Day 14 - São Paulo!

Yes, I'm writing this a week late. Sorry bout all that. 

Three of the gals I work with took me shopping in São Paulo on 9/7 - it's the first time I've been there. The traffic wasn't nearly as bad as during the week (I'm told) since we went on a Sunday. We went first to the "cheap" shops - inexpensive jewelry, souvenirs, etc - they were all the ones where the whole front opens up. I bought a bunch of Brasil crap for the fam. 

We walked from there to the Municipal Mercado - which was just awesome and I will definitely go back. Think of a big, old, airy building packed with fruit and meat vendors. There were fruits that I have never seen before in my life. Upstairs, there were a lot of restaurants that are apparently pretty famous - the gals told me that lots of movie stars and singers are seen there. Ge and I each ordered a pastel for lunch (hers- shrimp, mine - heart of palm) and we split them - oh my gosh they're tasty. Pastels are patries filled with pretty much anything you can imagine. The dough seems like the same thing as fried wontons at home. They are crispy and chewy and delicious.

We drove from there to the "richer" shopping area of São Paulo. There were lots of street performers and people selling art. We checked out a mall where I bought a bunch of fun fridge magnets to take home. The area felt very artsy and fashion-y. The only thing I bought was magnets because it was also pricey.

We stopped and got ice cream in this area - I had acai with granola and bananas added to it. It was delicious, and it turned my teeth purple :)

Sorry I don't have more pictures, my stupid phone died so I had to bum pictures off everybody else. The good news is, I've ordered an unlocked iphone that I'm going to get my buddy Ben at Sage to bring down to me to use instead of this god-awful samsung. 

This one is off-topic: lunch on 9/5 in Aruja at my favorite Japanese joint with the finance crew. On the left, starting at the front: Leandro (one of the newbies we hired that I'm training); Analice (tax accountant); Leila (AP/AR). On the right, starting at the front: Walter (IE); Andre (another newbie that I'm training); yours truly; Gerilicine (I'm not sure I spelled that right - she was just promoted from AP/AR to work in the controller area)

In the "cheap" shopping area in São Paulo. Left to right: Stela (HR manager - she doesn't speak English any better than I speak Portuguese, so not a lot of deep conversation happening there); your truly; Catia (accounting manager)

Same spot, Ge is on the left in this one. She's just adorable and always happy. 

All of us at the Municipal Mercado

Lunch! Catia's daughter Camila is in the back left corner there. She goes to college in São Paulo so she rode with us and we dropped her off at her apartment when we were leaving.

So this was one of the street performers in the more classy artist area we went to. How the heck did he DO that?? And why didn't I get in a thumbs-up pose too?? Arg...