A long while since I wrote...
Well, I've moved houses successfully, all though it was just as difficult as I had expected, if not more so.
My first family was really great. They were there with me throughout all of my development since I arrived here, they taught me a lot, and that is something to remember.
I suppose you discover the importance of people in your life when you separate from them...
They have been a huge part of my year here...the first four months are probably the most shocking. The time when you need to most support. And they gave it to me. But I know I will still see them, visit every once and a while. I plan on passing Christmas with my first family, and traveling with them in January to the beach. So they have not been lost, its just a change.
I've adapted to my second family..almost. Its been about a week and a half since I arrived. Eating their food is not so strange anymore, or having moments when no one is talking is not so awkward. I think this family may be more fitting for me then the first...just because of my lifestyle before I arrived. Here it is only me, my host mom, host dad, and the maid...so in other words, I'm the only kid, and I now can go back to my more solitary, independent life.
So Christmas is coming up, and I'm sure you are curious about what it's like here now.
Well, I dont really know at this point, I'll have to tell you after to be more accurate...
Right now, there are Christmas lights up all around the city, everyone is going crazy buying gifts, just like there...they have Christmas trees, wreaths, and garlands of pine, all fake of course because they don't have pines here...not even close.
One big difference is that it is like 90 degrees or hotter here..and I'm thinking, I dont know yet, but I'm thinking that Christmas here is more...cheery. More parties, more socializing...it's less organized...it's beautifully messy, the Brazilian way.
Brazilians like felicity.
Yesterday I went with my Rotary club to spread some felicity. They bought bunches of gifts for kids, and we went to 3 of the hospitals in the city and a children's center in one of the favelas in town. It was both amazing and horrifying.
We had a fire truck and 4 or so cars in the caravan, tons of presents, 3 santas, 10 'elves' and the token American. The 3 santas, 2 elves, and I rode on the top of the fire truck with the signal blaring, waving, and the others drove behind.
We stopped at each hospital, entered, gave the gifts to the kids there, and left just as 'quietly' as we had come in.
I was close to crying many times. These kids... The faces of their parents, sitting there at their sides, I've never gone through anything like what those children, or just as painfully, their parents are going through. I've never seen things like I'm seeing here...
I remember one little boy... I couldn't tell what had happened to him, but his father was standing at the side of his bed, the nurses applying bandages, and there was a rosary necklace on the pillow above his head...In the hopes of some kind of help.
I remember one boy who couldn't even bring himself to look at me or the gift I'd given to him.
But then I remember one little boy who had a smile from ear to ear when he saw Santa come in and give him a little toy truck, and I remember the kids from the favela running after the fire truck, yelling and laughing, with their soccer balls and sand buckets. And the way the kids waved goodbye, huge smiles on their faces...and the grateful expressions of the parents, for bringing some kind of happiness into a place of such suffering...
Its easy to forget that things like this are happening every day...as no one wants to know, but seeing it...its impossible to avoid. And you just want to help, even if it's just one person, even if it's just one smile...one moment where they forget...and you begin to resent the unfair luck you've run into. You resent how one person can have so much, and another so little...
I was walking through one of the hospitals, and I saw a man, obviously very poor, stretched out on a hospital bed, and I resented the $200 camera I held in my hand...
pictures: http://picasaweb.google.com/sommerbrazil/FireTruck
Monday, December 17, 2007
Saturday, December 8, 2007
move em' out
My bags are packed, it's my last day with my first host family...
Time to move again, time to adjust again, to adapt again, learn again, grow again, suffer again....do everything again.
I dont really know what I am thinking right now. Part of me is excited to be changing, for what is to come with the new family, but also, part of me is sad about leaving this family that has gone through so much with me already. I fit into my first family perfectly, I have everything I need, even some nice commodities (Wireless, guitars), and I mesh with their personalities well. I'm worried with the other family, things will not go as well, that I will continually think how much better my first family fit with me, but I suppose an exchange student can't think like that...
I have to keep an open mind, realize that it's not going to be the same thing, it's going to be different, some things will fit better, others will not fit as well, and I will learn to adapt.
I keep finding myself thinking how hard it will be to learn the ways of another family. My first family already knows me, what I do. They were there from the moment I set foot in Montes Claros, completely elated and scared. They were there my first night to open their home... they patiently waited for a mode of communication, which only arrived a couple of months ago... for the moment portuguese clicked...they were there to see me adjust to everything, there for the home sickness, for the awe...
this next family and I will have to learn and adapt to each other, and we'll have to go through that awkward period of seeing what is what.
