Its Promo Time

June 24
Today was another regular day of classes. In Portuguese we had language evaluations so that the professors can track our progress. It consisted of the professor calling our name out and giving us a topic to talk about for two minutes. I got sports so it was not that bad, but being put on the spot meant that I was mostly babbling for the two minutes. After class we got lunch on campus, no one wanted to venture out because the winter rains have begun here in São Paulo. I have been getting the fixed lunches they serve which change every day. Today it was your choice of meats, beans, rice, the Brazilian equivalent of grits and a juice all for $5.50!
At lunch Mari (our Brazilian TA) and several of us discussed plans to go see one of the cheesy Brazilian movies next week. On all forms of public transport there are tvs which advertise for these cheesy looking local films that are a cross between a novella and a comedy. We think it would be great to just go for the experience! After lunch we had an actual class meeting instead of an excursion for our Brazilian culture course. We spent all of the class, and then some, talking about the Brazilian modernist movement in art and literature. Tomorrow our class meeting will be an outing to and tour of the Museu Lasar Segall. We are very lucky in that our tour guide will be Jorge Schwartz one of the premier authors on the Brazilian modernist movement.
Since class got out late we ended up getting caught in the early rush hour traffic (and it was raining…) so it took about 40 min to get home on the bus, which still was not that bad. Once we got off the bus the Paulista group and our professor decided to stop in at our local bar/restaurant on Avenida Paulista to see if the rain would let up before our walks home. It did not, so we just braved the rain to stop by the Promo Center which is one of the locations of the grey market in São Paulo to get a new battery for Allison’s cell phone. It was amazing!! The whole place was full of knock offs of varying degrees of quality. Almost all consumer goods in Brazil are significantly more expensive than in the US, that’s why many Brazilians take shopping trips to Florida to buy what they need (it’s also why Brazil is the only country in Latin America where you can take two checked bags for free on most airlines). However, at the market I got a really cool Michael Kors lookalike watch for $20 and I saw about ten leather purses that I wanted too! This particular promo center is directly off of Paulista only a few blocks from the really expensive stores on the street. The market is almost completely run by Japanese and Korean immigrants to Brazil, as was with the Mercadão. I’m definitely going to go back before I leave!