Tag: Holidays

Festa Junina a Brazilian Fall Festival

We were walking the streets of Rio de Janeiro yesterday when my daughter piped up “Hey, it’s Festa Junina!” I shook my head and tolld her Festa Junina was last month. She insisted and pointed to a street vendor whose stall was decorated with primary colored flags and a stereo blaring forro music. My kid was right. This vendor was still celebrating Festa Junina. My husband, a native of Rio, explained it this way. “Whatever the party, it always lasts a month longer in Rio.”

In that spirit, I thought a post about Festa Junina in July makes total sense.

Kiddo’s very first Festa Junina!

Festa Junina celebrations, which happen with varying degrees of enthusiasm throughout Brazil, can be traced back to the Pagan tradition of worshiping the summer solstice. The Catholic church then hijacked this festival by assigning June 24 to Saint John the Baptist, and Portugal brought traditional Saint John celebrations to Brazil during colonization.

This is me eating a sweet soup called Canjica. Basically, take corn, add condensed milk, cloves, and heat it up.

Over the centuries, many Festa Junina traditions and celebrations have become entirely secular and blended with other cultures and annual events that happen at this time in Brazil. For example, June is when the corn gets harvested, and about 97% of traditional Festa Junina food is corn based. Salty and sweet. Eaten off the cob and baked into cakes. In soups and as snacks. Seriously, I had no idea there were so many ways to prepare corn, and they’re all delicious.

While many places in Brazil celebrate Festa Junina on the night of June 23 with an official holiday on the 24th, in the Southeast where I’ve lived, Festa Junina parties happen any Friday or Saturday during the month of June. Or if you’re a university club in Rio, every Friday and Saturday in June.

There are fireworks, dancing, carnival games, straw hats and painted freckles (girls) or a painted moustache (boys), and usually at least one mock wedding. I haven’t read exactly how the mock weddings became a staple of Festa Junina parties, but I have a theory. Saint Anthony is considered the patron saint of marriage because he helps single women get husbands so many offerings and prayers are sent to Saint Anthony on his day, June 13. In addition to June being a time when marriage is on the brain, bringing the corn harvest to market was one of the few times people in rural areas got to meet someone they weren’t related to. Oh, and how convenient to have your wedding at the same time as the already scheduled festival! You can save tons on catering! Thus Festa Junina became a day of many weddings.

At my daughter’s school, it’s always Year 4 that stages a mass mock wedding, and this year it was finally her turn. That meant her Festa Junina costume was a wedding dress with a veil, and she LOVED it. It also meant extra time on stage because in addition to the mock wedding, all grade levels perform a quadrilha, a traditional dance done during Festa Junina but with preschoolers is really just a lot of jumping and arm waving.

In my personal opinion, the best part about Festa Junina is the food, but I feel that way about all carnivals and festivals. Any event that has portable grills and homemade sweets being set up on folding tables arranged around ring toss and fishing games is something I’d be delighted to attend.

Even the teachers dress up!

When not performing mock weddings, Tio Rafa can be found coaching soccer.

Is there a culture that doesn’t have fishing games at festivals?

The grooms waiting for the brides to arrive

One bride is always brought in riding in a wheelbarrow. I have no idea why, but it’s super cute.

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July 28, 2016
NYC in a Preschooler’s Posse

We just got home after a week-long family vacation in New York City! I’ve been to New York City three times before, but this was my first visit as part of a preschooler’s posse. Our little Diva, with all of her four and a half years, was the central figure around which all activities were planned. If she wouldn’t like it or eat it or wait for it, then we didn’t do it. By we I mean, Mommy, Daddy, Gramma, and Grandpa aka The Posse.

My husband and I have declared New York our most successful vacation since Diva came home from the hospital.

I understand there are some people who might balk at spending a week in New York in the service of an illiterate, cookie-craving overload, but the fact we were willing to put the Diva’s needs first and foremost is why our trip was a resounding success for everyone involved.

You have to understand I’m not calling my child Diva for lack of a more creative nickname. If we define diva behavior as being irrationally demanding and prone to outbursts over minor inconveniences while assuming she is the center of everyone’s universe, then most preschoolers are divas. In addition, my daughter has some residual effects from an extended stay in the NICU which has left her “fight or flight response” on a very light trigger. Not her fault but still, her easy trigger leaves everyone in her posse scrambling to avoid both the fit and blunt objects likely to be thrown when an unexpected change in plans occurs. So the title Diva fits. And nobody wants a diva to start throwing or smearing snot on things in an art museum.

