I’m a bit behind on corrections from texts I’ve written on r/Writestreakpt. I published one called “A Greve dos Comboios” a few days ago, which I was told was error free but turned out to be full of crap so I’ve just republished that with the corrections on place. Thanks to Dani for doing such a thorough job.
Also, I keep thinking of all the posts I’ve written on here and forgotten about. It seems like I should do a sort of “revision” series where I oickniut the most interesting or neglected tips from my well-over-a-thousand posts. When would I find time though?
Looking at Guilherme Duarte’s website yesterday, I noticed that he’s actually playing a show here in London later this year. He’s at the Leicester Square Theatre on the fourth of November. I don’t think I’ve seen Portuguese comedians including London dates in their tour schedule before, and I’m not really sure how he’s going to be able to fill the room on a Friday night, but I am definitely going to see that!
A few days later, I have tickets to see Dulce Pontes at Cadogan Hall. That was originally scheduled for 2021.but it was delayed due to covid. November is going to be a good month for Portuguese culture in the capital.
Carrying on the translation tradition, I thought I’d have a go at this rap by Gandim because I can understand most of it but not quite all and I thought it would be fun to do the research and really understand it from top to bottom. Gandim means something like “workshy person”. He isn’t a real rapper, he’s a character invented by Guilherme Duarte. Duarte originally trained as a computer scientist (that’s relevant context for the song, believe it or not!) but he’s famous as a comedian who has been involved in a few different podcasts and media projects such as “Por Falar Noutras Coisas” (“Speaking of Other Things”). Here, he’s having a rap battle with himself in his “real” persona. It’s quite funny and has lots of good slang. It’s ABSOLUTELY FILTHY though. Seriously – this is definitely the rudest thing I’ve ever translated on here, so if you’re of a sensitive disposition you might want to skip this one!
It’s also interesting how they’re using some english words and expresions in ways that are close to but not quite identical to the way we use them ourselves: even in the title, “ego-trip”, seems just to mean a boastful rap and “feat” is obviously just “featuring” but later in the lyrics they seem to be using it as a noun, roughly equivalent to “collaboration”
*= Not sure what’s going on here – short for “nos esta(mos)” I think…?
**=I’ve gone against my principles and written this the american way because british spelling and rap do not mix
***=Look, I’m sorry, I’m just the translator, don’t blame me
****=I think this must mean the hungarian footballer who died of a heart attack on the pitch – hence the reaction!
*****=Comer a tua dama means “eat your lady” but comer is also a slang word for “have sex”, so I probably could have translated it less literally than this. The other relevant piece of information here is that the game we call drafts is called Damas in portuguese, and when you take the opponents piece, the word for taking can be “capturar” or “comer” so he could be talking about playing draughts. but in this context, probaby not!
******I guess he means Lamborghini here but the fact it’s so close to “lamber” is setting my double entendre radar pinging)
*******faroeste = far west? I’ve never heard this before, but I googled faroeste and it does indeed bring up a load of wild west films dubbed into portuguese!
********=-I assume this is the same as the slang use of spit in english – spitting lyrics, spitting facts. He’s dissing your rap lyrics, basically
*********= Panenka… he’s a footballer apparently. Good at penalties. Google him, I can’t explain
**********=This is an expression that comes up sometimes in exercise books – it just means something like – “we just carry on as normal, no matter what happens or who complains”
***********= Maria Joao Abreu was an actress who had died a few months before the video was released, so you’re meant to think that the shocked reaction that follows is as a result of the extreme bad taste of what he’s just said.
I usually record.my daily calories and exercise in my fitness app in Portuguese to get used to the language of food and health generally but we had vegetarian haggis today. I didn’t even bother looking that one up…
Some examples from the book I’m using, with idiomatic expressions relating to clothing. (Roupa). Example sentences are difficult if you’re working on your own because of course there is no model answer to check so I am just shamelessly posting them as my daily text on writestreakpt
Diz-se que o ex-ministro dos Negócios Estrangeiros recebeu luvas com origem na Rússia. (Receber luvas = take a bribe)
A crise financeira provocou desemprego no Sul da Europa portanto os cidadãos tiveram de apertar os cintos. (apertar o cinto = tighten one’s belt)
Os meus amigos trabalham na Televisão Estatal e quanto à realização de programas, sabem as linhas com que se cosem. (saber as linhas com que se cose = to be expert in some skill)
Another translation post. I’m in a translatey mood, I guess. This one is by Orelha Negra with A Garota Não (again!) on guest vocals. Like yesterday’s, it has a strong feminist theme, but whereas that was just calmly wishing for more representation, this one is about domestic violence so it’s pretty raw: far moreso than I would have guessed from the general vibe of the music. Batida can mean beat in the musical sense as well as “beaten” or “beating” in the violent sense, so I think I had an idea that it was jsut a song about making music until I started trying to translate it line by line.
