(conversation) “E a onde você mora?” “…não sei” “Não sabe? Como não sabe?” On the drive from the airport to the hostel my friend and I were staying in in Salvador, the driver asked me one of the truest questions anyone ever has, and I gave him an answer that even I surprised myself with. He asked, so where do you live? Now most people who have been outside of…
4 phrases I will miss from brasil
(written on the flight to Mexico City from São Paulo) I am reminded as the flight attendant attempts to offer me a choice of scrambled eggs or omelettes (huevos revueltos o omelette) that I will soon have to retrain my brain to speak Spanish as opposed to Portuguese. It took about 4 attempts for me to piece together that it was scrambled eggs she was talking about, and that I…
policing the city
I mostly like police** [written in 2013, update 2019, now in the times of deep corporate capture of the state, and increased militarism to protect state-corporate interests, I am wary of them] – perhaps that might be because I have never found myself on opposing ends with any one of them. And too because I tend to trust in people until they prove otherwise, if they do; and I understand…
goodbye poem
São Paulo by morning- when I last left you, já era noite. But in this morning light I see your predios, tall, multi-floor- um pedaço do ceu pra cada um, housing your workers- some of them. And in between, a glimpse of Baiano brick- It’s not all street and concrete. The jacaranda tree we passed- was that your gift to me as I say goodbye? Graffiti here and there, and…
I actually like…
I actually like this place that coffee and money made up.
on billboards: são paulo, rio de janeiro, salvador de bahia
As the bus drove into Rio, it hit me- full on in my face in several metres of printed plastic mounted on metal stilts- that I was no longer in São Paulo. There were billboards all over. And then I was glad for Cidade Limpa, the law that made it illegal to mount billboards or other outdoor signs above certain size specifications. Not only does it allow you to admire…