My Brazilian friend, Valquiria, was going to speak at a conference in Austin, Texas in early November and it would be her first time in the United States so I wanted to be there to welcome her as an ambassador to the USA like she has been an ambassador to me for Brazil.
I have never been to Austin before but living in Denver as an adult I met a lot of people who either love Austin, previously lived there or were hoping to return again. The city gets a huge amount of hype within the USA owing to a vibrant music, party and food scene. What once was kind of an edgy, unique and cool alternative city has blown up in the past twenty years to become a mainstream tech hub. During the pandemic people from both coasts moved to Texas to work remotely and save on paying federal income taxes and in the process engineered a sort of cultural revitalization or at least transitioning, at least from my perspective as an outsider who just heard lots of people telling me their opinions about Austin.
My post-college roommate Nick back in Allston, Massachusetts and his girlfriend both went to the University of Texas in Austin. Going to UT instills a sort of identity which is difficult to describe to people from other parts of the world where the university that they attended doesn’t have a sort of cult-like allegiance like it does in the USA. But knowing that college football is such a unique aspect of American culture, I wanted Val to go to a University of Texas football game so I got us tickets against Kansas State.
The stadium was packed! And the game was a really good one – the score was tied with just a few minutes left in the fourth quarter before the home team Longhorns pulled away and won the game. Valquiria’s favorite part though was seeing the American Actor, Matthew McConaughey in attendance at the game (he’s a big supporter of UT football). His wife is Brazilian and so he, like Tom Brady, has captured the hearts of many Brazilian women.
We went to a comedy club to watch amateur collegiate comedians which was more fun for the experience of getting served free wine with the price of admission, and being surrounded by 20 year olds in a stage room the size of a frat house living room. We went bowling in the University of Texas student union – bowling is really fun.
I was surprised at how expensive Austin was — I tried some local Texas barbecue at a place that was recommended by the hotel I was staying at (a very cool and historic hotel called The Driskill). It was okay — but they charged me $55 for 1/4 lb of brisket and four beef ribs. I guess this is just the standard costs in the USA after covid, but the value for what you get in the USA certainly seems like less than it was about 10 years ago. Makes it easy for me to stay away. But the value of what you can get was actually a big attraction for Val who wanted to buy all the things that were available in the USA compared to Brazil. So we visited a lot of outlet shopping stores so she could buy her family new phones and clothes, and then Walmart so that she could get a new vacuum cleaner. In the process I also went outlet shopping and replaced some of my clothes that if I’m honest with myself, probably should have been replaced a few years ago.
