Class #10 with Alexia, October 29, 2026

note: this is a recording of your private coaching session with Alexia. No one will see it except you, Alexia, and Foster 🙏

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Session summary

Brighton's traffic opened a class that covered a lot of ground in Portuguese: why you won't get on a mototáxi in Rio, Alexia's friends setting off on the Caminho de Santiago by e-bike with two small children, the pilgrims who walk past Alexia and Foster's coworking and the bird you thought peregrino was, your December with a cooking course in Italy and your birthday straight after it, a New Year you'd rather not build up, Alexia's New Year's Day with dolphins, the baptism of Foster's nephew and what padrinhos are for, and it finished with having children, adoption and surrogacy, where the strongest argument was yours.

What improved is that most of the ideas in this class were yours, and Alexia was handing you the words for them. That the old streets in both cities weren't built for modern traffic was your point. So were the fear of running out of battery on an e-bike, the obrigação de ser feliz at New Year, waiting for midnight like waiting for a bus, padrinhos as the people who get o privilégio de cuidar das crianças, and the case against asking a sister to be a surrogate. You also picked words up and used them again without being asked: estreita, ten minutes after Alexia gave you estreito, and Alexia's own joke, me avisa se você sobreviver, which you turned on the pilgrims. You still reached for English a few times (to hold, I am, the same age), and that's normal at this stage. The one thing to work on before next class is three short verb endings that change the meaning completely, and they're collected in the second-to-last section: se você sobreviver, adotaria and adotaram.

🚗 O trânsito e as ruas estreitas

Não existe uma razão particular — there's no particular reason

Estreito / estreita — narrow

As ruas são estreitas — the streets are narrow

As ruas não foram construídas para o trânsito moderno — the streets weren't built for modern traffic

Hoje eu não fui de moto — I didn't go by motorbike today (you said no moto. Transport takes de: de carro, de moto, de bicicleta)

When Alexia asked whether something had happened or it was just rush hour, the answer was não existe uma razão particular: Brighton's traffic is like that a lot. Alexia said Porto's the same. Then you made the point yourself: both are old cities, and the streets weren't built for modern traffic. Alexia's version was aqui é tudo pequenininho and as ruas são estreitas. Your second point was that families with two cars don't fit, and yours has two: meu marido tem carro e eu também.

🏍️ Mototáxi: segurar e se sentir segura

Mototáxi — motorbike taxi

Abraçar — to hug, to put your arms around someone

Segurar — to hold, to hold on

Seguro / segura — safe (segura because you're a woman: eu me sinto segura)

Segurar na parte de trás da moto, eu não me sinto segura — holding on to the back of the bike, I don't feel safe

Eu não me sinto segura segurando na parte de trás da moto — I don't feel safe holding on to the back of the bike

In Rio, the mototáxi is something Alexia has never done, though she knows plenty of people who use it. You wouldn't either, and your reasons were clear: you don't trust the drivers, and you don't know them, so you'd have to abraçar a stranger. Alexia's answer: ou você abraça, ou fica segurando aqui atrás. Either you hold on to the driver or you hold the back of the bike.

That gave you the best word pair of the day. Segurar is to hold and segura is safe, and they sound almost the same. Alexia built your sentence in two steps, and the second one uses both: eu não me sinto segura segurando na parte de trás da moto. Say it a few times; it works as a tongue-twister too. Alexia's verdict was the same as yours: eu também não.

🚲 A bicicleta elétrica e o Caminho de Santiago

No interior / no campo — in the countryside (you reached for campânia)

Me avisa se você sobreviver — let me know if you survive

Com a bike elétrica você tá sempre com medo de ficar sem bateria — with an e-bike you're always afraid of running out of battery

Ficar sem — to run out of (ficar sem bateria, ficar sem gasolina, ficar sem dinheiro)

O Caminho de Santiago — the Camino de Santiago, the Way of St James

O caminho da costa / o caminho do interior — the coastal route, the inland route

Com calma — at an easy pace, without rushing

Sem pressão — no pressure

You've ridden an e-bike once, not in the city but no campo, somewhere with mountains. Alexia's friend is braver: she and her husband are setting off on the Caminho de Santiago from Porto, along the coast, each on an e-bike, each carrying one of their two small children, plus the bags. Alexia's send-off: me avisa se você sobreviver.

The worry about the e-bike was yours. You were trying to say that with an electric bike you're always scared the battery will run out, and Alexia gave you the shape of it: com a bike elétrica você tá sempre com medo de ficar sem bateria. It's happened to her once, and the bike is very heavy.

