For those of my American friends who think life here in paradise is just one continual party, you should know that my morning has consisted of doing the dishes, washing clothes by hand in the laundry sink and listening to a language CD and making a list of the verbs.
How long since you have washed clothes by hand? I think it is very common here. Every apartment and house I´ve been in has a laundry sink. Sure, some might have a washer and dryer, but it is just as frequent that they do not. Somebody want to come here and open a good old-fashioned american laundromat?
As for picking out those verbs, my language process seems Sisyphean at times. Sometimes I despair of ever learning this language, and sometimes I can see the progress I´m making. In any case, I continue with the effort. Yesterday i went to the park hoping to find some talkative old guy on a bench, but I wasn´t successful. Will give it another try this afternoon.
Stay in touch!
Wednesday, October 29, 2008
Wednesday, October 22, 2008
Oops...What Do I Know About Film Festivals?
A couple of entries ago, I wrote about seeing the Polish film ``Katyn´´ at the Rio film festival, and about how much I liked it. I noted that I had read it received an Oscar nomination for Best Foreign Film. So far, so good except that what I actually saw was that it had been nominated as BFF for the 80th Academy Awards...and the 80th Academy Awards were held last spring. It has already lost to ``The Counterfeiter.´´ What do I know about film festivals? I just sort of assumed that the entrants were newly-released films. Oh, well.
To everyone in the U.S. who likes to complain about the immigrants from Mexico who are still speaking Spanish or fractured English, I want to say ``lighten up.´´ I´m on the other side now, and I have a lot of sympathy (of course, being an empathetic kind of guy, I always did). I am working on my Português, and I´m making a little progress, but I´m never going to be fluent in this language and English speakers here probably are always going to be a welcome island of comfort whenever I encounter them. I can´t imagine being here in Brasil without computer access to the NY Times and the LA Times, or The Daily Show and Colbert Report. I might be learning Português a little slower than I would otherwise because of these security blankets, but I´m a lot more relaxed and comfortable. I just wish I had some local English-language TV options. :-)
And now I am going to cut this short so I can work on my Português exercises. My teacher gives me lots of home work.
Tchau.
To everyone in the U.S. who likes to complain about the immigrants from Mexico who are still speaking Spanish or fractured English, I want to say ``lighten up.´´ I´m on the other side now, and I have a lot of sympathy (of course, being an empathetic kind of guy, I always did). I am working on my Português, and I´m making a little progress, but I´m never going to be fluent in this language and English speakers here probably are always going to be a welcome island of comfort whenever I encounter them. I can´t imagine being here in Brasil without computer access to the NY Times and the LA Times, or The Daily Show and Colbert Report. I might be learning Português a little slower than I would otherwise because of these security blankets, but I´m a lot more relaxed and comfortable. I just wish I had some local English-language TV options. :-)
And now I am going to cut this short so I can work on my Português exercises. My teacher gives me lots of home work.
Tchau.
Tuesday, October 14, 2008
Reading Jane Austen in São Paulo
Apologies to the woman who wrote ``Reading Lolita in Tehran,´´ but I couldn´t resist. My novel reading is limited to what I can find in the local used bookstores,. Mind you, I´m not complaining; sometimes it just strikes me as odd to be reaing ``Persuasion´´ on a park bench in São Paulo. Or Thomas Hardy, or Charlotte Bronte, or Graham Greene and Gore Vidal for that matter. Which reminds me: I had to come all the way to Brasil to learn that Charlotte Bronte wrote a book called ``Shirley.´´
I feel bad to have neglected this space for so long. While I was in Rio, my laptop wasn´t working and that limited my opportunities. Brasil seems to be crazy for film festivals, by the way. I thought the one in Rio was large, but next week the 30-somethingth (?) São Paulo festival starts, and it has over 400 movies on its schedule. And I know there are smaller annual festivals in Recife, Forteleza and Porto Alegre. I suppose the U.S. has a gazillion festivals too, to which I have always been oblivious.
I have met several of Heitor´s charming friends and colleagues who are in the film-journalism biz, all of whom are considerate enough to speak perfect English. Since none of them will read this, I will go ahead and say it: My favorite is Neusa Barbosa, an energetic pixie who seemed to be always on her way to or from one film or another in Rio, and still had time to sit in the bar and drink caipirinhas after the last movie of the day. And presumably she did some writing sometime too. She has covered Cannes each of the last eight years, but somehow has never made it to Sundance. I think it is just a matter of nobody has paid her to go there. In 2002 she published a book about Woody Allen´s movies which (I just learned by using Google) was the first in some publisher´s series of People in Cinema. It is odd, isn´t it? I bet the first book in a U.S. series of People in Cinema would not be about Woody Allen.
