Una Americana en Aveiro

That’s the name of my radio program. Yup, that’s right, I have a radio program. Every Saturday from 3-5 PM on a local radio station I get to host my own radio show. Translation, people have to listen to me talk and I get to play whatever music I want. How did I get such a sweet deal? Well, there’s a housing coop down the road from us, which we visited during class one day. The coop has a community radio station run by volunteers. One of the founders of the coop invited us volunteers to do a radio show, but the rest of the volunteers tenían mucho miedo (were very scared) of speaking live on the radio in Spanish. But, as my Colombian friend told me, I am sin verguenza (without shame) when it comes to speaking Spanish. I figure, my Spanish is never going to be as good as hers so why don’t I use her to practice? So two hours of speaking Spanish on the radio doesn’t phase me too much, especially since most of that time I’m playing music, not talking.
I had my first show this past Saturday. I was actually pretty worried because I’m never done radio before (and of course the first time I do, it’s in another language). It wasn’t as difficult as I thought it would be, however. After giving an introduction (“You are listening to 101.9 FM…”), all I had to do was introduce the songs. The boy controlling the music would cue me with my very own theme song, and after I was done speaking I would signal to him, it would fade out, and he would play the next song (my theme song, btw, is “Carolina” by Seu Jorge, though I’m wondering if that was the best idea picking a Brazilian song when everyone confuses me for Brazilian…). I played a mix of everything: bachata, reggaeton, Franz Ferdinand, Ok Go, Shakira, Justin Timberlake, Usher. And because I like talking, in between the music I talked about the artists, the songs, what’s popular in the U.S. Halfway through the show, I even gave a brief bio, explaining what exactly an American is doing in Aveiro: that Í’m in the Peace Corps, my project is Rural Economic Development, there are 6 volunteers living here, and we love Aveiro. I said all this in Spanish and then in Guaraní. They loved it! The moment I started speaking Guaraní, the highschoolers who were doing the music started cracking up; they were rolling on the floor with laughter. It remains to be seen whether the rest of the coop liked it, but for now “Soy Pooja y voy a ser tu locutora para las próxima dos horas.”