São Paulo In My Mouth

As we said, our trip to São Paulo was a bit like a little trip to Asia and the main reason was the food we ate! 

First up was a Chinese restaurant called Chi Fu. Dave's colleague had recommended to us and said it served authentic Beijing style duck. The thought of eating that melt-in-the-mouth crispy skin again meant it was literally the first place we went once we had dropped our bags at the hotel! We knew we were going to get the duck but once we were in there and saw some of the other dishes it wasn't such an easy decision! Everything looked really tasty and the size, style and business of the place felt just like China.Of course we did get the duck and it actually came as three dishes - a soup (not pictured as it was a bit naff), stir fried with beansprouts, ginger and all the usual Chinese flavours, and then the crispy skin with pancakes and hoisin sauce. The stir fry was really tasty and full of veg which was great. The skin was definitely reminiscent of what we had in Beijing, but it wasn't as juicy or as melty. But we weren't too disappointed as it had been so long since we'd had any kind of Chinese food!

With a limited number of meals in the city, we really had to prioritise what we ate! When it came to the Japanese food though, this was actually pretty easy - Rio is full of sushi but what we hadn't had for a long time was a big bowl of delicious ramen noodles, like those amazing ones we had in Fukuoka. So I did some research online and picked a ramen restaurant called Ramen Kazu. When we arrived there was a "queue" of about 25 people waiting outside the restaurant and my mouth started watering because I knew I must have chosen well. While we waited we decided what we wanted and placed our order in advance, so it was ready really quickly once we finally got a table. The place is tiny with an open kitchen and a digibog - it was like being transported back to 2011! We started the meal with a portion of gyoza and had to demonstrate immense self control not to order another six. I could eat gyoza/potsitckers/mandu every day and not stop loving them. In fact, I pretty much did that in Korea! Anyway, thank goodness we stayed strong - the bowls of noodles were HUGE! Dave went for a soy broth, sliced pork, mushrooms and nori (seaweed) and he really enjoyed them. I liked them, but thought mine were nicer (Dave disagreed - it's always good when you think you have the best food!) Mine had a clear broth and really spicy minced pork. It was absolutely delicious and I was genuinely upset that I didn't manage to eat it all.

One of the nights we decided to treat ourselves to a cocktail on the rooftop bar of the fancy Hotel Unique, which is shaped like a boat, with huge porthole windows. We didn't get a good photo in the dark but if you click here, google will show you some. We arrived quite early so didn't have to wait long to be taken up in the special lift. Once up there we discovered it was very noisy and dark and the view wasn't that great. But we weren't disappointed because the cocktails we got were incredible! The photo is badly framed and Dave has been cropped out because we just don't know how to take selfies but the drink on the left is a lychee and vodka concoction that was really yummy. Unfortunately we couldn't really appreciate how yummy it was because it was so very overshadowed by the seductively dark and luxurious açaí and prosecco cocktail on the right. I haven't told you about açaí yet because it deserves its own post but in brief, it is a berry found in the Amazon that has an odd, almost chocolately flavour that worked so well in this cocktail, I bought the liqueur the next day!

I think I've waffled a bit too much in this post so far so I'm going to be a bit snappier with these final items.

Mortadella and mozzarella sandwich from the municipal market. A huge pile of meat shoved in a crusty bun but oddly lacking in flavour and generally not that impressive. Sorry Brazil, but your sandwiches just don't cut the mustard. Actually, mustard would have been good...

Oh, what's this?! A cheeky dumpling with pickles from the Japanese market at Liberdade? Well everyone else was doing it and we didn't want to be rude!

While we watched some football final thingy in a pub, we ate this lovely chicken. It didn't have a normal batter or breadcrumb coating - it was a bit more like cornflake chicken, if you've ever had that. Really crunchy but still juicy and it came with a really tangy and tasty passion fruit dipping sauce. Yum!

And speaking of passion fruit...look what we found! The search has certainly slowed but it hasn't stopped yet.

