Lapa

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Lapa is a borough of the city of São Paulo, Brazil. Like Mooca, its past is industrial and many proletarian families lived there. In the north area of Lapa, which comprises the neighbourhoods of Barra Funda, Água Branca and the "Low Lapa" (Lapa de baixo) most of people are descendants of proletarian families who worked in the past in the two main railways of the city: the São Paulo Railway and the Sorocabana. Nowadays, both of these railways station became local urban train stations.

The southern area of this borough, which includes the "High Lapa" (Alto da Lapa) and the neighbourhoods of Perdizes, Sumaré and Pompéia, is a high-class area and has many historic buildings, and has many descendant of the english engineers who build the railways.

In the borough of Lapa is placed the headquarters of the Pontifical Catholic University of São Paulo, the opera house Theatro São Pedro and the "Memorial da América Latina" (The Latin America Memorial), a famous latin culture complex with impressive buildings projected by Oscar Niemeyer.