J. Beaman - The Magazine

On Thursday night Matias, Carmen and Maíra came over to watch Californication, drink some beers and eat some tasty viddles. After some David Duchovny love, six or seven beers and as many cigarettes we decided to watch the latest Chris Rock special and as we all watched and laughed the girls would constantly shout out commentary.; a peculiar trait in Brazilian people (women). They would laugh and say all kinds of things in Portuguese, some that I understood and some that I didn’t. Maíra, although less vocal than Carmen, continually exclaimed, “Nossa!” which means, “Our!”

“Noooooosssssaaaaa!”

That was a fucking head scratcher. Why would you say that? I was just about to ask when she hit the arm of the couch and shouted, “Nossa Senhora!” and it fucking clicked. “Our Lady!” the Brazilian equivalent of exclaiming, “Jesus Christ!”. I loved it. Now that I know it, I hear it all the time. And there’s something distinctly Brazilian about the tone. It’s my new favorite thing. I ask some people to help me out and show you guys the charm and grace that is Nossa!:

Nossa! from J. Beaman on Vimeo.

I went on a date on Wednesday with the girl from the wedding. I spent the bulk of the day alternating between trying to think of ways I could get out of it and reassuring myself that it’s the right thing to do: good for me, good for my portuguese and good for the universe. I didn’t want to bail because she wasn’t hot. I didn’t want to bail because I didn’t think it would be fun. We had a crazy good time at the wedding. I wanted to bail because I wouldn’t have control. Bad dates in the U.S. are bad and difficult to expurgate yourself from and up there I have a multitude of tools at my disposal. Handy lies. Well timed and placed incoming phone calls from understanding friends. Language. But here? Tenho nada.

But I went. Because I do things. That’s one of the secrets to my quality of life. Do shit, dude. Do things reluctantly and with a churny stomach and a chain-smoking desire but do them. She arrived a half hour late (Ela é Brasilera) and I was three cigarettes and two beers in. She looked amazing. Her hair was wavy (she had straightened it for the party where we met) and wet, draped over her slight shoulders, in a little summer dress. How do you describe a brazilian black (mulata? brown? Minera - a girl from Minas Gerais?) girl without sound offensive or like an douche? I’m going to try and avoid the color cliches (nothing about mocha here) but I’ve never seen women like this. The freckles. Jesus.

We talked awkwardly for a few minutes but then hit a flow (and by flow I mean she talked and I pretended to understand) and then the subject of my parents came up. It always comes up and is never uncomfortable for me and always uncomfortable for everyone else. I usually try to put folks at ease by make a joke or emphasizing my comfort with the conversation. And, I’ll admit, at times is my life I’ve been less than forthcoming with my comfort even managing to wrangle a few tears when dropping it on a well placed second date. But what do I do here? A translation:

“My mother is dead.”

“And your father?”

“It’s complicated.”

“Oh.”

“OK”

“No, you don’t have to tell me.”

“No, It’s ok. My father…hang on.”

I pulled out my dictionary. Murder murder murder murder murder. Got it. Assassinar. Conjugate it. Simple past. Assassinou.

“My father murdered my mother.”

Wide-eyed she grabbed the dictionary from me to make sure she heard right. She did.

“Wow.”

“And he’s in prison.”

She teared up a little bit and gave me kiss on the cheek.

I’m never going to be able to get rid of this girl. Maybe I won’t want to. Right.

Night One: Pasta Night.

