Berkley Center

“There is no Portuguese equivalent of the English word ‘streamline,’ and that should tell you something about Brazilian culture.”

My program director in Rio de Janeiro said this to our group during orientation on one of my first days in Brazil. It was nice of him to warn us, but it did not take long for me to realize this on my own. It seems like nothing here has an efficient process. For example, at restaurants there are often three different lines to wait in before you can sit down with your food: one to order, one to pay, and another to receive your meal. Additionally, in order to buy my Portuguese book for class, I had to go to the computer lab and print out an order form, bring the form to a bank to pay for the book, and then bring the receipt to the foreign language office to receive the book. It took an afternoon to do what one click on Amazon could have done had I been in the United States!

Life in Rio is certainly more disorganized than life in the United States, but Brazilians navigate it just fine. You may have to wait in three lines to get your food, but everyone easily figures out the system each restaurant implements. It may take an entire afternoon to obtain your textbook for class, but Brazilian students still arrive at school calm and prepared. Brazilians traverse their disorganized system in a completely organized way, while I run around frenetically trying to plot a course through seemingly incomprehensible procedures. How do they do it?

Believe it or not, I found the answer during a samba class. During my first month in Rio, my study abroad program organized an evening of samba. It included a brief lesson and a chance to show off our new skills at a “samba school,” a party where professional samba groups perform. At our samba lesson, we learned a few specific steps and moves. I assumed that we would do these exact steps when we arrived at the samba party, but I misunderstood. Samba is basically a free for all. When I was watching the professional sambistas, it was clear that everyone was improvising, swirling, shaking, and twirling around in a mass of color and sparkle. Yet they somehow moved in sync, as if they planned every step. I found it truly impressive that they could both act individually and adapt to what the group was doing at the same time.

Brazilians can flourish in a messy system for the same reason that the professional sambistas can simultaneously improvise and coordinate their dance moves. It is because they are able to easily adapt to whatever situation they are thrown into. They take in their surroundings and adjust their movements accordingly, all while keeping in time with the music, completely unfazed. That is why they can effortlessly traverse a complex system, while I still stumble along. Brazilian culture may lack the rules and rigidity that enable the efficiency of American society, but what they lose in efficiency they gain in the ability to easily accommodate change. In today’s dynamic world, this type of flexibility could prove invaluable.

While the United States travels in straight lines, Brazil swirls, loops, and pirouettes. The end result may not be streamlined, but it is colorful, exciting, and uniquely Brazil—just like the samba.