Will You Be My Porto Valentine?

Valentine's Day is quite well advertised in Porto, in many shops and restaurants, as a Day of Love.

About 9:30 we took metro to the João de Jesus stop at the El Corte Ingles department store for some shopping then meetup with expats in the restaurant: about 15 men at one table, and 25 women at another table! I met Ron, who started the group–I added my number to his whatsapp group. Also there was Bob and Victor, from church. A nice mix of newbies and old-time expats, discussing visas, property, and general topics. Barb met with the women. At noon we took the 903 bus many many stops west to Arabbiada Shopping Mall, for the long walk down narrow streets to the riverfront village of Afurada. We found the FCPorto Afurada restaurant! Cooking fresh fish over charcoal stoves outdoors – dourada and salmon, beer and wine and salad and bread, totaling $40.

Afurada is very picturesque fishing village, but completely remote from public transport. We walked along the riverfront a ways, then took a Bolt back home so that Barb could join her bible study group online at 3pm.

We went to Jazz at St.James, 8:30-10pm! performance by Brazilian duo: singer & guitarist/trumpeter (unnecessarily amplified), then wine & snacks afterwards – we helped clean up. Bolt car both ways, as the bus schedule is too unreliable.

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String Quartet Broken String

We attended a marvelous concert last night, at the Porto Museum of Casa do Infante , a beautifully-renovated 1325 building near the river. At one point it served as a customs house. The government sponsors Portuguese musicians to return from other European orchestras to perform in their homeland. We heard and saw this group play a traditional piece – Haydn string quartet Opus 20 #2. Then the modern Benjamin Britten's Three Divertimenti – the stunning last movement of which they performed as an encore. They performed (and I recorded) the Shostakovich Quartet #9, during which the first-violinist broke a string (it features several strongly-plucked chords!) and had to retreat&repeat!

EUA: tanto estrago em tão pouco tempo

As part of my effort to learn about Portugal, both the country and the language, I'm subscribing to the centrist newspaper, O Publico . There are plenty of newspapers: conservative tabloids, and socialist and communist-sponsored daily papers; I find O Publico to be most sober, with consistently interesting columnists and opinion pieces, in addition to some local (Porto) news, with just enough sporting news to keep me chatting with the taxi driver. Today's opinion piece sums up, I think, European pundits' view of the U.S. government. As the title puts it: so much damage in so little time. I shudder at the rank incompetence and corrupt behavior, demonstrating a cynical attitude toward public service, showing indeed that the cruelty is the point. What scandal, what damage will be the tipping point to collapse this government? And what will it take to recover from the damage? Who will be able to trust the US government again, ever? Only ni...

Música Tunas e Boémia

We attended an unusual concert last night: Música Tunas e Boémia (bands and parties) University student folk-music groups — big groups of 40 and more each! put on a great show of singing, playing, flag-twirling, tambourine-swinging, all at the major (private) concert hall. The most unusual thing about it was that nobody used any electronic device (except for microphone amplification)—no electric guitar or keyboard, no big drum set…every instrument and prop was hand-held. The singing was quite good, given the effort to synchronize 40 voices.

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