To be honest, it comes across as pretty bleak, but I don’t think it’s *just * that: there seems to be sense of wanting to move beyond the situation and reassert dignity. For a start, you have the dialogue at the beginning and the end of the song in english, talking about being ready for something. Then there’s the woman who does the live painting in the video (below). She’s called Mázinha and she’s obviously got a positive sense of the song being about forgiveness and redemption (quote here) so she’s painted a really upbeat image, indicative of a new start – presumably after leaving the dude. There isn’t much of that in the song lyrics though, as far as I can see!
Cala esses demónios / Silence those demons Já te podes perdoar / You could forgive yourself Não levantes essa mão se não for pra lutar / Don’t raise that hand unless it’s to fight Por um dia mais claro / For a brighter day Por um tempo mais doce / For a sweeter time Não trocava um abraço p’la jóia que fosse / She didn’t exchange an embrace for any jewel
O tamanho da mini saia / The size of a mini skirt É inverso a essa cobardia / Is the inverse of that cowardice Se não aguentas a mulher que tens / If you can’t stand the woman you have É porque te fica em demasia / It’s because she’s too much for you
Só mulher bonita /Only a beautiful woman Todas altas e esguias /All tall and slender E só entra a gorda /And the fat woman only shows up Para perder calorias /To go on a diet
A preta não entra /The black woman doesn’t appear A baixa não entra, não /The short woman doesn’t, no A velha não entra /The old woman doesn’t appear A torta não entra, não /The disabled** woman doesn’t appear, no Quanto talento gasto em vão /How much talent is wasted?
A preta não entra /The black woman doesn’t appear A baixa não entra, não /The short woman doesn’t, no A velha não entra /The old woman doesn’t appear A torta não entra, não /The disabled** woman doesn’t appear, no Quanto talento gasto em vão /How much talent is wasted?
*Coxa usually means thigh but I think the sense here is the feminine form of “coxo”, which is defined as “pessoa que coxeia” – a person who limps. So I have opted for “a lame woman” which I hope is what she meant!
**Torta, in this context, is a bit confusing. It means twisted or bent, and priberam gives a few informal meanings including rowdy, cross-eyed, disloyal. I’ve also seen twisted in the sense of having a crooked face after local anaesthetic at the dentist, so possibly someone with an asymmetrical or disfigured face…? I originally published this with the translation as “twisted” but I’ve edited it subsequently because some people I spoke to on reddit indicated that we’re supposed to picture someone whose bones are deformed in some way and who essentially has some form of physical disability or impairment.
I wrote a short text about speaking. Thanks to csc_3 for the help with this one.
A minha cunhada visitou a irmã dela ontem, o que me deu oportunidade de falar português. A minha mulher costuma* falar inglês em casa, mas quando a famÃlia se junta, a conversa passa para português. Falei bem (na minha opinião!), mas estou consciente de ter feito** alguns erros de concordância e tal. Preciso de falar mais.
*dammit, I seem to have some sort of weird mental block about whether to write “costuma” or “customa”
** Hm, when I originally wrote this, I was trying to say “I was conscious of making errors” while I was speaking but by the time the corrector finished straightening out the grammar it said “I am conscious of having made errors” which is also true but I was trying to describe my feeling of self-consciousness in the moment so the meaning has changed slightly.
Portuguese people be like…
I think this lack of speaking practice is a problem I really need to get hold of. As I said a while ago, when I was feeling gloomy, speaking another language is a challenge when you’re an introvert who doesn’t really live for conversation in any language. But I need to make the effort to find a place to get some serious speaking time.
Here’s a joke you can use at parties if you want people to look at you with a baffled, pitying expression:
Hoje em dia, os cães são autocolantes mas antigamente, se quisesse prender um cão numa parede ou seja o que for, teria de usar Cola Cão
Cola = glue and Cão (with an accent) means dog so I’m reading this as dog glue, even though I know it’s a brand of hot chocolate powder and Cao is short for Cacau. The joke is just riffing off the idea of what you might use dog glue for.
It doesn’t work because Cao is pronounced differently from Cão. More like “Cáu”. Apparently it took a couple of reads to even see what I was driving at. Disappointing. I was quite proud of it.
Luso 