isto é o melhor poste jamais

In the early fifties, Brazilian President Juscelino Kubitschek decided that Rio totally sucked, and ordered the construction of Brasília. It was to be a new city, entirely planned with Modernist thought to propel Brazil through the 20th Century and beyond.
The main urban planner was Lúcio Costa and the chief architect to most of the public buildings was Oscar Niemeyer. Roberto Burle Marx was the landscape designer .

From 1763 to 1960 Rio de Janeiro was the capital of Brazil, and resources tended to be centered on the south east region of Brazil. Brasilia’s geographically central location in the middle of the country made for a more neutral federal capital.


In order to better see the sweeping majesty of the first major city founded entirely on modernist principles, I thought I should go see it for myself. In order to prepare for my upcoming trip, I decided to relearn my high school Spanish in order to fit in with the natives. Imagine my shock, complete utter shock, when my brother informed me that Spanish is in fact not in fact spoken in Brasilia, or the entire country of Brazil for that matter. I took a quick trip up to Powell's to buy myself a Brazillian dictionary to see how closely it resembled Spanish. Once again, I was thwarted.

Get this.

Brazillians don't speak Spanish or Brazillian.

My coworker Sylvia, "Hi Sylvia!*1" is from Peru, and she informed me that they speak what is called "Portugese". Portuga is a country in Europe that is like Spain, but smaller, and it doesn't touch France. Portuguans used to be really fancy, and rich, and so they owned part of Central America. Legend has it that they owned one of the Chris Columbus boats. Probably the Pinta, that was the smaller one. Anyway, they came to Brazil and had a war to conquer all the Mexicans that lived there and made them speak their language. The language of "Portugese." I don't know why they don't go back to speaking Brazillian. It's not like Portuga could fight them and beat them up now. Wouldn't it be weird to be a really big country and have your official language be named after some other country that isn't even important anymore? That's a reciprocal question, and my answer would be yes. You could probably tell it by inferring.

So anyway, I know you all hate to read, so here's a picture of a basketball player from Brazil.



He'd be more popular if he played soccer. Then he would get a nickname that was one name, and no one would call him his real name but his parents.

In summary I can't wait to go on my trip.

Buenos Nachos

*1-I'm typing this at lunch and just said that out loud to her. I typed it too because it was funny that she didn't know I was typing about her.