Cultural Exchange: Brazil

[Pixelmage]

I've been thinking about one thing lately. And that thing is that we're spread all over the world, why not use the opportunity to learn more about each other's cultures?

My idea for this topic is, I'll talk to you all about my country, it's culture and history. And media and interesting facts. Basically, in this topic we discuss Brazil.

Obviously, I can't really create Cultural Exchange topics for the other countries, but if anyone else is up to it, go ahead and we make this into a series of topics to learn more about each other.

So, to kick this off, I ask first if you do want it to go ahead. And of course, what do you guys know or think of Brazil? What do you want to know? Just for a starting point. Oh, and this topic is totally not an excuse for me to delve into Gratuitous Portuguese.

And, just to clarify one thing... This topic will be ongoing, so jump in at any time to ask or talk about something you found out.

[Scarab]

Just for a starting point. Oh, and this topic is totally not an excuse for me to delve into Gratuitous Portuguese.

You say that like we'd object to a little spontaneous language education

I have to admit... I know next to nothing about Brazil. I'd like to learn. On a personal level, I am curious as to what your animation and video game industries are like

[Victin]

I'll also be here to help! And to speak Portuguese! But not today. I have to sleep

Just for a starting point. Oh, and this topic is totally not an excuse for me to delve into Gratuitous Portuguese.

You say that like we'd object to a little spontaneous language education

I have to admit... I know next to nothing about Brazil. I'd like to learn. On a personal level, I am curious as to what your animation and video game industries are like

As for animation, we don't have much. I could point a few minor, children cartoons (including one that makes me want to have brain bleach). As for video game indutry, I know about nothing except indie games. Though there's this course I would like to study in...

Sorry for not going very deep. I seriously have to go. But I'm pretty sure Pixel can explain it better, otherwise I wouldn't even tried to start explaining it.

[narrativedilettante]

I think this is a great idea. Tell us about Brazil!

For a start... um...

What is Brazilian food like?

[Victin]

I think this is a great idea. Tell us about Brazil!

For a start... um...

What is Brazilian food like?

It depends on the region, but as far as I'm concerned, the most iconic are rice and beans. And maybe barbecue, brazilian style (which is, as far as I'm concerned, different from the north american style). I even read that Burger King makes their hamburguers differently here.

[narrativedilettante]

I think this is a great idea. Tell us about Brazil!

For a start... um...

What is Brazilian food like?

It depends on the region, but as far as I'm concerned, the most iconic are rice and beans. And maybe barbecue, brazilian style (which is, as far as I'm concerned, different from the north american style).

I'd like to know more about Brazilian-style barbecue.
But if you need to go to bed Vic just do that the thread will still be here in the morning.

[Pixelmage]

I lost this post to ultimate lack of attention, clicking Edit instead of Quote. It was the one where I describe food, with the image, right? I guess Vic explained that so...

[agoraoptera]

What kind of festivities do you have there? Languages apart from Portugeuse?

[Victin]

I just woke up and I'm ready to make walls of text. You have been warned.

Just for a starting point. Oh, and this topic is totally not an excuse for me to delve into Gratuitous Portuguese.

You say that like we'd object to a little spontaneous language education

I have to admit... I know next to nothing about Brazil. I'd like to learn. On a personal level, I am curious as to what your animation and video game industries are like

As Pixel said, some companies have started to come to Brazil in the last few years, and they've started to dub more games. Differently from everything else, as far as I am concerned game dubbing is a lot better than any other kind of dubbing here in Brazil. Animation and movie dubbing are the worse! When I said worse, I mean the worst! To give two examples I remember: in Wreck-It Ralph, in the scene Vannellope asks if he is a hobo, they dubbed it as if she was asking is he was an unoccupied (I believe enoccupied here means unemployed, given the following dialogue); in Adventure Time, they constantly change the way they refer to the Lich, as they have dubbed "Lich" as: lizard king, Lich and zombie. [spoiler warning] In the episode Lady revealed she was pregnant, they didn't dub the part where she says she is pregnant. They dubbed every time she said a character's name but not her Korean speak, and yet the only sentence she spoke in English the whole series they didn't dub. [/spoiler warning]

