Class #6 with Alexia September, 1 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
An hour of conversation with no material. You were at your boyfriend's family's place in Bristol for the week, looking after their cat, and the class ran from beds and sleep to insomnia, to what a medical appointment costs in Portugal against England, to Alexia's iron infusion on Thursday, to Elmo the twenty-year-old cat, to Ketchup the dachshund who lived to twenty-one, to your bicycle accident at fifteen and the five years of dental work that followed it, to oral hygiene as a cultural habit, to both of your family trees, and it finished with recommendations for Minas Gerais in January.
You told the accident story at length and handed over two words, screaming and painkillers. Almost everything below came from Alexia typing it into the chat while you spoke. One grammar pattern is worth working on before next class and it's in the second-to-last section: third-person verb endings coming out in the first person. It was flagged in Class #5 and it's still the main thing. The eclipse story from that class didn't come up today, so it's still owed.
🛏️ A roupa de cama e o colchão
A roupa de cama — bed linen, sheets
O colchão — mattress
Macio — soft (for a mattress, a blanket, a fabric)
Duro — hard, firm (the opposite of macio)
O detergente de roupa — laundry detergent
Arrumar — to tidy, to sort out, to put in order
You asked for the word for sheets. Portuguese doesn't separate them out the way English does: roupa de cama covers the sheets, the duvet cover and the pillowcases together.
Macio and duro are the pair you need for a bed. The one you're sleeping in is meio-meio, firmer on one side and softer on the other. Alexia's distinction on memory foam is worth keeping, because the two things get confused: memory foam moulds itself to your body, which is not the same as a mattress that absorbs movement from the other side.
😴 Sono leve e insônia
Ter sono leve — to be a light sleeper (o sono is sleep. Sono leve, sono pesado.)
O ouvido — the inner ear, the one that hears (you said o meu orelho)
A orelha — the outer ear, the part you can see and touch
Surda de um lado — deaf on one side
A insônia intermitente — broken sleep, waking through the night
Voltar a dormir profundamente — to get back into deep sleep
Eu durmo bem, eu durmo rápido — I sleep well, I fall asleep quickly
O remédio — medicine, medication
A melatonina — melatonin
English has one word for the ear and Portuguese has two. A orelha is the outer shape on the side of your head. O ouvido is inside, and it's the one that does the hearing. Since you're deaf on one side, ouvido is the one you'll reach for most.
Ter sono leve is the fixed phrase for being a light sleeper, and the opposite is sono pesado. Note that it takes ter, not ser.
Insônia intermitente is waking repeatedly through the night rather than not getting to sleep in the first place. Alexia has that kind; your best friend has the other kind, awake until five or six in the morning for weeks at a time. Melatonina was the word you needed for what she's taking.
🏥 Marcar uma consulta: público, privado e seguro
Marcar uma consulta — to book an appointment
A consulta — appointment, consultation
O psiquiatra — psychiatrist
O psicólogo — psychologist (there is no psicologista in Portuguese)
Os hormônios — hormones (the stress falls on the middle syllable: hor-MÔ-nios)
Tirar sangue — to take blood
O seguro saúde — health insurance
É um tabu ainda — it's still a taboo
Quinhentas libras — five hundred pounds (a libra is feminine, so quinhentas, not quinhentos)
É um absurdo — that's outrageous
Psiquiatra and psicólogo both open with a silent p and then split apart. You went round both of them several times before they settled, so say them out loud again this week.
Marcar is the verb for booking anything with a time attached: marcar uma consulta, marcar um horário, marcar uma aula. It was in your Class #5 homework and it came out today without prompting.
The context was your attempt to get a hormone test in England, which needs blood taken and is close to impossible to arrange on the NHS, with a private quote of five hundred pounds for the first consultation alone. Alexia's comparison from Portugal is seventy euros at the very top end for a psychiatric appointment. You described going private in England as uma coisa um pouco moral, and the word she gave you for that was tabu.
💉 Ferro na veia
Estar com deficiência de ferro — to be iron deficient
Estar anêmica — to be anaemic
Ferro na veia — an iron infusion (a veia is the vein, so this is literal)
O relatório — report (here, the doctor's written report for the insurer)
Ser aprovada — to be approved
Reembolsar, o reembolso — to reimburse, reimbursement
O suplemento de ferro — iron supplement
As ampolas — vials, small liquid doses
Intestino preso — constipation (the everyday way to say it)
A minha madrasta — my stepmother
Se você não estiver se sentindo bem — if you're not feeling well (you said se você não está sentindo forte)
Eu já tô passando mal pensando nisso — I already feel ill just thinking about it
Alexia is iron deficient and having ferro na veia on Thursday before she flies to the United States. The alternative her doctor offered was suplemento de ferro, taken as ampolas, small liquid doses you drink, and the drawback there is intestino preso.
