The tony fitch gitterned with a flump (Part I)

Bizarrely enough, the Portuguese´s astonishing language abilities do not extend as far as their dictionaries.

In the staffroom at work recently, I was fortunate enough to be shown what has become one of my favourite Portuguese items, guaranteed to put more than a mere grin on my face during even the toughest of working days. An English-Portuguese dictionary, old enough for the front and back covers and several pages to be missing, but legible nonetheless. I flicked through, and discovered that on each page there were several English words which, to put it bluntly, were not English words. A merry afternoon was spent passing the dicitionary round the room to see who could come up with the best new words, and by the end of the day, my stomach muscles were truly aching. It was like Douglas Adams´ The Meaning of Liff, only somehow funnier, as we imagined the hordes of unsuspecting Portuguese proudly testing these words on sniggering English speaking friends and colleagues.

While studying the other day I noticed that my own dictionary contained some particularly suspicious-looking vocabulary, and decided that, for the amusement of my readers, it was only fair to share some of these little Jabberwocky-style gems*.

Can you guess the true definition of any of these words? (and no, none of them are rude)

1. Flocky (adj)
2. Sice (noun)
3. Tony (adj)
4. Bumbledom (noun)
5. Twitting (noun)
6. Trig (adj)
7. Gittern (verb)
8. Flump (noun)
9. Jib (verb)
10. Sot (adj)

No? Not figured them out yet? Aww... twist my arm and you might just convince me to tell you...

* To maintain the integrity of this blog I guess it´s only fair to mention that I cross-checked these words on an online dictionary and, sadly, some of them are genuine. But they are still so damn obscure and funny-sounding that they are all still worthy of mention.

Pois...

In the very early days of learning a new language, "getting by" is almost entirely based on blagging, faking, and downright bluffing. I´m no linguist, but after nearly five years of simultaneous language learning and teaching, I like to think I´ve learned one or two interesting things. Someone with a high level of English who looks permanently bemused and even traumatised because they don´t understand every single word you say is a much less appealing conversation partner than one who possibly only comprehends the merest smattering of what comes out of your mouth, but who does their best to respond in an appropriate, enthusiastic way, complete with exaggerated facial expressions and wildly flailing hand gestures.

Needless to say, I have always strived to be the second of the two, mainly because I love nothing more than blathering on for hours, even if, as is frequently the case in a foreign country, I really don´t have a clue what I´m talking about, and also because once my partner realises how bad my grasp of their language is they will either a) politely excuse themselves and walk off (or maybe just walk off if they are Spanish), or b) attempt to repeat everything they have just said in English, thus spoiling the whole point of the exercise. A big round of applause to the Portuguese for their astonishing linguistic abilities, but it really does make it hard to learn their language.

My first few months in Andalucia were therefore the language equivalent of learning to swim by being hurled into a swimming pool with a shark. I was on my own, skint, and the only way I could find work was by pasting hand-drawn posters all over town, advertising English classes. Soon, my new Spanish phone began to ring. And I had to answer it.

The first thing I developed was an immensely acute bullshit filter. Sevillanos just love to talk. Not content with telling me they would like classes at such and such a time on Wednesdays, they preferred to entertain me with their entire language learning history, starting way back in the dictatorship when Franco promoted French, so they never studied English at school, right up to how they employed an English-speaking Ukranian nanny for their kids so that they wouldn´t have to suffer in the same way. They would then repeat the story with various additions and tweaked details once I turned up at their posh apartment for each lesson with little Juanito.

And so I learned the art of Spanish conversation. It is emphatic, excited, and crucially, requires one person to speak at full volume until they are interrupted by someone who is able to speak louder and more forcefully than them. This means there is virtually no possibility of being dragged into a conversation in which you would be way out of your depth, and provides endless opportunity for study and listening. All that is required is the odd "Sí?" or "No!" uttered with the appropriate intonation as fuel for the speaker.

Thus the conversation proceeds in this way:
Loud Spanish Housewife (LSH): Rapid, deep, unintelligible Spanish
Vicki: (frowning deeply, visibly concerned) ¿Sí?
LSH: Raised pitch, increase in speed of hand gestures
Vicki: (Raised eyebrows, mock horror) ¡¡¡No!!!
LSH: Look of complicity, slightly reduced velocity
Vicki: (Nodding in feigned comprehension and compassion) Sííííí....
LSH: Varied intonation, short, sharp hand movements, looking to the sky
Vicki: (Really getting into this now, reaching Andaluz volume) ¡¡¿NO?!!
LSH: Stops dead. Stares at Vicki, incomprehension. Repeats: ¡¡¿NO?!!
Vicki: (Realising she has got it wrong. Stuttering) Err... ¿Sí?