Games in Brazil are also expensive as hell. Most people (when I say most, I really mean it) only buy an original console (sometimes even in a "not quite legal" store, but since I don't know how these stores works I can't tell if they are legal or not, but I suppose the latter, as the console is way cheaper than in big stores, as I can confirm based on myself) and every game they buy are pirated. Some people with more money have one, maybe two original games. This reminds me, one of my relatives ,to whom I don't talk much, sells those games. I've seen petitions on the internet asking for the politicians to reduce the charges upon games, but so far I don't think anything happened.

Video game industry isn't very big, but the original animation we have seems to be growing. I know that Cartoon Network has a special Brazilian-only progamation, which usually airs two different cartoons, and I know that Cartoon Network airs 4 different brazilian series, one of them based on an old book series, other based on a long-running (?) comic book series and two of original content, but all of them turned to younger audiences. It's funny that today when I was watching some of my recorded programs on television there was an advertisement for said Brazilian-only progamation in which the copy-pasted scenes of the series so they look like they are singing an English song. And I think I forgot to mention said programation usually airs once or twice a day, but since I don't watch it I don't know.

I think this is a great idea. Tell us about Brazil!

For a start... um...

What is Brazilian food like?

It depends on the region, but as far as I'm concerned, the most iconic are rice and beans. And maybe barbecue, brazilian style (which is, as far as I'm concerned, different from the north american style).

I'd like to know more about Brazilian-style barbecue.
But if you need to go to bed Vic just do that the thread will still be here in the morning.

As I said, brazilian food varies depending on the region. I'm no cook, so I can't explain much. But overall, the most iconic are:

• Rice and beans: with steak and French fries, the only way it can get mote generic is with farofa, a flour based dish which can have different ingredients based on personal preferences, as pepper or sausage, I believe.
• Feijoada: believed to be a brazilian invention, but it's actually european or arabian, I don't recall. I have never had one, so I believe it's like bean soup with meat, but wikipedia seems to work.
• Barbecue: grilled, with a variety of meats. As cuts of meats varie from country for country, I don't think I can get very deep on this one. At least here, at home, we usually have cuts of beef, chicken wings, sausage, chicken hearts and bread for the barbecua, always with farofa and mayonnaise, I suppose, I do'nt eat that thing, so I don't remember the true name. I've heard that Burguer King grills their hamburguers here, instead of the method it is used in other countries.
• Bread: what is known as French bread, they looks like a small baguette or a bigger bread roll (I think), is commonly regarded as the national style of bread, or something in those lines.

And those were simply the most iconic dishes. Now, onto regions we have the Northwest, whose cooking is spicy and usually takes on seafood. In the Southwest, I think we have cheese, but I'm not really sure. If I recall where Pixel lives, his state is historically known for the prodution of cow-based food, as meat and diaries, so I'm guessing. In the South we have chocolate, barbecue and... More cheese? I'm not very informed about food.

BUT

Historically, Brazil is known by its variety (of meats, fruits, etc.) but mainly by its coffee and sugar production, which was always favored by the government. That results in the most commom complaint from brazilians that come back from USA is that your coffee is weak. Companies like Starbucks and Hershey's, when they came to Brazil, they made their coffee stronger and their chocolates sweeter, because we thought they weren't good. Also, I remember that when my brother went to Europe, he commented that some of your food didn't have enough spice, so he usually ate at Italian restaurants, which are alike all over the world, and once he ate at a Brazilian restaurant, which didn't have Brazilian food, because since you don't know what Brazilian foods looks like you couldn't tell the difference (and my reaction to this was: ).

What kind of festivities do you have there? Languages apart from Portugeuse?

The most known festivities in Brazil are the Carnival, the June festivities (which include St John's Eve) and the New Year. Carnival is different on each region of the country, but it can all be summed up to lots of people in the streets, usually with costumes or other different clothing, dancing to loud music. The June festivities also vary a little bit, if I recall correctly, but in my region people usually dress as "caipiras" ("[...] inhabitants of rural, remote areas of some Brazilian states." from Wikipedia) and dance to traditional music while eating tradicional food. In New Year (also called Réveillon) most simply dress in white or any other color they believe will grant something and stay awaken until the next year.

