Gaúcha Ariana: March 2017

Olá pessoal!

After moving 3 times, overcoming language barriers, learning my way around Porto Alegre, and obtaining a stable internet connection I have finally done the unthinkable but not the impossible: created this blog!

As I mentioned in the past (I realize it’s now been quite some time ago), I wanted to create a blog to document my experience in Brazil: as a Fulbrighter, as a foreigner, as a tourist, and as a Brazilian. I hope to update this blog fairly regularly (you can define however you want what constitutes as “fairly regularly”) and provide you with a glimpse about minha vida, my life. Maybe I’ll even entice some of you to come visit me to see and experience all the action firsthand!

Disclaimer: I apologize for any sort of randomness, disorder, grammatical/spelling errors, etc. I’m not the most articulate writer, and sometimes (ok, many times) my thoughts and vocabulary get tangled up between English, Spanish, and Portuguese.

So first things first – Ariana, how did you come up with the blog title and what does it mean? What a marvelous question (as gramma Roz would say)! Gaúcha (or Gaúcho for males) are what people from Porto Alegre are called. It’s the same as saying “San Diegan” or “Miamian” *Not New Yorker* :-)

What is this strange and foreign land like and what have I been up to?

Details about this strange and foreign land:

Porto Alegre is a charming, cosmopolitan, tree-lined (with palm trees!), mid-sized capital city in Brazil’s southernmost state of Rio Grande do Sul. Its population is 1.5 million yet the entire metropolitan area amounts to approximately 4.4 million. There’s a wide variety of cuisines to sample (which I try to take advantage of, especially because the exchange rate is in my favor) and gyms, yoga, and pilates studios are just as plentiful in Porto Alegre as Starbucks is in NYC. There are museums, theatres, films, cultural activities, bars, clubs, concerts (artists from all over the world come here) and then some throughout the city. You really need to put in a great deal of effort in order to be bored here! The city is very walkable and buses, taxis, trains, boats, and uber are all very accessible. Every Brazilian that I have met has been so friendly and hospitable. They are excited and eager to help and get to know me, and always want to practice English. Now that the school year has started and summer has come to an end, social activities are slowly reemerging. Every Wednesday I go to an English language exchange group at an Irish pub, and every Thursday there’s a laid back hangout at a hair salon that’s also a bar. One of the professors put me in touch with a student from Brasilia who recently moved to Porto Alegre. She has been so amazing, helpful, and a great friend. In addition to her, Hirsch put me in touch with Pedro, one of his friends who lives here. Pedro has been great in connecting me to his friends both within and outside the Jewish community. I’m starting to reach the point where I am now recognizing faces at local events and hopefully these acquaintances will become good friends. I’m really enjoying myself here and am very happy with my choice; Porto Alegre is the perfect fit for me!

What I’ve been up to:

I’ve been keeping busy here, and getting lost in the city certainly has taken up a good chunk of time. I’ll try to keep my update brief because A) you are already somewhat aware of what I’ve been doing, and B) I want to be respectful of your time and write a blog post rather than a novel. There are a number of New Yorkers in this selective audience who don’t have time for anything (same goes for you too, New Jersey)!

1. Registering with the police and getting a CPF -

All foreigners that are staying in Brazil for more than 90 days need to register with the federal police. If you don’t register with the police you have to pay a fine once you leave the country, and if Fulbright finds out that you didn’t register then your grant gets taken away. Needless to say I registered with the police shortly after arriving in Porto Alegre. The process was fairly quick and painless thanks to José, José the lifesaver. Who is José? José is a former Fulbrighter who is now a graduate student at UFRGS, my host university. He has gone through the process of registering with the police and has simplified it. He was with me from start to finish (the two Fulbright ETAs - English Teaching Assistants – in Porto Alegre were also present) to obtain and prepare the necessary documents for the Federal Police and gave us specific instructions on what to do at the Federal Police. If it wasn’t for him, we never would have cracked the system and would probably still be trying to figure out till this day how to register with the Federal Police.

Getting the CPF, a Brazilian social security number, was surprisingly very simple and had zero bureaucracy. I simply showed up to my local post office, gave them my address, paid R$7 (approximate USD$2.50), and was then given a receipt to give to the Ministry of Housing. At the Ministry, all they did was take my receipt and ask me if the information was correct. A minute later I was given my CPF. The entire process, including two taxi rides, took less than an hour.

2. Carnaval -

Although I was advised to leave Porto Alegre for Carnaval because there are no festivities, I decided to stay behind and catch some R&R in my new city (plus I didn’t want to travel during what is arguably the most expensive time to travel in Brazil). I took advantage of that long and very quiet week to take various strolls and walking tours around the city that I created. At nighttime I went back to my airbnb to watch Carnaval on Globo, the “CNN” of Brazil. Not that I have any personal experience in Brazil or in the U.S., but it seems like Carnaval is comparable to Mardi Gras yet totally puts it to shame. The variety of music, dancing, costumes, and yes the parties, I thought were incredible! It wasn’t completely dull for me though, I did attend a Carnaval celebration here in Porto Alegre but there’s no comparison. I’d say that it was more like a Carnaval block party rather than a full on celebration like what occurs in Rio de Janeiro, São Paulo or Salvador.

