Um bairro novo significa passeios novos

I just moved this week to Bom Retiro. Great place, great people, great location, other district, new adventure somehow...you got that. But it means that I get to try new paths as well. Yesterday my hunt for a second-hand bike and the good weather took me walking through the Centro Civico, down to Juvevê and the Centro.

The Centro Civico is this collection of institutional buildings: justice, administration, municipal prefecture... The district is the Central Administrative District, acting for both the city of Curitiba and the state of Paraná - of which Curitiba is the capital. It is possible to walk between the buildings, although some have fences and guards and you feel quicly that you are overwelmed, on the edge of lost, between the high edifices and their reflections in the brilliant glassy facades... It is both messy and very straight forward planning. I came walking somehow from the 'back-door' of the site and had the feeling of a dedale, but landing on Candido Abreu, I realise that there is a central plan, a centralised design - a street, straight and wide leading up to a huge building with the Brazilian flag waving over it. But still in between, a square of lawn, a praça with trees, colourful buildings gives the mixed feeling between a social/communistic centralised power planning and a chill, relaxed spirit valuing light, warmth and colours.

Facades in Centro Civico

Official axis and buildings - many cars, a centralised design and a flag

Municipal hall of the city - decorated with the Araucaria and the Farol do saber

Avenida Candido Abreu could maybe compared as São Paulo's Avenida Paulista, smaller scale of course. But the principle of having office buildings, institutions and banks running along one axis; lunches, bistros and restaurants in the small houses in between. It is a straight cut in the city, going from the Centro Civico to Centro, down town, landing just in front of the shopping Mueller and the Praça Dezenove de Dezembro.

Candido Abreu seen from the Centro Civico and down

Japanese looking bridge, at the crossing of the cycling path from the parcs and the avenida Candido Abreu

This square was inaugurated as a commemoration of the political emancipation of the state of Paraná, the 19th December 1853, from the state of São Paulo. Paraná was dismantelled from SP, in order to constitute its own commercial and trade region, and apparently as well as there is link to the earlier participation in the Liberal Revolution of 1842 (but didn't quite get the story yet there).

Walking then up avenida João Gualberto, through Juvevê, small architectonic surprises appear along the axis (remember...? The tubo express, development axis - with high rise buildings...?). Old reminescence from a previous architectural (colonial, I assume) style and period in the city, a church out of use and lost between high building in construction and some shaggy houses with graffitis, a german looking villa...

Blue villa

Not used but still a beautiful planted garden...

My sunday morning pleasures

Sunday morning with coffee, laptop and the view over Parque Barigüi and the city... Life is great sometimes.

...and then the sunsets!

Thanks for that, Manuel :-)

Parcs and squares of Curitiba

Weekend in Curitiba - Saterday I went walking in Mercês, neighbourhood that I hadn't discovered yet. Very calm, green and agreable, linking Bigorrilho - where I live for a few more days - and Santa Felicidade - the Italian district. From the top of Mercês, nice perspectives over the main axes of the city are visible (transportation axes with high rise buildings). And from there going down towards the historic center and Largo da Ordem. Down to the shopping Mueller and Passeio Público. And home again - a nice 3 hours walk crossing some nice squares, largo and parcs of the city.

Praça Vinte e Nove de Março

A time-line or wall of memories, passes like a straight pathway at the upper part of the praça, but below the street, and passing under the big sculpture and fountain in the middle of the square. Kids bike or skate here, people run down the stairs and crossing to the other side of the square. Under the trees younger kids are playing, couple kissing, eating ice-creams, walking their baby in its buggy... Praça Vinte e Nove de Março is a rather big square - and the feeling is enhanced by the presence of this huge sculpture in its center - but walking on it, it offers many diverse spaces for various activities, more intimistic spaces, frames on the surrounding buildings and peace from the roads passing along it.

From under the sculpture, under the waterfall, on rua Martin Afonso - main street to the center

Walking up rua Brigadeiro Franco, on the corner of the square, a little homy house is condemned to become something amazing... in someone's eyes, but is going to be lost in mine. Under that tree, on this corner, this little humble building just fit perfectly - and considering that the high rise buildings running along the main development axis aren't further than some hundred meters.

Before - After

Reaching the main street between Santa Felicidade and Centro histórico, pizza and pasta places start to become more regular. I turn down towards the Center. There are funny walls, painted, coloured with signs, and some graffitis, then a wall without...

Coloured walls

"Misters street artists, spare your sprays and earn in solidarity - Each month that this wall not gets painted with graffitis, a charity institution receives R$ 50,00"

There are views, sneak-peeks to the city's high skylines, to private gardens squeezed in between buildings...