Maybe one day I´ll be able to read Neusa´s book (ha!). Finally I found the Português teacher I´ve been looking for. She speaks practically no English and that is a good thing. I wanted to find a class with a few other people, because I just think I learn faster in that type of setting....you know, competing to be the best student. But I finally just gave up that idea, because it was going nowhere. So I´m the only student in my class, sitting at my little desk with the teacher giving all of her attention to me. Yesterday was our second meeting and my first official class. We will meet every Monday and Wednesday. I will need to end this soon because she gave me a lot of homework.
Thanks for reading. Stay in touch.
I feel bad to have neglected this space for so long. While I was in Rio, my laptop wasn´t working and that limited my opportunities. Brasil seems to be crazy for film festivals, by the way. I thought the one in Rio was large, but next week the 30-somethingth (?) São Paulo festival starts, and it has over 400 movies on its schedule. And I know there are smaller annual festivals in Recife, Forteleza and Porto Alegre. I suppose the U.S. has a gazillion festivals too, to which I have always been oblivious.
I have met several of Heitor´s charming friends and colleagues who are in the film-journalism biz, all of whom are considerate enough to speak perfect English. Since none of them will read this, I will go ahead and say it: My favorite is Neusa Barbosa, an energetic pixie who seemed to be always on her way to or from one film or another in Rio, and still had time to sit in the bar and drink caipirinhas after the last movie of the day. And presumably she did some writing sometime too. She has covered Cannes each of the last eight years, but somehow has never made it to Sundance. I think it is just a matter of nobody has paid her to go there. In 2002 she published a book about Woody Allen´s movies which (I just learned by using Google) was the first in some publisher´s series of People in Cinema. It is odd, isn´t it? I bet the first book in a U.S. series of People in Cinema would not be about Woody Allen.
Maybe one day I´ll be able to read Neusa´s book (ha!). Finally I found the Português teacher I´ve been looking for. She speaks practically no English and that is a good thing. I wanted to find a class with a few other people, because I just think I learn faster in that type of setting....you know, competing to be the best student. But I finally just gave up that idea, because it was going nowhere. So I´m the only student in my class, sitting at my little desk with the teacher giving all of her attention to me. Yesterday was our second meeting and my first official class. We will meet every Monday and Wednesday. I will need to end this soon because she gave me a lot of homework.
Thanks for reading. Stay in touch.
Monday, October 6, 2008
My life in São Paulo goes to Rio
I´ve been neglecting this space for the last several days. I´ve been in Rio since 29 Sep because of the Rio International Film Festival, which runs from 25 Sep to 9 Oct, with over 350 films and something like 20 theaters all over town participating. Heitor has been here since the beginning, and his journalism credentials get him into everything free. They have gotten me into a few things free.
The two most powerful movies I´ve seen are ``Katyn,´´ from Poland and ``Dancing with Bashir,´´from Israel. The former is about the systematic Soviet massacre of thousands of Polish army officers (prisoners) in 1941 and the attempt until fairly recently to pretend it was done by the Nazis. The latter is technically an animated film about the massacre of 2000 Palestinians in the Lebanese refugee camps in 1982. It combines elements of drama with documentary and it is all animated. I won´t try to describe it further; google it. We saw ``Katyn´´ a couple of days ago, and just this morning saw a flyer which said it has been nominated for an Oscar for best foreign film.
If a simple head count of audiences determines anything, the big winner will be Woody Allen´s ``Vicky Christina Barcelona.´´ I won´t be able to see it, as all of its showings are sold out.
Rio is a much more touristy city than São Paulo and I like it better (at least after a few days) although I have only been to the Copabanana and Ipanema beaches, the real tourist centers, once. Most of the theaters we´ve been attending are either in the downtown or in some of the more middle class neighborhoods. The plan right now is to return to São Paulo tomorrow (before the end of the festival), just as I´m beginning to understand the Rio buses and subway.
Gotta run.
The two most powerful movies I´ve seen are ``Katyn,´´ from Poland and ``Dancing with Bashir,´´from Israel. The former is about the systematic Soviet massacre of thousands of Polish army officers (prisoners) in 1941 and the attempt until fairly recently to pretend it was done by the Nazis. The latter is technically an animated film about the massacre of 2000 Palestinians in the Lebanese refugee camps in 1982. It combines elements of drama with documentary and it is all animated. I won´t try to describe it further; google it. We saw ``Katyn´´ a couple of days ago, and just this morning saw a flyer which said it has been nominated for an Oscar for best foreign film.
If a simple head count of audiences determines anything, the big winner will be Woody Allen´s ``Vicky Christina Barcelona.´´ I won´t be able to see it, as all of its showings are sold out.
Rio is a much more touristy city than São Paulo and I like it better (at least after a few days) although I have only been to the Copabanana and Ipanema beaches, the real tourist centers, once. Most of the theaters we´ve been attending are either in the downtown or in some of the more middle class neighborhoods. The plan right now is to return to São Paulo tomorrow (before the end of the festival), just as I´m beginning to understand the Rio buses and subway.
Gotta run.
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