very nice. My avo on my mãe's side owns several factories, but I can't remember what they produce. I think it's something rather industrial - rubber, or something like that. She is an accountant there, and she said it's very boring. Her brothers and sister also work at the factories. Everyone on both sides of the family is well-off because they are successful entrepeneurs, and I think they have worked hard to become so.

Hmm, I think that's pretty much what has been going on. This Friday there is no school because it is the city's birthday (there was no school last Friday either in celebration of indepencdence day, which isn't really celebrated here at all, except that there's no school or work - I think maybe they did fireworks in São Paulo, but that's it, haha), and I am going to a concert with a few girls from my class and a few ex. students. My host parents were kind enough to get me the ticket, and I'm really excited to go. It's a band called Babado Nova, and it's traditional Brazilian dance music. They told me it's pretty much country, but it's a lot of fun to go dance. I don't know how to dance, but hopefully I will learn. They keep trying to teach me at parties, but it's sort of hard. They say here that Americans have no rhythm (which, compared to Latinos, most of them don't), but that I will learn eventually, haha.

Actually, being labeled an American is one of the strangest things about being here. I'm definitely not accustomed to being a minority, and, eventhough it's not a big deal to them, it's a strange feeling. The weirdest thing is being called gringa, which can be offensive, but when I get called that they are just kidding. Mostly I get called that in school - they also call Mexicans that, so they say 'oi gringos' (oi is hey or hi) or 'tchao gringos' (bye) or whatever. I'm not offended by it. It's just weird.

Okay, here's my bit of culture for this post: having a maid.

Having a maid is one of the biggest cultural differences I have to face, which is mainly, I think, because a lot of the differences are subtle, and don't come into your room to put your clothes away for you and make the bed. In the morning, when we're leaving for school, you can see all the maids walking to our subdivision to go to work, and they have a special "service" entrance where they check in. I guess they are basically considered 2nd class citizens, but they told us before we came to think of is as their opportunity to support themselves and their families, and that most of the appreciate that. I'm not sure how easy is it to move up in social class here, but my suspicion is that their kids usually end up doing similar work as well. I don't know, but from what I've seen that seems most likely.

Our maid's name is Beth (bech). She's probably in her late 20s, is married, and is very nice; I like her a lot as a person, but she has messed up a few of my clothes in the wash, which is a little bit irritating. Actually, sometimes when I get bored I wish I had to do laundry just for something to do - I have pretty much no responsibilities here, and I get antsy because of it. When I try to help, though, she tells me not to - I think she just prefers that I let her do her job, though, so I stay out of it. It's still weird for me, though, to be sitting there reading or watching TV while she cleans my bathroom, and I am not totally comfortable with it. As I told my dad, though, if the worst thing I have to deal with is akward convenience I guess I don't have too much to compain about, haha.

She likes company, though, and whenever I'm around she talks to me. It's funny, because it takes us like twice as long to have a conversation as it would normally, and it's a lot of my smiling apologetically, leaning in closer, and asking her to repeat everything she says. We're getting there, though, and I appreciate it, really, because she's one of the very few people who speaks to me solely in Portuguese. She told me that she always wanted to learn English, but was never able to. I think that learning English is really a big key to success here, and I find that almost everyone my age can speak it well enough to carry on a conversation with me. This isn't always the case with older people, but they can all say hello. I love talking to my Brazilian friends on the computer, because it's always a funny mixture of my bad Port. and their bad English. Haha, my favorite thing is that instead of saying 'haha', they say 'uhauhauha' (that was directly copied from a conversation I'm having at the moment!), which to me really doesn't resemble laughter all that well. I just sort of imagine this weird sound, haha.

Well, I have to get to bed. As always, thanks for listening, and I will write sometime in the next week or so - I have to tell you about the concert!

tchao and beijos! (bye and kisses)

<3 Alanna

Sao Paolo and This Week - No Culture, sorries

Hello Everyone! (and by everyone I mean a wider audience than I was really anticipating, haha) Sorry it's been so long; right when we got back from Sao Paolo the computers went to the shop, but they're back now. Really it's more of a pain for me because there's so much to catch up on. Oh, and thanks for the comments! I really appreciated them eventhough I didn't respond, haha - I was afraid this would be really boring to read, but I guess not!

