Vamos escrachar!

Wrapping up a solid weekend, my second one since getting back from Argentina and my first one since moving into the new place. The workload for school is quickly piling up and it looms large overhead when making my weekend plans….i.e. to go or not go clubbing til 6am when you have projects, papers, and presentations to prepare for. Lame right? Being stressed out in Brazil….sort of oxymoronic! Friday night I rolled with my roommate Samir, my friend Gleidi, and a bunch of her friends to a couple of live music bars – both were pretty chill scenes. Saturday night we went to The Bixiga festival here in Sao Paulo. It’s the annual festival held every weekend in August in the historically Italian neighborhood in the city. It was a massive street fair that took up about 5 city blocks. Pasta galore, music blasting in the streets, red white and green streamers hangings from the lampposts, and the many churches in the neighborhood were all lit up and decked out with decorations. Of course it had a naturally Brazilian twist to it since next to every pasta and spaghetti station was a barbeque pit grilling up the finest chunks of meat.

I’m getting to know pretty well my roommate Samir. He’s awesome. We’ve got the same sense of humor, similar interests in sports, music, and movies, and are in the same field of study. But really I think what puts him high on my ladder of respect is that he’s taught me what could be the phrase of the trip - “vamos escrachar.” It’s Brazilian slang, but more so slang between the guys living in the apartment and Samir’s other close buddies. Three of the four Brazilian guys I live with are from the same city in Brazil. So they have their own unique slang that I am slowly getting accustomed to. More or less “vamos escrachar” translates to “let’s party” or “let’s roll” or “let’s get crazy.” But the way Samir and the other guys use it is basically my equivalent of “chill.” Anyone who knows me well knows that I use the expression “chill” to basically mean anything and everything. It can mean “OK” or “cool” or “alright.” So “vamos escrachar” is as universally used much the same way I say “chill” but, of course, all stems from the camaraderie of the guys living in the apartment to go out, have fun, and let loose.

Vamos escrachar!