My Favorite Underrated Cities: Part 3-a, Sao Paulo
Liberdade and Centro Historico
2024/02/09 – 2024/02/23.
I’ve written about my Carnaval experience in Sao Paulo and some of the highlights of making friends in this city. This time, I want to take you through the city of Sao Paulo from the lens of a tourist. In writing this article, I wish to take notes of several fond and random memories that made the trip so memorable.
How I spent carnival in Brazil: https://medium.com/@kt0909/carnival-in-brazil-crossing-off-my-absolute-bucket-list-item-8021abc93c53
The overwhelming kind hospitality by the Brazilians: https://medium.com/@kt0909/brazilian-hospitality-3e20df66381b
There’s no doubt that my highlight in this city has been getting to know the local people, but the city itself also has a lot to offer. As Sao Paulo is incredibly sizable, I will cover some stories area by area.
Japão–Liberdade
Almost every Sao Paulo person with whom I spoke for over 30 minutes told me about the fact that the largest Japanese population outside of Japan was in Sao Paulo. I looked up online. Among the 12 million people in Sao Paulo, there are about 1.6 million Japanese people, comprising between 10–15% of the city’s population. I’m referring to Japanese-Brazilians here — who began migrating to Brazil in the early 20th century, 2 decades after slavery was abolished. The South of Brazil needed laborers for their coffee plantations. Many of them settled in the Liberdade area and Sao Paulo, creating what they call “little Tokyo” within a bound of several blocks outside of the metro station.
Funnily enough, I found that it reminded me of Ximen in Taipei during a time when they had some red decorations set up. The difference between Taipei and Japan is that we have traces of Japanese influence and the overall look and feel of a Japanese city, but it looks slightly less polished (because everything in Japan looks perfect). Liberdade felt just like that.
I was told that many of the Japanese people have moved on to live in other parts of the city by now. It would explain why this district has a number of non-Japanese Asian restaurants, most notably a boba shop, some Cantonese restaurants, and a few Thai places.
After traveling away from Asia for the past 2 months, I wanted to seize my best chance to reminisce the taste of authentic Asian cuisine. With my friend’s recommendation, I ended up at a famous place called Momo Lamen House. I got myself a can of Guarana (as one does in Brazil) and a bowl of Ramen. It tasted really authentic; however, in the hierarchy of the Ramen market in Asia, I think it would be placed somewhere around the 40th percentile. Regardless, my standards and expectations had become low and this was a really satisfying meal for my craving.
I had a tiny realization that I found amusing: the reason why they write “Lamen” when the rest of the world calls it Ramen was probably because of the Portuguese language. R placed at the start would be pronounced as an H sound in English (or j in Spanish), so they modified it so that people don’t end up calling it HA-MEN. Yes, I’m very easily entertained.
I also went to a boba shop, and they literally have everything within and outside your imagination. Coming from Taiwan where Boba originated, I was quite mind-blown by the random items that appeared there.
They also had a lazy man shaker machine for the boba. Normally we just use the metal cocktail shaker in Asia.
Walking past the infamous “Cracklane”
One day after my friend Lincoln left the city for a business trip to London, I went exploring the city by myself. My plan was to see the Municipal Market of Sao Paulo before heading to Bom Retiro, the “Korean neighborhood”. The station in the middle was Luz station, so I got off from the metro and began walking around 10 in the morning.
From the station to the market is about 12 minutes on foot, so I began walking. I checked the map as I exited the station and walked towards the general direction. The area seemed quite messy — there are lots and lots of people selling things in a very disorganized manner. It reminded me of many cities centers in South America (like Barranquilla and Medellin, etc), except, on one of the main streets, there seemed to have a few police cars parked in front of some commercial complex buildings. As I was about 4 blocks away from the market, I was sure I saw a police operation going on. They were rushed to a different road to where I was going, but they were all armed. I thought to myself — I’ll just go to the market quickly.
As I entered the market, I was very underwhelmed. I was looking forward to lots of stores, both groceries and restaurants. Perhaps I went on a wrong day or a wrong time, becuase most of the places were closed, and the whole market did not seem lively.
After quickly looking through everything there was in the market, I decided to head out and go straight to Bom Retiro. Maybe there I will find some authentic Asian food that I was craving, I thought.
