Travel report
FUNDAÇÃO GETULIO VARGAS (EAESP-FGV)
São Paulo
Spring 2015
K90634
K88237
1. Preparing for exchange
Visa and registration for classes
Once you have applied to study at FGV-EAESP (FGV) and received your acceptance
from Aalto, you will have to wait for the official acceptance from FGV for a while. It
will take its time but don’t worry, it will come eventually and as it was in my case, it
came along with a map of São Paulo and a nice brochure of urban arts in the city—
which the city is full of!
After receiving the confirmation letter from the host university you will need to apply
for a visa. With a Finnish passport you are allowed to stay in Brazil for 90 days
without a visa, but you need one in order to study there. There is no way around this.
The visa process is quite simple and fast. They say that it usually takes around 2
weeks, but I got mine in less than one as the embassy hurried their processes before
Christmas holidays.
For the visa you need:
·
Passport, valid for at least 6 months.
·
One recent passport-sized photograph, front view, white background.
·
Extract from the Criminal Records.
·
Original letter from the Brazilian educational institution confirming acceptance
or a place and duration of course.
·
Letter from the Finnish educational institution stating that the applicant is
registered there as a student and that the exchange will be part of the applicants
degree in Finland.
·
Proof of financial means of support during the stay in Brazil.
·
Round trip air ticket reservation with passenger’s name. Itinerary must show
dates and cities of entry and departure in Brazil.
All of the information concerning the visa can be found from the website of the
Brazilian embassy at http://helsinque.itamaraty.gov.br/en-us/_r_student_visa.xml and
you can visit the embassy that is located in Kaivopuisto (Itäinen Puistotie 4 B 1).
When receiving the visa, you will also get a form that you will need to register at a
Federal Police Office after arriving to Brazil. Remember to check all the information
in this form carefully to avoid any problems when arriving to Brazil. The
International Relations Office at FGV will help you with the registration at the
Federal Police.
The International Relations Office at FGV will start sending you information via
email after you have been officially accepted. Their emails will cover topics such as
acceptance letter and student visa, application procedures, registration for courses,
courses information, Portuguese proficiency test, Portuguese language course, health
insurance, internships, and the welcoming week. You will need to send the university
a copy of your visa and your health insurance, but no further documents are needed
until you arrive the country.
Registration for courses at FGV happens during a two-day period on a first come first
serve basis so it is good to go through the available courses well ahead to know which
courses to register for. If in doubt, it is ok to register to a few courses too many as the
first week of each module is the add and drop week. Generally exchange students will
choose courses from the MPGI Program, which is a Master’s in Managements and is
taught in English. You can also apply separately for courses in the MPGPP Program,
which is a professional master’s program focused on public affairs. Registration to the
MPGI courses happens through a website and to the MPGPP courses through an
application. The application for MPGPP courses consists of a motivation letter, CV
and your transcript of records. The MPGPP courses are mainly in Portuguese, but
they offer a few interesting choices in English as well. To register to courses in
Portuguese, you must do a Portuguese proficiency test in the beginning of the
semester at FGV.
Practicing your Portuguese
In order to practice and learn more Portuguese before your exchange, I strongly
recommend taking Portuguese lessons. I myself knew Spanish beforehand but as the
languages and especially the pronunciation is so different, Portuguese classes in
Finland helped me a great deal. The Brazilian embassy in Kaivopuisto is offering
classes in Brazilian Portuguese with cheap prices. The teachers are Brazilians
themselves and it is a great opportunity to get to know a little bit about the country
and the culture as well. To know more about the courses and their schedules visit
http://helsinque.itamaraty.gov.br/en-us/portuguese_language_courses.xml and
https://www.facebook.com/ccbfhelsinki.
FGV also offers a Portuguese language class that is twice a week and lasts half a
semester. The course costs R$425 (around 130€). Personally I didn’t take the course,
but I heard that the education was quite good at least in the advanced groups and it is
a good way to get to know the other exchange students better. If you wish to take
private Portuguese lessons, you can find teachers from for example craigslist.
Arriving to Brazil
After arriving to Brazil you will have 30 days to legalize your student visa. If you fail
to do so in time, you will be charged a penalty. To legalize your visa, you must
register at the Federal Police of São Paulo within 30 days from the day of your arrival.
Some exchange students were able to register their visas in another state and some
tried but couldn’t. According to the general policies it should be done in São Paulo,
but in Brazil there is something called “jeitinho Brasileiro,” meaning letting a small
things pass and with good Portuguese and a nice police officer you might just be able
to do this, but I wouldn’t count on it.