Our first consideration for the Diva was housing. To accommodate our Diva’s need for a quiet, calm retreat after a super stimulating day, we got out of Manhattan and rented a house in Queens. Corona is a delightful neighborhood bustling with families and charming restaurants filled with locals who seem to burst into song on a fairly regular basis. Between the Italian serenade we got over breakfast one morning and the Latin dance music pouring out from the restaurant across the street, Corona felt like living in a musical.

The hour subway ride into Manhattan or the car service were a small price to pay for the luxury of having a house with a den and backyard patio. The Diva is highly prone to outbursts when tired, so we wrapped up our sightseeing around 5pm everyday and spent the nights hanging out at the house. It was a stress-free way to end each day and allowed us to assume the role of local New Yorker for the week.

What did my Diva want out of a week in the Greatest City in the World? Playgrounds.

Our week in New York was a tour of playgrounds and any museums that happened to be close by, starting with the Science Playground at the New York Hall of Science. This hands-on museum geared toward young kids was just down the street from our house in Queens. Even many of the indoor exhibits were basically highly educational playgrounds, particularly the exhibit on physics in sports. My daughter particularly loved the rope jungle gym and giant see-saw bridge.

Our second day was all about the dinosaurs at the Museum of Natural History but before we got into the museum, a detour through Central Park led the Diva to Diana Ross Playground. I swear she has sonar for playgrounds. We did manage to get inside the museum with the promise of dinosaurs and the special exhibit “Dinosaurs Among Us” was a highlight of the trip. The exhibit wants people to understand that dinosaurs are actually still around. We just call them birds today.

Turns out dinosaurs were basically demon chickens.

The Diva enjoyed literally yanking her posse from one amazing feather-covered dinosaur recreation to the next. It wasn’t until we hit the gift shop that the first meltdown occurred. There was no stuffed velociraptor.

The near hour of tears shed over the unattainable stuffed velociraptor is a good example of how I know without doubt the Diva’s meltdown’s are not an attempt at manipulation or the result of being overindulged. Because she could have gotten any toy in shop. After thirty minutes of sobbing in the most profound disappointment, the Diva had four posse members ready to drop all their disposable income. But she didn’t want anything the store had to offer. She was fixated on a stuffed velociraptor and couldn’t let it go. The best her posse could do was offer a relatively quiet spot near the triceratops skeleton and some chocolate chip cookies. Eventually, she accepted some small dinosaur figurines and a blue whale viewing.

Day three’s plan to see the knights’ armor at the Metropolitan Museum of Art was immediately abandoned upon sight of the Ancient Playground next door to the museum. The playground’s stonework gave it a castle feel and the Diva unsurprisingly played for over two hours. What did surprise everyone was her question while heading back to the subway late afternoon “When are we going to see the knights in their armor?” When a four-year old expresses interest in an art exhibit, you go before she can change her mind or fall asleep in someone’s lap. The coolest part was the horses’ armor.

We took one day off from playgrounds to see Aladdin at the New Amsterdam Theater which is right at the Times Square metro station. While Aladdin was beautiful and fun and the Diva is still talking about the flying carpet, the chaos of Times Square was not fun or beautiful. A prematurely pitched lollipop, which she hadn’t liked in the first place, caused the second major meltdown of the trip.

The sidewalks of Times Square are really not conducive to calming and soothing, so phones were whipped out and frantic searches for nearby cafes, preferably with chocolate-chip cookies, were conducted. An early retreat back to Queens resulted in take out of some of the most amazing Mexican I’ve had in my life from the local joint across the street. (Seriously, I’m on the Queens’ bandwagon primarily for the food.)

After Times Square the posse had learned our lesson. Playgrounds and parks are enjoyable. Crowds and a sea of fifty foot iPads are not. This lesson led us to Brooklyn Bridge Park and the Main Street Playground near Manhattan Bridge. The Diva loved the nautical themed playground, and the posse loved the views. We rode Jane’s Carousel and had lunch at a little bistro just off the park. The breathtaking views are a great antidote to the effects of paying $4 for a single glass of coke that’s fifty percent ice.

