BRAZIL: Ibirapuera Park

In my temporary digs, I am just a few blocks away from Ibirapuera Park, the Central Park of Sao Paulo. September 7th is National Independence Day in Brazil, so I took at stroll over to the Park. It was full of people jogging, picnic-ing, visiting the museums that are scattered throughout it, and generally enjoying themselves.

Picnics, with the city skyline in the background...

The coconut juice vendor...

I love the tall old trees...

Recycling - it's everywhere here! A very strong theme...

The "Monumento as Bandeiros." This bears a little more explanation. The Bandeirantes or "Flag Bearers" were racially-mixed people descended from unions between the Portuguese and the indigenous Tupi people. Some of these men formed bands that scoured the Brazilian interior in search of local people to enslave. Their round-ups could last a year or two, and they brought back groups of hundreds to thousands of people to sell into slavery in the cities that hugged Brazil's coast. The colonization of Brazil was heavily dependent on slave labor. With its small population, tiny Portugal couldn't hope to supply enough colonists to work and settle their huge south American possession. The slave trade - both from the Brazilian interior and from Africa - helped to fill this gap. Brazil's slave trade long outlasted slavery in the US and was much larger in scope, impacting 7 times more people.

The Brazilians I have talked to don't seem to view this as unsavory or an embarrassing chapter in their history. Instead, the Bandeirantes are considered to be a kind of cowboys or land pirates who significantly expanded the borders of Portuguese America. There is a major street in Sao Paulo called "Bandeirantes," and the monument below prominently celebrates them. This unconflicted attitude is related to the lack of political engagement that I see among Brazilians. (If this were Argentina, there would be daily protests at the monument and contentious debates on TV!). The stereotype of Brazilians as having a "don't worry be happy" attitude to life may be an exaggeration, but it's got some basis in reality.

For some reason, people can't resist climbing on the Monument, which produces some charming scenes...

The Monument with Ibirapuera's fountains in the background...