During this week christians from everywhere are celebrating the long Easter, or as we say in Portuguese, Páscoa or “Semana Santa”. In Brazil in addition to religious celebration and traditions it’s also means free time for vacations or non-religious festivities. The oficial holiday is the Good Friday( Sexta-feira Santa), however is common that companies and schools give days off on Thursday and also on Monday, so events throughout cities start on Thursday and will last on the weekend.
During these days people usually travel to enjoy this short vacation or go for some cultural events spread around their cities. The meals become different, replacing meat for fishes, a christian tradition during this time, but even non-religious people follow this old Easter tradition. Besides, it is the sweetest time to visit Brazil =P If you are addicted to chocolate, “Semana Santa” will be your paradise. Chocolate Easter eggs filled with more chocolate are easily found in the ceiling of supermarkets and specialized stores. It’s like Santa Clauss bringing you gifts in the end of the year, but instead of Santa a Rabbit brings you chocolates.
Easter Rabbit(Coelhinho da Páscoa) and its chocolate eggs
Chocolates Eggs(Ovos da Páscoa) displayed in a supermarket
This year an example of non-holiday event happening during the Easter weekend is the music festival sensation Lollapalooza in São Paulo. The three-day festival at the SP Jockey Club will feature some of the biggest names in music, including headliners like Pearl Jam, The Killers, and Deadmau5, as well as Brazilian favorites like Criolo and Graforréia Xilarmônica.
However, if you are more traditional person is pretty easy to find Easter celebrations at the churchs, most of them have a full schedule from Thursday to Sunday which include spiritual retreats, Via Crucis, confessions and masses. Furthermore, you can watch beautiful plays about the Passion of Christ(Paixao de Cristo), they are usually cheap if it’s at the theater or for free on the streets. The most famous takes place in Brejo da Madre de Deus city, Pernambuco.
The mos famous play (Paixao de Cristo) performed in Pernambuco.
Passion of Christ performed in a famous avenue in Fortaleza, Ceará. Street teather for all.
Do you have any brazilian friend? So wish them “FELIZ PÁSCOA” (Happy Easter)!
So you are learning Portuguese, you’re going crazy studying grammar, conjugating verbs in all tenses, you’re following all kinds of Facebook pages and blogs which mention Portuguese, but you still can’t understand when someone starts to talk to you.
Are you crazy? Do you have problems to learn? 😛 I don’t think so! But the fact is that you need to be exposed as much as you can to the real way of speaking, real situations, real expressions. How about to learn more while you’re having fun? Watching movies (especially with subtitles) is a good strategy to help you to improve your Portuguese. Today we have for you a list of great Brazilian films to help you to immerse yourself in Brazilian culture, discovering new ways of speaking, learning new expressions and discovering new Brazilian places.
I hope you ENJOY IT!
Central do Brasil (Central Station)
Central Station (Portuguese: Central do Brasil) is a 1998 Brazilian-French drama film set in Brazil. It tells the story of a young boy’s friendship with a jaded middle-aged woman. The film was adapted by Marcos Bernstein and João Emanuel Carneiro from a story by Walter Salles and it was directed by the latter. It features Fernanda Montenegro and Vinícius de Oliveira in the major roles. The film’s title in Portuguese, Central do Brasil, is the name of Rio de Janeiro’s main railway station. The film premiered at the 48th Berlin International Film Festival.
Meu nome nao é Johnny (My name ain’t Johnny)
The film narrates the true story of João Guilherme Estrella, a middle-class man from the State of Rio de Janeiro that would become the head of the drug traffic in the late 1980s and early 1990s.
Estrella was a young boy from an upper-middle-class family of the city of Niterói. Loved by his parents and worshipped by his friends, he lived an intensive life of partying. In the early 1990s, he adventured himself through the world of drugs. Investigated and later imprisoned by the police, his life is exposed by sensationalistic newspapers and magazines. Instead of parties, Estrella has to face the bench of the culprits to tell the story of his adolescenthood.
The true story of João Guilherme Estrella (“Johnny”), a young middle-class bon vivant who became a big-time cocaine dealer in Rio de Janeiro in the early 1990s.
O Cheiro do Ralo
Lourenço is a lonely character who buys used goods from people going through hard times. His profession has made him insensitive to his client’s conditions or personal stories. Lourenço’s lack of emotions makes him deal with the world as a collection of objects to be bought. His main pleasure has become that of conducting perverse power games with his clients. The planned life of Lourenço is interrupted when he falls in love with a waitress’s butt. As with any other object, his main desire is to own it. The movie conducts us through Lourenço’s mind using him as narrator while his lust for power grows. The name of the movie (“The Smell from the Drain”) comes from an insistent bad odour that comes from the restroom of Lourenço’s office. It represents the self-awareness of Lourenço’s condition, which he unsuccessfully keeps trying to hide
Outro Lado da Rua (The Other Side of the Street)
Fernanda Montenegro plays a retired woman who keeps track of everybody in her neighborhood, until she thinks she sees an ex-cop (Raul Cortez) commit murder and so she becomes a police informant.
