Copacabana, Rio de Janeiro: 27oC, warm, sunny and slightly cloudy.
Friday is the last working day of the week and sometimes the hardest. In the past, Friday was a day when I worked until 2 p.m. at the maximum and then was free.
Many times, I would only work until midday, so for me, the weekend began super early. I would be able to have lunch with a friend in some special place like Urca or Santa Teresa. Nowadays, Friday is one of the busiest and most difficult days.
Throughout the week, I give classes, accumulating tiredness, so by the time Friday arrives, I am usually completely exhausted. Additionally, due to the increasing difficulty of making money in Brazil, I can no longer afford to have Friday afternoons off. I have to give a regularly scheduled class or an extra/re-scheduled class on Fridays to avoid losing money or a pupil.
Over the last couple of weeks, I have been comparing Brazil from when I arrived to the first ten years before when PT Partido dos Trabalhadores, the workers’ political party, entered its first office. PT entered in 2002, and I had already been in Brazil since April 1989, firstly in Jardims in Sao Paulo and later, for the most part, in Rio.
Before coming to Brazil, I used to live in London and was in a relationship with Adriana, who hailed from Sao Paulo. She belonged to a quattrocento family, which is a highly respected and traditional Brazilian Paulista family with a strong Italian heritage.
Many Italians migrated to Brazil and settled in Sao Paulo, and some of these families are over 400 years old (known as quattrocento families), with a deeply rooted Italian culture. When I told Adriana about my plans to visit Brazil, she kindly offered me to stay with her family at their home in Jardims, which was considered one of the best neighbourhoods in Sao Paulo at that time.
When I arrived in Brazil, I landed in Sao Paulo while Adriana stayed in London for a few more months. I remember Adriana’s younger brother picking me up from the airport and taking me to their family home. Their house was a small semi-detached townhouse in a quiet cul-de-sac in the Jardims.
Due to her parents’ divorce and the bad management of the family businesses, they had lost a lot of money. Furthermore, the terrible state of the Brazilian economy, which was going through another recession, had made the family somewhat decadent compared to their name and prestige of the past.
After meeting Adriana’s family, they invited me to see my bedroom and rest a little after my long flight. I entered a small, charming guest bedroom, which was tastefully decorated, with a single bed against one wall.
At the opposite end of the room was an open window with shutters facing out onto a backyard. In the distance, not so far away, I could see a group of tall palm trees swaying in the light breeze mixed with the late afternoon sun. The temperature of about 23 degrees gave me an epiphany of happiness and bliss.
In 1989, the internet and modern amenities that we are accustomed to today did not exist. Despite the implementation of Sarney’s second economic plan for Brazil, where everything from food to salaries was supposedly frozen due to hyperinflation of 1000% a year, there was still something unique and special about Brazil at that time. Although the supermarket shelves were sparsely stocked and prices constantly changed, the country possessed a sublime and singular charm.
Of course, the people would complain about the government, the economy, prices, and the day-to-day problems of living in a country such as Brazil, but there was something else there, a glimpse of something special that the people believed in; there was hope in the people’s souls. Everything was more straightforward, and the people, even though they suffered, were happier than they are now.
The view of the palm trees from my bedroom window swaying in the afternoon sun and breeze and the warmth of my first day in Brazil I have carried with me all this time. It is something that it is impossible for me ever to forget, and I think that has kept me in Brazil all this time until now and stopped my hope from flickering out.
I am sure that the first ten years in Brazil were my best; even my mother, who has been to Brazil more than ten times over the last 30 years, says Brazil is worse every time she goes.
I have also talked a lot to Yasmin about the future of Brazil and the possibility of her living in England or any other country, as we do not know what will happen or how much worse it will get in Brazil.
I picked up Yasmin in the evening after her last class so she could stay with me for the weekend. It is the first weekend in three weeks that she is with me; she has been having exams, and money is also short. When she is not with me, I miss her too much.
In bed by 9.00 pm.
Thank you.
Thanks for reading my blog. Check out my other posts and share your thoughts in the comments.
Richard
