Lisbon

I must preface this blog post by saying that it might not be a fair personal evaluation of Lisbon. My time here was spent in the shadow of my nostalgia for Porto which took hold immediately.

March 1, 2013:

I got off the train and made my way via metro to my hostel, The Independente Hostel & Suites. My impression from the exterior of the building and the lobby was that it was a grand hotel. It was right across the street from a look-out over the city with amazing views. When I checked in, I was led around by a staff member who did not speak any English to my room. After the first  5 minutes, I realized that he also didn't know the layout of the hostel. After 10 minutes, I began to wonder if my room number even existed. Finally, he led me into an unnumbered room. The bunk beds were three stories tall and all of the other beds were filled. There was stuff everywhere. My roommates had really made themselves feel at home.

The lobby was not exactly conducive to meeting people and I didn't realize that there was a common room or a kitchen, so I went out and walked down to the harbour. I sat by the ocean for a few minutes, watching the sun go down.

On my return to the hostel, there was one girl in the room, so I asked her all the usual questions and learned that all of my roommates were ERASMUS or Exchange students from various places (British Columbia, Australia and Poland) and that they had been two groups of friends that met in Barcelona and decided to continue travelling together. Perhaps without meaning to be, she seemed hostile. I was the intruder in the room that was not friends with any of them and I was going to ruin their party. My mum says "What you think about you bring about". I would have been happy to party with them, but I wasn't invited, so I went down to the restaurant in the hostel (which was formal and expensive) and asked for a table for one.

The tables were close together and an older couple next to me took pity and tried to strike up a conversation. The restaurant served bread and green butter. It was delicious! I ordered portabello linguine and moelleux chocolat with red fruit mousse which were also amazing, especially accompanied by a green wine. The couple was Swiss and Portuguese. The man spoke French with one of the most bizarre French accents I had ever heard (even stranger than Québécois, which is at least recognizable).

Back upstairs, I discovered the common room, and feeling kind of dejected, decided to watch the Tom Cruise movie that was playing. Maybe I was miserable because I thought I would be miserable compared to Porto... whatever the case, I went to bed in my top bunk. Zzzzzzzzzzzz.

Just kidding!

My roommates turned out to be the most disrespectful people I have ever had the displeasure of sharing space with. They came in around 2:30am, which was not a problem. I understand that I was staying in a hostel and that people have schedules that differ. One or two of the group of 8 snuck in to see if I was sleeping. I hadn't fallen into a deep sleep so I woke up when they came in and heard all of the chatter as it escalated in volume for the following two hours. Everytime someone climbed out of their beds, the bed shook. Everytime someone walked across the floor, the bed shook. They looked through the stuff I had left at the side of the bed, commented on the fact that I hadn't stirred since they came in, opened the windows wide to the noise of the city below (Lisbon is reknowned for its nightlife), until 3:30am they discussed going back out on the town, and finally at 4am one of them stood up to everybody and called them out for being awful to me who paid for the hostel room like all of them and was trying to sleep. My saviour!

Except that as soon as everyone settled down and decided to sleep, he started snoring so loudly the beds shook. I didn't fall asleep until 5am. And subsequently, any plans I had to wake up early and go out of town to Sintra or wherever were shot.

My frustration with them was doubled at the fact that I had to be embarrassed that some of them were Canadian. I was glad, however, that as the recipient of this roommate-abuse, I was also Canadian and can tell you that we are not all like that.

March 2, 2013:

Bright and early At the crack of noon, I climbed out of my bed. I had been hoping that everyone else would leave so I wouldn't have to pretend not to be incredibly annoyed by them. Instead, I shared the bathroom with them and although no one apologized to me for their behaviour the night before, each of them found some other excuse to say sorry.

I took my map and headed off on my own again to try and enjoy what was left of my trip. My first stop was the Praça do Marquês de Pombal where a protest against the EU austerity measures was beginning. I laughed to myself at the absurdity of having more police officers than protesters.

When I got back onto the subway, I almost had a run-in with a blind man and his support animal. And then, I was mistaken for a man's partner. He came up behind me and started running his fingers through the back of my hair. After the initial shock of what happened, he and his partner and I all cracked up really hard.

I had lunch at a restaurant called "LostIn". They were confused that I was eating by myself (maybe I should have borrowed my metro boyfriend to join me) but I felt a bit like Jasmin, hanging out in a canapied seating area with pillows and a beautiful view over Lisbon. I started with one of my favourite appetizers: slices of baguette toasted with goat cheese, honey and walnuts. I had some sort of fruity drink and a chicken wrap with lots of vegetables and everything hit the spot. I love vegetables.