I'd love to take the easy way out, stay with the family that has known me from the beginning, who saw me go through the hardest parts, and were there for me when I had troubles, who taught me so much...but with exchange life, there is no easy way out.
I knew from the beginning I was moving, and in reality, this move is anything but a big deal in comparison to what I've already done. It's really good for me in the bigger picture.
Today is another day for shock and growth. I've just gotta keep putting one foot in front of the other and keep my eyes open.
Time to move again, time to adjust again, to adapt again, learn again, grow again, suffer again....do everything again.
I dont really know what I am thinking right now. Part of me is excited to be changing, for what is to come with the new family, but also, part of me is sad about leaving this family that has gone through so much with me already. I fit into my first family perfectly, I have everything I need, even some nice commodities (Wireless, guitars), and I mesh with their personalities well. I'm worried with the other family, things will not go as well, that I will continually think how much better my first family fit with me, but I suppose an exchange student can't think like that...
I have to keep an open mind, realize that it's not going to be the same thing, it's going to be different, some things will fit better, others will not fit as well, and I will learn to adapt.
I keep finding myself thinking how hard it will be to learn the ways of another family. My first family already knows me, what I do. They were there from the moment I set foot in Montes Claros, completely elated and scared. They were there my first night to open their home... they patiently waited for a mode of communication, which only arrived a couple of months ago... for the moment portuguese clicked...they were there to see me adjust to everything, there for the home sickness, for the awe...
this next family and I will have to learn and adapt to each other, and we'll have to go through that awkward period of seeing what is what.
I'd love to take the easy way out, stay with the family that has known me from the beginning, who saw me go through the hardest parts, and were there for me when I had troubles, who taught me so much...but with exchange life, there is no easy way out.
I knew from the beginning I was moving, and in reality, this move is anything but a big deal in comparison to what I've already done. It's really good for me in the bigger picture.
Today is another day for shock and growth. I've just gotta keep putting one foot in front of the other and keep my eyes open.
Saturday, December 1, 2007
O Mercado
As I go deeper into this exchange I find even more things I love about Brazil.
Today I went to the huge market with my host dad and brother. A place where no tourist would ever go...It's like a flea market, full of everything. There are loads of fruits, veggies, honey, cheese. And all of the sellers are the ones that make the products. It's like a natural market in the US only HUGE, and there are all kinds of people. Rich, poor... the whole world mixes there. There are little restaurants in the middle of the markets, with authentic food from Minas...it's real, and that is what I've found I like.
In Brazil, there is an obsession with cleanliness because of the poverty that people here encounter, but it's turned everyday life somewhat sterile. I can see the culture being lost..which is why today was so neat.
The market was Brazil. There was not one element of the US there. Not one brand name, not one packaged good. Just what people made themselves. There is a grace in that.
Lately, I just think what an opportunity this is. To be a Brazilian for a year. To know what it is like living thousands of miles away from home, virtually alone, completely uprooted, surrounded by millions of new things...so many new things to learn. Few, very few people have this opportunity, to see a country as those that live there do. Because the more I look, the more I realize that tourism is not a way to see anywhere. Tourism's objective is to cater to the wealthy Americanized palate. You can never see the world if your blinded by your own culture.
pictures: http://picasaweb.google.com/sommerbrazil/OMercado
Today I went to the huge market with my host dad and brother. A place where no tourist would ever go...It's like a flea market, full of everything. There are loads of fruits, veggies, honey, cheese. And all of the sellers are the ones that make the products. It's like a natural market in the US only HUGE, and there are all kinds of people. Rich, poor... the whole world mixes there. There are little restaurants in the middle of the markets, with authentic food from Minas...it's real, and that is what I've found I like.
In Brazil, there is an obsession with cleanliness because of the poverty that people here encounter, but it's turned everyday life somewhat sterile. I can see the culture being lost..which is why today was so neat.
The market was Brazil. There was not one element of the US there. Not one brand name, not one packaged good. Just what people made themselves. There is a grace in that.
Lately, I just think what an opportunity this is. To be a Brazilian for a year. To know what it is like living thousands of miles away from home, virtually alone, completely uprooted, surrounded by millions of new things...so many new things to learn. Few, very few people have this opportunity, to see a country as those that live there do. Because the more I look, the more I realize that tourism is not a way to see anywhere. Tourism's objective is to cater to the wealthy Americanized palate. You can never see the world if your blinded by your own culture.
pictures: http://picasaweb.google.com/sommerbrazil/OMercado
Monday, November 26, 2007
habits
Not a lot new going on here now.
Life has become normal...
The language, just for the normal update, is going better. Now I'm taking some Portuguese lessons to better my conjugation, because Portuguese is crazy...and so that is helping. But I can have conversations now, I can use the future and past tenses, which is a big step.
