June 19th
Today was another normal day of classes at PUC. Our Portuguese class was broken in to sections where we focused on grammar, vocabulary and reading comprehension with all of the topics aimed at the graduate audience which means our discussions (while they may be at an elementary level grammatically) are interesting on a collegiate level. During the last portion of class our Portuguese professors took us to the Mercadão, the old central market in downtown São Paulo. It was a bit of a job to get all 30 of us down to the market. We walked to the closest metro stop and then took two different lines to arrive at Rua Vinte Cinco de Março which is one of the busiest shopping streets in the city. It’s just as busy as Avenida Paulista but for a completely different reason, Paulista is known for expensive stores and a classy shopping atmosphere, but Rua Vinte Cinco de Março is the street in town where you can find anything you want for less than 20 dollars, it is knock off city for purses and clothes and the district also sells all the makings of an amazing Carnival costume year round!
After pushing our way through the rather steep, bustling streets we arrived at the Mercadão an early 20th century building that reflects the economic boom of the coffee barons during the 19th century. The architecture of the building was an effort to consolidate and institutionalized the physical structure and space of the city into a very European type model. The building itself is gorgeous with a strong French influence, stained glass windows, skylights and soaring ceilings. It reminded me of an old train station, full of glass, iron and smooth stone. Inside the building are the regulated permanent market stalls, most of which have been run by Japanese immigrant families since the early years of the market. They sell almost any type of fruit, vegetable or meat that you could think of an once a week there is a flower market early in the morning. In addition to all of the wholesale goods there are many little restaurants which are famous for their deli sandwiches. Due to an unfortunate overlapping of schedules (the Tulane professors we were meeting there thought we had already eaten, and the Portuguese professors thought we were going to eat there) lunch was written out of the schedule, so we ended up spending most of or exploration time waiting in lines to get food from the restaurants on the second floor. Marcus, Angelika and I each got fresh juices and cheese or meat pastries for lunch rather than the amazingly large sandwiches. By the time we had gotten and eaten our food it was time to meet up with our professors for our afternoon cultural class which would take a tour of the old central town. Since we did not have much time to explore we decided that we would have to go back another day!
If traveling to the market with our class was difficult then traveling around the old center with and obviously foreign tour group was worse. It’s impossible not to attract attention with a group that large and out of place even if we were speaking Portuguese. Our tour of the downtown attracted both friendly and annoyed Paulistas. We stuck mainly to the pedestrian streets around the old banking center and the main cathedral. We attempted to go by the Pátio do Colégio and the Monastery of São Bento the fictional foundations of the city in the 16th century, however when we turned on to the street directly adjacent we saw that it was completely surrounded by the military police in anticipation of the protest that was supposed to gather in the area later on (part of the free pass movement). While we were discussing the significance of starting the protest at this location two young people on their way home from work came up to us to see if we were going to start the protest that day, and they were a bit disappointed when we said we were not. Here the protests are something very exciting and a flexing of new political muscles for civil society, which are for the most part very peaceful.
After ending our tour at the main cathedral (another important location for citizens to speak their grievances) we all began to disperse back to our respective parts of the city. The professors headed off quickly to go catch the end of the Brazil-Mexico qualifying game for the world cup next year. After a failed attempt to organize the group to go to watch the game closer to our homestays, Justin, Allison and I headed back to our local bar on Avenida Paulista (on the Praia Paulista) to catch the last quarter of the game. It was very exciting (speaking as someone whose never watched a futbol game before) and even more so than normal because Brazil won! The game also meant that there was a smaller protest than usual since so many were caught up in the longtime Brazilian passion for futbol! After the game we returned to our house to work on our homework and get some rest for the next day.
Today was another normal day of classes at PUC. Our Portuguese class was broken in to sections where we focused on grammar, vocabulary and reading comprehension with all of the topics aimed at the graduate audience which means our discussions (while they may be at an elementary level grammatically) are interesting on a collegiate level. During the last portion of class our Portuguese professors took us to the Mercadão, the old central market in downtown São Paulo. It was a bit of a job to get all 30 of us down to the market. We walked to the closest metro stop and then took two different lines to arrive at Rua Vinte Cinco de Março which is one of the busiest shopping streets in the city. It’s just as busy as Avenida Paulista but for a completely different reason, Paulista is known for expensive stores and a classy shopping atmosphere, but Rua Vinte Cinco de Março is the street in town where you can find anything you want for less than 20 dollars, it is knock off city for purses and clothes and the district also sells all the makings of an amazing Carnival costume year round!
After pushing our way through the rather steep, bustling streets we arrived at the Mercadão an early 20th century building that reflects the economic boom of the coffee barons during the 19th century. The architecture of the building was an effort to consolidate and institutionalized the physical structure and space of the city into a very European type model. The building itself is gorgeous with a strong French influence, stained glass windows, skylights and soaring ceilings. It reminded me of an old train station, full of glass, iron and smooth stone. Inside the building are the regulated permanent market stalls, most of which have been run by Japanese immigrant families since the early years of the market. They sell almost any type of fruit, vegetable or meat that you could think of an once a week there is a flower market early in the morning. In addition to all of the wholesale goods there are many little restaurants which are famous for their deli sandwiches. Due to an unfortunate overlapping of schedules (the Tulane professors we were meeting there thought we had already eaten, and the Portuguese professors thought we were going to eat there) lunch was written out of the schedule, so we ended up spending most of or exploration time waiting in lines to get food from the restaurants on the second floor. Marcus, Angelika and I each got fresh juices and cheese or meat pastries for lunch rather than the amazingly large sandwiches. By the time we had gotten and eaten our food it was time to meet up with our professors for our afternoon cultural class which would take a tour of the old central town. Since we did not have much time to explore we decided that we would have to go back another day!
If traveling to the market with our class was difficult then traveling around the old center with and obviously foreign tour group was worse. It’s impossible not to attract attention with a group that large and out of place even if we were speaking Portuguese. Our tour of the downtown attracted both friendly and annoyed Paulistas. We stuck mainly to the pedestrian streets around the old banking center and the main cathedral. We attempted to go by the Pátio do Colégio and the Monastery of São Bento the fictional foundations of the city in the 16th century, however when we turned on to the street directly adjacent we saw that it was completely surrounded by the military police in anticipation of the protest that was supposed to gather in the area later on (part of the free pass movement). While we were discussing the significance of starting the protest at this location two young people on their way home from work came up to us to see if we were going to start the protest that day, and they were a bit disappointed when we said we were not. Here the protests are something very exciting and a flexing of new political muscles for civil society, which are for the most part very peaceful.
After ending our tour at the main cathedral (another important location for citizens to speak their grievances) we all began to disperse back to our respective parts of the city. The professors headed off quickly to go catch the end of the Brazil-Mexico qualifying game for the world cup next year. After a failed attempt to organize the group to go to watch the game closer to our homestays, Justin, Allison and I headed back to our local bar on Avenida Paulista (on the Praia Paulista) to catch the last quarter of the game. It was very exciting (speaking as someone whose never watched a futbol game before) and even more so than normal because Brazil won! The game also meant that there was a smaller protest than usual since so many were caught up in the longtime Brazilian passion for futbol! After the game we returned to our house to work on our homework and get some rest for the next day.
One of the fruit vendor stalls in the Mercadao
The Pátio do Colégio surrounded by the military police
The main cathedral next to the Praca da Se
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