Day 21: Life with important yet strange Brazilians, networking, and foreign experiences

As I worked at Yuka's house today, at around 10, she asked if I would come upstairs and help translate the abstract for her doctorate thesis. She had already translated it into a rough draft in English, so I was finishing up correcting it when an older gentleman walked into the room. Yuka introduced me to Juares, who was here to help with the translated thesis as well. We began working. It was hard work, but I enjoyed translating Yuka's musical ideas into English sentences, which were usually very different than what she had written in Portuguese. Juares made the joke that somewhere in the abstract we should put the word "Melody," because Melody is really the essence of the whole translation. When we finished, Juares said to Yuka (in front of me) that I was very intelligent. It was a little embarrassing. He seemed impressed with my ability to write. Later I found out that he had spent a lot of time in New England and New York, and also in England, which made sense, because he spoke English well and had a large vocabulary. He is a renowned medical figure in Brazil and works at USP in the Department of Medicine, which is the best school for medicine in all of Brazil. He went to grad school in the states at Rockefeller Institute for Medical Research, and today is concentrating his research in psychological neuropathy. Juares is a tall man, probably in his early-to-mid 60s, with a keen sense of humor.

When we finished working, Yuka, her husband, her step-daughter, Juares and I had lunch. Juares noticed I didn't eat meat and when I asked for Yuka to pass the tea, he declared that I was a "natureba," which more or less translates to a flower-child. When Yuka's daughter-in-law started to talk about how she was still single, Juares told her that she had to find her "inner-self"--leaving the word in its orginal English form--before she finds love. Then he explained how he could see I had found my inner-self and that just by speaking with me he knew who I was as a human being. Yuka's step-daughter explained how it really isn't about men choosing her, she is just waiting to choose the kind of man she wants.

After Juares and Yuka's husband had finished a bottle of wine, the topic turned towards me again. Juares said once more that I was intelligent, and would I like to meet his girlfriend (funny, for an old man to have a girlfriend) and have dinner with the two of them sometime. I politely accepted. He said that he had just finished traveling an overnight trip from Bela Horizonte to Ribeirao Preto and he hadn't been able to sleep a wink. Yuka told me that when she called this morning, secretly hoping that he would remember they had a date to work on the thesis, he declared, "What do you want?!" and when she asked how he was to try to break the ice, he said, "I'm horribly bad!" Juares said he was glad that Yuka was able to persuade him to come over, because now that he had met me, he was in a much better mood and felt alive again. Then he said something poetic in Portuguese which I didn't understand, but whatever it was, it made everyone laugh, roll their eyes, stand up from the lunch table, stretch, and uncomfortably amuse themselves in something else. It was something about me being a moon and how my light shines...

I stayed downstairs to warm up my voice and perfect some songs, and Yuka and Juares went back upstairs. About an hour later, as I was just finishing up singing, Yuka came down the stairs and said, "Melody! Will you come up here please?" We turned to walk up the stairs and she said quietly, "Juares has a deal he wants to make with you." I came into the room and sat down. Yuka and Juares were sitting across from me, watching me seriously.

"Melody," he said, "I have been thinking about why you're here in Brazil, and the research you want to go home with, and I think it's very important. Now, I know nothing about music. My field is medicine, but I think more people should know about what you're doing, and more people should know about you. And, also, I'm in love with you." I raised my eyebrows. Yuka laughed out loud and hit him on the knee. "Be careful of this one, eh?" She said jokingly. He became stern and said, "No, no! Love is a general word in my case. I'm in love with many things in life. But," He said in a business-like manner, "I am in love with you."

I frowned...what was happening here? Was I being proposed to? "My daughter is part of a cultural program in Minas Gerais which invites speakers to give presentations about anything that culturally deals with Brazil. It is informal-- Yuka has sung there before, and she can tell you. But, I beleive it is a great opportunity for you and it will help to get your word out. So-- and this isn't a promise-- I will ask my daughter if she can try to secure a spot for you. Would you be able to travel there and give the presentation if she can get it for you?"

I had a dumb smile on my face. A presentation in Minas Gerais on my research? My undergraduate research? Wow, this guy thinks I'm a lot smarter than I am, but either way, it's an amazing opportunity to network! I looked at Yuka, and she nodded encouragingly. "It's really a great experience. You could get your lecture-recital ready here and present it, and then you would only have to perfect it when you were back in the states." Juares said I should sing and do the entire lecture in Portuguese. I laughed out loud at the thought of that. "Maybe you think your Portuguese is broken," he said sternly, cutting of my sarcastic mirth, "But it's not that broken." Yuka said, "Sure. And you have a whole month to plan." I must have looked pretty skeptical, because then she suggested, "And, if you like, you and I can split the songs, and we can both sing them." I smiled. Well, this sounded pretty dynamic. Yuka is an amazing singer, and as an undergraduate I would be honored if she would perform in a lecture/recital that I'm conducting, especially because she is the perfect example of how Brazilian art song should be sung!

I gladly accepted and thanked Juares heartfully. He looked at me sternly again and said, "But, I haven't talked to my daughter, so this might not happen at all." I told him I understood, but that I thanked him for thinking of me either way. They both shooed me back downstairs and I sat at the piano, my music splayed out in front of me, frowning, wondering what just happened, what I had gotten myself into, if this is all a dream....