Lisbon, Setubal, Process of Elimination

We've been in upper Lisbon for a couple of weeks now. The boys, as I call them, have been awesome hosts. They are quite funny, especially when they want help with some English word they've struggled to pronounce or understand. We end up laughing more than learning. Our Portuguese is coming along very slowly. I find I do better if I translate from Spanish, because the language is closer… like 'Bom dia' is closer to 'buen día' than 'good morning.' Other words are the same in Spanish but mean something entirely different, like sobremesa… in Guatemala it means 'on the table', here it is dessert.

Carnival, the time of gluttony prior to Ash Wednesday, is celebrated in a big way all over Portugal. It's not quite as big as Brazil, but still pretty crazy. We avoided it as much as possible. During the days before Ash Wed, especially on Fat Tues, the children dress up like they do in the States on Halloween. That's pretty cute. But the tradition of every man dressing like a woman is really weird to me… but the woman don't dress like men. No one I asked had an explanation for this tradition.

We went to our new church, Riverside International Christian Church (English speaking) last Sunday. It was awesome. To be singing worship songs together with a band felt so good. English is the common language for most people at this church, but it doesn't mean they're from English-speaking countries. This congregation was from all over the world; from the States to Korea to Denmark. The pastor said he would've gone around the room and asked people where they were from, but it would take too long, so he asked if there were any Portuguese there. Three people raised their hands. We all applauded and welcomed them… it was pretty funny.

We did find another pool. It's actually further from our place, but it's near the red-line metro. We just hop on the metro a couple of blocks from our pad, then we get off at Oriente Metro stop. This stop is worth knowing about because it's a metro and highspeed train station combined and it has a large shopping mall connected to it, plus there's a university there also. It's an intense hub of activity. The hard part was climbing the 100 steps and the five minute walk to the pool with all our gear. We arrived tired but victorious for the 11:00 swim-time. Then Joe realized he'd forgotten his swimsuit. We had 45 minutes to get back to the mall, buy him a swimsuit, back up the 100 steps, and the walk. We made it, barely. This pool actually gives me thirty minutes to shower instead of twenty, which is good because all the ladies in the pool are in the shower room at the exact same time.

It always amazes me when people go right past me on stairs or a steep hill while I'm gasping for air. It just pisses me off when they can do that while smoking or carrying some heavy burden! The other day a guy went straight up a hill with a box bigger than himself—RUNNING! Seriously… the guy was running.

I decided to follow my sister's advice and download one of those step-counting apps to my phone. So far I'm averaging about 5.5 miles a day. I'm sure I'm still gaining weight though.

There are so many cathedrals and ancient churches here in Portugal, we can't see them all. But I was determined to see the cathedral that survived the great quake of 1755. It's nestled up in the Alfama, a neighborhood that wasn't leveled. We also went to the Pantheon and the Saturday street market next to it. That was an experience. One of the few times we watched for pick-pocketers.

We're on a mini excursion from Lisbon right now. On the map, Setubal looked like it might be a pleasant place to live, so I booked us a three-night Airbnb in a tiny-house. It's a cute little place for a couple of nights, but it is not very functional for our needs. You can only run one appliance at a time or the electricity goes out. The shower is itty-bitty and has a long shower curtain, that you basically stand on, instead of a glass door. After listening to Joe complain about the process, I decided I'd rather be dirty. I'll take a shower when we get back to Lisbon. It doesn't have an oven or clothes washer, plus you'd have to hang your stuff out in the street—at street level. Not going to happen. 

Setubal is a very industrial fishing community. We haven't seen the families out and about like we're accustomed to seeing. The shoreline is all large fishing boats. They only have one little beach. It's been a disappointment to me, and I can't help feeling like I wasted our time and money coming here. Joe insists it is part of the process of elimination. I suppose, but I'm still disappointed. So far we've narrowed our search to Carcavelos, Santo Amaro, Sesimbra, and someplace in the Algarve. We now know we want to be near an ocean beach (not a river, lagoon, or bay beach). We want to be around a mixed crowd of young and old. We know we don't want only tourism or only residential.