View over to Cabral and Bacacheri

Colourful house

There is the highest building of Curitiba, the Palacio das telecomunicaçoes. A huge squared building with pare-soleils and facade expression as it could be residential almost. A grey building but with many nuances of grey. Actually a rather beautiful building, thinking that it is basically a skull for radiodistribution machines, at least a characteristic one.

Palacio das telecomunicacões

There are cafés full of people, a church full of people, then the historical center of Largo da Ordem, cheio as well. On a sunny day, what else to expect.

Way down to São Francisco

Largo da Ordem

The bars and cafes in Largo da Ordem

Largo da Ordem is the historical center, the place where is located the huge Sunday market for
all kind of artisanal stuff, the place to find the nice bars in town, some nice music bars and clubs as well... It is a cultural place, with the old casa da prefeitura, historical architecture and houses, ateliers, antiques, galleries and museums... The first time I was there I discovered the museum of a Norvegian painter who came to Paraná, and Curitiba, in the beginning of the 20th century and had his own little academy of painting, hereby forming a little school society typical for those years...a norwegian in Curitiba, back then...! All nationalities have really come to this land.

I reach rua Treze de Maio - the theater street. Here are theater schools, theaters of all kind, big ones, small ones, fancy ones, coloured ones...

Then down to the shopping Mueller. This shopping mall is one of the fine looking, typical ones - I mean in terms of architectonics. Its first use as a fabric gives it a particular look and a history - and probably adds to its expensive character. The sad thing is that no one seems to remember what kind of production was done in this ancient fabric... I keep asking.

Just on the corner is the Praça Dezenove de Novembro, also know as the naked man's square, since there are the statues of a naked man and women - huge! - on the square. He looks forward, straight and sure... some symbolic for looking towards the future and evolution - or something in that sense. Again various spaces with people sitting walking - green areas, mineral areas, people staying, sitting, walking, crossing, cleaning... A lot of activity. And then those magnificent red flowers! Fantastic in their colour and sharpness against the grey of the stone...

Praça Dezenove de Dezembro

Fountain on the praça - the space to admire

Women statue on the praça - the space to walk, sit...

Curitiba traffic on the end of a Friday afternoon

Entering Passeio Público

The late afternoon sun drags me to Passeio Público - the first square and parc I visited in Curitiba, when it was frio da porra! Today it looks much more friendly, and my tour there offers surprises I wouldn't have expected in the middle of this town: monkeys wondering and swinging freely in the trees.

Ape watching...

Yes, the parc was a previous zoo, the first of the town, but still those animals left here - mostly birds - are in cages. Here as well new ones have been locked out: flamingos, some kind of Brasilian eagles, and other which I don't know the names of... I really need to find a book about the flora and fauna of this region!

Birds in Passeio Público

In Passeio Público, you can go for a walk - a public walk, as is the name of the parc - you can admire the animals, you can eat ice-cream or pipoca (pop corn), you can just sit and watch other people, you can take your kids to play, you can go for a boat tour on the little lakes and lagoons. Idylic place especially under the sun. But if you come late at evening or night - don't go. It is the place for hookers and men, where you don't feel welcome or safe really. And when the parc is closed, it is the district around it that becomes a bit dodgy. That is how this city is, probably how most cities are here, changing radically atmosphere between day and night. But it is somehow what cities are, being the place for everyone and all... It is what public space is - doesn't take away the pleasure of enjoying it.

Pipoca seller

Dramatic scenery of Mata atlantica flora on a canvas of high city buildings

On to Praça Santos Andrade, where lies the Teatro Guaira and the first building of the Federal University of Paraná - UFP. The sun is an amazing scene director! The trees, the shadows, the buildings...old ladies sitting on a bench while an old gentleman chap brings them pop corn...people rushing to the bus, heading home with the day's shopping before ir pra balada (going out clubbing)...young couples here and there. Life everywhere under the tree's roof.

The old UFP building on one side...

...the theater on the other...

...busses, parc and people in the middle.

Around Praça Santos Andrade - some superb contrasts

On the way...rua XV de Novembro - the shopping street which was turned pedestrian in the course of one weekend!

Last stop is Praça Osório - I really like that square. A straight path through and green intimate corners on the sides, with benches. Sometimes cosy, sometimes dodgy, everything and everyone under the same green vegetation roof.

Praça Osório and its vegetal roof

And home to Bigorrilho again, with a fantastic sunset, reflecting itself on the high buildings'shiny skin...

That was that amazing day, another one, a new one, one more... How lucky can one be?