Luis, Monica, Thais, Raphael
Autor: Letras | Publicado: 2011-11-24T14:31:00-08:00

Good evening, my name is Luiz and these are my classmates. We’re here today to make an interview with a foreigner who is currently studying and living here in Brazil. First of all we thank you for your time and the chance to interact with.
So, lets begin!
Can you tell us about the main reasons behind you coming to Brazil? Please tell us some of your motivations.
Well, one side of my family is all Portuguese, so I thought about taking Portuguese classes at my school. When I took the classes, one year ago, it was very easy, felt similar to Spanish. My professor told me about Brazil and the exchange program down here. I took another semester of Portuguese, and still needed two more in order to come. I like here a lot, I wanted to know the culture.
Did you had any difficulties with the local culture and customs?
Well, culture shock hit me right when I arrived. It was weird because in my neighborhood there is like, these iron fences. I arrived at night so, it was scary, and I was getting homesick right away. It was bit weird. I even lost some weight here, because Brazilians have a big lunch and a light dinner, and in America we have a big lunch AND a big dinner, so that’s way people thing we’re a fat country. I’m still getting used to.. well, in America, you have to be on time for everything, 5 or 10 minutes earlier into class, classes here don’t start like 10 or 15 minutes after time. So, I’m still getting used to this “lazy” thing. But I do like here a lot.
I’m just curious, because Brazil has two big cities which are São Paulo and Rio. Why did you choose Belo Horizonte?
Actually I didn’t get to choose. Like I said earlier, my professor went here, my Portuguese professor went here it was fifteen years ago or something. He set up the program between my school and UFMG. So I didn’t really got the chance to choose Brazil or anywhere else. And not to be conservative, but Brazil was the one of the cheaper places to come to. If I wanted to study abroad: England or Italy is more expensive and a lot of more students were applying and you have to compete with all these within fifteenth or tenth position to go and I don’t have that high GPA and I heard about Brazil and as I was taking Portuguese and I really want from my school to come here in past five years. There were a lot of UFMG students to go to my school, but there weren’t a lot of student to come here.
Ok and my last question: When you go back to US what you will say about Brazil? What the most interesting thing that happened to you here?
It’s hard to say.
Tell us about something you found interesting or weird, anything.
You better know the language, because on my first day here I got lost and I didn’t go to my class. I forgot to get off on the right bus stop and in America usually the buses come around in a circle. Well, I didn’t get off on the right bus stop and I ended up in Santa Mônica and they told I’d to get off of the bus and walk, so a walked from Santa Mônica to Santa Amélia and it was really hot and I didn’t have a good sense of my Portuguese, so I was too shy to go and ask someone: “Onde está Santa Amélia?” and I finally got the courage after like one hour and half of walking aimlessly nowhere. So I asked someone in a gas station and he told me which direction to and I live close to the airport and the planes actually fly over my apartment, so I thought: “Ok, I’m in the right position”.
That’s a good signal. Ok, then.