I have decided that this particular blog should be standalone. You'll see why.
Topic: Brazilians taking the piss when it comes to renting out apartments because you're a gringo.
This is a message for every Brazilian out there who has a really shitty piece of property and thinks "hey, I won't refurbish it, I'll just rent it out in the state it's in - cockroaches and all - to a gringo who will pay twice the price for it". REALITY CHECK: WE WON'T. Why do Brazilians think that tiny/old substandard apartments that haven't been cleaned, painted, properly furnished or kitted out with half-decent kitchen equipment are ok to let out on a short-term furnished basis to gringos? I mean, they wouldn't accept that level of crapness for themselves, why do they think that we would?
I come from the 1st world, ok? Yeah, I'm willing to spend a bit of money but I also want some "vale a pena" (value for money) and there is such a place called THE INTERNET where I can check what the normal market rate is in the area, dipshit. I might not be fluent in Portuguese but I can bloody well navigate myself around zap.com.br. I can even factor in the condo fee, roughly how much the bills are costing you, and add a bit more for the fact the place is furnished and work out a fair price - with a profit margin and everything!
We went to see a couple of apartments before New Year's. One of them was old, seriously dirty, the little furniture it did have was really old and in bad condition, it was missing a bed (supposed to be a 2-bed flat), didn't have a washing machine or a decent table to eat on (Brazilians always have a decent table to eat on in their homes: we know), and one of the bedrooms didn't have a door on it. No, scratch that, it was missing a wall. We turned that one down.
The other one was in a cheap part of a decent area, building was nice, but the place was fucking tiny. They had clearly taken an ok-ish-sized one bedroom flat and put in an extra wall to make two bedrooms. Again, the flat wasn't particularly clean, furniture was cheap and tatty, there was barely enough room to swing a cat around in the living room, the fridge freezer was about 20 years old and probably hadn't been defrosted in that long either. Plus, they wanted about R$2700 for it all in, which was just a joke.
A Canadian guy in our Portuguese class had booked to go to Rio for NYE but cancelled at the last minute because the idiots that he had reserved (not paid, clever boy) an apartment with decided at the last minute to double the price for the weekend, so he just didn't go. They could have made some money over the period, but because they got greedy (very common here) they lost a paying customer 2 days before NYE. Dumbasses.
Moral of the story: if you have some money, you want to invest in property, are willing to provide a decent level of furnished & all-inclusive accommodation and you're not a greedy motherfucker, you would make an absolute killing over here.
Saturday, 31 December 2011
Thursday, 29 December 2011
Chanukah in Sao Paulo
I actually started writing this during Chanukah, but shit happened - as it tends to do - so this post was somewhat delayed. Still worth posting though:
You may/may not know this, but Brazil has the second largest population of Jews in South America. Argentina has the most, with the vast majority of them living in Buenos Aires. Brazil's Jewish population is roughly 100,000 and the city with the largest Jewish community is Sao Paulo, with a population of 45,000. There is a shitload of intermarriage and assimilation so it's really very hard to tell exactly what the population figures are (i.e. there could be a lot more), but I found a page somewhere on t'internet where they were quoting stuff all over the place so I lifted the info off of it.
I can attest to the fact that there are a lot of Jews in Sao Paulo. First of all, I'm one of them (ha), and secondly I've met quite a few without actually looking for them. Those I have met are not religious, much like myself. Sao Paulo's biggest congregation - 'Congregação Israelita Paulista' (something like a Reform synagogue) - has a membership of 2,000 families (that's a lot) and is the largest single congregation in Latin America.
So with all these Jews around, we've been looking for the usual signs of Chanukah. The first one we saw was actually in our nearest large supermarket, Carrefour. This one was up before Chanukah started (Tuesday night, FYI):
Sweet, innit?
Then our host Fernando told us they usually put up a large menorah at the end of Avenida Paulista near Consolacão, so we braved the Christmas crowds on Tuesday evening, past the throngs at Bradesco watching the Disney-like choir/weird-elf-like-people-prancing-around-with-cardboard-triangles performance, squeezed past the Christmas bridge, past a string quartet playing Bach/Brahms (couldn't decide which, could have been either), past a rather good Michael Jackson impersonator, until we got to Consolacão. This is what we saw:
If you've read my blog on Christmas lights in SP, you will be aware that this Chanukah display, in comparison, is pretty pathetic. AND they had all the arms of the menorah lit on the first night - WHICH IS NOT SUPPOSED TO HAPPEN. You're supposed to light one extra each night until you've got a fully lit menorah. DETAILS ARE IMPORTANT.
