Welcome to Portugal, give me your money.
After a debate about what those dogs did with their money (booze? drugs? how do they pick up the coins, they don't even have hands?), we arrive at our hotel. Given the general awesome nature of Dan's life, we happen to be booked in one of the best hotels in the city, that is only two years old, incredibly boutique, and situated on Avenida da Liberdade, which is the main drag in Lisbon and populated by the likes of Gucci, Burberry, Longchamps, and places that I have never even heard of but people who have more money than me point out are Very Important.
I assess my general scrubby demeanor: unwashed boat hair, same dress from six days in a row, one hair tie that is so stretched out that it has become a desperate situation that I acquire a new one, and yet that somehow seems like an impossible task.
Like tying my hair is going to improve what's going on here.
I go Assassin's Creed and blend in with Dan and his family who are familiar with nice places and doing nice things, and it turns out I had nothing to worry about because the Portuguese are so overwhelmingly nice that if I were wearing a trash bag as a hat (I was not, Likely is at home), they would politely ask me if I would like help taking it up to my room and if they could procure me a second trash hat and also follow me around asking me questions about my life and being generally encouraging about my choices.
Maoru the front desk man and his colleague Fernand exuberantly welcome us to Valverde Hotel and then lay out a map and tell us in very good, heavily accented English where we absolutely must go. Two things excite me to no end: Portuguese accents sound like a hybrid of Russian and German, and one of the main points of interest in Lisbon is a fucking CUSTARD TART FACTORY.
Lisbon is known for something called Pasteis de Belem, which is a goddamn custard tart. One of their points of interest is dessert.
I try to keep my tears at bay while everyone goes about their lives like I'm not having a choir of angels raise their voices to the sky and jam on electric guitars inside my stomach. Not only is Portugal the Land of Dessert Wines, it is the Land of Desserts. I have traveled to the holy land, which I thought was Germany because they are so angry, but apparently it is this chipper, delightful place instead.
After settling in, we all decide to take a lovely stroll down the whitewashed cobblestone sidewalks, to see what we can see.
They've got this thing.
This van was a highlight.
We have been told that there is a wonderful elevator in the center of the city, where you can press a button and be so high that you can view the entire panoramic of the ocean and the port town. They installed that elevator because Lisbon is the City of Seven Fucking Hills, where if you turn down a wrong street you are actually walking up for the next ten years until you end up a Moorish castle where no one bothered to conquer it because it was so goddamn far.
Having read zero history about the city with the understanding that my history books are much better, I conclude the Moors just died on the hills because it was too much effort to walk down. Having learned from that history, the Portuguese built things like this:
Stairs are for losers, and Spain.
Naturally, instead of using that fantastical elevator, we go to the Arc da Rua Augusta to see the city. The man at the desk assures us there is an elevator. As we enter it, he follows with, "Oh and also two flights of stairs!" Having been locked in to our decision, we decide to go with it.
"You know what's fun? Crawling inside tiny staircases inside clock towers."
Apparently, we are losers. Or Spanish.
A note to anyone who is not familiar with European staircases: they are only big enough for one small person, to the point that you have to press a button to get a green light to ascend, because otherwise you'll be stuck in a staircase with another person, staring awkwardly at each other until someone gets so frustrated they shove the stupid person down the staircase and then you have to pretend like you didn't do it once you get to the bottom, but who else was on the one-person staircase, I don't know officer, maybe they tripped because they don't know how to see lights?
Quick, distract them with a city scape!
The stairs are so small I have to duck my head, but once we get to the top, I am placated by charming vistas of the city.
Where the Moors died.
Portugal: no humping, no pooping.
A death-defying descent puts us back on solid ground, where the group decides that probably the best decision we could make is to go to Alfama, the old medieval part of town, and visit the Moorish castle, Castelo de Sao Jorge. I'm survivor drunk because I didn't die on those staircases for mice, so I agree that doing more things is what we should do. I politely stand in the middle of the street to look for a taxi, or for a little tuktuk cab, or golf cart to take us up the Moor hill.
Does a Bloody Mary come standard or do I have to order that extra?
While I am contemplating how beautiful it is that this is a city built on desserts and go-carts, Dan's family starts walking towards the castle. Walking. Like with their feet.
I grow worried that I am not among my people. I grow further worried that Dan's 70-year-old mother and 79-year-old father like walking so much more than I do. I make a vacation promise to walk more when I get home.
Okay, maybe not so hilly.
Nevermind, fuck this hill.
I discard my promise immediately. Walking is terrible. This walk rivals San Francisco's trash piles that they call quaint little hills, and I once again politely suggest we take alternative methods of transportation while drifting towards the tuktuk carts that are happily bumping people up the hill a million times faster than my feet will ever be inclined to go. Thankfully, this time everyone concedes, because the carts are cute and it has become evident that our walk is going to be more vertical than horizontal. I contain my tears of joy and take my rightful place in the back of what is basically a toy car.
As per usual, Dan doesn't give a fuck either way.
When we arrive at the castle, we discover that it was actually renovated in 1940 and is no longer its old castle self. Also there is a line down the block. We decide that doing stuff is overrated.
I'll just take a picture of this wall instead.
Alfama is beautiful, magical, wonderful, one of a fucking kind, so naturally I take absolutely zero pictures of the place. I put it all in my memory holes, where I vow to remember everything until I take enough drugs and forget it all, only to remember it randomly five years later and have to concern myself with whether it was a dream or a real memory, and then just pretend it was real, which is how I am absolutely convinced I know the mechanics of how dragons fly. We finish our hellish walking tour of God's Greatest Hills, and return to our hotel to ask our exuberant hotel men where we should eat.
They ask if we would like traditional or fancy, and we ask for traditional. They say that they will send us somewhere, but it is not...nice. I silently am thrilled that there is some place where I can be grubby in peace. We walk down a very shady street where I am convinced I see a tumbleweed blow by. Lisbon is interesting in that you can be on the nicest street in town, and one block over is a gutted out garbage street. Which is where we were going for dinner.
Dan's parents had already scouted the location, so they knew that it was in a tiny little doorway that had no signage or indicating factors of any kind except sometimes there is a person standing out front smoking a cigarette. We enter a tiny little shop that is wall-to-wall plastered in old Portuguese magazine photos and has three people working. It is playing only John Lee Hooker and fado music, which arguably could be called Portuguese blues. We all agree that this is the best thing ever.
They speak fantastic English, so we don't have to muddle through with our spare Portuguese This is a blessing, because Portuguese is the hardest of the Romance languages, and is comparable only to Arabic in its incomprehensibility. The Portuguese speak in the back of their throats, and like to just...eliminate entire letters. For instance, the way to say excuse me is 'desculpe.'
That is pronounced 'shculp.' Because d and e are stupid fucking letters, or something.
I'd like to say who comes up with this stuff, but English is rife with bullshit like that, so I just say 'shculp' and order in English.
The server had to touch everyone with his butt,
it was so small.
This is a goddamn glue-sticked collage
and a pop-up book.
Dessert was tiny cups made out of chocolate filled with port and madeira, which elevates it to The Best Thing Ever. We all go home drunk off of Portuguese wine, port, and pop-up books.
Like any good relationship, I have no idea what that restaurant's name is, nor do I have any inclination to find out. I am content having been inside of it, and leave it at that.
I haven't met you Roxanne but you are f***ing funny and smart. Reading your blog is just plain fun :-)
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