Okay, Sao Paolo:
We left early Thursday morning and drove for a long, tedious time (6 or 7 hours) to get to SP. It was fun to see the countryside though - well, not quite 7hours worth of fun, haha, but at least that was something - and I took some pictures and videos along the way there and back. I have a photo gallery account on Flickr now, so I'll be posting the pics this afternoon, and I will put the link in the list at the bottom of the page. Actually, I'll go ahead and add it to the bottom of this post too to make it easier. I also took some video (no sound, though, blah), and I'm going to set up a Youtube account so I can embed them on this page and also have a gallery. Diddo on that link.

We went to the giant mall to have a bite to eat. I had salmon that didn't compare to any salmon I could eat at home, but that's pretty much the only seafood I've eaten since I got here, so I'l take what I can get. After that we stopped at my Aunt and Uncles' lovely apartment (Claudia and Mauro), which is in a very nice area of SP, and then took my host brother to the airport, meeting my host cousin, Amanda (she goes to the university there) on the way. The scene was much less frantic than my departure was considering he actually had his passport and tickets with him, and it was, of course a common scene of tears and hugs and pictures, etc. I was sad to see him go; I liked him a lot, and he was cool about introducing me to his friends and stuff. He left behind lost of books and movies in Portuguese, so I'll bew getting into those. I started the 4th Harry Potter book in Port. the other day, and it's not too bad to read. I understand written Portuguese better than spoken, and I think it's helping with my vocab. Henrique left the Communist Manifesto, The Book of Five Rings, the Art of War, and the Two Towers beside his bed, but I don't think I'll be there... well, ever, haha.

The next day we went shopping downtown, and that was fun, but I was definitely ready to be done. Going shopping in the 3rd largest city in the world on $50 a month is a little tedious, haha, but, hey, that's culture, and sometimes I like trying on $500 sunglasses while pretending to sip from 200 tea cups (I'm not even exagerrating!). I tried to make sure I was in the back of the crowd at all the shops so the ladies wouldn't talk to me, haha, but it didn't work very well, and my host mom had to intervene when I gave them blank stares. I can talk and understand a little bit (sitting in school helps with the understanding a lot), but city chicks in shops talk too quickly for me to understand. Oh, in the morning we went to an open air fruit and fish market, and that was a lot of fun. It was less than a block away from the house, and they fruit is unbelievably cheap (unless it's imported). I didn't see a box of strawberries that cost more that $1 (and they are goood strawberries), and they are always giving you free samples, so I got to taste a lot of new fruits. My new favorite is Mexerica (mee-shee-ree-ka) - it's like an orange except way better. I eat one or two pretty much everyday. So yummy! Food here in general is cheap. We went to a good sushi restaurant that night, and six of us ate for, prepare yourself for this, under $50! We had plenty left over too. It was pretty awesome. Brazil has the largest Japanese community outside of Japan, so it's common here.

The next day we did "Citytour!!!", and went to a few of the historical places in SP. My favorite was the second oldest train station in the city (the first was built by the English, and this one by the Brazilian coffee plantation owners, so there were odes to coffe all over it, or so my host mom whispered in my ear while the tour guide was talking, haha), which now has the 4th best music hall in the world. We couldn't take pictures inside, darn-it, but it was reallyu astounding. The ceiling is made of blocks that move up and down in order to adjust to the style of music (church or symphony, etc.), and it was all the original ornately carved cement of the train station with comfy seats. There were four college students (they looked like, but they were incredible) practicing while she was talking, so I just tuned her out and listened to the music. Even in that setting it was a very neat experience, and it made me put going to a for real music hall to see a for real orchestra on my list of things to do.

