movingtoportugal

Life in Portugal can be tricky enough when you’re trying to negotiate the endless paperwork or identify strange looking cuts of meat in the butcher’s, let alone when you try and work out how to speak Portuguese.

How to speak Portuguese – be prepared to study hard

The difficulty with learning Portuguese is that what you say and hear doesn’t seem to correspond much with the written language, especially when you live in the Algarve where people have a heavy accent. With accents peppering the words and changing both the sound and the emphasis, Portuguese is a hard language to master. We have been here for nearly 3.5 years now and are still nowhere near fluent, although I do feel that we are learning more every day. In our case it doesn’t help that we both work from home, rather than having jobs where we spend all day with people speaking Portuguese.

If you are moving to Portugal soon or even just holidaying here, here are my top ten (tongue-in-cheek) Portuguese language cheats that will hopefully help you out.

Speak fast

When you are uncertain of what you are saying in another language, it is natural to speak slowly and try to say each word perfectly. If you do this in Portugal, you may well be met with a blank look. Instead, speak as fast as you can, pretending that you are speaking flawless Portuguese. You will have a much better chance of being understood.

Uma imperial

A beer please!

‘Uma imperial se faz favour.’

This means ‘a small beer please.’ In most bars you will get a lovely, small glass of beer. Given how hot the Portuguese summer is, ordering a succession of small beers means you don’t end up drinking the too-warm second half of a pint. In some touristy areas, even if you ask for an imperial you will be given a pint (‘uma caneca’) anyway, so that the bar can charge you more.

This phrase is often usefully followed by ‘mais uma, se faz favor’ – ‘one more please!’

Obrigado/obrigada

To say ‘thank you’ in Portuguese, men say ‘obrigado’ and women say ‘obrigada.’ The gender of the person to whom you are speaking does not matter. This is FACT, even though some Portuguese people will try to tell you that’s not how it works.

Can to be this

‘Pode ser isto’ – the literal translation is ‘can to be this,’ but this rather awkward phrase is actually used to mean ‘can I have this,’ so you can use it in shops, cafés, restaurants and anywhere else where you are able to point to the item that you desire.

Pode ser isto – useful for buying all kinds of things

If in doubt, smile and nod

When we first moved here, even basic interactions could be a struggle, despite six months of me obsessively playing Portuguese language CDs in the car anytime I drove anywhere before we left England.

There were many times when neighbours, shop assistants and others that I interacted with tried to make pleasant conversation about the weather, football or other random subjects. At first I would freeze in such situations, looking like a rabbit caught in the headlights while my fellow conversationalist painstakingly repeated the sentence in a futile attempt to make me understand. The result was usually an awkward silence while I blushed and felt stupid.

These early struggles allowed me to develop the smile and nod policy. Now when someone speaks to me and I don’t understand them, I don’t panic, I just smile and nod. Astonishingly, 90% of the time this is accepted as an appropriate and satisfactory response on my part. Although I still have no idea what has been said to me, instead of just feeling tongue-tied and stupid, I use my nodding time to replay the sentence in my mind and try to catch the key words that will make it all become clear.

Of course, this policy is far from fail-safe and it is absolutely not to be used when dealing with government officials, lawyers or anyone else where you could be agreeing to something serious without realising it!

Instantly get rid of excess waiters!

Warding off additional waiters

‘Já pedi’ – this means ‘already asked,’ and is a handy phrase for using in bars or cafés where you have already ordered but you spy a second waiter approaching with a notepad and an eager look in his eye.

Write it down

If you need to deal with officials in Portugal who don’t speak English, it’s often helpful to write down your request and take it with you on a piece of paper. That way if you bungle the pronunciation and they look confused, you can just hand over your pre-written request and – provided your handwriting is neat – be understood.

This approach was essential when we were trying to obtain our atestado document to prove that we lived in our village and had to ask two local residents to sign our form (apparently in the village council’s eyes the rental agreement for our apartment was not sufficient proof that we lived there).

