Mercado Municipal Paulistano

Our Mission President wants us to get out of the MTC at least once a week. This gives us a great opportunity to give out pass along cards. Vernon/grandpa does it best because he can talk with the people and answer their questions.

This was a visual feast. I have never seen whole pigs hanging in a meat market. Every imaginable part of the animal could be purchased pickled, salted or freshly cut.

I learned that tripe (the stomach lining of cattle is what is used as the casement for sausage. I may never eat it again.

a lot of the meat was salted so it did not need to be refrigerated.

Vernon/grandpa is always trying to increase his vocabulary so he was asking all the vendors the names of the fruit that we rarely ever see in the states and writing it down so he would not forget it.

I had never seen red bananas. They also had some bananas that were as small as a man's thumb.

I love cashews but had never seen a real cashew fruit. The nut we eat is the dark part on top of the fruit. One nut per fruit.

I absolutely loved this outing. Brazil is so colorful and this indoor market was a profusion of shapes, color and texture.

some of the stalls had their fruit displayed in fancy baskets and individually wrapped and others just stacked in crates straing from the farms.

on the second floor was a row of restaurants and hundreds of people were eating. The food look wonderful.

We ate at the Mission before we left so we wouldn't be tempted. It is so easy to over eat here in Brazil.

I couldn't resist taking a shot of one of the menus. the floor is mahogany.

The building was built in 1922 and has 22,000 square meters of floor space. A meter is a little bit larger than three feet. The building was built to house this market and has persisted to this day. The purchasing agent for the mission told us that this is where many of the best restaurants in Sao Paulo buy their meat, fruit, and spices.

The stain glass windows are wonderful and the architecture detailing of the building was fabulous.

needless to say this has been one of my favorite outings. I hope to paint some of these images when I get home.

MTC Brick Oven party

Finally the oven is cooking pizza. Aldo planned a grand opening. His wife came and made the first pizzas

It was very festive. Brazilians love a party.

Music was playing everyone was clapping and some were dancing.

all of the full time employees and the three missionary couples were invited to celebrate the firing up of the brick pizza oven.

Tables were set up in one of the hall ways and big plastic sheets were hung to block off the area so create a private dinning room by the oven.

valentines day outing

the day started with flowers delivered by the men to all us wives. Then the wives took the husbands out for American Pizza at Pizza Hut. It was great. Then we drove into the Center of Sao Paulo and went to the Modern Art museum. Photographs were not permitted inside the galleries but outside in the courtyards the cameras were allowed

The building itself was my favorite part of the museum. It reminds me somewhat of the Brimhall (Design) Building at BYU but on a much grander scale.

Outside the museum is a wonderful park filled with huge dinosaur-size trees. These parks are a wonderful relief from the skyscraper jungle that goes on for miles.

The parks are clean and amazingly un- crowded. Maybe there are more people enjoying the parks on the weekends just like the beaches. We usually plan our outings on Friday. The only crowds that we bumped into are usually school kids on outings with their teachers.

These tree trunks look like giant web feet to me.

Across from the museum is the train station built during the colonial period.

The building has been wonderfully maintained.

Vernon/Grandpa plans all of our outings and is looking into planning a train ride for us out to some of the surrounding cities. Many of the people in Brazil will commute to work on the train. Some have a three-hour commute, one way. When we asked one of the workers here at the MTC why, they said there is no work in the towns where they live.

I took this picture on the bridge that we had to cross to get to the car that we parked on the street. We were a little worried about parking the mission van on the street, but no problem. We take the GPS with us in our back pack just in case someone saw us take it off the window when we parked. I don't remember if I mentioned that Doctor Hall had his wallet taken right out of his pocket on one of our outings. Before he could notify the credit card company (two hours I think) the thief had charged over $1500.00. We are just a little more careful now than we had been.

Butter fly Farm

we spent a wonderful Friday in the Country. One of our visits was to a butterfly farm

The make butterflies will land on you they are attracted to the perspiration

The area is enclosed with nets so that the natural predators of the butterflies can't get in. Fly are one of their predators they can't get in but they do lay their eggs on the net and the larva does get through the nets

The flowers are native to Brazil and the area is filled with the flowers that attract the butterflies

these are called Chinese lanterns

This butterfly had just been born and was being released out of the cage

The lab is where they keep the chrysalis until the butterflies are born

the hydraingea were everywhere

They were huge

It was a wonderfully pleasant day

pizza party

This is Aldo Francisconi's home in Embue. Aldo is the director of the Missionary Training Center here in Brazil. He bought this home over twenty years ago and has been remodeling and adding on to it over the years. In Brazil you are required to take your vacation time all at once. Everyone is required to get a one month vacation even part-time workers.

The yard is surrounded by the jungle and they say that monkeys are often found in the yard. Aldo and his wife are antique collectors and avid pizza makers. Both Aldo and his wife have Italian ancestors.this is the side entrance into the new addition he has added on to his home.

this room is a pizza kitchen and a place to place a lot of their antiques

This is Francille and Aldo in their aprons and hats. Francille makes the crust, cuts up all the toppings and makes the tomatoe sauce Aldo does the cooking and the cutting. This is quite the show. Aldo puts the pizza in the oven with a wooden pallet. Shakes it off onto the bricks inside the oven. Then he shuffles it around with the metal pallet until it is done.

Here I am looking into the ovenAs soon as the pizza is done The bang a pan that hangs on the wall next to the oven, pour olive oil over the pizza and cut it up into wedges.

Vernon is looking out the window. He counted the seating and figured that they could serve 50 people in this room.

We had to leave early so they let us eat the first pizza that came out. I am a little surprised that they like things like Broccoli, Zucinni, eggs, chocolate and bananas on their what all they put on pizza as well as lots of what I like cheese, peppers, onions, and olives. The tomato sauce is more like a very finely ground up salsa rather than a tomato paste based sauce.

Besides the pizza they have a system set up for Kareoki (I am not sure if that is how you spell it)

Then they have over a thousand videos

and a room full of sofas. This is a perfect place for a family gathering or gathering of friends. I understand that they often host wedding parties here too. Needless to say it was just a delightful evening. The GPS even worked on the dirt roads that we had to take to get to their home.

a