Sao Paulo, Brazil

*The law working against the people

Ok. So bear with me for this is my first attempt at blogging. This is a picture of two building that have been cleared out by the city of Sao Paulo. They are an example of the government clearing out space in the city (space previously occupied by lower-middle-class people) to build a park and a parking lot for an area they are trying to gentrify and bring in private investment. Meanwhile, I visited the building on the left on a Manday. There were about 35 families still living there, and the story that they told was that the city bought out their apartments (which most families were leasing) and essentially turned a few hundred people living in a building legally into squatters. The Security was tight to enter the building, there were no fire extinguishers, no maintenence of the elevator, and many of the apartments are sealed off. It’s aweful. When we went, we talked to the community organizer for the building and he said they were in negotiations with city hall to find new apartments in the dowtown area. On wednesday we heard that all 35 families (about 120 people) were evicted. They were essentially thrown out into the street.
It will be interesting to come to this same area (it is right next to the municipal market in Sao Paulo) in a few years and see what the follow through has been with whatever the city has planned for this area.

Rhapsody Alumnus: Elle Marrone, Location: Rio

Duration: 6 months, which puts my return at the end of March

Location: Botafogo, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. This is right next to the Pao de Azucar (Sugar Loaf Mountain) on this nice little harbor/beach thing. I am 1 mile from Copacabana (which is to the south) and about 3 miles from the Center (to the north), which has all the administrative buildings and turns into a giant black market after 6, apparently.

Motive: Remember how much fun I had with my thesis?!?! That question is sarcastic because I drove myself crazy on it, but I was very excited by studying “marginal” urban populations through rap music. I did not get to look in to Rio as much as I wanted because of subject and time constraints, but I was noticing some really interesting things about the different understandings of the “city” between the formal (asfalto) and informal (favela) populations. This is not particularly unique, but the diverse and interesting (albeit sometimes traumatic) history of the city and the aggressive, numerous, and internationally funded urban program solutions that are getting attention worldwide make Rio a very interesting city to study for me: someone who loves (global) cities and “justice” policies.

Stay tuned…