We also went to the old palace (now the museum, but it was closed) and its gardens, the famous Cathedral of Se, a small museum with some famous Brazilian art and a place where you could tour the cells where they tortured Communists during the Cold War - creeepy-, and a few other places so I could get pictures. It was cool too see the history, but what interested me asmuch as anything was the graffiti and the poverty. I took a bunch of pics of the graffiti (of course I never seemed to capture the coolest pieces, of course), and stared just as much at the homeless people and the favelas (Brazilian ghettos) as the monuments. To me they seemed a little bit superficial with all the sadness and despair at their feet, and the old, toothless man speaking in tongues for money in front of the grand cathedral, the man resting against the side of an old building to take a dump, the homeless camps on the grass in the center of the freeway, and the crumbling apartment buildings held just as much significance as the place the artificial odes to government and religion.

Following most of our touring we went to this awesome indoor/outdoor market that was like the one we had gone to Friday morning except on a much larger scale (the pic is of me being excited about the cheese at the market, haha). It was in this huge building that was like a cathedral mixed with a warehouse, haha. It was just a big open space with pillars and stained glass with every possible (fresh) food item you can think of. There where isles and isles of all kinds of cheese, wines, meat, fish, fruits and veggis, etc. On the second level there is a big line of restaurants (like an up-scale food court), so we had a little lunch there and shopped for some fruit. That night we went to the mall for a little while, and despite my cynicism and disillusionment it was nice to look around, haha.

It was a good trip. I still really like my family, and it was a lot of fun to stay with Mauro and Claudia, who know the city very well, and have a warm and welcoming house and demeanor. I even got my own room! haha, and Amanda was cool (she's 20, and we stopped at her little aparment as well), and haning out with everyone is a good time, even if they were all sad about Henrique's departure.

When we got home the honeymoon period ended.

My host dad went back to work. He travels selling musical instruments and equipment for the family business, so he's only hom on the weekends. I went back to school, which is helpful, but terribly boring too, since it's an effort for me to understand, and after a few classes I get tired out and just want to sleep. There's a cool Mexican guy in my class, though, and his English is very good, so I talk to him most of the time. The people at school sort of talk to me, and they sort of don't. They do stare at me all the time when I'm walking down the halls or sitting in class, though, which is a little disconcerting. I think it's more curious than hostile, but I don't necessarily like the attention regardless.

Most days some new people will come up and ask me about myself and talk to me for awhile, but I haven't made any really solid friends yet apart from Gerardo. There are a few other people I talk to on a regular basis as well, and I think my social life will start to actually exist here in a few weeks, haha. They seem more likely to talk to me if he's around since he can help us if we don't understand eachother. When people talk to me slowly and directly I can usually do just fine, but the pronunciation makes it hard to catch the words. I can say all the essential things, but I don't practice anywhere near enough. Basically, I go to school and speak in English and some broken Portuguese, and go home and speak in English and some broken Portuguese. I am reading 100 Years of Solitude in English as well as Harry Potter, but once I'm done with it no more books in English! It's just way too good for me to give up.

After school is really boring right now becuase I haven't gotten into any activities yet. I have a little bit of a conundrum (spelling?) in the area too, because there is a gym up the road, but it costs $R80/month, and I only get $R100 so I don't think it's worth it. There is another gym that a few of the exchange students go to, and it costs $R60/month for both unlimited gym and capaoiera classes. I really want to go there, but it's sort of a pain for my family since I can't just walk, and the Capaoiera classes end at 7 when all of my host sister's classes (ballet and Engilsh) end at six. My host mom doesn't want to have to wait around on me, which is understandable, but I'm hoping to work out some other means of transportation so they can drop me off at the gym everyday during Paula's lessons and then pick me up when I don't have Capaoiera and I can take the bus or ride home with someone when I do. I'm sure we'll work it out, but I'm hoping it's soon because sitting around the house for 11 hours is not so wonderful. I even went and ran over a mile yesterday (I think - is 2,000m more than a mile? I'm pretty sure it is.), and we can't be having that!

