Sometimes I wish we all were born fluent in all languages. I don't ever wish there was just one language, though, because I think all of them have their way of being breathtakingly beautiful and poetic and make me want to cry.
I love the fact that I am fluent in different languages. That has always been a passion of mine. I speak English and Portuguese fluently, my Spanish is pretty damn ok, and I know some French just to get by.
There's this singer/songwriter in Brazil called Adriana Calcanhoto, and she's by far one of my favorite lyricists ever. She's fresh, contemporary, and if you could design music, that's what she would be. A music designer. Her words come with images, with smells, and flow through history, art and philosophy so subtly that makes you sing the words like they just came out of a kid's lullaby. And in this case, they kinda did. Last year, she released an album called "Partimpim", and she went on a tour around the country where at least 60% of her crowds were children of all ages. My favorite song of the CD is called "Saiba", which means "Know" in English. It reminds me of the old LPs my parents would play for my sister and I when we were kids. I wish there were more of these.
--
Know (Adriana Calcanhoto)
Know: everybody's been a baby
Einstein, Freud and Plato too
Hitler, Bush and Saddam Hussein
Those who have dough and those who don't
Know: everybody's had a childhood
Mohammed was also a kid
Archimedes, Buddha, Galileo
just like you and I.
Know: everybody's been afraid
Even if it was a secret
Nietzsche and Simone de Beauvoir
Fernandinho Beira-Mar
Know: everybody will die
President, general or king
Anglo-Saxons or muslims
Each and every human being
Know: everybody's had a father
Those who have passed and those who will
Lao Tse, Moses, Ramsés, Pelé
Gandhi, Mike Tyson, Salome
Know: everybody's had a mother
Indians, africans and germans,
Nero, Che Guevara, Pinochet
just like you and I.
