All posts tagged: Marcia

Adventures with Portuguese: “A PELE QUE HÁ EM MIM”

“I did nothing yesterday,” I said to Kris, emphasizing “nothing.” Kris was my new friend in San Miguel de Allende and we were lounging on the grass at La Gruta hot springs. It was the second week of my writing workshop and I was feeling anxious for not having written five novels already in 14 days. “Me neither,” Kris said dipping her chips in the guacamole. Our beers were barely chilled but I couldn’t care less. Sunbathing with good company in Mexico not writing was better than staring cross-eyed at my facebook newsfeed not writing. The truth is I was lying—I had done something the day before. “Well, I did translate a song from Portuguese to English,” I said. Kris laughed: “Of course, you did!” “I don’t speak Portuguese.” “Of course, you don’t.” She laughed some more. After listening “A PELE QUE HÁ EM MIM” on repeat for two days, I copy pasted the lyrics into Google translate. It was awful; made no sense whatsoever. But I was obsessed and no matter what, I had to understand …