Actually I have been pretty homesick these last few days, and I think it's mostly because I have nothing to to but sit around and think about what I could be doing at home, haha. Harry Potter and Protuguese TV only goes so far. As I said, the honeymoon period is over, and I feel like this is really the first week of my exchange. I think it will be fine; I just feel much less grounded than the others who are here, but most of them have been here for over a month, so I think that's okay. I just need to develope a rhythm now that everything has settled down.

Oh man, I accidentally just hit control-X and about had a heart attack, haha, but it's ok! Tudo Bom.

So that's where I am right now. I will put those pics and vidoes up following this, and add the links so you all can see them. You don't have to have an account for either, so no worries. I'm sure I left some things out, but I'm tired of writing, and that was a long post, haha.

Oh, and the water doesn't really spin the other way. I honestly never payed attention to the toilet at home, so I didn't know which way it spun, but I was under the impression that it was clockwise since I mentioned it to some people and they never corrected me. Sorry for the disappointment, but it's counterclockwise here, too. I took a video and everything! haha

Thanks for reading/caring everyone, it means a lot, and I'll write again soon! Oh, I'm supposed to do my culture thing. Darn. I'm too sick of typing now, so sorry, haha. I'll try to do it tomorrow or the following day, and maybe I'll proof it then too (would anyone like to volunteer to be my editor? haha). Any requests? I was thinking about doing maids or school; I know food is an area of interest, but I feel like I should know ther terminology better before I cover it, so it'll have to wait.

Tchao and beijos (kisses)!
<3 Alanna

my picture site: http://flickr.com/photos/alannainbrazil/
i haven't gotten the video set up yet - it's soooo slow
everything will be alannainbrazil, by the way, just to make it simple

My First Week and the Crazy Driving

Well, today marks a week since I got home, and there's sooo much to talk about.

I basically got here and unpacked enough to re-pack for a weekend in a town nearby called Salto Grande, where all the exchange students from my district met for a sort of conference/fun weekend. The pic is of most of the exchange students - they weren't all there because he was suddenly just like "ok - we're going to take a picture!" so not everyone knew about it. The whole weekend was really great. There are amost 70 of us in the district, I think, and I found a few girls that I got along with really well, so we're going to be hanging out on the weekends. I live in a fairly larger city, so I think they're going to come here for the most part, which is good for me, haha. Most of the people were really cool, and it was fun to sit at a table and eat lunch with people from Germany (there are lots of German kids here), Mexico, Canada, Holland, France, Denmark, Japan, you name it, haha. Almost everyone spoke English, though (literally like 98%), which was nice, but it also made me feel sort of ashamed to be American. It's like we push our language on everyone else and are, for the most part, too lazy to bother with theirs. I know that we don't have as much contact with other countries in terms of borders, but still, it made me feel a little bit guilty.

We had a bunch of boring conferences about rules, etc., but on Sat. night we had a big party where we did traditional dancing and dressed up, and then they played like club music. It was a lot of fun. I like the traditional dancing - it was basically the typical couple dancing where you trade around and all hold hands, etc. It was a lot of fun. The Brazilian Hip Hop is really good, too (or Hippy Hoppy, as they say, haha). There was this one group that I really liked, but I forget the name. I'll have to find out because they were quite good.

We also found out about the trips, and they look AWESOME.

I'm for sure going on the first two, which are a trip to the Amazon and to Northeastern Brazil (mostly the beaches). In the Amazon we'll be on a boat for three days sleeping in hammocks and making stops to go into the jungle and see some of the native villages and stuff, and we'll esentially be beach-hopping and going to Rio on the Northeastern trip. They made a DVD last year for all the exchange students (we'll get one too, yay!), and we watched clips from it (it was over an hour long). It looks absolutely incredible. I'm so excited. We'll be gone for 28 days and it's under $4,000, so I think that's essentially the chance of a lifetime - especially since we're going to get to go see native villages and do things w; actual Brazilian ppl instead of just being regular tourists. There are also trips to Carnaval in Rio, Iguacu Falls, and Machupichu (I would also LOVE to go there, but we'll see about the $$$), but those are later in the year.

