Ilha Grande gave us the tranquil spirit needed to tackle another big city. We met with Nana and Andreas at the wharf early next morning,exchanged a copy of the film for some wonderful nutella crepes they brought for Yannick. It was strange to wave goodbye to someone as we moved away into the ocean.
Missed the first bus from Angre del Ries to Sao Paulo but caught the next one. A 6 hour drive turned out to be 9 hours long which meant we reached SP at 11 pm. Bad news got worse with Yannick's backpack ripping open. The buses deserve a post by itself so I won't write about them now!
Anyway, found our way using a super metro system to Vila Mariana and the nicest family ever. Louiza was super enthusiastic, even picked us up from the subway station, which meant she dragged her mother out of her sons birthday party at 11.30 pm to find us.We stayed at her grandmothers place. Her grandmother Amelia, 91 years old , sprightly as a 60year old, still sits in her office for a few hours everyday , is everything you could want in a grandmother. It was wonderful chatting away with her, she in Portuguese, us using our phrasebook, a portuguese englsh dictionary and the kindle phrase book. She loved Yannick like he were her own grandchild.Tears in her eyes when we said goodbye! Yannick reciprocated equally. The family was wonderful, they took us in, fed us, had long discussions about |Brasil and just about everything else. We definitely leant a lot.
Sao Paulo is a big city, has a bunch of intersting things to see, the most impressive of which is the Merrcadom Municipal. A market with the most amazing fruits vegetable and meats. Fruits I hadn't dare imagine existed. Fruit Ninja can definitely add a few ultra rare fruits to its repertoire! It is also a huge food court with amazing restaurants. The pastel baccaloa is a SP speciality, so is the Mortadella Sandwich. Definitely gives the NY stle delis a run for their money, the juices are outstanding, the beer sadly still sucks!
Sunday was an early easter cleberation at Lauiza's house. Anu and Louisa's father Ricardo cooked, well what else but ...Baccaloa. Louisa, Yannick and I took the bicycle ride of our lives 25or so kms through SP. The city shuts down a lane from 7 am to 2 pm every sunday for cyclist to ride aroud and hundreds land up. The best way to see the city! The easter lunch doubled up as Anu's birthday celebration. It was also Henriques birthday so was a nice double celebration.
We also bumped into an Indian at the Market, who was so surprised to see Indians here that he invited us over for dinner. It was a real surprise that he had actually watched and loved Barah Aana. I think dinner was payment for downloading a pirated version of the film!! I´m beginning to have a chage of heart about piracy! How wlse would someone in SP see my film? The party was a bunch of Indian expats who have been living in SP for varying lengths of time. Interesting!
Sao Paulo for us for mostly Luiza, Ricardo, Sulekha (laura's mom), Maria (sis), Henrique ( bro) and Amelia, not to forget Neozinho (Amelia's housekeeper). Nouzinha was amazing, she even gave Anu a gift , a box of biscuits. A fantastic gesture! Made Nu's day! Walking aroudn the city , cycling around etc was a different kind of few days and we loved it!
Off to the cataratas - foz de Iguazu , apparently the most impressive waterfalls in the world!
Missed the first bus from Angre del Ries to Sao Paulo but caught the next one. A 6 hour drive turned out to be 9 hours long which meant we reached SP at 11 pm. Bad news got worse with Yannick's backpack ripping open. The buses deserve a post by itself so I won't write about them now!
Anyway, found our way using a super metro system to Vila Mariana and the nicest family ever. Louiza was super enthusiastic, even picked us up from the subway station, which meant she dragged her mother out of her sons birthday party at 11.30 pm to find us.We stayed at her grandmothers place. Her grandmother Amelia, 91 years old , sprightly as a 60year old, still sits in her office for a few hours everyday , is everything you could want in a grandmother. It was wonderful chatting away with her, she in Portuguese, us using our phrasebook, a portuguese englsh dictionary and the kindle phrase book. She loved Yannick like he were her own grandchild.Tears in her eyes when we said goodbye! Yannick reciprocated equally. The family was wonderful, they took us in, fed us, had long discussions about |Brasil and just about everything else. We definitely leant a lot.
Sao Paulo is a big city, has a bunch of intersting things to see, the most impressive of which is the Merrcadom Municipal. A market with the most amazing fruits vegetable and meats. Fruits I hadn't dare imagine existed. Fruit Ninja can definitely add a few ultra rare fruits to its repertoire! It is also a huge food court with amazing restaurants. The pastel baccaloa is a SP speciality, so is the Mortadella Sandwich. Definitely gives the NY stle delis a run for their money, the juices are outstanding, the beer sadly still sucks!
Sunday was an early easter cleberation at Lauiza's house. Anu and Louisa's father Ricardo cooked, well what else but ...Baccaloa. Louisa, Yannick and I took the bicycle ride of our lives 25or so kms through SP. The city shuts down a lane from 7 am to 2 pm every sunday for cyclist to ride aroud and hundreds land up. The best way to see the city! The easter lunch doubled up as Anu's birthday celebration. It was also Henriques birthday so was a nice double celebration.
We also bumped into an Indian at the Market, who was so surprised to see Indians here that he invited us over for dinner. It was a real surprise that he had actually watched and loved Barah Aana. I think dinner was payment for downloading a pirated version of the film!! I´m beginning to have a chage of heart about piracy! How wlse would someone in SP see my film? The party was a bunch of Indian expats who have been living in SP for varying lengths of time. Interesting!
Sao Paulo for us for mostly Luiza, Ricardo, Sulekha (laura's mom), Maria (sis), Henrique ( bro) and Amelia, not to forget Neozinho (Amelia's housekeeper). Nouzinha was amazing, she even gave Anu a gift , a box of biscuits. A fantastic gesture! Made Nu's day! Walking aroudn the city , cycling around etc was a different kind of few days and we loved it!
Off to the cataratas - foz de Iguazu , apparently the most impressive waterfalls in the world!
SIGH!
ReplyDeleteLove the posts Unni...