To complete our admittedly small sampling of New York City playgrounds, we went to Billy Johnson Playground in Central Park just north of the zoo. This comparatively humble playground features a 45 foot granite slide that the Diva went down at least twenty times. It was a gorgeous day and Central Park was lush and green. When we stumbled upon the Central Park Zoo after leaving the playground, there was no debate. The Diva bonded with a spirited puffin and enjoyed a hyper-active sea lion.

We ended our week in a New York with a trip to the Rose Center for Earth and Space and a show in the Hayden Planetarium. While the Diva was awed by the concept of a movie on the ceiling, the New York Hall of Science is infinitely more accessible to the preschool aged public. Although, her posse thought the planetarium was awesome.

I hope I haven’t given the impression that being in the posse of a small diva is only stressful. It does require planning and a willingness to abandon those plans, but the plus side of a diva is that they are energetic, passionate, and expressive people who draw you into their world. My Diva manifested such joy after seeing her first dog walker, I thought we’d have to follow him around the city.

It’s also because of my Diva, that my husband and I have completely reimagined what living in NYC must be like. We spent a week in the “concrete jungle” running and climbing around parks. The local government has done an amazing job of providing outdoor resources for children and family throughout the city. I’ve spent my entire adult life living in apartments in cities, Washington D.C., Rio, and now Vitoria, and none of those cities have provided the public playgrounds and green spaces like New York. (Rio and Vitoria’s governments do not get credit for simply building their cities on beaches. In fact, negative points to you Rio and Vitoria for letting your outdoor spaces get septic.)

Now if only it didn’t cost a fortune to buy a home in New York. And the winter. If the government could do something about winter, then I could definitely see the Diva and her posse living there.

June 3, 2016
Bible Belt Road Trip

Growing up in Atlanta, road trips were a big part of my childhood. In the summer we’d drive five hours to St. Simons Island on the Atlantic or maybe eight hours to Orlando. I’ve sat through the twelve hour drive to Washington D.C. many times. I’ve got family in Panama City, Florida so I’ve made that six hour trip at least a dozen times in my life.

But until this year every trip was made from the passenger seat.

January 2016 is now etched in my memory as the month I piloted my first road trip. For years, my husband and I have been content to get chauffered around or borrow cars during our holiday trip to Atlanta, but this year we rented a car. And I was the only licensed driver for it.

We rented a…honestly, I don’t remember the name. It was a Kia. It had a hatchback, four doors, and operated on gasoline. I’m not a car person.

The most impressive detail about the car was it’s near pocket-size. I’ve traveled enough to know that in many countries our Kia would have been considered normal-sized. Not so on an American interstate. Imagine your dining room table covered with water melons and one matchbox sitting in the middle of them. My family and I were inside the matchbox.

That’s what it felt like as I merged onto Interstate-285 around Atlanta, aka the scariest place in the United States. The road circles the city for 64 death-defying miles and is a training center for domestic terrorists.

My time skirting between 18 wheelers on I-285 in a freshman engineering class’s final exam with a screaming preschooler and frantic husband in the back seat was spent mostly in a semi-conscious state operating on pure adrenaline. It’s apparently standard operating procedure on 285 for freight truck drivers to allow about five feet of space between the truck and car in front, demonstrating complete indifference to the laws of Georgia, physics, and common sense.

My fellow Americans, you’re all worried about the wrong things. You’re not going to be blown up. You’re going to be flattened by an 18 wheel truck filled with hamburger buns.

My family and I survived that first hour and a half in the car and made it out of metro Atlanta. We left the traffic and everything else behind. Welcome to rural Georgia. We hope you enjoy our pine trees.

There is farm land in Georgia. Lots of it. But much further south. We were driving South-west toward the Florida panhandle, cutting across southern Alabama. It’s a route that doesn’t provide much in terms of scenery save for the occasional buildboard advertising Jesus or a strip club.

Even the exits disappear and fifteen minutes can pass before it’s even possible to get off the highway. A fact critically important when traveling with a four-year old who does NOT like to take bathroom breaks before her bladder is on the verge of exploding.

“There’s an exit with a McDonald’s ahead. Little Bit, do you need to go potty?”

“No.”

“Are you sure you don’t need to go potty?”

“No.”

“Does that mean you do need to go?”

“No.”

“So you don’t need to go pee pee?”

“No.”

“Why don’t we stop and you just try?”

“I said no, Mommy.”

Do I even need to write the conversation that happens two minutes past the exit?