So I had a great weekend, but I was happy to just come home and chill out - it was a tiring few days between traveling and staying up late, etc. I started school Monday, and, just as I assured, it's really boring, haha. Portuguese is really hard to understand - like Spanish/French/Russian all mixed up, haha. It's a beautiful language, and I'm looking forward to learning it, but it's hard, haha. I think I'm goint o take some formal lessons, though, which should help. They're expensive, but if I can get a group together we all split the cost, and I already know one guy who said he'll do it. I think we'll be doing a lot of grammar, which is good because that way I'll be fluent in both written and poken Portuguese. The teacher seems like he's very good - he teaches at the college and works through Oxford, and he's super-nice. So, that's cool.

I haven't been terribly homesick yet (some people talked to their parents like 3x in the first week), but it's supposed to really set in after the first month and a half. Luckily, though, that's when we're going on the trips, so at least I'll be distracted. I did get a splitting headache in school today, though, and it made me sick to my stomach to the point that I almost thre up, so I left at like 10:15, went to sleep, and woke up a little after 1. I'm still not feeling my best, but I'm much better now. I really hope it doesn't happen again.

We're leaving tomorrow morning to go to Sao Paolo for the weekend and to drop my brother off at the airport. He's going to Canada for the year, and I'm sad to see him go because he's very nice, and his English is very good, so he's been helping me out a lot and introducing me to people in the neighborhood. Oh yea, there are these BBQ-type things they have every weekend in athe center of my subdivision, and I met a lot of people there. They talked to me more than the people at school did, so hopefully I can become friends with them. They also have soccer every Tues and Thurs for girls (like lessons), and I went last night. They're all younger than me, but they're nice and I made 2 goals, haha. At the same time the guys who are serious and very good play in the other field, so that's fun to watch as well.

I was thinking it's a good idea, since there's just so much to talk about, for me to talk at first about what I've been doing, and then to cover an aspect of culture that I've experienced - family, food, fashion, friends, etc. (note my brilliant use of alliteration, hahaha) That way I can cover everything. So, my first topic, since it was really the first Brazilian thing I really experienced, is driving.

People drive crazy here!!! I thought maybe it was just a city thing when I was in Sao Paolo, but it's NOT, haha. There is no such thing as pedestrian right of way, and people go so fast through town (literally like 40MPH, I'm guessing - everything's in Kilometers, so I'm not sure) even when there are people around. The stop signs ("Pare") don't mean stop, they mean yield, and by yield they mean go through them anyway and if someone is coming slam on the brakes. They very rarely use turn signals, and they literally drive in athe middle of the road and cut eachother off constantly; there are also tons of little motorcycles that are always weaving through traffic, and speed bumps throughout the road that make you fly up out of your seat because they don't cause people to slow down. It's so stressful for me to just sit in athe back seat and hold on, haha. I'm not allowed to drive here, but even if I was I wouldn't - I would die, haha.

But it's funny, because they are so layed-back about it (just like they are about everything). When they get cutt off or os someone almost hits them they don't really care at all. No one beeps, no one gets mad or gives eachother the finger, it's like they understand that no one is going to follow the rules, so it's ok. I'm getting used to it, but it's still somewhat disconcerting.

Anyway, I have to pack for the weekend. I'm probably just going to buy batteries so I van take pics of Sao Paolo, and figure out a way to charge mine when I get back. I might buy a converter too, while I'm there, so I can actually plug it in.

I hope you all are well. OH, I almost forgot, for those of you that are wondering, the common myth about the toilets flushing counter-clockwise is indeed TRUE, haha, maybe I'll take a pic to prove it. Actually it took me a few days to figure it out because the toilets just sort of suck everything down at once and don't really spin at all, but I noticed it one day in the sink while I was brushing my teeth, haha.

I'll update sometime next week.

Tchau!

AQUI ESTOH NO BRASIL (here i am in brazil)

Soooo, I'm here!

