Elisabete França

Caitlin Morrissey 

Elisabete, what is the DNA of São Paulo?

Elisabete França 

I think that the DNA of São Paulo is to be a city of various peoples from Brazil and all the countries around the world. It’s a welcome city and is a city of work.

Caitlin Morrissey

And what makes São Paulo São Paulo? How many São Paulo’s are there, and what differentiates them if there’s more than one?

Elisabete França 

Well, I think São Paulo, first of all, comparing all the other metropolis in the world, is a welcoming city. When you arrive, we hear from different parts of the country, other cities, other states and other countries now, even shorter time you become a São Paulo native, integrate into the city, and in this city cultures. And at one week in São Paulo, you began to claim further rights. It’s incredible that in my opinion. And important to mention, that São Paulo is not a prejudiced city.

On the other hand, São Paulo has some tribes. The tribes in the neighbourhood, tribes of other states. It’s very interesting this. It’s important to mention that it’s very different from the northeast of the country because the cities in the northeast of the country have a lot of prejudice. It’s important in the surname to present each other, but in São Paulo, totally different. At the same time, we could find here groups that are united by cultures, for example, a culture of graffiti, hippie-hoppy, funky and so on. But of course, it’s not perfect, and you have a small portion of the population that is the elite, and they are always far from the reality of the city. But I think this is the profile of São Paulo.

Caitlin Morrissey 

Thanks so much. When you mentioned that São Paulo is different to other cities in the north to other Brazilian cities, do you know why that is?

Elisabete França 

Yes. Because I think you have the kind of Portuguese culture, the people-- the traditional families, they think that it’s important to be a big surname, and they live in these small groups, and don’t recognise that now it’s completely different to that colonial time. But in São Paulo, no, because you have a lot of immigrants, the Black people, north east people etc.

Caitlin Morrissey 

So its cultural fabric is very uniquely diverse, I think, is what I’m hearing and what you’re saying. And so who lives in São Paulo, and why São Paulo?

Elisabete França 

Well, I think that people that come from everywhere, come for the attraction, employment possibilities, the welcoming city, and now people could come and try opportunities. The city has more opportunities than Brazil, than the Latin America. And so, it’s good to live here because this welcoming city and the opportunities and now where we are you are receiving more and more immigrants. Now, the Venezuelan immigrants, Bolivian immigrants, African immigrants. And you have, in terms of government, a social network that includes all the people access to health services, education services, and it’s very important that to attract people.

Caitlin Morrissey 

And does that have anything to do with São Paulo being such a big city in terms of its population, all of this opportunity?

Elisabete França 

Now you have something like 12 million people, and I think the technical capacity that the city promote is one factor of attracting more people. But all the new-- for example, Google, Amazon, they come to São Paulo because it’s the only place that could try people technical to work in this new opportunities in Brazil.

Caitlin Morrissey 

Yeah, that makes so much sense. And then moving on now to the geography of São Paulo. How has that shaped the city as it has evolved, then its location as well, slightly inland?

Elisabete França 

Well, the city was founded in a hill from where it was possible to see the valleys formed by the main rivers. It’s a city of hills and rivers. Thus, the city began to occupy the peaks like Avenida Paulista, Consolação, but the demographic growth, first the occupation in the valleys and the planes which were subject to the flooding. It’s a problem now. This city continues to grow along the rivers, but always with the waters back to them, creating it’s a big problem. And we have a cars culture. So along the rivers, we created marginals, the avenues. It’s not good for the city. Now, you try to change the discussion, but it’s not easy. We have it now seven million cars in the city. The Paulista people have this cultural car culture. It’s very complicated. When you try to change the forms of mobility, improve the cycle or pedestrian, it’s not easy. Public transport too, people love cars.

Caitlin Morrissey 

And in São Paulo do, people commute over long distances to get to work? Do they have long drives to get into work?

Elisabete França 

In general, people that would live in the east area of the city and come through the central areas to work. So these people must use metro trans public transport. But to do-- the thing is like the schools to the children, by the supermarket, it’s possible to walk to this place, but unfortunately, our culture, people don’t do it. So for example, we have researched that 40% people that use the cars use it to shorter distance, five kilometres, three kilometres. It’s possible to walk, no, but people, ‘it’s not secure’. That’s not true.

Caitlin Morrissey 

So the car is number one transport mode in people’s minds?

Elisabete França 

One, two, three. Four is metro. Five is public is transport.

Caitlin Morrissey 

Yes, I understand.

Elisabete França 

And we have here something like one million motorcycles. It’s very important this mood in the city. Now we are creating some special line to the motorcycle. One million.