A Dona da História (The Owner of the Story)
A 50 year-old woman who analyses her past. She pictures herself when she was 20 years old and she re-creates the story of her life through a game of innumerous possibilities… What if she wouldn’t have gone to that ball? What if… instead of meeting the man of her life, with whom she married and had kids, she would have called a girlfriend and they went to the theater? What would be her destiny? (From IMDb.com)
Vinicius (Vinicius)
Documentary on Brazilian poet, playwright, critic, diplomat, composer, singer and lyricist Vinicius de Moraes (1913-1980), internationally famous lyricist of Bossa Nova hits like “Garota de Ipanema” and “Insensatez” and writer of the play which originated the film “Black Orpheus” (1959). Archive images combine with up to date interviews with members of his family, friends, partners (Chico Buarque, Edu Lobo, Carlos Lyra) and also musical numbers with famous Brazilian singers.
Cazuza – O tempo nao pára – Cazuza – Time Doesn’t Stop
Cazuza – O Tempo Não Pára (Cazuza – Time Doesn’t Stop) is a 2004 Brazilian movie about the life of singer Cazuza. The film is directed by Walter Carvalho and Sandra Werneck. It stars Daniel de Oliveira as Cazuza. The film is based on the book by Cazuza’s mother, Lucia Araujo. Cazuza – O Tempo Não Pára won a best actor award from the São Paulo Association of Art Critics Awards.
Focusing on Cazuza’s personal life, the film chronicles his early career, his subsequent success, his drug use and his promiscuous lifestyle. It starts out in the early 1980s in Rio de Janeiro, showing his usual day-to-day life until he joins the band which would become Barão Vermelho. It then shows the band’s rise to fame and its frequent “mutinies” which led him to pursue a solo career. Later, it depicts his struggle against the AIDS virus and his final days.
The movie was one of the most successful of the year in Brazil.
Se eu fosse você (If I Were You)
The publicist Claudio and the housewife and choral teacher Helena have been married for many years, but they do not understand and respect the feelings and view point of the partner. Claudio sees Helena as a shopper and “little teacher of a choral” and Helena sees Claudio as an insensitive and rough man. On the night before the fiftieth anniversary of Claudio, Mars, Earth and Jupiter are aligned and Claudio and Helena argue with each other at home and they speak at the same time “If I were you”. On the next morning, when they wake-up, they have switched bodies and they have to face the difficulties of the other in the agency, in the school and with their friends and acquaintances.
( Reviews from: http://www.imdb.com/list/vJxBEGOSdIk/ and Wikipedia)
There’s nothing worse than think or feel something and can not express it into words, especially if these words are in other language. So today we are going to help you to express you feelings in Portuguese! 🙂 🙂 🙂
Are you happy? Are you excited? Are you pissed off? So say it out loud in Portuguese! hehe
AI QUE….
Let’s start with these common expression “AI QUE + xxxx”. When we want to say something about what we are looking at, listening to or just feeling that moment, we can use “AI QUE + adjective”
Eg: AI QUE NOJENTO! or AI QUE NOJO! (Something disgusting)
AI QUE SACO! or DROGA! To say that you’re boring or sick of something.
Ai que saco. Nao tem nada legal pra fazer hoje. (Damm it! There´s nothing cool to do today.)
AI QUE RAIVA!! Say it when you are really, really angry.
If you are excited about something or if you think there’s something really good, you can use:
“AI QUE TUDO!”, “AI QUE IRADO!” or “AI QUE MASSA” (just like our blog!)
Eg:
Diego: Carla, eu consegui nossos ingressos pro show do Paul Mccartney!
Carla: Sério?! AI QUE TUDO! Obrigada, Diego!!
If you wanna sound even more natural, you can skip the “AI” and say only “QUE TUDO! QUE IRADO!” 😉
And if you have a friend who really gets you tickets(for free!) to go to your favorite singer/band concert I must to say to you:
CARAMBA! or NOSSA!(Noooooossa!) INCRÍVEL! Look at my face:
Now imagine that someone called you to say that your boyfriend or girlfriend is cheating on you, but you really trust him/her. Could you believe that? So you start to think about it and ask yourself:
SERÁ POSSÍVEL? (Is it possible?)
Será possível? Or maybe the last picture(CARAMBA!) is more appropriate…hehe
If you are in doubt about something, use “SERÁ POSSÍVEL?” or “SERÁ?” to demonstrate that you’re not totally sure, but you’re thinking about it. 😉
I really hope nobody here will be cheated 😉 but if it happens, you will feel like: CHATEADA.