Like most Americans, our bathrooms of choice are McDonald’s. Clean and available when literally no other restaurant is in a ten mile radius. Whatever else is true about the chain, their bathrooms are a service to humanity because the alternative to McDonald’s is a gas station.

Gas stations in South Georgia and Alabama. They’re actually quite fascinating as long as you’re traveling with your traditional nuclear family and don’t have an Obama sticker on your car. In addition to a fabulous array of retro snack food like Yoohoo and Hostess SnoBalls, there’s no end to the items decorated in camouflage: hats, shirts, tabbaco, koozees, lighters, and bibles. You can also pick up the monthly publication of mugshots of people arrested by the city police. It’s the society pages of Pittsview, Alabama. (That’s a real town, btw.)

My husband doesn’t find these places quite as charming as I do. In fact, his Brazilian instincts tell him to avoid at all costs isolated buildings in the middle of nowhere that would attract location scouts for a zombie apocalypse movie. He’s waiting for somebody to walk in with a gun. I told him to relax and just assume everyone walking in has a gun.

The upside to driving in this part of the state is the road itself. There’s no traffic. It’s flat, paved, and has clearly visible lines painted on it. I could drive on those roads endlessly. After so much time spent on Brazilian roads, I forget that “bumpy” is not a given description of car rides everywhere.

The US highway system is one of my husband’s favorite things about the country. He longs to take a cross country trip in the US. By comparison, my husband avoids extended road trips in Brazil as if his life depended on it. (Statistically speaking it kind of does. Roads in Brazil are more dangerous than gangs.)

Kendall Manor Eufaula, Alabama

By the time we were in southern Alabama our road was a smooth, two lane stretch running straight through Eufala, the undisputed scenic highlight. Eufaula, Alabama is home to 13,000 people and the most breathtaking collection of homes. They sit right off the main (possibly only) street through town.

Shorter Mansion

Mansions with wrap around porches, a turret or two, carriage houses. They line both sides of the street beckoning to tourists with their corinthian columns, tempting them to abandon reason and move to Alabama.

After Eufaula there’s not much else until Florida and the Gulf of Mexico. If you’re desperate to make those last two hours of driving pass by you can play road kill bingo. Prep your cards in advance with local species but you can only put oppossum on the card twice. They line the road like mile markers. On this trip, I spotted a raccoon, fox, armadillo, and coyote.

I drove the last hour in the pouring rain, at night, listening to the dialogue of Cinderella II for the

The Gulf of Mexico! Totally worth the drive.

third time in a row. When we reached my grandparents’ house, dinner was waiting for us on the table. I considered my first road trip a resounding success.

So much so, we did it all again three days later.

February 15, 2016
5 Ways to Improve Christmas in Brazil
We put our Christmas decorations up this past weekend. This is the first year my daughter has really anticipated decorating and, more or less, helped in the process. She’s very proud of her Christmas decorations, and so am I. They are minimal but were hung with Christmas spirit. And a lot of sweat. Probably more sweat than Christmas spirit for my part.

That’s the problem with Christmas in Brazil. It’s hot. It’s humid. It is decidedly un-Christmasy. At least for someone who grew up spending Christmas a good bit north of the equator.

I tried to recreate my tree decorating memories for my daughter. We had Christmas carols playing. We pulled out the Christmas books and read Rudolph. But everytime I had to stop and rehydrate, the pleas to “Let it Snow” felt more like a cruel joke than an endearing tradition. Not that I’ve ever had a white Christmas in Atlanta, but it’s at least cold enough to necessitate pants.

I can’t shake this feeling that I’m faking Christmas and it’s not just because I’m importing my foreign Christmas culture. Brazil has already imported 90 percent of American & European Christmas traditions. The malls pipe in instrumental versions of American carols, and shop windows are filled with fake evergreens decked out in red, green, and sprayed on snow. Apartment buildings string lights in the shape of icicles and poor Santa greets kids in fur-trimmed, red velvet.

What feels so wrong about Christmas in Brazil is the juxtaposition between Northern hemisphere customs and Southern hemisphere weather. In order to make the season feel more authentic, I’ve got a few suggestions for improving Christmas in Brazil.

