“Wherever you go… are there…which means, no matter where you move to, you still are… you are gonna be… yourself”
This proverb probably comes from the informant’s direct experience as an immigrant. Probably many circles of immigrants have this proverb as a way to connect back to their roots from home. It’s a proverb that exists within the community a sort of rule to not move away from your roots and that as far as one may leave home, at the end of the day, they are still themselves.
“Saci Perere is a Brazilian legend… that…it… he is… Sani Perere is a black boy with only one leg, a red cap, and a pipe in his mouth, so he keeps peeping…erm….smoking his pipe and the red hat…the red cap gives him the power of disappearing whenever… ummm… he feels like it or whenever he is a….ummmm… tricky situation. He is a prankster so he is always playing tricks in the country side people of Brazil. Like, he would hide the toys of the kids in the garden, or… not in the garden whatever… or he would make the cake not rise, or he would spoil the eggs… so that’s Saci Perere… so he’s a trickster but he’s not like… he doesn’t really do any bad deed so he is kind of loved by people around the country”
Saci is a fairly popular folkperson throughout Brazil, appearing on products, and television shows alike. Almost as recognizable as Robin Hood. He seems to be partly based in stereotypes around black people within Brazil who has constantly had fairly racist named folk beliefs and names for things. Even some early drawings of Saci Perere feature overblown racist features that one might find in a United States minstrel show.
“Okay… so I don’t remember where I heard this riddle I must have been extremely young. But I remember it very vividly because I thought it was so cool and I don’t know what it’s called but I remember how it goes. So a Sphinx… when you’re walking down a path and you’re just trying to keep walking but a Sphinx is in your way and so…in order to get past the Sphinx the Sphinx will never let you pass and I think it kills you if you don’t answer the riddle correctly… but the only way to pass is to answer a riddle correctly and this is the riddle the Sphinx asks, ‘what walks on four legs in the morning, two legs during the day, and three legs in the evening’ and nobody ever gets it right so the Sphinx always kills them or doesn’t let them pass, I don’t remember if they kill them or don’t let them pass but the correct answer is a person like a human being because when you’re a baby you crawl on four legs and when you are an adult, you walk on two, and when you’re an old man, you walk on two and your third is a cane and that’s how the Sphinx gets ya”
This is a fairly common folktale if one had studied greek legends. what I enjoy about this folklore is that it’s both a story. A folktale about a Sphinx that kills people, but it’s also a riddle as well. There is a riddle within the story. It’s very Shakespearean in that sense.
“Every year in D.C… Washington D.C., there’s what’s called a Cherry Blossom Festival. And ummm… it’s in the spring and it… happens each year when all of the cherry blossom trees… blossom… I guess…ummm… and… it’s super cool because everything is that bright washed out shade of pink and there are pedals everywhere especially after the festival is over and like the trees like… and the pedals have fallen everywhere because of the wind. I used to think it was super cool when I was like eight, but now I just think it’s kind of a nuisance because it happens every year but it creates a ton of traffic and I can’t get where I need to go… And it happens in D.C. and like in Annapolis there’s like… that’s like an hour’s distance and there’s still traffic so it is a gridlock nightmare but it’s still a super cool part of D.C. that not a lot of people that… don’t spend a lot of time in D.C. realize. So it’s a fun tradition”
This one is a modern festival based on a natural phenomenon. We don’t usually have that many new festivals based on these phenomenons in modern day. We don’t celebrate the winter solstice or anything really but this seems to be a festival representational off of a new age of spring and the aesthetic beauty of the cherry blossoms of Washington D.C.
“I had an ummm…. sort of racist I mean it was very racist, I think this might have been in the Devils Rejects, was it in the devil’s rejects? I think it was anyways I did the same thing as the people in the Devil’s Rejects did in elementary school… not murdering people… but this demented nursery rhyme… it went sort of like ‘Chinese, Japanese, look at these hit my knees*’ it was very racist and I think that’s why we did it and even the Japanese kids in our class did it…. ummmmm…. We knew it was bad and we did it anyways (laughs)”
*note the informant does motions with his hands when he says “Chinese” he stretches his eyes length wise, “Japanese” he stretches them width wise, “Look at these” he motions towards his chest as if to insinuate breasts, “Hit my knees” fairly self explanatory, the speaker hits his knees.
I found this one interesting because it’s a rhyme that’s clearly at the level where it’s made for kids. It’s very intentionally crude as sort of a taboo rhyme. It was a horrible non sensical thing to say but it whoever said it felt like they were breaking rules. This probably added to the fun of the rhyme.