If you looked at the Google Maps screenshot above, it seemed like an easy path to walk back. About 15–20 minutes I should be able to arrive. Because the area immediately outside of the market seemed too chaotic, I tried not to use my phone and just followed my mental impression of the map. I would stop occasionally at the corner and took out my phone carefully, holding it with both hands and my back against the wall to check the map. At one point I realized I had been walking for way too long without reaching the destination, so I entered a supermarket called Extra Mercado to check the map again. Below was the shortcut I mapped out.
Av. Rio Blanco might look normal on the map, but it was very dead. It almost seemed like every store was rundown, closed, or abandoned. Even the supermarket Extra Mercado had a homeless person sitting on each side of the door.
My local friends had told me to be careful around the center because the lawless, zombie-like “Cracolândia”, or Cracklane, is nearby. The name comes from the fact the authority somehow got the crack addicts into an enclosed area and just turn a blind eye on the inside — so long as they stay within the borders. What my friends never told me was where exactly it was located. I did some Google search before so I knew what it should look like, but again, I could not find a street name or a block that represented what was supposed to be Cracolândia.
Not knowing where exactly the street was, I didn’t see a better option except to follow the shortcut, which seemed to be a walking distance of 5–6 blocks until I would reach a park. I saw a man headed towards the same direction, so I kind of followed his footsteps, not feeling overly concerned.
Into the smaller streets (still wide enough for two cars to slowly cross one another), it got emptier and emptier. No shops were open except very occasionally some basic (and I mean BASIC) local grocery places. As I walked past a street called Rua dos Protestantes, I saw a curious sight like nothing I had never seen before. Two police cars parked at the start of the road, blocking 80% of the entrance, and inside were piles on piles of clothes, garbage, and random things on the floor as if… a flee market, except it was immediately obvious nothing in those piles was for sale. Overwhelmingly crowded it seemed, the people were wearing battered-looking clothes which looked clearly unwashed for a while. None of the buildings resembled any commercial use. It was simply, a road.
The realization of what this was gave me goosebumbs, but I also could not contain my curiosity. I looked towards the street a few more times as I sped walk across the corner, still following the man that had been in front of me. The presence of the police force gave me a sense of comfort as well.
I continued speed walking, heading towards the park. I saw from afar that of the same road, there were also a few police cars parked on the other side. It appeared that the area was somewhat being managed, if not successfully contained.
After another 3 minutes of walking that felt like 30, I walked across a bridge and reached the park. The park was closed that day, and the side connecting to the bridge also lay a somewhat medium density of homeless people (relatively speaking). I remembered thinking — I’m lucky to not have been robbed just now, but I can’t afford to get lost again. Fortunately, after crossing the street to the left of the park, I saw the “Bem-vindo” sign for Bom Retiro. I was just so eager to sit down and have a good meal.
Despite being in a “Korean town”, my mental capacity was drained after this, and I needed a place to sit down. By chance, I found the best buffet lunch deal during my entire trip — 30 Reais (6 USD) for you can eat. I enjoyed the meal and processed what had just happened. Safe to say, the food was the highlight of my day.
I proceeded to Pinacoteca, a really famous and extravagant museum across from Luz station, also right next to Bom Retiro. I didn’t have any expectation after the whole ordeal in this area this morning, but I decided
There were also some nice art pieces that I stopped for. Sat on the bench and absorbed in all the good feelings of being in immersed in the world of art.
There was a part about Northeastern men. I had no idea about the story or the key messages, but I very much enjoyed it aesthetically.
As I left the beautiful museum and walked toward the metro, I had my little moment of shock. Outside of the train exit of Estação da Luz probably had the highest density of homeless people and prostitutes I had ever seen in my life in close proximity. It was as if a lot of people had been attacked and were lying on the floor, anime style. But no, they were all just sleeping or minding their own businesses. It certainly left a profound impression on me, but very safe to say, I was happy to stay on Avenida Paulista and its surrounding for the rest of my time there.
Strangely, seeing the other side of Sao Paulo made me appreciate the city more. The more tangible impact on the rest of my trip was that I was no longer concerned for my safety and constantly thinking that I would get robbed. Obviously, I learned all the basic precautions, but mentally I was at ease for the last 2 months. “If I walked past Cracolândia and still be fine, there’s no way I would get robbed here!”
More to come.
