Tuesday, November 30, 2010

Abbey Road Brasileira - us - young, free and irresponsible


left to right:
Lua,*
Jamile,
Beta,*
Fernanda,
Vika,*
Samara.


*BFFs









Us - Beta, Lua and I - the Die Hard Trio. Someone decided to call Us that because Us were always together. Up and down the city. Laughing & crying, fighting & making up. Us. Always together. Always Us.


And we did lots of crazy stuff together.


Some of them were caught on camera:


  • Us laying on the floor of the parking garage at the mall.

  • Us on the crosswalk “a la Abbey Road”. Just that we were dancing and jumping, instead of calmly crossing like John, Paul, George and Ringo.

  • Us swinging from the lamp post in front of McDonald's.

  • Us holding the covers of all our Beatles CDs.

  • Us throwing eggs on my head to celebrate my b-day.

  • Us sleeping over at my aunt's.

  • Us doing group hug.

  • Us at my wedding.


Lots of crazy stuff we did together were never caught on camera:


  • Us crying on each other's shoulder every time a boyfriend did not work out.

  • Us making plans to live together and eat Ramen Noodles for ever.

  • Us making plans of world domination.

  • Us yelling at each other for never getting a chance to say anything.

  • Us yelling at each other for being late for our meeting at the mall.

  • Us screaming at the TV while we watched an old Beatles TV show.

  • Us being loud and messy on the bus.

  • Us growing apart and growing closer again.

  • Us saying we were sorry.

  • Us telling secrets that we won't even tell our moms.


Us. Always Us.

I miss Us.

I miss having friends like Us.



Sunday, November 21, 2010

No books? No texting? No way!

So I went for the MTEL on Saturday morning. And I was aware that there was a no electronics policy. So I left my cell in the car and grabbed myself a book. As soon as I walked into the classroom and sat down however, the proctor told me - you must not have a book on you.

A book? I thought. Must not have? Must not have a book?

Ok, I said. What do I do with it? Put it away by the window together with everyone else's pocket books.

Well, a policy is a policy, those who have the power make them, those who have working brains obey them. So I put the book away.

And for the next 30 minutes I sat there suffering from some sort of withdrawal syndrome - no book to read, no phone to mess around with. What am I supposed to do? I felt weird. I felt empty. I felt as if those 30 minutes would never come back. And I was wasting them by doing nothing.

Weird do-nothing feeling! Not used to it.

Friday, November 19, 2010

best of both worlds? can't have it.

I miss my friends.

When it comes that time in which you just want to be irresponsible, and do silly things, and just be your silly old self, you realize you miss your friends more than everything in life.

It's november 19, 2010, and I just found out Paul McCartney - yes, Paul McCartney, my favorite singer ever and the only guy I've liked for longer than my husband - is going to be playing at the SNL on December 11.

My husband said he'd come with me to NYC, to try something insane - stand in line for stand-by tickets for SNL the night before.

"However," says hubby, "if you can get a girl friend to go with you, I will stay home."

My baby is doing that for me - stand a whole night in a line to TRY to see Mr. McCartney - for me. How could I possibly ask God for a husband better than that? A husband who will put up with my madness?

I know he'd rather not go. He'd rather stay home and sleep in his nice cozy bed. If only I had a friend to go with me.

And that's when I realized - I have those friends. I have friends who would drop everything and come on an insane trip to try to see Paul, with me, without thinking twice. But they live a continent away.

I look around me, where I live, in this country I chose to be my home, and I don't see a single friend I'd dare to invite to join in for one of my crazy ideas.

Other than my husband, this angel sent from heaven, no one else would drop everything for me.

They say we only value things after we lose them.
That's not true for me.
I always knew what the girls and I had was special. I always knew our friendship was the most precious jewel I could have. I always knew it. We knew it. From the moment we decided we were going to be best friends, no matter what, we knew we were on to something special.

I just didn't realize how terribly I'd miss it. And how guilty I'd feel for having chosen to leave.

Even though our friendship is still there, I am not. I'm here, in the US - all by myself - while they are there, in my Brazil, with the rest of the stuff I chose to leave behind.

Maybe it's true that you can't have the best of both worlds.

I miss you, girls. Please, forgive me.

Sunday, November 14, 2010

more crazy dreams: Freedom, mom, and Paul McCartney

Why did I care so little about being with my family when I was a teenager? While everyone of my peers was terrified about spending a weekend away from mom and dad, I couldn't wait to get out of the house and see the world. "How silly can they be?" I asked myself.