I’ve also successfully used this method the first time I ordered a large takeaway and the first time we had to exchange our empty gas bottle – knowing that my grasp of Portuguese was at the time insufficient for these (now mundane) conversations, I took along my trusty piece of paper, which on both occasions saved the day.

Write it down

After-dinner conversation

‘A conta, se faz favor.’

In Portugal you are welcome to sit and relax once you have finished your meal in a restaurant. You can enjoy the company of your friends or family and engage in after-dinner conversation, without the staff desperately trying to get you out of the door so that they can turn the table. This is part of what makes dining in Portugal such a pleasant experience. However, for those ready to pay and leave, it can be a little frustrating. If that’s you, use this phrase, which means ‘the bill, please.’ Of course you could also use the internationally recognised mime of writing on your hand!

Have a glass of wine

It’s astonishing how much more confident a glass of wine can make your attempts to speak Portuguese. After three glasses I’m unfailingly convinced that I’m fluent, much to the dismay of my Portuguese friends.

Confidence in a glass!

And if all else fails…

‘Desculpe, não entendo.’

If all else fails, you can resort to this phrase, which means ‘I’m sorry, I don’t understand.’
Our efforts to speak Portuguese have been overwhelmingly well received. Even when we get in a muddle and mispronounce things or say something silly, the fact that we have tried always goes down well. Even if you have no plans to work out the full intricacies of how to speak Portuguese, a few choice phrases will ensure you stand out and earn you service with a smile wherever you go.
Boa sorte!

If you want to hear more about our adventures with the Portuguese language, why not check out our book: Moving to Portugal

Image credits: Wikimedia Commons, Flickr

Confession time.

I’m rather ashamed to say that, after over three years in the Algarve, I still cannot speak Portuguese particularly well.

Don’t get me wrong, I do get by, but I think the naïve, pre-expat me thought it would be much easier than this.

Well, let me tell you, it’s not. After three years, I don’t really think my Portuguese skills match those I had in French when I took my GCSE. And, on the subject of those French skills, they’ve now left me completely. Whenever I try to speak French now, I just come out with bad Portuguese.

Learning Portuguese isn’t Easy

So, what should I have done differently? Well, first and foremost, I should have looked for language trainers before I left. Sure, the books and CDs helped a bit, but they tend to teach you a “Queen’s English” variation of a language, which sounds little like real people actually speak it.

I should also have dedicated a lot more time to learning Portuguese. Yes, you do “absorb” the language once you arrive, but absorbing means that after three years I understand a bit of the news, the occasional radio advert and snippets of people’s conversations. It doesn’t mean I can speak any more than pigeon Portuguese.

I really do wish that I’d spent every spare minute in the run up to our move absorbing Portuguese. I should have typed “where should I take Portuguese classes in London?” into Google back in 2009! Because I didn’t, I’m still playing catch-up.

This is the year I get it sorted. I can’t have the Portuguese version of Enid Blyton’s “Famous Five” taunting me from my bedside table any longer. I’ll be fluent one day—just you wait!

M is for Mopeds

Anyone who knows me personally will know that these had to get a mention. After all, they are my current favourite toy (move over iPhone, you’re no longer the new kid on the block).

A few weeks back we took delivery of the two shiny electric scooters you will see in the photograph. These are the perfect transportation between apartment, café and beach (but not bar – you wouldn’t want to wobble too much on these little things!)

Electric Mopeds in Portugal

These electric mopeds seem to be becoming increasingly popular in our area. Restricted to just 25km/h, they have pedals and are legally treated as pushbikes. You don’t need license, registration or insurance and, best of all, you can ride them on the lovely network of Algarve cycle paths.

Above all, I’m now a southern-European; I could hardly NOT have bought a moped now could I?

N is for Nobre (Hotdogs!)