We left the house at 11:00 AM yesterday for the Pittsburghy airport, and I arrived at my new house at 3:40 PM (4:40 here) our time. Right now everything is very exciting and surreal. It's like everything is the same, but all the details are different. The roads look like our roads, but the stop signs are round and say "pare", the cars are the same but the liscence plates are different, the people look the same, but I can only understand little snatches of what they´re saying, the key board is just different enough that I have to pay close attention to type, the shower has hot water but it's solar heated, the clock in my room (my host sister´s room) says 22:06, and you have to throw away your toilet paper instaed of flushing it.

The trip here was good once I left Pittsburgh. The big dilema was that the travel agency had sent my passport through FedEx, and we told them to hold it at the store for me because we were going to pick it up on the way to the airport (it´s right off the highway on the way); however, they sent it out anyway, so we had to wait for them to go pick it up and bring it to the airport. My flight left at 1:45, and they weren't there until 1:05, so, needless to say, it was a huge rush to get me through security and all that once they finally arrived. We would have been fine if it weren't for their mistake. Anyway, it actually turned out to be a good thing that I was in such a rush because it helped to give me the momentum I needed not to stop and hesitate at the door. I just gave quick hugs and kept going. I only cried while we were taking off and after that I slowly became okay.

My layover in NY was 6 hours, so my friend Luke, who goes to acting school there, came to visit me ther for about 1 1/2 hour. It was a nice little visit, especially since he'll have moved to LA by the time i get home, so we don't know when we'll see eachother again.

The flight to Sao Paolo was 10hours, from about 10:30 PM to about 9:30 AM, but by that time I was ready to leave the country. Once I got through the first flight and knew there was no turning back I started to get less scared and more excited. There were two really nice Brazilian guys sitting by me on the plane, and they talked to me for most of the time (sometimes they had side conversations in Portugese then they would ask if I understood - which I didn't, haha). The one has his own factory making and selling organic/protein cookies, brownies, and other snacks in NY, and he was showing us his products. He was extrememly friendly and hyper, haha, it was a lot of fun. They both told me a lot about me town and Brazilian life, etc. And, I will note, they were much nicer than the Americans I was sitting beside who never said a word to me, haha.

In the morning I was able to sit by the window and look out at the countryside - the view was breathtaking. It reminded me of a Van Gogh painting with all of the patchwork fields and rich, contrasting colors. Where I am is basically rolling hills/plains, you can see around for miles. It's very different than what I'm used to, but in a very good way. And Sao Paolo was HUGE. I think it's the 3rd largest city in the world, and as we flew down it was literally sky scrapers as far as the eye could see. I'im gald it was a clear morning, but it's too bad I did't have my camera on the plane. Anyway, you can check it out on Google Maps or Google Earth. It's a great place.

My host mother (Leana), her sister in law (Claudia), and her brother in law (Mauro) were all there to meet me once I got through customs, and they were all extremely kind and excited to see me. We drove to a smaller airport, and on the way we had some nice conversation that was a mix of Portuguese, English, and Spanish. Today Leana has let me speak English, but after this weekend I think we will try to be more strict. The driving here is much less structured - very much an every man for himself deal - but i've only been in the larger cities, so that's pretty normal in the US as well.

My host family so far has been great. They have made me fel very much at home, and their house is beautiful. I think I wil be very happy here, especially once I can speak more Portuguese. I think I will be able to pick it up enough within 2 or 3 months to at least hold my own, and Leana is looking into getting me lessons with her English teacher so that I can learn the grammar and everything as well.

Basically, so far so good. I am getting up at 6 tomorrow to go to a weekend long convention, so I should probably go to bed. I will probaly pick 2 days out of the week to get online for a while to update this, upload pics, check e-mail, etc, so dont't think I'm rude if I'm not prompt, haha.

I feel like there's so much more to say, but I'm tired and I don't realy know how to say it, anyway. It's only the first night, afterall. I will take pictures of the house, my shcool, the town, etc. and post them within the next few weeks. I still have to set up an account, but when I do I will put it in my links at the bottom of the page.

Thanks for reading, and feel free to comment, e-mail, and whatever.

Muito Amor!
Alanna