It has come to our attention that we must be sniffing happy dust over here, our blog is so gushy. Well, it's true, we are really fond of this place and it has been a big pleasant surprise. But let's get real, down and gritty.
We know this place is not for everyone. It is not Switzerland or Denmark, where things are clean, tidy, well-organized, and efficient. The look of much of Porto and its environs could be described as, well, a little grungy. The history of the older parts is visibly on display and some of the new construction is a little shabby. It hasn't been all tidied up. The buildings are generally not freshly pressure-washed and painted, and the streets are a crazy quilt of ancient shops and apartments with rusting antique wrought-iron railings and faded paint. But we think that gives the place a certain genuineness and authenticity. It's much more interesting to walk over cobbles and to see buildings that look like they've been around for centuries, full of history and character and not turned out last week by an Ikea factory.
There is some graffiti. It's less than we've been seeing in Seattle and it seems less destructive, like the vandalizing of street signs we've seen there. Pictures of Lisbon show graffiti too, and it does seem to be a worldwide phenomenon.
There is a very little bit of homelessness, and what looks like a few gypsy professional beggars (who are all over Europe).
There is a lot of bureaucracy here. It's unavoidable. But it is tolerable because of two factors: them and us. Most of the bureaucrats we've worked with here seem to genuinely want to help people and to do their job well. (This, incidentally, seems to be the way much of business is run here.) The other half of the equation is us: it's important that we remain polite and patient, qualities which are valuable to cultivate in anyone's life. The bureaucrats are just doing their job and Portuguese society is in fact trying to become more streamlined, and getting angry at the agents doesn't do any good at all. We become better people when we practice respect and keep perspective. Plus, at the end of a hard bureaucratic day there's a glass of Portuguese wine.
The language barrier can be daunting. It would be wonderful if everyone spoke English and had infinite patience for stumbling Portuguese language beginners. But people can't take half hour blocks out of their day to listen to foreigners mangle their native language, while gently providing corrections to help them learn. The locals have their lives too. There are plenty of ways to learn the language and the barriers slowly do come down. There is a great deal of English spoken in the cities, which we're grateful for, and it's really up to us foreigners who want to live in a new country to learn the language.
We did find it a bit hot and uncomfortable during much of July and August because of the humidity here in Porto. It's noticeably more muggy than Seattle, but inland it is better.
OK, we've racked our brains and this is about all we can come up with to complain about, in the interest of fair and balanced reporting. We've been raving about all the wonderful stuff, which you can read about and see pictures of in our earlier posts, and here we've tried to soberly consider the other side. Now back to the gushing.
Monday was our first day without a car, having returned the rental the day before. We made use of the time confined to the apartment by applying for our Portuguese social security numbers, checking on our car delivery and contacting the bank about transferring funds, shopping for car insurance, trying to get our internet/phone utility records straightened out, combing through expat forum chats for useful nuggets, manually entering financial transactions from our Portuguese bank into Quicken software, and having an introductory video meeting with our latest language course host and other students. (Did we say something about gushing? Maybe next post.)
And the last few days have been devoted to more general paperwork and preparation for the car. Gerrit found auto insurance and got that underway, our immigration conference meeting setup is underway, and we transferred the money for the car to the dealer. We also found out that social security numbers are no longer provided to retirees as of a couple months ago, and not necessary for our immigration meeting. Things change fast around here.
Our car experiences have been interesting exposures to the way the Portuguese love their paperwork. Instead of simply transferring the money from the bank to the dealer online, which US banks, Wise and other financial services allow you to do, we had to meet our personal banker and fill out a number of documents and forms, and have them authorized and stamped. Then we provided the resulting Proof of Transfer document to the dealer so they could continue. (At least that could be done online.)
Signing up for insurance involved getting an official automobile Declaration of Characteristics document from the dealer, which was just as officious as the bank document. It listed things like the model number and engine size, things you can find on the auto manufacturer's website. We're sure there's a simper way to do this, but it's actually kind of sweet to meet with our banker for example, shake hands, and watch how diligent he was. Good old fashioned person-to-person contact.
Unfortunately the car won't be ready for us until Monday, so we have to cool our jets till then. The next few days may be a little boring as a result.