Internationality Pt. 2

When I came back from Wales, I changed my residence on Myspace (it was still cool then) to Citizen of the World. I'd had my first taste of internationality -- meeting dozens of friends from around the world, talking about differences in our cultures from the big (politics) to the small (what noise a rooster makes in German, French, Spanish, Italian) and saying goodnight to flatmates in three or four different languages. It was incredible, and I learned what an astonishing amount you can discover about the world and about your own culture from conversation alone.

When I moved into my apartment in Oak Bluffs, I knew there were five Bulgarians and 11 total roommates. I was hoping we might be able to have a watered-down duplicate of the experience I had in Wales, but no dice. Everyone ended up staying in their own rooms and doing their own things. It's rare to see anyone else in this house, even if I cook a meal and spend an hour and a half in the kitchen. A few of my Bulgarian roommates are pleasant and we smile and wave when we pass each other in the street, but they're here to make money, not friends. They've told me.

But all hope for internationality was not lost. Martha's Vineyard is a huge hotbed of Brazilians -- some summer workers and many year-round residents. The restaurant where I work, Mediterranean, is no exception -- at least five Brazilians work there, meaning their mother tongue is Portuguese, meaning I get to use some of my kinda-similar-but-not-that-similar Español with them. On Sunday morning last weekend, I had most of a conversation with one of the dishwashers in Spanish, peppering the rest with Portuguese from her and English from me. (Favorite parts: Her asking if I had a girlfriend -- "Tienes una amorada? Tienes una novia?" and learning she has a son my age in Brazil).

One of the only real friends I've made thus far is Marcio, also de Brasil, from Rio de Janiero. He'd been living in Orlando for the last seven years working for Disney. He's a surfer and tennis fiend. He has some great stories to tell. I like Brazilians if they dream to go to Portugal, since it is to Brazil what France is to Quebec or England is to America (sort of). Marcio wants to. Danubia, a server at Med, does not. [That link is a cool story about her in the Vineyard Gazette]

There's a crowd of five or so Serbians my age who work at Mediterranean. Haven't learned too much about them yet although they're wicked nice. Drago's eyes absolutely lit up when I told him I like football/soccer and he said, "Soccer is my life," and told me how he's played his entire life, semi-professionally most recently. The Red Sox are always playing on our bar's TV, so a few of these Serbian gents have afforded me my first opportunities to explain baseball from point A to point Z. Thanks, Oggy and Zell.

Mediterranean's secret weapon is Gilbert (pronounced Jill-bear) from beautiful Nice, France (I saw the city last March and was enamored beyond belief). He has the authentic French half-mustache, with the top half carefully shaved, and sees serving and restauranting in general as an art. If you dine at Mediterranean, I'm going to stringently suggest you request Gilbert. He's lived in America since the '60s, first moving to New York, and talking with him about The Beatles and New York in the '60s is out of this world. He saw the Rolling Stones on 14th Street right after "Satisfaction" dropped and the show began with an hour of nonstop screaming from excited girls -- screaming so loud he couldn't hear anything but the band's bass. He also saw The Doors before they had an album out. He can be a little snooty about some things, but he calls the Canadian variants of French "a treasure." He said he felt at home the first time he visited Quebec. This Frenchman also reminded me how cool it feels to walk or ride your bike with a piece of long grass jutting from your mouth like a cowboy.

I work with Ben, from Israel, where military service is requisite. I said something like, "Yikes...not like it's exactly a peaceful place to serve." He replied matter-of-factly, "Yeah. I had friends get killed." Yowch...

Our floor manager is Mike from Toronto. I went a whole shift without noticing his Canadian accent, and now I pick it up in every sentence. It's awesome. He chimed in on a Beatles conversation Gilbert and I were having, adding that Montreal seems to still be in Beatlemania -- it's all he hears on the radio the entire time he visits the city. Mike also says cheers for thanks, something I sorely miss from living in the UK.

Piret, the woman who trained me at the bookstore, is from Estonia. She and the owner, Ivo, run a resort in Estonia. They're going there for the summer. They invited another Estonian to be the caretaker of their home for the summer and to work in the bookshop. The day Piret and Ivo trained Anna, with Anna's miniature Estonian son prancing around the shop, it felt like I worked in a used bookstore in Estonia. The four of them spoke the language the entire day.

These are some little tastes and stories of internationality from everyday life here. I'll spin some of these threads out more in later entries, especially the Brazilianness of Martha's Vineyard, but even just at the tip of the iceberg, it's an eye-opening blast to be around so many cultures again.

Obrigado [Portuguese for thanks] for reading.