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Introducing Mystery Class #7

Sao Paulo, Brazil
23.533 S, 46.617 W

 

Hello, and welcome from the "Paulistanos"!

Our City

São Paulo has an estimated population of just over 11 million in the city itself, which makes it the most populous in the Southern and Western Hemispheres according to some. But São Paulo is sprawling like Los Angeles, and so if you count the population in the metropolitan area, some will say our population is between 19 and 29 million.

We call ourselves, "Paulistanos", or the people of São Paulo. A similar term, "paulista" designates anyone from the whole state of São Paulo , including the paulistanos. The city's Latin motto is "Non ducor, duco", which translates as "I am not led, I lead". A famous nickname for the city is "Sampa".

Being so large, São Paulo can be an intimidating place, but if you like big cities, it offers the excitement and attractions of one of the world's most dynamic cities.



Our skyline is very impressive,
by day or night

In the middle of the city, we also have a beautiful park to provide a little green space, called Ibirapuera Park .


Ibirapuera Park

São Paulo has many famous public buildings. The Museu de Arte de São Paulo is one of the most important art museums in Latin America. Its building of modern architecture has paintings of great artists from all over the world. Works by Bosch, Rembrant, Poussin, Van Gogh, Renoir, Degas and other great names.


Museu de Arte de São Paulo

The Municipal Theater of our city was inspired by the opera house of Paris. Constructed between 1903 and 1911, the building has
been recently restored and maintains many of its original characteristics.



The theater is the home for the Municipal Symphonic Orchestra, and the Ballet of São Paulo City.

Of course, football is the most important sport for us, and we have several major teams here in Sao Paulo and stadiums too.



Estadio Morumbi , home of the São Paulo FC team.

Our Country


Brazil is known as Republica Federativa do Brasil in Portugese, or Brasil for short. Our official language here is Portugese, instead of Spanish which is the official language of most other countries in South America. However, many of us speak Spanish too, and many other languages as well.

Brazil is the largest country in South America, so large in fact that we have four time zones. Our estimated total area is 8,511,965 sq km (3,319,666 sq mi), which is only a little smaller than the United States.

As you can see from this map, Brazil borders every other country in South America, except for two -- Ecuador and Chile. And we have a very long coast line on the Atlantic Ocean, estimated to be almost 7,500 km long. Some of the most beautiful beaches in the world are found on our Atlantic coast.

One of the beautiful beaches on our Atlantic coastline

Our climate here is mostly tropical, because as you can see from the map, the north of Brazil sits right on the equator. In the south of Brazil, the climate becomes more temperate.

Brazil is one of the most populated nations in the world. Recent estimates give our population as 190,010,647.

The Brazilian population tends to concentrate along the coastline in large urban centers. While Brazil has one of the largest populations in the world, population density is low and the inner continental land has large demographical empty spaces. It is a multiracial country composed of European, Amerindian, African and Asian elements.

Our flag

We hope you have enjoyed learning about Sao Paulo and Brazil. Come for a visit!