When we arrived in Praia I was excited yet nervous at the same time. I got kind of worried when I tried to communicate with my new “mother” for the first time and failed. She couldn’t understand me and I couldn’t understand her. We quickly adapted the use of a sort of sign language between us. The difficulties with communication between me and my host family were not as apparent as with other students. I may have not known any Portuguese or Creole, but the majority of the family members knew at least a little bit of English. Since most of them knew at least some English I never really felt forced to learn the language. Looking back at the experience I wish that I would have been forced a little more to learn their language. I think it would have been a more impactful experience had I learned more Portuguese.
I believe my lack of knowledge about their language greatly impacted my overall experience. The first night I spent with my family was actually a fairly scary time for me. I had no idea what I was supposed to be doing, were I was supposed to go, or how I was supposed to get there. I felt vary cut off from everyone and everything. The scariest time came when one of the family members (Jica) took my phone and walked off into someone’s house. I had no idea why she was taking my phone. The reason I was so scared was because that phone was the only way I could communicate with anyone else from the UWM group, and she had just walked off with it into someone’s house without being able to communicate to me the reason for doing so. Come to find out she was using it to store a number to later go back and put that number into her own phone that she had left at the house. It was then I came to realize that I needed to begin to trust in my family, and believe that they would never do anything to heart me.
My “new family” that I was staying with was quite large and extensive. So much in fact that it took me until about the tenth day to finally get down an accurate depiction of the family dynamics within the house. First, there was Nelita, the mother and owner of the house. Living with her were her three children Otavio, Vandy, and Venusa. Otavio had his two children Tavinia and Tiago. Vandy lived with his wife CaRiny and their three children Valeno, Rick, and Liedson (with a fourth child on the way). Venusa lived with her husband Walter and their daughter Edileny. Also living in the house was Gi, Janice, and Jica. They are the children of Nelita’s brother Pedro. There were a few other individuals within the house, but I was unable to establish their relationship with the family. With me not really getting to know those individuals and the daily visits by friends and family from around the neighborhood and city is why I believe it was so difficult for me to get an understanding of who I was and was not living with.
The family I stayed with lived in the neighborhood of Calabaceira. The neighborhood is one of the oldest neighborhoods in the city of Praia. The neighborhood is quite well developed, and has many features that some of the other neighborhoods in the city do not have. I never seemed to have to go very far for anything. Living in Calabaceira was nice, so nice in fact that while I was there I at times felt like I was in some way missing out on some of the experience. For example, the house I stayed in has a municipal water supply directly to an underground cistern under their house. My “journey” to go and get some water consisted of just walking across the house. Also, if I ever needed to get some food, catch a bus to go anywhere in the city, or even go to church, it was always just a minute or two walk from the house. Even though I feel like I may have missed out on partaking in things like having to walk for ten minutes just to get some water, I enjoyed the time it gave me. Because of the extra time I feel I was able to get to know all the members of the family so much better.
Once I got over the initial shock, which I would say took about a week; I began to feel right at home (quite literally). I recognized a great deal of similarities between my new home and family and the one I have back in the states. The neighborhood of Calabaceira felt a lot like the one I grew up in. The families are very tight knit, people have their friends and people they know, but not everyone knows everyone in the neighborhood. My family in Cape Verde was fairly large with quite a few little kids everywhere; while back home I am the youngest of eight, and have ten nieces and nephews. Both families even treated me the same way. They both teased me, made fun of me, and cracked jokes about me. The only difference was that with this family I not only couldn’t understand what they were saying, I had no way to defend myself since I didn’t know Portuguese. I felt even more like family when I was privileged to listen in on a family meeting. Even though I didn’t have any input and couldn’t understand exactly what they were saying I still got an inside look at the family dynamics. Even though it was a serious meeting they still found the time to make fun of me, but I actually enjoyed it.
No comments:
Post a Comment