The Sertao

Camarotes

ok so I know that from my postings it seems like my life in brasil is filled with nothing but fun, excitement, festas feijoada and caparinias. And though that’s largely true, I thought it was important to mention that at times it gets lonely, feels super foreign and baffling especially when I step back and once again process that people are communicating in a totally a different language. Its muito strange, man. There’s also times that I work myself up into a cold sweat thinking about what my life will be like when I return to states. However, this last week has been full of the aforementioned festas. My friend Naomi has come for a visit and we’ve been doin it up – camarote style. Camarote means VIP tickets and for the last 2 Friday’s we got camarotes to a great little club called barraca de raizes (roots club) and heard a good samba band that was preceded by great house band. Both times, in classic brazillian style streets outside the club were lined with folks drinking, eating chiaroscuro, and chillin. Then, in classic new orelans second –line style, at about 11:30 pm the house band came down the block drumming and playing outside until they entered the club about a half hour later. Inside , the crowd was fully vibing off the energy and sambaing like mad-people (we especially enjoyed the beautiful tranny who held the crowd captive and as she shook her thang). Then the band came on and kept folks going the rest of the night. we also went to a great concert last week headlined by Gal Gosta and Maria Martinali – two giants of brazilian music. The next day we attended a beautiful candomble ceremony at the Gantois terreiro in honor of Oshala who is the orisha traditionally honored on Friday. The day after that we went to a birthday party of a brazilian woman I met when I was in sao paulo. After getting a little lost in the taxi and arriving there a little early (I was told 8 pm, got there at 10 pm and of course it didn’t really get going to 11:30 pm). We got to practice our Portuguese while hanging out with some cool folks in a neighborhood that was off the beaten tourist track route. The next day after the beach, we ended up at casa da mae listening to the amazing samba de roda band I had heard the week before. again the old ladies danced, again the gringos (yes here im a gringo – I was shocked when I found this out) and the locals mixed, and this time I was even pulled in to the circle to dance which I had been reluctant to do being that I cant samba worth a damn. It was total bahian immersion for Naomi and it felt great to be able to share my new world with a friend from home. This week, consisted of 3 birthday celebrations for a friend who lives here. Last night after the third and final celebration, we ended up at sankofa – an African place in the pelorino – that played American hip, hop and club hits from the last few years. I have to admit – it was really fun to dance to hip hop again. Tonight we are going to hear Olodum the afro –brazilian drum ensemble (we just watched the video they were in with Michael Jackson called ‘they don’t care about us’ on youtube.) and then we are off to Chapada Diminitia which is a national park about 5 hours from Salvador. So I will be off-line for a about a week or so. ate mais and i miss all the camarotes in my life.

Lingua Portugese

Lately ive been loving portuguese. the singsongy melody, the funny words, the 'tino' added to words to make it small and 'cao' added to things to make it big. this has come after a spate of not digging it - of muito frustration and exhaustion and i think it is happening now because im starting to actually understand people - voices are not just an incoherent din of background noise that follows me through the day. but of course this means that im only now getting gists of what people are saying. i miss out on crucial details all the time, confuse words and numbers constantly but despite all that it feels like my world has opened up. somewhat. a little. ok, a smidgen. and when i was in rio last week i noticed how differently the cariocas (rio residents) speak. rio is a muito bonita cidade. the highlights were hanging out with my friend and colleague annie, - talking about our work, and life in and out of brasil and planning our collaborations. we also had a harrowing and hysterical ride in a tram up to the amazing neighborhood of santa theresa complete with an armed guard (rio is a heavily armed city - policia just as scary as the drug traficantes they are supposedly protecting the public from.) annie also took me to this great samba bar in the cool section of the city called lapa. she broke down the basic steps of samba for me but i still doubt i will ever be able to do it. also, in lapa i went to these amazing steps that are a must- see for any trip there. the artist has been working on them for like 20 years. when i returned to salvador (or 'cidade de felizadade' as it is known), i realized that even though i was only gone for a week - i missed it a little bit. and of course last weekend was a holiday (you gotta love a country where there is literally a holiday at least once a month) - baihian independence day. i spent the night before independence day listening to samba de roda (specifically samba from bahia) at casa de mae - a very cool small music spot not far from me. american students, bainas, ex-pats, old women and small children were vibing on the music and dancing. and to make it even more of a brazilian moment, the window looked out onto the waves crashing in the ocean across the street.