First, it was the easy route. I had, to date, had a stellar track record learning Spanish which unfortunately I'd only used during brief jaunts to central Mexico and for chatting up the Mexican chocolate makers at the store I called home during high school (as evidenced by my slow but sure weight gain). However as I prepared to graduate from high school, the real turning point was a dinner with Dan Crowley, a now deceased professor of festivals at UC Davis. "Portuguese, the language of the future!" he declared. "X million people speak it. If you can, you'll be set. Not only that but Brazil is the most amazing, beautiful country I have ever seen." Of course I am paraphrasing since that conversation took place many years ago, and unlike in many books, I don't have flashbacks to exact conversations. However, whatever he said made me try out Portuguese. After the first class at UCLA, the beautiful ssshing of the language had me hooked.

I studied the Portuguese language through the advanced classes. I remembered what I learned for years. I never went to Brazil, or Portugal for that matter. Always an excuse - too dangerous, no one to go with, don't want to leave my job or boyfriend, boo hoo. Somehow I managed to voyage to Europe, Mexico, Costa Rica, Guatemala, and across the US several times during that period.