OK, so my choice for “N” is perhaps a little weak. But these inexplicably popular and rather nondescript hotdog frankfurters were the first thing that sprang to mind – and, if I’m being honest, I couldn’t think of anything else!

All Portuguese supermarkets have a surprisingly large section of tinned hotdog sausages. While we often go months without eating them, there is usually a tin of this Nobre brand in our cupboard ready to be thrown in a burger bun with fried onions and mustard when a particularly troublesome hangover rears its head.

Nobre Hotdogs in Portugal

We have also encountered Nobre hotdogs at tourist attractions such as Zoomarine Algarve. These come with little thin potato chips inside that make for a surprisingly agreeable, crunchy addition. So, there you have it. N is for Nobre.

O is for Olhão

I have chosen Olhão for my “O” for two reasons.

First of all this town in the East Algarve is quite unique in that it is still essentially a working town that remains stubbornly untouched by tourism (although a very posh hotel and spa at the western end of the seafront is doing its best to change that).

Olhão is a down to earth kind of town with lots of restaurants and shops, and also an agreeable place to walk along the waterfront. From here, ferries run to the beautiful beach islands of Armona and Culatra – where a five minute walk can provide you with peace and tranquility, even in the peak of the summer season.

Ilha da Armona - Accessed from Olhao

My second reason for choosing Olhão is that the word itself separates the men from the boys in terms of Portuguese pronunciation. While phonetically, an English speaker may be tempted to say “Ol-how,” “ão” with the accent over the “a” in Portuguese make a “yaow” sound (“yaow” as in “how,” not as in “sow”).

So, what you are looking for is “OL-YAOW” – go on, practice it!

Now you’re in the mood for Portuguse, perhaps it’s time to learn a bit more? Here’s how we started off!

Get Talking Portuguese in Ten Days (Teach Yourself)

Image credit: Visitar Portugal

J is for Junta (de freguesia)

The Junta de Freguesia is the equivalent of a local parish council in the UK. The junta itself usually refers to the town or village hall. In many small villages the junta shares a building with the local post office, so is a place you end up visiting fairly often.

I am tempted to be cynical and use the fact that the Junta is an official building to head off on yet another rant about Portuguese bureaucracy – but I won’t. I will instead say that, in our experience at least, the local junta represents the friendly end of the Portuguese bureaucratic experience.

A Junta de Freguesia in Portugal

One of the key pieces of paper a new Portuguese resident needs to get from the junta is a form called an atestado. This is often required when applying for Portuguese residency and requires two local voters to vouch for the fact you live in the town or village. It is worth getting an atestado, as the need for one seems to randomly pop up in all kinds of situations!

K is tricky

The letter “K,” strictly speaking, is not part of the Portuguese language. Although it is included in the Portuguese alphabet (and said, phonetically, as “kappa,”) it is only found within words loaned to the language from other tongues.

So there you go, I don’t really have a “K,” but you got some free language trivia. Perhaps “K” is for “Kop Out.”

L is for Lisboa

I actually thought of a few different things for the letter “L,” including lingueirão (razor clams), Lagos (our favourite town in the West Algarve), and laranjas (oranges). But, how can I not choose the country’s beautiful capital city?

Looking over the Tagus from Lisbon

Lisboa (or Lisbon to the rest of the world), is now the place we head to for many of our short holidays (you can read about one of our trips to Lisbon here, and also find out about neighbouring Sintra and Cascais here).

Now we have been to Lisbon several times, it’s wonderful to have built up a general sense of direction in the city and got used to using the subway system and local trains. Together with being able to speak semi-understandable Portuguese, this makes us feel a lot more “local” in the city – and it’s a wonderful feeling.

As I am mentioning Lisbon, I feel I should draw readers attention to the wonderful book, “The Moon Come to Earth” by Philip Graham, an American who spent some time living in the city and who I interviewed in this post. His book can be found at the link below:

The Moon, Come to Earth: Dispatches from Lisbon

This time last year – we were deliberating as to what to do about a car of our own, and beginning to enter a “worn down by read tape” phase – you can read the post here.