The easiest way to deal with the registration is to contact the international relations
office of FGV and let them help you. They will do this with everyone during the
welcome week, but if you arrive to São Paulo prior to that, I recommend you go visit
them beforehand to sort everything out before the rush of all other exchange students.
You can also do the registration totally by yourself and the international office will
send you information on how to do this via email.
After you have registered your visa at the Federal Police you will get a slip of paper
with an official ID number called RNE. You need to take a copy of this slip back to
the international relations office. With the RNE slip, you can also go and register
yourself and get a national ID number called CPF, which will become very useful
during your stay and will be required in many occasions, such as getting a Brazilian
SIM card, a bank account, booking bus rides and flights, and basically everything that
is official. With the CPF you can also get discounts at stores and gain tax reductions
based on your purchases.
Another useful thing to get is the student travel card. With the travel card you can get
discount on public transportation inside the city. The only problem is that it requires
yet a bit more paperwork to get the card and it takes few months to arrive. The
international relations office will help you with this as well, but due to the long
process and the size of the discount, only a few exchange students ended up getting
the card. You can also buy a regular travel card from any metro station, which will
give you discounted fees if combining different transports and/or using busses and it
will release you from the need of carrying cash with you.
The spring semester at FGV starts in the beginning of February. There is a mandatory
welcoming week during the first week (only a few days, not the whole week) and the
courses begin in the second week. During the welcoming week you will be assisted
with your visa registration if you have not done it yet, given information about the
school, school clubs, sports teams, courses, the city, etc. On top of the formal stuff
they organize a party and a city tour.
Each exchange student at FGV receives an “exchange buddy.” This person is there to
help you with any problems that you may encounter, to hang out, or whatever else.
Your exchange buddy might be of good help when you first arrive to the city and are
looking for apartments etc. with your rusty Portuguese, but because the buddies are
usually 1st/2nd year students, you rarely end up hanging out with them that much if
you’re in master’s exchange. My buddy was cool though and we ended up having a
beer every now and then.
Accommodation
Getting accommodation isn’t too big of a problem in São Paulo if you speak
Portuguese, but with poor language skills it can be a bit more demanding to find a
place. As it’s a big city, the rents are higher than what you might be used to and
usually students rent rooms rather than apartments. The rents for a room go from
R$1000 to R$2000 and over (330€ - 700€). The rents are usually on a month-tomonth basis. The host university doesn’t help you too much with finding a place to
live. They provide you a few links and some announcements directed especially to
exchange students at FGV, but I found the living arrangements in their
announcements either poor or expensive.
Some students get their places well in advance, but personally I wanted to see where I
am moving to, so I went to a hostel first and then started to look for a place when in
the city. When you go apartment hunting, you will most likely be offered a lot of
downright terrible and dirty places. You should not settle for these but keep on
searching, as there are good apartments available as well.
The city of São Paulo is enormous and it makes a great difference where you live.
Different areas have different amount of services available and even though you
would find a place from a great area, it might be that it will take ages for you to get to
the university from there. I suggest living somewhere near a metro station so that you
get fast and easy access to wherever you want to go, because otherwise you will
spend all of your time on transport. My recommendations are neighbourhoods of Bela
Vista and Jardims (near FGV) and Vila Madalena and Pinheiros.
To find accommodation look through the following sites:
www.airbnb.com
www.easyquarto.com.br
sampaflatshare.blogspot.com
Facebook groups: https://www.facebook.com/groups/sosrepublica/
https://www.facebook.com/groups/dividirAPsp/
https://www.facebook.com/groups/400311046770107/
and https://www.facebook.com/groups/aluguelapartamentosp/
There are also announcements on bulletin boards in the university.
2. Exchange studies
The spring 2015 semester was divided on two academic modules. For the both
modules the planned amount of studies were 24 ETCS (four courses) which means
that the student would take two courses for each module. Other arrangements are also
acceptable; for instance some students took all of the 4 courses for the first module
and travelled the rest of the spring.
The registration for the courses is made online in advance for the both modules. The
courses are chosen online couple of weeks before the first module, about in the midJanuary. The students will have an opportunity to change the course during the first
week of lectures, so the school is rather flexible about the changes in the courses if
wanted.
In general, FGV is an urban city business school well located in Sao Paulo. The
neighbourhood where the school is located is rather safe, close to Avenida de Paulista
what is the main business street of the city. The facilities in the school are relatively
new but the school is rather small; the classrooms are divided to various floors and
there is no accommodation for the students, nor other facilities for example for sports.