Conversation ends, Loud Spanish Housewife highly offended, having realised that Vicki has not actually followed any of what has been said for the last quarter of an hour, Vicki making excuses about going to the bathroom. Game over.

So imagine my joy upon finding that Portuguese, while infinitely harder to understand than Spanish, has this nice little get-out clause in the form of one little four-letter word: Pois.

Pois means Yes or No. It means Really? It means Hmm. It means Seriously! or I get you or Exactly. It is gold dust for foreigners. The Russian Roulette days of ¡Sí! and ¿No? are over. I´ve learned all the Portuguese I need to for now.

Pois?

In the Olden Days

As much as I often grumble about being a TEFL teacher, it has allowed me to meet the strangest selection of characters, and discuss some pretty curious topics, on a level that, as a regular tourist, I would never be able to do.
The subject of yesterday´s lesson, for example, was technology. As a warmer, I invited the class to brainstorm objects or services which we take for granted today, but which, 30 or 40 years ago, simply did not exist.

All the usual suspects were there - Internet, mobile phones, laptops... but there were some particularly eye-opening suggestions to add to the list this time.
Here is a brief summary:

• Cars

Considered a luxury item during the Salazar dictatorship, in 1980 there were just one in ten people who owned a car in 1980. Now there are around four times as many cars per head.

• Roads

Another surprise entry, until you know the information above. Portugal used to have just 30km of motorway. Being fully aware of Portuguese drivers´ preferred velocity, this was probably covered in roughly ten minutes, end to end.

And while there are now plenty of roads and motorways for the Portuguese to accelerate across, the original roads in the small towns are still lacking pavements, in memory of the good ol´days of horses and carts.

• Central Heating

I laughed when my students told me this. not because I couldn´t believe that the Portuguese used to live without central heating, but because it is a luxury on the Iberian Peninsular that even I had stoppped taking for granted a long time ago. Hence me writing this with frostbitten hands, three pairs of socks and two hoodies. Under a blanket.

• Running water

Ok, ok, there has always been running water in Portugal. It´s just that, until recently, it used to be running from a small fountain out in the street, where the villagers would have to go and collect it in their tin buckets. Now they are lucky enough to have taps in their very own kitchens and bathrooms. Though don´t go counting on the hot one...

They hurt me the shoulders

Rather than a bit of gentle stretching and meditation in today´s yoga class, we were instructed, somewhat directly, to "put your leg behind your head", followed by "balance on your hands. Now take your right hand off the floor..." Seriously, it just wasn´t going to happen.

Stretching and wincing and bending and gasping through the bizarrest and most comical postures imaginable, I pondered, as means of distracting myself from the pain emanating from regions I never knew I had, how fortunate it was that I had just been studying how to say "It hurts!!!" in Portuguese.

I was now able to growl at my smiley yoga teacher exactly which bits of me would be unable to function normally for at least the next three weeks.


So here´s a list of my sore bits:

Dóem-me as pernas (legs)
Dóem-me os ombros (shoulders)
Dóe-me o pescoço (neck)
Dóem-me as costas (back. Of which I have two in Portugese)
Doém-me os dedos (fingers and toes)
Dóem-me os pés (feet)
Dóem-me os mãos (hands)
Dóem-me as coxas (thighs)
Dóem-me os joelhos (knees)
Dóem-me as costelas (ribs)

This is not an exhaustive list, but it goes some way to describing my pain.

I just like plantain.

Strolling through the shady district of Martim Moniz the other day on the way to work, I couldn't help stopping to sniff, squeeze and shake the exotic selection of fruit and veg that Lisbon's resident African population has brought with it from the ex-colonies of Angola, Mozambique and Cabo Verde.

Some particularly tasty-looking plantain caught my eye (black, yellow and green!) and I couldn't resist picking up a few sweet ones to fry up as crispy patacones.

As I apporached the till, a beaming black man came up behind me, showing off all his discoloured teeth as he grinned.
"Plantain!" He gasped in muffled African Portuguese. "You're taking home plantain!"
"Sim. Eu gosto muito das bananas." I replied in slightly more muffled Spanish Portuguese.
Without hesitation the smiley guy said "You like plantain! Es africana?!"
"Uh?" I must have misheard.
"Are you African? You're buying plantain!"
"Um, no" (I'm giggling a bit now) "I just like plantain..."

So this got me pondering, as many things do, about what it is that defines us as being from one place or another. As far as I'm concerned, I look about as English as you can get, though since moving to Portugal my tell-tale lisp and habit of saying "sabes?" or "vale?" at the end of every sentence has meant that on several occasions, and in spite of my clear lack of Latina colouring (or bottom), I have been mistaken for a Spaniard.

