Adventures of a Gringa

Hey gringos - looking for more private students?

I'm not teaching anymore, but I thought it would be useful to create a page with a listing of native English teachers who give private classes in various Brazilian cities. I added some friends to the listing already, but if you're interested in putting your information on the page, please email me at riogringaconsult at gmail dot com. It's good advertising!

Brasileiros- estão procurando professor particular de inglês? Estou montando uma página de profesores nativos aqui. Dá uma olhadinha!

Expat Love

I've met up with a whole bunch of expats recently--my old photog friend, a Brazilian who was living in the Middle East, a fellow Jewish New Yorker, a lovely couple from the Mid-West, and a whole bunch of Americans through my new jobs. It's not that I necessarily prefer the presence of foreigners, but I love meeting new gringos and finding out why they're here--particularly ones who have a real interest in Brazilian culture and Portuguese (and all of the ones I've met have). It's just really nice to meet people you have something in common with: being far from home but loving this country.

Oh, and the jobs! Through a gringa tip, I got a job doing voice recording work (in English), which is a lot harder than it sounds, but a lot of fun and pays really well. I never realized how much work goes into enunciation, pronunciation, and tone! The guy who runs the studio is an American guy who's been here for over a decade and is super gente boa with a perfect recording voice, and the other Americans he hired were cool, too.

I am trying out a new teaching job this week, which sounds a lot more like summer camp than my last teaching job: I have to live on a fazenda-like place outside the city for five days, without having to pay for food, lodging, or transportation. I'll miss Eli, but I was intrigued by the opportunity (and the salary), so I'm giving it a try. If it works out, I'll do it a week a month, though I am hoping to work out another different teaching job soon.

Wish me luck on my working vacation! Though I do suspect there will be a lot more work than vacation involved...

(P.S. They have Internet there--thank god! But I've already pre-written the posts for the week, so no worries.)

a note on learning languages

I've learned a lot about the process of learning languages since I've been in Brazil.

First, I've realized that I really like teaching kids and teenagers one-on-one, since they learn really fast, pay attention and show more respect than in a classroom, and make me feel like I'm doing something right. I especially like teaching teenagers, who seem to look up to me, an older, but not too old gringa. Plus, I have learned endless respect and admiration for people who actually teach in schools.

Next, I've seen firsthand how important it is to start kids early. At the English school for kids where I had my little stint way back last year, I saw what a difference it made for the kids who started learning really young, at age 2 or 3, and those who came in at age 9 or 10. It's absolutely incredible, but the younger the child, the spongier the brain, and the longer you wait, the less of a chance a language is really going to stick.

The other day, Eli and I were on the bus and there was a little blonde-haired, blue-eyed girl chattering away with her babysitter. Eli nudged me and said, "She looks like a gringa." So then I eavesdropped on the conversation and found out that the girl was six and had moved with her family from Germany recently. The babysitter was talking to a random lady, telling her that the girl still had an accent but had learned very fast. I couldn't tell she had an accent, and assuming the girl had been here less than a year, she had soaked in the language without even trying.

Lastly, I have come to appreciate my job teaching adults English. It may be difficult, but is totally necessary. The other day, I helped my student on the phone, since she was having trouble understanding a woman in the Middle East. I could barely understand what the woman was saying, and saw what my students have to deal with on a daily basis. (Between the two of us, we managed to decode her email address, which was something like Dukentrhiptpqpoeir@multinationalbank.com). For better or worse, English has become the language of international business, and until that changes, people have got to learn to become understandable.

oof

Ever since I started teaching, especially early classes, I've woken up before my alarm most days, even when I've barely slept, out of anxiety that I'll sleep through the class. But I never manage to sleep through because of my ticking internal clock.

This week, after the major schedule fall-out, coming back from our trip on Monday, and another small schedule change, my mind conveniently erased the fact that I had class at 11 today. I realized this at 10:36, after I woke up groggy and feeling like I'd hit my head sometime in the night (or perhaps, the beginning of a migraine?) Frantically, I called my student, saying I'd be late, and thankfully she was incredibly nice about  it and said she'd prefer to have class tomorrow anyway, since she's very busy. I feel terrible.

