Saturday, April 03, 2004
Oh Galería….
Aaron’s back from Brazil, and the photoblog gallery is open!. I’m relaxing and catching up on music and photography. It’s easier to post the latter : - ) Enjoy Enjoy…. The photography is by the following artists, in order: Beat Experience (2 photos), TopLeftPixel, Jinky Art, Chromogenic, Damon Brinson , San Francisco’s Epehemera, Sweden’s 40-H , and Pixpopuli (2 photos). All of these are usually groovy.
this entry's permalink
Send It
My friend Celia from Buenos Aires had a great idea. I would like it if you could all send me a childhood picture, which I will scan for a special presentation and return... It couldn't look goofier than this picture of me and my sister Deena. : - ) Trip to Belo Horizonte yesteday was brief but we knocked them dead! : - ) See pictures of Belo below. A good week all in all, it's certainly whet my appetite for further travel, business and pleasure, near and far. Hope you've enjoyed our Brazil trip, it's nice to be home!this entry's permalink
Friday, April 02, 2004
No Nutrition In The AAdmirals Club...
Just booze, junk, olives, and evil cheese....
Chilling sound in Mexico... ..the sucking sound of manufacturing jobs leaving for China, and service jobs lost to India. Thomas Friedman, who I often disagree with, wrote a compelling piece about Mexico's dilemma this week that's right on the mark...
Here are some photos of Belo Horizonte, Brazil's third largest city and the gateway to several perfectly preserved colonial towns like Ouro Preto that are real jewels. That's where I was this morning:
this entry's permalink
Thursday, April 01, 2004
Meat Brazil
Down in Porto Alegre, yet another lavish meat luncheon, with the 'gauchos' (pronounced ga-ooh-shoes), who are mostly of German descent, with a peppering of Italian genes. The 'churrasco,' or mixed grill, was served in rotating style, as in Rio, with the waiters incessantly coming by offering different kinds of meat, until you switch your green signal to red. Afterwards, we met my old pals at Gerdau, which makes long steel (beams, poles, fences) and began with a small nail factory in 1901, growing into a $4 billion empire with 10 mills in the Eastern US. Tomorow I must rise at 5am, fly to Belo Horizonte, fly back for a meeting, get to the international airport by 6pm for my 10:30pm flight. Chances are I will not post (boo hoo), but this weekend will be interesting too.
this entry's permalink
Happy Birthday, Mom!
Work, Sleep, Look At Scenery. Work, Sleep, Look At Scenery...
this entry's permalink
Wednesday, March 31, 2004
Happy Birthday Mom from Rio....
I wish you could see all this up close...
My Mom was born April 1, which is NOT April Fool's Day here (December 28th is, and they call it Day Of The Innocents) Ah Rio ....beats the hell out of my cubicle!
Speak of the Dictator... It was 40 years ago today Brazil saw a military coup that would last 21 years. Newspaper ran a special section which I found fascinating. Will talk more about this era when I'm back. It's something Americans never got the whole picture of....
Lovely scenery all around as the cab took us back and forth across the 10 miles of sprawling coastline that IS Rio de Janeiro. For those unfamiliar, 10-20 blocks from the beach are huge hills that are sharp, steep, and covered with vegetation, an explosion of green and brown. So Rio is very long and very thin at some points. The bay surrounding Rio is peppered with these same hills, jutting right up out of the water.
The largest of these is called Paõ de Açucar, or Sugarloaf, after its shape, and offers a gorgeous view to those who brave two successive cable car rides. Sugarloaf also houses a mini-zoo and mini-botanic garden. We ate at Porcão, literally, Fat Pig, a meat restaurant arranged so that waiters keep bringing you different cuts of meat until you can eat no more. You then turn your green signal to red, and beg for coffee. Porcão has an amazing view of Sugarloaf. Here's Porcão from the inside
Of course, I just admired Rio's sights from afar, busy as I was exploring the wonders of Brazilian telecommunications, petroleum, and mining. Here's the building of Petrobras, the state oil company, a wonderful funky modernist assortment of cubes:
Tomorrow I have a day trip to Porto Alegre, about 600 miles south of here, halfway to Argentina, to see a steel company. Like the Argentines, people here call themselves "gauchos" and eat a lot of meat. Many Germans settled here in the 1800s, and there are many, many blonde people....
Friday, before leaving, I have a day trip to Belo Horizonte, about 400 miles north of here, to visit another steel company. People from this state, Minas Gerais, are legendary for being cautious, laconic, and stubborn. Minas was the cradle of Brazil's independence.
this entry's permalink
Tuesday, March 30, 2004
Alice The Cook R.I.P.
This dish is called "Muqueca," fish, spices, and vegetables in a rich, thick broth. Many regions of Brazil claim its authorship, and each has a unique recipé. More good meetings today. People remember me. : - )
While I was busy having my diapers changed, in 1960, a newly-constructed Brasilia replaced Rio de Janeiro as Brazil's capital. President Juscelino Kubitschek (koobie-checkie) ran for President promissing to build this miracle city within four years. His good pal, modernist architect / visionary Oscar Niemeyer, created the basic design. But the seed was planted when Brazil became a republic in 1889 - I never knew this It was actually written into the constitution that a new capital was to be founded inland, to drag Brazil's population away from the coast (to this day, 85% of Brazil live within 150 miles of the Atlantic, even though Brazil is the size of the U.S. without Alaska.)
