Mensajes

Apparently Oporto is the English name for the Portugese city known as Porto within the country…I saw it written both ways, so I am just going to go with the shorter version.

After hip, happening, rough, fascinating, largely English speaking Lisbon, Porto was sort of a strange shock. Porto is the second largest city, but felt entirely different—traditional, shabby, a bit of a timewarp, completely dead on Sundays. The hostel screwed up my reservation, which meant I had the choice of two rooms full of Spanish guys—both groups there for bachelor parties. Wonderful. On my first evening, I wandered around for a long time trying to find an open restaurant, preferably one where I could watch the Portugese Eurocup match. In the time it took me to find one, I didn’t pass a single person. Eventually, I went to a kind of run-down bar/café where the game was playing and I was clearly the only outsider. In Lisbon, most Portugese menus were easy to understand, if not to pronounce, but this bore no resemblance to any language I know and no one working spoke any English or Spanish. Having read about the Porto love for tripe, I double checked that the special WASN’T that and then ordered it, along with a Portugese version of Sprite known as Snappy. What came looked somewhat intenstine-like and was covered in cheese and a spicy-looking sauce. After a few moments of hesitant sizing up on my part, the man next to me leaned over and said (in English), “It’s a hot dog.” He didn’t understand much of my relieved thanks, and I got the idea he was coming up with that sentence while I was coming up with some courage to eat the strange thing set in front of me. I’m not a big hot dog fan, but this was sort of like a currywurst (+serious cheese). It was sort of an adventure, it could have been worse, and Portugal won the match.

When menus in Porto included English (rarely), the translations were a little questionable...

In the morning, I wandered around some of the city center, bought three beautiful peaches for 40some cents, and stopped into the well-equipped tourist office on my way down to the water. The big thing to see in Porto is Da Bolsa, the Stock Exchange. It was built between 1842 and 1910 to showcase Portugal’s wealth and artistic abilities to possible business partners. Despite their stylish tourist office, Porto doesn’t really know how to handle tourists. The schedule at the Stock Exchange was strange and I had to go back a couple of times to catch an English tour (it ended up being bilingual in French, which was fine) but it was really quite fascinating, though smaller than I expected. The amazing inlaid wood floors were different in every room, made of exotic woods from former Portugese colonies. Ironically, the Bolsa was built not long after these colonies (most from Brazil, but some African locales as well) had gained independence, so the government had to pay for what had just recently been theirs for the plundering. Too bad, Portugal. Score one for the colonies. Although the most talked about highlight was the Salão Árabe (Arabian Hall), which was made entirely of plaster, gold—about 40 pounds’ worth—and a bit of wood and made to echo Spain’s Alhambra (it’s also available today for wedding receptions), I was most amazed by one specific table. Beautifully inlaid with an unbelievably intricate pattern, it was built by one man over the course of three years using nothing more than a pocket knife! Check it out in the middle of the Sala dos Retratos 360 degree tour here and then check out the Arabian Hall (and those floors!).

After the gold and the paneling and the pocket knife wonder, Porto itself was starting to feel like a bit of a let down. I went on a tasting tour of the Sandeman port wine factory, figuring if you’re going to try port for the first time, it might as well be in Porto, and walked along the shores of Vila Nova de Gaia, the town across the bridge that’s entirely dominated by British and American middle aged port wine aficionados wandering from tasting to tasting.

As I was sitting, eating a mediocre sandwich and feeling sort of blah, the sea of polo shirt wearers separated and along came a parade of people singing in Portugese and dancing in traditional costumes. Apparently, they were part of a Northern Portugese folk culture dance group, which meant I was treated to almost two hours of singing and dancing that was one part do-si-do, one part clogging, lots of swishing of skirts and clapping of hands. And then Porto opened up for me again.

In a lot of ways, it was what I expected Portugal to be—lots of azulejo-fronted buildings, working class, great old signs, CHEAP Portugese food and not the international fare I was drawn to in Lisbon. The food improved after the mystery hot dog but mostly involved lots of meat, some soups and a fair amount of rice. A multi-course meal for two, with wine, cost me and a travel buddy I picked up along the way 11 euros. It may be the only place left in Europe where a cup of coffee is still calculated in cents. It felt sort of Old World in a way I can’t seem to describe accurately. Young boys were kicking soccer balls in the streets under canopies of Portugese flags, using language that was similar enough to Spanish for me to know their mothers wouldn’t approve, while others were testing their not-yet masculinity by jumping off the town’s main bridge into the water far below. Walking across the bridge, I got close enough to one kid with steps shaved into the side of his head, maybe about eleven, to see just how much his fingers were shaking, struggling to hold him up. It took him a while to work up the courage, but he jumped in the end. It seemed an important Porto coming of age ritual.