The insurance sequence gives you three words in a useful order. Normally you have to ser aprovada before the procedure. Because she can't wait for that, her doctor writes a relatório, she pays up front, and the insurer reembolsa her afterwards.
Madrasta is simply the word for stepmother, and it's the one to use. Alexia isn't fond of it, and her reason was Disney: the madrasta is the villain in the films everyone grew up on, so the word carries that even though it's neutral on paper.
The last line is the grammar point to take from this section. After se, Portuguese uses the future subjunctive, not the present indicative. You said se você não está sentindo forte, and the form is se você não estiver se sentindo bem. The same shape gives you se eu tiver tempo, se você quiser, se eles vierem.
🐱 O Elmo, a mantinha e o Ketchup
A manta, a mantinha — blanket, little blanket
O canto — corner
O pelo — an animal's coat, fur
Um cheiro ruim — a bad smell (o cheiro is masculine, so um cheiro ruim. You said uma cheiro mau.)
Tadinho — poor thing (short for coitadinho)
O salsicha — dachshund, sausage dog
A eutanásia — euthanasia
Deixar descansar — to let them rest
Grogue — groggy
Pelo is an animal's coat. You reached for pele, which is skin. Elmo's pelo has gone hard, he smells, and he spends his days na mantinha, no canto.
The -inha ending isn't about size. Mantinha is the same blanket said with affection, and Alexia's framing was that you use it when you want to be fofa. Tadinho works the same way, shortened from coitadinho, and you produced it without being given it.
On Ketchup: eutanásia exists and Alexia reached for it, but what she said her father actually did was deixou ele descansar. Both are correct. The second is what a family says out loud.
Grogue is groggy, taken straight from English and used the same way. Buddy came home grogue from a dental cleaning and was back at daycare the next morning.
🦷 Nove cirurgias, um sedativo e a anestesia local
Arrancar um dente — to pull a tooth (tirar works too. Arrancar is the more physical one.)
O siso — wisdom tooth
O sedativo — sedative (eles me deram um sedativo)
A anestesia local — local anaesthetic
A anestesia geral — general anaesthetic
Gritando — screaming
A pior dor da minha vida — the worst pain of my life
A fístula — fistula (the same word in both languages)
O abscesso — abscess
A mandíbula — jaw
O aparelho — braces
Inchado — swollen
Comer direito — to eat properly
Dói muito — it hurts a lot
O efeito dominó — the domino effect
Na minha boca — in my mouth (a boca is feminine. You said no meu boca.)
A dor — pain (also feminine, so a pior dor. You said o dor twice.)
Eu nunca tive anestesia geral — I've never had a general anaesthetic (ter, not ir. You said eu nunca fui na.)
Ele tava tendo um bom momento — he was having a good time (um bom momento, not um bom tempo. Tempo is time as a quantity, or the weather.)
Cento e trinta — a hundred and thirty
Arrancar and tirar both work for taking a tooth out. Arrancar is the more physical of the two.
When you were choosing between eles fizeram o sedativo and eles me deram sedativa, the second one was closer. The verb is dar, and sedativo is masculine: eles me deram o sedativo.
A dor is feminine, which makes it a pior dor da minha vida. Dói muito is the same idea as a verb. Both are worth having ready, because this is a subject you'll talk about again.
The protocol difference is a useful piece of cultural information as well as vocabulary. In the United States a siso comes out under sedation. In Portugal and Brazil it's anestesia local only, unless you have a condition that stops you keeping still. Alexia's three surgeries in Portugal came to around a hundred and thirty euros in total, against something starting from five hundred dollars in the US.
Fístula is the same in English. She also used abscesso and described it as an infection with no traceable cause. Mandíbula is the jaw bone, which is what you were reaching for. O efeito dominó was her name for what happened to your teeth: one extraction breaking the next tooth, and four out in the end over about five years.
