não sei

i don´t think i can count the number of times i´ve used this phrase here, ha ha...probably one of the most useful phrases in a language when you´re learning #1 because it´s easy, #2 because it´s true...não sei = i don´t know.

today though, when i did know, i could only say "não sei" because i couldn´t find the other words...sigh. anyway, just to give you some background: i work on the other side of the city from where i live, and salvador isn´t so small. it´s not too far, only 10 mins by car with no traffic, but by bus with traffic, it takes about an hour. anyway, today i took the bus alone for the first time...yay for being a big girl, ha ha :) anyway, i needed lots of help before because the city is so big and the bairo (neighborhood) names so unfamiliar that i really had no idea where i lived, especially in relation to where i work. the aiesecers were very helpful and wrote out directions and sample sentences in portuguese for the bus driver in case i needed them and came with me a couple of times :) anyway, the bus leaves from the stop across the street from my house and stops a block from my work...pretty sweet. well, when i came down from work it was about 5:30 pm and already dark (it gets light at 6 am, so ya know) and i saw some guys that i work with chillin in the lobby of the building. please note here that none of the 3 of them speak english...at all. also note that i´ve been in brazil for 6 days and have therefore known the little portuguese that i know for 6 days...can we all see where this is going?

they ask me how i´m getting home and where i live. i tell them that i catch the bus down the street and that somewhere on the bus it should have the name itaguara, but that´s not necessarily where i live. i guess they didn´t catch that part, or maybe i didn´t say it. anyway, we go down the street to my stop and i´m waiting for the bus and they then tell me that my bus isn´t coming for 2 hrs and that it´s the wrong bus, which i know isn´t true because i had caught it at this same time the day before. unfortunately, i keep forgetting the word "yesterday" and that isn´t very helpful either. by this time 2 of them are both speaking fast and loud to me and i can barely understand a thing, much less answer with something comprehensible. they begin leading me away from the stop to catch another bus when lo and behold, here comes my bus...and i miss it b/c we´re too far away. oops. i call the vpx here but by the time she tells me to just wait for the other bus, one of my co-workers has gotten me onto a bus that he says goes by my house. it goes in the right direction, as it turns out, but not near my house really...i don´t want to leave him because he speaks portuguese and it´s not safe for me to be by myself here, especially on a bus, especially at night, especially as a blonde-haired, blue-eyed girl that doesn´t blend in at all. we ended up calling another aiesecer that was able to pick us up from a place near my house so everything ended up ok, but for me it was a little scary, even though i knew the people involved...they didn´t scare me, just the fact that without the language, i´m very vulnerable, you know? i don´t always understand things correctly if i understand them at all, and i know this will come with time, but i think today the strangeness of everything hit me more. it won´t be strange forever though, and that´s the real reason we need aiesec, you know?

eventually i will understand (the culture and the language, hopefully :D), but until i do, i´m afraid a little...not like afraid for my life necessarily, but safety is a concern in any unfamiliar situation and i just don´t know what´s normal and what´s not, am i being polite, did i say something completely offensive, did i do something completely offensive, am i representing myself, my family, aiesec, and my country the way i should be? so many questions, and the answers will come only with time. by the way, in writing, this doesn´t look how it felt really, but believe me when i tell you, and i think michael metioned this in his blog too, that communication is so so so so so so important, whether you´re facing a language barrier or even an emotional barrier, whatev. being able to communicate is the thing that makes us understand and act and think accordingly to the situation...that´s why people end up and then stay in aiesec, you know? what a horrible place this would be if we all knew only about ourselves.

beijos :)