The last chocolate scoop from home

Aug 05, 2024

My delicious chocolate powder that I brought from Brazil is running low and reminded me of all the crazy things we used to bring back and forth from Brazil and Chile.

This tradition of believing anything can be brought onto a plane started with my Mom during her first trip to Disney World at age 18. She bought a microwave for her home in Sao Paulo. Since it was too heavy to carry she decided to buy a skateboard and some rope and pushed it all the way back home. This started something, of course, abiding by air traffic regulations, my Mom believes we can bring anything on flights. The world is her supply and there is nothing stopping her. From microwaves to childhood treats.

Chocolate, peanuts, soaps, sandals, cheese (pasteurized), cookies, candy, and brushes are just some of the few common things you would find in our luggage. All these are fair enough, we are immigrants and miss the taste of home. For my family, it never stopped there. Here are some of my favourite stories

Massive Scissors for one tree

One summer my grandma went to Chile for a visit. My Dad had purchased a big tree-cutting stick. On our next trip to Brazil, you better believe it, my Mom had two long sticks under her arm ready to be checked in. She packed away the long scissors that were attached to the top on our checked luggage but the sticks were too long to fit. As a teenager, I was embraced. Why do we need to bring so many things? My grandma was extremely happy with her cutter. Funnily enough, she just had only tree in her house to use it on.

Delicate Party Topper

Brazil can do parties amazingly, I have written about that before. Growing up, my Mom would ask me and my sisters what we wanted the theme of our birthday to be whenever someone was travelling from Brazil. Could be 6, or 8 months in advance, it all depended on luggage space. Family members would bring all our decorations. From paper plates to cake stands. Most of the time it was my grandma flying to see us. My favourite story, which sums up my family, was on my 8th birthday. I had chosen ‘Snow White’ as my birthday theme. My grandma saw a beautiful house made out of styrofoam that I had to have as my cake topper. It had the shape of the cabin from the movie. Nobody cared to mention how fragile and big it was. This was still no problem for my grandma. She flew for 5 hours with it in her lap. But that is not all, it was so nice she brought it back to Brazil and then flew with it to Slovakia so my cousin could also have a ‘Snow White’ themed birthday party. I think this styrofoam cake topper is still in someone's basement about to turn 20 years old.

I could never imagine travelling with a foam house on my lap for that many hours. Looking back, I was so excited about it. I appreciate those memories so much and I could never replay my family’s efforts to make our birthdays so awesome.

Whole Cheesecakes for the Flight

Another of my Mom’s classic travel stories is set on a domestic flight in Chile. She brought 2 whole cheesecakes on the plane that went right on her lap. I have said before how Chilean desserts are not very good. At that time we frequently flew to the south of Chile to see some friends that had moved there. They used to buy a cheesecake that had a lot of Jell-O. It was not very tasty. So my Mom decided to be the one to bring the delicious cheesecake this time. Picture two store-bought cheesecakes going through the luggage metal detector. Now picture me on the side so confused. The cheesecakes made it. They stayed put on my Mom’s lap the whole flight. And they ended up saving us from having that very gross cheesecake during that trip.

The reason I was thinking of all of this is because I want more of my Brazilian chocolate.

I do have a chocolate problem, this is my bag from my first trip to Germany. Half of it was Kinder.

I can laugh all I want about my family's crazy habits but I did bring 6 months’ worth of chocolate, a year worth of soap and so much granulado (chocolate) to make brigadeiros for 10 parties. I love to share my culture with my family and friends. This is how we stayed connected living so far apart. Running out of chocolate makes me sad because I feel a little further from home.