Day 1 in Brazil

Sao Paulo. 4th largest city in the world!

South America. I've never been there before. Now I want to go to Africa. I want to get a feel for how big this world is. I like being amazed at how much one group of humans can be so much alike, and also remarkably different in how they look and act.

We didn't get to the beach near Sao Paulo, but we did take a side trip to Rio de Janiero for five days. There was so much to explore just in Sao Paulo. We crammed so much into each day, including the last one before heading to the airport that night.

I live in a small town in Southern Utah. Going to this massive city was really wild.

It wasn't just the amount of people, it wasn't just the fascinating buildings that seemed to pile on top of each other. It was also things like the smells. Sometimes when walking by homeless people going through trash on the streets it's a blessing to be wearing a mask to at least dull the odors even a little.

This was view outside the door of our hotel, and part of the view from our window in the room. I like the design and color of the building that is blue, nestled back there. It appeared to be an optical illusion of sorts.

Every night people put their trash on the this corner, every day it was picked up and the business owners wash the sidewalk down.

Next time I won't pick this neighborhood, but I'm glad we stayed there to see all the chaos and hardships. It gave us a truer sense of the city than if we had been somewhere "nicer". Sometimes it was hard to be face to face with all the homeless and struggling people. It was very sobering.

This is the same viewpoint as the above picture, only more to the left of the street.

Graffiti and street art were common.

I was happy for the decorated buildings, it helps to get my bearings in a complicated city. We once tried to use google maps to find a store and went around in circles trying to understand what the app was telling us. There was some kind of error with the arrows, and it ended up being so ridiculous that it was comical. We were meeting a new friend and ended up making it just in time because we gave up on the app and went for brain power instead.

When going to a new town the first thing is to find some coffee for Ron.

This coffee shop was light and had tall ceilings and no one who spoke English. So we pointed a lot, and finally got our order in. I'm not good at Portuguese, but I'm good at charades! It was a lovely shop with things that surprised us. We pointed to a little pie looking thing and it was actually a Nutella dessert. Very tasty.

The first day we didn't wander more than a few blocks, and only in two directions. We found a fancier burger place a block away and gave it a shot. The burgers were small, which suited me just fine. Delicious and cheap too. And the way it was designed was cool too. It would take too much to describe the layout. We went upstairs and above the counter was all open to the street for watching dusk settle over one corner of the city.

I am including a picture of myself because my hair transformed in Brazil. I take the selfies for my darling mother, and my hair ended up changing quite a bit from this first picture.