The only official language here is Portuguese, but the Portuguese here varies from the ones in Portugal and in other African countries. Our cultural variety usually shows up in the habits an culture as general, asides from people. But many languages have influences upon our Portuguese, historically speaking we have African and native words incorporated, but nowadays we also have many words based on English ones, even though some have a non-used translation in Portuguese.

[narrativedilettante]

There is a restaurant near my parents' house called Cafe Brazil, and as you pointed out no one knows what Brazilian food is like so I doubt most of what they serve is familiar to you, but! They have farofa! And until now I had no idea what it was. It was just this weird stuff that they had on the table like it was a condiment. I'm so glad to finally know what it is.

[Victin]

There is a restaurant near my parents' house called Cafe Brazil, and as you pointed out no one knows what Brazilian food is like so I doubt most of what they serve is familiar to you, but! They have farofa! And until now I had no idea what it was. It was just this weird stuff that they had on the table like it was a condiment. I'm so glad to finally know what it is.

If they literally serve coffee and bread there I'm not sure I can help. My grandparents are Portuguese, so the way I eat French bread with coffee and requeijão is influenced by they. As for farofa you can eat it with your meat, whatever it is. You can simply mix everything up (though this is in relation to rice and beans, I dunno what they serve) or just pick your meat and pass (?) it in the farofa. Personally I prefer mine thin and with some pepper (I'm not really sure, because there's this industry-made farofa which is very good and sometimes is spicy, so I'm not sure how much pepper they use), without sausage.

[narrativedilettante]

There is a restaurant near my parents' house called Cafe Brazil, and as you pointed out no one knows what Brazilian food is like so I doubt most of what they serve is familiar to you, but! They have farofa! And until now I had no idea what it was. It was just this weird stuff that they had on the table like it was a condiment. I'm so glad to finally know what it is.

If they literally serve coffee and bread there I'm not sure I can help. My grandparents are Portuguese, so the way I eat French bread with coffee and requeijão is influenced by they. As for farofa you can eat it with your meat, whatever it is. You can simply mix everything up (though this is in relation to rice and beans, I dunno what they serve) or just pick your meat and pass (?) it in the farofa. Personally I prefer mine thin and with some pepper (I'm not really sure, because there's this industry-made farofa which is very good and sometimes is spicy, so I'm not sure how much pepper they use), without sausage.

They do have rice and beans, but that's fairly standard in California as well, due to Mexican influence. Their farofa is actually very bland, which might be because they're worried about making it too spicy for people unused to real Brazilian food. Next time I go there I'll experiment with it.

[Victin]

There is a restaurant near my parents' house called Cafe Brazil, and as you pointed out no one knows what Brazilian food is like so I doubt most of what they serve is familiar to you, but! They have farofa! And until now I had no idea what it was. It was just this weird stuff that they had on the table like it was a condiment. I'm so glad to finally know what it is.

If they literally serve coffee and bread there I'm not sure I can help. My grandparents are Portuguese, so the way I eat French bread with coffee and requeijão is influenced by they. As for farofa you can eat it with your meat, whatever it is. You can simply mix everything up (though this is in relation to rice and beans, I dunno what they serve) or just pick your meat and pass (?) it in the farofa. Personally I prefer mine thin and with some pepper (I'm not really sure, because there's this industry-made farofa which is very good and sometimes is spicy, so I'm not sure how much pepper they use), without sausage.

They do have rice and beans, but that's fairly standard in California as well, due to Mexican influence. Their farofa is actually very bland, which might be because they're worried about making it too spicy for people unused to real Brazilian food. Next time I go there I'll experiment with it.

Actually unless it is the food from Northwest, I don't see brazilian food as spicy, unless you're not talking about pepper but about spices in general.

[narrativedilettante]

Actually unless it is the food from Northwest, I don't see brazilian food as spicy, unless you're not talking about pepper but about spices in general.