Still, FGV has a library and good group working areas where it is possible to
concentrate on the studies, as well as some cafeterias and lounges to have coffee and
lunch.
The quality of the teaching and the courses varied during the modules. Some courses
were very well structured and interesting, while in others you understood after the
course that you did not have much in your hand, i.e. you did not learn much. Most of
the courses are taught in Portuguese but there are plenty of courses also in English,
which are full of exchange students. I would recommend taking courses in Portuguese
if possible, and entering to the world where the Brazilian business students actually
are.
MPGPP-13594 Infrastructure Challenges in Brazil, Graduate level, 6 ETCS
Professor: Gesner Oliveira
Grading: Class participation 30%, Course paper 30%, Exam 40%
Language: English/Portuguese
The course is part of the master’s program in public management and exchange
students need to send a separate application to be accepted to the course. I was
interested in the course because I wanted to know more about doing business in Brazil
and infrastructure challenges being the biggest issue detaining further foreign direct
investments to the country, this course hits the spot. This is also what I wrote to my
motivation letter, in case you wonder what you should write in order to get into this
course.
The course goes through the history, current state, the future, and the challenges of
infrastructure in Brazil, and how it affects the country’s economics as a whole. The
lectures are divided by different areas of infrastructure i.e. airports, ports, railways,
telecommunication, etc. The professor invites guest speakers to almost every single
lecture, which is good, as you’ll learn from the local professionals.
The course is supposed to be in English, but as most of the students in the class were
locals the professor decided to switch the language to Portuguese. I had a hunch that
this was his original plan because all of his and the guest speakers material were in
Portuguese. I was able to do my course work and exam in English.
11963-30 Corporate Social Responsibility, Graduate level, 6 ETCS
Professor: Mário Aquino Alves
Grading: Class participation 20%, Presentation and report 30%, Final essay 50%
Language: English
The course goes through the development on corporate social responsibility, the
different forms of it and where it is heading. As CSR is a lot about moral and ethics,
the course is very conversational and different issues and problems are discussed
together during the lectures. Before each lecture there are a few mandatory readings
about the lecture topic, one presentation to the class, and a final paper. The course
doesn’t require much work and due to the conversational method of teaching together
with the multicultural environment, I found the course fun and interesting.
11956-30 Bric and the international economy, Graduate level , 6ETCS
Professor: Antonio Carlos Manfredini da C. Oliveira
Grading: 25% Group presentation, 35% Term essay , 40% Final exam
Language: English
The point of this course was to dig deeper into the economic dynamics in emerging
BRIC countries. This course was full of exchange students and taught fully in
English.
The classes were not obligatory to attend, although they were interesting. Each BRIC
country was analysed individually and went through in separate classes, and these
classes gave a lot of general knowledge about their history and the current situation.
In general, the course taught pretty much but also was slightly more demanding than
the other courses. The professor was serious about the subjects of the course but was
also very professional and knew what he was doing. Especially the grading of the
final exam was relatively rough and the grades created some complaining from the
students. Thus be careful if the good grades are important. On the other hand the
course taught plenty of things especially about Brazil, and fills a hole in general
knowledge about the BRICS.
11956-30 O desafio de empreender , Graduate level , 6ETCS
Professor: Marcio Sanches
Grading: 40% Creating a business plan and presentations, 20% Exercices, 40% Final
exam
Language: Portuguese
This was one of the two courses, which were offered in Portuguese for the MPGI
program during the spring semester. The class attendance was fully participative; no
points were given about attendance or activity during the classes.
The course was based around the entrepreneurship and what should be kept in mind
when starting new businesses. While the lectures were kept in Portuguese (as well as
the slides of the lectures) the reading material for the lectures were in English. In
addition, the two presentations about the business plan were held in Portuguese but
the exam and the exercises could be answered either in English or in Portuguese. The
business plan could be written in Portuguese or in English as well.
The professor was very kind and relaxed person. He knew that plenty of the people in
the class were not perfect in Portuguese, so he gave all his effort to articulate as clear
as possible during the lectures that everybody can understand what he says. And he
definitely succeeded. If all the Brazilian people would talk Portuguese like he talked,
everything would be so much clearer and easier.
At the core of this course was the idea to create a business plan in Brazil in groups
and present it as a final presentation at the end of the course. The company and the
idea were also briefly presented at the middle of the course.
