Sao Paulo

12/05/13 to 14/05/13 - Usually most tourists tend to skip Sao Paulo as it is the commercial and economic city of Brazil, with lots of horrible tall glass and concrete buildings. We went there because we had to collect Flora’s new debit card that her bank had sent over. However, we found that for a couple of days, this city had some good things to offer.

The first day, we walked from our hostel which was in a safe area near Faria Lima metro station to Parque Ibirapuera. On our way we visited the Museu de Casa Brasileira, where an exhibition of young South American Designers and Graphic designers was held. We continued to walk towards the park on almost empty roads but as soon as we reached the park, we knew that most of the people from the city were there.

As it was Sunday, we visited (for free) another couple of museums: the Museu de Arte Modern with pictures of “Lady” Andy Warhol taken by his friend and the Museu de Afro Brasil, both situated in the park.

We walked again up to the Avenida Paulista to reach the metro station to go back to our hotel. As we weren’t sure of the way, we asked some people who told us that the nearest was 5 mins away (Brazilian time though, as it took us 15 mins!)

The next day, as it was Monday, we went to the trader’s district to the bank to pick up my card, passing the Estacao de Luz train station, and happened to wander through the trader's district, where each street specialised in a different product. We picked two streets at random and had the pleasure of passing hundreds of bridal shops, mannequin shops and fabric shops. There were some nice old buildings in amongst it all. After the bank we went to Mercado Municipal for lunch, where we had quite possibly the biggest low-carb sandwich ever.



After lunch we went to Edificio Altino Arantes, which used to be the tallest building outside of the United States when built in 1947. The building looked like a small version of the Empire State Building, as its architect was inspired by it. The view from the top was extraordinary, with skyscrapers in every direction as far as the eye could see. You'd think a city this size (19million) would be dirty and smoggy. Maybe it’s due to the fact cars run on ethanol, or the breeze from the sea, but the air was surprisingly clean and clear.

We finished the afternoon by walking around the centre to see the Cathedral da Sé and the Municipal Theatre.

In the evening, we went for few drinks near our hostel in the famous bohemian area Vila Madalena. There was a nice live band playing samba and later a couple of girls were dancing.  Flora tried to copy them from farther away and they caught her trying to dance samba. She had a thumbs up from one of the ladies and she made a sign for me to join, but at this point after 5 minutes trying, she was tired (imagine doing 180 steps in one minute….)

The following day, we were supposed to head to Paraty in the morning, but we realised that the bus was fully booked at the time we wanted, so we had time to visit the Museu Pinacoteca do Estado near the old station and go to the Beco de Batman (a street covered in grafitti which was a bit like a smaller version of Valpairaiso, but without the nice buildings).