As planned I made my way to a hostel near Paulista. Unplanned was how I got there, who I met on the way, and a sunburn covering my face, head, ears, and probably neck. Despite being untouched the previous two days, the sun came out in full force today. I did not use any sunscreen which I will remedy in the future. While my sunburn heals I have a plan to learn the rest of Portuguese in less than 2 days. Rather than explain it in detail, I will explain what led me here, show you a preview of my new method and move on.
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Today I started walking early in the morning and ended at 2PM after a great lunch. Certainly until my cast is off, I will not be able to walk as much as I did today. I overdid it and I'm expecting awful problems to start to occur tomorrow with my arm. Generally walking and a cast do not mix. I will have no problem covering more territory by metro in the coming month though. It has now come to my attention that I am in way over my head as far as Portuguese goes. Every time I have attempted to listen or to speak it has been a train wreck. If someone with an automatic weapon were to shout an order or a question at me, I would be toast. Luckily those sort of people have no questions or orders for me.
Since I have now learned that Portuguese is more difficult than I thought, I am putting mouseover text which should translate a few interesting things for you. Look for italic green text like this and put your mouse over it for a few seconds. If you think of a better way to display this, let me know.
Looking to the left from the top of the hostel:
Looking straight from the top of the hostel:
Looking right from the top of the hostel:
An easy photo opportunity at Santa Cecilia Station:
Near Santa Cecilia Station:
Across from Santa Cecilia Station:
Easiest landmark ever:
It's amazing. I actually made it to São Paulo, Brasil. I can't speak Brasilian Portuguese (of course I can't) despite having a ton of confidence before I left. I'll make a lot of progress everyday. What's more interesting is that I am writing this blog hours after arriving. If you recall, I didn't post my first blog in Tokyo, Japan or Berlin, Germany until over 48 hours after. The reason for that is easy access to what a person needs. Information is key to speed sometimes and boy did it work. The taxi stand had a database that took a street name and listed hotels, hostels, and other points of interest. 88 Real got me to the hostel in 45 minutes. Had I been smart I would have taken the bus. I wasn't able to figure out which bus to take so that would have been a bad idea. The hostel was happy to put me up despite having my reservation be for tomorrow. The hostel has 110V power (same as US) and WPA wifi, so it was really easy to get online. After my adventure, I hopped on and posted this. No photos yet but just wait.
Today I got lost. Similar to my adventure in Tokyo and Berlin, I simply walked in one direction until I needed to turn and didn't keep track of where I turned. After a while I found a landmark and followed my way home. For a while though it was a bit difficult to find my way. São Paulo doesn't have long straight streets. That's why a street name can get you a list of hotels and hostels. The street I'm on can't be more than 5 blocks long. I'll post the actual length in another post.
São Paulo is wonderful. There are so many shops in my area that I am in awe. The streets are dangerous and the sidewalks are uneven as possible. The heat is wonderful and the mood is good. There is so much graffiti everywhere that I actually wonder if the graffiti artists have the same values as other cities around the world. Maybe not. The largest building I can see from the 7th story here has graffiti at the top. São Paulo is 2 hours ahead of US Eastern Time (BRST), so this is being posted at 2:20pm rather than 9:20am. The time difference is quite a kick especially since flight was 19 or so hours. I'm pretty sleepy having not been able to sleep on the flight.
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