Friday, March 20, 2009

Welcome Spring

At 6:44AM local time, Winter left, and Spring came in. And not a minute too soon if you ask me. Let's all celebrate by standing an egg on end.

Thursday, March 5, 2009

Obrigado e tchau

Not too much to say today and no pictures either. We head for home tomorrow. Lunch today was at another weigh your plate restaurant. They seem to be a popular way to eat. The hotel has 3 restaurants, Japanese, French, and Italian. Tonight we had dinner at the Italian. I had a spaghetti with chili peppers, garlic, and olive oil but no sauce. It was good and spicy.

It's been an interesting visit. The meetings were productive. We had a driver to take us to and from the office each day. Riding in Sao Paulo traffic makes you surprised that the cars don't all look like they've been in a demolition derby. And the motorcycles that weave at high speed between the cars would give even a Chicago cab driver a fright. It's remarkable that there aren't more accidents. But we were safely transported every day.

I have another overnight flight to endure, but it will be good to be home again.

Wednesday, March 4, 2009

Boa Noite

Nothing much to report tonight. So I'll just put up a couple more pictures.

We are on an executive floor of the hotel. It has a club lounge where they serve snacks and cocktails every evening, and a continental breakfast every morning. There is free Wi-Fi in there and you can also get DVDs to play in your room. This is a view from the club lounge window.


Here is the building that houses the VSI offices. They have to scan their fingerprint every time they enter or leave the building.


Across the street from the office is a restaurant. This is a self serve buffet type restaurant. You fill your plate with your choices from the buffet which includes salad items, hot vegetables and meats, and desserts. Then they weigh your plate at the end of the line kind of like a salad bar, and you pay per ounce or kilogram or whatever.


I tried a new soft drink that is very popular in Brazil. It's called Guarana Antarctica and it tastes something like cream soda. Apparently it is very high in caffeine. I didn't notice any effects from drinking it, but I already had plenty of strong Brazilian coffee by then.

Tuesday, March 3, 2009

Bom Dia

Today was a full day of meetings. I think they went well. We ended the day at a Churrascaria restaurant called the Montana Grill. This is one of those Brazilian all you can eat steak houses. You start at a self serve salad bar, and then they start bringing you meat on skewers non stop. We all ate until we were stuffed. The meal was accompanied by some delicious Caipirinhas. These tasty drinks go down easy and each one makes you want another. I know I had more than one, and less than four, but my counting got a little foggy. :) After the dinner we enjoyed a delicious papaya cream desert, and finished the night with a shot of Cointreau. Fortunately we had a driver to bring us back to the hotel. Some pictures:


Complimentary breakfast buffet


Dinner group


Meat on a stick


Caipirinha number ??


Sao Paulo night view

Monday, March 2, 2009

Brazil

The company that supplies software for our POS devices is located in São Paulo, Brazil and I am here this week for some meetings. The overnight flight got me here around noon. Leaving Chicago's 20 degree temperatures and stepping off the plane into 93° was quite a shock, although a welcome one. We had pre-arranged transportation that picked us up and brought us to the São Paulo Grand Hyatt, a very nice hotel where we have exceptional accommodations. After arriving we walked to a nearby shopping area for lunch. Our meetings start tomorrow, so I had the afternoon off to rest from our travel. This evening we had dinner at one of the 3 hotel restaurants where I had a chance to get to know a couple of the VSI employees a little better. Tomorrow morning begins our series of meetings this week. Here are a few pictures.


The Hyatt

My colleague, Mr. Weatherby in front of the Hyatt entrance

Hotel Lobby

São Paulo

The Hyatt entrance, viewed from hotel room

View of suspension bridge from hotel room

Hotel room