Feeling a little older today

Off the subject of Brazil for a post...

Last night, I attended Back to School Night at Edge's school. He's in 8th grade now, believe it or not for those that know me or him. The school seems nice, familiar. His teachers all seemed friendly and enthusiastic about teaching. The curriculum is more PC than I recall from my days. Now that the PC culture that has developed in the US has made being proud to be American nearly criminal, I just hope he will learn the facts, and not be editorialized to during class.

This year one of his teachers appears to be younger than me. Much younger - probably by a decade or more. I guess that threshold was bound to be passed at some point, and moves me one step closer to being officially "old". This particular teacher said "like", "you know", and "umm, ok" a lot, which I hope isn't reflective of the English, oh excuse me, now it's called "Language Arts", education he will be receiving. She also was a bit of an "uptalker", which drives me crazy. Other teachers are as I remember my 8th grade teachers: there's the strict one, the one that makes you record everything from the blackboard into a notebook word-for-word, the wacky-cool one, and the "hot" one. Let's hope there's not the "drop the pencil and lookup the girls skirt" one (you ex-Falcons will remember).

I guess I can go into a whole Brazil tie-in here too and talk about Edge's school in Brazil. Or I could drag this into a trip down memory lane for me and 8th grade. It's late though, and I'm tired - maybe in another post. Sing it Nena.

Copa

I was fortune enough that my last day in Brazil (13/Jun/2006), was also Brazil's first game of the Copa do Mundo (World Cup). Fortunate in that I at least got to experience one game of the Copa, Brazilian style. Here's how it went...

As you no doubt understand, "futbol" (pronounced "foo-chee-bowl" there)is religion in Brazil. Next to the 85% who claim to be Catholic (this is another interesting thing, 85% Catholic but I don't recall anyone going to church, ever), almighty Futbol is 100%. Each Brazilian male, and a healthy percentage of females, is required by law to have a favorite soccer team, and support them vehemently and to debate until words fail anyone who supports a rival club. Since the weather is nice year-round, so too are the soccer leagues. I never quite figured out how the leagues work - there just seems to be games on TV nearly every night. At the gym I went to, there was either a soccer game or novela playing nightly, but a soccer game of a local or regional team always trumped the novela. Period. Rumor had it that wearing the wrong team's colors into certain sections of the big cities is reason enough to rumble.

Brazil's first game was against Croatia. Croatia's not exactly a soccer powerhouse, but, hey if they made it to at least start the Cup, they had to be decent. About a month before the games, the schedule of work delays and closings appeared. The first game was at 4pm, so the plant closed at 2, just to make sure everyone had enough time to get to the bar, friend's house, or local restaurant where they and their friends/co-workers/family would gather to watch. The more games Brazil plays in, the more time off from work for everyone, so this is additional incentive to cheer for the home team. Not just my company either...every company. Stores lit up Green and Yellow starting about a month before, with as many Copa promotional tie-ins as possible. One sterotype that is proven true in Brazil is their love of the game, and their ability to play it. They recognize that the world recognizes this too, and they love it all the more. The Copa, in a very real sense, is Brazil's national pride on the line.

As game time approached, traffic slowed to a trickle, the streets cleared, and all that could be heard was the murmur of crowds and extermely loud party-favor noisemakers. Some noisemakers were powered by hydraulic cylinders, just to be sure. I met up with about 10 or so co-workers and headed over to a local watering hole. We were lucky to get an upfront seat, close to the ad hoc movie screen and projector setup for the game. Soon after, the beer started flowing, and the party was on. The game wasn't I believe Brazil's best effort, but they won 1-0. The crowd went wild at the goal, like you might in the States if your team scores a 50 yard last-second Hail Mary pass to win the game 24-23. Great stuff. Work and social life mix more than I find they do here, and watching a much anticipated soccer games is no exception. Thanks to my friends in Brazil for indoctrinating me in the ways of the Copa.

Altough I left Brazil the next day, I still followed their games. Of all countries to loose to, they lost to France and were denied getting out of the first round, something never before dreamed possible. Brazil and France are not at odds with each other as say the US and France are, but there is a bit of a rivalry. Argentinians consider themselves like the French of South America, and the Brazil/Argentina rivalry is well-known, therefore by default France is not a favorite of Brazil. When France eventually lost to Italy during the championship game, I felt better.