Weird & Wonderful: São Paulo

It's been sometime since we have posted a weird & wonderful together. The world hasn't become more normal though, we promise.

The coolest dog in the world

Piranha Fish to eat! If they have fed on a human before, does that make you a cannibal?

Testicles. My favourite snack.

Afro-Brazil museum contained an exhibit of famous people with multi-cultural heritage

This crossing was in Liberdade. Remind you of anything in Shibuya?

Naughty Graffiti

Super cute old-school post box for bread and milk

This was some slightly threatening graffiti we stumbled across while aimlessly wandering the streets

We felt really at home at the Gay Pride parade!

The pedestrian signals were changed all over town to represent the nearby famous monuments!

Beer is served super gelado! It sometimes contains ice crystals!

The Greatest Flight Since Sliced Bread Was Served Onboard

We recently blogged all about our trip to São Paulo and how awesome the city is. What we didn't talk about was the journey to get there. What is (I imagine) an arduous six hour drive turns out to be a rather wonderful one hour flight.

Besides all the usual nonsense of airports and security (although Brazil is actually better to get through than most) it was a great trip. It was the clearest of days and the flight took us along the coast, over the incredible beaches, rivers, and lagoons in the short one hour flight. The route the plane takes from Rio to São Paulo is below:

We have blogged about our journeys before such as a great bus through Vietnam & Laos and a flight through the rainforests of Borneo. This simple and cheap one hour flight was up there with all of them. Okay, enough talking - grab a window seat and let's get moving!

The map shows the flight is over coast line most of the way. It also shows the islands of Ilha Gande and Restinga da Marambaia. Restinga da Marambaia is worth a google to see how interesting the shape of this island is. Flying over it was truly beautiful.

Is it just me or does this look like a rhino balancing a ball on it's horn?!

So many secluded and beautiful beaches, such as Paraty, which we hope to visit at some point

A view over some of Rio with the area where we live (Barra) at the top of the picture (beach side).

The journey back into Rio was a steep descent with some sharp moves to land safely at Santos Dumont airport. We flew very close to Christ the Redeemer and I almost wanted to high five the fella. You would never guess from this photo that this statue is in the middle of a city.

The journey into São Paulo showed how densely packed the city was and as I mentioned last blog, it felt like Tokyo mixed with Hanoi.

Anyway we thought the photos were worth sharing and if you are ever flying betwee Rio and São Paulo, make sure you grab a window seat!

São Paulo - A Little Taste of Asia

A four day weekend saw us once again flap our wings and leave the fair city of Rio de Janeiro and head to the metropolis known as São Paulo.  It is the largest city in Brazil with ~21 million people making it the “most populous city in the western hemisphere,” according to wiki. According to us it was bloody busy and packed full of skyscrapers, which was a great sight from the plane ride in and out.

For a city of its size, there isn’t a huge amount of sightseeing to do. São Paulo has a great collection of art museums, but we aren’t the greatest fans and have to be in the right mood for such things. We stayed in Hotel Paulista Wall Street, very close to the most famous street in the city, Avenida Paulista. As you know (because I'm sure we must have told you at some point), the people of Rio are known as "Cariocas" - well this word "Paulista" is how one refers to people from São Paulo.

Paulista Avenue is very pretty with a bank of unusual buildings and Eiffel Tower wannabees lining up along it. There are plenty of shopping malls and people selling unique and individual goods on the street and inside the malls alike. We had a great time walking down and people watching. However our introduction to the street was not so friendly...

About 45 minutes after our plane landed we arrived at the Metro station by our hotel, with suit cases in hand. While we looked for the right exit, a policeman came running into the Metro with his gun drawn and shouted at a nearer passerby, asking where the guy he was chasing had gone. In a country where a lot of people are killed by police it was a little reminder to two Brits, who are not used to seeing police with guns, to keep our wits about us...Anyway the area generally is the safest in São Paulo and apart from this, I never felt uneasy on Avenida Paulista, even at night.

