The bloco

Bangalafumenga

Yet again, I cannot say that I really know what was happening during these two weeks. In Trinidad, I was lucky to be learning about Carnival with an academic eye while I participated. But I’ve realized that what I learned in Trinidad is not applicable elsewhere. For example, I didn't meet any fascinating carnaval characters to make deductions about conquest and colonialism here. Black face? Check. White face? Yup, that too. Gender bending and overt sexuality, for sure! But I didn't see much method, just a ridiculous amount of madness. And madness is what Carnaval is all about, right? I can infer, deduct, study as much as I want, but that just prevents me from understanding what Carnaval is really about: "freeing up", as they say in Trinidad.

Rio’s carnaval is known for it’s commercialism. “Traditional” is not the word I've heard to describe the revelry here. “Party” is more like it. The costumes ranged from boring “Boa Director” Tango hats advertising Antartica beer, to blue tulle skirts, to tiny little pastel hats (Peruvian Quechua style), and, of course, men wearing dresses. Lots of oversized plastic sunglasses, chicken/penguin/beer hats and Amy Winehouses. And I wore a lion hat made out of foam, but some guy took it and now I have his "Jewish" hat, which is pretty nice but I would rather my lion.

The Sargento Pimenta Bloco

Where does one wear these costumes? Blocos, neighborhood parties revolving around a theme and live music, spring up all over the city at all hours. There are blocos that begin at 8:00 am, and others that start at 12:00 am. There are blocos on the beach and blocos in the favelas. There are Bob Marley Blocos and Paulino da Viola blocos. There are blocos for children and...blocos that some people bring their children to, even though the heat and drunken crowds make this seem inadvisable. All blocos have beer. “Mini-blocos” are the small parades that pass through the streets in a moment. The popular or traditional blocos, like the Beatles-themed Sargento Pimenta bloco, attract millions of partiers and stay put. This is the side of Carnaval that I saw the most of (you can't avoid it, everywhere you go there's a bloco!), and I will sum it up simply: a big party. Remember that scene in Black Orpheus where people dance and sing by Orpheus as he plays his guitar? I guess that’s where blocos came from, but the ones I went to have a dramatically different (BIGGER) feel.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-KznlNRyjUg&feature=related

The most important lessons I learned: #1 Blocos are only fun with a lot of friends: new or old, doesn't matter. #2 Being a third wheel/woman guarantees that a lot of strange men will try to kiss you. #3 Don't wear your Havainas, that's just stupid. #4 If you drink beer, you're going to have to pee. Plan accordingly. #5 People are going to try to rob you. Don't do stupid things like wear your purse unguarded in back (This I learned from experience!)

NOT a Bloco: Pedra do Sal, a bi-weekly Roda de Samba. My preference.

E tudo se acabar na quarta feira...really?

Fancy Sailor in Trinidad. This was my first Carnival!

Yesterday, I was walking through Praça Edmundo Bitencourt, a quiet park near where I live. Small dogs greeted each others behinds, neighbors lounged on the benches and octogenarians flung their limbs about on the green exercise machines that the city has set up in every park. I love Copacabana for its energetic octogenarians. Beyond the tweeting of birds and the yapping of those ugly white/yellow/pink dogs that old people always have, a thumping caught my ear. As I neared Rua Figueiredo Magalhães, the thumping clarified into a samba school’s endreo, the song they made to illustrate this year’s presentation.

“A minha Ilha e ouro é prata,

Tem o bronze da mulata,

Canta meu Rio em verso e prosa,

Com a cidade ainda mais maravilhosa.”

I couldn't find any pictures of Carnival in Baton Rouge. This will have to do.

A poetic reference to the upcoming Olympic games...Quickly I was engulfed by the bloco: the urgency of the thumping bateria, the joyfulness of the people dancing and singing along with the loudspeaker. I stood to the side and smiled as they passed, but didn’t even have to resist an urge to jump in. It’s the Saturday after Ash Wednesday. I’m a little tired of Carnaval! When does this party end?

The Infamous Negrita Puloys in Barranquilla! This picture was practically the advertisement for Aliarse, it was so prolific.

