Menino Maluquinho – Wacky boy
Ziraldo’s “Menino Maluquinho” is a famous Brazilian cartoon. He is a little frolicker boy who has an indescribable imagination and a pan over his head. He likes wearing his father’s blue jacket, playing soccer with his friends and going to grandma’s home longing to eat a lot of cake and goodies. It marked my childhood as well as every child mind in
Ziraldo was an active political journalist, though writing story for children also. He is one of the founders of a political resistance journal during the Military Dictatorship from 1964 to 1984 called “O Pasquim”.
In
One year later he won the International Oscar of Humor in the 32nd International Exposition of Caricatures in
posted by Leonardo
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Die Temperatur
I once asked to a German friend how was the weather where he lives. He told me it was getting warmer, about 20° degrees. I said “Wow! Getting warmer?! Here it’s getting colder, it’s about 20° degrees!”.
Rio is not the hottest city of
That’s why cariocas (people who was born in
So, if you live in a cold country, when you’re sweating I’m freezing.
Marcadores: Culture
posted by Leonardo
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Vira e mexe
'Vira e mexe' is a Brazilian expression which is used referring to something we often do. 'Vira e mexe' I listen to classic music, or 'vira e mexe' I must solve some problem at work. But the funny thing is: it doesn’t make any sense in English. I think it doesn’t make any sense in any language. Literally translated it means 'turn and mix'. For example, turn and mix I cook pasta. Maybe 'turn and change', 'turn and shake' or 'twist and shout' (ok, not this last one).
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Circus
“Teatro Mágico” (Magic Theatre) is one of my favourite Brazilian bands. They mix theatre, poetry, circus art and contemporary music in a wonderful way.
Listen to Teatro Mágico’s “Separô” song.
Access Teatro Mágico’s website.
I was talking with a friend and I found out that circus has a bad meaning in some European countries, often associated with animal abuse. We have a different circus in
There are another troupes like Intrépida Trupe (Intrepid Troup – not a difficult translation) and so many others.
I think this is a good example of a similar word, with the same meaning, referring to the same thing, but with a different culture.
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Brothers and cousins
Have you ever thought about similarities between languages? It is a funny topic. Many times when I talk with someone who has a different mother language from mine I’m took by surprise and suddenly find some identical or quite similar word.
Have you ever heard about Language Family? Language Family is a kind of genealogy of a language. My language, Portuguese, comes from the French/Iberian group in the Indo-European family.
As you can see in this map, Portuguese has the same origin, or proto-language, as French and Spanish and such languages are pretty close to Italian as well. If you go further I your investigation, you will realize that English, German and Dutch are “cousins”. And Russian, Polish, Czech are relatives somehow. We say “e-mail” – from English, “toilette” – from French, “alcohol” from Arabic and many other words with Latin or Greek origin. Beside this fact, this phenomenon called globalization (can I say phenomenon?) makes our languages even closer. Gazeta, piano, global, orthography, hippopotomonstrosesquippedaliophobia (fear of long words, though the irony), are common words in many languages.
But I wonder there is something beyond language families and globalization. How Chinese people have been saying “mama” and “papa” since ages ago at the same time we have been saying it here, on the other side of the world? Here is a reasonable question and an impossible answer.
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Mental Connections
We can have communication problems even if we live in the same country, speak the same language and have the same accent or dialect. This kind of problem come when our minds are not connected. When our bodies send unintelligible encrypted informations. It is like enzymes. If it doesn't fit, it doesn't work. You can speak Portuguese perfectly, but i won't understand one single idea if we don't think together. Or worse, i will misunderstand it.
That is what fascinate me about communication. It doesn't matter if you say olá, hola, helo, hallo, ciao, salut, cześć, hej, shalom, salam alaikum, konnichiwa, ni hao, or whatever. We must try to read each other and try to be connected somehow, otherwise we can't understand one another. It is more than speak, it is communicate.
Marcadores: Culture
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