*shrug* What do I know?

Okay, new question. What can you tell us about Brazilian music?

[Victin]

Actually unless it is the food from Northwest, I don't see brazilian food as spicy, unless you're not talking about pepper but about spices in general.

*shrug* What do I know?

Okay, new question. What can you tell us about Brazilian music?

Well, the historical origins of Brazilian music bring us to the point where it originally was simply a copy of European music, but with time, Brazilian genres of music were born. Since most of those genres aren't played anymore, I won't speak about their history, and also because the only one of those genres I remember is Bossa Nova (which isn't that old, but I don't think there are new musics of it anymore). One of the genres that survived during tiem was Samba, which can be seen every year during Carnival. Other genres were born but died during time, as for example Jovem Guarda (which was the first installment of Rock in Brazil) and Tropicália (which was, as I remember, some crazy shit). There was also Rock Brasil, or BRock or however elephants else it can be called, which peak was in the 80s, but it soon declined in the 90s (my knowledge abour BRock stops there, because the paper they gave me at school about that was made in 2000, so it also stops there). There are also newer music styles, as Funk (which differs from American Funk), Sertanejo (mainly Sertanejo Universitário these days, I believe. It stands for University Sertanejo) and maybe Mangue Beat (which was new... In 2000, because I think it died in the 90s, but since I don't live where it was supposed to be). Another "style" that was born was the Bloco, or something like that, but I know absolutely nothing about it except it exists. I'm not even sure if it's a style or what.

[Pixelmage]

Okay, new question. What can you tell us about Brazilian music?

Vic brought the historic version. Now, I bring you sort of an artists list. Disclaimer: I don't listen to most of this stuff, ever. So... I'm linking somewhat randomly just to show an start point for the type of music.

In the rock front we have Angra. They're more known internationally than here and nearly all of their songs are in english, but! They're all Brazillians!

Heavy metal, also known internationally and singing in english we have Sepultura.

From a more traditional music side there's Roberto Carlos. Yeah, he's one of those romantic singers that every single housewife listens to. But back in the day he was along with the Jovem Guarda that Vic mentioned, so his first songs are pretty different from his latest work.

One of the guys I find interesting in a different style is Zéca Pagodinho, I don't know what he's up to these days, but his songs even though fit he Samba/Pagode style are quite stand alone in that area.

Old and no longer in action, we have Legião Urbana which breaks the exception, being one of the Brazilian media I actually listen to. That one is in the soundtrack and has english subtitles, so, for a bonsus, here's another one from them.

On a note about Brazilian Funk. Please, disregard it exists. This may seem like a schmuck bait, but I'll be honest: It is drug apology and a cult to sex and violence. Really, even listing the "lyrics" here would count as a Rule 3 violation. There is some context to it, as to how and why it exists, but I'd be leaning too close to Rule 6 to be comfortable. Of course, ask me in PM in the chatroom if you want to hear more, I don't mind talking about it.

Oh, and I forgot to mention, if you guys want I can translate some lyrics, if you want to and don't find a translation online. Just nudge me and I can get you some fairly easily.

[Pixelmage]

As promised, I'm back with news on the game and animation industry.

As far as produced games go, I'm limited to this wikipedia list. Honestly, I don't recognize most of what's in there, and don't know how accurate it is. But before going digging for any notable titles directly, it seemed like a good place to start.

On a industry level though, there are two big events hosted here. The Anima Mundi, and Brasil Game Show.

Anima Mundi is quite big, the site is offered in english as well as portuguese, so you can have a look if you have any interest. Let me know if any of you end up attending to it. I'd try to go just so we could meet up. Well, anyway, it's focused on animation and has quite a big number of attendees. It is, I think, the biggest convention we have in the country. As I mentioned, the main focus is on publicity so there are not many animated entertainment works showcased in it, but it is a good place to see technical skills and different styles. Actually, on a more close look... Yes, there are quite a few entertainment works in it too!

