CURRENT MISSION

My current mission is to find out what my current mission is.

ABOUT ME

I'm a fan of classic rock. I love learning about languages - not just learning how to speak them, which you can only do with a handful, but learning how the most diverse languages organise their speakers' perception of the world. For example, there's a language in the Brazilian Amazon which requires you to say how do you know what you're saying - if you saw it, if someone told you about it, if you think it to be true. You cannot form grammatical sentences without this!

(OK, I confess: I was reading about this just yesterday. I further confess to spend more time on Wikipedia than most people would consider sane.)

PHILOSOPHY

I have a very individualistic outlook. I believe everybody should be free to do whatever they want, provided it doesn't harm other individuals. This may sound obvious, but the implication is that any victimless "crimes" really aren't, for example. And stuff some people find OK - bailing out banks, for example - are definitely wrong.

So, my personal philosophy is to be opinionated...

Why I’m on Couchsurfing

HOW I PARTICIPATE IN COUCHSURFING

So far, I just take part in activities organised by São Paulo CSers. Soon I'll be travelling a bit around Brazil, surfing other people's couches if I can, and afterwards I plan on start hosting!

COUCHSURFING EXPERIENCE

Little. I've never surfed or hosted. But once, when I was in Haifa, Israel, I made friends with a girl who was surfing, and her host invited me to ride with them around town - I got to see that beautiful city from a spot only locals know.

Interests

Meeting new people! Having a good time!

• reading
• traveling
• surfing
• languages

Music, Movies, and Books

Movies: The Departed. Inception. Star Wars and its goofy parody Spaceballs.
Books: the Couchsurfer's, whoops, the Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy. Internet Profile Page Filling for Dummies.
Music: as stated above, classic rock. My favourite band are Rush, but I also like all the other "usual suspects": the Beatles, the Rolling Stones, the Who, Led Zeppelin, Black Sabbath, Queen, Deep Purple.

One Amazing Thing I’ve Done

Taking part in the celebrations of the 100th Bloomsday in Dublin, 2004.

Teach, Learn, Share

Well, something about languages. Brazilians have an easier time understanding our Spanish-speaking neighbours than the other way around. One big reason for this is because we have a lot more sounds in our language than they do. Our 12 vowels outnumber their mere 5 (not counting diphthongs). So, if you want to learn Portuguese, you have to look out for the distinction between closed and open E and O (they sound a bit like the vowels in the words bed, say, door and hope). Also, nasal vowels! The sound comes not just through your mouth but also your nose, which is tough to relate to English. Perhaps if you try to "mix" the sounds of the letters U and N in the word "under", you'll be getting close to a nasal vowel. (Nevermind that it's a nasal A, not U.)

So, yeah, Portuguese is harder than Spanish!