I remember my first caipirinha. It was the summer after my freshman year of college, and my family had just arrived in Brazil. Like any thirsty college kid who had a few, not so graceful encounters with alcohol, I wanted to use the system to my advantage. As we were sitting in my aunt’s living room, I proclaimed to my family, “Hey! I’m 18; I can drink legally here!” With a grimace, my dad reluctantly conceded.
Later that night, I took my first sip of the drink, made from a blend of limes, sugar and cachaça, Brazilian liquor made from sugarcane juice. It felt like a rite of passage and another insight into the world I had orbited around my entire life.
My parents moved from Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, to Golden, Colorado with my 4-year-old brother three years before I was born. I grew up in the states isolated from my extended family and the culture of my parents. Throughout my life, I ventured with my family to Rio a handful of times, accumulating a bundle of random snippets in my mind. My first actual memory was a blip from early childhood, walking to the beach barefoot and remembering how the pavement was burning my feet.
I remember stepping off the plane into the thick, sticky air; pulling up to my grandma’s building and the long, dimly lit hallway leading to her heavy brown door. I remember the sweet smell of my aunt’s soap, banana milkshakes, sandy feet, chaotic bus rides, black and white stone sidewalks and the squeaky sounds of the cuíca during a samba performance.
But mostly I remember bites of Brazil at home in Colorado. Home movies from my toddlerhood showed me perfectly babbling in Portuguese about my brinquedos or my favorite Disney princess Branca de Neve. Portuguese was my first language, but English became my native tongue. When I started school, not wanting to confuse me, my parents didn’t push Portuguese on me, and I rebelliously resisted when they would. With little thought, I discarded the language like a toy that no longer interested me.
Portuguese was still spoken in the house, through the stereo, on the TV and at the parties my parents threw. (Brazilians will always find other Brazilians.) My mom would make feijoada, a black bean stew with pork and beef, and my dad would make caipirinhas. My dad would laugh with friends as he took the wooden pestle and smashed, stirred and ground, grabbing limes from the dozen we bought before each party. I never completely understood what he was doing, just that I wouldn’t be partaking.
For school, I did reports on Brazil, thinking I’d have a leg up on the information but realizing I knew nothing about the country. This point was proven once when my dad was editing an elementary school report and gently reminded me that while some women wore fio dental (dental floss, a nickname for a thong bikini) to the beach, it wasn’t a national uniform.
I went to school packed with a last name that Americans didn’t know what to do with: Moutinho. Usually their first guess was, “Mountain-Ho?” To simplify, I Americanized it to “Mo-teen-ho,” or as one of my classmates suggested, “I always remember it as “Moreteen-hoes.” A lovely nickname for a teenager.
I was always proud of my heritage, and I enjoyed the chance to brag any time I could. But it was a superficial pride, appropriating a culture that wasn’t my own. It made me exotic in the time of adolescence when everyone is desperate to be interesting. I reveled telling my friends I was the most Latin of the group because my parents were from Brazil. (Of course, at the time I wasn’t accounting for the fact that my great grandparents migrated from Portugal.)
The cultural divergence intensified when I grew no affinity for sports, specifically futebol. I’d stay in my room while my parents and brother violently screamed at Brazilian soccer refs on television, and I’d sit quietly at meals as they’d discuss the new team coach or league rankings.
That silence also took hold at Portuguese-speaking tables, where my lack of language skills became more of a nuisance. My brain knew it, but my tongue didn’t. Any time people found out my parents were from Brazil, the obligatory question would come followed by my answer: “No, I don’t speak Portuguese, but I understand it!”
It seemed an odd dynamic for people. But for me it was normal that my mother would speak to me in Portuguese and I’d answer in English. (My dad gave up speaking Portuguese with me when I was a kid, and I was grateful for that.) It was hard to start when my skill level was so stunted, like a chef with a book of recipes and no ingredients.
It also didn’t help to have an older, fluent brother who liked to tease me. One day feeling prideful, I shut him down with, “Eu fala bem!” (The equivalent to “I talks good!”) This did not help my case.