Caitlin Morrissey 

I see. Yeah, that is a lot, a lot. And so, in terms of São Paulo’s physical built environment, are there sort of infrastructures, roads, plazas, public spaces, or architectural features that really shape the character of the city as you see it?

Elisabete França 

Okay. Well, I wrote a demand infrastructure of characteristics, in my opinion, is the highway culture, the Corbusian modernism, I think it’s Brazilian repercussions in all the cities of Brazil. So we build two new bridges. Recently, we are trying to focus on pedestrian mobility, but it’s not easy. But in terms of architectural characteristics, São Paulo is an open museum of modern architecture. When you talk about the production of the city-- in the cities in the ‘50s, we have a lot of antique buildings, so I think people love it. Especially in the central areas, there’s a lot of sightseeing to go. And you see this production, it’s really, I think it’s, it’s really beautiful. This ‘50s production, ‘50s/‘60s. We have beautiful buildings and it’s very important for us.

Caitlin Morrissey 

Are there any in particular that you think sort of characterise that architectural movement? Any favourites?

Elisabete França 

It’s a more modern movement, at this time we have a Paulista modern movement that compete with the Rio de Janeiro movement. And you have the immigrant architect that comes from Brazil, especially from São Paulo in the Second War, good architect, European architect. It’s very important movement here, especially Jews, architects from Poland that came to Brazil, especially after or during the Second World War.

Caitlin Morrissey 

And so you mentioned earlier that São Paulo is different to other Brazilian cities, but role does São Paulo play in Brazil and in the region more broadly?

Elisabete França 

Well, São Paulo is a rich city. The richest in Brazil. That’s in America. The GDP is the third in the country.

Caitlin Morrissey 

And what would you say the relationship is between Rio and Sao Paulo?

Elisabete França 

Well, I think the two cities are very connected, but very different, of course. The Rio has beaches, the natural, beautiful, tourist opportunities. But nowadays, São Paulo is attracting a lot of tourists. We have more tourists than Rio, but it's our business in general, tourism. People came to the events and stay three days more to visit museums and parks and etc. But the relation between São Paulo and Rio? Sometimes it's good! We love to go to Rio, but in terms of profile, it's very different. São Paulo is a city of work, it's our culture: work, work, work. Rio is different.

Caitlin Morrissey 

More the city of fun and sun and carnival and festival. Elisabete, thank you so much for everything that you've said so far. It's been really fascinating. But in your mind, what are São Paulo's most world-changing inventions or discoveries?

Elisabete França 

Well, I did research in terms of innovations, I didn't find some special people or creation. I think it's not an important profile for São Paulo.

Caitlin Morrissey 

Is this a city where discoveries from other places come to find a platform because of the city's large scale and audience? Is it maybe more like that? That people come to São Paulo to find a platform for their innovations that they may have made in other places?

Elisabete França 

I think it's possible attracted that because now you have the possibility to contract technical people that are prepared because you have a good university, the São Paulo University is the most important in the Latin America in terms of engineering, technology, because it is, I think, very attractive.

Caitlin Morrissey 

And in your mind, who are the city's most influential leaders? And they can be cultural leaders, sports leaders, political leaders, past leaders, present leaders.

Elisabete França 

Yeah, so I think São Paulo doesn't recognise the leader. We have momentary leaders, like some males, but it's very momentary. After one or two years, people forgot their names. I believe that this city has some-- in terms leaders, in terms of people that promote culture. For example, in the ‘50s, an important man come to São Paulo, Ciccillo Matarazzo, and he creates a lot of factories. And he created the Biennale of Arts, one of the most important art. He creates the MASP, the Museu de Arte de São Paulo – the Lina Bo Bardi project – and he created a lot of museums. And this man is very recognised simple. I think he will prefer to recognise people that promote art or some football leaders, but it should not make up of the football. Nowadays we have the Olympics Games and the gymnast woman, Rebeca Andrade. She is not Paulistana. She was born near São Paulo but now is our leader. We are very proud by her. She just won a gold medal.

Caitlin Morrissey 

So you're saying that cultural leaders are generally those who are remembered in the city, rather than political leaders who sort of come and go?

Elisabete França 

There are some Mayors, for example, we have a Mayor that I think he's leaving the imaginary of the people that called Maluf. He implanted a lot of highways, two new bridges. But nowadays, no one.

Caitlin Morrissey 

And what are the key stories that people tell about São Paulo? What songs or myths, that sort of capture the city?

Elisabete França 

Well, we have a holiday in July – 9th July – that we commemorate the battle: the State Government against the Federal Government. São Paulo, in that time, the State decided to separate from Brazil. So you commemorate until now, and people remember this movement.