I downloaded the Fork app, so I just made a reservation for Taberna Grande for 30% off. I've never used the app before, so hopefully it will work out. This restaurant is known for its traditional Portuguese food, but not fish, which is a little unusual because we're in a fishing town. It's nice because I could make the reservation with a couple of clicks. I'll report back after the meal. Yesterday we had Choco Fritas—fish and chips for you Americans. They use cuttlefish and it has a very firm texture. It was good, but I doubt I'll order it again even though it's on every menu.

I'm sitting in front of a local café with a glass of wine filled to the rim for one euro. A pigeon keeps sweet talking my shoes. Three ancient round ladies sit to my right. One is swinging her legs back and forth like a six year old… mainly because her legs are as long as a six year old's.  She was there yesterday too. Joe is drinking a bottle of stout beer for 1.20 Euros and reading my book, Bringing Apollo Home. Life's good.

Avenidas Novas, Getting to Know the Community.

We left Belem... Avenidas Novas is the informal name of the area we are staying in now. It's at the northern edge of the city of Lisbon. It's relatively level, especially compared to the rest of Lisbon. We took an Uber here and thankfully we had a talkative driver. The first thing he said was, "Cascais?" It took me a minute to understand he was assuming we were going to Cascais (a beach town to the west) because that's the address Joe accidently sent him. I told him no, Avenidas Novas up near Alameda Park… the opposite direction. This brought everything to a halt as he took Joe's phone and put in the correct address. Just think—we almost went 30 minutes in the wrong direction! It became a running joke with the driver as he pulled into our new inner-city neighborhood. "How do you like Cascais? Pretty view, yeah?" he asked with a laugh.

We got settled into our new home, which is thankfully on the first floor (2nd floor). I was a little concerned at the tiny room and tiny bathroom, but the bed turned out to be super comfortable and this shower is actually big enough to shave my legs in. It has a nice front-room and dining room with a small but functional kitchen. Our hosts are Antonio and Martinho, and they are neat freaks. This place is immaculate. They are super respectful of our space and have told us at least twenty times that it is our home too. And, good news is that the apartment isn't over a smelly restaurant!

We went out to dinner our first night to the Imperio. This is the first restaurant we ate at when we arrived last year. Nothing has changed. Same waiter and everything. I love their salmon and mashed potatoes all drizzled with a lemon butter. Yesterday was errand-day. We walked for 45 minutes to the MEO store to put some money on our phone cards. 5G for thirty days for $18 each. Next we went in search for the pool recommended by our last pool. It's at the very top of one of the steepest streets in Lisbon. It zigzagged like Lombard Street in San Francisco. The corners were so steep that they had steps on the side walk so we didn't have to crawl up on our hands and knees. By the time we got to the community pool, we were hot and tired. Then we went inside… it felt like a sauna. Let me tell you something about Portuguese community pools; they want a lot of information, like your passport. I don't understand why they need that, but anyway I had to go outside to breathe. I'm thinking we may be taking this month off from swimming.

Our next task was to find our church; Riverside International Church. We entered through the Lisbon Project. This church's main focus is immigrants. They have tons of services for them and lots of home church-group studies. They also are known for feeding everyone who comes on certain nights and before church services. We met a gal from California who works there. It was fun to chat with her… she was a bundle of energy.

We went shopping and I made us a couple of salads with chicken from the shop. Scrawny chicken. That's been hard for me to get used to… the chickens are little and not very flavorful. Today we went to the big round market and bought potatoes and a big steak cut to order. Joe said the market reminds him of Hunger Games when they were on the spinning lake. We could not figure out which side we'd come in on! Anyway, I can't wait to cook it tonight. The guys are going somewhere for Antonio's birthday, so we have the kitchen to ourselves.

We scheduled Joe for a haircut today in an hour. Antonio walked us down to his barber and booked the appointment. Antonio took today off work for of his birthday, so he's busy cleaning and doing laundry. 