No matter what happens to me in BH, a stabbing on the streets of Centro, big romance with a little favela girl, Dengue Fever or if I just go home after a few months to work in restaurants and flirt with waitresses, pasta night will always be what I remember the most fondly. Something started by his father when Matias were young and taken over by Matias in his adult years. It’s exactly as it sounds; people come over, pasta is cooked coupled with talking and drinking and eating and smoking until the wee hours. For me the first pasta night was:

1. My first great night in BH
2. The night I knew I would have friends that were like me
3. The night I knew I would have friends that that I would like
4. The first night I watched the Brazilian sun come up over beer, cigarettes and conversation

However, my vagina has been bleeding lately (my vagina and the truth are not very close) and I spent a bit of Friday night’s pasta party mopey. My whine sounds a little bit like this:

Fuck. All I have are my fucking words. I can’t make myself or my ideas understood in Portuguese. And if I’m speaking English I fell like I’m putting an unpleasant burden on folks (minus Matias, Carmen and Eduardo who speak better English than I do). It’s especially hard when I’m hanging out with that crew because there’s little romance for them in talking with foreigners (they all have lived abroad) and when they’re speaking Portuguese, they’re usually expressing complex ideas that are totally fucking lost on me (in contrast to the Average people who are excited to talking to me just because my accent is cute and they don’t talk to Americans much and who speak in a simpler language, expressing simpler ideas). So, from time to time, when the Portuguese was flying left and right I found myself lost in my own thoughts and wishing I was at Maverick drinking blueberry mimosas and flirting with Sarah.

Thankfully, Matias has little tolerance for my whine.

“I think I’m gonna go home. I’m tired and having a hard time understanding things. I need to study.”

“Shut the fuck up and sit down.”

How do you respond to that? You sit down, take a deep breath and man up. It’s always the right choice. And I had a great time. And we talked until 7 in the morning. And it is, and always will be, my favorite.

Yeah, I shaved the beard and am starting to grow a mustache. And, yes, I’m wearing non-prescription, sweet, Karl Lagerfeld glasses. And, yes, you’re jealous.

Pasta night=costume party. Karl Lagerfeld’s lover.

Yeah, he scares us, too.

Took a trip to São Paulo the other weekend for our friend, Ric’s, birthday party. After a long(ish), comfortable(ish), overnight bus ride and after Eduardo violently yelled at a passing car that almost hit him, subtly reminding me to never, ever anger a cuddly mustachioed bear no matter how cuddly or mustachioed he may seem, we wrangled a cab to our hotel. Our hotel was a stark, slightly soviet, utilitarian tower (exactly what we wanted. Just a bed to sleep in.) in a neighborhood called Jardims (Gardens) with an unfortunate but expected check-in time of noon. For R$4 a piece we stashed our luggage and ventured out for some life in the big city. And on it goes, we went to the big fancy museum. Art. After about a half hour I looked at Matias and asked, “Are you Bored?” “Oh, god. I’m dying.” We let Eduardo know and he was disappointed if not surprised. He’s an art whore and we left him to it.

Matias and I hopped on the Metro and heading to the city center and did some T-shirt shopping in a great little market filled with rock and roll T-shirt shops, tattoo parlors and cheap food. It was a wasty, wandery afternoon comma-ed by a delicious P.F. (a common dish here, Prato Feito). There was some trouble getting our room squared away but it all was warm and fuzzy in the end (it always is). Tereza (Ric’s delightful and charm filled girlfriend and an ancient and super-close friend of Matias) told us about a cafe nearby where we could grab an espresso and wait for them to finish out their friday business.

Oh, fuck. Wait a minute. Back. The. Fuck. Up.

The first São Paulo treat: We were about 200 meters from the hotel, exhausted and a little dirty, walking along the edge of a wide boulevard when Eduardo lets out a girlish shriek, holds his meaty hands daintily up to his mustachioed face, and skirts behind Matias and I. I look ahead, unsure of the shriek-worthy event to see 5 or 6 SP motorcycle cops, guns drawn, pointing just beyond us to our right. It was AWESOME. They had been (apparently) chasing down some guys on motorcycles who had stopped just behind us. I looked back at them, their hands up, vigorously over-compliant. We skittered to the left, out of the line of fire and marveled, momentarily, at the violent spectacle of it all. I’m not much of a gaper and neither are Matias or Eduardo (thankfully) so we continued on with a little adrenaline and some nervous laughter.

