Our second day in Portugal went more smoothly. We had arrived with hardly anything, no kitchen utensils or cookware, no bathroom supplies, and perhaps most importantly, no espresso machine. (Pat says "ick!") It was clearly time for some serious shopping.
We also needed to rent a car. There was a place within walking distance called Europcar, so off we went. It was located somewhere in a shopping mall called El Corte Inglés, which sounds suspiciously Spanish, but on the map it was clear we wouldn't be crossing the border.
We thought Europcar was on the second floor of El Corte Inglés, so we went straight in. Holy cow, it looked like we were in a souped-up designer section in Macy's! Gucci, Ralph Lauren, Rolex, Armani, Dior, Chanel, as far as the eye could see, acres of high-end designer products. We wandered around like star-struck teenagers, and began ascending the six-floor building on the escalators to check it out. Floor after floor of beautiful high-quality consumer products from all over the world: fashion, electronics, TVs, housewares, beachwear, outdoor gear, on and on. It was like a huge mall all stacked up on six floors.
It turned out that El Corte Inglés is indeed a Spanish department store and there are two branches in Portugal, one in Lisbon and the other about three blocks away from our apartment. What a find!
After locating the car rental place which was actually on the minus-2 floor (two floors underground), and renting a very nice little hybrid Toyota Yaris from a helpful and efficient agent, we went back upstairs to start spending some serious money. We brought two shopping carts with us and filled up on dishware, pots and pans, organizers, towels, a TV, glassware, yada yada, and the obligatory espresso machine (Pat still says "ick", but she got a nice tea kettle too).
The clerks were uniformly excellent. They were well dressed in suits for the gentlemen and dresses for the ladies, there was always a reasonably competent English speaker nearby (although we did try to inject some Portuguese), and they were conspicuously not pushy, just available. They were friendly, calm, energetic, and polite. They wrapped our dishes and glassware in paper where appropriate, and watched our carts for us when we left for lunch. Shopping as it should be, in other words.
Back downstairs we spent a few more hours wrapping up our shopping frenzy, checked out, and took the haul to the basement and into the trunk of our new car. There was a cafeteria and supermarket one floor up, where we had a quick dinner and did some final grocery shopping. Gerrit took a wrong turn onto the freeway on the way home so we did a little inadvertent exploration of Porto, but Google Maps guided us gently back.
The next day we took a little breather. There was a lot to do around the apartment with all our new booty, and we were worn out from our efforts yesterday. We did take a walk to the Lidl variety store for a few more groceries and supplies. We also got caught up on the big backlog of our Portuguese lessons, which had been backing up for three days.
We also tried out our new cookware and dishes that evening, making pork chops and salad, and enjoying some startlingly good €4 Portuguese wine. We had been buying special "Duroc" pork back in the US, a derivative of an Iberian pork, but here it's just what you get in the supermarket. Delicious! Tastes like pork used to.
And that brings us up to today. We got back to our morning Portuguese lesson routine, and then headed back to consumer nirvana at El Corte Inglés. We bought another shopping cart overflowing with mostly household goods, and learned a bit more about this wonderful store. There is a fully stocked hardware store in the basement for example. We had another excellent lunch in the store restaurant, this time camarões (shrimp) for Pat and bacalhau (dried salt cod) for Gerrit. Both were excellent.
Bacalhau has kind of an eye-rolling reputation as a puzzling Portuguese favorite. It comes from a centuries-old relationship with Norwegian traders, who had plenty of salt cod which they traded for Portuguese goods. The Portuguese developed a taste for it, and despite the ocean full of fresh fish in the Atlantic Ocean next door, dried salt cod from Norway became a favorite. You have to soak it for days to reconstitute and desalinate it, and there are apparently over 1000 recipes for it. Gerrit's lunch was a fairly simple recipe, and he was amazed at how good it was. It is definitely cod, but it has a slightly chewy, stringy texture like braised beef. He thinks he must be part Portuguese.
Again we staggered through the afternoon finishing up our shopping, hauled the loot to the car, and did a final run through the supermercado (supermarket. What, you knew that?) before heading home and beginning to unload.
So far, after all of three days here, we have seen nothing but kindness and friendliness in the people, deliciousness in the food and wine (well, maybe with the exception of that KFC desperation dinner), and beauty, style, and functionality in our apartment. We are beginning to pick up the language better. It is helpful to see all the signage, have to figure out the labels, and to dredge up our beginner's Portuguese when talking with a non-English Portuguese. That's the best, actually -- we are forced to use Portuguese and sign language, and they are patient because their English is pretty weak too. The Portuguese seem to like it when we try to speak their language, and who can blame them? They often light up when we use a phrase understandably. We think we'll be conversational before very long.
The Portuguese are very considerate and thoughtful to families, old folks, and the infirm. They are constantly helping us, holding elevators, gesturing us ahead, and giving us places in line when they see our canes. It's quite heartwarming.
And the shopping carts! All four wheels swivel, which makes them so easy to control and steer. Why do they fix the back two wheels in the US? It's way more awkward. Also, there is a moving ramp from the El Corte Inglés supermercado to the parking garage which has standard escalator-like grooves in it. But the shopping cart wheels have matching grooves, so when you push the cart onto the ramp it settles into the grooves and doesn't move. You can even let go as you descend the ramp and it doesn't roll away. Brilliant!
There is no curbside garbage/recycle in our neighborhood though. It means no noisy garbage trucks thundering through once a week, but we do need to tote our garbage and recycling to some discreet-looking mushroom shaped dumpsters about a half block away. It will just be part of going grocery shopping.
The milk is labeled "magro " and "gordo " (thin and fat) instead of the rather delicate "skim" and "whole" in the US. Hah! It's fun to see how different cultures handle things you just take for granted.
(As usual, you can click on any photo to enlarge it, scroll through them all, and click in the black outside a photo when you're done.)