5 Way to Improve Christmas in Brazil

This was in October. December is hotter.
1. Put Santa in Board Shorts For his own sake, at the very least. It’s also hard for a parent to explain Santa’s velvet uniform to a kid running around in her underwear. “Yes, it’s very hot here, but Santa is magic and can maintain a constant body temperate even when wrapped in fur under the sun in 98 degrees.” How about some window decals of Santa strolling down the beach in board shorts pulling his sack along on a boogy board.
2. Carols About Sand, Not Snow “Oh the weather outside’s delightful. And the barbecue’s left me quite full. Laying out that’s my plan, In the sand, in the sand, in the sand.” They could also be more local. I think the world needs some Bossa Nova Christmas. “Gifts and fun and family and sunshine. Good will to all, good cheer we keep in mind. We’ll raise some glasses, attend some masses and dine.”
3. Replace Red & Green with Yellow & Blue Look in the store windows and you’ll see red and green wreathes, ornaments, figurines, dinner ware. These colors are too dark and heavy for a place that’s got sunlight until 8pm followed by balmy evenings with temps in the 80s. Christmas in Brazil should be bright and bold. It should be swirled on a sarong that you wear over tanned (or in my case sunburned) legs. I propose Christmas decorations in yellow, for the intense sun, and blue, for the ocean that everyone is visiting on their summer vacations.
4. Exchange Santa’s Sleigh for a VW Bug What good is a sleigh going to be in a tropical rainforest? Or on the sandy coast? Or the sertão, the arid grasslands? No good at all. For a truly Brazilian ride, give Santa a VW Beetle from the 70s pulled by a team of flying capybara. (Someone please draw and post that image!) I’ve seen old Beetles driving around every city I’ve visited in Brazil. Those cars can run forever in any environment. Santa can land in Caracas, send his team of reindeer back to the North Pole with the sleigh, and pick up his Beetle to continue distributing presents in South America.
5. Christmas Palm Trees First, we need to burn all the artificial evergreens that been assembled around Brazil. Most of them are probably made by children in Bangladesh with toxic chemicals. One thing Brazil is not short on is vegetation. No more cheap, fake fir trees. Let’s decorate little potted palms. It’d be a hundred times easier to wrap light around a palm tree. There wouldn’t be room for quite as many ornaments, but I can make sacrifices.
Rabanada. Mmmmmm!

I have no complaints about Christmas dishes. Nuts, pineapple, figs, codfish, ham, and lots more fruit. These are all things I can support. And rabanada. Especially the rabanada! It’s like french toast on steroids. It’s amazing and one Brazilian tradition I’ll be taking back to the US with me.

It’ll be my addition to the dessert table. When else wold you serve bread dipped in egg and covered with cinnamon and powdered sugar? At breakfast?
November 23, 2015
Throwing a Brazilian Halloween Party: An Odyssey of Prep

I threw a Halloween party for fifteen preschoolers last Saturday. It was a huge success, but I feel I owe my guests an apology.

Multiple parents came up to me and said I was “muito animada”, a very fun-loving, party-throwing person. I realized that by throwing a fun children’s party, I had completely misrepresented myself to them. I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to lie. The fact is I’m not a creative, crafty mom who saves egg cartons to make earthworm condos for the compost pile. My perfect Sunday afternoon is sitting quietly with a good a book and cup of coffee. Ideally on the beach and without people unable to wipe their own bottoms.

So why did I throw a class Halloween party?

Because they don’t traditionally celebrate Halloween in Brazil. I loved Halloween as a kid, and if I don’t throw the party, my Brazilian daughter won’t know one of my favorite childhood traditions.

Why did I make such an effort on the crafts and decorations?

Because the day after I announced my intention to have a party, one of the moms came up to me at school and told me she’d always dreamed of going to a real Halloween party. To which I thought “Oh crap! I’m fulfilling someone’s dream of Halloween? I don’t want that kind of responsibility!” But I accepted it. And that brings us to the last and really most revealing question.

How was I able to come up with such creative and age-appropriate themed snacks and crafts if I’m not a creative crafty mommy?

I’m an intelligent and highly-organized, type-A personality with access to the Internet and a working knowledge of Pinterest. That’s it. That’s the real me. If I take on the responsibility of a project, it will be done well. Even if it’s something I usually avoid.

Like baking.

Let me tell you about the cookie baking.

While in Atlanta in August, I found Halloween themed cookie cutters and decorating supplies. Bat, ghost, and pumpkin cutters. Black, orange, and green slime icing. The kids could decorate cookies! It would be awesome.