3. Looking for an apartment -

I must have seen over 20 apartments in Porto Alegre. I wanted to rent a room in a furnished apartment and live with Brazilians. Sounds easy right? Surprisingly not! All the apartments that I saw either: had no security, the room was tiny, the room had no natural light and/or was not furnished, or there was a problem with the roommate (ex: smoker). After a lot of patience and frustration, I finally found a great place! I’m living in the Bom Fim neighborhood, which is close to the university and is filled with cute shops, restaurants, and cafés. Bom Fim also happens to be the historically Jewish neighborhood and a majority of the Jewish institutions are still housed here (the Jews live throughout the city though and are not concentrated in Bom Fim). My roommate is Ana, a newly retired professor who happened to work with the professors that I am in touch with. She grew up between El Salvador and Brazil, got her MA at Stanford, has hosted Americans in the past, and is so nice and friendly! Now that she’s retired, her new project is helping Haitian immigrants assimilate in Brazil whether that’s through language, contacts, culture, etc. After the big earthquake in 2010, Brazil took in many Haitian refugees and a sizeable amount settled in Porto Alegre.

4. Wedding in São Paulo! –

My amazing brother-in-law Donny Epstein was so kind in putting me in touch with his Brazilian relatives that live in São Paulo. He had told me that they were amazing people, so warm and welcoming, and that I would hit it off with them right away. At first I thought that Donny was greatly exaggerating and I didn’t think much of it (sorry Donny!). While I was in São Paulo for the Fulbright orientation in February, I met up with them. Donny, your comments were spot on! They are so lovely, incredibly generous, filled with personality, have such interesting stories, and the list goes on and on. One of Donny’s cousins was getting married in March and invited me to the wedding. Naturally I said yes, how could I not go?! The wedding was absolutely spectacular, certainly a night (and later turned to morning) not to forget! I couldn’t gage well how many people were there, but my rough estimate is around 300. There was an endless amount of food, the caipirinha menu was quite impressive (why doesn’t every wedding have this?!), and people danced to Jewish, American, and Brazilian music. I left the wedding at 4am and it was still going strong!

5. Research –

I’ve started my research project and it’s slowly taking off. I’ve met with two professors who both seem eager and open to helping me in some capacity. I’m currently researching the history of European immigration to Rio Grande do Sul, and have interviewed two people about the municipal law mandating Holocaust education in local public schools. One thing that I learned that I thought was interesting is that the public school system in Brazil is different than in the US. There are two types of public schools within Brazil: state and municipal. In Porto Alegre (and this might be the case across Brazil, I’m not sure), municipal schools have significantly less resources than the state-funded schools. Apparently, many students at the municipal schools only attend because they know they are guaranteed a meal. Over the next couple days I hope to interview two municipal teachers, a former official from the Municipality of Education of Porto Alegre, and visit a municipal school to see the Holocaust education (or at least their daily realities) in action. I’m excited to carry out the project, yet I also feel very overwhelmed. The last time I conducted research was in 2009 for my senior thesis. Needless to say I’m very rusty and need to relearn how to organize myself, budget my time, how to find and skim sources, extract important information, etc.

Lastly, I’ll end this blog post with some of my interesting discoveries in Porto Alegre. In no particular order…

1. Perú – This means ham in Portuguese. I found out the hard way :-/

2. Pinha – My new favorite fruit. It tastes better than ice cream!

3. Immigrants from Senegal– They are all over the city and park themselves on the street corners to sell sunglasses, purses, small electronic gadgets, clothing, and shoes. According to Ana, they are not refugees like the Haitians. I wonder why they choose to come to Brazil?

4. RU –Lunch at the Restaurante Universitário (RU), the cafeteria associated with my host university Universidade Federal do Rio Grande do Sul (UFRGS), costs R$1.30. That’s USD$0.42! As you can image I frequent there often, and the food is actually very good. Everyday there’s some sort of salad, rice, beans, cooked vegetables, meat and fruit. Definitely the best deal in town!

5. The Jewish school in Porto Alegre is one of the best in the city. In fact, it is so good that non-Jewish students outnumber Jewish students.

6. Organic farmers market – Every Saturday in my neighborhood there’s an organic fruit and vegetable market. Some of my favorites include: fresh sugarcane juice, pastel, pinha, sampling various pestos, and the pop-up café where if you snooze you loose and will never get a table.

Abraços e beijos e até mais!

Hugs and kisses and until next time!

- Ariana