aletha&brasil: The American Curse

One of the main differences I have noticed from Brasilian culture to American culture, is that in Brasil they never sleep. I swear they don't need more than four hours a night to operate on full speed. They are always happy, even with no sleep, and they are always running on full speed. Now I on the other hand can't function on that little amount of sleep for very long, I am often found taking naps after school and going to bed at a relatively early brasilian time (10:00). When I was at Northfield High School, I would often find myself staying up until 12:00, 1:00 a.m. to work on projects or catch up on reading, or even just to relax and watch a movie. Then I would wake up as close to 6:00 as I could (normally 7:15) and get ready for school. I wake up at 6:00 here for school so it could be assumed that I would be fine, however the culture here is exhausting. I never stop smiling or laughing, and my mind never stops running. We are all over the place here and it gets very tiring. In comparison in the United States when I would stay up late and get up for school it would be low key most of the day. Wake up, go to school, try and pay attention and stay awake during classes (sometimes a test or two), sports or work (these weren't very intense either), go home and procrastinate homework by relaxing and doing nothing, start homework, give up on homework and leave it for 1st period the next day, go to sleep, repeat. Here my day involves school, lunch at home, (I try and steal a nap here), some outing with friends or family, dinner, sometimes another outing, home, sleep. It probably doesn't help that life is always harder when you have to try really hard to understand everything that's going on, and you have to think before you speak (not because you are being polite, but because you can't remember how to say a word or conjugate a verb or both).

The last couple of nights we have been out until late evening and I was doing okay, especially with my naps. Then last night we had an Interact (Rotary for teens) pizza feast, where we spent the last two days preparing the vegetables, making the pizzas, and cleaning and setting up. It was a lot of fun and I enjoyed being able to help out. It turned out to be a huge success! I worked a lot during the days but I didn't have to help to much at the actual event, I just got to enjoy the pizzas. We made a brasilian supreme one (corn, sausage, tomatoes, cheese, olives (whole olive), oregano, onion), a shredded chicken one, a bacon one, a brigadeiro chocolate one, a banana one, and something else I'm not sure about. Now I'm a sausage pizza kind of person and I don't eat very exotic pizzas, but brasilians really know how to make pizza! Every kind I tried was delicious!! Now as awesome as this event was, we prepared from 1-6 (I was only there from 3-6) and then it didn't actually start until 7:30, this would be no problem if brasilians weren't such big visitors. So my mom, dad, and I got there around 7:45 and started eating and after I was done, I went to help everyone else and hang out with the people my age. We started dancing (they attempted to teach me) and then someone went and got a guitar and we had singing and dancing entertainment!! All of the brasilians seem to be born entertainers and amazing with music! They made me sing "I'm Yours" or the first part of it anyways. It was a lot of fun. So the evening continued like this and we cleaned up here and there. Then it turned 12:00 and it being my brother's birthday today he was pig piled, had raw eggs smashed on his head (tradition), and we sang happy birthday. Now about 1:00 we all piled into a couple different cars and moved the festa elsewhere, someone's house. Here there was more singing and guitar playing, more joking around too and I got to meet some pretty cool adults that I can go to with any problems. Now me being exhausted from the move, school, and the new culture, I was going to go home at 1:00, but I was persuaded otherwise. I didn't mind too much besides the fact that when I'm tired it is much more difficult to focus on paying attention. We were supposed to be at this person's house until 5:00 a.m. and I had school at 7:00 a.m., however one of the great ladies I met was leaving and offered me a ride, so my brother and I left with her. We arrived home at 2:00 a.m. to no furious parents, no questions, just a tired mom who opened the door and we all went to bed. My brother went to school this morning to help with the festa da familia we have today (they didn't wake me up, so I didn't go...it wasn't real classes today anyways). I slept in until about 8:00 and then layed in bed trying to go back to sleep, I eventually did and now I'm plenty awake. :)

Some new faces to make yourself familiar with, you'll probably see a lot of them.