We came here to Alameda park so I could write. I love sitting at this kiosk next to the grassy area. It's always a hub of activity. In the morning all the picnic tables are taken by the old guys playing cards or dominos. The old ladies are with me at the kiosk ;) I just had a lady step up to me and say she was hungry. Usually when I offer to buy them food, they say no and wander off. This lady said yes, so she and I went up to the counter and she got coffee with milk and a veggie pastry. She thanked me over and over again. Now she's at the table next to us, quietly eating. It's apparently lunch break for work now. The tables are filling with workers. Later today this whole area will be packed with kids and dogs.

Speaking of dogs; Yesterday a small dog was running around enjoying itself when an older man arrived at the park with a very big dog. It wasn't on a leash. The dogs approached each other and suddenly got into a fight, which of course the small dog was losing. All hell broke loose as the two owners tried to stop the fight. People jumped up and went to their sides when the owner of the small dog managed to get his little guy up into his arms. The cool thing was that the big dog owner pulled out his phone and got the other guy's information while at least ten people stood around watching while a lady inspected the little dog for injuries. I'm not sure why, but this all touched me deeply. I'm actually choked-up just writing it. Maybe the intensity of community? Not sure.

We made the mistake of discovering a croissant shop called O Melhor Croissant da Minha Rua (The Best Croissant on My Street). That's not true—it's the best croissant shop in the world. Unbelievable flaky texture and flavor. I had one with cream cheese and salmon with arugula… wow. Unfortunately, I felt pretty crummy afterwards because I don't normally eat any grains. We actually avoid that street because it smells so good.

On a final note, I signed up for something called Internations on the recommendation of a lady from the last church we were going to. This is a worldwide organization that is designed to get people of like interests together in whatever city they happen to be in. I've already connected with a guy from Sacramento who lives here. We're going to meet him for a coffee or beer. Thursday night we're going to a meet-and-greet event down in the city center at a bar, so we may meet him there. The site is organized according to language and country of origin.

In case you haven't noticed, I'm going to start including photos of all the pets here. I don't think I'll do a whole blog on them. However, there was one pet of stronger interest… a cat. In Belem a guy came to the park with his young cat. Joe and I were spellbound by this cat. It would arch it's back and hop sideways around its owner with stiff legs and then leap at him. The guy would wrestle with it and then it would bound off again. It wandered pretty far from the guy, but would race back when it felt threatened… too cute.

Cascais, Caparica, Coaches, and Quakes

It's been a busy week. We were in Cascais and decided to head back down to the waterfront. There was certainly nothing to do anywhere around our Airbnb. We arrived to a big ceremony at the main square. A bunch of police cars were lined up with these gorgeous policemen (I think it's a job requirement in Portugal for police officers to be extremely good looking). 

A group of well dressed people, and a large group of military and policemen in splendid uniforms, stood around a distinguished looking man in a suit wearing a red tie. He must be the president of Portugal! Nope. He was the mayor. I snuck through the crowd to get a look at what was going to be presented. It looked like awards of some sort. I got a picture and zoomed it only to find it was car keys to the five new cop cars. Pomp and Circumstance.

Cascais loves their pets. I'll have to do a blog just on all the pets here. It's a parade of dogs down along the beach promenade. We enjoyed sitting at one of the many cafes to watch. 

You remember me telling you how the Portuguese follow the rules and are polite? We stopped at a public bathroom down by the beach. Usually you have to pay to use those bathrooms. This one had the employee table in front, but no employee. I noticed that people went up to the table and laid down the fee on the table! There was a little pile of coins sitting there… can you imagine? I felt very patriotic as I put our coins in the pile.

Joe would've taken pictures too, but for some reason his phone locked him out and wanted his sim card PIN, which was back in Belem. He wasn't happy. When we got back, I sent the PIN to our text and to our emails, so now we have the numbers available from multiple places.

So, we came back from Cascais last weekend. This time I got pinched in the train doors. Naturally Joe was on the inside watching as I battled to get my backpack though the doors. I couldn't reach the button to open the door at first, but I finally got it to open. I staggered in and glared at Joe, who was cracking up. We got back to Belem to find a protest in the park next to our Airbnb. The park was absolutely packed. From what I could translate, the signs implied some sort of educator's protest. The thing that caught my attention was no one was on the grass. They all stayed on the many pathways and the center part where the fountain is. So polite.

