portugese poulet
I GREW UP on the ocean. So what I cannot figure out is how I mistook seagulls for chickens last night while wandering through the streets of Porto. They talk differently here. There was no alcohol involved. I think I just imagined that live poultry would rule this town and chickens would hide in little streets with little guns like mafia chickens. THIS TOWN is a chicken hiding town.
The city is near perfect. and from the looks of it, the terrain here INCLUDES a town. But not the reverse. The mountains and the river simply refused to conform for the people so the people just made do with what they had. There are bridges nearly traversing through apartments and churches which wrap around the side of the mountain squeezing through little streets and right by living room windows. I have NO idea how they managed to build an underground metro station (and I'd be afraid to go in it). The portugese I've met tell me this area and most of Portugal suffers from earthquakes. Not exactly my favorite natural disaster. In fact, its at the bottom of the natural disaster favorites list. The VERY bottom. So I'll be damned if I step foot into that metro. Even cross the bridge by foot (which I did twice last night) I find less death defying. Cause I can swim but maybe not with 10 tons of iron falling on me.
where was i? oh. Well my coworker mentioned that in most of the little european towns he went to which had a seaside (or riverside) that the bars RIGHT on the seaside would be too touristy so for a touch of authenticity, he took us back a few streets off the main one in search of a "local" bar. We found at least three local bars but didnt dare enter as they were clearly too local. They seemed more like someones backyard and the family was outside playing and hanging out. We felt like we would crash a family outing or something. So we kept walking. Ultimately we ended up right back on that main drag at a bar called "Sandeman" for some porto. I recognized the label and the name immediately. Truth is, I liked the Porto from the hotel bar much better. We were all still anxious to see the town and so we walked. We walked and I took enough pictures to drain my battery down to one bar. I hope I have enough for the ocean which we will hopefully see on thursday.
At this one moment when we had reached a high point in the town (the place of the first photo) we all stopped and looked back at the river. No one said a word which I missed so much. Last week my cousin from the states remarked about this woman and her daughter, clearly tourists, on the Paris metro with her and neither of them spoke a word for about 7 metro stops. She couldnt believe that they had nothing to say to eachother for that long. I couldnt help but laugh and think it was because silence must make my cousin extremely uncomfortable. It made perfect sense to me that one could be in a foreign country and at times just need to not speak and simply listen or even drift off into your own thoughts. I think thats why they were nervous each time I was silent and always wondered what was wrong with me. But I felt again this comfort in silence when me and the french coworkers just stood there without words and enjoyed the view.
On a side note, there were about 20 minutes last week when my chatty cousin was reading a magazine and like a good junkie I was having withdrawl from her ramblings and asked her to immediately put down the magazine and commence with chatter! She was happy to feed my fix...
Once we reached the town center it was nearly midnight and the city had shut down. It was so quiet except for the chickens so we headed back.
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Wednesday, July 9, 2008
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