I knew I was going to have to make the dough from scratch. Shortly after arriving in Brazil, I tried to bake a pecan pie for reasons again related to culture sharing. I asked my husband where I could buy the crust. He stared at me brow furrowed. “Buy the crust? You mean the ingredients?” I laughed. Ha. Ha. Good joke. I’m not making my crust from scratch. Not even my South-Georgia raised, preserve-making grandmother makes her own crust anymore. Nobody does. “Uh, they do in Brazil.” Oh.

So I knew I was going to have to make sugar cookie dough from scratch and having baked maybe four times in my life, I knew I’d need a practice run. I planned out every day of the week leading up to the party. Saturday I went online and found a simple and well-rated sugar cookie recipe. Sunday I bought the ingredients. Tuesday was the baking run-through.

After my experience with the pie crust, I brought measuring cups back from the US because I’d learned I’m a victim of the US education system and can’t think in metric. Also, the Brazilian versions of recipes often call for “tea cups” which is not a standardized form of measurement! I find baking stressful enough without vague instructions, so American measurements and tools it is.

Recipe. Ingredients. Measuring cups and spoons. I thought I was prepared.

Preheat the oven to 350 F. My oven only has a line decreasing in thickness and the numbers 1 through 5, but my plan was to pick a number and once the first batch was in check them every minute and figure out the right amount of time at that setting. First problem solved.

Mix dry ingredients. Easy.

Cream butter and sugar. That’s when I realized I had a handheld beater with no beaters. They had been lost somewhere between a school project and kitchen renovation. Ok. People were obviously baking before electricity, so I decided to mix by hand. If I had known I would be creaming butter three times in a week, I would have gone out and bought a damn beater right then. But I didn’t.

Fifteen minutes and two sore arms later…mix in dry ingredients.

Two quivering arms and one sore back later…put dough on cookie sheet. Looking at the dough, I could tell using the cutters was out the question. The dough stuck to everything. I could have wallpapered with it. I went ahead and baked globs of it to test the flavor but knew I was going to have to address the stickiness.

One minute of internet research later, I’d learned the dough must be refrigerated for at least an hour before attempting to cut out cookies. Great! I had learned a valuable lesson. This is why test runs are important.

Friday morning I made the dough for a second time, breaking a sweat mixing by hand. I left it in the fridge all afternoon. I was going to bake the cookies after my daughter was asleep, but on a whim I decided to do one batch before I picked her up from school.

Within minutes I learned that firm dough doesn’t stay that way for long in an 85 degree kitchen. Central air conditioning in the kitchen would have been a big help, but I shrugged it off. People baked without air conditioning for most of human history. No big deal. I simply raced, hunched over my kitchen table, to roll out, cut, and dump cookies onto to the baking tray before the dough softened into a gooey mess.

I put cats, bats, and witches’ hats into oven and pulled out 8 amoebas. Son of a bitch.

I collapsed in a chair. Beads of sweat dripped down my back and forehead. My shoulders ached. And the prospect of mixing another batch of dough by hand loomed before me and crushed my soul.

I hate cooking. No matter how much I research and prepare, I feel I always, always, end up facing a dozen unexpected challenges that keep the results from being perfect. And perfect is the end goal, people. And it should be achievable with good planning and organization. That doesn’t seems to be the case with cooking, which is why I hate it.

The silver lining is that by making that test batch before I picked up my daughter, I was able to swing by the store and get more flour and butter for a third batch. Because I was making the cookies. My daughter had already found the cookie cutters and asked for a cat to decorate. I had brought the icing and spider sprinkles from the United States. I was making those damn cookies.

And by 1:12 a.m I had forty cookies in recognizable shapes.

At the party the next afternoon, a mom asked my husband where I bought the cookies. He told her I had baked them. She exclaimed “Really? Oh, those creative moms.”

That’s why I want to apologize to her and the other moms because I’m not the person the cookies make me out to be. I don’t get a thrill from making my daughter’s birthday cupcakes. I get stress knots above my shoulder blades. I don’t jump at every chance to throw a party. I cringe remembering the mess after the last one. I wish my Portuguese was better, then maybe I could translate my sarcasm when I talk about the joys of crafting.

I may have given my daughter wonderful Halloween memories and successfully represented a piece of my culture abroad, but I misrepresented myself in the process.

Which could be true for a lot party hosts. Maybe behind every Pinterest image, there’s a sweaty person popping painkillers and muttering obscenities at a tray of cookies.