The second São Paulo treat: The cafe Tereza sent us to, Santo Grão, was a goddamned joy. Outstanding espresso, great service (Alexandra was incredible) and a few hours of coffee and chat and cigarettes. Sorry, non-smokers, but I would be stoked to smoke a few cigarette inside the Ritual.

I know it’s blurry but nice, eh? Matias and I went there every morning for our entire trip and drank copious amounts of the Yergacheff and Kenya and plenty of the Brazilian coffees.

And for you snobs who know the look of a mocha, yes, this has chocolate in it. We sent it back but it’s the only one that had it’s picture taken.

Ricardo and Tereza showed up around 10pm. Ric marveled at how much Portuguese I’ve learned (the Brazilians are prone to blow smoke up your ass - they call it being nice - I call it bullshit. Thankfully Matias is a no bullshit kind of guy so I at at least have some point of fucking reference for the truth) and they were super excited to see us. After another hour of coffee and cigarettes (Brazilians are never in a hurry for anything) we moved on to our next bit of radical living.

São Paulo treat #3:

Fucking La Tartine. Five hours. Three bottles of wine. Three courses (I had some kind of roasted rabbit stew. Tasty fucking business). Cigarettes. A famous Cellist hit on Tereza and Ric got pissed followed by a delightfully tense moment. Thankfully we were all laughing about it 20 minutes later. At least I think we were. I certainly was. Some SP slut slipped the waiter her number to give to Matias. He has a girlfriend that would make the most hardened bachelor wish they had a girlfriend but, jesus, that kind of think will make any man’s head swell. And Matias is prone to head swelling. I was jealous.

Charming mismatched tables and chairs. Nudie pictures of Bridget Bardot on the walls. The aromatic mix of roasted meat, quiches, cigarettes, Argentinean Malbec and slightly jealous boyfriends. It was a dreamworld of magic and one of the best eating experiences I have ever had. And, this, was hanging in the bathroom.

I really wish that those pics were taken in that actual bathroom. I like the idea of imagining all of those things happening right there.

São Paulo treat #4:

Ricardo’s birthday party. So, yeah, Ric is amazing but his friends are lame. Third world rich is way worse than first world rich. I’ll just leave it at that. But the beer was cold and the Picanha was tasty (if slightly over cooked) and we drank and ate and talked. Some friends of theirs pulled Tereza aside and pointed over at us and asked, “Who’s the band?” As a narcacistic bunch who marvel at our own coolness (ok, maybe just me and Matias) we ate that shit up.

Here’s a few more great pictures of the party.

Ric, Matias, Eduardo and me.

Matias, Tereza and Branca.

Matias and Tereza.

Matias and Pedro.

Pedro and Tereza.

The aforementioned cuddly mustachioed bear. Eduardo.

Me and Pedro.

Wait for the Simba Safari post.  Boy-o.

Steve’s incredibly cute baby, Leo

This is in Mercado Central and those rope-like coils are tobacco of some kind. I’ll write about Mercado Central another time but it is, doubtless, the coolest place in all of BH.

Mercado Central.

Mercado Central.

Cerveja. I love it.

A new friend (even if he is a Paulista), Ricky or Ricardo (I’m sure the spelling on that is dicey….sorry Ricky)

Carmen, another new friend, with beer and cigarettes (old friends).

Matias…”What the fuck is wrong with you? You’re so Average!”

We actually didn’t even go in this bar. We drank at the gas station next door. Yeah, seriously. Walked into the gas station bought some beers, opened them, drank them and smoked copious cigarettes right in the gas station parking lot. There were many others.

Cigarettes, food, new friends.

Dinner party for Hudson’s birthday at him and his wife’s (Maira) amazing place. They are awesome.

Steve and I on a hike behind Retiro das Pedras (where he lives).

Great little waterfalls and pools.

View of Retiro from the hike.

Steve “I’m a badass” Blanton.

Leo and one of his little pals. (Aurturo, I think)

My new little office. It’s my other favorite place in Brazil.

This is a dream come true.  All praise and thanks be to Dudu.