Please don’t shake your head and say, “Oh, Eliza, what’s happened to you? Are you getting to old for Carnaval?” No! According to my wonderful neighbors, no one is too old for Carnaval! As I pressed against the wall and passively enjoyed the passing excitement, a grey haired couple sprung hand-in-hand out of their apartment’s gate, skipping and singing along. Two weeks ago, at my first bloco, I jumped in with untapped energy, too. And that was two weeks ago. Every other Carnaval I’ve ever been to has ended with uncharacteristic punctuality on Ash Wednesday. I was pacing myself with that information in mind. But where others stop, the Cariocas keep going. Last night, on the Metro to Lapa for a concert, I spotted a man waiting on the opposite platform. He sat there, alone in his platic seat with an enourmous shiny collar on, his only company a 3 foot tall feathered headress sitting next to him. I think his carnaval was over. In Lapa, fireworks and blocos and unending energy. But finally, on the omnibus home, I saw a homeless person sleeping on a statue. Keeping watch was another beplummed headress. It was a quite and poetic image for me to end this experiece with. Now it’s Sunday. I think it’s over, and I'm not going outside 'till I know for sure! Haha just kidding. I’m going to describe the two main Carnaval activities I participated in in two separate entries because this is getting too long!

What am I doing?? I'll just wear some glitter and try to blend in!

A Rio Passes through my Life...Again!

Finally, I'm able to wake up again. I don't know if it was the 3 hour jet lag, the birds twittering on the green hill by my window, or too much beer, but for the first week here, leaving sleep every "morning" felt like coming out of a coma! I like to experience the pace of morning and gain momentum throughout the day with the rest of the world. 11:00 is too late.

I've had my coffee and fruit, and I'm waiting to call my mother to wish her a Happy Birthday. (Quick adorable English learner memory: my students in Colombia thought that the word for cumpleaños was "happy birthday," as in "When is your happy birthday, teacher?"). What better time to tell you where I am?

Rio de Janeiro. When I was a child, I used to buy these color-in posters at Sandy & Sons. The pictures were jungle scenes, with hundreds of tiny little leaves and flowers. I loved coloring each leaf with two shades of green, each petal on the flower a different pink. I enjoy meticulous details. This city is full of detail. From the carefully tiled streets, to the squiggly style of graffiti, to the beautifully arranged women, to the houses tumbling down the hills and the leaves in the forests on the morros. There is so much sound, so many people, so much culture and diversity and beauty and horridness. The wealth and the poverty, the mountains and the ocean. So much to feel.

I've actually been in a funk these first few weeks. Can you believe it? I don't think that this is entirely a bad thing. It's moved me to reflection, and I'm glad to reflect at this point, a starting point, where moving forward is the only direction.

The Magic of December

Carnaval Arts

One unusually beautiful day in November, it might have been the 5th or 13th, Mr. Smit told me it was finally December. “The air. This is December air. It won’t rain anymore.” That same afternoon, I walked into my class at Aliarse and Leonardo, a talkative, engaging student, elaborated on the December theory. “All of the people are happy in December. The light is different. The wind is strong and the sky is always deep, deep blue. Today, it feels like December.”

But it rained for most of the rest of November. The arroyos were “impressionable”, as Cecelia says, invading houses and carrying away people and belongings. Looking at any horizon at 11 am, grey clouds churned and expanded. If I wanted to go somewhere during the day (like work), I’d have to get across Calle 76 and 75 before the rain began. La Felicidad, La María...arroyos with pleasant names but fierce personalities. November was a special month, marked by weather. But it was nothing like the magical diciembre that everyone was getting so excited about.

People here have been talking about December since the soggy, humid depths of September. With every debilitating arroyo, December dreams are recounted: the quality of light changes, the wind eliminates stagnant air and mosquitos, the rain blows off to elsewhere, and, most importantly, everyone becomes happy. It’s funny how I hear these stories; the first person to say something so grand and sweeping sounded cute and idealistic. When the second person coincidentally made a similar observation I thought, “Oh, ok, another Barranquilla urban legend.” When I realized that everyone was talking about the magic of December, I couldn’t help but suspect some kind of commercial propaganda that has brainwashed the city into a favorable Christmas buying mood, something like what I saw on Friends’ and Lovers’ Day

December arrived on December 1st (haha). It rained that morning, a rain as strong and manic as usual, but with the additional quality of endurance: it down-poured for 3-hours. The city shut down. I realized how the media can manipulate a population when I rode a taxi back home from Transelca. On the radio, we listened to the local news:

“I’m reporting live from Barranquilla and it’s raining really hard here! Sandra, how is Soledad looking?”