🪥 Higiene bucal e sangue brasileiro
A higiene — hygiene
Escovar os dentes — to brush your teeth
A limpeza — a clean, a scale and polish
Uma coisa cultural — a cultural thing
O dente is masculine, so it's meus dentes, not minhas dentes. Escovar is the verb for brushing them, and a higiene is what you go in for once a year.
Alexia's point was that careful oral hygiene is uma coisa cultural: long-standing in Brazil, and only common in Portugal from the nineties onwards.
🌳 Bisavó, trisavó, tetravó
A árvore genealógica — family tree
O avô paterno — paternal grandfather
A avó materna — maternal grandmother
O bisavô, a bisavó — great-grandparent
O trisavô, a trisavó — great-great-grandparent
O tetravô, a tetravó — one further back
O pentavô, a pentavó — one further again
Os hexavós — one further still
Os parentes — relatives (you said os meus relativos, which is the English coming through)
O trem — train
As ferrovias — the railways
English stacks up great and loses count. Portuguese counts instead: bi, tri, tetra, penta, hexa. Once you see it as numbering you can go back as far as you need, which you will, because your family tree needs it.
Parentes is the word for relatives. Relativos is the English word in Portuguese clothing and it doesn't refer to people. You said os meus relativos brasileiros, and Alexia typed the whole sentence back with the noun and the verbs fixed: os meus parentes brasileiros chegaram no Brasil para trabalhar.
Ferrovia is the railway, trem is the train. Your relatives arrived in São Paulo in the eighteen nineties to work on the ferrovias, which was exactly the period Brazil was building them. Alexia's side runs through Minas Gerais, Italy and Sicily on her father's side and Portugal and Spain on her mother's, and the grandfather who left Portugal was the one chosen out of a large family to go to Brazil and send money home.
⛰️ Minas Gerais: Ibitipoca e as serras
Mineiro — from Minas Gerais
A serra, as serras — mountain range
A cachoeira — waterfall
Alugar um chalé — to rent a cabin
Um centrinho — a little town centre (the -inho ending again)
As águas termais — thermal springs
Vale muito a pena — it's really worth it
Mineiro means from Minas Gerais, and it covers the people, the accent and the cooking. Alexia's father is mineiro.
Serra is a mountain range, and it's how most of these places are named: Serra da Canastra, and the five others she's sending you over WhatsApp so you can choose by wherever you end up.
Her recommendation is Ibitipoca. Rent a chalé, arrive early because they limit how many people are in the park at once, and there's a centrinho with live music at night. She's asking a friend whose wife runs an Airbnb there. She's never been to Tiradentes or Belo Horizonte. Poços de Caldas is her father's town and has thermal springs, which she said in English, so águas termais is the phrase to keep.
🔁 Terceira pessoa: eles falaram, não eles falei
Quando eles tiraram — when they took them out (you said quando eles tirei)
Eles quebraram outros dentes — they broke other teeth (you said eles quebrei)
No fim minha mãe falou finalmente acabou — in the end my mother finally said that's enough (you said minha mãe falei)
Os meus parentes chegaram e trabalharam — my relatives arrived and worked (you said cheguei e trabalhei)
Eles tiveram muito tempo — they had a lot of time (you said tive)
Eu sei — I know (you said eu sabe)
One pattern, running through the whole hour. When the subject is someone other than you, the ending stays in the first person. It isn't a gap in what you know: you produce the right form when the sentence is short, and you self-corrected nós dois falei to nós dois achamos without help. It's speed. The ending has to arrive before you have time to choose it, and repetition is the only thing that does that.
📚 Homework
1. Six sentences into the recorder
Take the six sentences from the section above and run them through the method you already have. Read each one out loud into your phone's recorder, leave a gap, play it back and repeat while you're walking or cooking. One narrow target.
2. Retell the accident story
Record yourself telling it again, start to finish, with gritando and os analgésicos in the two places you reached for English.
3. The eclipse story, still owed
From Class #5. Write it, record yourself reading it, send it to Alexia as a WhatsApp audio.
4. The words you handed to English today
Say each one out loud a few times, then put it in a sentence about your own week.
A roupa de cama — sheets, bed linen
O ouvido — ear
A manta — blanket
O canto — corner
A madrasta — stepmother
A consulta — appointment
Gritando — screaming
Os analgésicos — painkillers
Um bom momento — a good time
A mandíbula — jaw
A higiene — hygiene
O trem — train
Os bisavós — great-grandparents
Os parentes — relatives
Want more homework or have any questions? Message us on WhatsApp anytime.