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March 22, 2005
I am Fine. I am So Fine.
My friend Dercio translates his greetings directly from the Portuguese. Thus he asks me, "Are you fine?"
"Yes, Dercio," I say. "I am fine."
"I am fine too," he says. Sometimes he kicks off an e-mail by writing, "I am so fine, so anyway..."
But the point of this message is to say that I am so fine. I am writing from the port city of Beira in central Mozambique. I have just spent an hour listening to the provincial health director bitch at me about the lack of support from the central government. Beira is a run-down city of about 400,000 without much to recommend it. The HIV prevalence rate here is about 40 percent; Beira is the endpoint of a transportation corridor from central Mozambique, Zimbabwe and Malawi.
Tomorrow I head into the bush to visit several very rural clinics. My guide for this trip is Dr. Aurelio Gomes, perhaps the most cynical person Iīve met about the AIDS situation here and the governmentīs ability to manage it.
The Internet access here is slow, and Iīm sure itīs non-existent where Iīm going. I have much more I want to post, but I donīt know when Iīll find the time.
Update: My luggage also is so fine. Thanks to everyone for asking. It arrived in Maputo three days after me. To get it, I just walked into the international arrival baggage claim, picked it up, and walked out. It was very efficient.
Posted by Adam Graham-Silverman at March 22, 2005 04:24 PM
Comments
Do you think Dercio is going to hate you when he finds out he has the lingo all wrong, and you told all your friends instead of correcting him? You bastard.
Posted by: Daphne at March 25, 2005 08:09 PM
I love the expression and plan to start using it. As someone who has spent my fair share of time screwing up idiomatic expressions in foreign languages, I appreciate the value of oddly strung together words that may seem vaguely foolish but are also utterly charming. Sometimes you need to defamiliarize your notions of your own language. And that is so fine.
Posted by: Mira at March 28, 2005 07:05 PM