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November 3, 2015
Fortaleza, Brazil: All-I-Can-Take at the All-Inclusive

Vacationing in Fortaleza, Brazil! A lot of a good thing.

I just got back from a family vacation in Fortaleza, Brazil. Our group was made up of three generations traveling from three different cities. It was a great trip and some memories will be with me forever. Which is only slightly longer than all the meat I consumed will be.

If Rio is looking to present an honest and endearing image of itself to the world during next year’s Olympic Games, they should build a barbeque pit in the international terminal and welcome each flight with a free lunch. “Welcome to Brazil! Have a plate of meat!”

A plate of meat, piled as high as it was wide, and a mojito made with a shot of white rum and 32 scoops of sugar was my lunch each day of our stay at the all-inclusive resort. Because once you’ve decided on the all-inclusive vacation, you’ve clearly made self-indulgence your primary goal for the week. No point in trying to hide it under a few leaves of arugula with olive oil.

Of course, visiting an all-inclusive with the entire family does limit the extent to which a person can self-indulge. Vacationing with my only-child who prefers me to any other person in the world, (She’s 4 and hasn’t met a wide range yet.) meant that I did not get the writing and reading time I would have liked. Being unable to pass out under a palm tree with a book on my face due to parenting responsibilities, I compensated by giving my stomach completely uninhibited and unrestrained access to every buffet at every meal.

Puddings, steak, french fries, cakes, risottos, Prosecco, sandwiches, salad, cappuccinos, tarts, omelets, shrimp, cheeses, mussels, chicken, soft drinks, sausages, pasta, mousse, fruit juices, fish, rice, beans, ice cream, croissants, pineapples, and pork were all consumed with reckless abandon. Lunch involved at least three plates; the grilled meat got it’s own plate of honor. Breakfast would take over an hour and I survived the long stretch between lunch and dinner by indulging in the afternoon tea, which included no tea but lots of cake. It was four days of eating as if life was free of consequences. All consumption and no exertion. It was glorious and delicious. I didn’t worry or go to the bathroom from Tuesday to Saturday.

Actually, I did start to worry on Saturday but not because I was feeling awful. I got worried because I didn’t feel awful. My rational-self kept waiting for the effects of my week-long bacchanalia to catch up with me. That part of me knew no person could eat with total abandon for long and not feel utterly disgusting. And that part of me waited. And waited. Meal after meal after, I filled my plate and went back for more, my taste buds rejoicing in how life could be if I didn’t care about staying a size 8 or living past 45, and I felt fine.

Saturday’s lunch was fish stew, fried shrimp, pork chops, rice, and french fries. I ate some of everything washing it down with a Coke. I enjoyed every bite and would have eaten a few more french fries if they hadn’t cleared the plates. On the walk back to the hotel, I wondered if I should seek help.

As we hid out from the tropical sun for a few hours in our room (because too much sun is really terrible for you), the hotel staff dropped off complimentary bottled water and coconut candy. My husband opened up one of the candies, took a small bite, and abandoned it on the table saying “Wow, that is too sweet.” So I immediately went over and finished it.

I popped the last bite in my mouth, swallowed it, and thought “I will never eat anything again.”

With that last bite of coconut candy, I hit my food wall. The full weight of every meal landed on me and left me in a fetal position on the bed. That was it. I was done eating. Possibly for the rest of my life. It took four and a half days, but I found my physical limit for food consumption.

I’m back home and in my normal routine that includes exercise and vegetables. My parents have gone back to the States and my daughter is back in daycare. I’m already looking forward to our next vacation, but perhaps a camping trip would be healthier.

I’ll bring the s’mores!!!

July 28, 2015
A Brazilian Christmas

Describing holiday gatherings in my family as hectic would be an understatement. There are multiple sets of grandparents, aunts, uncles and cousins to visit and dine with. The table is buried under enough food for a week-long bacchanalia. Enough dessert is prepared for every person in attendance to have her own cake.

In comparison, the first Christmas I spent with my in-laws in Brazil was a pleasant afternoon picnic with some acoustic guitar.

It was surprising to me that my American Christmases are filled with more food, presents and cousins than those of my Brazilian in-laws. It certainly seems to go against the stereotype of family-focused Brazilian culture and allowing-the-disintegration-of-the-family American culture. But which “American” culture am I referring to?

Middle-class America? Middle-class, Latino, urban American from Miami? The diversity of the US makes it difficult to define what is American and the same is true of Brazil. What is Brazilian? Well, are we talking about the Paulista sushi chef of Japanese heritage or the Carioca taxi driver of Italian/Portuguese ancestry?