Mom always told me, "I did not raise you for myself. I raised you to go out and see the world. I raised you to go after your dreams. I raised you to be free." So I guess she succeeded. I went out and saw the world. I followed my dreams. I didn't achieve everything I ever wanted, but I went after my dreams one by one with as much passion as I could, prioritizing the ones I thought were really important, leaving others in the back burner, I am still going after my dreams. The only part of that speech I could not accomplish was the "be free" part. I wake up every morning at 6 and go to work all day at a job I am not fond of. I left the job of my dreams to land something that would pay the bills and my dream vacations. Maybe I am free, just that I have to finance my own freedom. Mom also raised me to be responsible.

Why did I care so little about being with my family, while my peers were terrified about leaving home? Because mom told me too.

However today, as most of my peers are out in the world, with families of their own, and as they don't worry so much about being away from mom and dad anymore, why do I feel terribly homesick? Why do I miss mom and grandma and aunts more than anything? I do have a family of my own, as I have always dreamed of, ( no children, yet - I happen to value my freedom) but I wish, oh how I wish, I could just get in a car anytime and go see mommy, and just ask for a hug.

I had a nightmare last night. Mom and I were alone in a fancy house and someone bad tried to break in. I woke up crying, "Mom! Mommyyyy! Mo-o-o-o-ommm!" Mom came. We were at a pool house. With sliding window doors, and thick curtains. "It was just a bad dream. It's ok. Just make sure you lock the doors at night." That's when I woke up for real, and I was in my bed at Cross Street. With my husband's cat. My baby is away with his family. Just lock the doors, I remembered. Are the doors all locked? It's 12:30. Are the doors all locked? Well the doors to my floor are locked. What about the main doors to the house? I never lock them. Oh, my God, I never lock the main doors! And I am home alone! Of course I was still in a dream state. I ALWAYS lock the main doors. They are usually the only doors I lock. But in my half-awake half-asleep mind, I thought I never did. I tried called my baby, but he would not pick up the phone. He always says, "Wake me up if you have a nightmare." I tried.

I did not have a husband last night. I did not have Mommy last night. I was all alone... with my husband's cat to take care of.

Oh, you bet if someone broke into the house, the cat would be the last of my worries. I guess that shows I am not ready to be a mom.

But since my mind was half asleep, I closed my eyes again. Asked God to take care of me and my house, and went back to sleep.

I was with mommy, at the airport. And we spotted the one man I have loved since I was 10 years old. You guessed it! Paul McCartney! No fans. No crew. No band. No TV reporters. Just him. I'm sure he had his band with him. I am sure he was just wondering around the airport looking for something. I was hoping he was looking for me. But I knew he was not. There's a whole lot of things to do at an airport.

I was scared of talking to him and finding out he was not as nice as I always thought he'd be. But I went ahead anyway, and he was super nice. I asked for an autograph. "I can't talk right now. But give me 5 minutes and I will be back." And he was back! He gave me his autograph and I asked for a hug. A hug, of course. Would I have the nerve to ask for a hug in real life? Oh, I don't know. Maybe I will find it out someday. "Can I give you a hug?" it is the one thing I always ask him every time I have a dream in which he shows up. I was so mesmerized by having Paul right there that I could not talk about any subject for more than 5 seconds. It was like trying to fit everything you've always wanted to tell someone for the past 20 years in the few minutes you know you'll have that person with you. Then you'll never see him again.

"We're stuck here because our plane fell off the sky." "What?" Yup, I got his attention now. Just before he showed up, I saw a plane falling off the sky. I was the only one who had seen it and no one had paid attention to me until now. "Yes! I saw it! It was right over there! It just ...fell! Like this: voosh." He looked at where I was pointing as if what he had been thinking had started to make sense. Had he seen it too?

But then he really had to go. And so he did. "Nice meeting you." And only then I remembered, Your novel! Tell him about your novel! Oh, gee! Seriously? You could think of all mundane things in the world to spill out at Paul McCartney, except to tell him you wrote a novel? How stupid can you be? When will you have Paul McCartney's undivided attention again? Uh, never! Go after him! Run! And that's when I forgot I was a grown-up, I forgot Paul was walking around trying to be a normal person, I forgot Beatlemania was over and I ran and called out his name. Wow, I never knew calling out Paul McCartney's name would work out magic. Like magic, security people came up and made sure I did not get anywhere near him. "Wait! I wrote a novel about the Beatles. Can I send it to you? Will you read it?"
"Can you make it into a books on tape?"
"How about kindle?"
"I don't have one."
"Books on tape it is."
And then he really had to go.

