:(

Bolinha in my kitchen

A friend once said that I take in stray animals and international students whenever they are in need (or something like that!) and I guess here in Brazil the first part is proving to still be true, and the second part, well I guess now I am the international student in need, haha.
Anyways, my first day here I started befriending a neighbor's dog, Bolinha. She has owners, but is mostly a street dog. A lot of people here don't like to have pets in the house, especially bigger dogs. So I started feeding bolinha (she looked a little too skinny), training her simple tricks (really impressed the neighborhood kids), letting her sleep inside (she had a favorite spot on the bathroom rug, which unfortunately led to a tick infestation in my bathroom, which was.... unpleasant).
Since I was one of the few people who was really nice to her, she kind of adopted me. Which I had no problem with since I am missing my dog at home.
Well this morning someone poisoned her, she was vomiting, foaming at the mouth, couldn't stand up. Gave her some medicine, she's ok now. I'm just worried if they try again.

coisas

Some random things that have happened since I last wrote:
-went to my first Brazilian soccer game (so loud!)
-saw (and smelled) a dead horse which was actually really upsetting, it was roadkill, I never imagined something so large as roadkill
-had my shower head shoot sparks and light on fire while I was taking a shower (they use electric shower heads here that heat the water right before it comes out), sparks and fire is a lot scarier when you are naked btw
-introduced my coworkers to the American cupcake, they actually were kind of messed up because it was hard to find some ingredients here and too sweet for my taste, but luckily for me Brazilians LOVE sweet things, I think I am their new favorite person
-Was at a bar watching a soccer game when a cachaceiro (a drunk, particularly from cachaça) ran his truck into an electric pole right by us. Explosions, fire, sparks, downed electrical wires thrashing all over- It felt like I was in an action movie. Took out power for the whole city- and right in the middle of an important soccer game, I swear you could hear the whole city groan. (It ended up being 8-1, would have been such a fun game to watch!)
-Went camping at a nearby lake, you don't know the meaning of barbecue until you barbecue with Brazilians
-Had to give a 14-year-old former drug dealer a ride to the hospital because one of his five bullet wounds was bothering him
-Watched some Brazilian "gauchos" breaking in horses. I think its really funny-they train their horses so they can go to the bar, get drunk, hop on their horse and the horses automatically bring them home. Designated driver!

More later!

quero falar sua lingua

In my life I've known a lot of people whose first language was not English, so I know the common mistakes people make, the grammar that seems to have no sense behind it (prepositions!), the sounds that seem impossible to make, and definitely that look on someone's face when they don't understand what you are saying. I think this helps in teaching English, along with the fact that, as I've mentioned in previous blogs, I am struggling with Portuguese. I can tell my students don't be embarrassed or shy, because I am in the same situation as you. Learning a language is hard (well at least I think so).

I've always found accents both endearing and amusing, and I only hope that brazilians think the same of me when I speak Portuguese. I know they at least sometimes find it amusing. For instance, no doubt the hardest sound for english speakers to make in portuguese is the "ão" sound. It is an impossibly nasal sound, and in class whenever I say a word like macarrão (pasta) everyone giggles or smiles. But by far, my least favorite word in portuguese is PÃO. Pão means bread, but if you fail to produce that nasal ão sound, it sounds instead like pau, which means wood, but is more commonly used as slang for dick. So essentially 90% of the time I say bread it sounds like I am saying wood or dick, which really makes people laugh. Unfortunately, this had led me to avoid using the word as much as possible. I never know at the grocery store when I go to the baker to order if she will simply hand me my bread or will look at me like I just ordered "6 woods, please" or even worse "6 dicks, please". You never know how much you use the word bread until you try to never say it!

Oh well, I get to laugh when brazilians say they want to lay on the beach and it sounds like "I want to lay on the bitch".

Lotta, you aren't the only one who doesn't like v's! :)

Side note: For those of you who were concerned about my work schedule, no worries, the disappeared teacher has returned, so I don't have to do 15 hour days anymore. In fact, I had the afternoon off. And it looks like I'll be paid appropriately too!