One rather simple exam and written reviews were not demanding, and this course was
very friendly to these people who have the somehow strong basis of Portuguese but
still are not yet fluent and want to practice it more. I personally recommend taking
this course for the people who want to study in Portuguese and are interested about
entrepreneurship; the course was interesting, practical and clear.
3. Living and traveling in Brazil
Brazil is very a large and diverse country. For the people who wants to travel a lot and
see what a multiculturalism is, Brazil is perfect place to do that; the vast amount of
options forces to choose from the cities and places which are very beautiful. On the
other hand, the distances between the places are long and thus some time and money
for the traveling is needed.
The smartest ways to travel inside the country are with a bus or by a plane. In
addition, renting a car is not a bad idea, however for the longer distances the plane is
the easiest and most comfortable way to go but on the other hand, it is also the most
expensive one.
Your traveling budget pretty much defines how many places you can see. The time is
not the problem, there is plenty of time to do this; there is couple of breaks from the
school during the spring semester and in addition there is a lot of opportunities to
travel during the courses. Thus there are chances to travel that the exchange studies do
not suffer. Of course the timetables of the courses and your own scheduling define
how much you can spend time on traveling. In the next paragraphs some of the places
seen are briefly introduced.
Rio de Janeiro
Perhaps the most beautiful large city in Brazil. Some people even think that the most
beautiful city in the world. This place is well known about the open people,
overwhelming infrastructure, nice beaches, food and of course, from the carnival.
The various tourist attractions make Rio the most travelled place in Brazil. Just to see
these attractions the time goes fast. For example the well-known statue of Christo, the
Sugarloaf Mountain, Copacabana and Ipanema beaches as well as football make the
city fun for every traveller. Also the favela parties, the experience sports like hanggliding and the nightlife especially in the part of city called Lapa make hard to
criticize Rio.
Compared for example to Sao Paulo, Rio is quite different. While Sao Paulo is
located in inner country being the “business machine” of Brazil with its concrete and
urban infrastructure, Rio is perhaps more leisure city closer to the nature to enjoy the
more relaxed but still lively life. Still both cities have their totally own advantages.
From Sao Paulo to Rio the overnight bus takes about 7 hours and costs about 20
euros. With a plane the prices vary: depending on the date the prices are between 40100 euros back and forth.
Salvador
The earlier capital of Brazil is located in the state of Bahia, about 2,5 hours flying
from Sao Paulo. It is well known about their Portuguese colonial architecture and
happy African culture and is worthwhile visiting. However Salvador is quite
dangerous compared to other places in Brazil, so higher caution is preferred.
From Salvador it is easy to travel to the rest of Bahia. The beach towns like Morro de
Sao Paulo and Itacare as well as the fantastic natural park Chiapada Diamantina make
the whole state unbelievably beautiful. The weather is mostly warm or hot, which
attracts travellers from the whole Brazil.
If the exchange period is on spring semester, a worthwhile considering though is to go
to Salvador for the carnival. The 3,5 million city goes literally crazy to party for their
holidays for more than a week for the largest carnival in the world. The three main
carnival zones give you opportunities how to spend your party of your life. Compared
for instance to Rio, the carnival in Salvador is more authentic, less touristic and
perhaps bit less packed.
Iguazu Falls
One of the Seven Wonders of the World is located in the border of Brazil and
Argentina offers the breath-taking experience to feel the huge waterfalls. The
waterfalls can be seen either from the Brazilian side or from the Argentinian side.
Both sides are worthwhile for experiencing. From the Brazilian side the general
landscape is perhaps bit better by seeing also more the Parana River where the falls
drop. On the other hand, the Argentinian side offers much more different waterfalls
and it is possible to feel the actual water flow more closely.
To enter the Brazilian side, the journey is pretty simple by first going to the park,
where a bus brings the visitors to the falls. To enter to Argentinian side the journey is
bit more complicated. You have to pass the border with either a bus or with a taxi. On
the border you have get a stamp to your passport when you enter to Argentina as well
as you leave the Argentinian side. However for the Finnish people, a visa is not
needed. When crossing the border with a bus you have to know when to leave the bus
in the right stop to get the stamp and continue with the next bus towards the park
where the falls are. There are also plenty of taxis which offers you “a full service”
which means that they pick you from the Brazilian side, pays your entering the border
and get the stamps, drive you to the park and pick you back to Brazil when you want.
Compared to the efforts when you don´t have to do anything, using this taxi the price
is reasonable: for one person it costs about 30 euros. Remember also to acquire
American dollars for the Argentinian side to pay the fee to the park.
