You Horny Bloggers, You!

It's official, my blog is a hotspot for the pervs! It probably doesn't help that I use the words "Horny" and "Suck" in many of my blog posts, but what can you do? A while back I posted about my recent discovery that us bloggers can see what keywords people are typing in that lead to our blogs. I will not retype the words, in fear of attracting any more of you fetish-folk, but it's here:

Feeling Frisky?

For the first time since posting this I checked my keyword links again and the pé chupadores (yes, I made that word up....that's the beauty of Portuguese...and yes, I am avoiding using the actual keyword) have BLOWN UP MY STATS PAGE! There are all kinds of freaky keyword searches...like, things I've never even thought of doing to feet pés.

So, I guess I'll just have to accept it. I've found my niche and it's writing posts for pé pervs. I guess it could be worse.

My Bilingual Boo

I've been dating my boyfriend for a little over a year and a half, and he hasn't yet been to the US to meet all of my friends and family. My mom and sister came to Brazil and met him, as well as my best friend, but other than that, he's relatively unknown to all that are close to me (aside from the random skype "hellos").

One of the most common questions that people ask me when they find out that I have a Brazilian boyfriend is what language we speak when we are together. (That and "Can you do an impression of his accent?") I never really know how to answer the question because I never pay attention to the language we are speaking.

When we first started dating, he always had to bug me to speak Portuguese. I was living with all Americans and it was difficult for me to make my brain switch into Portuguese mode...you know, when you sort of just spout something out like "fala aí mermão"...and have no idea where you learned it or what it means, but you know it makes sense in context.

However, now that we are both comfortable with each other's languages (more or less) our conversations are all over the place. He will say something in English and I will respond in English with a couple Portuguese words mixed in and he will respond in Portuguese...blah blah blah back and forth with neither of us noticing how weird it must sound to anyone listening in. (I mean, half the time my parents think I'm speaking French when I speak Portuguese...damn Carioca accent!)

I guess what I'm trying to say is that it's exciting. All those years of Portuguese classes, and homework and presentations and tests...and all I had to do was get a boyfriend. I should of known that's where I would find the motivation!

P.S. I have told myself that I am going to write more often (I sort of fell off the bandwagon this month), but I am going to be in Santa Cruz (the one in California, not in Brazil) this weekend to visit a friend (my gatinha's other mommy) and baby gatinha!!!! Yay!

Shout Out!

I would like to formally thank whoever decided to play “Get Low” on a loop for four hours in my office today. You made me realize that Yes, it could be worse.

And although I am grateful that you have finally acknowledged that I am the translator, I do not want to take part in your debate about what “sweat drip down my balls” means…

A shout out Haiku about my life’s achievements:

Nearly bilingual,
With a linguistics degree,
Translate “sweaty balls”

The Monolingual Translator?

I work part time at a travel and tourism company here in Rio as the in-house translator. Well, technically that is what I am supposed to do, but nobody there thinks they need a translator, soooo I get paid to drink coffee and doodle.

You see, my coworkers (read: patricinhas) think that 1 summer in Miama studying English trumps my 22 years and a bachelors degree in Linguistics. Totally makes sense right? No! And the strange thing is, it's not just my coworkers. It's my boss too.

Granted, all bosses have superiorty complexes because they are, well, superior to their employees. But, to tell your translator her translation is wrong because it doesn't sound right in Portuguese....how does that make any sense?

I realize that "bancos do rio" doesn't make sense, and it should be "margin do rio"...but that does not mean that "banks of the river" has to be "margins of the river" in English. You see, they are two different languages.

At the end of the day, I don't care if her site looks unprofessional because she wants to use her craptastic English. I mean, who needs an in-house translator when your employees provide your site with glorious gems like these:

-"Cum drink a yum-yum in the hotel's slave quarters"

-"The church is filled with little negro angels"

-"The STD room has a contagious energy"

Yes, keep insisting your English is better than mine because those descriptions are F.A.B.U.L.O.U.S!!!

And, to the B$%*& who was under the impression that the translator (me) wouldn't understand portuguese, and asked a coworker right in front of me if I was a lesbian: No, i'm not, but if I were, you wouldn't make the cut!

Say Whaaaaat?!

I love idioms! I think nothing says more about a culture than the Idioms people use. I was once called out in front of my entire class at PUC (a class called “Estudos da Cultura de Português como segunda língua) for an email that I wrote my professor where I translated an idiom. It was an idiom so ingrained in American culture and our conception of time, that I didn’t even realize it was an idiom.

Thank you for your time.

To my teacher, it was absolutely absurd that I would thank her for something like “time”. To me, it was polite. She went on a huge rant about how Americans think time is something to be owned, have, give, waste, use wisely, borrow, need…etc.

Once I started realizing that idioms are so demonstrative of people’s cultures, I reaaaaallly started to understand why I love Brazil. Português has idioms for many of the same concepts as English, but they manage to put a naughty spin on it:

Favorite Idiom #1:

Don’t count your chickens before they hatch = não conta com o ovo no cú da galinha

Rough Translation: Don’t count on an egg that's still in the chicken’s asshole.

Favorite Idiom #2:

He was left with nothing but the shirt on his back = ele foi deixado com uma mão na frente e outra atrás.

Rough Translation: He was left with one hand over his man parts, the other over his bum-bum = NAKED!

Favorite Idiom #3:

Ele não fode nem sai de cima = He doesn't fuck and doesn't move away either.

I have no idea what the equivalent in English would be. Basically, someone who can't make a decision. He doesn't use the resources he has but doesn't free them up for others to use. Do we have an idiom for this?

Favorite Idiom #4:

Quem tem cú, tem medo. = He who has an asshole, has fear.

Again, I don't know if we have an idiom for this one. I'm assuming this means something like "everybody is afraid at one time or another"...

Anyways, Brazilians do seem to have an obsession with all things cú related...and it has quickly become my favorite naughty word in Portuguese!

Say Whaaaaat?!

Being a linguist (I feel totally pretentious every time I say that) I am constantly realizing weird little things about language that I and only I (well, maybe Danielle too, I hope) find interesting. In hopes that others might share my interest, I’ve created this little subsection of my blog: “Say Whaaaaat?!” for all my linguistic inquiries.

I’ll start with the Brazilian word-intial “R”. Oh Brazilian “R”, how you have provided me with hours of entertainment at my Namo’s expense. I do not know how many times I have heard Brazilians refer to “rats” as “hats” and “rap” as “happy” (gotta love that strong accent on the word-final stops). “Hippy-hoppie”, “picky-nicky”, “flippy-floppy” (okay I made up that last one).

In attempting to drill the correct pronunciation of the American word-initial “R” into my Namo’s head, I seem to have gone over board. Now, words that start will “H” are being pronounced with “R”s. Like some sort of crazy overcompensation. So now not only do I have to decipher rat vs. hat, and rap vs. happy, but roneymoon vs. honeymoon and rouses vs. houses.

Don’t get me wrong, I’m not meaning to bash on Brazilians. Learning a new language is hard and it is kicking my ass as well. I can’t even tell you how many times I have flubbed up the infamous pão vs. pau. And I have decided to just pretend ver & vir are the same verb because I don’t want to (read: can’t) figure out the difference in conjugations.

I came here with the intention of being a teacher, but other opportunities arose and I put teaching on the back burner. I know a lot of you are teachers, do your students do this? Pronounce words starting with "R" with an "H" sound and vice versa?