If you give a hand, they take the whole arm

So I have a lot of things I want to write about here, but I haven't been able to find the time recently. I have been working a lot, even though this is only my second week of working. Last week I was learning how things worked there, etc. and taught a few classes. This week I have been teaching almost ALL the classes, like 7 am to 10 at night.
Let me first say that I really have enjoyed teaching so far. Everyone I work with is really nice, although unfortunately my Portuguese is still lagging and so there are definitely some communication problems with the girls that work at the front desk. Which is a shame because I really want to talk to them-they are university students and the only people I have really met so far that are my age.
But what I really like about working is the students. I love the students! For some reason I assumed most of my students would be college students, but they are actually everything but. For the most part half of the classes are like 12-14 year olds, and the other half are older adults like 30s and 40s. This is a private language school so everyone here is paying money and taking time specifically because they want to learn English. I really admire their determination to learn English. Obviously some of the younger students are taking classes because their parents are making them, but almost everyone legitimately wants to learn and they work hard. A lot of them have goals, like they want to travel in the U.S. or England, or they want to go to school in Canada. The students are also really curious about me so they really try to speak English so they can ask me things like where I'm from, why did I come here, how long will I stay, do I like it here, etc.
I also want to know about the students, why do they want to learn English, how old they are, how long they've been studying. So its a good exchange, we both get to practice our respective languages.

I was worried about my ability to teach, but the students seem to think I'm doing a good job. I speak Portuguese so badly that everyone assumes I understand very little, but I actually understand almost everything, which means I overhear what everyone says about me (its surprising how much people will talk about you right in front of you if they think you can't understand!) but luckily it has been all good so far. I taught some classes for another teacher here, and I heard the students say afterwards "oh today I really learned English!" "Tell Glaucio (the director of the school) we want her to be our teacher" "A real American, I am learning real English!" It's so cute.

But anyways, the reason I am working so much this week..... well another English teacher kind of "trained" me last week and I taught a few of his classes for him so he could have a break (he had a really full schedule) and I could get some practice. Well this week he just disappeared! I think he called and said he couldn't come in on monday, but after that  nobody has heard from him. And so I just took over all his classes, which is a lot. Its been pretty tiring, but I think he comes back soon. I should tell them I can't work so much, but I don't like to let people down. I'm sure some of you remember when I worked as a waitress and by the end of it I was working so much that I had shifts every minute I wasn't in school, including before my Organic Chemistry final (i.e. I didn't study AT ALL for my O-chem final). So, yeah, this is a reoccurring problem for me. But for now I don't mind. I like to be busy, and I like teaching, I just can't let this become a regular habit.

endless juice possibilities

Brazilian fruit is the best

I'm also confused about my pay. I originally negotiated a contract with a monthly salary, but I was supposed to just be teaching make-up classes and a Music and Conversation class once or twice a week.... now I'm teaching all these classes and I don't know if I'll get paid per class (like the other teachers do) or if I still just get my monthly salary. They'll pay me. I think....
Negotiating my contract was a ridiculous matter itself. The director of the school (who speaks perfect english) was busy so I talked with another guy (I still don't really understand what he does, but he works for the school) who does not speak english. So he went over everything in Portuguese, and I understood pretty much everything except the amount I was going to get paid. I kept thinking shit what is that number he is saying? shit, I don't understand what number he is saying.... and then I kept asking him to repeat it but he would repeat the rest of the sentence except the number, over and over. I tried to say no not that, what is the number, and he got confused and thought I was saying no to the deal, then he thought I was saying how much is the real compared to the dollar and was trying to do conversions. ahhh so confusing. finally he asked "so its a deal?" and I agreed, but had no idea what salary I agreed to. Anyways it turned out ok!
well this is long now, so here are some random pictures.

First Impressions

view of the city

Oi gente
I've had quite a few requests for a blog, so here it is.
Although I would have loved to live and teach in Rio (I love that city), it is just too damn expensive... So now I am in a small city in the state of Minas Gerais (north of Rio de Janeiro). The population is around 85,000 people. It is urban enough and there are two universities here, but according to wikipedia the city is essentially agricultural. "The main crops are fruits, vegetables, and especially coffee. With an area planted with 66 million trees in more than 320 square kilometres, coffee growing provides about 8 thousand direct jobs and 35 thousand indirect".
So like any small, agricultural town you don't get too many foreigners here. I am one of the only  Americans here (maybe the only). This has its advantages and disadvantages (more about this later).
Advantage: I quickly got a job teaching English at a language school here despite the fact that I have no teaching experience and basically can't speak Portuguese.

By the way, my Portuguese sucks. Before coming here I really thought I had a better grasp of it than I do.... My first couple days here everything sounded like gibberish and I could barely remember how to form a sentence besides "my name is" and all that other introductory stuff. A little more than two weeks later I can understand a lot, maybe not 100% but most. The speaking..... hasn't improved quite as quickly. I kind of feel like a mute, I listen and nod and maybe say "sim" or "nao".... but Jolie has reassured me that it is possible for me to speak Portuguese, as she had a similar experience during her first 3 weeks in Nicaragua. So we'll see I guess.

the steep climb to my house

For now I'll just give you some pictures:

My street

Minha Casa

my little kitchen