E agora, Jose? What now?

Minha vida esta numa dessas encruzilhadas. E a sensacao e a de que essa nao e a primeira vez, e muito menos sera a ultima. A diferenca e como eu me sinto em frente a situacao.
Ok, ok, eu conto.
Ha 3.5 anos, moramos no Oriente Medio. Sempre soubemos que essa opcao nao e eterna. O Oriente Medio e otimo pra quem quer trabalhar, ter um certo estilo de vida e um dia voltar pra casa.
O problema e que eu nao tenho "casa".
Nosso tempo por aqui esta acabando ( o que me angustia e me desespera, por que eu poderia facilmente ficar aqui pelos proximos 30 anos. Eu me encontrei, eu sou feliz aqui). Meu marido nao quer ficar aqui nem mais um minuto. Ele esta cansado disso tudo e quer ir embora. A situacao na empresa dele tambem nao esta das melhores, e mesmo que ele quisesse ficar, talvez nos nao pudessemos. Tudo e uma grande incognita.
Pensei em arrumar um trabalho em periodo integral e ficar aqui com as meninas, mas nenhum emprego me pagaria o suficiente para que eu pudesse pagar o aluguel a escola delas e viver tranquilamente. Ai a sinuca de bico. Eu nao tenho muita opcao. Embora haja um numero enorme de opcoes disponiveis para "nos", elas sao todas possibilidades, nenhuma certeza, nenhuma garantia.
E eu estou exausta. estou cansada de viver essa vida temporaria. De tres em tres anos, nos empacotamos tudo e vamos embora, comecar do zero em algum lugar novo.
Com a crise mundial, nos nao sabemos nem onde vamos parar dessa vez. Australia? Nova Zelandia? Europa? Hong Kong? Cingapura? Canada? USA?
A verdade e que eu nao queria ir para lugar nenhum. Queria ficar aqui, no Oriente Medio, que e quente e onde eu nao preciso ficar fazendo continha pra ver se a grana vai dar pro supermercado.
Vou ali tomar um Prozac e ja volto!!

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My life at one of those crossroads at the moment. I feel this is not the first time and,  unfortunately, it will not be the last. The difference now, is how I feel in front of the situation.Ok, ok, I tell you what is going on.We have been in Bahrain for almost 4 years. We always knew living in the Middle East is not a permanent option. The place is great for people who want to come here, work, live a different life style and one day go home.The problem is: I have no "home".Our time here is coming to an end (which distresses me and drives me to despair, as I could easily stay here for the next 30 years. I'm happy here). My husband does not want to stay here any longer. He's tired of it all and wants to leave. He had enough. And the situation in his company is not the best, even if he wanted to stay, we might not be able to. Everything is a big incognita at the moment.I even considered getting a full time job and staying here with girls, but no job would pay me enough so I could pay rent, their school and live comfortably.It seems  I do not have many options, I will have to leave this place.
Although there are a huge number of options available to "us", they are all possibilities, none of them are certain. We could do this, we could do that, we could do the other thing. But we may not be able to do any of them.It will all depend on where and if we find a new job.I'm exhausted. I'm tired of living this temporary life. every three years, we packed up everything and leave, starting from scratch, somewhere new.With the global crisis, we do not even know where we will end up this time. Australia? New Zealand? Europe? Hong Kong? Singapore? Canada? USA?The truth is I do not want to go anywhere. I want to stay here in the Middle East, which is hot and where I do not need to be counting coins to see if I can afford the supermarket bill.
I will go there, have a Prozac and will be back soon...

I spent a wonderful weekend with my Lost Family in Guaraci ! Don't worry, I will tell you all about the weekend, with photos and everything, in the next posts. Today I will only talk about the "father syndrome" that took over my dad's actions during the weekend.

 I'm thirty-nine years old, I live across the world and have two teenage daughters. Right? Right.

Well we went to my cousin's BBQ party where we met the whole family. The party was great, the company wonderful, and I was dying to spend as much time as I could with them. But my dad decided to leave. 

- Shall we go?

- No. I'll stay. Someone can drive me home later.

- No Inaie. Let's go.

I was not very sure what was going on there, I just stood my position. A minute later, my mother comes, breathless:

- Your dad said if you don't come home with us now, he will not go out tonight and I am not allowed at the party either... 

I'm 39 and my mom is 59 ... and he bosses us both around. To avoid problems, I went home. Soon after, all my cousins joined me at the farm where we were staying. It was fun, we went down to the river, we eat fried fish, we laughed. 

The night we all went to the square - aunts, uncles, cousins, little cousins! The whole Ramalho clan. Guaraci and Olimpia are neighbor cities, and there was a huge party in Olimpia. A regional festival, people coming from all over the country to see it.