Actually, this expression to show you’re pissed off about something. It’s an “internet hit” among brazilians specially after a famous soap-opera called AVENIDA BRASIL which was on TV last year. They made a meme of its protagonist using #xatiada (“X” instead of CH is not gramatically correct to write this word) and it is still famous on internet.
Eg. Sininhos está chateada.
#xatiada
Now let’s see some expressions using the verb “ESTAR” to show how are you feeling (click to conjugate the verb) .
ESTAR COM SONO
Eg: Eu estou com sono. (I’m sleepy)
Ele está com sono.
ESTAR APAIXONADO/APAIXONADA (to be in love)
Eg: Eu estou apaixonado por você. (I’m in love with you)
ESTAR CANSADO/CANSADA (To be tired)
Eg: Estou cansada de limpar tudo sozinha. (I’m tired of cleaning everything alone.)
Ela está cansada.
And I really hope you’re feeling GREAT(ótimo/ótima) after reading this post 😉
Today in Brazil is the National Day of Poetry and we choose Carlos Drummond the Andrade (1902-1987) to be our “special guest” to celebrate this date. 🙂
Drummond’s statue – Rio de Janeiro, Brazil
Drummond was born in Itabira, a tinny village in Minas Gerais and he was probably the most influential Brazilian poet of the 20th century. Son of farmers of Portuguese ancestry, Drummond studied in the city of Belo Horizonte and later with the Jesuits at the College de Anchieta, Nova Friburgo in Rio de Janeiro, from where he was expelled for “mental insubordination.” 😛 Back in Belo Horizonte, he began his career as a writer with the Diary of Minas, whose readers included followers of the modernist movement in the State of Minas Gerais.
His popularity has been credited because a great part of his poetry (especially after lyrical maturity) has acquired an impressive capacity for the translation of ideas, transforming his particular troubles into a tool for universal communication. Though his earliest poems are formal and satirical, Drummond quickly adopted the new forms of Brazilian modernism that were evolving in the 1920s, incited by the work of Mário de Andrade (to whom he was not related).
Drummond was known as a creator of images, his works have everyday life and the world as themes, with verses that focus on the individual, homeland, family, friends, and social issues, as well as questions about existence, and about his own poetry.
He wrote hundreds of poems, but also essays and short stories, besides more than 30 books, including those for children. Several of his works were translated into many languages such as English, Spanish, Italian, French, German, Swedish and others.
He translated to Portuguese the works of several authors like Balzac (Les Paysans, 1845; The Peasants), Choderlos de Laclos (Les Liaisons dangereuses, 1782), Marcel Proust (Le Fugitive, 1925 , García Lorca ( Doña Rosita, the soltera o el lenguaje de las Flores, 1935) Francois Mauriac (Thérèse Desqueyroux, 1927) and Molière (Les Fourberies de Scapin, 1677).
But nothing better than read some of his poems to understand the soul of his poetry, the beauty of Brazilian literature. Enjoy them here, in Portuguese and English versions 😉 HAPPY POETRY’S DAY!
POEMS
Non-reasons of love
I love you because I love you
You don’t have to be a lover
and not always know how to be one.
I love you because I love you
Love is a status of grace
and it is not payable
Love is given freely
it is sowed in the wind
in the waterfall, in the eclipse
Love runs from dictionaries
and several regulations.
I love you because I don’t love
Enough or too much me
Because love is not swapped
nor conjugated nor beloved.
Because love is love for nothing,
happy and strong in itself.
Love is Death’s cousin,
and of the death, winner
Even if they kill it (and they kill)
in every moment of love.
Eu te amo porque te amo.
Não precisas ser amante,
E nem sempre sabes sê-lo.
Eu te amo porque te amo.
Amor é estado de graça
E com amor não se paga.
Amor é dado de graça
É semeado no vento,
Na cachoeira, no eclipse.
Amor foge a dicionários
E a regulamentos vários.
Eu te amo porque não amo
Bastante ou demais a mim.
Porque amor não se troca,
Não se conjuga nem se ama.
Porque amor é amor a nada,
Feliz e forte em si mesmo.
Amor é primo da morte,
E da morte vencedor,
Por mais que o matem (e matam)
A cada instante de amor.
Carlos Drummond de AndradeComo acordar sem sofrimento?
Recomeçar sem horror?
O sono transportou-me
àquele reino onde não existe vida
e eu quedo inerte sem paixão.
Como repetir, dia seguinte após dia seguinte,
a fábula inconclusa,
suportar a semelhança das coisas ásperas
de amanhã com as coisas ásperas de hoje?
Como proteger-me das feridas
que rasga em mim o acontecimento,
qualquer acontecimento
que lembra a Terra e sua púrpura
demente?
E mais aquela ferida que me inflijo
a cada hora, algoz
do inocente que não sou?
E agora, José?
