O cotidiano

It’s been so long!

I have been wanting to write about a day in my life in Brazil for such a long while now but have had trouble doing so because my life has changed so drastically as of late. In addition to thinking of my next class, my next meal (because it seems that I have reverted to binge eating again, thank goodness that many of the Brazilian snacks and candy bars could even be considered as healthy meal options in the US), the next episode of “A Favorita” (a soap opera, or telenovela, that I’ve become hooked on in the past few weeks), and the upcoming weekend, I have taken to thinking of the untimely death of Terrance Davis (COL ’10), a one-of-a-kind personality and good friend of mine, my recent stroke of bad luck, and of Georgetown and everything that it has come to mean to me over the past two years. The fact that I am more or less all alone in a foreign country, with few people to whom I feel close enough to truly confide in, has worked to exacerbate my emotions and, at this point in time, I believe it is safe to say that I am going through an especially difficult time here in Rio de Janeiro.

Yet, as with all things, this too shall come to pass.

A few things that I have been able to take from this experience:
-Georgetown’s community is…wow, I’m at a loss for words…
-I have realized how fortunate I am to have such great support back home
-The few friends that I do have here have been very understanding and have done a marvelous job at helping me to keep myself occupied
-Speaking is good, even if it hurts at times, or if I’m afraid of coming off as overly sentimental. It is better that your loved ones know exactly how you feel about them, than it is for them to not know at all.

But now, back to Brazil.

Generally, I awake at some time between 9am and 12pm, because I love to take my time before class, to a lovely spread (OK, I’m definitely exaggerating about the “lovely” part) of fresh fruit, usually of papaya and bananas but sometimes with pineapple, guava, or even watermelon, French bread, jam, requeijão (a sort of cream cheese spread), and luncheon meat (if my host is feeling particularly gracious). After gulping down a cup of artificial fruit juice (aka Kool-Aid aka fruit drink) sweetened with saccharine, which tastes a lot closer to actual sugar here in Brazil than it does in the United States, and a cup of coffee, if I need that extra burst of energy, I catch a bus or van to PUC for about $1.50. I usually like to arrive a half-hour early or so in order to use the internet and chat with friends and family as I do not have internet at home and am not a huge fan of the internet café around the corner.

At PUC, I am enrolled in four classes: (ranked least favorite to most favorite) Portuguese as a Foreign Language, Introduction to Photography, Education & Society, and Social Inequality & Poverty. Overall, I would say that the quality of teaching at PUC is more or less equal to that of Georgetown and that I have less work, or rather, that it is easier to do less work because the professors end up explaining everything in class instead of pinpointing specific cases on which to concentrate during class discussions. Apart from the last two classes I mentioned, which are very amazing because they cover subjects that are very pertinent to Brazilian society and help me to conceptualize and understand my environment, school is, inevitably, school, and I am always thinking of what is next on the agenda.

After school, I usually stick around the campus to use the Internet once more and to chat with friends. It is a commuter campus after all and once I leave, I’m pretty much out of contact with anyone other than the elderly woman and her skittish Siamese cat that I live with in Ipanema. A week ago I joined a gym, where I discovered that in the past two months since my arrival in Brazil I have lost ten pounds due to the huge change in lifestyle that I’ve undergone, so I hope to keep that up. Even in a country known for its heavy national cuisine and scrumptious fried pastries, called salgados, it is surprisingly very easy to make healthy choices here in Brazil. And also, the fact that you see so many walking around in skimpy bikinis and revealing sungas (a more flattering version of the Speedo) and looking darn good in them definitely gives you more of an incentive to take care of yourself. In addition to that, I’m also highly considering taking on a job as an English teacher, giving private lessons to one or to students at a time. In general, I am really just searching for constructive ways to combat this very unsettling idleness that I now have on my hands (which is the direct opposite of my life at Georgetown).

I’m sure that I’ll find a way though.

I always do.