My cousins ​​were going, of course.

I agreed to go - I love a good party!

But my dad was quicker than before:

- Don't start, Inaie.

- I am just going to the party with them...

- You will not.

- Ahhhh??

- If you go, I'm never going anywhere with you. If I knew you would be doing THIS, I would not be here. 

I could not believe my ears, but I decided not to create a fuzz.

The hardest part was to explain to my cousins I could not join them because my dad did not let me...

Humiliation! Oh humiliation...

PIERRE HERME X FAUCHON

Eu visitei duas lojas de comida chiquerrimas hoje. Uma delas,  Pierre Herme, vende macaroons e chocolates.
O lugar e teoricamente sofisticado, os doces excepcionalmente deliciosos e o servico de alta qualidade. Visitei a loja da galeria lafayette. assim que entrei na espelunquinha, na loja, cumprimentei as imbecis, funcionarias que vao apodrecer atras daquele balcao, se nao forem demitidas por justa causa antes que isso aconteca, trabalham la.
Pois e. Eu, educadissima, disse:

- Bom dia!

E as duas cretinas, coitadas, imbeciloides, macacas, fulanas, simplesmente cairam na risada. Riam, riam e riam um pouco mais. Nao havia mais ninguem na loja. So as duas topeiras e eu.

Confesso que eu me senti mal. Cheguei ate a me sentir humilhada pelo tratamento. Como eu tenho um certo complexo de achar que a culpa de tudo e minha, fui logo tentando imaginar o que e que EU tinha feito para provocar tamanha grosseria. Nao demorei muito a perceber que as duas eram simpolesmente duas desqualificads que deveriam estar na fila do salario desemprego, ou sentadinhas na porta da Notre Dame, pedindo esmola, ou comendo os restos da comida dos pardais.

 Sai de la e fui para a Fauchon, uma loja com uma variedade de guloseimas incrivel. De chas a cafes aromatizados (em grao), de macaroons - quem precisa da Pierre Herme?? - a delicados petiscos, ha de tudo nessa loja.

E o atendimento e de verdade show de bola! Recomendo a qualquer um que va a Paris!

Comprei uma latinha de cha perfumado para a minha mae, e sai de la me sentindo a Rainha da Inglaterra. Fui bem atendida, descobri a existencia de uma loja nova, passei uns bons momentos me deliciando com os produtos da fauchon. e a Pierre Hermes que se dane...

Claro que quando cheguei em casa escrevi um e mail para  a dita loja, quem sabe a grosseria das fulaninhas e algo nao aceitavel para os padroes deles, e alguma providencia vais er tomada?

Nunca se sabe, ne?


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Today I visited two food stores in Paris. The first one, Pierre Herme, who is supposedly sophisticated, charming and exclusive, was nothing but a disappointment. Imagine That i arrived and greeted them as I normally do. There were two employees behind the counter and no clientes. Or no OTHER clients, I should say.
They looked at me and bursted into laughter. Can you imagine that? I felt humiliated, sad and terribly down.

To cheer me up, I went straight to Fauchon, another gourmet shop, this one far more complete than the first.
They have a huge variety of products, from coffee beans to savories. And an exceptional training team, who taught the employees to treat their clients with respect.

I bought a tin of flavored tea for my mum and swore I will never set foot at Pierre Hermes again. Bastards. Yep, i did write a complaint e mail. hopefully someone will care.

LONG LIVE FAUCHON!!!

PAssports, visas and bureaucracy. WHAT A PAIN!

I only have a Brazilian passport. My grandma is Italian, but Italian women did not pass citizenship to her descendants until 1949. I am married to a Brazilian who is also Italian, however citizenship is not contagious and I can not get mine this way.

Twice I lived in New Zealand long enough to be entitled to a kiwi passport ( I am already a permanent resident), but I moved away while they were processing it, which made me lose my right. I have to "do my time again"

In short: all I have is a Brazilian passport.

One that makes it difficult for me to travel within the Gulf.

One that makes officials ask me several more questions when I am at their border.

One that makes my american visa request a pain.

One that creates problems when I travel alone to some countries. Brazilian? Alone? Sorry, no can do.

One that does not allow me to visit Iran (when all my French and Kiwi friends go without a hic up)

Now the bureaucrats in Bahrain decided not to renew my residence visa (2 year worth) because 'my visa will outlive my passport.

The Brazilian embassy can not give me a new passport because it still has one year to live, and there are enough pages available.

The American Embassy In Bahrain will not issue my tourist visa because I have no place of residence ( because the bureaucrats in Bahrain decided ...

And what should I do?

Sit on the floor and cry my eyes out?

Just yell until my lungs hurt and someone gives me a new passport or someone else just stamp the visas I need?

I am accepting advice.