All about... grandma

This is a hard post to make, but I'll try to make it in a happy way because it's about a special and happy person: my grandma. She passed away two days before last Christmas and this is my first Christmas without her in fact (last year was so confused with the funeral and stuff) and without my parents close to me. But she was the funniest and the happiest person I met in my all life, so I try to keep just the good memories about her.


I didn't meet my other grandma, so she was always the only one. And she was my godmother too. And I never met other woman like her. Always strong and always trying to see the good side of everything. Always making jokes, even about her own problems. When times get hard to me, I think about her. She used to love Carnival. For years, she made costumes and went on the streets of the small city she lived with lots of friends and relatives to celebrate and dance. She didn't like her birthday, so every year she used to choose one day to be the “birthday day”. She was religious, but didn't want to go to heaven. To her life on earth was the only one she knew and the sky seemed to be boring (with just “white clouds and souls dressed in white”). She always knew she wouldn't live after her 84th birthday and that's how it was. She didn't like go to weddings because “I went to mine and it wasn't that good!” and she loved Christmas.

We used to celebrate Christmas with a big party every year the night of December 24th. My mother's family isn't that big (considering most of the Brazilian families), so we used to be together – my parents, my brother, grandma (and for some years, my grandfather too) and all uncles and nephews, at our house in this small town (just her lived there in fact). And she always arrived carrying the big red bag of gifts and using Santa Claus' hat. This is the best memory ever. And that's why I still love Christmas. Not because of the religious part, not because of Santa Claus, not because of the gifts. Because of my family and because of my grandma.

It wasn't easy to her to understand why I decided to be vegan. She grew up in a farm and used to cook with animal fat for years. When I told her that I wasn't eating meat, eggs and milk anymore, she was really pissed off. She couldn't believe I wouldn't eat her food anymore, and most important, I wouldn't eat all desserts she used to cook with love for me. But after some time, she started to think about some alternatives. She found out a place in that small town that had soy and she learned how to cook some vegan food for me. And after, for Matteo. She loved him. It was love at the first sight. She used to call him “Matteozinho” (little Matteo) and everything she was cooking was for him. Sometimes she forgot about the things, and asked us if we wanted something with chicken or meat, but it wasn't to make jokes (like so many people do), it was just hard to remember or to understand. She was doing her best.

She was the best person I ever met. She will always be an example for my life. She was my sunshine and she will be always in my heart.