BGS has a drop down menu where you choose a language in google translate that they pretend to be multilanguage support.
But, rage aside, it's a new thing here. The first installment was back in 2010, but it is already big enough to be notable in Latin America. It still trips on itself and has a lot of rough spots, but we're learning. Not much I know about it personally, so I'm not sure what to say other than it exists.

[Victin]

This is supposed to be an exchange so... What do you know/think about Brazil? Does anyone wants to come here one day? What about FIFA World Cup? And the Olympic Games? Those will be in 2014 and 2016, respectively, in Rio de Janeiro.

[Pixelmage]

Well, the Olympic games will be in Rio anyway. FIFA WC will be all over the place. Yes, WC, it is intentional.

Yeah, I'll just skip the sports talk.

[Pixelmage]

Well, I finally found what the foodstuffs is called in english, so, I present you Pão de Queijo:

What you'll need:

• 5 cups of Sour Manioc Starch (Link)
• 1/2 cup of hot milk
• 1/2 cup of oil
• 1 egg
• 1/2 spoon of salt
• 1 1/2 cup of grated cheese (Shredded? Sliced? All I know is that it has to be in tiny little pieces )

The link on the starch thing is because I had absolutely no idea what it was called in english, so I just link to an english site that shows you exactly what I'm talking about, the Sour kind. Oh, and another edit. Eli brought to my attention that the site is actually in portuguese when you load it, so, there's an UK flag in the top right, just click it and it'll take you to english version of the page.

How to make it real:
Pour the hot milk over the starch, along with the salt and oil. Add the egg and cheese and mix it all. If you need to, add more milk until it gets to a consistency when you can make the small buns. Then bake it in high temperature until it dries up and looks something like the image above.
According to wikipedia, you have to either bake it right away, or freeze it then bake it from frozen state later, or it will kind of melt away.


Yes, I know my instructions are... Unorthodox, but as I have mentioned, I can't cook to save my life, so...

Anyway, for some trivia, that is not only "Brazilian" food. It's mostly exclusive to my particular state! If you make it, let me know if you like it!

[Victin]

I suppose it is Cassava Flour. My wikipedia and real life pt/pt dictionary skills brought me to here and here. Also, I usually find Pão de Queijo in parties sometimes and also in... Bars? I think one could find it in bars, but neither me nor my parents go to them, so I dunno.

[narrativedilettante]

Those look good! I might make them some time when I'm in a situation to experiment with food, although I may want to look up a more specific recipe to avoid the risk of undercooking or burning them. (Oven times and temperatures can be tricky :p)

Any idea what kind of cheese is typically used? I'd probably go for a mix of cheddar and mozzarella if left to my own devices.

[Pixelmage]

Well Dilly, word of warning, some english recipes I found over the web tell you to add mashed potatoes to it. And the measurements are completely different. Because I mean... why not add potatoes? -.-' Seriously, who came up with the idea of adding potatoes?! (Disclaimer: Maybe it's still tasty. I'll never know.)

But I agree about the oven time issue, I don't know how to describe it other than "Hot and leave it there until it's ready."

About the kind of cheese.. I suppose any kind would work, but I'd recommend something that's not too strong. We have our own kind of cheese made in my state here, which I also have no clue what's called up there... But go for sort of white cheese, If i'm not mistaken cheddar is the orange kind and that would make for a completely different flavor.

[Qara-Xuan Zenith]

Adding potatoes makes everything better.

And while I've never made cheese buns, I've made enough things with potato starch (and let me tell you, when you're using it as a flour substitute, you make a LOT of things with potato starch...) that it makes sense-- the consistency/ with elephants of potatoes would work well with something like cheese buns. If I weren't totally incompetent with breads and things (and also have no clue where to get Cassava flour), I'd be tempted to give it a try, with the potatoes.

[Pixelmage]

Just a note, I actually went around looking for pictures and Cassava Flour is actually rough, brown and the thing we use for "Farofa". The Sour Manioc Starch is what looks like flour, being white and thin. I'm... shocked that these things are so hard to find outside Brazil though... Any grocery store here has it as a default!

You could attempt to do with the potato starch, but I can't foresee the results.