Pizza

Day 8-10: São Paulo, Brazil. There's no getting away from the fact: São Paulo is a monster. The largest city in the southern hemisphere and the third largest metropolis on planet earth. With a population two and a half times that of Greater London, twenty million people have decided to make this place their home, and to plagiarise Paul Hogan's words from the film Crocodile Dundee, this should make Sampa (as locals affectionately know it) the friendliest city on earth!

And you know, despite Brazil's rampant crime rate, São Paulo does actually feel like a safe and friendly place to live due, in the main, to it's unparalleled racial and ethnic diversity. Ask me to point out a typical 'Paulistano' to you and I wouldn't be able to. The city has been multiracial since its foundation in the 16^th Century, bringing together Portuguese, African and indigenous people. Since then, wave after wave of immigration has given the city a truly global face. Italian and Spanish migrants poured in during the 18^th Century to pick coffee after Brazil emancipated slaves in 1888 and they now number about 5 million and 3 million respectively. Add to this the highest number of Japanese descendants outside of Japan (1.5 million), the highest number of Lebanese descendants outside of the Lebanon (850,000), the 1 million or so Germans, the 130,000 strong Jewish community, the Chinese, the Armenians, the Lithuanians, the Greeks, the Syrians, the Koreans, the Polish and the Hungarians and you'll see what I mean.

And for 'foodies' like Karen and me, this made for one of the most interesting and diverse culinary melting pots in the world. A trip to the Mercado Municipal provided a great insight: This daily food market of gargantuan proportion is housed inside a neoclassical building dating back to 1928 bringing together the best of produce from around the globe: Dried fish from Norway, Serrano hams from Italy, olives from Spain, beers from Denmark, whisky from Scotland and Vegemite from Australia (well done Australia)!

But despite all of this diversity and choice, the city's signature dish is actually pizza. With such a huge Italian influence the locals maintain that Paulistano Pizza is better than anything you'll try in New York, Chicago or even Naples! And from our experience of the little Pizzeria in the chic Vila Madelena region of the city I wouldn't disagree with them (although had my Portuguese been a little better, I may not have ordered the corned beef, cream cheese and olive concoction that I ended up with)!

Walking around this intriguing, albeit slightly tired city, the enormity of the place really hit us. The presence and magnificence of the art-deco architecture, the views from the top of the Banespa building, the 110 museums, the 402 cinemas, the 12,500 restaurants and the 15,000 bars (that made for one hell of a pub crawl)!

But of all that Sampa had to offer, one of my personal favourites was the Museu de Futebol, located under the terraces of Corinthians' pseudo home stadium, Estádio do Pacaembu. This modern, R$33 million investment, celebrates the history and successes of the the 'Beautiful Game' throughout Brazil in an interactive, informative and engaging experience (and let's face it, as the only team to have qualified for all Copa Mundial and to have brought the prized trophy home no less than five times, Brazil has an awful lot to celebrate)! And yes, we had to endure countless replays of Ronaldinho’s free kick, much to the delight of the gathered Brazilian crowd, but this was about Brazil's triumphs rather than England's failures.

One of the exhibits also provided a great example of why Karen and I love travelling so much: To appreciate different cultures views on our own ingrained British perspectives. The particular display charted the history of all of the World Cups going back to the 1930's and through pictures, video and audio described not only what happened on the pitch, but the social, economic and cultural background that set the tone for each of the four yearly competitions. So in 1966, as Bobby Moore lifted the the Jules Rimet trophy on the steps of Wembley Stadium we saw how the Beetles were setting the global music trend (you can't argue with that). In 1978, as Daniel Passarella lifted the trophy in his beloved home land of Argentina it was against the back-drop of the Sex Pistols and punk-rock (again, a good call: Sid Viscous and Jonny Rotten were the certainly setting the music agenda for a whole generation of teenagers brought up in the late 70's). And by 1998, as Brazil lifted the trophy in the United States for the umpteenth time it was apparently the Spice Girls that were at the forefront of style and music vogue. Now, I know that I spent most of my 1990's in a drunken stupor, but did I miss something here?!