I just got back from a Brazilian butcher shop. I bought like 5 pounds of picanha for a churrasco some of my friends and I are going to do later this afternoon. When I went up to the guy at the counter I struck up a pretty long conversation about how I'm going to have a barbecue with my buddies, and I'm not sure what kind of meat to buy. I told him that its been a while since I did a churrasco and that it has been a while since I've even spoken Portuguese. He went through various sorts of meats that might be good and in the end I asked him if he was a Gaucho (someone from Rio Grade do Sul -- where churrasco is really big). He said he was, so I just told him that I trusted his judgement and that I'd take whatever he recommended (which really boosted his ego). We chatted a bit more about nothing in particular and I was on my way.
I would never have had this interaction with any American. In general I'm pretty shy and introverted. I prefer to keep my business to myself and say as few words as possible to basically everyone other than my closest friends. For some reason, this is simply not the case whenever I'm talking in Portuguese. When I am chatting with someone in Portuguese I want to know their whole life story, and what's even stranger, I want to share my whole life story. I always tell them about how I learned Portuguese while living in Bahia, how I'm already forgetting how to speak Portuguese, how I went back for a week to vacation a few years ago, how I'm married, how I am originally from Utah, etc, etc. Basically I'm pretty good at making friends, or at least friendly banter, whenever I'm speaking Portuguese.
A very real example of this happened when Gwen and I went to Brazil a few years back. Gwen, her friend Ruth and I had just arrived at a sleepy fishing village called Saquarema (know known mostly for its amazing surfing and beautiful beaches). When we got there we were super hungry so we stopped at a small restaurant/bar that was 100 percent empty to get some lunch (ahhhh yeahhh beans and rice!). I struck up conversation with one of the guys who works there and within 10 minutes I found myself checking out this building he had just built and was currently setting up to be an inn. He gave me this super long tour and we chatted about where he was going to put the furniture, how many rooms there were, how much he was going to charge, when the busiest seasons of the year are, etc. When I came back to the restaurant (to a very confused Gwen and Ruth-- I forgot to translate that I was going to tour his new place), he invited us to his cousin's birthday party that was to be held at that same restaurant and bar. There would be churrasco, live music, the whole thing. So later that night we went.
Gwen was shocked at how different of a person I had become. It was like she was on a vacation with a complete stranger. I didn't even notice I was different until she pointed it out. It just felt natural to wonder off with a complete stranger and get invited to a family party. It felt natural to chat up every person I ran into.
Why do you think this is the case? I have a few theories:
1) Brazilians are more outgoing and friendly so it's more natural to make friends
2) Introversion/extroversion/personality is learned with language. Since when I was learning Portuguese I was talking to so many strangers every day, whenever I speak it now I just revert to that persona.
3) Since Portuguese is a foreign language to me I don't pick up on how awkward I sound when I'm speaking it so I'm less self conscious.
4) A combination of 1-3
Saturday, June 29, 2013
Introverted in English, Extroverted in Portuguese
Posted by Andrew at 12:34 PM
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3 comments:
Nice post! Another reason that I can think of is that when you were in Brazil it was for a specific reason that required you to talk and interact with people. In a way, it's a little like a sales job. When I worked at REI I chatted way more with people then I normally would, because that was what we were taught and was the expectation. If I had to guess, it would be that there is some level of Brazilian cultural aspect that encourages with being chatty and friendly with folks, but that you also had to get out of your comfort zone in Brazil and be much more extroverted when you were here and maybe some part of your brain associates that behavior with the language. Just my guess.
Hmmm intriguing. The above comment also seems reasonable. Certainly its a good skill to have, being extroverted makes language learning way easier.
I think I am more extroverted in Portuguese because of the circumstances under which I learned that language. I have always associated Portuguese with talking to strangers on the street because that's what I did the majority of the time I was speaking it in Brazil.
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