When friends and family came to visit, I’d silently sit at the table as everyone debated Brazilian politics or complained about the problems of their country. I nodded or shook my head when necessary, laughed at their jokes and turned red when asked a question that I had to stutter through.
While my parents and brother made yearly trips to Brazil, I only went a few times throughout my adoles cence. But during senior year of college, wanderlust took hold. I wanted to teach English and explore the world. I opted out of Asia and decided to go to my family’s homeland instead.
I navigated Rio feeling like a tourist dressed in a native’s costume. Despite my previous visitits, I had no real knowledge of its soul. And what I found was a culture that welcomed me with open arms.
Everything I had grown up with in small portions was available in endless supply. I could find the Brazilian snacks I loved at any grocery store, not to mention fresh mangoes and passion fruit. The dishes my mom made on special occasions were served at every restaurant. Live samba music was sprinkled throughout clubs, bars and even on the streets. I was constantly surrounded by warm, spirited people with a thirst for happiness and pleasure. Plus, you could get a caipirinha just about anywhere.
I got to know the city of my roots, experiencing the culture first hand instead of distilled through someone else. And Rio is a city that’s easy to fall in love with, hence its nickname Cidade Maravilhosa (Marvelous City).
Its natural beauty is captivating, and I started to understand why people enjoyed being outside, a place I had shunned back in Colorado. I made my home on the beaches of Copacabana and Ipanema, where I spent most of my time in Rio, dissolving into the white sand and blue waves. My friends and I sat on lounge chairs ordering caipirinhas from muscled men in Speedos. Ultimately, we became savvy enough to barter down to local pricing, “R$20 for a caipirinha? Pode ser R$10?”
With no parents to hide behind, my Portuguese had to come out and play again. Each day the words rolled easier off my tongue. And if there weren’t any challenging words, then I could even be mistaken for a native speaker. My language skills actually became useful to friends who didn’t speak Portuguese. It especially came in handy when I helped a friend avoid deportation by calming down a screaming match between him and the tourist police by translating for both sides.
I developed a personality in the language, and an appreciation for its playful beauty. I was actually able to speak my mind, instead of sheepishly answering with monosyllabic words. And I finally wasn’t the loudest person in the room; I was in a room full of Brazilians whose natural volume is loud and louder.
Eventually, I bought my own wooden mortar and pestle and made my own caipirinhas. (Take a lime and cut off four one-eighth slices of the peel. Then quarter the lime, add in a couple spoonfuls of sugar and grind the ingredients together before generously pouring in some cachaça, then serve over crushed ice.)
Even the soccer came with time… and a lot of explaining. (I’m fairly sure I can possibly tell when something is maybe offsides.) I actually cared if our team won or lost. I went to games in the stadium surrounded by thousands of screaming fans, and I got heart palpitations if our team played badly.
Of course, you can put the American girl in Brazil, but you can’t take America out of the girl. (Or as a student said: the hardware’s Brazilian, but the software is American.) Frustration boiled in me with the inefficiencies of this still-developing country, and I understood some reasons my parents hadn’t moved back to Brazil. My list included: Late buses, nonexistent customer service, unnecessary bureaucracy, broken infrastructure, decaying environment, stupid fat pigeons and a lack of peanut butter.
But Brazilians are the first to tell you everything wrong with their country. Yet overshadowing that list of grievances is the never-yielding pride coursing through every Brazilian. It’s a feeling I observed my whole life but didn’t truly understand until I spent a year gathering experiences unfiltered through the lens of family members or school reports. I carved out a piece of my heritage and claimed it as my own.
When I was finally ready to return to America, I had to say goodbye to the place I loved. Dressed for the airport I donned a black shirt, heavy jeans, tennis shoes and a bulging backpack, sweating in the blazing, beach sun. I sat on the Copacabana sand and quietly sobbed over the place I’d grown to adore. (Everyone else on the beach probably thought I was a slightly deranged tourist.)
Then I walked up the street to Ipanema to a kiosk and ordered a final caipirinha. I toasted to this marvelous city that I finally felt connected to.
“Thank you. Until next time.”
“Obrigada. Até a próxima.”
