Mariana Cabral, Bumba na Fofinha: “The youngest children are beggars, they fight for crumbs of affection. The older brothers are chalupas”

Born in December 1986, in Lisbon. She lived, grew up and studied in Restelo. Her mother is a translator of German, English and French, her father was a naval engineer and “fascinated by his tricks”.

To the “dismay” of their parents, none of the four children followed one of their professions and the youngest is even a comedian. Mariana Cabral inherited many things from her brothers, including school bibs “full of patches”.

She grew up always worried about the possibility of making a living from a profession she didn’t like. She thought journalism was her destiny and it started out as such. She graduated in Journalism, but never found facts funny. Being a journalist was “boring”, mainly because she couldn’t change the narratives of the stories.

After the course, he jumped from job to job and even worked at Disneyland in Orlando. “It was erratic. Basically, I went to jobs that paid me relatively well so I could travel later,” she explains.

It was at least around this time that “Bumba na Fofinha” was born. “Explaining the story from the beginning is always a hassle”, but he summarized: “I found something I liked”, he says.

The character Bumba na Fofinha began as a blog and today is a “brand” known to everyone. “For me, Bumba is Mariana Cabral, it’s me, on steroids”, she confesses.

“While Bumba talks about the things that worry me and sometimes they don’t worry me as much as I feel uneasy. Obviously it’s all a bit extreme, but I’m the same person”, he continues.

Mariana Cabral is the new guest on the Geração 80 podcast and brought something sour to the conversation, because this generation no longer eats “things from the ground” and she ate a lot when she was a kid.

In this conversation led by Francisco Pedro Balsemão he talks openly about the limits of humor and words that make so many “hurts” today. It reflects on the “curation” of “beauty, color and happiness” on social media and how perfect profiles make others think they are “wrong for feeling alone”. Listen to the interview here.

Free and dreamy, the 80s in Portugal were marked by the consolidation of democracy and an opening to the world driven by membership of the EEC. These were years of great creativity, the impact of which continues today. Despite the mustaches, the wads and the perms, did the 80s give the world the best harvest ever? In this podcast, we give voice to a series of Portuguese people born in that brilliant decade, in a return to the future guided by Francisco Pedro Balsemão, born in 1980.