Sunday we went to church again—St. Andrews Church of Scotland. We already fit in there. The people are so nice, but there's only about 25-30 of us. During the service I noticed Pastor Norman suddenly had his hand to his throat. I watched carefully. I realized he was fiddling with his white collar… you know, that white thing that goes around their necks where a tie would be. I could see skin. Afterwards, when we came out, he was trying to fix it in the foyer. Apparently the top button had popped off during the sermon! We all trooped down the yard steps to the garden and rec room for our snacks.

A boy came directly up to us and said, "Hi, I'm Steven from Lebanon." A girl skipped up to his side and said, "I'm Favor. I'm from Peru." Then they dashed off to play with the newest toy—a stand-up punching bag. Steven's older sister ended up being chased around by Steven as he whacked her with the detached punching bag. Favor had on the punching gloves so she followed to try and rescue the sister. A man standing near me said, "They come from a country in a civil-war. Maybe they're just acting it out." The Peruvian grandmother sat against the wall in her traditional outfit and watched. I went to her side (with my cup of box wine). It seemed safer.

Back in Belem we got off the tram by our place to see the park was full of families. One of the things I love the most about Portuguese is their family values. Here it was; cold, windy, and getting dark and the playground was packed. The little ones were all bundled up like the little boy on A Christmas Story.

We decided we must go to one of the million museums in Belem/Lisbon. I narrowed it down to the Coches Museum. This place has a huge collection of horse-drawn carriages. It was interesting to see the progression of style over time. I was most interested in the wall of paintings of every king dating back to 1143. There was a description of each epoch written in snarky humor… I loved it!

I've started another novel, which is why I haven't written my blog as much. This novel starts in the mid 1700's and ends up in Portugal, of course. I needed to have a catalytic event, so I chose the Great Earthquake of 1755. As I was researching this quake, I stumbled across the Quake Museum. It's only a five minute walk from our place. We went last night and, wow! It's a completely interactive museum and the room where you sit in the church pews (the quake took place at nine in the morning on November first—All Saints Day) is set up for the 9.0 shake. It starts with the calm Catholic service and then suddenly all hell breaks loose. The pews we were in shook hard! The walls came tumbling down around us (a video playing on the walls). Talk about an adrenaline rush. The cool thing was they had these stations throughout the museum where you could hold your electronic bracelet to have more information sent to your email address to peruse later in more detail whatever it was that interested you. (That was a long sentence.)

We took the ferry over to Costa da Caparica again. This time it was sunny. I'd been doing a lot of basic searches for condos to rent for long-term. This area is inexpensive and has beaches stretching as far as the eye can see. It's definitely pretty. We loved the surfer-vibe, but… I don't know… it just didn't seem like enough of the culture we're wanting to be part of. We still like Carcavelos.

We head up to Lisbon's Alameda Park area on Monday for our last month here. During that time we'll head over to another beach town called Setubal for a weekend. I'm going to miss our pool. I'd just started to be a familiar face to the ladies in the locker room. Hopefully we'll be able to find another pool by our next place. It'll be strange to be staying with a couple in their house. I don't know if it'll be good or bad. Shrug.

Cascais, Almada, and Being Polite.

I'm kind of at a loss as to where to start with this post. A lot of stuff is accumulating on my list of things to tell you about! Right now, the thing foremost in my mind is the transition from Belem to Cascais for three days. Cascais is known for it's beauty and its large expat community of English speaking people. 

I rented this place for the view (both sunrise and sunset) and its low price, but that low price comes with certain expectations… like a bed that you can feel the springs in the mattress, the microwave that doesn't work unless you slam the door and maybe it'll work, and dirty silverware. Oh well, we can get around those inconveniences. The bed was actually comfortable once I figured out where to lay. I'm stunned at how noisy this apartment is. It's on the 7th floor and the traffic and landscapers sound like they're right outside the window. I'm excited to have made a discovery—we aren't cut out for high-rise apartment living.

We came over yesterday in the afternoon and sat at the waterfront. A nice waiter came all the way out to us on our bench and brought us wine and beer (Largo da Praia da Rainha). We Ubered up to our high-rise and tried to remember all the recommendations our driver gave us… no success there. He did ask us if we were from California though. He could tell by our accent.