I've learned to sing some songs in Portuguese, which is neat.
Guitar is still going...I'm practicing more now, which I need to be doing, learning some samba and things like that. Singing lessons are still happening too...but I dont know how well they are going. Singing is much harder then I'd thought.
I'm feeling more Brazilian all the time, I guess that is something that comes with getting comfortable in the other country. I've noticed that I've picked up their cultural habits without knowing it. Just little things that I had noticed were different in the beginning like...when they are eating, they dont change the knife and fork from hand to hand to cut food, they leave the knife in their left hand, which I've picked up now. And when I got here, my host mom thought it was so strange that I didn't wear shoes in the house, and now, when I walk around, I automatically put something on my feet. I've picked up the cultural 'warmness', the clothing style, I've started wearing more jewelery...Just picking up new habits which is strange.
Life has become normal...
The language, just for the normal update, is going better. Now I'm taking some Portuguese lessons to better my conjugation, because Portuguese is crazy...and so that is helping. But I can have conversations now, I can use the future and past tenses, which is a big step.
I've learned to sing some songs in Portuguese, which is neat.
Guitar is still going...I'm practicing more now, which I need to be doing, learning some samba and things like that. Singing lessons are still happening too...but I dont know how well they are going. Singing is much harder then I'd thought.
I'm feeling more Brazilian all the time, I guess that is something that comes with getting comfortable in the other country. I've noticed that I've picked up their cultural habits without knowing it. Just little things that I had noticed were different in the beginning like...when they are eating, they dont change the knife and fork from hand to hand to cut food, they leave the knife in their left hand, which I've picked up now. And when I got here, my host mom thought it was so strange that I didn't wear shoes in the house, and now, when I walk around, I automatically put something on my feet. I've picked up the cultural 'warmness', the clothing style, I've started wearing more jewelery...Just picking up new habits which is strange.
Monday, November 19, 2007
:D
Over the past weekend I had 4 of my school friends over to make chocolate cookies and watch a movie at my house here. It was really great. One of the first times I've actually felt like I have a solid group of friends. Now I feel like I can say they are my best friends here, and I like them a lot. We started the day messing around on my pretty little laptop, I was showing them some photos, and thought it would be neat to take some with the photobooth program, and we ended up playing with that program for like 40 minutes. After that we watched a little of a concert and then started with the cooking. They had never eaten chocolate chip cookies before. Never seen them before....Chocolate chips dont even exist here, so I bought a couple chocolate bars and cut them up.
So, we made the cookies, and they turned out good...not the best cookies I've ever made, but they thought it was awesome. The problem was that i couldn't find brown sugar here, I later discovered that it does exist here... but I just used regular sugar for the cookies, so they were just a little bland or something. But my friends have not stopped raving about them.
After we made the cookies, I made some iced coffee, a friend of mine brought a pizza, and then we watched the movie and ate. haha. sounds gross, but it was really neat. after the movie we just stayed talking. I can understand almost everything now. I can converse, participate in the conversations. Its really good.
So that was really neat. To have my first little friend thing here. I'm liking here more all the time. Getting more accustomed all the time.
I have the pictures from the day up on the photo website. take a look! :D
So, we made the cookies, and they turned out good...not the best cookies I've ever made, but they thought it was awesome. The problem was that i couldn't find brown sugar here, I later discovered that it does exist here... but I just used regular sugar for the cookies, so they were just a little bland or something. But my friends have not stopped raving about them.
After we made the cookies, I made some iced coffee, a friend of mine brought a pizza, and then we watched the movie and ate. haha. sounds gross, but it was really neat. after the movie we just stayed talking. I can understand almost everything now. I can converse, participate in the conversations. Its really good.
So that was really neat. To have my first little friend thing here. I'm liking here more all the time. Getting more accustomed all the time.
I have the pictures from the day up on the photo website. take a look! :D
Saturday, November 10, 2007
cicmat!
Yesterday was my school's..I suppose its like a talent show.
Each class made up one group, changed the lyrics of a popular song so it's about math, and made up a dance to go along.
I have been 'working' on this project for the past 3 weeks, but nothing got done until this week. Oh so the Brazilian way.
So anyway, my group was called Tropic de Elipse, because the music we chose was from a movie called this (you should check it out by the way, its awesome). The song is from a genre called funk (said funkie hahahahaha) which is like...rap sort of, but its maybe...more melodic, and the beats are a little different. The girls of the group, after deciding that it was impossible to work with the guys, made up a separate chorography, and ended up dancing in front of the stage instead of on the stage. Us girls also took another song and learned the guitar and changed the lyrics and performed this as well.