“Well, Jorge, its raining in Soledad. There are some strong arroyos and it doesn’t look like it will stop soon.”

“Thanks, Sandra. Now, we have a taxi driver on the line. Driver, is it raining where you are?”

“Jorge, it certainly is raining cats and dogs over here in the north. The traffic is terrible!”

Etc. I started panicking, until I remembered that it rains every day and it only takes about 10 minutes for the surging currents to diminish into a trickle after the rain stops. I did worry, though, that my Aliarse students in Soledad wouldn’t show up, which would have been frustrating, since their final exam was that day. I thought my lunch date wouldn’t show up, since he was locked up in the University way to the north of my Calle 79. When it rains in Barranquilla, nothing is certain. But, around 11, the rain started to taper. The grey light started to clarify. Soon, scattered rain drops were falling through sunshine, and finally the little poofs of wind collaborated to gust away the remaining clouds. My lunch date arrived under a blue sky. The wind blew the door open for him, and we ate on the floor in a splotch of yellow light; warm light, not painful. He said, “This is December.”

Pradomar

It has been December ever since. Even though I made fun of it, I love Barranquilla’s December. The sky is blue, it never rains, and there is a strong, healthy breeze that keeps everything cool and dry. I am leaving the city in the middle of this glorious season, and I am sure I will leave with happy memories. On December 2nd, to celebrate the end of a year of teaching in Colombia, my roommates and I drank cheap champagne on the beach at Pradomar. Because of the rain, the ocean was clean(er). A bar nearby played reggae music. University students on break flirted with each other, and surfers tore up the measly little ripple waves. The sun was in full force, but the light didn’t hurt like it usually does. We ended the night in a posh bar: a lame meat market scene, but at least now I can justify preferring La Troja’s griminess.

The next day, Sandro brought me to his cumbia comparca in Barrio Bajo. The members discussed the responsibility of the Carnaval dancers, and everyone was included in the discussion: little girl dancers, called semillitas, matriarchs who have danced with the comparca their entire lives, young men who feel invigorated contributing to the maintenance of this beautiful aspect of Colombia’s cultural heritage...even me! I felt like I could have been sitting in a steel-band meeting. There are the elements of community that I crave in my life, and that I always find in Carnaval groups. People, when they weren’t talking, listened with smiles on their faces. Obviously, this isn’t something I’ve seen everywhere here, but it was notable to me, that a smile was where these people’s faces rested. I really felt so happy to be sitting there with these strangers. We spent the night with one of the leaders, first on the street and then at La Troja. I danced with everyone on my little corner in the street. Somebody bought me a red rose. I was also given potato chips and aguardiente (haha, I forget to mention the presents my students gave me! An Agatha Christy Novel in Spanish, a well loved plastic carnaval bracelet, a bocadillo with a bite taken out of it...) I think that, because it’s December, I’m starting to understand this city better. That sounds really quaint and ridiculous, but you have to believe me: December is the secret to Barranquila’s puzzle!

Cumbia

I'm Starting to Talk like Your Students

"Jack Nicholson" and the girl who always brings her drums everywhere. I actually hamg out with him a lot more that I like to admit!

My final semester at Aliarse is turning out to be pretty easy. I am teaching my fancy gerentes at Transelca, and a group at ITSA, a continuation of one of my last semesters’ classes. These are the more advanced students, and I suppose accordingly the curriculum has a sort of deconstructed quality to it. This is what I have to work with:

Module 6

Indirect questions

Question tag

Get used to/

accustomed to

be used to

Get + adjectives, get + prepositions get + past participle.

SECOND TERM

Phrasal verbs ( COME / GET / GO / PUT / TURN)

Linking words expressing:

Condition ( despite of / in spite of although / Thought )

Purpose: ( so that / in order that /

Cause and result: ( Because / because of / due to; for this reason, as a result, that’s why )

Adding, Emphasizing, Listing points: (also / Besides / finally / in addition / fist of all / what’s more / last but not least.)