Me avisa se você sobreviver has a verb form that Spanish has all but dropped. After se (if), when you're talking about the future, Portuguese uses the future subjunctive, and for regular verbs it looks exactly like the infinitive: se você sobreviver, se você precisar, se você chegar. Spanish would say si sobrevives; Portuguese keeps the extra tense, and Brazilians use it every day.

You didn't know you could do the Caminho by bike, or even by car. Alexia explained that agencies run it in small minibuses, and if you want to walk, you can pay a company to carry your backpack to the next hotel or albergue. How long it takes depends on the person and the route. From Portugal there's o caminho da costa, where you see the sea, the sea and more sea, and o caminho do interior, through small towns and sometimes right beside the cars, on roads that are, in your word, estreitas.

Foster has walked the Caminho Francês, and when you checked, Alexia confirmed that it starts in France. You said quero fazer. So does Alexia one day, com calma, and you gave her the phrase for it: sem pressão.

🐦 Peregrinos e passarinhos

Os peregrinos — pilgrims

Bom caminho! — what you say to a pilgrim: have a good walk, safe travels

Pássaro — bird

Passarinho — little bird (the diminutive, used all the time for small birds)

Alexia and Foster's coworking is on the Caminho route, so in spring they see lots of peregrinos walking past, and everyone on the street says bom caminho. You knew peregrino from English, but as a bird, so Alexia gave you pássaro and passarinho. Then the joke was yours, and with the right ending it goes: bom caminho, e me avisa se você sobreviver. Two phrases from the same class, put together for the people they belong to.

🎂 Dezembro: Itália, culinária e aniversário

Treze — thirteen

Quinze — fifteen (careful: cinquenta is fifty)

Dezenove — nineteen

No dia 13 de dezembro vou para a Itália por 3 dias para um curso de culinária — on December 13th I'm going to Italy for three days for a cooking course

Curso de culinária — cooking course (you said curso de cozinhar)

E depois do curso eu faço aniversário — and after the course it's my birthday

Fazer aniversário — to have a birthday (literally to do a birthday: hoje eu faço aniversário)

With less than two months to go until Christmas, Alexia asked about your plans. December starts with Italy: three days on a cooking course, and your birthday comes straight after it. Quinze and cinquenta got tangled for a moment, so they're both on the list. And note fazer aniversário: in Portuguese you don't have a birthday, you do one.

🎆 Uma grande expectativa em cima do Ano Novo

E o Ano Novo? — and New Year?

A obrigação de ser feliz — the obligation to be happy

Existe uma grande expectativa em cima do Ano Novo — there's a lot of expectation riding on New Year

Em cima — on top (em cima da mesa, on the table; em cima do Ano Novo, riding on New Year)

Estou lendo / tô lendo — I'm reading (tô is how estou sounds in conversation, and tá is está: você tá sempre com medo)

Tenho uma grande expectativa em cima do livro que tô lendo — I've got high expectations for the book I'm reading

Por exemplo — for example

Os fogos — fireworks

A gente vai dormir e acorda no ano que vem — we go to sleep and wake up in the new year

You're not doing anything special for New Year, and the reason was yours: New Year comes with a obrigação de ser feliz. Alexia gave you the frame, existe uma grande expectativa em cima do Ano Novo, and you asked what em cima was doing there. Literally it's on top: em cima da mesa. Here it means everything is riding on that one night. Alexia's example was a book everyone's talking about, and you made it your own: tenho uma grande expectativa em cima do livro que tô lendo. Then your comparison: dinner, then three hours of waiting for midnight, like waiting for the bus.

Alexia agrees. When she was younger and living in Rio, they'd go to someone's place in Copacabana and head down to the beach late in the evening to see the fogos. These days she and Foster go to sleep and wake up in the new year. Brighton has fireworks on the beach too, you said, but it's cold, and when Alexia sees pictures of Times Square she has the same reaction you do: no.

🐬 Primeiro de janeiro: caiaque e golfinhos

Dia primeiro de janeiro — January 1st (the first of the month is primeiro; every other day is a plain number: dia dois, dia treze)

Passeio de caiaque — kayak trip

Golfinho — dolphin

Cerca — fence

Camarão — shrimp, prawn

Em cima da areia — up on the sand

Last New Year's Eve, Alexia and Foster were at a beach in the United States with no fireworks at all, so they went to bed. On dia primeiro de janeiro they went on a passeio de caiaque on a river that runs in from the sea, and there were dolphins. They come in from the sea to hunt: they make a kind of cerca around the fish and the camarões, and practically come up em cima da areia to eat. That's em cima again, the literal one this time.

