Decoding Derp, pt. 1 - "malandra"

Because I have many moments where internet memes pop into my head and I find myself thinking "you keep saying that word. I do not think it means what you think it means" when I hear things uttered, I've decided to start a new feature called Decoding Derp wherein we visit expressions that are used repeatedly and either out of context, incorrectly, or some combination of the above. I go along with things to the extent that I don't get completely annoyed, but when I notice even my own speech patterns reverting to a linguistic equilibrium — adapting to use the same or similar words and phrasing in order to establish a 'common ground' of language — all bets are off. All of these words and examples should be read in a voice subtly and artificially accented in a manner of denial that such a thing exists at all.

Today we start with a descriptor adjective of this city, the word malandra:

malandra [mǝlandɹa] adj.

From malandro, meaning a person of a quality described as a "clever swindler", a "bad boy", a "lover or flirt that conquers women one by one". Connotation neutral; neither positive nor negative. In Brazil, can also mean "a dishonest man involved in illegal activities"; "a swindler"; "a trickster".

In common parlance, this is to be used ad nauseam to describe a city in any situation describable in negative terms and qualities. Preferable usage should depict situations in which one is under no realistic threat of harm to or violation of their person except in the imaginations of the much-satirized suburban American middle class. Synonyms include "sketchy" and its variants. Examples:

"Hey dude, don't get smoked! It's a malandra city!"

"Yeah, you know, it's a malandra city, you've gotta watch your back."

"I was walking down the street the other night man and it's like 4 AM, and even though this is a total malandra city, I think even the criminals go to sleep at some point because I didn't see any sketchy people at all, it was totally fine!"

In Which Portuguese Becomes Vaguely Intelligible

At some point, probably around when my sleep schedule seemed to correct itself and I began waking up at hours that would only qualify as a "morning period" to the Portuguese, I began the process of getting over and allowing myself to look like a complete idiot (if necessary) in Portuguese in order to get and enjoy what I want instead of the limited scope of things I've already done or tried. It's not so much that I've gotten over anything, as the way in which my cheeks feel flush with embarrassment and my mind races to correct whatever phrase or thing it was that sounded stupid, but I've just begun to make a significantly better effort at plodding along through the vaguely mortifying feeling of being unable to communicate the extremely basic things that you're trying to ask for or otherwise express, sometimes literally in front of your face. It feels like what I imagine drowning might, only there's no risk of death, so you just have to live with it until you come to terms with the fact that, indeed, there are some people in the world that think you are a complete moron and what are you doing here if you can't even get the pastry order right? It is perhaps human nature to think about these things too much and assume them to be worse than the situation actually warrants.

And so it was that I got sick of having only pastel de nata, as delicious as it is when made properly (which is not the case in many of the pastelarias that are so abundant here), and one day went into a pastelaria determined not to be intimidated by the sharp bom dia of the server immediately upon my entrance and first examination of the items on offer in the glass case. I was not going to use English, the way that might get me what I want more often but would not help any semblance of assimilation or sense of actually living here, much less my Portuguese language skills. I was going to look at the pastries until I had decided fully well which one(s) looked good to me, and then just point and order, regardless of knowing the name or not. (Incidentally, a Portuguese person I am well acquainted with told me that in common lore, a man that knows the name of more than a couple of pastries including de nata is considered to be definitely gay and not necessarily in a positive way. This was reinforced in further conversations with other Portuguese people.) The end result was that I got probably the two best pastries I have ever consumed in my life. That was nice on its own, and contributed to my mood enough with the excess of espresso I had consumed that the whole ordeal was, well, not one, but it was also really the first time I managed to get through a fluid customer service interaction (as opposed to the robotic thank-you-come-again sort that one has in the US extensively and here only when you order exactly what you want as soon as you walk in and then pay immediately) without major issues and with genuinely friendly reception from the server. Apparently the effort, as bumbling as I can be, is well-taken, because similar exchanges have only gone better since then and now waiters no longer need to switch to English to clarify what the fuck exactly I was trying to obtain.

This all goes down the drain if I'm with native speakers, though, especially those who speak quickly and quietly typical of these people, and especially not at 10 in the morning before I've had any coffee and am still not home after not expecting to sleep elsewhere the night before. Portuguese is still sort of like that though – half the time it's intelligible and I feel like I've made great progress because I understand everything and the other half it might as well be Romanian, I have no idea what is going on, and I am just as frustrated as the native speaker twisting his tongue through eccentric English to get to a point simpler than it seems. That had better change with the amount of work I am pouring into this.

On Extended Leaves of Absence

Because my classes start in March and because of my general antipathy to structured studying environments, instead preferring to soak up lots of information and study quite a lot on my own, I have profited from having a yet further-extended break. What this is elaborately worded text for is to say that I've had plenty of time to party, be a tourist, and generally act like a philistine live out all of the moments that are less befitting of my academic character than otherwise. It's not so much that I've made poor judgments or anything, but I may or may not have accidentally walked into a pole on the street. Twice. Nor am I wasting away the time completely, studying Portuguese a little bit every day and continuing to read, albeit at a reduced pace from before. Before the break started though, because I would be lying right to your face if I laid claim to reading even a full book during my break before coming here.

Everything feels sort of like life blew up and confetti has come down in its place, nothing particularly organized and everything scattered about just waiting for me to clean it all up, piece by piece, one thing at a time. I went almost immediately from living a stable domestic life, spending more time than not with a partner doing things like tending home and seeing movies, getting breakfast with my mother on Sundays, and other things that are terribly boring except for those living and accustomed to doing them on a routine basis to partying perhaps a little too hard the night I got here, becoming a tourist, and fumbling my way through a language my brain only understands well half the time. Studying in the very concentrated and intensive way that I had been doing all through the last semester would be an exercise in futility at this point, and it was not on accident that I chose my courses so that I could start later and put more effort into them when I am better equipped to do so. I can only handle so much at one time – even my room took two weeks to get completely organized. My spirit is still confused.

I feel stagnant at times and overwhelmed by things to do at others, and sometimes I have days where I step back and take a breather and things seem just fine. Mostly I pinch myself just to make sure I'm actually experiencing all of these things, because sometimes it feels like I'm watching it on a movie screen. I'll leave you with a panorama from one of the days I finally got to breathe for a moment.