Posts Tagged ‘Sao Paulo’

Wrapping up in Sao Paulo

All good things, they say, must come to an end. And so it is with our stay in Sao Paulo. This last week has been packed with a lot of things going on in parallel: planning our 1 month South America trip, completing the related tourist visa activity, winding down Uma’s assignment, last minute shopping […]

Golf in Sao Paulo – 2

I made another daring attempt to experience golf in Sao Paulo. It’s simply not easy in this part of the world. There are very few golf courses out here. Most are private, some may require a member accompanying you, and the public courses are few and far away. After much research, I decided to pay a […]

O do Borogodo

This place12 is so cool, it deserves a separate post. At the outset, everything about it in terms of location, entrance, building, etc. look rundown. But come 11 pm, it transforms into a hip samba spot where the dim lighting is just right, the live music/singing is soul piercing, the overcrowd (yes, I am using […]

Targeted advertising

The last few days, I’ve been catching up on “The Daily Show”, and “The Colbert Report” episodes over the internet. Every time they break for commercial, I get this annoying ad peddling cosmetics to teenagers!? Either teenage girls in Brazil ardently watch these shows, or the targeted advertising is way off. I won’t be entertaining […]

Renting a car in Brazil

We heard good things about Paraty (pronounced Pɑ-rɑ-chi) from the locals. It is a drivable distance from Sao Paulo…all we had to do was pick a weekend, rent a car, and head on thataway. NOT SO FAST AMIGO! Here are some obstacles I encountered…future car rental enthusiasts might want to take note: Renting cars here […]

New friends

Andrea 1, a close friend of mine since the old Sun Microsystems days, introduced us to Maria, a native of Sao Paulo…or as they say, a Paulistana. We met Maria and Adel on Thursday, just before heading out to Paraty for the weekend. We had a terrific time getting to know them, the city, how it […]

Beam me up, Subramaniam…

When you are an alien in a foreign land, every once in a while, there is this urge to connect back with the mother ship. Being a vegetarian Indian visiting a predominantly carnivorous country, one tends to seek out Indian restaurants as ideal trans-communication portals. Sometimes, the meal hits the spot…often times, not. I would […]

Sao Paulo International Film Festival

Ever watched an Italian movie with Portuguese subtitles, while understanding neither languages? We managed to pull off such silliness just to experience the Sao Paulo International film festival 1. The movie (Reality) was about a normal guy who starts obsessing about getting on a Reality show (Big Brother). Apart from blankly looking around while everyone […]

Ibirapuera Park

We took a relaxed stroll in Ibirapuera Park 1, a large city park, about 1 km away from our hotel. It’s a fantastic place with a lot going on, especially over the weekends. People are ‘slack lining’ 2, practicing Brazilian Jui-Jitsu, skateboarding, playing team sports, etc. On occasion, we’ve been coming down here for a […]

Samba School

The Carnival 1 is a big deal for Brazilians. Hundreds of ‘samba schools’ 2 participate in the parade, and each school has thousands of participants (musicians, dancers, singers, god mother, old aunts, etc.). Every year, each school comes out with a ‘samba plot’, theme, songs, costumes, etc. They introduce their plot, and start practice almost […]