Friday nights and friends ...and a downpour! - São Paulo

Jacare Grill Vila Madalena

Yesterday one of my closest childhood friends arrived with his family from New York. They had had one of those hell trips that involve 2-hour lines for security snaking through the airport as everyone tried to escape the winter storm. They arrived here 2 1/2 hours late and eager for warm sunny weather.

We took them out to one of our favorite places in Vila Madalena, called Jacaré Grill (Alligator Grill). It's a really fun place on a Sunday with Harley riders pulling up and drinking a beer right on the street. You can't find a place to sit after 2 pm. Friday night is a different crowd and also 80s music blaring from the speakers. Okay, we enjoyed the 80s music, even the teenager. 

Carne Louca

Food was a mixture of "carne louca" (crazy meat), pork and sausages. And a great salad for you vegetarians. And a lot of cold beer. We were tucked back so far in the restaurant that we didn't even notice it had started raining some time during our dinner. No, not raining, POURING as it does in tropical countries. The roads were already rushing rapids since Vila Madalena is filled with little hills like in San Francisco.

We made a run for Bacio di Latte, the gorgeous gelato store on the next corner. We were soaked from a 20 second run. We ordered giant pots of ice cream and stood around getting dripped on from the glass ceiling with obvious weather-proofing issues. Then we sat around and sat around waiting for a break in the rain so we could get the car parked two blocks away. It rained harder. Even when I thought there was no possible way for it to rain harder, it rained harder. The New Yorkers were exhausted. And cold--believe it or not. In wet clothing in an ice cream store. Albeit a very nice ice cream store.

Bacio di Latte Vila Madalena

We ordered tea which arrived lukewarm and not delicious. I don't think they had ever before been asked for tea. My friend had first wanted decaf coffee, which they did not have. Brazil simply does not have decaf coffee. Or if they do have it, it's not good.

Finally, with kids falling asleep on the benches, my husband made a run for the car. The rain, the wonderful long-absent rain, continued through the night.

Nooks and Stairs - Vila Madalena, São Paulo

The old, the new, the written-on.

The neighborhood of Vila Madalena is full of nooks and staircases and dead-end streets and graffiti with charm. This is one of my favorite shortcuts from the metro down to Rua Girassol. You meet all kinds of people on the stairs--commuters in suits, nannies with small kids in school uniforms, older ladies with bags of groceries slowly heading up or down, hands on the walls.

Riding on the metro-oh-oh - São Paulo

One of the things I love most in São Paulo is the metro system. Yes, it's true. The metro system is a joy--on most days. On days of rains, days of "pane" (breakdowns) it is not fun. But most of the time, it is a delight. And what continues to surprise me is how few people in Classe A/B, as they put it here, ride it. In fact, when I told a Brazilian friend that I had taken it to the conference yesterday, she looked at me as if I were crazy and exclaimed "Aren't you afraid of being robbed?" 

I am afraid of very few things, actually, and being robbed on the metro is not one of them. I assume that it will happen to me one day in some city in some country of the world. I haven't seen the numbers for robbery on the metro here versus any other big city, but I would believe they are roughly the same. Pickpockets are a universal delight.

Yesterday the South Africa conference was being held at the Maksoud Plaza, a wacky hotel just off Avenida Paulista. For sure, it will be tomorrow's post. The place is stuck so firmly in the 1970s, I want to wear bell bottoms when I go there. The meeting started at 9 am--traffic at this hour to get near Avenida Paulista, a major thoroughfare, would not be fun.  So here is what I did.

I parked my car, for free, on a street four blocks away from Vila Madalena station. I admit I have an advantage with my car being bullet-proof. There is no way to steal it--I never think twice about leaving it parked on a street. I walked up a nice stairway, a little like this one below (actually this is the block before where I get the staircase).

Photo credit: www.livingdesign.net.br

Three blocks later I arrive in front of the Vila Madalena station. It is always "movimentado" or full of people going in, leaving, catching a bus out front or waiting for friends. An escalator down and you are in the big open atrium. I flick my "bilhete unico" (unified ticket --bus, metro and train) card onto the reader and I'm through the gates. Another escalator down and I join the people waiting on the platform.

At 8 am on a weekday, things are busy but not crazy. One of the best things about the V. Mad station is that it is the end of the line. When the train comes in, you can usually find a seat pretty quickly, and there is no fight for space. Things fill up slightly at the next two stations (Sumare and Clinicas) but the big munch comes at Consolação which connects with the yellow line. The next station, MASP/Trianon, is mine and I have to ask pardon to get out, holding tight to my bag.

At MASP/Trianon, I am a little confused about where to exit and end up getting on the correct side of Avenida Paulista but farther from my destination. But it's only a three block walk on the other side and I get to walk down one of the most fun streets in Brazil. For people-watching, that is. The whole trip, from parking to arrival at the hotel, has taken me 30 minutes, and I've arrived stress-free. Cost of US$3.00 for metro back and forth. If I had parked at the hotel, the most obvious cost would have been the US$20 parking, not to mention gas, time and frustration.

Avenida Paulista. Photo credit: wikipedia.com

Love the metro. Makes me sing that old Berlin song (no I had neither a whiskey nor a gun on my trip). Riding on the metro-oh-oh...