On Strange Hotel Guests

The staff of the hotel in which Beta (American mother, Brazilian father, multi-lingual friends) and Cris (Brazilian parents, multi-lingual friends) had their wedding were used to having Brazilian guests.  Or sometimes foreign guests who didn't speak Portuguese.  But all these guests for the wedding were switching between languages, sometimes while talking to the same person!  They looked at us in wonder, like a looking at a mouse with leopard spots.

My mother came in to see me while I was getting my nails done and after she left, the manicurist said, "I was listening to you and your mother making all those strange sounds and I wondered to myself, 'can they really understand each other?'"

On Waves upon Waves upon Waves....

Poetry is not for me.  I find it tiresome and unnecessarily convoluted. But every time I step out onto the beaches of Ilheus, the scene inspires nothing short of love.  The beaches are unlike any others I know:

The sand is a modest brown, but so fine that it packs down hard and flat - you can easily ride a bike on it or even bounce a basketball.  The beach is so flat that at low tide the water recedes dramatically.  The waves break in simultaneous rows of five or six: thunderous ones that only the surfers brave farther out to sea and subsequently smaller ones that break over each other until they are barely ankle high.

I love how the waves come in in sweeping arcs with lacy edges - sometimes like the borders of an egg fried in butter and sometimes more delicate, like a crepe.  The water is too turbulent to be blue but occasionally a shy wave will venture out to kiss my feet, as crystalline as a layer of clear nail polish.

For every meek wave, there are those assertive ones that may only come up to mid-shin but rush in with such force that unless you stand your ground, you risk water shooting up your legs and soaking you thoroughly.  You have to walk a far way out to actually get half way submerged.  Those of us who know the sneaky way of these waves, like this weekend's bride and my childhood friend, Roberta, can master wave jumping while still keeping our possession of our bathing suits.

I didn't expect to spend any time with Beta during her wedding weekend, so I was thrilled to slip away with her to the beach not once, but twice.  The first time, we went for a walk, like countless walks we have taken on these beaches, usually with some combination of mothers and sister.  The hard sand leaves your feet baby soft afterwards!  The second time, we went out to wave jump like the pros that we are.

Simple pleasures...

On Old Friends and the Pleasures of Language

The beach in front of the Butlers' property

My father has been in Brazil since February, tying up lose ends we have here and hanging out with two sets of family friends who my parents have known since they moved to Brazil in 1975.  Unlike Judy and Roberto, who I  have known since birth, David, Sueli, and David's Land Rover from the UK were mostly characters in my parents' stories to me.  They moved back to Brazil a couple of years ago after living abroad, most recently for 12 years in Trinidad.  They have a house on a small lot on the beach that includes a workshop where David and a few workers put together frames for high end bicycles for physically handicapped cyclists.  These get shipped to his son, Graham (business owner), in California.  My dad has been doing...well, I'm not sure what there.  Perhaps having breakfast with a horse.  My mother did inform me one day that he took one of the bikes out on the beach and found himself waist deep in a creek.

On my first full day in Ilheus, my parents picked me up to take me to David and Sueli's place.  None of us could remember the last time I had met them, but they are lovely people. Vanessa, the youngest of their four kids, had just arrived from England.  All three of them are warm and generous - the kind of people who take in strays of all shapes and sizes.

My father with a cocoa pod which I later devoured.

Sueli with an encomenda of kibe, coxinha de galinha, pastel de carne and pastel de frango

Chapati making operation:  my mother on Step One

David, Vanessa, and my father handling Step 2 (I was too busy taking care of Step 3 to photograph it)

It was also really nice to be in a household that spoke English and Portuguese interchangeably.  I tend to get lazy with language when I'm in Brasil and scramble my words, using those that seem most appropriate regardless of language.  Rare are the times when I'm around people who do the same thing!

On Rainy Days in Tropical Beaches

Just the other day I was defending sunny days and blue skies to Miranda, who feels like they create too much pressure to go out and seize the day.  She prefers overcast without the threat of rain.  No surprise - she lived many years in Washington state where the sun is a semi-mythological entity.

After Miranda and I said our goodbyes in Salvador with promises of a New Years reunion in Vegas (any takers?), I headed south to my old 'hood: Ilheus.  Well, I was born 20 minutes northwest of Ilheus, but the beaches of Ilheus were where I honed my crab-eating and wave jumping skills.  This was also where the wedding I was going to was taking place.  Before the madness began, though, I resolved to spend at least a couple of days on my own at a little lodge on a hill overlooking the water.

After the rain clouds cleared.

My parents met me at the airport and we met up with our family friends (including bride and groom) before having dinner by the sea.  My parents informed me that it's been raining cats and dogs, which could put a damper on my dreams of long walks on the beach and brushing up on my wave jumping.  Nevertheless, there's something about watching the rain come in over the sea and hearing the cacophony of tropical rainstorms that suited my need for some down time.  I read an excellent book (Brazil on the Rise: The Story of a Country Transformed), which was all the more fun to read while in Brazil, and enjoyed some quiet time with no obligations other than refilling my coffee.

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On Morning Ramblings, Globalization, and Being/Not Being from Bahia

Ah....the joys of being back in Bahia do not extend to the sometimes blunt and graceless way that I am sometimes addressed:  Indiana!

As in: Indian girl!

