Obrigado Brasil!

Greetings from Brazil! Me and Farah (whom I will now take a second to introduce as my older sister and co-blogger) arrived from Vancouver in São Paulo via Houston yesterday morning. We had planned to spend a couple days in the city, despite many recommendations that it was "just a city" and not worth the time, for a few reasons: firstly, although last summer I spent most of my stay in five-week Brazil in São Paulo state, I only passed through São Paulo's airport, and didn't spend any time in the city, it also seemed like a good idea to spend time in the Brazil's largest city (and one of the largest in the world, by most accounts well over 20 million people!), and finally because I had a couple friends in the city whom I wanted to see. So far, we haven't disappointed, its a huge city, and its unlike any city I've ever visited before.
From the time we left Vancouver, we've run into our fair traveling difficulties, or as I like to think of them "adventures": flight delays meant that we had to run to our gate in Houston to make the plane being held for us, we arrived in São Paulo without baggage, and the international phone card I had gotten specifically for this trip will not work despite our best efforts. Luckily, Brazil, and more specifically Brazilians have treated us extremely well, we've encountered so many helpful people: the flight attendant on our Vancouver to Houston flight, who made sure our connecting flight was held for us, the airline agent near the baggage claim in the São Paulo airport, who was extremely flexible and nice (a welcome and unexpected disposition for someone who probably spends their day dealing with angry and frustrated travelers in similar situations to our own,) who took down the name and number of our hostel and my email address, the staff at the hostel, who communicated with the airline, and enabled me to be sitting right now in clothes from my checked luggage, as well as helping us out with orientation in the city and neighborhood, and have really made our introduction to independent traveling an easy one, and finally the agents at a little travel agency/tour operator outfit, who were extremely sweet, and who helped us book our flight to Rio de Janeiro at a great price, and who also guided us on a walking tour of São Paulo's historic centre yesterday morning. Muito Obrigado Brasil!

I'll return now to why São Paulo is unlike any other city I've visited and why it was so different from what I expected. In short, I expected São Paulo to be like Shanghai, but with Brazilian culture and people. The surface similarities are many: both are the largest cities in developing countries with huge populations and growing economies, and both are capitals of the region, but not of the country, and both have had most of their development in the last half centuries. The aspect which surprised me most about São Paulo was not really the immense sprawl, or the juxtaposition of luxury and squalor, wealth and poverty, which were all very striking and a definite difference from Vancouver, but the lack of centralization. The two downtowns: Centro and Paulista, which I would not describe as close to each other, are little more "downtown" than many other areas. The view from the top of the Banespa building looking towards Avenida Paulista to the south-west looked the same as looking in any other direction. Avenida Paulista, the newer downtown area which neighbours some affluent residential areas, and is home to the central banks and corporate head offices, but not always to government buildings which are mostly in the older Centro, is the strangest downtown I could imagine because it is pretty much just one street. The street seems not to end, and Farah and I got very tired just walking a little portion of it, but to either side of the road, along most of the length, it quickly looks like Vancouver's downtown east-side (i.e. very run-down, and somewhat sketchy.) The only explanation that I can come up with bizzare urban landscape, is that this is the natural, uncontrolled, way that a city which would be absolutely unrecognizable to a Paulista from 50 years ago, develops. I think that the key difference between São Paulo and Shanghai, is the incredible amount of planning and lack of conscience, on the part of the national, regional, and city governments in Shanghai. Whereas in Shanghai, giant skyscrapers are heavily subsidized, and slums and historic neighbourhoods are destroyed on a daily basis, it was possible to create a neat efficient city instead of what is simply a mess of a city. However, The one thing I need to commend the São Paulo for (apart from that conscience thing) is the best, cleanest, most intuitive, and most streamlined metro sytem I've ever experienced. Without any preparation, Farah and I could figure out exactly how to pay for tickets, which trains to take, how to transfer, and how to exit the first time we rode almost as if it were part of our regular daily commute. The stations are huge caverns with tall ceilings, which I still have some difficulty believing are underground, and the most we've waited for a train to come is 2 minutes. It's simply astounding and trumps the New York Subway System, Boston T, Montreal Metro, and Shanghai Metro, and of course the metro system in my my home city, which I'm too embarrassed to mention by name here.
Today is our last day in São Paulo, we're not leaving till the evening, so we're planning on going to Liberdade, São Paulo's Japantown, which also now is home to plenty of Chinese and Korean people and establishments as well. I'm really glad that we came for 3 days, I've had a chance to see a good part of this intriguing city, have a smooth transition into the trip, where I've been able to call home, and get online easily, and I got to have a drink with my friend Cacao last night. Now I just can't wait for Rio de Janeiro!