Uncle Eduardo* was an assiduous character of my childhood.
When I came to visit, yo was tiny. He would lift me off the floor and smack me wet kisses with his profuse itchy black beard plus an unmistakable pipe smell. I wiped my cheeks, annoyed and rude. The adults were amused. I believe.
From him I also learned one of my favorite expressions: go plant coconuts on the asphalt.
Anyway. For me, the craziest thing about Uncle Eduardo was his accent: a mixture of Portuguese-from-Portugal and Northeastern. Coolest thing in the world. Mezzo-portentoso, mezzo-dragged way of speaking. Because Uncle Eduardo was at the same time Portuguese and from Pernambuco – he lived in Recife, until the end.
I remembered this dear friend of my parents these days talking to a Spaniard who lived in SP for a couple of years.
By the way, whenever I run into this guy, the conversation is in Portuguese, with the right to say “hey”, “cool mill”, “can you believe”, “pooooouurra”. I think, at this point, he speaks Portuguese more fluently than I do.
When I mentioned that I was born in Pernambuco, he burst out laughing.
“That’s a hell of a lot, huh?!
[insert aqui sua cara de orgulho ao meter um “pra caramba”]
Eeeh. Like this. It’s far from here for Pernambuco, son – I thought about replying, vaguely offended.
He explained:
— My father, who is Andalusian from Granada, when he wanted to say that something was far away, he would send a ‘he went to Pernambuco and didn’t come back’.
That’s how I discovered that Pernambuco, in the Spanish imagination, is as far away as Cochinchina.
It is said that the origin or, at least, the popularization of the expression goes back to a very famous Spanish humor almanac created in 1958, Mortadelo y Filemón (Mort & Phil, or, in Brazil, Mortadelo and Salaminho, published almost nonstop from 1974 onwards). ), by the Barcelona-born Francisco Ibáñez (who remains steadfast at the age of 86 ♡).
They’re like Asterix or Tintin from Spain.
In their adventures, the two main characters, clumsy secret agents from the TIA, were always leaving or sending someone to Pernambuco. Every time they “put a paw” (= they took a shit), which happened every 2-3 comics, it was time to flee to Pernambuco.
It is also said around here: “vete Pernambuco”, which is like the go-plant-coconut-in-the-asphalt. Nowadays, the expression is something chaste, like ember, mora, but everyone knows it.
Well there it is. My hometown, 6,262 kilometers from Madrid, is part of the Spanish pantheon of the Far-Away-Quasi-Chimerical Lands (item: ok, ok, but that #tejedito that Rio de Janeiro is at least 1,500 km further from Madrid than Recife Only the fame, the fame…).
Anyway, it’s not a matter of distance.
For Spaniards, for example, and speaking of ubiquitous topics of the moment, Ukraine can also be far away. More precisely, Sevastopol, the largest city in Crimea, a zone of centuries-old disputes and the epicenter of the crisis that led to the (contested) annexation of the region by Russia in 2014.
In Spain, “aquà y en Sevastopol” means: whatever it is, it’s true everywhere.
In this case, the origin of the expression dates back not to the 2014 conflict, but to the Crimean War between 1853 and 1856.
Thanks to press coverage at the time, the name of this strategic port on the Black Sea, until then relatively unknown in the western zorope, gained space in the collective imagination. Sevastopol, 3,000 kilometers from here.
***
In Recife, uncle Eduardo sailed, like my father. One day he went to sea and didn’t come back — not with his quiet vivacity, not with his pipe at the end of his mustache, not with his dreamy gaze with long eyelashes.
Pernambuco, so far and so within. I miss I don’t know what.
######
*name changed because you