In Lisbon it is amusingly easy to spot the main immigrant nationalities. The Brazilians always wear beachwear, even on the chilliest December morning (hey, if you've got an authentic pair of Havaianas, you might as well show them off) while the Africans simply refuse to take off their enormous black quilted coats, even while the rest of the city swelters in the Mediterranean heat and humidity.

But what is it really that defines us as being where we are from? I know ex-pats who have lived in their adopted country for longer than in their native land, married foreigners, changed their passports. They've had foreign babies whose first words are not English, and have subsequently grown up to be fully fledged foreign adults. But these ex-pats always seem to be the most exceedingly English people you could ever hope to meet, as if they wish to compensate for their self-imposed exile with an excess of patriotic beaviour. I know people who were born and raised in one country by foreign parents, whose nationality they still claim to feel closer to than their own. And then there are the swarms of 20-30-something nomads, who have spent a few years roaming the planet, lose touch, need a couple of days' practice before feeling fully comfortable using their own language again, and yet have not managed to adopt any other nationality as their own and are now stuck in some kind of limbo. It's a fabulous, exciting, curious state to experiment with for a while, but when does it start to become draining, confusing, unsatisfying?

We don't choose where we are from. We choose where we are. We choose what we eat, what we wear, where we shop. So maybe a plantain, catching my eye in Martim Moniz, is just as good a clue as any other as to who I am.

Science, maths and just a little bit of chocolate

You know that theory that if you eat a stick of celery you actaully burn more calories chewing it than you gain from the nutritionally-challenged vegetable itself?
Well, I have developed my own, slightly more indulgent version of this, involving a hell of a lot more sugar and fat... and pleasure.
I live on the third floor of an old building, which therefore has no lift. My reasoning is that by descending three flights of stairs, speed-walking to the bakery at the end of the street, and dashing back up to the flat, I have actually burned more calories than I will gain from whatever cream-filled and chocolate-coated piece of yumminess I choose to buy from the bakery.
This means that, in theory, this activity could be repeated endlessly throughout the day, with no increase in calories whatsoever, and a damn good pair of thighs at the end of it.
Isn´t that the perfect solution to winter blues?!

And where are YOU from?

"Where are you from?"
"Are you from England?"
"¿De dónde eres?"
"Are you Spanish?"
"De ónde és?"

Origin, for anyone venturing outside of their own country, is a hot topic. How many days can go by without me being asked at least one of the above questions? My nationality ranks above my job, my marital status, my education and my ambitions in the list of Top Ten Questions To Ask A New Person. It´s a conversation starter, when confronted by so many new faces on such a regular basis. It´s a conversation filler, when the new face turns out to be a bit short of small-talk. If you´re from the same place - well, hey! Wow! That´s something to talk about then, isn´t it!? What a coincidence! If you´re from different places - cool! What´s it like there? How´s the weather? The beaches? The food?

"Where are you from?" has become one of the most detested questions amongst seasoned nomads. It reeks of unoriginality, boredom, desperation. You´ve reeled off the answer so many times, with catchy little soundbytes devised for your village/region/country/continent, depending on the distance of the questioner´s own origin, and level of geographical comprehension. Thus, in London, I am from Kent. In Portugal, I am from London. In the States, I am British, though the closer I edge inland, the more I become European. In Chile I was, as the most recognised point of reference, from Spain. In Ecuador I was from some where so incomprehensibly distant that it simply became Not Ecuador.

The soundbytes themselves are lame attempts at either self-deprecation, humour, or patriotism, a trait rarely witnessed within England but which is forced to flourish once abroad. A typical soundbyte about my village will also depend, once again, on the other player´s own origin. It could be as follows:

Slough: "Yeah, Kent. Just this crappy little village in the middle of nowhere with one poxy bus an hour to the nearest town. An you only go there if you fancy getting bottled by a couple of orange girls with thongs sticking out above their miniskirts."

Spain: "It´s sort of between London and France. So it´s not as cold as the North. And the food is really ok, no, honestly, you should have a Sunday roast at my grandma´s sometime. No, the beef doesn´t have mad cow disease..."

USA: "It´s this pretty little village with one pub serving traditional pints of Kentish ale, yeah, surrounded by forest and farmland, and at the bottom of the hill, past this really old church, there´s this iron-age burial site with STONES..."

Ecuador: "We have lots of trees in my village too but we have these things called, er, seasons, and, uh, the leaves fall off the trees... yeah, it´s totally weird, and we have glass in our windows cos it´s quite cold, and, um, that´s why we can´t wash our clothes in the river. Well, actually, machines do our washing. Magic."