I had read somewhere that Pastel de Nata was a must-try in Lisbon and a tour book I'd found at the hostel recommended a shop on the same street as LostIn called Nata Lisboa. I bought some as a snack for later.

I walked around through some of the areas that were more residential on my way back down toward the water. A woman told me something in Portuguese which I took to mean watch out for the slippery tiles. Man, were they ever slippery. And all the sidewalks were made from them. The night before, I had climbed up a hill covered in the same kind of tiles and slipped and almost fell, as if it was icy. I must not have been wearing the proper shoes.

I sat next to the ocean to eat my Natas and they were so delicious. They are like a butter tart, but instead of butter and raisins or whatever, they are filled with custard. Yummm.

I thought of doing a bit of shopping in the main square next to the ocean, but instead, ended up straight in the middle of the protest that had started hours earlier. It turns out they hadn't underestimated the number of police needed at all, although their presence made me uncomfortable. All of the protesters were peaceful (not at all like some of the images I have seen of riots in Greece and Spain), many of them carrying signs denouncing the current political climate and the actions of the EU concerning Portugal, Spain and Greece. The square was quickly filling up with people. It seemed as though all of Lisbon was converging on the square.

When the program for the protest got underway, there were groups starting up different chants, but suddenly, the whole square broke out in song. I thought it might be the national anthem (which always gets me going when I'm in Canada - I cried when they played O Canada after the gold medal game for the 2010 Olympics), but it turned out to be even more significant for the people of Portugal:

"Grandola -- the signal-song of the 1974 "Carnation revolution" that overthrew the fascist dictatorship of Antonio Salazar after the army rebelled -- reverberated through the crowds in Lisbon, which has a population of about 3 million."
http://in.reuters.com/article/2013/03/02/portugal-protests-austerity-idINDEE92105O20130302

My hair stood on end. I saw many people wearing carnations all through the crowds and remembered what I had read about their revolution before coming to Portugal. It was 2pm when I had chanced upon the meeting point for the start of the parade, and I had been underwhelmed by the number of protestors. By 5pm, when I found them in the Praça do Comercio square, the numbers had swelled to 200 000. I snuck out of the square before the end, but I didn't see the end of the parade until 6pm, and they still hadn't all made it into the square where the Finance Ministry is located.

I had my room switched, hoping for a good night sleep, and met my new roommates. One was from Argentina and very friendly, the other worked for the hostel and was kind of cold when I spoke to her. I decided to eat alone once again, but I knew I had to go to a Fado house, which is traditional of Lisbon. I chose Luso's Café. I was unpleasantly surprised by the cost of eating there, but the show price was included in the menu and I didn't have much choice. I had a delicious starter and a delicious main, but the dessert was the weirdest thing I have ever seen.

I was repeatedly harassed by a Francophone couple who thought they were doing charity by offering to let me sit with them and talking to me loudly across the tables. Then they thought it was hilarious that I had an North American accent. Then they thought it was so amusing that I was Canadian. Then they said "God Bless America" which was perplexing so he asked, "What? You don't like Americans?". I thought to myself, "I certainly don't like you", but I responded, "I didn't say that. I'm just not American." His partner had to explain to him that there is a difference. They went on to request songs from the performers, and to laugh and talk through all of the performances.

When I managed to tune them out and focus on the performers, the music was beautiful. It really is particular and hard to put a finger on what makes it stand out from other genres, but it has been listed as a protected World Heritage tradition. It was worth the money I paid.

I returned to my room for some Spanish practice. Apparently the pronunciation of certain sounds is completely different in Argentina and Spain. I learned that the hard way. In Spain two Ls, as in "¿ Cómo te llama ?" is pronounced like a "y" sound in Spain, but almost like a "ch" sound in Argentina. He thought I didn't even recognize the question "What is your name?"

My Spanish is not that bad.

He had an early morning so we went to bed at a reasonable time and no one came into the room in the middle of the night. Success!

March 3, 2013:

I still didn't manage to wake up much before noon. I stopped for "breakfast" at an Italian restaurant called Nosolo Italia and got a Mexicana pizza with piri-piri chili spice (featured at the Portuguese-inspired restaurant "Nando's").

I said farewell to the ocean, grabbed the metro, and caught my flight back to Lyon for the last month of my exchange.