Monday - Embu das Arte & Municipal Mercado

Monday - 

We woke up about 7:15ish, went down and had breakfast at the hotel. We then needed to determine how we would get to Embu das Artes. Public transportation would’ve been a city bus, as the metro and train system don’t go out of the city that far. It would take about 90 minutes depending on traffic. An Uber would shave off about 30 minutes, so we opted for that. I had the Uber app on my phone, but had never set up an account. I thought I’d just sign in thru Facebook...that messed things up as Uber expected me to have a US phone number as part of my account set up. It wouldn’t accept my Brazilian number, so fortunately Jon had his already set up and was able to summon an Uber which arrived in a matter of minutes!

As we drove through and out of São Paulo, the poverty is striking. The favelas are small houses/apartments built one on top of each other. They are shacks at best, with tarps covering roofs & huge tubs to collect rainwater for everyday activities (bathing, laundry). The brothers strongly suggested that we not visit favela neighborhoods due to high crime. While stealing is wrong, I understand more why these people resort to it. We also saw so many people living on the streets. Mattresses under trees with entire families living there. On cold evenings they build fires to keep warm. The city itself is filthy - trash everywhere! Yes, 12 million people live here, but there is such disregard for the earth. How we need the Kingdom - everyone will have a beautiful, safe, clean home and no one will want for anything! 

Anyway, we arrived in Embu das Artes a couple minutes to 10. We looked at sculptures made by different mediums in the city square. Very unique. We met some of the friends right away and visited for a few minutes. My introverted hubby decided to go off on his own to film and explore. 

So Jon and I had a nice mother/son visit while we walked and shopped. When I say walked, I kinda mean hiked because the streets are SO steep!! Our first shop was artisan spirits and snacks. I immediately teased Jon about day drinking as the proprietress started pouring him samples of all these kinds of Cachaça, the national drink of Brazil! I picked up a bottle of Cappuccino Liqueur and a 500g bag of Brazilian coffee! We picked up most of our souvenirs in the little shops here. Sadly, many shops are only open on weekends. The brothers from the Branch set this town as one of the sponsored excursions we could take, but we didn’t want to overload our schedules and so we didn’t sign up for it through them. Had we come with the brothers, the shops would have been open as they had negotiated that for the days leading up to the convention. Oh well, it was still fun. 

We went to a little outdoor restaurant for lunch and I ordered what I thought would be a plain Jane grilled chicken sandwich. Nope! What I got was this behemoth! I gave 1/2 to Shawn. In Embu das Artes, there are many stray dogs who just hang out on the streets, take naps in the sun ☀️and beg for food from tourists having lunch. We quickly discovered these dogs are picky - they won’t eat your fries or the naan style bread from your sandwich. They want the meat!! Made me laugh because meat is SO important to people here and that trait has been passed down to man’s best friend. 

At about 3:15, Jon called up another Uber and off we went downtown to the Municipal Market. Off Shawn went on his own again as Jon and I wandered through this culinary paradise. Oh my goodness! Smoked meats, cured fish, spices, produce, specialty items...they were all there including food stands and restaurants serving the giant  Mortadella sandwich which we did not buy because we were still too full from lunch. But...walking past a fruit vendor we were accosted by a man with a knife! He was cutting up huge chunks of fruit and giving us samples to encourage us to buy. Yellow kiwi, red dragon fruit, white dragon fruit, cashew apple, a citrus that was a cross between an orange and a grapefruit, another type of citrus, French grapes, champagne grapes, nectarines...he went on and on. We must’ve tasted between 12 and 15 fruits. Yes, we bought some! Look up the mortadella sandwich and cashew apple on Wikipedia!

About 5:45 we left, as the market closed at 6pm. As we went out there were people and tables and awnings and carts everywhere. When the indoor market closes, folks move outside. It’s winter here in the Southern Hemisphere, so it was starting to get dark. By this time I was also beginning to think I was in the early stages of a cold. Uber number three picked us up and brought us safely back to the hotel. Grabbed an evening coffee from the lobby and headed upstairs. 

Leaving the US is certainly a different experience. It makes you grateful for what you have, you see that bigger or more isn’t always better. Many products are smaller, from soda bottles to the size of cough drops. Stores are smaller in the mall. A drugstore isn’t the size of Walgreens or CVS - more like the size of a convenience store. There are enough choices for products, not an overwhelming choice like in the US. Coffees are about 5-6 oz. But they’re much tastier and stronger so I’ll give them that. 

That about does it for Monday. I’ll start on Tuesday ASAP, so I won’t have too many memories to retain for too long before I put them down in writing. Bom diá!