They Don't Speak Spanish In Brasil

By Bob E Sherman

As an audit supervisor for Ernst & Ernst, the author applied for a transfer to Barcelona and ended up in Sao Paulo Brazil. The book is a humorous look at working overseas. It's both a memoir and a travelogue. The book includes many pictures of Brazil and South America. The book is an excellent reference for anyone planning to visit or work in Brazil.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Bob E Sherman
• Release date: Jun 23, 2013
• ISBN: 9781301891801

Bob E Sherman

Bob E. Sherman was born and raised on the Jersey Shore. He attended MIT (Milwaukee) to be a diesel mechanic; then transferred to The U to study marine biology before getting his degree in accounting. A retired CPA, he is now a licensed USCG captain and former columnist for the Waterfront Times. His column, Dead Reckoning, received the 2010 Merit Award from Boating Writers International. His first book of tongue-in-cheek essays, Am I the Only One That Signals? was published in 2008.

Book preview

Você pode se lembrar-me dos meus dias de jogar futebol. Eu me aposentei pela terceira vez, ao mesmo tempo que Beto se mudou de volta para os EUA. Setenta e cinco mil torcedores assistiram o meu último jogo em outubro de 1977. Um número um pouco menor disse adeus a Beto no aeroporto. Quando Beto mudou para o Brasil em 1975, eu fui para os EUA para jogar para os Cosmos Nova York.

Eu nunca conheci Beto. O irmão-de-lei do meu melhor amigo do primo de segundo grau sabia que sua empregada Janda e me pediu para escrever o prefácio do seu livro. Janda falou muito bem dele. Eu não sei como ela sabia que ele estava escrevendo um livro trinta e cinco anos depois que ele deixou o Brasil. Eu li uma cópia antecipada do livro e não fez muito sentido para mim. Os americanos são pessoas engraçadas.

Eu gostei do capítulo Loucura de futebol. É o único capítulo que eu entendi. Ele prova que os americanos nunca vai ganhar uma Copa do Mundo. Eu também gosto do título do livro. Porque, quando me mudei para Nova York, todo mundo ficou falando espanhol para mim.

– Pelé [2]

My Translation:

You may remember me from my days of playing football. I retired for the third time, the same time that Bob moved back to the US. Seventy-five thousand fans watched my last game in October 1977. A slightly smaller number said goodbye to Bob at the airport. When Bob moved to Brazil in 1975, I went to the US to play for the New York Cosmos.

I never met Bob. The brother-in-law of my best friend's second cousin knew his housekeeper Janda and asked me to write the foreword to his book. Janda spoke highly of him. I don’t know how she knew he was writing a book thirty-five years after he left Brazil. I read an advance copy of the book and it did not make much sense to me. Americans are funny people.

I liked the chapter, Soccer Madness. It’s the only chapter I understood. He proves that Americans will never win a World Cup. I also like the book's title because everyone was speaking Spanish to me, when I moved to New York.

[2] The foreword actually was written by the author during a Macumba consultation, after he drank chicken blood and slipped into the persona of Pelé.

Preface

When I tell people I lived in Brazil for two years, they always say So you speak Spanish? Back in 1976, I knew very little about Brazil. I did know, however, they spoke Portuguese. In the early seventies I worked as an audit supervisor with Ernst & Ernst in Orlando. An opportunity arose to work overseas in Spain. My story takes you through the steps of applying for a position in Barcelona but ending up in São Paulo, where I worked for two years.

I used some Brazilian words throughout the book. The English translation follows if the meaning is not obvious. I have not kept in touch with the Americans or Brazilians I worked with in Brazil. I tried to Google, Facebook and Twitter them to no avail. Some of the difficulty may be due to their common names. Unlike them, there is only one Bob E. Sherman.

One of my colleagues Sergio with his wife Sonia and Tomas another colleague.

Thirty-five years ago Brazil was considered the country of the next decade and still is today. As the 2012 article The Country of the Future, Again? in The American Interest suggests. Brazil is largely ignored by Americans compared to attention given to other Central and South America countries that primarily are known for the trouble they cause, the Mexican drug cartel, anti-American polices in Cuba and Venezuela, to name a few. The Brazilian population has increased in recent years in South Florida, especially Miami. I belong to the South Florida Brazilian Meetup Group that meets regularly at restaurants and other venues featuring anything Brazilian.

I’ll never forget my experience in Brazil. I learned a second language, travelled around South America, and acquired a taste for Brazilian music and cuisine. I also got to visit three of the Seven Wonders of the World, Iguaçu Falls, Christ the Redeemer statue in Rio de Janeiro, and Machu Picchu in Peru. However, I was disappointed to find the toilets didn’t swirl in the opposite direction, contrary to popular belief. Gravity is universal; therefore, outhouses work the same in both hemispheres.

Overseas Opportunity

After graduating from the University of Miami (The U), I took a position in Orlando with Ernst & Ernst CPAs, known affectionately as Uncle Ernie. I was a minority, as Uncle Ernie did most of its recruiting at the University of Florida and Florida State University. I was the only Miami Hurricane for the six years I worked there. As an auditor, I worked in many industries, unlike many of my colleagues who concentrated on one. I chose to be flexible, which was not the best career choice.

One day I was enjoying one of our fringe benefits — a six-ounce Coke for 5 cents — in the employee lounge. A notice on the bulletin board advertised an opening in the Barcelona office. Uncle Ernie was known as Ernst & Whinney in Europe. With no audit specialty or kids, I thought it seemed like an exciting opportunity. I spoke a little Spanish, thanks to Viola Bates, my high-school Spanish teacher, and living in