Sites & Eats of Sao Paulo

 

  Yesterday was a very quiet day for me and the city in general. In most cities with a strong religious presence/history, a lot of places are closed on Sundays including restaurants & markets. I did decide to change hotels and unfortunately I did not do any research on the area beforehand. I somehow ended up in an area that locals refer to as "cracklandia." You can imagine why, and I can attest to why. 

  For those two reasons, I only went out once to get drinks and snacks. I will be changing hotels again today for my last few nights here. I did get out today once already to see some more sites, including the famous Market Municipal Paulistano. I love visiting markets in international cities to see the variety of produce, meat, and other foods they have to offer. As you can see from the pictures below, this was a good sized market with an amazing selection of fruit. 

  As far as food goes, the most popular items here are pastels (friend pastries) with different fillings, mortadella sandwich, and caldo de cana (sugar cane juice). The popularity of the mortadella sandwich was especially surprising, given it's an Italian meat, but you see it everywhere! That's definitely been a recurring theme of my international travels - our American perception of what people eat in other countries is usually wrong. 

   After I change hotels, I will be going somewhere I think is very appropriate for today in the US. I am going to visit the Memorial de Resistencia de Sao Paulo. This museum is nearby and in a historical building with exhibits on the city's past political oppression and resistance. Hopefully I can learn a thing or two, and hopefully history does not repeat itself here or at home!