Given conflicting travel schedules, I haven't seen Alexander on a weekend since September. This is fine as I have developed a Saturday habit of sleeping late, going to the market, feasting on a fat breakfast, watching MTV (Parental Control, Made, Sweet Sixteen, Pageant Girls and Pimp My Ride) Then, I go jogging with my neighbor and finish off the night trying to get smarter either taking IQ tests or doing Sudoku. It is awesome! Sunday is usually mostly work, cooking and maybe the gym if I feel like it. While this weekend style is great, it doesn't really take advantage of the whole living in Europe thing i am supposed to be doing. Since we don't have weekends together and I have 100000000 vacation days, we took off Monday to Wednesday to fly to Lisbon. It is an amazing place and just perfect for a quick trip.
Lithabon. It's like Italy only cheaper and easier. Actually, it felt a lot like Montreal in that is small and managable with a lot of personality. Alexander says it is almost exactly like Spain which is probably a good thing. I have never been to Spain. We decided we will go to spain, check it out, decide which we like better and then learn either Portugues or Spanish. It was really annoying not knowing the language at least a little bit. Knowing thanks is just not enough. I spoke Italian the whole time and honestly that worked. It's just annoying that I can't understand what they are saying back to me. I wanted to buy a copper pot, but had no idea what the pot was for. It honestly looked like a bed pan/warmer. So I asked if it was for pesce and the guy said "shhwwissshhh schheweee tthhhuuuxxxssshhir" ahhhh, yes of course. We bought the pot anyway because not knowing what something is for is no reason not to get it, especially when it's a copper pot that would cost $200 at Williams Sonomo and costs €25 in Lisbon. Just like we fly to London to buy clothes, we have now decided to fly to Lisbon when we need kitchen supplies and a ham. Yes, that's right. We bought, carried and have now have in our kitchen an entire Proscuitto ham from Lisbon.
It is 7,2 kilos of a pig's ass and leg. If you pull the foil off the end you can still see the hoof which we decided to keep covered. I am a carnivor, but not a sadist. Poor little guy. He tastes damn good though.
Lisbon or as I now like to call it, Lithabon: Portugese is basically a mix of Spanish and Italian with a lot of thhh thhss ssshhwwwiiisshhhh thrown in. After two days in Portugal we discovered their talent for making patries that they call Pasteis (Patthhhh t EETSSHHH thhhh and finally figured out the tricks of getting service in a language niether of us knew much about. We also had to figure out how to order in a counter culture without knowing the language. A lot of food and service is at a counter with no beginning and no end, just a counter. After not getting served many times, Alexander put 2+2+2 together and got Seishhh which is six in Portugese. So Alexander goes up to the counter and asks for seeisshhhh passshhhteaassschhhhh and magically the lady behind the counter wrapped up six pastries in a nice box. IT WORKED. I can not stop saying Seishhh passchtaashh and laughing because not a half a second after Alexander said it, he turned to me and said "it worked, I didn't know what I was saying, but I just said shsshsshhhhaaa passhhsshhiisshhh and she understood me!!!"
We flew there on Monday morning. The cab to the middle of the city from the airport costs 8 Euro and takes about 10-15 minutes. The weather is a perfect 20 degrees C. and even if it rains it feels like a mist and nothing actually gets wet. November is such a wonderful time to travel because nobody is there. I honestly can't imagine what Lithabon is like at full capacity and 30 degrees. Also, Alexander and I are now really big fans of breezing into a city for a few days and back out again. It's the perfect way to travel. OUr hotel was five star which we could afford because we flew for free and it is the off season. It was called the Hotel Barrio Alto and it is right in the middle of everything. When we pulled up with our cab we parked in front of a shield that said, Member of the Leading Small Hotels of the World. Not too shabby. It felt good. Our shower was worth the cost of the hotel. It was one of those giant, round shower heads so that when you shower, your entire body gets wet at the same time. There is no leaning in bullshit to make sure you get all of your hair wet etc. This shower-head is a must-have. I think they call it the Rain Forest Shower.
When we weren't showering, we were walking around the city and when we weren't walking around we were eating. We had some interesting experiences. On day one we walked around Bario Alto which is up the hill, narrow streets all little stones and tiles everywhere. We stopped into a little hole in the wall with everyone at the counter. We asked for two wines and pointed to what the guy next to us was eating since, well- that's about all we could figure to do. That turned out to be Lamb. (theierssshhhhtthhh) Delicous. Later that night we went to another strange place where two old men cooked for us and we watched a program on poisonous snakes and then the lotto. They didn't win. The next day we ate lunch at this place in the Muslim section of town. Alexander spied it. More fish, but this time better. The guys at the table next to ours were playing dominos and hacking something into handkerchiefs like old Portugeuse men do. Then, we discovered the portugeus art of pastry. They are really good. the food is simple, simple simple- always fish and potatoes or fish and rice, but the pastries are truly unique and we didn't have one that didn't taste great. That night we got dressed up and went to a restaurant we found while walking. It had the big lobster tank up front with fresh fish and you know, a whole goat hanging in the window. Turns out the restaurant is well-known, but we felt good that we stumbled across it on our own. I had a fresh crab that I picked out of the tank- it tasted like butter and salty heaven. Whenever you order something they go to the window, and take whatever you ordered out of hte display case or fish it still alive out of the tank. Then, they show your uncooked, undead food to you at your table before taking it to the kitchen (which is an open kitchen so you can see that they aren't pulling the old bait and switch to frozen, microwavable food. Alexander had a dorade that he says was the best fish of his life WHHHOOOOOOOOOOOOOTT!! The wine was good and they bring you all sorts of goat cheese, olives and hams to eat before the fish. The food is all really cheap. Even our gourmet meal at the fancy place with wine and port and fresh crab it only cost us 80€. Our lunch at the counters cost us 16 EUR for two fish, soup, wine coffee etc. It really makes it nice to not shell out 50EUR to get a drink of water and some packaged sandwich like in most tourist places.
Lithabon is sort of dirty in a way. There is graffiti on everything- really bad too, no imagination. But it's charming because the streets are narrow, made mostly of stone and have huge holes in them. The houses are made of tiles and are very intricately done. Lots of little windows with real wash hanging outside. People actually live there which is nice. There are tons of old people. I think it takes them 4 hours to get to the market and back, but there they are, climbing the narrow street with their canes. The city is many different layers going up from the water. Almost all red roofs and tiles. There is also some amazing architecture like the monestary and the castle which is still in great condition. The old street cars are a nice touch. Their wheels are close together underneath in the middle so it always looks like they could topple over. we took the 28 which is famous because it is the original line with the old, orignial cars still running.
Our driver was such a character. He got out to smoke on numerous occassions seemingly in the middle of the route. When we stopped at the castle he said in this dry tone: "Castle. Casshhthhhhilo. Schloss. Chateau. etc. etc " Shortly the castle, casshhthilllo, Schloss, Chateau we stopped because a car was parked on the tracks. I am told this happens often. Our driver didn't look upset. He smoked another cigarette´and told us we could wait or not.Whatever. Puff. After a few minutes, some people gathered together, picked up the car and moved it onto the sidewalk. Our driver finished his cigarette, then continued to drive. We have a picture of his bad ass.
We came home with two knives, a knife sharpener, three ladles, one copper pot for god knows what and a jar of honey that we bought from an old couple in a furniture shop with three jars of honey in the window. Oh- and 7,2 Kilos of ham.