There was something really sad but also mysterious about Porto’s crumbling buildings, especially those that look like they are about to fall into the water. Like being in Pisa, one is aware that this isn’t going to be like this forever. Porto has a brand new metro line leading to a brand new airport, meaning people are going to start coming for more than the wine and the residents are going to have to pick up some English, some of the old buildings will get facelifts and signs will be replaced. Yes, Porto was looking a bit worse for the wear, sort of abandoned fifty years ago, but in that grunginess and that sense of being forgotten lay its charm. In a continent as well-trodden as Europe, finding a place that feels unexplored can sometimes be rewarding in its own right.

Inside the Porto train station

This post has been long in coming, both for the typical blogger excuses as well as the fact that I have thought a lot, one might even say struggled a bit, to try and explain (even to myself) just why I enjoyed Portugal, especially Lisbon, as I did.

Part of it was timing. After a month of partying in Córdoba but not going anywhere, I was ready to break out. It had started to get hot, most of the other foreigners there had returned home while all of my Spanish friends were still working. There was also foot fetish weirdo in my elevator, but he can be considered little more than a footnote.

Arriving in Lisbon, I was pleasantly shocked by the hostel, a renovated mansion with hardwood floors and IKEA styling. (read my Everywhere magazine “place” blurb here). My room was on the top floor, with skylights, high ceilings, and small patios overlooking the river. For 20 euros, I felt like I was staying in some sort of resort (although I guess sleeping in a bunk bed and sharing a room with 9 strangers could pull the plug on that fantasy..I just went with it).

I walked all of two minutes up the hill to Noobai Café, where I experienced the first of many international menus, a real treat after living in the very Spanish south for so long. Although everyone told me Portugal isn’t as cheap as it used to be, it remains Western Europe’s bargain spot, cheap even as compared to Andalucía. If I wanted to, I could have eaten really cheaply (and well) throughout my stay, but instead chose the “more bang for my buck” approach, paying what I might normally but feeling like I was eating the best thing on the menu, over and over again. Back to the resort mentality.

For some contrast to the trendy Santa Catalina-Bairro Alto area, I spent the afternoon and evening wandering around the Alfama district, the only part of Lisbon spared from the 1755 earthquake that rocked the city. (get it?) Everyone was gearing up for the Festa do Santo António, hanging papier-mâché fish and colorful paper streamers as part of the celebration honoring Lisbon’s patron saint. It occurred the day I left Portugal, sadly, but I did catch a bit of the Festas de Lisboa while I was there. I capped off the night at A Tasco do Chico, a fado bar close to the hostel. After seeing Carlos Saura’s amazing film “Fados” at Córdoba’s Filmoteca, I had been really curious to hear the traditional Portugese music sung in person…and not at an overpriced, strictly for tourists place in the Alfama, either. Amateur night at A Tasco do Chico was perfect–one of many examples of old fashioned Lisbon mixing comfortably with Lisbon as Europe’s new hot spot. The people at the next table were eating traditional sausage, which is lit on fire at the table, while the singers were wearing sweatshirts and Members Only jackets. The young Portugese guy across the table from me was a fado fan, a genre so rooted in the past, but then spoke perfect English, was there with a friend from one of Portugal’s former colonies, and offered to translate for me as the songs were just beginning. (For a Spanish speaker, written Portugese is easy to understand, but seeing as how it has nine vowels and everything seems to have a strong “shhh” sound, it’s really difficult to understand spoken, and even worse sung.)

See the scene from the movie here:

The next couple of days were spent wandering, eating, and taking pictures at my own pace, enjoying the people watching and the perfect weather. I made the trek to Belém, as much for the famous pastéis de Belém pastries as for the Torre de Belém, a center of Portugese nautical pride that just happened to be all dolled up in what appeared to be a huge necklace, I assume for Santo António. I rode the Elevador de Santa Justa for the chance to see Lisbon’s terracotta colored roofs from a good vantage point. I whizzed through all of the ancient art at the Fundação Calouste Gulbenkian museum in favor of some of the rugs and Arabic art on loan. I skipped the Convento do Carmo at the last minute, instead rooting through second hand book stores in a fruitless search to find English or Spanish books.

The next morning, the French giant FNAC offered a huge selection of English books, more than I had seen at one time in eight months or so, and then I made a pit stop at Swedish H&M without having to feel guilty for missing any key Lisbon spot in the meantime. One of the greatest parts about Lisbon is that it somehow all felt like it fit–from trendy boutiques and international menus to dusty old bookshops, tile front houses with laundry out to dry, and streetside stands selling bifana sandwiches. It managed to be one of the cities most stuck in time one minute and most up to date the next. How all of these people peacefully share Lisbon’s seven hills is really beyond me.

