“How are you finding it? Did you make the right decision?” – Early observations of living in Portugal

5 and 4 weeks ago, respectively, Rene and I got onto a plane and left our life in the UK behind. Since then multiple people have asked us variations of the following questions:

1. Have you already completely settled into your new lives?
2. How are you finding life in Portugal?
3. Did you (think you) made the right decision moving to portugal?

The answers to those questions are all in the realm of ‘we don’t know (yet)’ and ‘no’. The first week(s) of our life here was camping in our new rental home. The following 3 weeks have been unpacking, figuring out what was missing, and making sure at least all our admin and stuff were sorted so that we would have a solid base to start living from and build those new relationships, gather experiences, and start figuring out what would be next for us. And where that would be.

That doesn’t mean, of course, that we have not experienced anything but boxes and admin yet. We have had to venture out a few times. Whether it was by choice and for fun, or because we really had to (mostly when it involved shopping..), our first memories and observations have been made. So, in this post, I thought I’d share a few of those.

Observation 1: Learning Portuguese is a MUST.

Let me be clear: this does not come as a surprise or isn’t a revelation. It is something that we were already very much aware of. Having said that, we have come across many people who will tell you that ‘most people speak English and it’s not that pressing’. Sure, many people know a few words and you can have a basic conversation in a shop or bar, but, at least to me, that isn’t enough to get a connection with a new environment and its people.

Being able to respond to a quick question in said shop (“is that item left at the beginning of the belt yours?”), to understand what the delivery driver says and respond accordingly (and not just with “uuuuuhmmmmmm obrigada?”), being able to have small talk with the neighbours or the little boy who loves our cat and waves at it in the window will make all the difference to how we experience our new life here, and, also, how people will perceive and engage with us.

On 10th of April we will start our 12-week A1 Portuguese course. 2 evenings a week + homework will hopefully get us going with the basics rather quickly, and we are planning on packing through to at least C1 in one go because being able to have small talk is vital to me feeling at home somewhere.

Observation 2: Personal Space invaders

So far I’ve noticed, in shops particularly, that personal space isn’t really a thing. People have a thing to do, and they will do it, whether or not you are there. Need that thing that someone is also looking at? Just dive in front and grab it. Moving from aisle to aisle? People in your way? No such thing. Just go for it. It’s not rudeness, it’s just the way of things, it feels.

Another peculiar observation in this same category is that since our home offices have windows directly onto the street, we have become part of that public space. Or, well, when I say we, I mostly mean Lily. She is attracting quite the attention, just lounging in the sunlight on her scratch pole or in the window sill. People literally stop in their tracks or even trace their steps back to come and have a look at her. And more than look, they tap the window with their faces pressed against it to say hi to the friggin’ cat, and then also give me a wave, while working/trying to work. Over the last few weeks we feel like we’ve become quite the attraction.

Observation 3: Wine over beer

Again, not a surprise, as we are very much aware that Portugal is more of a wine than a beer country. But, choosing our weekend poison now is quite different, and there is a lot of learning to do on our end to get more familiar with the different types of wines, especially the regional ones.

We’ve already taken quite fondly to the Vinho Verdes. This isn’t a ‘green wine’, but rather a young wine. Instead of maturing, the wine is sold as a finished product as early as 3 months after harvesting the grapes. They come in various varieties, including, of course, red and white, but so far the whites have been our favourite. Light and refreshing, and, we imagine, absolutely perfect for an after-work drink in the garden or on the beach! And then there’s port wines, of course. Last weekend we took visiting family to Sandeman for a tour and tasting, and in that segment there is a huge variety to enjoy and explore as well. It’s a hard knock life.

As for beer, a lot of it will have to come from our own brewing adventures. This isn’t necessarily a bad thing. Not having the insanely varied selection that we had in the UK will mean we’ll have to resort to experimenting a bit more ourselves. We’ve already found a brewing supplier here in Portugal, and tomorrow we start rebuilding our homebrew stash. First we will start with 4 of our core beers: a weizener, saison, blond and stout. After we’re back at an acceptable stash level, we’ll also seek to brew/clone some of our favourite adventurous UK beers, including some pastry stouts, sours and, who knows, an imperial aged on port barrels?

There are, of course, also wonderful Portuguese breweries, including some in Porto that we have already visited. We’ll try and visit as many as we can over the next few years to sample and spread the word. As soon as we’ve bought a car some weekend trips are on the to-do list. We can make it a whole blog category I bet.

Observation 4: Huge, wonky, wonderful, great quality vegetables

This might look like I’m trying to make people back in the UK jealous. Well, I totally am. We left just before the vegetable availability in the UK became really, really dire. Social media showed us the empty shelves and lack of many staple vegetables. So, walking into the supermarket here is an absolute treat. We have yet to pluck up the courage to hit the local shops as well with some basic portuguese, but the choice there is also wonderful.

In the UK and Netherlands, a lot of the vegetables are ‘curated’ with some weird standards (for far too low prices). Here the veggies are found in all their wonky glory and I am here for it. Letting them grow and doing their thing also allows them to just GROW infinitely it seems. Especially the peppers are MASSIVE units. And the taste, they taste wonderfully!

Also, vegetables seem to be of higher quality. They last ages in the fridge (and not even our good fridge), and where in the UK the success rate of avocados was around 40/60, it’s 90/10 here.

Observation 5: Kindness gets you a long way

Yes, we still have to learn 99% of the language.
Personal space invaders are still a thing we need to get used to.
We don’t know all the right things and places to eat and drink and combine yet, so we will make some weird and wrong choices…

But, despite all of this, there’s nothing that indicates that we have made the wrong decision (for us). Everyone we’ve encountered so far has been amazing. From the estate agents to our landlord himself (even though we’ve only met him once for 15 minutes). The people in shops and supermarket, in restaurants and bars. The neighbour upstairs, delivery drivers and window replacement guys, all wonderful, whether we understood each other or not. Everyone was friendly, patient and kind.

Soon, hopefully, we’ll meet many other people as well as we venture out to practice our portuguese and explore this wonderful country further, looking for a place to make our own, because even though our upstairs neighbour is a wonderful guy, his music taste isn’t ours, and, surely, he wears shoes made of lead…

But, until we find that place, this view in our garden will pull us through!