A festa acabou,
a luz apagou,
o povo sumiu,
a noite esfriou,
e agora, José?
e agora, você?
você que é sem nome,
que zomba dos outros,
você que faz versos,
que ama, protesta?
e agora, José?
Está sem mulher,
está sem discurso,
está sem carinho,
já não pode beber,
já não pode fumar,
cuspir já não pode,
a noite esfriou,
o dia não veio,
o bonde não veio,
o riso não veio,
não veio a utopia
e tudo acabou
e tudo fugiu
e tudo mofou,
e agora, José?
E agora, José?
Sua doce palavra,
seu instante de febre,
sua gula e jejum,
sua biblioteca,
sua lavra de ouro,
seu terno de vidro,
sua incoerência,
seu ódio – e agora?
Com a chave na mão
quer abrir a porta,
não existe porta;
quer morrer no mar,
mas o mar secou;
quer ir para Minas,
Minas não há mais.
José, e agora?
Se você gritasse,
se você gemesse,
se você tocasse
a valsa vienense,
se você dormisse,
se você cansasse,
se você morresse…
Mas você não morre,
você é duro, José!
Sozinho no escuro
qual bicho-do-mato,
sem teogonia,
sem parede nua
para se encostar,
sem cavalo preto
que fuja a galope,
você marcha, José!
José, para onde?
I’m sure you are thinking: “Are they not the same?” 🙂 and I tell you they aren’t. Let’s see why…Grammatically BEM and MAL are adverbs, just like “WELL” and “BADLY/HARDLY”.
Eg: Eu não tava realmente me sentindo muito bem (I wasn’t feeling very well, actually.)
Sometimes you also can use BEM and MAL like nouns (in Portuguse you can do it by putting an article before these words):
Eg: Obem vence omal. (The good overcomes evil)
If good and evil exist, you can choose from.
Eg: Esta cirurgia plástica foi mal feita. (This plastic surgery was poorly done)
Muito mal feita..hehe
How about BOM and MAU? They’re easier to understand because grammatically they just can be adjectives, like “Good” and “bad”. Check these examples:
Eg: Este sorvete é muito bom. (This icecream is really good.)
Existem bons pastores e maus pastores . (There are good shepherds and bad shepherds.)
Hoje eu estou de mau humor. (Today I’m in a bad mood.)
Now let’s think about some common greetings in Portuguese: “Tudo bem?” and “Tudo bom?”. They both mean “how are you?”. So, in this case it doesn’t matter if they are adverbs or adjectives :D, if I ask you “tudo bem?” or “Tudo bom?”you just answer me: “tudo bem e você?” or “tudo bom” (yes! it’s possible! but only in this situation) or to sound even more natural you can say “Tudo. E você?” 😉
And if even after those explanation you still have doubts, so here is a good hint to help you:
BEM is always the opposite of MAL and BOM is the opposite of MAU. Do not forget! 😉
Did you like this post? So give us a like and share it with your friends! Leave your comment and let’s learn more together in the next post!
Good question! 🙂 A lot of students ask me about it and the answer is simple: THERE IS a difference. But the fact is that almost everybody don’t pay too much attention to it in everyday spoken. These two words are demonstrative pronouns in Portuguese, but there are also ISSO/ISTO and AQUELE/AQUELA
Let’s understand it better checking this chart about PRONOMES DEMONSTRATIVOS (Demonstrative Pronouns):
Notice that the pronouns agree in genre and number with the noun. And basically the difference is about the space and time. If something is close you should use: ESTE/ESTA (singular) or ESTES/ESTAS(plural). Look the pictures bellow:
Esta bola
We used “ESTA” because bola is feminine and the person is holding it, it’s close.
Essa bola
Here, the person is not holding the ball anymore, the object is not so close and the best option is the demonstrative pronoum “ESSA”.
Now look at this exemple using “AQUELA”:
The ball is not with the guy or close to him, so we use “AQUELA”. If we are talking about masculine so we should use “AQUELE”
Eg: De quem é aquele carro? (Whose is that car?)
If you take a look at the chart again, you can see that there are some neutral pronouns, such as:
ISSO/ISTO/AQUILO
It means they do not vary, they do not have plural, masculin or feminine. But is the same idea: ISSO or ISTO for something close(in space or time) and AQUILO when something is far. PAY ATTENTION – this is very important – ISTO, ISSO and AQUILO are never followed by a noun (person, animal, object). NEVER! 😉
ISSO
AQUILO
But finally…Does it really matter?
Depends…As we said in the begining of this text, people do not worry about it in spoken language. However, if you are learning Portuguese it’s important to know that when you’re writing documents for business or school/college you need to follow the grammar rules and pay attention to these little details. But if you are just talking with your friends in informal situations don’t worry about it.
Is it clear now? 😉
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Português é Massa 