On my last night in town, I experienced the cool community feel of Bica, a pedestrian-only hill where students gather at night to chat and drink the 1 euro beers on offer from state fair-like stands along the way. One of the random Aussies I was with bought a veggie burger from a guy toting an Eliza Doolittle looking basket on his arm. After a little while in Bairro Alto, we took a taxi to the waterfront and hit some discos there, managing to get in despite inadequate footwear on my part.

One of the highlights among a number of highlight days: Quinta da Regaleira. Once again ditching the mainstays for something a little different, I passed up the most famous sites in Sintra, a charming, albeit touristy, city outside Lisbon in favor of the Quinta da Regaleira. As I wrote here, it was like something out of a fairy tale. Since I already wrote about the treasure hunt feel of tracking down sites A through X, I’ll just plan to post some photos in the next week or so. I’ve gone on long enough. Next up: Porto.

The Olympics begin in one week, for anyone who has been living in a yurt somewhere in the tundra (in which case, this post will probably remain a mystery anyway). I am generally not known for my nationalism or for being especially patriotic. My friends in Spain were always surprised by my quickness to criticize America and my sundry iPod tunes bashing U.S. foreign policy in one form or another. But I am a total Olympic sucker.

It’s not even that I am obsessed with the U.S. winning. Sometimes it makes me happy and I get a touch of pride, other times I’d rather some dude who practiced running marathons barefoot win. When the talent-heavy, ego-burdened U.S. basketball team fell on its face four years ago, I felt no pity. Even those athletes who have the most money and the best coaches and the sports therapists and nutritionist-balanced diets and sleep regiments and high altitude training sometimes don’t win. There’s something really awesome about that.

Sure, there’s an ugly side to the Olympics. Doping comes to mind, as does Bela Karolyi telling his teeny-tiny prepubescent gymnasts to “eat air.” Actually, let’s put gymnastics in general under the “ugly” category. There’s something kind of scary about the length to which kids are pushed in the Chinese athlete schools, some of them starting at age 3. (Though there’s something really beautiful about the 900 portraits Gerard Rancinan shot at these same schools for his Faces of China project).

I know this is naive, but I like to think of the Olympics in exactly the way Bob Costas announces them–as one of the last bastions of international cooperation. I have been in love with the Olympics for as long as I can remember. When I was young enough to be a lot more motivated (and foolish) than I am now, I read the Sports Illustrated Olympics issue and decided to make brackets on butcher paper in the basement for every Olympic sport. Since my brother was younger and I liked bossing him around, he was handed the other ruler and we got to work. Needless to say, we didn’t finish the bracket (I didn’t even know what steeplechase was, and I’m not sure I do now) but we put in a couple of hours’ work. Meaning my brother whined for about twenty minutes and finally gave up, while I put in another hour and a half or so. I was determined and it made me feel connected in a way my athletic abilities, being what they are or better yet are not, never would. The abandoned bracket is somewhere in my parents’ basement, crumpled for sure but a sign of hopefulness.

The new Sports Illustrated Olympics edition fell into my hands this past week, still listing medal favorites for every event. I didn’t make a bracket. But yes, I spent a large portion of the afternoon poring over it, reading every little strange athlete tidbit. Montana is one of three states without an athlete representing us, I am disappointed to report. One of the members of the softball team is named Lovieanne, after two members of Gilligan’s Island. I will look forward to seeing Ben Askren, a wrestler who says about his long blond curls, “I actually don’t really like my hair that much, but I am a man of realism, and I realize people like gimmicks. [In Beijing] my hair’s going to be my gimmick. Hopefully, I’ll get a sponsorship or two, maybe some money out of having stupid, curly hair.” What’s not to love about Dara Torres still kicking ass?

I am curious, as many in the world are, to see whether China pulls this one off. I was sad when the torch run was clouded by protests, although the protesters are probably in the right. I am hoping that more airtime can be devoted to athletes and less to China’s “no spitting” social classes. How cool are the “Water Cube” and “Birds Nest” buildings? I am dying to walk through the Olympic Village, as my cousin will do when covering the games. Hopefully they will still be visible through the smog…

In the end, I don’t care about China and their political problems, at least not during these few days that only come every few years. China’s political problems are not new, just finally getting some long-delayed attention. The Olympics are supposed to be about the athletes and their ridiculous skills and sacrifices. Win or lose, I’ll be reaching for the Kleenex. Other peoples’ sadness makes me emotional. So does their happiness. So in case Bob Costas and crew’s athlete Hallmark stories weren’t jerking enough of my tears, I pretty much well up everytime someone wins. Or loses. Bonus points for being a cancer survivor, an orphan, poor, or for having overcome any sort of odds, even if the NBC network makes them up. Also when people sing along to their national anthems. And let’s not forget the Opening Ceremony’s national pride (especially for little tiny countries with one or two delegates–love them!) and the Closing Ceremony’s bittersweetness (over so soon?)

