Grzegorz Mielec was born on 30 August 1972 in Sulechów, Lubusz Province. He is a chemical technician by education. He was a contestant in the first edition of the Polish version of “Big Brother”.
After graduation, he moved to Italy, where he lived for three years. He then spent another seven years in Germany, and later another year in the United States. For the past ten years, he has lived in São Paulo in Brazil. He works at the Prince Paulo Sanguszko House of Polish Culture. There, he handles administrative matters and the promotion Polish culture. He is a dancer in the dancing troupe “Chabry i Maki” (Starthistles and Poppies).
He was interviewed by Aleksandra Pluta on 12 May 2015 in São Paulo.
And why Brazil? When I was a kid, I would not stop telling my family that one day I would go to a place where the sun shines all year round. My mom would laugh at me a little, she would said a place like that didn’t exist, but I read a lot of books and knew that such places existed. Let me start by saying that perhaps I was not born at the time when life in Poland was very tough. But I was born at the time when leaving the country was difficult. People’s passports would allegedly be hidden by the police and so on. Anyway, I started to travel the world via reading books. And I think I read all adventure books that were in the school library, all books in general. So I started to travel in my mind while reading books, and I would dream that, one day, it would be possible for me to go and see the places I read about. It was improbable first because of politics, and second because of the economy. The tickets were so expensive that it was hard to imagine travelling to the other side of the world.
I am a technician by education and I started to work in a university laboratory. It was a pretty nice job, but my need to see the world was stronger, so I left it all behind. My family, my job, my homeland, I took my backpack and went to see the world. However, my parents told me: go, son, if life is good, you will stay, if it isn’t, you’ll come back. Though it is a shame you’re leaving. I come from a close-knit family and family is very important to me. So I cut all ropes and I was surprised how nice it felt, I think it was the only time in my life I felt so free. It wasn’t cutting loose any deadweight, but when I cut myself off from my family, my job, my friends, from everything that was mine – that moment was astounding because that was the only time I felt that way. Like I said, it was not deadweight, it was liberation, it was awesome. The world became my oyster and I could do whatever I wanted.
I chose Brazil. I chose it from among other countries. It wasn’t like I came here because I fell in love with Brazil, it seemed so exotic and interesting that I thought that maybe it would be worth it to stay here. Even though Germany, Italy, the US, they’re different countries than Poland, but there were so many similarities, maybe it was nice there, but it just wasn’t it. Brazil was so far away and different, and besides, the winter here, all the other things. So I thought I could live here. I first came here on vacation when I was still living in Germany. I had come here a few times on vacation and every time I would see a new beach and meet new people. Of course, the language, it was a matter of language as well. During my stay in Italy, I learnt Italian. Later in Germany i learnt Spanish. It was funny because when I would come home they would ask me how my German was coming along. And I would say that my German was okay, but my Spanish was really awesome. And that was because I had friends from South America. From Argentina, Chile, Columbia. And thanks to Italian, Spanish was quite easy to learn as well, so I started to learn Spanish to make our lives easier, so to speak. After a year or two I started to speak Spanish. And then I added Portuguese because, as it turned out, it was so different that initially, when I only spoke Italian, I could not understand Portuguese. And I made friends from Brazil, so it would be nice to learn Portuguese. So you know, I started to learn Portuguese simply by listening and speaking it. And later when I came to Brazil it sure came in handy as you’re going to have a hard time in Brazil if you don’t speak Portuguese. It’s much easier if you speak Portuguese. Brazilian, let’s say. The Portuguese language in Portugal is a bit different, but of course you can get by. Spanish too, actually. South American Spanish is a bit different that Spanish in Spain. Anyway, coming to Brazil I could already speak some Portuguese. And I was fluent after a year. Of course, I did not make life easier for myself and I didn’t use English or anything like that. So I became surrounded by people who spoke only Portuguese. It’s got to be the best way to learn a language.
To be honest, when I left Poland, I was not looking to contact any Poles, the expat community, as that was not what I wanted to see. I knew it from back home. I kinda stayed away from such contacts. I just wanted to see the world, the new world. Not look for the old world. But after so many years in Brazil, after I had left Poland, I warmed up to the idea of having contact with Poland via work. I devoted myself fully to that. And when I was working in the Chamber of Commerce, I was invited to work at a Polish culture house.
