I've worked my way down through Spain to Lisbon. I get a taxi to the hotel with a woman driver. That's a rarity here as in most places. She works the late shifts so she can be with her 14 year old son in the mornings. I am beyond lucky with my life and feel so pathetic that I have the chance to travel for a year, eating out twice a day and yet I still have a stomach full of anxiety and I can’t even think of what I will do for the rest of my life without adding fear to my already overwrought digestion.
Lisbon is wet. The white cobblestones are so slippery that I walk with great care, protecting my expensive back operation. The next day it’s still bleak. I walk gingerly and find a beautiful old cafe run by two old ladies. I have the Portuguese tart of course, I’m not a great fan of custard but I have to have it with the Pingado coffee that is the Portuguese version of a macchiato. It’s strong and gets me moving. The shop is small and filled with male workers, grabbing coffee to go and the ubiquitous tart alongside.
I head towards Cafe A Brasiliera, built in 1905 and home of the Bica, a strong espresso. It became a meeting point for Portuguese intellectuals, writers and poets so I’m keen to try the coffee. It’s a wonderful art nouveau building, chequerboard floor, wooden details, great surrealist style paintings, mirrors and fantastic waiters. It’s packed with tourists and I squeeze into a small marble table and order a bica and another Nata tart in case the coffee's too strong.
It’s still raining as I emerge. I wander the streets looking at the tiled buildings everywhere. Art is built into this city! But it's starting to rain more heavily. There are tuk tuks here, as in Thailand, and they are offering cheap hour long tours of the city so I am won over by Fabio and his tuk tuk that is enclosed from the rain. He puts a rug over my legs and we're off.
Fabio is an aircraft engineer who has escaped Brazil and is retraining to work here where life, he thinks, is better. He’s got two kids back in Brazil that join him on holidays. He plays the guitar in cafes at night and sings. We go to the famed Miradors for the views but the fog has come in so I have to imagine them. We visit churches and he takes me on a tour of the old Alfama area where we drink the famous Ginga from an old lady who sits by her doorway with her homemade cherry liquor. The area is rundown but there’s a feeling that at night, everything would come alive. The tiled facades of the building are cracked but still amazing. It has such a 1950’s feel, as if it were put on pause.
I’m eventually dropped at the Time Out Market where I can lunch, Fabio offers me his card and tells me he’d happily take me around on his day off. He’s in his early forties, just starting to grey, soft sculptured lips and eyes of blue. I should take up his offer but I know I won’t. I didn’t run away to have a brief moment with a passing stranger. I’m not ready for that. I don't even go to see him playing his guitar tonight.
The Time Out Market or Mercado da Ribeira is a wonderful old marketplace from the 1890’s. I lunch there on big hunks of herbed octopus on a bed of fluffy, buttery potato. There are beautiful retro shops here as well. I go a bit crazy and buy a haul of vintage looking products. I love that about Europe, how they embrace and nurture their past.
I decide to walk back home, it's quite a way but the sun has begun to shine the city and the stones under my feet are not so hazardous. I pass over the bridge of the Rua Nova do Carvalho which was once Lisbon’s Red Light District and is now full of bars. It’s been gentrified since the old days of the port city when sailors hung around the area. It’s too early for the bars and it still looks slightly seedy from the bridge where I stand and the bright pink road beneath has seen better times.
That night I dine at Jamie Oliver's restaurant, close to my hotel. I've never dined in one because they're usually expensive but the Portuguese one is cheap. I have an amazing prawn linguine and then I'm off to bed as tomorrow I'm on the road again.
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