According to SI, this year, over 212 hours of coverage will be offered PER DAY. That’s 1,000 more total hours this year than in all past Olympics combined. My family recently got digital cable, and I just happen to not have a job, which means I am going to be able to skip past primetime coverage (aka mostly gymnastics) in favor of the offerings of Oxygen, CNBC, MSNBC, USA, and yes, even Telemundo en español. It’s a little overwhelming, but I think I’ll manage.

If you want to know what I’ll be doing starting August 8, check your TV guide. It’s going to be an intense couple of weeks.

(thanks to SI for doing a lot of the legwork on this one. Surprisingly, I didn’t get great athlete access for this post.)

Having scanned Craig’s List for all of twenty minutes this week, I can say with some confidence that the job search has begun. Emotionally, at least. Kind of.

A number of well-intentioned friends and relatives have asked me questions about my future, and I’ve gotten the impression that few have been too impressed with my answers. “I’m thinking of finding a job somewhere in the U.S.” wouldn’t satisfy many, and understandably. At this point, it’s the big circle on my Venn Diagram. I have sort of scoped out a few cities, nothing for sure and changing all the time, but if someone asked me my criteria, I think I would be embarrassed to admit the influence of off-handed remarks from friends, movies, magazine articles, and proximity to major airports. I figure I can’t live anywhere known for a meteorological condition I don’t like, such as rain. As I told a friend, “Rain makes me want to curl up with a blanket, a book, a cup of tea and some Norah Jones.” Not too conducive to starting a new job. I even did some random Googling–and I refuse to share any of those keywords out of pure self-preservation.

So I haven’t really figured out where to begin, what I might want to do, where exactly I might want to do yet-to-be determined thing. I figure there’s lots of things I could enjoy. Plenty of other things I could semi-enjoy that would involve twice-monthly paychecks for a while. So it’s just a question of looking. Right?

I know everyone goes through this post-college transition period. Not really being an adult, not really being a kid. I just happened to postpone my time a year or so and wasn’t smart enough to move in/move on with college friends as some brighter friends have done. Then again, most of my college friends are in law school or married. Some of them have careers, which, I’ll be honest, don’t really appeal to me too much. Whether I plan to or not, I kind of follow the whole “I will go in this way/and I’ll find my own way out” bit anyway (thanks, Dave).

At this point, I’ve lived with 17 (!) different roommates over the past six years in eight different apartments/houses/dorm rooms in four cities, three countries. (And that’s not even counting the three summers I spent living in a cabin in northeastern Washington.) As a disclaimer to any future roommates I may have, most of them came into the relationship with a deadline already in mind–I only drove one away and that’s because I evicted him. Part of me is tired of going through the motions, the meet and greet and then getting accustomed to their strange cohabitation patterns, becoming close friends with some, only to do it all over again a few months later. Even as I am sick of it, just like I am getting pretty damn tired of moving this unbelievable amount of stuff I have accumulated, I know it’s a necessary evil. I like my stuff. And I’m not sure I can see moving to a new place where I know no one and living alone as the smartest option. Meeting people in the post-college world is awkward enough. You can’t knock on the door down the hall during the first week and ask if they want to hit the Food Zoo. There’s no orientation or small classes or student groups. I’ve been told I could join a gym–there’s just a couple problems with that idea. I hate gyms, and I’m not sure my red-faced sweaty self is the first impression I am looking to give to future friends. Book clubs, classes from cooking to car maintenance, knitting groups, all the other tenets of chick-lit friendship building I haven’t entirely ruled out. I don’t even know where I’m moving yet.

Despite all of the confusion and general angst, I’m excited. When the time comes, I am guessing I will feel ready to start something new. I am looking forward to getting to know a U.S. city outside of Montana, getting to know the U.S. in general. I’ve traveled so little here. It’s fun, though clearly overwhelming, to have some choice in where I’m headed–last year, I got a letter saying I was assigned to a city in southern Spain and off I headed, completely clueless. To some extent, I’ll be clueless whereever I go, but at least I have some say in the matter.

And hey, there’s always random Googling.

I’ve been on vacation mode for some time now. So until I get around to writing and editing up a storm of posts sitting in my brain, I found this while searching through one of my favorite Flickr photostreams. It requires only a bit of graphic design/computer dorkiness, so it’s right up my alley and made me laugh. Comic Sans is the worst cutesy font ever.

Keep an eye out for the arrival of Wingdings.

Font Conference video on collegehumor.com