Brazil cardio workout

I continue my journey in what I will refer to as the Gym of Aggie s. My last post discussed a portion of this vast gym, where there are numerous rooms to explore; as you may recall I ventured into the weight room last. However this Saturday embarks on a new journey, I will explore and write about the cardio room in this Gym. The time is 12:00 P.M. and Saturday is game day in El Paso, although many students ventured off to watch; there still remains a vast majority of students working out. I observe many people of different race, and gender, certain groups that were formed, and the different actions that they did. One group specifically sparks my interest where I will write about them in more depth; there were a total of four people that were in the group. They all appeared to be Brazilian ( From there accent, attire, and use of Portuguese).

When I first walk into the cardio room I hear a loud "Oi!!!!! Como Vai" ( in Portuguese this means hey how are you?) between a certain set of individuals within the cardio room, The persons name who said the unfamiliar language we will call Gusto. He was a male wearing a shirt that says I love Brazil, with shorts that represented the Brazilian flag. He said this same greeting to all individuals, first it was to a female (we will call Bonita) ; around 19 or 20, wearing a Brazil soccer shirt and workout shorts. She said "Tudo Bom!" where they exchanged two kisses; one on each cheek. The other female Gusto approached was another female around 21, with a NMSU shirt and workout shorts, responding with the same thing that Bonita has said, and exchanged in the same kissing of the cheeks as Bonita did. We will call her Brazilian Queen. Finally Gusto did the same thing to the final individual in the group; this female looked to be around 22, she was wearing, a shirt that resembled the Brazilian beaches, with bright blue work out shorts. We will call her ocean blue, Ocean blue was the only one to start talking English in the group.

After there greetings they briefly spoke in English about the difference between New Mexico and Brazil in terms of the gym, they were astonished by how much bigger this gym was then back home. As each of the members of the group engage in trying to come up with a workout they all did the same thing. For instance all asked the question what do you guys want to do first? I noticed all the females stood quietly looking around confused at each other, waiting for Gusto to speak. Gusto then stated " we will stretch first, and go running" the accent was hard to understand between all the members in the group, but all females responded with "Sim!" which translates to yes in Portuguese.

After 10 minutes of stretching Ocean Blue complains in English on how hard her English courses she is taking are. She appeared to be overly stressed about all of her classes, Ocean also states how much she misses Brazil. Bonita was the first to come up to her, hugging, and stating it will be OK, As did Brazilian queen, Finally Gusto, I'm here for you Ocean Blue whatever you need don't hesitate to ask me. I was amazed on how overly supportive they were towards Ocean Blue. I thought to myself everyone here I am sure is overly stressed with their classes, yet why is Ocean receiving more empathy from the others. I never seen this form of supportiveness in such a public setting, especially at the gym. Through jokes and laughter, Ocean's negativity appears to go away. There exercises for the day is to run on the treadmill for about one hour. I notice Gusto pulling a stereo system from his bag and he puts on some music from Brazil.

I noticed the group dancing to the music for the course of a whole song, the dance was something I never recognized before it looked similar to salsa, but had its Brazilian twist to it. Throughout the course of their treadmill exercises, I notice Bonita talking about all her memories from back in Brazil she talks alot about her family more specifically her sister; we will call Tahiti. She was only 11 and Bonita missed her dearly. Brazilian queen was talking constantly about the cute boys that she met in the course of her college year. Ocean Blue ironically talked about how much she missed the beaches in Brazil. and finally Gusto talked similarly as Brazilian Queen and all of the " Beautiful American Girls here". I noticed instead of focusing on the exercise they used this time at the gym for a social gathering/ venting session, which I found to be very interesting.

I began to ask myself, is it a culture difference in what the gym is used for? For instance here in American/ English culture we use the gym for purely working out vigorously. However with the Brazilians based on what I noticed they used this time as a social gathering more than workout session. The Portuguese language was interesting along with how much they love Brazil; these were things that I found personally interesting.