The new Polish expat community wasn’t really interested, the fourth or fifth generation of Polish-Brazilians does not speak Polish. They only had a faint idea about what the Polish culture house was, what it was about. I know that the big reason for those descendants of Poles to contact the House, the Consulate was that a Polish passport would open for them the doors to Europe after Poland had been admitted to the EU. It was not because of love for Poland. Of course, you could add everything together, but it was like a movement that started. It happened around that time. I remember, I think I was on a plane from Brazil to Poland. I arrived in Berlin, because that was where I would usually arrive and I would cross the border with my brother by car, and there were no customs, no control. It felt strange because I had known that place for so many years and you had always had to show your passport. Somebody would ask you questions and so on. Anyway, it was a bizarre experience. But it was also one of the things that roused the interest of the expat community as there would be lines forming in front of the consulate. And the descendants of Poles would start to show up at the House. The most frequently asked question was how to get a Polish passport.
More reasons why Brazil? Apart from the Sun, which I have already talked about, I also liked the fact that Brazil has got to be the largest Catholic country in the world. Of course, you’ll find different shades of religion here and so on, but I liked the way people believe in God here, in what you cannot see. It’s the faith of a child. I don’t have to touch it, I don’t have to see it, but I believe in it. Even though Poland is a Catholic country – would that be possible in Europe? And when you talk to the people here about various things, it’s blind, child-like faith. If they say it should be like so, and it is like so, then it exists. I grew up in Poland and when I was growing up, Churches were packed full of people. I know it’s not about the faith, the church was a place you could escape politics and the regime for a bit. That was also kind of demonstrating that you’re against the system. And I grew up in that. But it was the part of Brazil that I found my faith in, actually. In this trust in something you can’t see. And I liked the fact that Brazil kind of lives like that. For me as well, I compare Brazilians, perhaps not nowadays, I’ve been here a long time. At first I thought they were children. Give the child a car, let it drive. It is capable of doing that, theoretically. You can get in, push the gas pedal and drive. It’s just that I really missed looking at things from a practical angle. But Brazil works. So that car has never crashed, never will. But it was just so different from what I had known. I knew that I had lived in different countries, that I had been to different places around the world. And this country here functioned totally differently and it worked. Perhaps it would work better if things were more organised, German style, but that would be something else.
Showing Poland here in Brazil. It’s fun because it’s not even... for the expats it’s always “bem vinda” (Portuguese greeting). We invite all Poles and expats. But it’s mostly for the locals. It’s about showing Poland to the locals. In Brazil, when they think of Poland, they think of the Pope. When you say “Som da Polonha”, they say: “O, Jean Paul II”, and then just “São João”, saint, our saint. Vodka is another thing... Wałęsa, I even wear a moustache now and some people tell me it’s because of Wałęsa. Maybe not, but when I looked at it... His was the same. And that would be it. Sometimes some historical event. They’ve been just talking about the end of WWII, so they showed a snippet of the celebrations in Warsaw, Victory Day.
In Brazil, foreigners are usually treated better than the locals. That’s because Brazilians believe that if you are from Europe, you come from a better world so you know more, you are well-behaved. This is what people are taught here. It depends on the social class and so on. You are absorbed easier by the people here. Most of the time, you will be treated even better because you are from Europe. It seems to me that I adjusted really quickly to the life here and the people. In Germany, I’m not complaining, but you will always be a foreigner. You came from Poland, something is always off. But here in Brazil, foreigners are a higher caste, they are treated better. I think I was able to get things done easier thanks to that.
Brazil – Sao Paulo – Sao Paulo is ugly. Sao Paulo is terrible. Most of the old buildings have been razed and blocks of flats and car parks were built in place of listed buildings. For me it was like, I get it now, but at first it was terrifying to me. How could you do such a thing? When I visit Poland, Europe, I want to see those things again, so nice, so pretty, different, old. I remember one time being at the fair in Bello Horizonte and we were in a car with a group of Poles and the driver said: oh, this here is an architectural gem, that house is 100 years old. And I’m like: oh damn, 100 years old, haha. My grandma is that old. It was not a gem at all. Yeah. I visit Poland as a tourist as well. Obviously, I go to visit my family as well. But when I go to the old town in Zielona Góra, which has been renovated and repainted, it’s so pretty and it’s a great experience. I take photos there like a tourist, like a Japanese person. When I show them back in Brazil, everyone is like, so pretty, so nice and stuff. I go there on holiday, kind of, it’s all connected. Tourist, vacation, it can be one and the same. Besides, Poland has been changing a lot. I come to visit every year and there’s always something new in town and around it and it’s nice as well, it’s like I can always discover and see something nice.
My grandma died without having seen the sea. We lived in Zielona Góra, she lived in Cigacice. Some 200 km away from the sea. She never went to the seaside, to the beach. She will never get to see it. That’s how it is. And the idea I had for my life was: if she could see something through me, then I wanted to show her the world. When you’re a teenager, your grasp on the world is totally different, laughable, I don’t know. You believe you will conquer the world, change it. And then it’s you who changes, not the world, perhaps both. But I was simply curious about the world and I believe that the path I took was the only way to satisfy the need to see and learn about the world, and about myself at the same time.
