Interview with Ana Paula

This is another interview that I did for my report. It is with Ana Paula, my portuguese teacher.

Cyrille Gindreau

Interview with Adelaine LaGuardia

About two weeks ago, I was sitting in a car, next to my friend, going to his home town... I was looking out of the window thinking: 'what the hell? I'm in freaking Brazil! freaking crazy...' I was very happy with this thought, I just wanted to scream I was so thrilled, I wanted to show people what I was doing... And so then it came to me: why don't I show people?

I'm in journalism here, they want me making reports on things and what not... Well that was part 1 of the documentary idea that is being formulated... The assignment is to make a report on something going on in the city. So why not do it on the exchange program between NMSU and UFSJ? So I set out to start creating questions to interview people with but instead of just writing them down, I would film so that at the end of the year here, maybe I could put together a little documentary of my exchange program. So this past week, I have done two in person interviews and two email interviews. I plan to do another 2 more before I turn in my report which I will also post here when I am finished with it (portuguese and english versions). So here is one of the interviews; it is with Adelaine LaGuardia, the exchange program coordinator here at UFSJ. Although she does speak english, the final report must be in portuguese so I hope you all can understand!!!

Cyrille Gindreau 9-20-09

hitch hiking Brazil

So there I am, sitting at a bar with Lucas, (room mate and best friend in Brazil) talking about life, women (and men(he's gay)), school and things to do in Brazil when he tells me he's going to his home town in Varginha. He tells me that there this party that he plans to go to with some friends. And then he asks me to go. Keep in mind, this is Thursday night and he wants to leave on Saturday, come back on Monday because it's a three day weekend. So I tell him sure, that sounds like fun, I'd love to go to another city in Brazil. So whatever, the night ends, we go back to the house and I go to bed.

I wake up like any other day on Friday, go down stairs to check my email; I sit down, turn on my computer, and in comes Lucas. "Get your stuff together, we're leaving soon!" 'Today?' "Yes, c'mon, let's go!" 'Umm, wha, umm, K...' My computer finishes turning just so I can shut it down... I pack my things together, run to the school to reschedule an appointment and run back to the bus station. As I walk up, here comes Lucas, we hop on the bus, sit down, and we start our journey. So here's where you start wondering: Bus? I thought you said hitch hiking? Well yes, we were on our way to go to Lucas's favorite place to start hitch hiking... We get there and there we were, holding a sign that said 'Lavras' holding our thumbs out. After about waiting for about half an hour, finally we get picked up... Nice enough couple going to Sao Paulo and Varginha was kind of on their way... I fell asleep in the car and woke up to Lucas sticking his finger up my nose. We arrive on the side of a freeway next to a gigantic statue of Pele, a Brazilian soccer player, and start walking for a little bit... We get to the other side of this interstate intersection and around the statue, stop, and start sticking out our thumbs again, this time with a sign that says Varginha... soon enough, some old guy picks us up and we get to the city. We walk to Lucas's house and I get to meet his mom... Nice enough woman, full of energy and the craziest stare I think I've ever seen. We don't do to much that night; go downtown, check out the place a bit, go to a bar, nothing special. It's Saturday and we leave the house to go looking for something that I wanted to buy; a tripod and lavaliere (fuck portuguese, try explaining what a lavaliere is to someone who knows nothing about video and sound in a language that you cannot communicate completely in) We found the tripod after checking like 7 stores but couldn't find the mic so we gave up and got coffee. afterwards, we went home to find some new developments in our plan... This is really where the story gets interesting, please, keep in mind that I am completely straight and had no idea what was to come of the next 48 hours... We come home to see that Lucas's boyfriend had arrived along with one of his friends. We hang out for a little bit and then go to some of Lucas's friends house. Turns out to be a lesbian couple and one of there friends. So we have a grill out from 7 till around 11. Somewhere between those hours, I remembered sitting at the bar with Lucas and him telling me that we were going to a party that night so around 11-1130ish, I start to think that we just aren't going so I settle down and knock back like 7 beers... haha, I was wrong, it's about midnight when we leave to drive about an hour and a half to some club in the middle of no where, which of course, turns out to be a gay club... It was a fun though, I enjoyed myself for the most part, loud techno music, fun people, good times... around 3 in the morning, Lucas and his boyfriend leave, leaving me with a lesbian couple, and two other people that I had met at the grill out early, so around the time of my third cocktail/second beer, I'm just sitting in the back, enjoying the music when this drunken gay man starts hitting on me. That was kind of awkward. I'm straight and don 't speak much portuguese. Well I actually led him on for a while, bought him a drink when he spilt his all over me, tried talking to him and after a while i got board so I just joined up with my other friends leaving him with the phrase: 'sorry, I'm straight, I'll see ya later' soon afterwards, we left and went back to the house. I wake up with a bit of a hangover, to find that we're going to a gay parade. So I down some Guarana, eat some pao de quijo, and we're off. We get there and there's actually only like 100 people, must of been early cause we decide to walk around a bit. After more people have joined, we find a nice spot to hang out and dance for about 3 hours to the pulsing techno music that is filling the streets of Varginha (gay parades in Brazil apparently consist of a truck in the town square blaring techno music as loud as possible and a bunch of people drinking, dancing and well, being gay. After a few hours, the truck starts moving around the town with everyone following it) So after 48 hours of dancing and being hit on, I think we all begin to get a bit tired so Lucas, his boyfriend, and I go back to his place and the rest of the weekend is much tamer... Eat good food, have some more good times and I found the most amazing cafe in the world; the first internet cafe I've seen since my arrival in Brazil, but it's Brazil so this isn't no ordinary internet cafe. sure they have the usual coffee drinks and what not but they also have and an entire menu for alcoholic coffee drinks so of course I get an Alexandra cocktail. It's now Monday night(we were supposed to leave today but Lucas decided to Tuesday morning and get back before classes start) and a friend of Lucas comes by to say hello. For anyone who knows Gerry, this guy was his Brazilian equivalent; totally right wing and the first person that I met who didn't like Lula(Brazilian president). He pretty much had no good points as far as I understood and was quite self centered in his reasons for not liking him but he was fun, very passionate... He leaves, we eat dinner, go to bed(which i didn't do till around 4 in the morning) and wake up at 530 to start hitch hiking back. The return trip was a bit more fun because it wasn't as easy even though it was faster... We take a bus to the outskirts of Varginha and start holding the sign. Get picked up after 20 min by quite a boring and non-talkative person, and are driven for about 20 min before we have to find another ride. Again, we wait for another 30 min and get picked up by a couple going to Belo Horizonte. A bit more interesting but not to much to tell. they drop us off at the entrance of Lavras. This time we only wait for about 5 min before this old fellow picks us up and says he can at least take us to the other side of the town where it would be easier to get a ride to Sao Joao. We get to the other side and wait for another 20 min and a very colorful character picks us up. After finding out that I'm from the states, he starts saying: "You like Brazil? You like the woman here?!? There very beautiful yes?!? You have lots of sex with them? You like to party? Get drunk a lot?"Very funny person, I liked him... Turns out he was going down our street in Sao Joao so he drooped us off right in front of our house... we got back around 11, leaving a day early, getting back a day late... I sleep for an hour and get prepared to go to class...