Praça da República

At the southeaster edge of downtown Belém is the Praça da República, home to the Teatro da Paz and a nice urban green space. On Sunday, the praça hosts the Feira Artesanato where you can find a lot of crap for sale but also some decent regional handicrafts and Christmas presents for certain family members. I like to go and stroll around after brunch. Here are some photos I took today:

Craft/crap stalls lining the "tunel das mangueiras." If you happened to receive a very sketchy looking postcard of Belém at night, this is the area in the daytime.

Street performance with an empowered woman whose theme was "use a condom." And there were *children* in the audience! You can bet that it wasn't financed by USAID as the Republican right goes into conniption fits at the mere thought of a pragmatic HIV/AIDS foreign policy. I donated R$1 when the hat was passed. The Teatro da Paz is visible in the background.

You can even get a tatoo. Mine says "I lived in Belém for four months and all I got was this lousy tatoo." The one I got last week says "mother."