From Sao Paulo the easiest way to travel to Iguazu falls is to fly about 1,5 to town Foz
do Iguazu. From the town it is possible to travel both sides of the fall. The bus from
Sao Paulo is much more cheaper but takes about 17 hours so the journey is rather
long.
General living
While Brazil is so diverse country in every way, it is challenging to give any universal
guidelines how to behave, where to go etc. From north to south and from east to west
the landscapes, cities and especially the people are very different, but in an extremely
positive way. I have hardly never been in a country where different people are
tolerated so well and treated so kindly as in Brazil.
Brazil is known for the samba and outdoor bars and restaurants, which offer you
delicious food and drinks with a reasonable price. Brazilians like live music and this
is one of the best things to experience when traveling the country. The music styles
vary depending where you travel from funk and samba to rap, rock and axe. Also
various other music is offered and the amount of gigs where to enter is huge.
When we discuss about Brazil, it is almost impossible not speak about safety issues
which have also been under the global discussion. It is true that the country is still
quite in equal and especially in large cities the crime and violence has been a serious
issue for the government. In addition, the latest corruption charges in the national oil
company Petrobras have created anxiety among the Brazilian citizens.
However, I personally would not restrict the visiting or traveling possibilities in Brazil
based on the safety concerns. Still most parts of the Brazil are safe places to live or
visit for any people. In large cities like in Sao Paulo, Rio and in Salvador most of the
places where to visit are safe and the people are nice. Also the rest of the country is
even safer. Foreign people, especially the Europeans are respected people and the
local citizens are very curious to know about your culture and the way you live.
Simply the easiest way to get out of troubles is to stay away from low income and
dangerous parts of cities, e.g. the favelas. It is easy to skip these places and you don´t
arrive there by accident. Also, during the night time, prefer to move in groups,
especially if you are a girl. Using a taxi as well as buses and metros are also a safe
way to travel; especially taxis are safe and in general operating honestly with a meter.
Finally, based on the heard stories the most of the troubles were based on the
situations where the people were alone and inebriated during the night in a place,
which was unknown. This is the most common way to get into the trouble and also is
dependent of people’s own judgement how they behave. Of course there are other
situations where some bad can happen but this is the most common initial setting for
something to happen. Thus the main point is to be aware and understand that the
possibility to get into troubles exist but do not let that to restrict too much the
behaviour where to go or to whom to speak. If you are too cautious, you will not only
limit your personal positive experiences about the country but it can expose you even
more to troubles during your journey. Remember to relax and concentrate on the
receptive people, the beautiful places and the various cultures what the country can
offer. That´s Brazil.
4. Final comments
Would you recommend the host university to other students?
I most definitely recommend FGV to other students of Aalto. The level of the courses
might not be quite as high as back home and the way of studying is not as interactive
as what I was used to in Aalto, but the experience was undeniably worthwhile. FGV is
the leading business school in the country—and perhaps in whole of South
America—which can be seen from the professionalism of its professors. Still I would
not attend FGV if studies themselves were your number one motivation for going on
an exchange. The large size of their exchange program and the fact that it is a CEMS
school brings along an international atmosphere and excellent networking
opportunities. FGV also offers a great variety of free sports and I strongly recommend
joining a team.
On top of FGV being a strong brand and a good university, the city of São Paulo is
something to experience. Like New York in North America, São Paulo is the mecca
of urban culture in South America. With the abundance of restaurants, bars and art
galleries, it is impossible to be bored in São Paulo, unless you stay at home.
Is there anything you would do differently if you were going to the same university
for another exchange?
I might consider again taking the Portuguese language class, as many of the exchange
students got to know each other well already at that course. I would also bring along
my basketball shoes and join the basketball team (basketball shoes cost a lot in
Brazil!). Other than that, I wouldn’t change a thing.
What did you learn during your exchange?
I learned that the Brazilian people are the nicest and warmest people on the planet.
Everyone wishes that you will have the best time in their country and they will do
anything to help you. I learned a lot about the challenges in the country and how it
operates. I learned about the history of Brazil and its people. I also learned a lot about
other countries and cultures from the other exchange students. I learned Portuguese
and I learned tons of phrases in other languages. I learned jujitsu. I learned how to
surf. I learned how to make a perfect caipirinha and I learned there’s always time for
another one.
What did you learn about yourself during the exchange?
I learned that I am exotic and interesting in the eyes of millions. I learned that my
humor is appreciated also in a totally different culture. I learned that I am very
privileged to be born in a place where I get quality education for free and where
everyone is taken care of by the state and no one is left alone.