It was so cool. 'working' on the dance was always a lot of fun, and performing it was even better. We all had matching camo shirts, and when we all got up on the stage everyone started to scream, and I couldn't stop smiling.
I was nervous, but not as bad as normal, not so much that I forgot to have fun.
The first thing we performed was the guitar and song that us girls made up. We didn't actually play in real life, because we recorded the song earlier, but we all pretended. And then after we did the dance, which was the best part. I really hope I can get a copy of a video from someone...because I think it was pretty neat. Everyone was screaming the whole time, and I was just laughing. My face hurt after. Serious.
After the show, practically the entire school went to the Avenida, which was cool. Sat down, had dinner and talked with bunches of friends.
Brazil is good. I'm liking it here.
photos: http://picasaweb.google.com/sommerbrazil/Cicmat
Each class made up one group, changed the lyrics of a popular song so it's about math, and made up a dance to go along.
I have been 'working' on this project for the past 3 weeks, but nothing got done until this week. Oh so the Brazilian way.
So anyway, my group was called Tropic de Elipse, because the music we chose was from a movie called this (you should check it out by the way, its awesome). The song is from a genre called funk (said funkie hahahahaha) which is like...rap sort of, but its maybe...more melodic, and the beats are a little different. The girls of the group, after deciding that it was impossible to work with the guys, made up a separate chorography, and ended up dancing in front of the stage instead of on the stage. Us girls also took another song and learned the guitar and changed the lyrics and performed this as well.
It was so cool. 'working' on the dance was always a lot of fun, and performing it was even better. We all had matching camo shirts, and when we all got up on the stage everyone started to scream, and I couldn't stop smiling.
I was nervous, but not as bad as normal, not so much that I forgot to have fun.
The first thing we performed was the guitar and song that us girls made up. We didn't actually play in real life, because we recorded the song earlier, but we all pretended. And then after we did the dance, which was the best part. I really hope I can get a copy of a video from someone...because I think it was pretty neat. Everyone was screaming the whole time, and I was just laughing. My face hurt after. Serious.
After the show, practically the entire school went to the Avenida, which was cool. Sat down, had dinner and talked with bunches of friends.
Brazil is good. I'm liking it here.
photos: http://picasaweb.google.com/sommerbrazil/Cicmat
Friday, November 9, 2007
Stuff
It's been a bit since I wrote., but I dont know that I have much new to say.
Life here has become normal, but it wont stay like that for long as I am moving houses and being completely uprooted in 2 weeks.
The date for me switching houses has been set. The 25th. And the closer I get, the more prepared I feel. At the beginning, the thought of leaving my current family made me sad and the idea that they would be 'replacing' me with another student made me ridiculously jealous, but now, I've accepted that I have to move, and I'm actually kind of excited.
The Rotary's set up with moving houses, I think is a good and bad thing. There are a bunch of kids here with AFS, another exchange program, and they all talk about how ridiculous it is that we have to change houses. But its good because you get to experience so much more of your host country. Meet family friends of 3 different families. Know 3 native families inside out. And that is something that not everyone can experience.
I have been thinking lately about how not many people actually get to do this. Actually get to see a country for what it is. I know Brazil. I am as close to a Brazilian you can get without actually being one. I live in the home of natives, go to school with natives, eat their everyday food, not the food of restaurants, go out with them to the local spots. They incorperate me into their daily lives, and that is how you really should experience a country. When you travel as a tourist, you see what they want you to see. You encounter the norm, the fakeness of pretention, and you truly dont get to see the real country, or know its people. I'm a different nationality this year, and its a new life.
I've pretty much accustomed now. I'm speaking well enough to have conversations, and I understand enough to know what is going on 90% of the time. I am making more friends all the time, learning more about life here. My goal, which I'm not sure I will achieve, but I want, at the end of the year, to be mistaken for a Brazilian. Now, its difficult in my city to be mistaken, because there are very few Caucation people here, but in the south of Brazil, when I go there, I will see. Already, people have mistaken me for a native, but that, of course, was before I talked to them :p
I'm trying to speak without an accent, but I think that is impossible at this point, there are just some things that you have to live in the country from childhood to pick up...or else, live there for a long time. But I'm training now. I started a Portuguese class with the English teacher of one of my friends, and every class, he has me read passages in Portuguese, and helps me with pronunciation. Explaining sounds and how letters phonetically work. Which is strange in Portuguese.
I'm going on Summer break in a month, and I'm so ridiculously excited. I think that, of course, its going to be boring sometimes, but there is no way it is more boring then being at school. So it should be good. And I've met so many people, I think I'll have things to do a lot of the time.
