Felippe's Leaving Week

---

Crank Bank's Coming Soon

I met Felippe a few months back at Johan's BBQ. He is the Brazilian guy who just happened to be in a pretty famous pop/punk band in Brazil. From the night I met Felippe and his friends (Tiago, Leandro, Edilson, and Caroline) they became my little Brazilian family. I have spent loads of time with them hanging out at their flat, watching the boys fight it out playing FIFA on the Play Station, watching the Brazilian FIFA games at the Australian pub, watching movies, and partying at the Brazilian night pub every wednesday. Unfortunately, Felippe had accomplished his goals for being in Ireland and was desperately missing home.

Felippe is 19 and came to Ireland 5 months ago to learn English. By improving his English he will be able to nearly double his potential salary and obtain a much better life for himself. Felippe could work for an international company that would have him working out of Canada or if he follows his dreams he will get a new band together (called Crank Bank's) and continue to be a drummer. While here Felippe's English became really quite good but he didn't really enjoy the country or people of Ireland. I think Ireland is really hard for many people to adapt to especially if you aren't used to the dark sense of humour that the Irish have. Also, if you live in Dublin there is a huge proportion of the population that are poor, aka Knackers, and live a drug/alcohol/thieving/abusive life style. Knackers of all ages can be incredibly scary and if you only live in Dublin you may begin to get a really negative view of Ireland. Felippe, unfortunately only stayed in Dublin and only was able to experience the negative representatives of Ireland. Also, as someone from a warm climate where life is always lived in the outdoors the cold weather was really difficult to get used to. So despite the fact that Felippe made some really great friends it still was too hard to live in Ireland.

In the week leading up to Felippe's departure we went out to celebrate a lot. Friday night at the hiphop club, saturday a small dinner at the Brazilian boys flat, wednesday the last night to Brazil Pub, and finally thursday the bus ride to the airport. We had a lot of fun times and jokes together in the short time that I knew Felippe in Ireland. But now that he is gone I can't make fun of him for being a broke back mountain cowboy and a nerd. And he can't make fun of me for...well actually I'm too perfect to be able to be made fun of... ok fine I may have had a problem with saying dollars instead of Euros, unwanted attention from a french admirer, I may have said Eh once or twice, and for pronouncing Toronto as terona. But other than all that I am perfect! Felippe was always eager to learn about other cultures and was happy to share information about Brazil with me. He sent me some pretty good Brazilian hiphop-samba mixes by Marcelo D2 and was kind enough to send me copies of the lyrics in English.

Anyways, BYE FELIPPE... we will miss u! You are a pretty awesome guy and hope that you are happy back in Brazil and hopefully we will meet again. Don't forget to send me tickets to your first major concert for Crank Bank's.

ps. I think it would be awesome if the monkeys wore business suits and ran the business world of Brazil from the Jungle.

---

Photos

dropping felippe to the airport 10
3 tickets just to get home... iccck

dropping felippe to the airport 11
the final bus ride

dropping felippe to the airport 7
last group shot

dropping felippe to the airport 8
I'm sorry the pop star isn't in the mood for pictures

goodbye felippe 001
The last Brazil pub