Yes, I'm a pedant.
You may/may not know this, but Brazil has the second largest population of Jews in South America. Argentina has the most, with the vast majority of them living in Buenos Aires. Brazil's Jewish population is roughly 100,000 and the city with the largest Jewish community is Sao Paulo, with a population of 45,000. There is a shitload of intermarriage and assimilation so it's really very hard to tell exactly what the population figures are (i.e. there could be a lot more), but I found a page somewhere on t'internet where they were quoting stuff all over the place so I lifted the info off of it.
I can attest to the fact that there are a lot of Jews in Sao Paulo. First of all, I'm one of them (ha), and secondly I've met quite a few without actually looking for them. Those I have met are not religious, much like myself. Sao Paulo's biggest congregation - 'Congregação Israelita Paulista' (something like a Reform synagogue) - has a membership of 2,000 families (that's a lot) and is the largest single congregation in Latin America.
So with all these Jews around, we've been looking for the usual signs of Chanukah. The first one we saw was actually in our nearest large supermarket, Carrefour. This one was up before Chanukah started (Tuesday night, FYI):
Sweet, innit?
Then our host Fernando told us they usually put up a large menorah at the end of Avenida Paulista near Consolacão, so we braved the Christmas crowds on Tuesday evening, past the throngs at Bradesco watching the Disney-like choir/weird-elf-like-people-prancing-around-with-cardboard-triangles performance, squeezed past the Christmas bridge, past a string quartet playing Bach/Brahms (couldn't decide which, could have been either), past a rather good Michael Jackson impersonator, until we got to Consolacão. This is what we saw:
If you've read my blog on Christmas lights in SP, you will be aware that this Chanukah display, in comparison, is pretty pathetic. AND they had all the arms of the menorah lit on the first night - WHICH IS NOT SUPPOSED TO HAPPEN. You're supposed to light one extra each night until you've got a fully lit menorah. DETAILS ARE IMPORTANT.
Yes, I'm a pedant.
Saturday, 17 December 2011
Things that annoy me #1
I am a generally happy-go-lucky person (in person, haha), but I am also easily annoyed by little things. As much as I have enjoyed living in this city for various reasons, there are several little things in Sao Paulo (maybe some of them are national things, I can't say yet) that annoy me. I have decided I will make this an occasional feature called 'Things that annoy me' when I have at least three things to bitch about.
This is what I've got so far:
1. People walking slowly. EVERYWHERE. OH MY GOD. This is supposed to be the biggest metropolis in South America, every Brazilian in London I spoke to said "oh SP, that place is just work, work, work" so I was expecting a bit of a pace, but hell no. People meander around as if they don't have a care in the world. Rich people, business people, policemen, beggars, random crazy people, shop workers, cafe workers, people with their families. You name it, everyone walks slow. Not only do they walk slow, when there's a narrow pavement (if you're American, just assume that every time I say pavement I mean 'sidewalk' - you're just going to have to learn to translate) they walk in rows of maybe 3-4 people, talking to each other, totally oblivious to everyone and everything around them. Saying "com licensa" does NOT work. You literally have to walk ahead into the road to get around them. Then when you get around one group, there's another one doing exactly the same thing. And another one, and another one, and another one. The problem is compounded when you try to walk down Avenida Paulista at one of the following times: morning rush hour, evening rush hour, lunch time. Then there's the random stopping in the middle of the street. People just stop in the middle of the street: sometimes to look at something, sometimes because they're having a particularly animated argument on their cell phone, sometimes because they forgot which way they're supposed to be going, sometimes because that lanchonete (snack shop) looked too good to pass up and they had to turn around - and they HAD to do it RIGHT in the middle of YOUR path.
2. People cancelling appointments. Always at the last minute. Even when you've confirmed the appointment with them in the morning, just to make sure because you know what Brazilians are like. I've heard them all: "I forgot I have to take my car to the mechanics", "I have to pick up my kid", "Oh, I forgot I already had a meeting at that time - can we reschedule?". Doesn't anyone use Outlook here? They all have bloody iPhones or Blackberrys or super-duper Samsung touchscreen thingies - fucking use them!! If you can't guarantee you are going to make an appointment/meeting - DON'T FUCKING MAKE ONE. And STOP wasting my time - I've got better things to be doing with it than waiting around for you NOT to show up!
