While the children were at school learning Portuguese through sudden total immersion, we were learning in a piecemeal way: a mixture of tackling necessary tasks (paying the rent, talking to the neighbours, signing a mobile phone contract, joining the health centre) and studying from a textbook. This text is from April 2021:
As we work our way through our Português Língua Não Materna text book (Non-Mother Tongue Portuguese) a world-view begins to emerge. The illustrations are almost all of young or middle-aged adults, well-dressed with ecstatic smiles. They grip their mugs of coffee. They gesture to the pastries that decorate the tables of the university canteen. They always meet in the university canteen.
They talk about their trip to Japan, or their friend who’s just back from Mozambique. They live in Lisbon or in Cascais and play tennis and go to parties. They ask each other ‘Onde mora? Cascais? Que interessante!’
When a character from outside Portugal enters a dialogue they always have an alibi: Yes, I’m here to learn Portuguese. Hi, I’m doing a degree in Portuguese literature. Pleased to meet you, I’m visiting the North of Portugal, it is so beautiful in spring. If they’re not a student, then they’re an architect or a doctor on a working visit. No-one has a boring job. No-one is poor.
The free videos we use on Youtube concur: the lessons teach you the language for eating out, hiring a car at the airport, buying clothes. A world cleansed of sickness, struggle and injustice. It’s a period piece, a costume drama. It’s a way in.
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