I've been asked where Miranda is from a lot - we speak to each other in English and are tourists.  When I say she's American, there is an immediate assumption that I learnt English in the US and that is how we met (neither of which is true).  This isn't a crazy assumption, I suppose, but is perhaps a sign that in these days of hyperglobalization*, the most cogent of conclusions may be the farthest from the truth.  Assume the craziest of connections!  Minnesota small town fashion-merchandizing/journalism major finds herself running a Global Fund malaria prevention project in Papua New Guinea where she befriends her colleague, a Brazilian of East African parentage who grew up speaking English at home.  That must be how they came to travel through Brazil together!

Where was I?  Oh.  In Bahia, the curiosity extends to me, because I talk like a Baiana but look different.  In the market, one man yelled O, Indiana! to catch my attention, much like he would have yelled "hey, yellow shirt" or "hey, Palmeiras fan" or "hey, baldy" to anyone else.  I hate it.  Last night, while waiting out a rain storm in a little bar, someone else asked me where I'm from.  I said Bahia.  He said, "Baianos come in all forms these days."  I said, "These days?"  He said, "Yeah, this new generation is really diverse."  The man couldn't have been more than 10 years older than me.

So what's my point?  I don't really have one, I guess.  Maybe it's that for all the creativity that Baianos are famous for in music and dance, they remain unimaginative about other people and other backgrounds?  Nah.  Maybe it's just that I don't like people to associate me with a culture I know nothing about, just because I look Indian?  That's probably it.

* hyperglobalization: I thought of this term, real or not, while looking over some bowls and beaded bags that were very craftily made - probably in Taiwan - such that they could have been sold in a shop in Brazil, India, Swaziland, Indonesia, Haiti, Spain, Belize, South Africa, Myanmar, and possibly any country ending in an "a".  Brilliant!  Miranda really only wanted to buy things made in Brazil, which on one hand, I understand, but on the other hand....hyperglobalization makes all that moot, no?  Even our energy could be coming from a hydroelectric dam in another country....

On Being a Visitor in Brazil(s)

I'm traveling through Brazil with my American friend, Miranda.  It's her first time in Brazil and she doesn't speak any languages that would help her understand Portuguese.  Traveling with her has made me appreciate some of the idiosyncrasies of the language.  It's not until I was forced to translate everything I was reading or hearing that I realized, for example, that a strapless bathing suit is called an "I hope it falls down." 


We have just come from spending four days in Rio Grande do Sul's wine country.  It's a beautiful region of Brazil that I had never been to.  It is different from Bahia, my state in the north, in every way possible: the climate is mild and dry, the people talk funny and are unfailingly courteous, the streets are clean, people are fair-skinned, order prevails, polenta and pasta are common on the menu, people seem embarrassed to accept tips, and free courtesies (like coffee) were common occurrences.

"Ladies! Before you go!  Here are the mushooms that were in your lunch!"

 When we got lost and I asked for directions from some policemen at a gas station, they turned on their lights and showed us the way!

The street behind our guest house.

I was apprehensive to then bring Miranda to Bahia, the land of loud, effusive people; rubbish on the streets; pick-pockets; drumming; Afro-Brazilian culture; spontaneous dancing; and tempers as inconstant as the weather.  Good thing Miranda has Sudan, Malawi, and Papua New Guinea under her belt: to my relief, she fell in love with the historic part of Salvador at the first sight of its windy cobbled streets and its ornate [but gently dilapidating] houses.

Miranda and Carla in the Pelourinho.

Miranda becomes a Brazilian!

I introduced Miranda to her first acaraje, which we ate during a flash downpour.  We then spent a couple of hours in the Mecado Modelo, an indoor craft market catering to visitors.  I usually dread bargaining but doing so on the behalf of someone who does not speak Portuguese allowed for all sorts of subterfuge and theatrics.  It was fun.  I understand now that it's not about the R2.00 that you saved on that last trinket - it's about a sense of pride and accomplishment you feel having battled the vendor to a lower price.  After a good day's shopping, I'm pretty sure I only paid 50% more than I should have.

On How I Ended Up This Way

E-mail from my father (in its entirety):

had b fast with a horse

 
I have said this before and I'll say it again: I turned out quite well, considering.

On Discovering the First Brasilian Syrah.

You heard me.  The first Brazilian Syrah!  The first vintage (2010) of the first Brazilian Syrah, even!

My friend, Miranda, and I are travelling through Switzerland.  I mean - Germany.  Oops - Italy.  Wait.  They speak Portuguese in Italy now?

Ha, ha.  We're in Brazil.  On holiday.  In wine country.  Miranda is coming from Papua New Guinea and I am coming from Haiti and we're on holiday in wine country.  It's too much to take in.

Italy.  I mean - Brasil.

"Did you see that goblet of wine that man has?"

Wine tasting!  Yay!

The first Brazilian Syrah at Almaunica Winery.

Yesterday, we drove around tasting wines, found a little Italian biscuit factory the size of your bathroom, and ate lunch at a churrascaria.  This morning, we went walking through the woods with a puppy I named Porky.  I am overwhelmed.  

On the Difference Between Happy and Unhappy Gunfire

Sweet Mickey just officially won the election!  This after all the NGO info collected at the Karibe pool yesterday definitively (and worrisomely) said "Manigat".

It's LOUD outside with happy honking, happy gunfire, a few fireworks and a stream of people running down the hill in front of my house to Place St Pierre where the election commission office is.

Phew.

At least for the immediate future.