3. Bureaucracy. I've only just started touching on this, but they have a really weird way of sorting stuff out here. We both got a 'Bilhete Unico' (a bit like an oystercard) for the transport system. For some bizarre reason the chip in my Bilhete Unico malfunctioned and we had to get it reset. We only discovered this after going to the metro station and telling the lady at the desk that the card wasn't working. She didn't believe us, scanned it, said it was working fine. We said it wasn't working because it couldn't be read on the 3 buses we tried it on yesterday - she said no, it was working fine. We walked away and tried to get the balance reader to read the balance, it didn't work - she said no, it was working fine. Then we told her to add some credit to it - let's see how well it's working, bitch. When she tried that, she said "oh, it's not working" (no shit, Sherlock) and ONLY THEN did she tell us we'd need to get it reset. "Can we get it reset here?" we asked. "No, you have to go to an SP Trans office". "Can't you just replace it?" (not an unreasonable question, they replace oystercards for free in London if they malfunction) "No, you have to get it reset at the SP Trans office". Of course, the SP Trans office was fucking miles away and was of naturally shut when we got there at 4.30pm. HALF FOUR IN THE AFTERNOON. We got it sorted in the end, but you bet your ass I'm being a hell of a lot more careful with my card now.
Another example: to apply for a CPF (tax number - you can't wipe your arse without one here) you have to go to a "Correios" (post office), give them your details and then they give you a "protocolo" which is a receipt with all your details that you then have to take to a "Poupa Tempo" (general government service centre) and they will give you the CPF. Why can't they just frickin' give it to me at the Post Office? Why do I have to travel to one of only TWO Poupa Tempos in SP that actually issue CPFs??? Oh sorry, make that ONE because the one in Praca da Se no longer deals with CPFs as of December 16th!!
This is what I've got so far:
1. People walking slowly. EVERYWHERE. OH MY GOD. This is supposed to be the biggest metropolis in South America, every Brazilian in London I spoke to said "oh SP, that place is just work, work, work" so I was expecting a bit of a pace, but hell no. People meander around as if they don't have a care in the world. Rich people, business people, policemen, beggars, random crazy people, shop workers, cafe workers, people with their families. You name it, everyone walks slow. Not only do they walk slow, when there's a narrow pavement (if you're American, just assume that every time I say pavement I mean 'sidewalk' - you're just going to have to learn to translate) they walk in rows of maybe 3-4 people, talking to each other, totally oblivious to everyone and everything around them. Saying "com licensa" does NOT work. You literally have to walk ahead into the road to get around them. Then when you get around one group, there's another one doing exactly the same thing. And another one, and another one, and another one. The problem is compounded when you try to walk down Avenida Paulista at one of the following times: morning rush hour, evening rush hour, lunch time. Then there's the random stopping in the middle of the street. People just stop in the middle of the street: sometimes to look at something, sometimes because they're having a particularly animated argument on their cell phone, sometimes because they forgot which way they're supposed to be going, sometimes because that lanchonete (snack shop) looked too good to pass up and they had to turn around - and they HAD to do it RIGHT in the middle of YOUR path.
2. People cancelling appointments. Always at the last minute. Even when you've confirmed the appointment with them in the morning, just to make sure because you know what Brazilians are like. I've heard them all: "I forgot I have to take my car to the mechanics", "I have to pick up my kid", "Oh, I forgot I already had a meeting at that time - can we reschedule?". Doesn't anyone use Outlook here? They all have bloody iPhones or Blackberrys or super-duper Samsung touchscreen thingies - fucking use them!! If you can't guarantee you are going to make an appointment/meeting - DON'T FUCKING MAKE ONE. And STOP wasting my time - I've got better things to be doing with it than waiting around for you NOT to show up!