The area of the city that we visited the most is is called Liberdade, and is home to the largest community of Japanese people outside of Japan, along with other, smaller East Asian communities. We ended up visiting this area on three separate occasions: once for food, once for food and a gander, once for food and a market. Yes we miss Asian food and the large variety of East Asian cuisine on offer was enticing. As you should know by now, Katie will chat all about the food in a later post.

As well as food, Liberdade is full of Asian-ness, such as big ornate gates and so many shops full of goodies that we hadn’t seen since Korea (or the last Asian supermarket we visited in the UK). We even managed to find some spicy onion ring crisps we used to eat a lot in Korea and hadn’t eaten since. As well as crisps, there were Korean ice creams and we explored this interesting area of town, window shopping while enjoying these ice cold treats - it was a delicious lick down memory lane. This place had a completely different feel to anywhere else we have been to in Brazil – it really felt like being back in Asia.

There is a Saturday market in Liberdade that is cool and full of cute little things from clothes to dumplings. As long term readers know, I am a fantastic boyfriend and I even treated Katie to a pair of origami earrings – paper jewelry is safe to wear out on the streets of Rio.

From here, we walked down to an area called Sé and then on to São Bento, passing a beautiful cathedral that was very impressive from the inside and out.

One thing we couldn’t help but notice was the volume of homeless people. There are a lot of beggars and groups of a dozen or more sleeping rough under the shade of a tree. It’s very upsetting and I always find it odd in a city with a lot of wealth – London is similar in many ways.

Anyway in São Bento there was a staged area that was showing some music in one of the free events that was happening that weekend. Now is as good a time as any to talk about the largest gay pride event in the world, which was happening in São Paulo on that very long weekend. Katie still considers our timing to be an accident... Our farewell from the city involved walking with our suitcases through the parade, getting covered in glitter and bombarded with images of scantily dressed men, women, and everyone in between.

From re-reading our earlier blogs in our blogbook, I recall some old advice we dished out about visiting new cities – go up a high building to see the city. Well following this piece of advice turned out to be a bit of a lesson in Brazilian queuing, when we went to an old building called Banespa, similar in design to the Empire State Building. We arrived at 2.20pm and joined the long queue in which we would end up waiting for nearly three hours (during which time I ran off to grab some espressos). The reason for the painfully long wait was that the lift to the top could only handle five people at a time. In all honesty, knowing what we know now about the very limited five minutes that we were allowed on the observation deck, it probably wasn’t worth it. Maybe an early morning visit would reduce the queue down to a more acceptable level. What was great about the experience though was that only a small group was allowed on the observation deck at a time, making it a very intimate experience. And the views were stunning, especially as the sun was setting in the sky. Who knows whether it was worth the four days of leg pain that we experienced afterwards though...

Another “must see” in the city of so few must sees is Ibirapuera Park. It is a nice green oasis in a city of grey looming skyscrapers. It's easy to rent a bike and go for a cycle as well.

All in all it was a great trip and the city has a lot to offer food lovers, museum lovers, and tall grey building lovers alike. The huge metropolis, coupled with the large Asian presence, really made it feel like somewhere in between Tokyo and Hanoi.

Here are the photos we thought were worth sharing - enjoy!

Ibirapuera Park Fountain

The nearby obelisk

The exhibitions in the Afro-Brazil museum were rather interesting

Banespa from the outside. It really does look like the Empire State Building.

The three hour queue for a five minute view!

Worth it though! Well done Banespa.

Avenida Paulista

Welcome to Liberdade!

Liberdade Market

The Municipal Market

Street art around Vila Madalena

The bar where we watched the Champions League Final. It is called Posto 6 and is in Villa Magdalena.
It is named after the famous surfing district in Copacabana (we can't escape Rio now!)

The largest Gay Pride Event in the world. One to tick off the bucket list.