Caitlin Morrissey 

And what in your mind, what does the celebration of this day or that event, what does it say about the city? Does it still see itself as independent and different to the Federal Government or the country in some way?

Elisabete França 

Sometimes people comment that São Paulo is the richest city. São Paulo supported the other states. That’s not serious. I think now people are proud about some events. For example, the biggest gay parade, the big carnival on the street, people are proud for this event to meeting millions of people. The biggest Biennale, the biggest, etc, etc. We love it to be the biggest of the Brazilian cities.

Caitlin Morrissey 

That makes sense. Are there other misconceptions that people hold about the city, whether that's when you're travelling around Brazil or internationally and you say you're a Paulistano, are there misconceptions that come with that?

Elisabete França 

International? I don’t know. But in terms of the other cities, people say that São Paulo is grey. People just thinking work, don't leisure. São Paulo doesn't attract the tourists. São Paulo is the bad sun, the images, the misconception about São Paulo. Of course, it's grey, but sometimes you have sun, for example, today and people doesn't work only because we have a carnival, museums, restaurants, and we love the streets, and we go in the bar.

Caitlin Morrissey 

In terms of São Paulo's history, are there these key moments or shocks that you think have shaped the city in some way, and how has the city responded to those?

Elisabete França 

So as I mentioned, we have a recent story, the Revolution of 1932. It's a trauma because some people died. Part of the city were destroyed. And, of course, the pandemic period is really a trauma because we lose shops and jobs and lives, of course. But-- it's a trauma, but on the other hand, I think the city responded in terms of pandemic time very quickly to the demands at the moment and the especially poor people and the poor communities. They create their social network. It's impressive. They prepare food, health system, etc. So I think in this trauma pandemic moment, the city responded very well, especially the poor communities. I was so proud about that.

Caitlin Morrissey 

So the city is able to sort of galvanise very quickly its resources in response to a shock or a trauma in a way that you've just described. Would you say that that's reflective more broadly of how São Paulo is governed, that it's able to respond quickly to challenges?

Elisabete França 

I think it's the profile of the people of the city. We could respond to this trauma with solidarity network, it’s really impressive. The social network at that time is a result of the profile of this mix of millions of immigrants, one million Italians, one million Japanese, two million from the north to east, so these people create the internal networks and to connect with each other.

Caitlin Morrissey 

So the enclaves and the diaspora network spawn the sort of foundation for the city to respond, the citizens to respond to whatever sort of shocks they face. That's really fascinating, and it does seem to be sort of a unique way that São Paulo responds.

Elisabete França 

Yeah, some days when we look to the things that you could see around the world, these wars between Russia etc, São Paulo is totally different, totally. We have it here, some neighbours when Jewish people and Arabian people live together, connected, it’s really fantastic.

Caitlin Morrissey 

I was going to ask you actually whether you find sort of Italian communities, Japanese communities, living in Italian neighbourhoods or Japanese neighbourhoods or are people more mixed?

Elisabete França 

Yes, yes. But for example, the Japanese neighbourhood now here, Liberdade, initially the Japanese community. Now, the Korean people, northwest people from the other cities live together and work together, and Italian communities too. We now, we have new communities like the Bolivian people, African, the central area of the city. I'm here in the central area. We have a lot of African communities from Angola, Mozambique, Mozambique, and now we have the Venezuelan people that come from the moment.

Caitlin Morrissey 

Yes, yes. Does São Paulo have a reputation as being a sort of safe haven for migrants, or is it more to do with its opportunity, would you say

Elisabete França 

Yes, I think it's the profile, all the people from all the places come here and have the opportunity by their self, their self-employment, great jobs and other things.

Caitlin Morrissey 

And so our final question is, what does the future hold for São Paulo, and how will its DNA shape its future?

Elisabete França 

Okay, well, first of all, I am an immigrant because I came from Curitiba, a city in south of Brazil. So I think this city, São Paulo, continue to be the country's locomotive and the future of the cities, I am in public services. I think, is to continue to invest in technology, technical training, to the population responded to the demands of the 21st century, and I think it's important to pay the ending critically renewable investment environment. It's very important now. And become a theory adapted to the demands arising from the climate changes. This is very important. Investing contemporary urban solutions, more green areas, friendly public spaces, walkability and both clean up our rivers because all the rivers are polluted, too.

Caitlin Morrissey

Thank you so much, Elisabete. And just one final question, which is, do you feel that you've been able to say everything that you wanted to about the DNA of São Paulo today?

Elisabete França

For me, the most important is to clean the rivers, and the possibility population to access the rivers, to know the water of the city.