“Green is the prime color of the world, and that from which its loveliness arises”
Pedro Calderón de la Barca
Since arriving to Brazil, I have spent the past two days trying to catch the rhythm of life in Petropolis, get comfortable, and create a new program with my host for improving our language skills.
Brazil is on holiday at the moment, and yesterday was Sunday. In the morning we had papaya and a tea made of silicia (silicon?). We visited the other American who is staying in Petrópolis, and had breakfast together with her host family.
They were completely lovely, and already knew my host through mutual connections. I learned new things about Brazil, like Goldfish crackera rank with iPhones as in-demand American imports and tapioca is a must try street food in Rio! We left with about a zillion brazilian plans for the coming weeks!
Then was lunch and small lesson. Marta was interested in the correct English phrase you would use to let yourself into someone’s house, a rough translation of “com licença”. I offered up “excuse me”, but I’m not really sure I know an equivalent in American English, the “open door policy” seems much more vibrant here!
“Remember our door is always open, except when we are sleeping!” Is how the family we met at breakfast sent us off, which is basically something we say in English too- but with another level of sincerity!
Learning the words for familial relationships also seemed like a first priority, so we flipped ahead in the ESL textbook to the family tree. I learned that “parentes” in Portuguese means something like relatives, so it is a false cognate with our word for mother and father.
After this casual lesson, we went for dinner with Marta’s sister for her birthday and toured some historic sites in Petropolis by night, including the assymetrical “house of the 7 mistakes”.
We had pizza “portuguese style”, with onions, ham, peas and egg, and for me, a Coca Cola made in Brazil.
The festivities extended to the next day, when we went for lunch in Itaipava. I realized that even though I think I get the gist of what is going on, I was surprised to be seated at a table of 10 when we arrived and realIze since it was Sunday lunch was happening with all the parentes!