We don’t really know how to speak Portuguese properly yet, even though we have been here over two years. Sure, we cope day-to-day and have even managed to read some novels in Portuguese, but our ability to speak and comprehend plateaued after the first year and our progress stalled.

Many people say that you can never properly understand a country and its culture until you can speak the language, so we decided a couple of weeks ago that it was time to arrange proper lessons and finally learn (properly) how to speak Portuguese.

Today we had our first lesson. Our tutor, Andrew, is a local expat who has spent several years intensively learning the language. The fact he is English means he understands the key differences in the two languages, and this gives him the ability to identify the key areas we will find difficult.

I only wish we had started to do this sooner. Within ten minutes of the lesson beginning, I realised that I have been violating the correct pronunciation of words that I have been using confidently for the past two years!

We are taking lessons along with three members of our extended family who live locally. We are all at different levels of existing knowledge, but we quickly decided to all start from the beginning together, when it became clear that even the more confident amongst us had been getting some of the basics wrong.

How to Speak Portuguese

Two of our party have already been having classroom based lessons at a local school, but the kind of teaching Andrew delivers already seems to be a better way to learn how to speak Portuguese. Large classes containing mixed nationalities and abilities tend to move at the pace of the slowest learners, and one of our party commented that the ability to ask questions of someone who shares our native language is invaluable in the context of making everything make sense.

Within the first lesson we have all already began to learn how to conjugate verbs, which I think is key to learning any language – indeed, it is the way I learned French at school. Once verb conjugation is mastered, you have the ability to look anything up in a dictionary and get your point across – from there, your pace of learning is only held back by how quickly you can increase your vocabulary.

I am very excited to finally be learning how to speak Portuguese properly. I am also excited that I can order my coffee and cake tomorrow with the correct pronunciation – and I have high hopes for a positive reaction from the lady in the local cafe!

Just one lesson in, I can sincerely give a high recommendation for Andrew’s inexpensive and well-structured private lessons. He is based in the East Algarve and travels to us to teach us in the comfort of our own home. If you are in the Algarve and want to learn how to speak Portuguese properly, I would be delighted to provide his contact details.

Here are a couple of learning aids for those keen to pick up the language:

501 Portuguese Verbs (Barron’s 501 Portuguese Verbs)

Rosetta Stone Version 4 TOTALe: Portuguese (Brazil) Level 1, 2 & 3 (Mac/PC)

It’s trivia time this week on Moving to Portugal. We’ve just come to the end of a long run of different guests staying with us, and this morning I was reflecting on some of the little bits of information about life in Portugal that sometimes come out in conversation, and are a surprise to those who haven’t been here before. So, here we have a light-hearted list of ten things not everybody knows about life in Portugal.

1. There is a reason why people often spend what seems like an unusually long time at the cash machine. The Portuguese Multibanco system is highly sophisticated, and allows you do to all kinds of things. Want to go fishing? Buy your license at the ATM. Need to pay your tax bill? Use the reference number on the bill, and pay it directly from your account using your cash machine (a quite scary task when thousands of euros disappear instantly from your account…. you will definitely want to double check that reference number). Want to book a seat on the train to Lisbon? Yep, you do it with Multibanco. With this in mind, try not to get impatient in the queue for the cash machine!

Portugal Multibanco Machine

2. There is a nominal fee made in Portugal for a TV license. It is charged automatically on your electricity bill.

3. Petrol is even more expensive in Portugal than it is the UK.

4. So are cars. Due to the ways cars are taxed here, they are a LOT more expensive. On the bright side, the climate down here in the Algarve means they are less likely to rust.