I’m not saying overarching national or regional cultures don’t exist, just that within any culture are seemingly endless subcultures that create huge variety among people and families.

I realized this year, after hearing many accounts of “Brazilian” Christmases, that my southern family celebrates Christmas in a more “Brazilian” way than my Brazilian husband does.

Growing up, I’d usually celebrate Thanksgiving in South Georgia on my Grandmother’s pecan farm. As one of the oldest, I got to drive my younger cousins and the kids of my dad’s cousins (who I believe are called second cousins) around in my great-uncle’s golf cart. On my mom’s side, Christmas dinner often included the daughter of my step-dad’s brother-in-law’s sister, a relationship the English language has no term for.

Because my parent’s are divorced, Christmas day usually included visits no fewer than four houses. One set of grandparents has since moved to Florida, so we’re down to a mere three present opening sessions. Three homes is more than enough to leave my husband shell-shocked with only the strength to sit upright, mumbling to himself, “It’s so much. It’s so much.”

Whether he was talking about the number of presents, pies, or names of family members to remember I don’t know, but after my first Christmas lunch in Rio with only his immediate family and a single pudding for dessert, I understood his culture shock.

We now make a point of spending Christmas in the U.S. Every December we fly to Georgia for lots of family and food. It’s a very Brazilian holiday.

January 7, 2011
Why are you here?

“Why are you here?” I probably posed that question 20 times over the course of my teacher training. Asking a person to explain her existence may seem a bit forward for a first meeting but among expats it’s typically asked as a follow up question to visa status. “So, why are you here?”

In this context “here” is understood to be Brazil and answers ranged from the romantic to the idealistic. While our individuals stories differed, whether South African, Irish, or New Zealander, all of us attending the training were united by the designation “native English speaker” plus the fact we had chosen to take up residency amongst non-English speakers. And this was more than enough to make for two weeks of great conversations, lasting friendships and several explanations of cricket.

Jump to four days after the last training session and I’m suddenly posing the same question to myself, “Why am I here?” I was seated amongst a few bleached blonde teenagers in letter jackets and puffy-haired, middle-aged women in college football sweatshirts at a Chinese restaurant in a strip mall. The day before I had listened to my grandfather calmly discuss Obama’s intention to make the US a socialist state. While shopping, I’d overheard a conversation as a man fervently hoped the US “drops some nukes” on Iran, item one on the worst Christmas wish list ever.

Then I was deciding between lemon or kung pao chicken while the children at the next table called for “Mama.” I felt as if I was observing a scene without taking part in it, like Scrooge and the Ghost of Christmas Present, only instead of quotable, crippled children there were text-messaging Republicans.

So, why was I having Chinese at a strip mall surrounded by people I would probably never have great conversations or lasting friendships with? Because I frickin’ love Chinese food. Because I can understand every southern-accented word spoken and I can identify which college claims which animal among the alligators, tigers, and bulldogs featured on sweatshirts.

I’m here because we drove to the shopping center in five minutes on a four lane divided highway. A divided highway! It’s how angels travel around heaven.

I’m here because I can mentally roll out a blue print of this strip mall and know that starting at the far end, my printer ink is at Staples and my reasonably priced jeans are at Gap. I bought my camera battery at the store next door to the Chinese restaurant with the wonderful egg drop soup. My salon is further down and three doors down from the grocery store. I know that while the grocery store’s bananas will taste like wax, it carries all the peanut butter I could eat in a lifetime.

I’m here because at the far end of the parking lot there is a Target and a Borders both of which I can wander through blindfolded. I know without doubt that every suburbanite wants a coffee from the Starbucks inside Target but not a single one of them will walk across the parking lot to get one. They will get in their cars and drive alongside the paved sidewalk to a closer parking space.

I’m here because I know this place and I know these people. This is where I became the person who moved to Brazil and became a registered Democrat. Clearly this place is not as soul crushing as I like to paint it. The truth is I share a lot with my fellow Chinese food patrons, from a love of a separate and clearly marked returns counter to a fanatical observation of traffic laws.

At Christmas a person wants to feel at home and this is my home. I moved to Brazil but my family and my culture is here. That’s why I’m here among people I understand and who would agree that cricket is a ridiculous attempt at a sport.

December 28, 2010