Contrast : ( but / however, although / on the hand )

No books, no course packets, just this meager list. And the brilliant minds of my students and myself. My brilliant mind is bored by the prospect of a whole term of “get used to” and “....isn’t it?”, so I’m back to my old ways of inventing what I think we should learn. The problem is that I don’t usually know much about what I’m teaching until I start teaching it. Yesterday, I thought it might be useful for the students to learn phrases like “although”, “in case” and “as long as”. What a can of worms! I was calling them conjunctions, but I really don’t even know...and I forgot that in Spanish, you have to use the subjunctive with adverbial conjunctions. I think I just made a random vocabulary list, and tried to teach them as a grammar point. There was a little confusion. So much for ignoring the syllabus.

There are certain mistakes that all of the students, from my fanciest energy company gerente to my most timid electro-mechanics adolescent, make. Would, could, should and must get mixed up a lot, and my students always say things like, “It must be nice to go to the party tonight.” or “It should be scary to travel by yourself.” Then there are possessive determiners. It doesn’t matter is it’s my, her, their, our; to my student, everything is your. “Last night, I watched TV with my boyfriend at your house.” Or, “My mother is pregnant, and your stomach is getting really big!” I’m happy to be so involved in my student’s lives, but unfortunately, I hear this mistake so often that I’m starting to use it myself! Another one, which is kind of awkward in this unquestionably homophobic culture, is that the boys always say boyfriend instead of girlfriend. I don’t want to assume that the boy with perfectly painted eyebrows, a tight pink shirt and shining fingernails means girlfriend when he says, “Next year, I will marry my boyfriend.” I usually don’t correct them (the other boys will do that for me, between peals of hysteric laughter: “Yes, your boyfriend, marica, hahaha!!!!)...I’m trying to get them to consider the word “partner”, a word I myself have never really gotten comfortable with in my own life. But in this situation it could/should/must/would be useful.

A mysterious fire always elivens the bus ride home.

All in a Days Work

It’s 7:06 am. I’ve just finished watching the sun rise: at 5:45, the different blues and greys of the night sky (the madrugada sky, actually) define into clouds, and the Sierra Nevada mountains, 200 km to the east, are silhouetted by the sun rising beyond. My schedule here demands that I wake up at 5 am four days a week, and I feel well acquainted with the Barranquilla sunrise.

Today, as I was walking out of my building at 6:30, my phone rang. The caller ID informed me that Cecilia, my 7:00 student, was calling, but the voice that greeted me was definitely masculine. Does Cecilia have a manly morning voice? “Hola?” “Good morning, Eliza” “Good morning...” What language do I speak to this unknown voice, at this unfavorable hour? We shared a moment of silence and I started worrying that I was very late- sometimes I unaccountably lose 15 minutes somewhere in the morning. “Estoy en camino, Ceci! I’m running out of the door...” “Eliza, Ceci is still sleeping. She is very tired.” Aha. Ok. This must be the mysterious, bohemian hospital executive husband who turns up in so many of my student’s colorful anecdotes. Class canceled. I turned around to return to my apartment, and before my phone was in my bag, it rang again. “Eliza, I’m going to my farm at 10:00 this morning. Would you like to go with me?” Cecilia and her husband have a little coffee farm up in the cool Sierra Nevadas, a completely different world from this city, with rivers and waterfalls and fresh fresh air. Of course I would like to go, but not alone with Cecilia’s husband...I guess the sun rise today was just for the sake of it.

Anyway, my students in Soledad are waiting for me. Today we’re going to discuss gender roles in Brazil, and think of reasons why the percentage of woman heads-of-household is so much higher in the Northeast of that country. This half-quarter-trimester the gringas are running the show at ITSA, and I’ve decided to raise my standards. I made up my own test for the mid-term, and the students did very well! At least the ones who studied/cheated did. I’d like to give you an example of the test I was supposed to give these guys...the listening part is the most ridiculous. I didn’t listen to the recording, but judging from the questions, it’s impossible.

Choose True or False for the following statements:

a) Fay has a hundred glass horses.

b) Ron thinks elephants bring good luck.

c) Ron got tired after the dragon dancing rehearsals.