👶 Batizado, sobrinhos e padrinhos

Nós vamos decidir até esse fim de semana — we're going to decide by this weekend (até with a deadline means by, not until)

O batizado — christening, baptism (the event; o batismo is the sacrament itself)

Sobrinho — nephew

Sobrinha — niece

Os padrinhos — godparents

Madrinha — godmother

Padrinho — godfather

Filha única / filho único — only child

Alexia and Foster have to decide about New Year até esse fim de semana, because in January it's the batizado of their sobrinho, the younger son of Foster's brother. They're padrinhos to both of his children. Alexia herself is filha única.

You defined padrinhos better than a dictionary: as pessoas que recebem o privilégio de cuidar das crianças, responsible for their moral education. Alexia added the Brazilian side. Being a godparent is taken seriously there, and she knows people who were raised by their padrinhos when something happened to their parents.

💬 Ter filhos, adotar e barriga de aluguel

Você quer ter filhos? — do you want to have children?

Desagradável — unpleasant

As pessoas romantizam muito a maternidade — people romanticise motherhood a lot

Você adotaria uma criança? — would you adopt a child?

Eu adotaria uma criança — I would adopt a child

A barriga de aluguel — surrogacy, a surrogate (literally a rented belly)

Eu conheço dois homens que são casados — I know two men who are married

Eles adotaram duas crianças — they adopted two children (adotaram is the past; you said adotaria, which is would adopt)

Eles contrataram barriga de aluguel para ter os dois filhos — they used surrogates to have their two children (contratar is to hire)

As duas crianças são da mesma idade / têm a mesma idade — the two children are the same age (both work; têm takes the accent in the plural)

Quiseram — they wanted (the past of querer)

Algo aconteceu — something happened

Irmã — sister (don't drop the r: without it you get ímã, a magnet)

Mudar a decisão — to change the decision

A decisão errada — the wrong decision

E podem viver com essa decisão — and they can live with that decision

You asked Alexia whether she wants children. It's something she and Foster talk about a lot, and right now they don't know. As a woman, she sees the pregnancy side as very desagradável, and she thinks as pessoas romantizam muito a maternidade. You wanted to ask whether she'd adopt, and that's the conditional: você adotaria uma criança? Her answer was yes: eu adotaria.

Then your story. You know two men, a married couple, with two children the same age. You started with eles adotaria, which is would adopt, and then corrected the story itself: they didn't adopt, eles contrataram barriga de aluguel. You couldn't remember all the details, only that at the start they quiseram one child and then algo aconteceu.

Alexia's view is that it's very hard to do ethically, and that using someone from outside the family feels strange. The best argument in this part was yours, and it went the other way: inside the family is stranger. If your irmã carried the baby, she'd be there every day, she could mudar a decisão, and every day she might wonder whether it was a decisão errada. You allowed that some people want to give something like that, e podem viver com essa decisão. Alexia's conclusion: it's a question of personality.

🔁 Se, -ria e -ram: três terminações

Me avisa se você sobreviver — let me know if you survive (se plus the future: the verb looks like the infinitive)

Eu não sei se eu levaria as crianças — I don't know if I'd take the children (Alexia, about the Caminho)

Eu adotaria uma criança — I would adopt a child

Eles adotaram — they adopted

Eles contrataram — they hired

Eles quiseram — they wanted

Eu não sabia que começava na França — I didn't know it started in France (you said não soube)

Three short endings carried a lot of meaning today, and they're easy to mix up. -ria is would: adotaria, levaria. -ram is they did, and it's finished: adotaram, contrataram, quiseram. And after se, when you're talking about the future, the verb looks like the infinitive: se você sobreviver. Add one from Class #9: twice today you said não soube for I didn't know. For something you didn't know over a stretch of time it's eu não sabia, the same sabia as in eu não sabia disso last class.

📚 Homework

1. Three endings, out loud

Read the seven lines in the endings section out loud, thirty seconds a day. Then make one of each about your own life: something you would do (-ria), something your family did (-ram), and a me avisa se você... you could send to someone this week.

2. Coast or interior?

You said quero fazer. Pick a route and say why in two sentences: eu faria o caminho da costa porque... (fazer becomes faria).

3. Your December, ready for next class

Tell it once, start to finish: no dia treze de dezembro vou para a Itália, um curso de culinária, depois do curso eu faço aniversário, and one sentence on what you're hoping to learn to cook.

4. Still open from Class #9

The Bluebird story and the seven past-tense sentences still count. Bring the story to the next class.

Want more homework or have any questions? Message us on WhatsApp anytime.