Weekend in Sao Paulo

Lisa write: We left Varginha on Friday with Èlison and Edivani -- without the kids -- for a couple of nights in the big city of Sao Paulo. I'm not kidding about the "big." It's a bajillion million people. Huge shopping centers and people in Land Rovers. Slums slapped together from plywood and carboard boxes and kids offering to wash your windows at stoplights. And everything in between. We stayed at the Formula One Hotel. The rooms were the size of a walk-in closet, but very new and clean and cleverly designed, á la Ikea, to have everything you need within -- literally -- arm's length. (Important cultural note: "Hotels" are legit and charge by the day. "Motels" are something else and charge by the hour.) Friday night, we hit a super-de-duper fancy churrascaria with guys in gaucho pants (and the southern Brazilian accent to go with them) serving big slabs of meat from skewers. It was so fancy, the restaurant sends a car to pick you up from your hotel. We ate ourselves silly, then went to bed.

Saturday, we slept in and digested for while, then walked to the Metro to take a city tour. We didn't read the small print or something, because it turned out the tour consisted of only the Memorial dos Imigrantes. In the early 1900s, thousands of immigrants came to Brazil from Portugal, Japan, Italy, and other countries to work the new and growing farms and factories. Half of them processed through this building. It's the Brazilian Ellis Island. Edivani was especially touched by the pictures of these bedraggled, shoeless folks standing in lines hoping for entrance because her Italian great-grandparents were among them.

We dashed back to the Metro through the pouring rain, went to Mass, and then hit the biggest mall in Sao Paulo. Four stories of fancy, unfamiliar stores. One thing that is so strange is how Brazil is sort of ... invisible to the United States. It's a huge country (the size of the continental U.S.) with a huge population and growing industry, and yet when was the last time you heard anybody speaking Portguese? Or heard of anybody studying Portuguese? Or buying or selling anything from or to Brazil (except coffee and oranges)? I think Brazil is really sneaking up on us and we're going to wake up very surprised one day.

Today (Sunday) we made it to the LDS services through the heroic efforts of Tom and Èlison. We got directions to the chapel from the hotel desk, but when we arrived, the brand new, beautiful chapel was locked and barred and empty. We found an internet cafe and looked up an other chapel. Turns out, the first chapel hasn't been dedicated yet. We went to a really nice Sacrament meeting. It was fast & testimony meeting (or, as Tom calls it, Open Mic Night) which is sometimes a little cringe inducing when you're bringing non-Mormon friends for the first time. But this time, they started with a musical number by the kids in the Primary singing "I Am A Child of God," then two baby blessings, then a young guy got up and announced his mission call and shared a really beautiful testimony of his gratitude to the congregation and how excited he is to serve. That opened the floodgates and about a dozen people went up to share their testimonies. We heard from his friends and parents, from a couple of other young guys who want to go on missions too because of his influence, from an American missionary who is going home this week, and from an older gentleman who is celebrated his 50th anniversary of marriage and 66th anniversary of baptism. The meeting went about 15 minutes overtime because so many people wanted to talk. I was really impressed by the energy and enthusiasm of the people. Here we are looking mighty fine after church.


Speaking of energy and enthusiasm and Brazil sneaking up on us, we also meet and talked to three American "ex-pats" who are living in the city. One is married to a Brazilian, one is on an internship with an international bank, and one is a diplomat at the embassy. Everybody seemed really excited to talk to us.

And right now we're back at E & E's apartment in Taubate collecting beach umbrellas and towels for a two-day trip to the beach at Ubatuba. That's your fun word for the day. Say it with me: Ubatuba! Ubatuba! Ubatuba!