Keep in mind, this unit has nothing to do with Chinese culture or festivals from around the world. Barranquilla doesn’t have a Chinatown, and dragon dancing is not something people do here. Imagine if you were learning a language, and you listen to something of which you only understand 20% of the words. Would this topic make any sense? No! Poor students. On my test, there was no true or false, no multiple choice. They had to write and they couldn’t guess. It took the class 2 hours, but I gave them cookies afterwards. And they did well! I am really happy that I raised the stakes for them. They say that the class flies by...I am by no means a very good teacher: the class “flies by” because I have this impulse to entertain them, and so I act a little kooky. Still, I think that they’re learning something.

On another note, the bus ride to work has been depressing recently. The posture of the street people, the look in the addicts’ eyes, it’s so sad. I see so many spines, covered in dull, greyish skin, exposed as the body bends over a bag of trash. The other day, on a corner where the saddest prostitutes usually sit, I saw a teenage girl. She wasn’t sitting, maybe she was just there coincidentally, maybe the other women aren’t even prostitutes. But a man on the bus looked at her and said something to another man sitting ahead of him, punctuated by a salacious laugh. A tiny old woman with dried-apple skin got on, and no one but me got up to offer her a seat. I think that life is really hard here, so hard that small hardships go unnoticed sometimes. The impact of this on me, nothing more than a witness, is cumulative, and these lives I see from a bus are only now reaching me. I have no idea what can be done, though.

Am I turning into a bitter old ex-pat?

Still riding Motocarros

Blogging on long-term life just isn’t the same. The bus rides, the encounters, the animal in the street, the music and the heat just don’t llaman mi atención anymore. This is not to say that I am used to living here, or that I don’t experience things every day that shock or delight me. It’s just that shock, delight (along with bewilderment, frustration and occasionally joy) are just the emotions that I find myself grappling with on a regular basis. I usually can’t even remember the sources of my numerous emotional highs and lows. Thank goodness I’ve figured out how to do yoga at home. Without this, my heart might have hardened a little bit here with the many sudden attacks of anger that I go through when something doesn’t go my way.

This weekend is election weekend in Colombia. People are voting for their governors, their mayors, and all of the comities and assemblies that get behind them. Although the streets of Barranquilla don’t resemble the crime-nest that some stories of Colombia might conjure up in your mind, politics are still a sort of dicy game. For example, Soledad has way more voters than residents. Dead people vote in Soledad! I think some ridiculous percentage of the senators of the past couple of decades are serving time. And, people are still killed, kidnapped, and threatened during their run for office. The numbers of homicides, kidnappings, and attempts that I read for this year on the Caribbean coast alone alarmed me.

It still floods everytime it sprinkles

Perhaps for this reason, this weekend is a dry weekend. “Ley Seca” went into affect around the country at 6 pm this afternoon (and the grocery store was swamped with people purchasing their emergency alcohol rations). Last night, my roommates and I went out for a drink to get ready for the crackdown, and I had a frustrating experience where, after 10 months of living here, I ordered a vodka tonic and could not be understood. The words for vodka tonic in Spanish are “vodka” and “tonica”, so I really don’t know how I kept on ending up with Old Parr mixed in ginger ale and who knows what. It took three tries! And the worst thing is that the waiters here have to pay for their mistakes, so once I realized that I decided to forfit my free “happy hour drink” to pay for the misunderstanding. But I swear, people look at me and decide they won’t understand before I even open my mouth. Vodka. Tonica. Vodka con tonica. Vodka y tonica. Dos ingredientes. I don’t have a great accent, but how does that sound like “Old Parr”? It’s embarrassing for me sometimes!

Now I’m waiting for my friend who is a boy. He’s only about 2 hours later than he said he would be (which is actually very unusual for him). I hope that my readers can sense my “This is totally normal and I wouldn’t expect anything else” air...I am not writing these frustrations out of weariness. I still like living here, and learning how to deal with vexation is great. I’m writing this for you because it’s funny! Next time I’ll write something nice...but I guess I’ll have to admit to you that I might be acquiring some of that irritating ex-pat sardonicism. If that is the case, it’s a very good thing that I’m leaving in 2 months.

Cumbia in Palenque