Thursday: Sao Paulo, Churrasco, Festa

Thursday morning I took the bus again, and once again ran into Gabriela. We spoke for a while, and once again parted ways at the bus terminal. I called Rodrigo to tell him I would be a little late to work, and he told me we would actually be heading to Sao Paulo. So we headed off towards Sao Paulo, and along the way we stopped for lunch at a very interesting restaurant beside the highway. The place was called NYC Burger, and it was decorated with plenty of American memorabilia, along with antique cars and a yellow taxi cab out front. The sign outside advertised, "taste the flavor of America." We ate burgers and took a bunch of pictures with the different artifacts while listening to a live performer playing popular American oldies on an electric guitar. Then we continued on the way to Sao Paulo.

Rodrigo with the yellow cab out front of NYC Burger

The table we ate at

Football Rollin

We arrived at the convention center that housed the Franchising Expo, the reason for our trip to the city. Only Professor Sabbatini and Rodrigo went in, though, and Tiago was assigned to show me some of the sights of Sao Paulo. As we drove through the bustling streets of the massive city, I was at times reminded of many other cities in the world. One moment we would be driving through the small hilly streets of San Francisco, making our way to the snaking overpass highways of Hong Kong, and on to the high-walled freeways of L.A. Our first destination was the Avenida Paulista, Sao Paulo's equivalent of Fifth Avenue. The street was 8 lanes wide, with lines of tall buildings on either side, housing banks, tv stations, and other office buildings.

Tiago and Rodrigo outside the convention center

Looking in the direction of the center of the city - note the change in sky color

After strolling along the avenue for a while, we drove off to Parque Ibirapuera, the big park in the middle of the city - somewhat of a mix of central park and the national mall. The park had a very nice lake and beautiful views of some of the buildings in the area. The park also has an obelisk, somewhat like the Washington Monument, except less pointy at the top. We walked around the park for about 45 minutes, before driving back to pick up Rodrigo and the professor. Getting out of the city took over an hour, with stop and go traffic from the center to the outskirts. I didn't arrive home until 10 o'clock.

Parque Ibirapuera:

The guys at the house were having a churrasco, or barbeque, to see off Freek, the Dutchman. Last night was his final one here in Campinas, as he was headed back for home on Monday and would spend the weekend in Sao Paulo. By the time I arrived, home, however, there was nothing left but beer. So we drank and partied before heading out to a festa, or party, at UNICAMP. Almost all of the guys in the house went, and we were singing and yelling and drinking all along the road on the way there. The party was plenty of fun, and we stayed out until 3:30 or so, then Freek, Kevin, and I sat around watching Crank on tv, eating Freek's extra pizzas from the freezer, while Renato was passed out half-drunk behind us. We went to bed at 5, and I truly felt as though I was losing a good friend, or at least someone who could have been a good friend had we had more time.

The guys