There is a truism that the dirtiest word in the Portuguese language is "Não." [No]. No one will ever tell you 'no' to anything, because to say 'no' so directly would be akin to implying you disliked the person and you would never entertain a proposal of theirs again. A French guide to Brazil describes it this way (translated and paraphrased):
If you ask someone if they want to go to a party...
"Sim, vou com certeza" (Yes, I am certainly going) means 'most likely, yes.'
"Sim" (Yes) means 'I am on the fence.'
"Pode ser." [possibly] means 'Probably not.'
"Talvez" [Maybe] or "Depende" [it depends] means 'no.'
"Não" [No] means 'Fuck off.'
Navegating this shifted scale of politeness has been one of my greatest social challenges. Indeed, I often say that I speak very good Portuguese, but I can't figure out the metric system for shit. And this is my social metric system. I had no problem adapting to Brazilian time. Arriving 30 minutes late to everything is one of my favorite luxuries of living in Brazil. What has always confused me is how seriously I should take the commitments of others and how seriously I should commit to things. Imagine my self-reflexive surprise today when g-chatting with a friend and finding I have almost completely internalized this system (the self-reflexive recognition of this internalization not withstanding).
Today my friend chatted me because she wanted confirmation on a brief message that she had to write in English. After helping her with a few prepositions, we wrote:
Jay: vamos tomar uma este mês. tou livríssimo
Bxxxx: pode ser! eu vo viajar no dia xx, mas antes disso eu posso
Jay: ótimo! bom, me fale quando vc tiver uma hora livre.
Jay: Let's drink a beer some time this month. I am totally free.
Bxxxx: Possibly! I am going to travel on the xxth, but before that I can make something.
Jay: Great! Well, tell me when you might have some free time.
What I realized from the conversation was not just that I accepted that this drink, which we have already been planning for a month or so, probably won't happen in January. It's the ease with which I responded, implicitly accepting that my friend was busy without calling attention to it. The future subjunctive tense with which I put the proposition (tell me when you might) puts the encounter, and even the planning for the encounter, in the indefinitely perpetual 'as if.' Grammar aside, however, I think the more radical thing is not that I have conquered the art of polite non-commitment, but that I have accepted (more or less) the emotional part of what comes with never making plans. Before, I might have said that the difficulty making plans is stressful. Now, I feel rather liberated by the "let's figure out everything later" attitude.
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