5. When, after a meal, you appear to have become invisible to the waiter as soon as you have been served your coffees, it doesn’t mean standards of service have suddenly dropped. Here in Portugal, people often sit for some time after finishing a meal. On one occasion, I even saw someone place head on table and have a short nap before leaving. We don’t have a table-turning culture. Just ask for the bill as and when you are ready to leave.

6. Shopping centres here universally stay open until 11pm, even on a Sunday.

Fernando Pessoa

7. Portuguese people typically revere literary figures at least as highly as famous musicians and sports stars. In an increasingly dumbed-down, X-Factor loving world, this is a wonderful thing.

8. It is unclear why there is a nationwide shortage of all euro coins in Portugal, but there is. Prepare for wrath if you intend to pay for a 2.08€ grocery transaction with a note and you don’t have the 8 cents. Once you’re known in your local town you may be sent on your way with your goods and asked to come back tomorrow with the right change!

Portugal - Where are the Euro Coins?

9. When eating, it is customary to keep your napkin to the left of your plate, and not on your lap. I’m not sure why this is, but it is practical. Constantly reaching down for a napkin below the table results in sardiney fingers making clothing smell unpleasant.

10. It can get cold here in winter. Really bloody cold. Without central heating, it can feel colder than the UK. People never believe this, but those of us that live here don’t just say it for a laugh. People who have actually visited us during the winter know this to be true, but, for some strange reason, May and September always seem to be “the popular months” for most!

So, I’ve thought of the first ten. Can any Portuguese residents think of more? If so, please comment below.

PS. Anyone wishing to become familiar with Portugal’s literary output would do well to begin here:

The Book of Disquiet (Penguin Modern Classics)

Image credits: anabananasplit starrynight1 FreeFoto

It was when I was in London a couple of weeks back that I got to thinking about the ways in which we were becoming “more Portuguese.” I had just bowled into my hotel, smiled, said “Ola, bom dia” loudly to the receptionist, then gone very red when I realised I had spoken in Portuguese instead of English.

It wasn’t the only time I did it during that trip to the UK. In fact, after that initial embarrassing experience, I started to over-think it, and found myself saying “good afternoon” before beginning a checkout transaction in Tesco Express, because I was translating the Portuguese “boa tarde” INTO English in my head before saying it. Saying good afternoon in a London Tesco may be polite, but I was looked at as if I was trying to parody a city gent from the 1930s.

Now, I know people say “when you start thinking in the language that’s when you are fluent.” Well, I am still very very far from fluent. But, in these day-to-day interactions, it has obviously become instinctive, and to such an extent that it feels more natural in some situations speaking Portuguese than speaking English. This realisation made me think about the other ways we are now “being Portuguese.” It must be time for another list post:

Being Portuguese

1. 10pm now seems to be a perfectly sensible time to do the weekly grocery shop. Midnight seems like a perfectly sensible time to light the barbecue.

2. If we are due somewhere at 2pm and have still not left the house at 5 past, I don’t really see that as being late, as such. (Although to be honest, my timekeeping has never been particularly good, I just now live somewhere where a lack of punctuality is more ingrained!)

3. If a person dawdles in front of me in a shop queue, I don’t feel an instant blood-pressure rise and begin seething and silently blaming that person for all the problems in my life. I just wait.

4. The same applies when the car in front stops for several minutes to chat to someone they’ve just spotted walking along the road.

5. The other day I saw a sardine recipe which called for the sardines to be gutted, and my horrified reaction was: “WHY would you gut them? How silly.”

Sardines are not usually gutted in Portugal

6. Still on a fishy theme, I actually find myself craving bacalhau at least once per week.

7. I now know which days of the week the butcher has lamb, so I don’t end up sulking because I can’t find any on a Tuesday.

8. 27 degrees Celsius is no longer defined as a “hot day.” In fact it is more likely to cause us to remark that “I’m sure it was warmer last year.”

