On Monday, Jun was my guide to the location of the school, but not before a typical Brazilian breakfast of strong coffee, bread with a choice of butter, jam or cheese spread, some rolls and some small bananas. The coffee was excellent and it helped me awaken from the mess I had made of myself the day before. After breakfast, it was time to head to the school.
The apartment is on Alameda Casa Branca. To get to the school you have to walk down the Alameda for some four blocks until you get to Alameda Lorena. Alameda Casa Branca has something along the lines of a 20-degree incline. Of course, I never thought what would happen at the end of the day when I returned to the apartment. On foot. More on that later.
On Alameda Lorena you make a left, walk one block and run smack into Avenida 9 de Julio, a six-lane avenue. Thankfully, the traffic lights work, and so do the pedestrian signals. One half-block away is the alley that leads to the school. The school is a remodeled home that's been adapted for the purposes of a training environment. I was greeted by the receptionist, then taken to a small conference room where other students who were also starting their training on a Monday were filling out their induction paperwork (registration, short test to gauge Portuguese language abilities, etc.) I was also greeted by the owner of the school, another nice lady who unfortunately had just had surgery on her left leg and was on crutches.Soon after that, I met my first instructor, David, a 28-year-old with an infectious laugh and a great sense of humor. And that's where the confusion began. You see, I can read Portuguese but I have a hard time listening and understanding, and let's not even talk about speaking it. Imagine what it might feel if you were to become stuck inside a Cuisinart food processor equipped with the ginsu knife blade attachment, and someone turns the damn thing on. That's how my brain felt after about an hour of "education."
To make matters worse, David was substituted by another instructor, Marçel, who is a bit younger but equally well-qualified to teach, as all Fast Forward instructors are college graduates with degrees in what the Brazilian education system calls "Letras" or "The letters." In other words, they all have degrees in the Brazilian language. Actually, my brain got worse. Marçel was doing a fine job, and has been doing a great job since.
My other instructor is a very gregarious and strong-willed lady by the name of Amarilia (I think I spelled that right, I have to check tomorrow with her). Marçel is my grammar instructor, Amarilia is my conversational instructor, and yes, they are my instructors because thankfully I am taking four weeks of private instruction. Why thankfully? The group sessions are not running nearly as fast as I am, since I can already ready the language to a fairly technical degree. Had I been in a group I would have been held back by the slowest student. As a private, intensive, full-immersion student I can plow ahead at my own speed, which according to my instructors is as close as you can get to a Caterpillar backhoe running downhill in the middle of a hurricane.
By the end of the day, I was dead to the world. And then I realized... holy moleed, I forgot I have to raise my altitude to the level of the entrance to the apartment building using nothing but leg power. After nine hours of mush, wearing flip-flops and carefully avoiding strategically-placed piles of apartment-size-doggie-poo.Well... one thing's for sure, I'm going to lose weight and I'm going to finish the month in much better shape than when I arrived. More tomorrow. Need to get some sleep and I still have other work to do.
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