One huge irony of Brasilia is that even though its art and architecture are a valentine to progress, forward-thinking, and democratic institutions, Brazil became a dictatorship in 1964, just four years after Brasilia's inauguration, a situation which was to last 21 years and five dictators. Since the military always justified a coup with promises to reinstate democracy when "it was safe," these inscriptions were never altered, in Brazil or elsewhere. Incidentally, voting is compulsory in Brazil and in most of Latin America. It is considered a duty as much as a right.
Tomorrow I'm up at 5:30am, flight to Rio, four long meetings, and back to Sao Paolo at 7pm. If I post at all, it'll be brief. My hotel, L'Hotel (which they pronounce Ellie Hotellie) has cable TV, and I recieve the news in five languages. In all cases, the perspective seems more international and more balanced. We Americans, for all our world dominance, have a very inward, parochial perspective, reinforced by our media.... Alice The Cook, of course, is who Archie Bunker thought Mike and Gloria were referring to when they mentioned Alistair Cooke. : - )
this entry's permalink
¡Feliz Cumple, Tomás!
Here's a plate of empanadas to celebrate... It's a funky morning in Brazil. In the atrium of our corporate HQ a throng of women are practicing Tai-Chi in gym suits. Steam is rising from the grey and white mosaic stones of the sidewalks as the Paulistas scurry off to work. On my menu today: beer and petrochemicals. More to follow...this entry's permalink
Monday, March 29, 2004
Good first day. Lots of hand-shaking, card-distributing, and self-promotion. Learned a lot about sewage management and had a great session with VCP, Brazil's leading paper company. This will intensify, especially Wednesday, with four meetings on a day trip to Rio.
Digesting Brasilia (and lunch) Brasilia has some wonderfully creative modernist buildings, such as this Cathedral, but on the whole, as a city it left me cold. Perhaps the most strictly zoned capital on earth, Brasilia was built in the form of an airplane, with the government in the cockpit, residential sections in the wings, and commerce in the main cabin. Six-lane highways criss-cross around this outline, distances are enormous, leaving the pedestrian at a disadvantage. Thus, we have a car city where at least two-thirds of the people are probably too poor to own one.
Brasilia's glories are clustered around the "Plaza of The Three Powers" This refers to the three branches of government, represented by two out-sized pavillions with futuristic white columns that serve as the Presidential Palace and Supreme Court, and in between are the twin towers of Congress and their half-dome lawn ornaments. The grass-free concrete plaza also contains sculptures, a pantheon of national heroes, two museums, of which one contains a scale model of the city, and an odd brown pigeon shelter shaped like a clothespin.
Like so many dominoes, the dozen or so ministries are stacked up on both sides of the wide highway that leads to the Plaza. The ministries are identical white marble rectangles with green shutters, and on a Sunday there was almost nobody around, and it felt oddly like some eerie housing project right after a neutron bomb explosion. Two ministries, Justice and Foreign Affairs, have distinct and beautiful pavillions, the latter surrounded by a pond with greenery and sculpture. More on Brasilia to come...
this entry's permalink
Modernist Ghost Town
Digesting Brasilia (and lunch) Brasilia has some wonderfully creative modernist buildings, such as this Cathedral, but on the whole, as a city it left me cold. Perhaps the most strictly zoned capital on earth, Brasilia was built in the form of an airplane, with the government in the cockpit, residential sections in the wings, and commerce in the main cabin. Six-lane highways criss-cross around this outline, distances are enormous, leaving the pedestrian at a disadvantage. Thus, we have a car city where at least two-thirds of the people are probably too poor to own one. Brasilia's glories are clustered around the "Plaza of The Three Powers" This refers to the three branches of government, represented by two out-sized pavillions with futuristic white columns that serve as the Presidential Palace and Supreme Court, and in between are the twin towers of Congress and their half-dome lawn ornaments. The grass-free concrete plaza also contains sculptures, a pantheon of national heroes, two museums, of which one contains a scale model of the city, and an odd brown pigeon shelter shaped like a clothespin.
Like so many dominoes, the dozen or so ministries are stacked up on both sides of the wide highway that leads to the Plaza. The ministries are identical white marble rectangles with green shutters, and on a Sunday there was almost nobody around, and it felt oddly like some eerie housing project right after a neutron bomb explosion. Two ministries, Justice and Foreign Affairs, have distinct and beautiful pavillions, the latter surrounded by a pond with greenery and sculpture. More on Brasilia to come...
this entry's permalink
Getting Down To Business
It's going to be an action-packed week. My meetings are wall-to-wall, and all in Portuguese. My Brazilian co-workers are very nice. This morning we visited Sabesp, Sao Paolo's water and sewage company, housed in a beautiful modern chrome-and-glass building on red columns, near the University. You'll be happy to hear that Sao Paolo's two rivers, puny as they are, are becoming less polluted thanks to Sabesp, and the fish count is steadily rising. Next time, maybe we'll get to see the sewage plant. Lunchtime! I'm getting hungry. More later, especially about my Brasilia visit
this entry's permalink
Sunday, March 28, 2004
I made it to Brasilia! On my 17th visit to this country, I´ve final seen its capital. How can I describe it? The set of Star Trek IV? A gleaming white UNESCO-protected love letter to modernism? A white elephant of galactic proportions? A quirky curiosity? Failed urban planning? Probably, all of the above.. Further details when I'm back in Sao Paolo. Até logo, chauzinho....this entry's permalink
Run, Run, Run.... Well, slept through my 6am alarm, missed my 8:20am flight to Brasilia. But no matter. Improvise, improvise. I´m off to Congonhas airport, I should be able to buy my way on to the 12:45pm flight for $150 or so. You only live once!
More later, stay tuned!
this entry's permalink
More later, stay tuned!
this entry's permalink