So I took my plane home and in it I had a dream I really had a time machine and young Paul and a couple of my friends and I ended up in some early 20th century civilization and had to escape these evil people. Indiana Jones style. Now, yes, this was the young Paul from the Beatles years. However, he held a camcorder. A portable one. Like the one his son brought to Brazil in 1993.

We're struggling for our lives and you have a camcorder? Ok, help me up this rope first. You can film again as soon as you push be back to safety. He didn't look happy, almost as if saying, all you need me for is to keep you safe? What about my film? "Come on! We're running out of time!" Whatever, said the look in his face, if being safe is that important to you, I guess I will help. "Here, hold my camcorder, and I will push you up."

Yup, pretty surreal. Can you imagine someone going like, ok I know we're about to die, but, crap, let me get this on film! LOL! If anyone would do that it would probably be me!

Saturday, November 13, 2010

Think of me - anti-homework version - by Vika

So much homework to do. All piled up. And I feel nothing like doing it. I hate homework. Hate it! Hate it! With all my heart, mind and soul!

I remember my middle school years, when I used to sing those anti-school versions of famous songs, the ones that use to be love songs and we turned into songs that talked about how much we did not want to go to school, like Roberto Carlos famous, "Everything can go to hell". Instead of "What good is the sun shining in the beautiful sky?", we sang "What good are books for students to study?" It's kind of like what Weird All does.

I don't know who wrote this Roberto Carlos version. What I do know is that I wrote this one version of "Pense em Mim" (Think of Me), by country duo Leandro & Leonardo. I will write the English translation here. It's reall just a translation, if you try singing it, it won't match. It's just to give you an idea of what we used to sing.

Think of Me - anti-homework version By Vika

"Instead of you staying home doing homework
Instead of you worrying about homework
Come and play, grab your soccer ball, come run with me
No, don't do your homework
Come and play, grab your soccer ball, come run with me
No, don't do your homework
Homework...
Forget about homework

Look outside, it's the best of the sun, the sun, the sun -ooh, ooh
Makes me feel like going out
Let's hop on the first bus
headed to the Barra Lighthouse
At the Barra Lighthouse
Only you and me

Come and play, grab your soccer ball, come run with me
No, don't do your homework
Come and play, grab your soccer ball, come run with me
No, don't do your homework

Homework...
Forget about homework"

Ah, Good old middle school years... Of course I could not forget about homework! I was responsible. But homework was torture. So I wrote this other anti-school version of a famous Leandro e Leonardo song: (again, this is just the word by word translation, if you try singing it in English it will sound really bad)

I'm sorry but I will cry (Desculpe mas eu vou chorar) - anti-school version by Vika again

The lights of my room are on
showing all the books on my desk
And I am sitting here with me
in sheer torment

I hear my friends playing outside
I'm the only who's here working
I'm the family nerd at work
that's my lament

Then I start to wonder
"is studying really worth it?"
The sometimes I even think
"I will run away"
But then I come to my senses
I don't want a bad grade in English
And I still have to do my Portuguese homework

I will cry, I am sorry, but I will cry
I can't study anymore, I can't take that much pressure
I will cry, I am sorry, but I will cry,
But when Christmas time is here, I will not be in Summer School"

The Little Girl From Yesterday

So, I was telling people about my book yesterday at belly dancing practice.
And one of my classmates told me her mom sneaked into the Beatles hotel room when she was a kid. And here was I thinking this kind of stuff only happened in movies... naive me...
Another classmate told me about this one little girl that simply walked up to John Lennon's door and asked for an autograph. Apparently he was impressed by how bold the little girl was and they became friends...
Ay,ay, if I had a time machine...
Anyway... if I do discover Paul McCartney's address, don't you think I will not go asking for an autograph? LOL No!!! I will go ask him to read my book. You bet I will.

Wednesday, November 03, 2010

Linda & Paul

Last night I had this dream that I got to meet Paul and Linda McCartney. That's a stupid dream because Linda passed away over 10 years ago. I was really upset when that happened. First I was sad for Paul and his family. He really loved her. Second I was upset because I really wanted to meet her (and him of course), some day. I just hope I get to meet him someday.


On a happier note, I really can't wait till I can start my guitar lessons. When the semester is over I will start. I can't start now because all of my nights are taken. Next semester I will save my Mondays for guitar lessons.

I am loving belly dancing lessons.

And I am having a blast with the drama club at school. The kids looooooove it. And I love leading them. It's my little way of keeping in touch with drama. I miss my drama team so much!