melting pot
noun
1
a: a place where a variety of races, cultures, or individuals assimilate into a cohesive whole b: the population of such a place
2
: a process of blending that often results in invigoration or novelty
— melting–potadjective
First Known Use of MELTING POT: 1887
Sitting at a barbecue the other night over some Brahma and delicious home-cooked food...the colors of the differing cultures began to show themselves a little more after each drink poured. There we were, our own little "UN" as someone told me, each with a story to tell...each with a lesson to learn...each with a language (or two...or three...or four) to speak. Something I had forgotten after my last trip to Brazil until now is how much of a melting pot Brazil really is. With globalization there are many countries these days that we could refer to as melting pots. The significance in this metaphor when talking about Brazil is that , Brazil/Brasil, like other countries, contains people of all diversities, colors, nationalities, and languages........but even in the heat of the "melting pot", each person remains equally unique....equally flavorful...... seperate yet within the mixture....they keep their form...they preserve their flavor.
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Anchorage, Alaska
Me and Jill start the day over coffee and cleaning. Its vacation for us in Brazil which means no work and lots of eating, drinking, and talking. (Lol) I was very fortunate that when I came here to Brazil to start work at an English school, there was a fellow American working with me, but even more fortunate that this fellow American was so full of stories and lessons to teach and tell me about politics...about the world...about family. She's great about sharing perspectives and the story of her life is just really incredible... and a bit crazy. Born in a small town, U.S.A.....she traveled nearly all of western Europe during college.... completely ALONE.... for a month....then lived in freaking Alaska for 10 years....and now she is living and working in Brazil....being a mother to 2 adorable children (who are now fluent in Portuguese and English)....adjusting to the culture and learnig the language (and I'm REALLY summing things up for you). Talk about someone to learn something from. She was kind enough to invite me to spend the Brazilian holiday (a week off from work) with her and her family, and today is the Barbecue that she planned.
A beach in Lebanon
We started early in the day (noon)...and after an hour or so....the array of friends and acquaintances begin to arrive...each with something special and different to share. I talked early on with a woman who moved here from the Middle East, she tells me as she lights up a Dunhill ciggarette and asks if I want one. I say no thank you and refill my already empty glass with more Brahma (side note: remember to first cheers with someone else before drinking...because Brazilians believe that if you forget to cheer, its 3 years without sex, lol) then she tells me that she was 17 years of age when she came here with her immediate family because her father had recieved a decent paying job in Brazil. Without ever knowing a single word in Portuguese she managed to pick it up... and speak it perfectly in just a couple of years...and now she studies english as well. I ask her what was most difficult for her in learning the language and she replies, "reading"....because the books in her country you read from right to left....not left to right....and writing works the same. Wow, how strange it must have been for her to have to learn to re-write, in a sense...and re-read as well. Her two year old daughter comes over to sit on her lap as she continues with her life story. Now she works...she goes to college...she's a mother and a wife (to a Brazilian man) -with a very multifarious family of 4. The rest of her relatives still live in the Middle East but she doesn't have the opportunity to visit often, though she still speaks the language. She tells me it is beautiful where she is from and that I should definitely visit if I'm ever given the chance. -My interest is sparked.
"No Me Quitte Pas", interpreted by Celine Dion
Next to arrive is the crazy Frenchman with his guitar and book of music in hand. Long black hair with streaks of grey...a bag of tobacco and rolling paper; he smokes like a chimney and looks about 20 years older than he actually is. He finds his place and sits down at the table to begin his "concert", if you will, in classic songs....one in French, one in German, one in Spanish, one in English. The man speaks 5 languages and has been on the road outside of France since he was 19 years of age. A professional hitch-hiker he managed to go all the way from NYC to Mexico with nothing but a backpack, a 16 yr old girlfriend, and a charismatic personality. A long distance relationship led him to Brazil which resulted in a marriage that didn't last....but with a love for Brazil that did.- Talk about some interesting stories...this man nearly took them all. He opens his books for me and asks if I will sing with him a beatiful love in song in French, "No Me Quitte Pas"...and with my horrible French accent, I manage to sing along.