Thank god for nice people.

crap

Fuckityfuckfuck.

I should have taken it as a bad omen when I saw one of the English teachers feeding about 100 pigeons out of his bare hands in the middle of Centro today. Because that's just crazy.

But today was kind of crazy.

First, I noticed that the Metro is going up to a whopping R$2.60 next week (it's now R$2.40). That may not seem like much but I use the Metro twice a day, four to five times per week. It adds up.

Then, the kicker:
The Oil Company has canceled all classes for drivers. I had three of these, so my hours have now been cut in half, as has my monthly salary. Luckily, I'm getting a temporary class next week for another few weeks, but I'm still pretty screwed since I'm completely broke as it is.

And despite all my complaining, I feel bad for the drivers. I get the impression it's largely due to some of them skipping lots of classes and being irresponsible, so that the company now doesn't want to pay. Yeah, they're hard to teach (and I was supposed to get a new student this week classified as a "non-learner" oh dear god) but some of them are really sweet and really do want to learn.

Oy vey.

More Ilha Grande adventures coming up soon, as I am going to have some time on my hands this week.

teaching is fun i swear

Last night, at 9:30pm, my cell phone rang. I saw it was a student of mine, and I thought that was odd since I don't have class with her again until next week. I picked up.
Student: Hey Rachel! How are you??!
Me: ...Fine...
Student: I was wondering if you could help me translate this one thing...
Me: Uh...
Student: (line of broken English for email)
Me: (Corrects line to make it not broken)

Then she put her cute son on the phone who said "HI!" (in English) and then she thanked me and hung up.

Does this mean:
a) we're friends
b) I'm being exploited to my full potential or
c) what I should have expected when I got into teaching?

This morning went like this:
6:55 AM: Text message to Flaky student asking if we are having class
7:00 AM: Phone call from student saying yes, but he'll be 20 minutes late
7:05: I get dressed and all ready to go
7:35: Phone call from student saying he'll actually be an hour late
8:30: I leave the house en route for class
8:34: Phone call from student saying you know what, he's actually not going to be able to make it.

Then I turn around, walk back the two blocks to my apartment, clean my entire bathroom, and pass out for 3 hours.

there are those days

There are those days when you start the day knowing full well that you are perfectly healthy enough to be out and about but would have been much better off staying in bed all day.

Case in point: 3 English classes, each an hour apart, one of which I had patience for because he's advanced and I just let him talk and ask him questions about politics and current events and bask in the glory of semi-fluent English.

Today I also had some awkwardness at the kilo lunch place I usually go to. First of all, at busy lunch places like that are buffet-style, there are frequently not enough tables for everyone, so total strangers will sit together. It's also funny because if you sit down at someone else's table it is polite to say "Excuse me" (com licenca) as you sit down AND when you leave.

I don't mind too much when the person sits diagonal from me, but today I had three people sit at my table and I found it profoundly irritating and uncomfortable, and downed my food so I could get the hell out of there. Also, in my haste, I slipped and fell on the stairs on the way to the ground floor, which wouldn't have been so bad if a) it hadn't been one of those slow-motion falls where you can feel yourself going down and can't stop yourself and b) if the people downstairs hadn't noticed and gasped loudly, AY!.

Anyway, I'm pretty clumsy so I've grown accustomed to such embarrassing moments.

So there's a lot of interesting stuff in the news which I'll add later. For now, the news is that a maid is cleaning our kind of gross apartment to make it spick and span because...my parents are currently en route to Rio.

UPDATE: The maid asked if she could take home two shopping bags, one from a fancy book store and one from an upscale clothing store. I'm not sure if she knew where they were from or not, or if she just liked them because they have handles. I said of course. After all, carrying around nice plastic bags from stores is a status symbol here, and if it makes her feel good, all the power to her. Additionally, she did a way better job than the first maid we hired awhile back, whole left everything all out of sorts and unplugged.