A Weekend At Himundo's

This past weekend was pretty intense. So far on my trip, I have considered myself unsusceptible to what some lesser beings call “culture shock”. That is some psychologists’ term for wussies who can’t adapt. That was until Saturday at any rate. I woke up relatively early and as I sleepily went through breakfast my host moms gave me two options: go to an island for the day for a family member’s birthday or go to a party at night. I wanted to go out with some people from school to watch Brazil’s World Cup qualifying game at night, so I chose an easy trip to an island, or what I thought would be one. I figured we would drive to the ferry terminal, wait in line for a few minutes and sit on a beach. But then we left and everything changed.

During breakfast, Leana (one of my host moms) mentioned picking some things up for the store to bring to the party. Yeah sure, whatever you want to do. It was Brazilian Independence Day this past weekend, so there were even more people than normal on the streets and, well, everywhere for the 3 day weekend. We went into a grocery store and it was a total madhouse. We picked a bunch of cases of beer and soda and waited in this huge line and when we got to the front, Leana told Sandra, the German exchange student in our building, and I to pay for these presents. I didn’t realize I had to pay and had no money. Neither did Sandra. Then I’m really not sure what happened; next thing I knew we were in the street flooded with people and Sandra and Leana were arguing in, Portuguese and Portuguese-German respectively, about what we were doing. I just told them I’d go to an ATM to quell tempers and before I knew it had spent 38 reals on beer for people I didn’t know going to some place I didn’t know. I just really felt like I had no idea what was going on and we hadn’t even made it to the ferry terminal.

When we did get there after a long walk carrying all the cases of beer for the women, things didn’t get much better. The line was insane and it took us almost three hours to make it onto the boat. The baking sun and smell of pee accompanied us the entire time. While waiting I began to calculate time and when I asked my host mom when we’d come back, she was just like, “who knows, we’ll probably just spend the night.” That really brought things to ahead for me. I didn’t think I’d have a problem adjusting to “Brazilian time” but the stores and ferry pushed my limits and now this was over the top. I didn’t want to spend the night or even really go but I didn’t say anything because frankly I didn’t know how too, without hurting her feelings at least. By the time I was on the boat (which was overcrowded and appeared to have very shotty looking sonstruction), I decided to just roll with the punches and have some fun because my three hours or 38 bucks weren’t coming back. I was glad I did.

The ferry ride was calm and actually quite fun. Sandra and I talked with some little girls across from us who had never seen a person with so many freckles and were impressed by the fact that we had both ridden on airplanes. The water was a very bright blue when we arrived to Ilha Grande (I’m not actually sure that’s its name) and I couldn’t wait to jump in, but first we had to find the house. As we walked away from the dock the paved roads turned into dirt and palm trees lined a beautiful view of the city.

Within ten minutes we had arrived and I was introduced to the man of the house and the hour, Himundo, also known (appropriately) as Hi. He welcomed me to his home in broken English and immediately took me under his wing. He sat me down with his friends at a table while the women went off to help cook and poured me an entire glass full of whiskey, which I could not refuse without insulting him because whiskey is an imported delicacy here. This would begin a day of constant, unabridged drinking. Because its so hot here, Brazilians have developed a system where one giant, cold beer is kept in a coozy in the middle of the table and everyone is poured small glasses; otherwise, your drink would just get hot before you could finish it. An ingenious plan, no doubt, but not one concerned with measuring how much you have drank. The entire time I was there, my cup was just being refilled. Another beer is opened and poured before your glass is empty. The drinks were paired with the best Churrasco steak of my life. My program took us to a fancy steakhouse but this cut charred in the island beach house was much better. Unfortunatly though, it did little to stem the tide of alcohol in my body.

After I finished eating, I managed to sneak away from the drinks and went to the down to the beach. As soon as I jumped in, some local kids swam over to me to practice their English. They were using pieces of packing styrofoam to try and ride the waves and I bodysurfed with them and we practiced the numbers 1 to 20 in both languages. The water just seemed to be the perfect temperature; warm but still chill enough to still cool you down. We proceeded to name fruits and began launching into flips. When their mom came and told them they had to leave, they begged to stay and bargained 15 more minutes out of her. Its funny how kids having fun act the same way in different parts of the world. Anyway, I got out with them and shared my towel and their mom offered to let us stay at their house, but we maintained we had a party to get back too and what a party it would become.

Hi was now insisting everyone, especially me, samba dance. He also dropped a very poetic version of Imagine by John Lennon on the keyboard, which involved some pretty sweet new lyrics given his limited English vocabulary. I mentioned in between songs that we should probably start getting a move on to the ferry. We had our final drink and about 9 final drinks later the last ferry was gone and we were on a way to a karaoke bar to watch the soccer game and, of course, drink some more. Brazil beat Argentina and karaoke went on for quite a while at the bar. At this point, I didn't hesitate to belt out the only song available in English, “My Heart Will Go On” by Celine Dione. I thought I was being ravished with praise for my spectacular performance but it turned out Brazil had just scored a goal. On our way back, the streets were clogged with people celebrating Independence Day. A band played on top of a big truck and lights strung between 2 palm trees dimly lit a courtyard packed with gyrating bodies. After we got back, I went with Hi’s daughters and their boyfriends to the dance and stayed Sambaing until 4:00 in the morning. At 2:00, I was like this will stop, no one can possibly dance for this long, but they weren’t even phased. I thought the same thing at 3:00, but it just kept going. Out of all the times I have stuck out as that random white person in my life, I can honestly say this by far took the cake. One week ago I was in a rich suburb, drinking lattes and discussing the pros and cons of universal healthcare and now I was the only white person sambaing at 4:00 in the morning on a tropical island full of black people who spoke no English. We walked back along the palms under nothing but moonlight and, needless to say, I passed out hard.

I awoke just a few hours later to more Samba music blaring from the house. There is never enough Samba in this country. My back was in knots from sleeping on the bad air mattress I shared with another person and when I got into the kitchen Hi greeted me with a shot of whiskey. I thought he was joking, until he downed mine and took his right after. It was 8:00 in the morning; simply put this man is an unadulterated beast. He then went to the fridge and offered me a beer. I told him that I just badly needed some water and he looked at me laughing and said one of my now favorite quotes, “There is water in beer, man”. Ah Himundo, So true, So true. He sat back with his beer, layed his baby granddaughter over his gigantic stomach, looked out to the blue ocean and said, “This is guhd”. Still aching, I couldn’t have agreed more.