I'm excited for my summer days here. Lazy and hot, but full of festas and swimming, and just relaxing. Making friends. Having a coconut in the shade. haha.
Right now a lot of the kids are freaking out studying. My senior friends are taking the huge college entrance exam now, named vestibular, and they are studying like crazy. To enter college here you just have the grade from this test. There is no matter of essays or interviews or going to meet the college. You go where you get accepted and can afford to go.
And then the kids in my grade are freaking out about some country test, I think it is something like a standardized test in the states. But when that stuff is over, there will be more people for me to go out with.
I'm starting to worry about what I'm going to do when I go back to the states. With college and stuff. I know that I will be ok. I can deal with what I need to do to graduate. Just that I think I'm going to have a slightly lowered work effort when I first arrive, and I'll have a lot to do. I still have to take the SAT and ACT, I have to get 6 or more credits to graduate. I have to get my college applications worked out. Figure out what I'm doing with my life...oh jeez. Its a lot that I will have to deal with, and it will be hard to go back to real life. All though this life is pretty real too, just that there are different priorities.
I know that this year is worth it though. Whatever I will have to do to re-cooperate I will do. Just worrying like I do.
Life here has become normal, but it wont stay like that for long as I am moving houses and being completely uprooted in 2 weeks.
The date for me switching houses has been set. The 25th. And the closer I get, the more prepared I feel. At the beginning, the thought of leaving my current family made me sad and the idea that they would be 'replacing' me with another student made me ridiculously jealous, but now, I've accepted that I have to move, and I'm actually kind of excited.
The Rotary's set up with moving houses, I think is a good and bad thing. There are a bunch of kids here with AFS, another exchange program, and they all talk about how ridiculous it is that we have to change houses. But its good because you get to experience so much more of your host country. Meet family friends of 3 different families. Know 3 native families inside out. And that is something that not everyone can experience.
I have been thinking lately about how not many people actually get to do this. Actually get to see a country for what it is. I know Brazil. I am as close to a Brazilian you can get without actually being one. I live in the home of natives, go to school with natives, eat their everyday food, not the food of restaurants, go out with them to the local spots. They incorperate me into their daily lives, and that is how you really should experience a country. When you travel as a tourist, you see what they want you to see. You encounter the norm, the fakeness of pretention, and you truly dont get to see the real country, or know its people. I'm a different nationality this year, and its a new life.
I've pretty much accustomed now. I'm speaking well enough to have conversations, and I understand enough to know what is going on 90% of the time. I am making more friends all the time, learning more about life here. My goal, which I'm not sure I will achieve, but I want, at the end of the year, to be mistaken for a Brazilian. Now, its difficult in my city to be mistaken, because there are very few Caucation people here, but in the south of Brazil, when I go there, I will see. Already, people have mistaken me for a native, but that, of course, was before I talked to them :p
I'm trying to speak without an accent, but I think that is impossible at this point, there are just some things that you have to live in the country from childhood to pick up...or else, live there for a long time. But I'm training now. I started a Portuguese class with the English teacher of one of my friends, and every class, he has me read passages in Portuguese, and helps me with pronunciation. Explaining sounds and how letters phonetically work. Which is strange in Portuguese.
I'm going on Summer break in a month, and I'm so ridiculously excited. I think that, of course, its going to be boring sometimes, but there is no way it is more boring then being at school. So it should be good. And I've met so many people, I think I'll have things to do a lot of the time.
I'm excited for my summer days here. Lazy and hot, but full of festas and swimming, and just relaxing. Making friends. Having a coconut in the shade. haha.
Right now a lot of the kids are freaking out studying. My senior friends are taking the huge college entrance exam now, named vestibular, and they are studying like crazy. To enter college here you just have the grade from this test. There is no matter of essays or interviews or going to meet the college. You go where you get accepted and can afford to go.
And then the kids in my grade are freaking out about some country test, I think it is something like a standardized test in the states. But when that stuff is over, there will be more people for me to go out with.
I'm starting to worry about what I'm going to do when I go back to the states. With college and stuff. I know that I will be ok. I can deal with what I need to do to graduate. Just that I think I'm going to have a slightly lowered work effort when I first arrive, and I'll have a lot to do. I still have to take the SAT and ACT, I have to get 6 or more credits to graduate. I have to get my college applications worked out. Figure out what I'm doing with my life...oh jeez. Its a lot that I will have to deal with, and it will be hard to go back to real life. All though this life is pretty real too, just that there are different priorities.
I know that this year is worth it though. Whatever I will have to do to re-cooperate I will do. Just worrying like I do.
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