Tres Taxistas: My First Night in Sao Paulo

by Srinivas Rao
on October 12th, 2010
1 Comment

This is a somewhat comical look at my very first night in Sao Paulo during my 6 month study exchange program in Brazil.

The night that lay ahead of me was nothing that I could have possibly prepared for. As the night started, a herd of foreign exchange students wandered down Avenida Paulista, another place we would all become intimately familiar with. We arrived at Café Crème and before we knew it everybody had drinks in their hands. Across all cultural boundaries the one thing that seems to make people open up to each other at rapid pace is the consumption of alcohol ( I guess that’s why we call it the social lubricant). Maybe instead of fighting wars we should all just get wasted together. We could just have one giant party where people around the world just get together and get and drunk. Right I’m supposed to be telling you a story.

As the introductions started, it was amazing to see how truly fascinated we all were with each other’s cultures. What started out as an international evening of drinks quickly changed. I didn’t realize that what happened next would be the beginning of a series of Taxi mishaps and problems that even the Paulistanos would get quite a comical thrill out of seeing. At this point I was fortunate enough not to be continually mistaken for Brazilian (a problem that would start a few weeks later). As an Indian-American with limited knowledge of Portuguese, but such similar skin color to the Brazilians, I can only imagine how confused the cab drivers must have been. All this and they still had to figure out how to read a map that they would probably take to their deathbed trying to memorize.

Around midnight I decided that it was time for me to call it a night. The alcohol and a conversation with a girl who was brushing her teeth in the bathroom that prompted me to to ask if she was a dentist (this was the most clever conversation I could think of given my limited knowledge of Portuguese), were enough to make me realize that if I had much more, this first night in SAMPA could be a disaster. Looking back it wouldn’t have made a difference. I bid farewell to my new friends and flagged down a taxi. I handed the driver the address to my hostel and asked if he knew where it was. He nodded confidently and I relaxed.

One thing I learned about Brazilians is that they never seemed to want to disappoint you when it came to ensuring your confidence in the fact that everything was ok. Yet, it rarely was. It’s an amazing skill I think they have mastered. Even though the night was about to turn into a complete disaster and this guy knew it, it was like he didn’t care at all. In fact I felt pretty relaxed when I saw how relaxed he was. As we turned the corner on Avenida Paulista, I was overcome with a certain feeling of doubt. So, I asked him if he knew where we were going and he looked back and said “no…..” In my mind I was thinking “shi#$#, I better stop this guy before he gets me too far from this bar.” So he drove in a circle and dropped me right back in front of the bar.

The next hour felt like I was in a relay race where the object of the game was to take as many cabs around the block as you could in 30 minutes and have one drink every time you came back to the bar. Of course, the other people at the bar have no idea you are in the relay race, so you just look like a crazy-drunken American who is slowly tarnishing the already damaged reputation of a country that the rest of the world doesn’t think too highly of.

But on the second round a girl from France decided to walk me to another cab. When I got in, she waved goodbye and I thought I was on my way. Suddenly as we turned the corner on Paulista, I was overcome by doubt again. Once again I ask the guy “Voce saba onde fica este lugar. (Do you know where this place is)” He looked back and said “no”. 5 minutes later I found myself back at the bar, where everybody was stunned to see me. I explained to them that no cab driver seemed to know where my hostel was at. I was on the verge of a meltdown, but that didn’t keep me from having another cocktail. Anybody who always says “third time’s the charm” has clearly never been in a Taxi in Sao Paulo. I got into the third cab of the night only to find myself right back in front of this bar.

30 Years Old, my first night in Brazil and I had no idea how to get back to my hostel. Despite having money, this was one problem I couldn’t buy my way out of. I felt like I could have probably put on a Nascar event with the taxis that night and probably would have ended up back in the bar that morning. Finally, the another gringo offered me a place to crash. I think he must have had some experiences that were somewhat comical himself so he felt some pity. That night I slept on his couch, and then woke up in the morning and decided to find an internet café to see if I could find out what the name of my hostel was and where exactly it was located. Then I did a brave thing for a gringo,I got on a bus in an attempt to get to a metro station. According to one of my friends, there are 10,000 buses on the streets of Sao Paulo. You do the math. Stupid gringo + Bad Portuguese,+ first day in the 3rd Largest City in the World+ 10,000 buses= yet another gringo disaster waiting to happen. In my short bus ride, I realized I was going nowhere and decided I’d better get in a cab and just go to the nearest metro. Fortunately I found my way back to the hostel, and washed up and headed over to the university for disorientation.

Srinivas Rao

Srinivas is an avid surfer and personal development blogger at The Skool of Life. He's also the host and co-founder of BlogcastFM, a podcast for bloggers.