I’d always known that a year abroad would be a part of my undergraduate experience.  But what I didn’t know, and certainly hadn’t expected, was that following a year abroad in Salvador da Bahia, Brazil, I would be sitting in a Main Street pizzeria explaining to one of my best friends at Smith that I had changed, and having that not be enough to describe that I had fallen in love with a place, with a people, with a person, and most importantly with a way in which my life could be potentially other. I had, indeed, been irrevocably changed.

I thought I was somehow exempt from a process of adapting. My JYA term in Salvador da Bahia was not my first experience in Brazil, nor was Portuguese a language I casually picked up during my first years at Smith. I was the proverbial know-it-all and I thought, despite my mediocre language skills and vast generalizations of a diverse and varied culture, that I was going to dominate in my new environment.

But, life is nothing if but a never-ending exercise in humility. And I was quick to discover that I had ample room for improvement not only in my capacity for conversation, but also in the understanding of the rich cultural and topographical landscape unfolding before me. It took me almost six months before I felt comfortable engaging in real conversation or had the intuition to decipher jokes, music or television references, and even signs of affection.

I cannot deny that my abroad experience was invaluable in the immersive opportunity it provided. My knowledge and use of the Portuguese language continues to flourish every time I return to Salvador da Bahia. However, it was definitely not the most academically productive year of my life. I felt, as a foreigner, that I was anonymous on campus. And because of that anonymity, I didn’t feel like anyone expected me to show up.

So, I frequently skipped class to take trips to a nearby island with my boyfriend at the time, or simply sleep in. I didn’t dedicate the same energy and care to written assignments because I thought, “this isn’t my real school.” As a result, when I returned to Smith, after a year of half-hearted and lackadaisical academic participation, everything from my attendance to my grammar suffered. And my heart, too, yearning for that other life I had merely glimpsed, suffered from what the Brazilians call saudades; an untranslatable word for an implacable longing.

I can’t pinpoint exactly what shocked me back into reality. Perhaps it was a professor’s email letting me know she’d been keeping track of my absences or the disappointing grades I received in areas where I had previously excelled. But, suddenly I realized, stripped of the anonymity I’d spent a year fostering, that I had allowed a pervasive ennui to take the reins of my academic career. I never felt more humble than the week I resolved to meet with my fall semester professors to discuss my poor performance. The magic of Smith is its inherent network of support. All of my professors knew I could do better and were glad to know that I was finally taking stock and responsibility.

With reinvigorated determination, I was able to focus my efforts on two exciting projects concerning Brazilian women writers. One, examining the endless mysteries of Clarice Lispector, arguably, Brazil’s most renowned woman writer of the 20th century and her self-conscious narrative writing. And the other, exercising creative prowess, translating a selection of poems by mystic poet, Hilda Hilst. I presented my senior seminar paper on the role of the author and Lispector’s The Hour of the Star to receptive classmates and professor’s praise. I shared my Hilst’s translations and all the struggles and small victories bound up with translating them on a Collaborations panel. And with these projects as a foundation, I applied for, and was honored with, a Fulbright research grant to translate the poetry of major Bahian literary figure, Myriam Fraga.

It’s been three years since my abroad experience and my grant period is coming to a close. I always come back a little bit sandy and a little bit sad. These adapting, and consequently, humbling experiences have taught me to dust off the sand, push through the sadness, to harness that new knowledge into fascinating and rewarding work on the road to a life of distinction.

Photo © Chloe Hill. All rights reserved.

Chloe Hill is a Portuguese-English translator and literary researcher currently based in Salvador da Bahia, Brazil. She holds a BA in Portuguese/Brazilian Studies and Comparative Literature from Smith College. Her work emphasizes Brazilian women poets, with translations of Hilda Hilst’s poetry published in Metamorphoses, the Five College Literary Translation Journal, and her current project translating Bahian poet, Myriam Fraga as part of a Fulbright research grant. Her writing has also appeared on Dispatches, the Words Without Borders blog. She was the 2011-2012 student correspondent to the Smith College Alumnae Quarterly, and has previously worked at the Brazilian Endowment for the Arts in New York City as Assistant Literary Events Coordinator.

 

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