Last night we wandered down to the waterfront area again and found a happening restaurant in an alley… meaning it was actually outside in the alley. It was fun and our waiter was hilarious. Joe made fun of me because the waiter offered to give me a taste of the wine before he poured it. Joe said he'd like a taste of the beer, which is in a bottle. So the waiter had some fun with Joe. He made a show of opening the beer bottle and holding it across his forearm like wine. He poured a little in the glass, so Joe did his best impression of me and sniffed it then took a sip. They discussed the year… a 2023 Super Bock Stout. They had so much fun at my expense!

Today we went down to the marina. Wow, that's a whole lotta money. The yachts, the shops, the restaurants… we kept walking to a humbler part of town. The fish and chips at O'Neill's Irish Pub was great. We stopped at the grocery store on our way back and bought rotisserie chicken and potatoes. It wasn't until we got home that I remembered our microwave doesn't work. After slamming its prehistoric door several times, I got it running so I could cook the potatoes.

Now let's go back in time a bit. A couple of days ago we took a ferry across the river to Almada. I could see from the internet pictures that it had a pretty pedestrian street with lots of restaurants. This must be their off-season, because we were the only tourists in town. But, one must always be prepared for the unexpected. I walked past an open door. A glance showed it to be dark and musty. I saw a newspaper article on the wall outside. This was the home of the Guinness Book of World Records largest mural made out of coins… come on… how could I possibly pass that up?

I back-tracked and an elderly man, Eduardo Henrique, ushered me in. He proudly showed me the mural made up of 67,567 coins of various values, metals, and sizes. It's called "Europa." But even better was the wall-to-wall, ceiling-to-floor murals and sculptures made from coins and other artifacts. Eduardo proudly escorted me down into the bowels of the shop (more a museum, really), turning on lights as we went. Room after room of antiques like old compasses dating back to some bygone era. One mural was of an ancient ship at sea. He said it represented the first Portuguese voyage to discover the ocean's limits. He explained that Portugal was the oldest country in the world and they discovered the sea. Not actually true. Japan is 15 million years old. But Portugal is very old (Oct 5th, 1143) and Lisbon is the oldest city in Europe (settled in 1200 BC) and one of the oldest cities in the world. The region of Portugal was settled by the Celts in the first millennium BC. The oldest mummy in the world was found here.

We decided to head back to Lisbon. Being fearful of missing our ferry, we hustled to the waiting area. Suddenly Joe asked for his ferry card and then he sped away to the turnstiles. He scanned his card and broke into a run. I trotted after him. I couldn't get my card to scan, so the guard helped me. I tried to catch up with joe, but he's fast. He disappeared around a corner through the giant closing gate. I ran and made it through without being crushed. Then Joe turned to make sure I followed him… this was a subject of conversation for the rest of the day and has come up every day since :)

Once back in Lisbon, we went to Time Out—that enormous market with half devoted to fresh fish and produce, and the other half a food court. It's fun, but a madhouse and expensive. Being the frugal pair we are, we went outside to a kiosk and got a glass of wine and beer at half the price and none of the crowds. We prefer being around the Portuguese instead of the tourists anyway.

Portuguese have a lot of things that are, in general, unique. One of the unspoken national mottos is; Mind your manners—be polite. It's probably why it's one of the safest countries in the world. It's truly cultural. Boarding buses and trams, they always give way to elderly or infirm. Another thing is their habit of following the rules. In Belem, the drivers all stop for pedestrians anywhere near the crosswalks. Even the big trams stop if someone steps to the crosswalk. People always scan their tram passes, always. We watch because it's a super easy system to cheat. I've never seen an employee watching. The buses are a little different, because we all shuffle past the driver and the scanner is right next to him.

Usually the buses are fairly smooth, but the other day, on the way to the pool, the driver was a maniac. First let me tell you that the ride up to Restelo (where the pool is) is full of the geriatric crowd. This driver would take off as fast as he could and slam on his brakes. Everyone was hanging on for dear life. Watching them try to get to the door before the bus stopped without being knocked down was traumatic for me… but no one complained. Maybe they were too busy trying to survive.