An image taken during the war in Bosnia during the early 1990's
Rodrigo (Jill's hubbyyyy) stands over by the grill cooking up the best meat you have ever tasted in your life, and filling our bowls at the table on after another. Sausage, steak, pork-chops, chicken wings....he does it all....to perfection. Overqualified in the kitchen, Rodrigo studied how to cook during culinary school and is a Chef of all kinds and types of foods. Born Brazilian but with the culture of a Californian hippie, he's probably one of the funniest guys I've met in a long time, and equally as bold. At a young age he set out alone....away from Brazil...away from his family...and out into the world to discover. After a few years spent abroad with the Brazilian army and having the opportunity to experience a considerable group of countries within Eastern Europe....he set out to Canada. The trip was very spur of the moment, as he told me, and it actually started with the idea of his friend who had always dreamed of going to Canada but didn't have the desire to go alone. He asked Rodrigo to take the trip with him, Rodrigo said okay..... his friend's visa was denied....lol....Rodrigo's wasn't. So without a second though, Rodrigo went alone and did his own thing. In total, 13 years spent outside of Brazil and within the cultures of several countries....he's a man with many ideas and experiences. From Brazil to Europe to Canada to the U.S.A. and back to Brazil again...he speaks English, Portuguese, Spanish, French, and German....this guy knows his world, and as he asks me if I would like some barbecue sauce for my drumstick, I'm reminded that he knows his food toooooo. (Mmmm...mmmm!)
A Spaniard man in his scarf and Beret
The Brahma runs out and go into the kitchen to get the Itaipava while Jill reminds me of the delicious Bloody Mary's she made and hands me a glass. Spicy and salty with some green olives in the bottom of the cup, they are to die for. I go back to my table and Nicholas (the Frenchman) sets his guitar down to have a chat and asks me if I know any Spanish. Very little, I reply....and ask why. There is a much older man sitting beside him, about 65-70 years of age, wearing a black beret and thick rimmed glasses, that I hadn't met. He leans over to listen to my response and begins speaking to me in Spanish, I guess assuming that "a little" means, "enough" lol. So here we are, a young American girl, a middle aged Frenchman, and an elderly Spanishman...exchanging words in Portuguese...English...and Spanish. Lol. Something rare to see unless you happen to work internationally for your government. The Spaniard talks some in Portuguese,with his strong Spanish accent, and what he can't say in Portuguese...he says in Spanish....and the small bit I don't understand in Spanish...Nicholas translatese for me into English...which I then respond to in Portuguese. Haha....even writing it is difficult, Idk how the conversation worked....but it did. He tells me that he came for the first time to Brazil in 1975 for a job of his, he is an engineer, and after a short time here....he fell in love with the country and wanted to remain forever. He decided not to return to Spain, and instead married a Brazilian woman and started a family in a city about an hour from Taubate. We talked some about the different things that we both loved about Brazil, the closeness of people, the gorgeous land and weather, the heavenly food. He still visits Spain, he tells me in this Portuguespanish language he seems to have created on his own. A very intelligent man with so much of his own culture and language still within him, his 25 year old son looks at him with a laugh and says that with my 2 months in Brazil, my Portuguese is better than his father who has been here for 30 years. His appearance his European, but his heart is truly Brazilian...he tells me he would never again live in Spain.
Paraguay vs. Brasil, 2011 game during the Copa Americana
During this conversation, some of the guys go into the house to grab one of the TVs and bring it out into the backyard area. They plug it in and the TV is loud with nothing but white noise and black lines dancing across the screen....two of them continue messing with the antena and switching channels back and forth, seeming a bit desperate.... but I'm too preoccupied in my conversation to be concerned with what, exactly, they are attmempting to do. From the corners of my eyes, eye notice the kids start grabbing the plastic chairs near the tables and arranging them into a sort of half moon around the TV, in suspense of what is to come. As I'm talking with the Spaniard and the Frenchman, I borrow a lighter from Nahed (the woman from the Middle East) to light my last ciggarette and the white noise finally faids from the background. Cheers explode as I finally turn my full attention to everyone..... and they turn their chairs to enjoy the game.Brazil vs. Paraguay.
The screen is still fuzzy, the white noise coming in every now and then, but the conversations around us cease, the grill is left unattended, the food untouched....
Because in Brazil...
Soccer is life. Soccer is friends. Soccer is culture, excitment, passion, and fun.
I look around me and can't help but smile and remember how VERY different each one of us at this barbecue is....how VERY different each country is that we represent....how VERY different each language is that we each speak....and how....
For the next hour....
As we glued our eyes to the television
As we clapped at every victory
As we yelled at each mistake
We were all equal....
and all Brazilian.
Cândido Portinari, "Futebol" (a group of neighborhood children in Brasil making a game of futebol...or soccer as Americans say)
Portinari was one of the most important Brazilian painters, muralist and also a prominent and influential practitioner of the neo-realism style in painting. He is regarded as the greatest artist Brazil has produced. After the 1940s Portinari became an international Brazilian icon. Café, Morro, Monumento Rodoviário da Estrada do Rio-São Paulo are some of the works that consecrated him as a distinguished painter. “Portinari’s ultimate artistic consecration came with his War and Peace murals of 1953, which he painted for the entrance hall of the United Nations headquarters in New York.”
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