3. Bureaucracy. I've only just started touching on this, but they have a really weird way of sorting stuff out here. We both got a 'Bilhete Unico' (a bit like an oystercard) for the transport system. For some bizarre reason the chip in my Bilhete Unico malfunctioned and we had to get it reset. We only discovered this after going to the metro station and telling the lady at the desk that the card wasn't working. She didn't believe us, scanned it, said it was working fine. We said it wasn't working because it couldn't be read on the 3 buses we tried it on yesterday - she said no, it was working fine. We walked away and tried to get the balance reader to read the balance, it didn't work - she said no, it was working fine. Then we told her to add some credit to it - let's see how well it's working, bitch. When she tried that, she said "oh, it's not working" (no shit, Sherlock) and ONLY THEN did she tell us we'd need to get it reset. "Can we get it reset here?" we asked. "No, you have to go to an SP Trans office". "Can't you just replace it?" (not an unreasonable question, they replace oystercards for free in London if they malfunction) "No, you have to get it reset at the SP Trans office". Of course, the SP Trans office was fucking miles away and was of naturally shut when we got there at 4.30pm. HALF FOUR IN THE AFTERNOON. We got it sorted in the end, but you bet your ass I'm being a hell of a lot more careful with my card now.
Another example: to apply for a CPF (tax number - you can't wipe your arse without one here) you have to go to a "Correios" (post office), give them your details and then they give you a "protocolo" which is a receipt with all your details that you then have to take to a "Poupa Tempo" (general government service centre) and they will give you the CPF. Why can't they just frickin' give it to me at the Post Office? Why do I have to travel to one of only TWO Poupa Tempos in SP that actually issue CPFs??? Oh sorry, make that ONE because the one in Praca da Se no longer deals with CPFs as of December 16th!!
Wednesday, 14 December 2011
Christmas lights in Sao Paulo
I was warned long before coming here that this city goes a bit doolally when it comes to christmas decorations, and I have not been disappointed. So far, on Avenida Paulista, I have seen:
The most interesting thing about the Christmas lights on Avenida Paulista are the crowds that come to view them every evening. Most of the photos were taken on Monday evening. There were thousands of people out and about late, around 9-10pm, with their families, taking pictures, walking around slowly and blocking the pavement (sidewalk, for any Americans reading this). There was also a huge queue to get into the Christmas bridge. I have no idea what's in there, but I intend on finding out, child or no child in tow. My mother's small enough....maybe I can take her in...
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| FIESP building |
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| Probably a bank |
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| I want to say HSBC...? |
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| HUGE Christmas bridge over Av Paulista - apparently there's going to be a massive show. This is the first time, speaking as a Jew, that I've actually been *excited* about xmas. |
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| Slightly spooky and quite beautiful LED display in Parque Trianon-MASP - this park is usually closed at night due to cruising. |
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| Christmas tree in Parque Trianon-MASP |
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| Itau Bank, which is in competition with the Jungle-themed bank. I think the jungle bank won, in my opinion. |
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| Crowds outside Itau Bank |
General Update
Chihuahua update: he now has fleas. We had to dose him with frontline and then bleach and spray anti-flea spray everywhere. Apparently it's something to do with him feeling unwell. I don't give a flying f*** what it's about, I don't want to be bitten to pieces any more. Although, it's worse for my mother because she has some kind of allergic reaction to flea bites - she gets a massive swelling about 5-10 centimetres wide. Ouch.
Portuguese: my spoken portuguese is bollocks due to me speaking english most of the time. I have a lot of shit to do: find work, sort out visas, other legal crap with our (english speaking) lawyer, make plans...we're really busy and taking the time to "umm" and "errr" through an awful Portuguese conversation is not top of my list of priorities. I know it's important, I will get around to enforcing some portuguese conversation for a minimum of one hour a day at some point, but at the moment I'm limited to speaking it in shops, cafes/restaurants (which I don't go to very often), and screaming "COM LICENSA!!!" (roughly translated: "EXCUSE ME!!!") when trying to get past all the meandering Brazilians on Avenida Paulista. On the plus side, my verbal comprehension is very good; i.e, I can understand everything you say but I will talk back to you like a 3-year-old.
Personal life: don't even go there.
Portuguese: my spoken portuguese is bollocks due to me speaking english most of the time. I have a lot of shit to do: find work, sort out visas, other legal crap with our (english speaking) lawyer, make plans...we're really busy and taking the time to "umm" and "errr" through an awful Portuguese conversation is not top of my list of priorities. I know it's important, I will get around to enforcing some portuguese conversation for a minimum of one hour a day at some point, but at the moment I'm limited to speaking it in shops, cafes/restaurants (which I don't go to very often), and screaming "COM LICENSA!!!" (roughly translated: "EXCUSE ME!!!") when trying to get past all the meandering Brazilians on Avenida Paulista. On the plus side, my verbal comprehension is very good; i.e, I can understand everything you say but I will talk back to you like a 3-year-old.
Personal life: don't even go there.
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