Is it winter yet?

It's been chilly here (the average Brazilian would say very cold). Lows have been in the upper 40s (Fahrenheit, of course). There's no heating, so all we can do is put socks on and wear one or more additional layers of clothes, depending on your endurance. I wish we could have heating, but an insulated home is a luxury very, very few can afford in Brazil, even though the average house is significantly smaller than in the U.S. But let us not forget that my energy bill is higher than what I used to pay in the U.S., where I could sit comfortably at home wearing shorts whether it was freezing cold or unbearably hot outside. Now here's an interesting point. Winters may be harsher in the U.S., but you get to enjoy them. In Brazil, even though winters are comparably mild, they are still harsh enough to be a nuisance, and the experience is upsetting rather than enjoyable.

The Oscars

I don't think I ever mentioned this, but I really enjoy watching the Academy Awards. Some may say Hollywood has built a solid track record of putting out garbage year after year, which I agree with. Others may say if this or that movie takes home more Oscars will not really change your life, but I'm not in it for a life-changing experience. I just dig watching the genuine happiness of people reaching what could arguably be the pinnacle of their careers through peer recognition (peer recognition rocks, baby!). OK you may not get voted just because of sheer talent, but you can't deny there's some recognition there. Anyway, that's I go for. C'mon, we see so much violence, so much crap on the tube all the time, why not a dose of genuine happiness?

Movies have become a luxury for me, as finding a sitter in my neck of the woods here is next to impossible. Therefore, whenever we have family around, we just run to a theater. I haven't seen many of the movies nominated for best picture. I've seen The Social Network, The Kids Are All right, and True Grit. The latter is very good, but I found the former two utterly boring. I have to say I slept through significant chunks of all three of them. I can't help it. Movie theaters are just the perfect place for a little nap. Ten, fifteen minutes after working through my popcorn and coke, I just doze off. Actually I did just that the very first time I went to the movies with my wife. That was a huge red flag, but she failed to notice it.

And to wrap this up, I don't have much of a fashion sense, but I keep asking me why Nicole Kidman, with her fair hair and skin, year after year insists on wearing a light-colored dress to the Oscars. Can anyone tell her that's a no-no? By the way, if it were up to my, Amy Adams would take home an Oscar every year.

Never mind that staredown

Never mind that staredown. That was just part of the show, a final push to ramp up pay-per-view sales. Who will emerge victorious tonight? Silva or Belfort? Well, even though he is older and wiser, I think we will see the old Vitor rushing towards Anderson and raining punches down on him at lightning speed. He knocks him out and sends out a huge "The Phenom is back" message. But, and there's always a but, if the champ is able to weather that initial storm, he may have the upper hand, especially if the fight goes the distance. He showed against Sonnen that he has enough in his tank to survive 5 rounds and retain his belt. Either way it's going to be a tremendous fight. As for Franklin x Griffin, I don't think Forrest stands a chance. If I were him, I'd just call in sick.

A glimpse of the Brazilian translation market

I just came across the website of a translation agency based in São Paulo. Everything looks nice until you start poking around and reading. The list of services they provide includes “version”, a special kind of service you would be hard-pressed to find anywhere else but in Brazil. In the company’s own words, this “consists in passing a text written in Portuguese to another language.” Their São Paulo address is translated into English (So-and-so Avenue...), and they have a "center of attention" (a call center, I suppose). If that is the best English they can come up with for their website, you can only imagine what goes into the translations they produce.

It’s all about bias

One of the top stories on CNN's website today is “Ex-guerrilla vies for Brazil's presidency”. The link takes you to a story entitled “Former Marxist guerrilla vying to be Brazil's first female president.” It leaves me wondering what kind of feelings that provokes north of the Rio Grande. Right-wing Americans might even think, "Oh! My God, Brazil is turning into Venezuela. We have to do something about it!" Easy, that’s not as bad as it looks. Ms. Rousseff and her Workers’ Party certainly have a red, socialist tinge, to put it mildly, but times have changed. More importantly, I strongly believe there are enough checks and balances in place to keep them from turning the country into anything that could be cause for concern. The other possibility is that CNN just went for the attention grabber. Something in the vein of “Lula-groomed candidate poised to take victory in Brazil” would not have produced the same effect as the title they chose, as many navel-gazing Americans would likely go, "Who is Lula anyway? Who cares?" Nope, I still think it's more about bias than anything else.

Back in the saddle

After eight years as a staff translator at the IMF, my employment relationship with the Fund finally came to an end yesterday. This means I am now free to take any job or work that comes my way. I have set up shop in the São Paulo area and, for the time being, will be pursuing a freelance translator career.

