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There are currently 6 IAESTE students living in ora round Belo Horizonte. Unfortunately, Adjam, from I don’t know where and Mats, from Norway, live about a 4 hour bus ride away in Viçosa. The other two, Stefan, from Germany and Brad, from the US live close to me in Belo Horizonte.
I got all their contacts from the IAESTE office in Belo and I thought it would be good for all of us to get together for a beer to get to know one another since we are all in the same situation… being in a foreign country on this exchange and not being able the speak the language all that well.
I arranged for us to meet at this pub famous for its Chopp (draught beer). The place was called Maria de Lourdes (www.mariadelourdes.com.br if you want to check it out).
Brad was the first to show up… he is 20, from North Carolina and is a mechanical engineer working for Siemens here. I had to ask him if he watched hockey since it was the Carolina Hurricanes who beat the Edmonton Oilers in the Stanley Cup Final. His response was a subtle, no. But he knew that their team had won the cup. I was all gung-ho to get into a really heated hockey conversation with him, but unfortunately all he knew was that they won. Yet again another reason why the cup belongs in Canada!!
Stefan was next to show up. He is from Leipzig Germany which is really close to where I was in Freiberg last summer. I got to practice my German a little on him and talk about the region where he is from. He is an architect working for some firm here in Belo. The pub we were at was serving Krug Bier, a German name but definitely not a German beer. The draught beer here is called chopp and it is a very lite beer, only about 4 % alc. Of course we had to make jokes to Stefan about this joke of a beer with a German name but not the German alcohol content.
My friend Fred and his brother Fabricio met up with us there too. Both of them have spent some time in the US and can speak English very well. Fabricio when to high school in New York for 5 years and Fred has been there for 6 months or so. They were interested in meeting the other exchange students to hear their stories and speak some English. A girl friend of Fred, Kenya (yes like the country) joined us soon after. A very beautiful girl… dark skin, long dark hair.
At around 01:30 or so we decided to all head home, but I wasn’t ready to go. I had worked all week and I needed to make the most of my weekends here, since they are limited. I decided to go with Kenya to a club called Andy´s Pub. We drove around for like half and hour to get to this place… I thought we were really far from where I live, but in fact I could even walk home because we were so close.
The bars here have a cool way of receiving payment for drinks etc… they give you something like a punch card and whenever you order a beer they scratch out one of the beer signals on the card. At the end of the night they tally up what you owe and then you can pay.
Anyways, I managed to meet a couple of friends that I know from work at this pub, Rafial and Carolina. All of us partied till early morning. In a club like this the man has one single mission for the night… to kiss a girl. A friend of mine told me this is what you do: “you start up a conversation with a cute girl to get to know her a little, but not too much, and then you ask for a little kiss. They may say no to begin with but you have to persist, joke with her a little, ask her why not? I am a handsome man, why won´t you kiss me? Make it sound that you are the man! Eventually they will come around and at the end of the night, everyone is happy.” This is the ritual here.
p.s. Happy Birthday Canada!!!
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chantelle
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so - did you get a kiss, you handsome man, you? I hope the feminist in you could appripriately analyze that strategy!