And so it went, my first and only Copa 2006 game in Brazil. Maybe for Copa 2010, I'll be back.

Boa Noite Brasil

Watching TV tonight, I ran across "Sabado Gigante" on the Spanish TV station. For those of you not familar with SG, the closest I can describe it is like a Hee Haw in Spanish. The show lasts for hours, and is a mish-mosh of comedy skits, live band performances, and commentary; all the while beautiful latinas in revealing outfits prance around in a seemingly pointless manner. I am willing to bet more than once when you were flicking through the channels one lonely Saturday night and you came across this show and the former caught your attention. The host Don Francisco, a German-Chilean, has apparently been hosting the show for decades. He tapes the show in Miami every week, then flies home to Chile. Nice.

Anyway, why am I bringing this up? SG reminds me of a couple of Brazilian TV shows. These type of variety shows are all the rage in Brasil (of course, Novelas and Soccer rule the airwaves; I'll come back to that another day), two I remember the most are "Boa Noite Brasil" and "SuperPop". Both are shown live, with production values not quite what you would expect from Oprah or Letterman, but more in line with Jerry Springer or Maury. They each come on at about 9 or 10pm, and run about 2 hours. Boa Noite Brasil is hosted by Gilberto Barros, a rather large man, who captivates his audience one day with wacky "Battle of the Sexes" contests, the next a serious topic like recovering from cancer or some other illness, and another day would be a "desfile de moda" - fashion parade. By fashion, most nights meant lingerie or bikini show. Gorgeous models parade on stage in lingerie and high heels while Gilberto and a panel of fashion experts talk in detail about the "fashion". Yea. Right. The fashion. The camera pans up the girl's body slowly, stopping about 1/2 way up and then again at about 3/4 of the way up. This would shock even Richard Bey's audiences.

In this clip, the show's topic is "Electrolysis - A treatment for cellulite". I don't remember seeing this particular show, but I'm willing to bet the girls were on the benches, bastically naked, while Gilberto and crew discussed the pros and cons of electrocuting your ass to remove cellulite. In this clip, one of the models falls off the bench. Remember - the show is live. Gilberto does his best to cover.




The other show, Superpop, I believe considers itself to be the Oprah of Brasil. The hostess is Luciana Gimenez, who's claim to fame prior to hosting the show was sleeping with Mick Jagger and having a baby by him. (As a side note, when the Stones were in Rio this year playing a free concert for 1.5 million of their closest friends, the country was a-flutter with the big question - will Mick go to see Luciana? He didn't.) Luciana does tackle some more serious issues like Oprah might, but still throw in a transexual discussion and, of course, desfiles once or twice a week. My wife liked Superpop, and I guess I did too. As I got better at Portuguese, it started making more sense. This is a commercial for Superpop which runs covers a bit of everything you might expect to see.



Go to Youtube and do a search for "Boa Noite Brasil" or "Superpop" and you'll see what I mean. You don't really need to understand Portuguese to get a feeling for the shows.

Tribute

A tribute to my favorite TV show, Sao Jose dos Campos style.




Click here for FULL SCREEN.

Special thanks to my wife and Edge for their camera work, and patience, as I scouted locations, obsessed over shots, learned how to get copious amounts of smoke from a cigar, and spent insanely long hours putting this together.

Soldiers Commercial

I'm doing a little testing here of linking to video. I have some of my own videos I was considering sharing, but I didn't want to publish them to YouTube for the whole world. So, consider this a bit of a test.



But, there is a Brazil tie in here for me. This commercial came out during the '05 Superbowl. The Superbowl is broadcast in Brazil over Spanish ESPN, but without the commericals. Curious about the Superbowl commericals that year, I searched online and found them. This one stood out to me. By then, we had been living in Brazil for about 6 months. When you live outside your country for a while, your native patriotism tends to increase in proportion to the time away. Anyway, this one really hit home for me, and I'll admit, I got "choked up" by it. Somehow, the part when the cooks start clapping really gets me. Even today when I watch it, I always think about sitting in my home office room, in Brazil, watching it for the first time.