Although I started out as a freelancer, working in-house for eight years makes it fell like I’m starting afresh on a completely new job. It’s not quite like that, but it’s still an exciting challenge.

So, JV is now open for business. Bring it on!

x - x - x

Após oito anos trabalhando como tradutor concursado no FMI, meu vínculo empregatício com o Fundo foi finalmente encerrado ontem. Isso significa que agora estou livre para aceitar o trabalho ou emprego que bem entender. Por ora, vou trabalhar como tradutor freelance na região de São Paulo.

Embora tenha começado como freelance, após trabalhar oito anos fora desse mercado, tenho a sensação de que estou começando num emprego totalmente novo. Claro, não é exatamente por aí, mas ainda assim tem um gostinho de desafio.

Portanto, estou de volta ao mercado e aberto a projetos e parcerias. Vamos em frente.

The kind of stuff that brings tears to your eyes

Para quem não lê inglês, mais tarde traduzo.

I just received an email from Clarissa's former 1st grade teacher in Virginia. She compiled messages to Clarissa from some of her former classmates. That's the kind of stuff that brings tears to your eyes.

"Dear Clarissa,

1C misses you very much! We have some things to tell you:

I hope you are having fun in Brazil and I hope you have a great time (Caroline)

I hope you're having a good time in Brazil and do you still have your fish? (Natalie)

On Earth Day we went outside with our 5th grade buddies and we found a lot of trash and helped the earth. You are still inside my heart and I really miss you and I really would like you to try to book a flight back with your family and come back to this school to visit. I'd like you to stay here forever. I'm sure that everyone would like to see you again. (Kinsley)

I miss you so much! We are on the 4th book of Mrs. Piggle-Wiggle. (Mitchell)

I hope you are having a great time at your new school. (McKenzie)

When we were picking up trash we found a canoe but we didn't throw it out, it would be way too big. (Christopher)

We miss you so much and hope you move back. (Kate)

Clarissa, we miss you a lot. We hope you're having fun with your family and we got a new boy named Taylor in our class. I hope you're having a good time in Brazil and we all loved having you here with us and we were sad you left, but we still remember you in our heart. I love you as a friend. We are very happy that you are having a good time in your new home. I miss you a lot. I really enjoyed having a good time with you but I still see you in my heart. (Brennan)

I hope you like your new home. (Emily)

Is the weather cold or hot in Brazil? I guess it's hot because it's close to the equator. (Taylor)

I really hope you are having a good time in Brazil. (Eli)

Do you have Earth Day in Brazil? (Daniel B)

I hope you're still enjoying your time in Brazil! (Daniel F)"
 
Funny thing is last night Clarissa asked to take a look at the scrapbook that was put together and given to her the day before we left. She went carefully over each page and, this morning, asked to take it to school to show it to her friends there. As far as I am concerned, that's a scary coincidence.
 
I am going to print out her teacher's email and leave it on Clarissa's bed. We are in for an emotional afternoon.

An update

A little something I wrote to post somewhere else...

Just a little update, as I've been too quiet on this front (I'm not a big Facebook fan, I'm afraid). We've been at our new home for almost two weeks now. We're still adapting to life in Brazil, and it's not been easy at times. We do not have an Internet connection yet due to technical problems with Telefonica, the local phone company. This means I cannot set up shop yet, but I've been busy with organizing things for when the container arrives. It's expected to be here next week, so I'll probably spend my birthday (just short of 40) surrounded by boxes (not again!!). Érica went through a selection process at a local college and is now teaching a class there twice a week. It's one semester only, but we see it as an open door. The kids are all right. Clarissa still sorely misses Virginia and her former school and friends, but she's getting used to life here. Rodrigo is taking the longer hours at school (7:30 to 15:00) in his stride and seems to be enjoying himself. All in all, life's been good.

(I originally wrote this one for Facebook, but they wouldn't let me post it because it is too long. See why I'm not a big fan? So I decided to post it here.)

Economical Writing

This is the very first time I post in English. I will try to do this as often as possible, but you will continue seeing mostly Portuguese here. But for sure I will use English from now on to comment on books written in this language.

Economical Writing is a short little book that grabbed my attention the other day at the Fund. The author had economists in mind, but that doesn’t mean people from other fields could not benefit from reading it. To tell you the truth, I was not terribly impressed, as you can find better books in the market (The Elements of Style comes to mind).

If you still want to give it a try, check rules 23 (on word order), 25 (on verbs, active ones), 26 (on avoiding words that bad writers love), and 28 (on being plain).