Day 63 - São Paulo (Part 1)

Wednesday, 15 October 2014

I actually felt worse today than I did yesterday, I don't even know how that is possible. It's all this yellow phlegm business, I tell you!

I started walking today at about 9 am, to see a few places in the Centro neighbourhood of São Paulo, where my hotel is. The guys at reception told me I was mad to walk and maybe they were right, I walked in total for about 4 hours just in the Centro neighbourhood alone (!) including all the stops in churches and to take photographs being the true tourist That I am. I also got lost many times, but this time it was not due to my bad sense of directions, it is because all the maps of São Paulo do not have details of each street, only the main streets and avenues. This is because São Paulo is really a very very big city, with a population now of about 30 million people. Imagine the whole of Malaysia living in a city! 

My first destination was supposed to be Sala São Paulo. On the way I came upon an interesting monument, with a big statute of a man on a horse at the top of the monument. I have no idea what monument this was, but I took a picture anyway.

Then I arrived at Sala São Paulo, which is a part of a building known as Estação Júlio Prestes. Built between 1926 and 1938, this building was designed as the headquarters and the railway terminus for Estrada de Ferro Sorocabana (EFS). EFS was a rail company that transported coffee beans to the coastal ports for export. As the importance of the trade declined and country roads improved, the use of this railway station eventually ended. In 1999, the building was restored and turned into a cultural centre, Centro Cultural Júlio Prestes, which houses the São Paulo Symphony Orchestra. Its impressive music hall, Sala São Paulo, located in the main gallery of the station, is said to have the best acoustics in South America.

Next, the Igreja de Santa Ifigênia. From where I was standing, I saw a tower with Jesus at the top, so I assumed that it was the Santa Ifigênia church. I was wrong. It turned out to be some kind of a Christian Sanctuary; the tower was quite beautiful though. And I think I passed by a dodgy neighbourhood on my way to the sanctuary, the buildings were almost in ruins and downtrodden, I saw many homeless people sleeping on sidewalks and picking up stuff out of rubbish bins, and there were many people just idling around, and they kept staring at me a bit too long for my liking.