Growing Up In Brazil

Growing up in Brazil was quite different from the life I came to know in the USA. All I knew was the sunny, uplifting, and sometimes careless spirit of the people around me. Growing up in the capital of Brazil and the youngest of four boys felt like destine was traced for me, I was going to work for the federal government just like my father and later my siblings. However, during my last semester in school I noticed there was more to do and places to visit around the world, than the pleasant thought of working at a stable job in the government. Then, I decided that I should explore other things before settling down. That is when I made the decision to sell my business, which with financial help from my father I owned and managed during my undergrad
I enrolled in an English as a second language program and started my long journey. During the process, I experienced racial bigotry for the first time in my life. Recently graduated from college in Brazil and under the illusion that I knew so much about life and the world we live in, I quickly came to realize that I knew nothing. I could barely communicate verbally and much less read or write in English, I felt illiterate, helpless and lonely. In face of those obstacles, I started to question my decision to immigrate to the U.S. With all those difficulties, I decided that I was going to do my best, so I filled my small room with regular and irregular verbs on the walls and as I learned them, I would scratch them off one by one. As my vocabulary and my capacity to communicate improved, I started understanding the new culture and making lifetime friends that mitigate the fact that I was so far from those who I loved. I started traveling through the continental USA and ended up meeting the woman of my life in Atlanta with whom I constituted a family with two beautiful kids. We later moved to Huntsville, Alabama due to a job opportunity and worked my way through the corporate ladder to a management