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 It was January of 2006 when my American husband and I traveled to Santa Tereza, the place of my birth. The town is nestled between coffee-covered mountains a mere hour's drive from the beaches of Brazil. I had forgotten how rustic the town appears and how much it looks like a village plucked by the hand of God from a mountainside in northern Italy and dropped thousands of miles away in the state of Espírito Santo.
It is an immigrant town - settled by Italians during World War I. They came to the area like most immigrants hoping for a better life. In this case that meant land and farming. They brought everything they owned with them and infused this place with Italian life. The cobbled streets rattled the suspension of our 1.0 liter Volkswagen Gol rental car. It had been some years since my return to the town, but after a few minutes of winding through the streets I managed to locate the padaria owned by my aunt Florinda. The bakery has been in the family for 30 years now, and the stucco exterior shows the wear of countless mountain rains. It may look shabby, but the smell of fresh baked bread is enough to chase away any other judgments. We entered the bakery and my aunt greeted us immediately and of course loudly. The immigrants to Brazil have lost none of their Italian mannerisms. My husband who had injured himself surfing just a day before was greeted with a hard slap on the injured shoulders and a strong hug from my aunt. He managed to wince in pain and smile at the same time. There were hardly any customers that afternoon, so we sat and enjoyed some food. My aunt brought us fresh locally grown café (coffee), some biscoitos (cookies) and some empadas, pastries with various fillings. My husband was still learning Portuguese, so he took every opportunity to enjoy the Brazilian food. He had popped an empada in his mouth immediately and smiled at my aunt - all was forgiven for the previous injury. My aunt and I immediately began to talk about goings-on in the family. The health of everyone, talk about jobs, talk about the farming. However, I was waiting to ask my aunt a question. As a child I grew up in Brazil with my parents speaking Italian, but I knew they were born in Brazil. I didn't know much about my grandfather other than that he died when I was two years old and that he spoke Italian. I was hoping my aunt could tell me more about him. My aunt smiled at me as if she were waiting for the day I would ask her about this. She set down her coffee cup and began to relate the story. "Everything started with your great-grandfather," she started. "He came from Italy when he was just a boy. At that time there was a war going on in the world and he wanted a place where he could feel safe, so when he heard about land being given to people who could work in the coffee plantation in this small city in Brazil called Santa Tereza he found a way to get on that ship. "He crossed the ocean with a large group of friends and they went to Brazil. He worked several years in the coffee plantation until he had enough money to buy his own land and cultivate his own products. Your great-grandfather married a girl he met on the ship during his trip to Brazil. "Your grandfather was the youngest son of their marriage and he was born in 1881. He was a very hard working man and also very handsome. Any girl would be happy to marry him. At a very young age he started dating a local girl and he decided to marry her. "It was a tradition of that time that every time a son got married the father would give part of the land. That is how your grandfather started his life. With his wife he had three kids but during the birth of the third child she died, leaving him to take care of his kids and his land. "During that time he had a next door neighbor called Angelo that was also his best friend. His wife had just had a baby called Lidia Maria and your grandpa would leave his kids there during the day. "One day while he was dropping off the kids he got to see the baby. He held her in his arms and told his friends that she was so beautiful that he may wait to marry her. His friend replied, "I will tell you what, when she gets old if she likes you enough I will let her marry you. "But your grandpa could not wait that long, he needed to find another mother for his kids and so he married again with another local girl. They had 7 kids together and again during the birth of the 7th child she passed away. Your grandpa was now 42 and had eleven kids to take care of, so again he started looking for another wife. "One day he went to visit his friend Angelo and Lidia his younger daughter opened the door. She was now nineteen year old and he could not believe how beautiful she looked. He reminded his friend Angelo about his promise to let him marry his daughter and since they shared the property lines it would be good business for both families. "So, that is how he married your grandma. With the wedding they got a new piece of land as wedding gift where your grandpa built the house you used to spend your vacation with our brother. The house was made with the trees he found on the property to make the structure, the walls were made with crossed bamboos, and the stucco was made with red clay mixed with water that held the bamboo in the walls. "With your grandma he had eleven more children making a total of 21. Our house was constantly getting upgrades for another room, which is how it got so big. Since our family was so large your grandpa had to cut down one of the tallest trees he found on our property to build a table so we all could sit for the meals every Sunday after church. "The waterfall that you loved so much when you were a kid used to be a small river that goes around the property, but one winter a big storm washed away part of the hill changing the path of the river and creating a waterfall. "Around 1950 your grandpa decided that we needed electricity in the house, so he built a generator using a wooden wheel and some parts he bought from a store. When you were born your grandfather was ninety years old. He still rode his horse all around town. Sometimes he would go visit your mother and he would hold you and speak Italian with you for hours. He died in 1974 when he was ninety three years old from an ulcer in his stomach, but he didn't suffer. He had gone to see a doctor about his stomach several times before and they gave him medicine that would alleviate the pain, but I guess it did not cure him. One morning he woke up feeling sick and by noon he was dead." The story was amazing to me. Twenty-one children? "How did grandmother manage to take care of all those children by herself once he passed away?" I asked. "By the time your grandfather died, grandma was seventy years old. Some of the kids from the first marriage were already married but they still lived on the same property. Every time a son got married they received part of the land, but they still helped manage the farm. The first daughter of his first marriage was the same age as your grandma. She helped your grandma to take care of the youngest kids. "What is the age difference between you and my other uncles and aunts?" I asked "Pretty much one year apart. Grandma spent the first 12 years of her marriage pregnant. During that time there was no birth control. Decent women did not use any prevention to avoid kids. Kids are a gift from God and during that time, taking birth control would be the same as having an abortion. Only in the late 1980s did the women in our family start using birth control and it was still against the wishes of your grandma." "What happened to grandma's houses now that she is living with you?" "It is still in the same place. Uncle Jose and Uncle Erasmo built a bigger house on the same property, a little bit down the valley. They are still working the farm. Now they sell the coffee and tomatoes to the capital market and I hear their coffee is exported to several countries like Mexico, Peru, and Costa Rica. They hired some workers to help them farm and the workers live at your Grandma's house." After the story my Aunt and I talked a bit more about other things in the family and with Brazil, and then we said our goodbyes. My husband clearly wired from drinking too much of our coffee drove the rental car back toward the coast as if in a race. I looked out the window as we winded our way down the forested mountains and thought about the story of my family. My family is still migrating. Of my immediate family, I have only my mother, father and one sister remaining in Brazil. I live in Texas. One of my brothers lives in Boston. The rest have returned to Italy and live in the same city my great-grandfather left during World War I. I think my great-grandfather would be proud of us, for the courage it takes to leave your home and build a new life in a land that is "new" to you. He faced a long journey on a slow ship from Europe, I faced the slow US immigration problem and nearly endless bureaucracy. He learned Portuguese and reshaped his land, I learned English and restarted my career. The spirit of this migration exists no matter how small the world becomes with our technology. I wonder where my children will choose to live? Will it be Brazil? Italy? Perhaps they will stake their claim somewhere else entirely. I looked over at my husband driving this little car on the winding mountain roads of Brazil, and he smiled at me - clearly happy to be with me in this strange land. Marilza Ghisolfi Hobbs was born in Santa Tereza, Brazil, 34 years ago. She moved from Vitória, in the state of Espírito Santo, to Houston, Texas, in 2000, where she met her husband Robert. She works as an SAP Consultant and is completing her Computer Science degree. She can be reached at
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