9. I no longer check the weather online every single day. It’s summer, and therefore it will be sunny.

10. Carpets feel weird (that one was my wife´s contribution).

Just another Sunday in Portugal

Settling in another country is like getting older. When you are about 25, you look back at your 21 year old self and think “I can’t believe how little I knew.” Then you get to 30 and think the same about your 25 year old self. After 20 months of “being Portuguese,” I look back at posts I wrote after just six months in the country and can’t believe I thought I was already settled. It’s all a learning curve, and I feel that even after this long we still have a long way to go. It´s a good job that a fair proportion of it is jolly good fun.

Image credit (Portuguese flag): tiseb

Last Saturday, I asked my wife if we had any butter left in the fridge. Her reply was, “we only have butter without salt.”

Now, I’m sure you’re wondering where on earth I’m going with this post, so let me explain. If we still lived in England, her answer would have been, “we only have unsalted.”

Learning Portuguese - Unsalted Butter

In Portuguese though, it’s not called unsalted butter, it’s called “mantiega sem sal.” Butter without salt. My wife was translating Portuguese into English and not the other way round.

This rather dull dairy-related anecdote is actually really huge to us. It’s like the next significant stage in our integration into Portugal. We are finally, if only very rarely, starting to think in Portuguese.

After this happened, we started to weigh up our progress learning Portuguese, as we approach the 18 month point in our Portuguese adventure. My wife recalled that the butter incident wasn’t the first time she had thought in Portuguese – a couple of weeks previously she had been unable to remember the English word for chives, only recalling the Portuguese.

Don’t for one moment think that this means we are approaching fluency, or even competence, in speaking Portuguese. However….it is surprising how much has gone in subconsciously. Sometimes the radio will come on in the morning, I will listen to an advert and think to myself “hang on, I understood that.”

Even stranger was the other day when I found myself singing a tune to myself that I had heard. It was a Portuguese song called “O Que Faz Falta.” It hadn’t really occurred to me that what I was singing was Portuguese. Doesn’t mean I understood what I was singing but still!

Whilst the language learning is progressing, wading through the cross-border bureaucracy is still a hateful nightmare. Never be fooled into thinking that if you live in the European “Union” that all European nations sing from the same hymn sheet.

I appreciate that our exact situation of working in one country and living in another is unusual, but from the reactions we get from official bodies you would think it is the first time anybody has ever done it.

We have just had to force ourselves to sit back and let the situation unfold at its own pace. Back at the start of January we had to send a form to HM Revenue and Customs in the UK. HMRC are so behind that we were told that it would take them six week before they had time to OPEN our letter. At the time, that meant we expected a response in mid-February. When we called back at the end of February we were told their “target date” for opening our letter was now mid-March.

Our Portuguese accountant shrugs a lot and constantly says reassuring things like “it’s not your problem.” Yet somehow it feels like it is! I’m starting to realise that my fondness for a slower pace of life has limits.

Danger: European Red Tape

When you have to wait three months for a response to a letter you have to learn patience. On this occasion it is England slowing things down and not Portugal, but the way European freedom of movement and employment law works in practice is a cruel joke, with all of the countries seemingly free to interpret legislation in their own way.

If we were actually trying to claim ANY kind of benefit, I could understand all the delays, but all we are actually trying to do is work hard and pay tax on the money – I can’t believe how hard it is proving to be! If sitting on our butts claiming benefits was our plan, then we hardly would have left England now would we?

I’m starting to rant so I’m going to sign off now. To sum up, I now know my first song in Portuguese but still haven’t got to the bottom of my tax situation. It would be kind of useful if it were the other way around.

PS. One thing that has been helping with our language learning is a new “Portuguese Language Lessons” page we recently “liked” on Facebook. If you do the Facebook thing, check it out!

To conclude my retrospective look at our first exciting year in Portugal, here, as promised in my last posts are our high points and respective low points of our first year in the Algarve.

THE HIGHS

1. Sharing our new home with friends and family - some of our happiest times here to date have been those we have shared with our visitors. A big thank you, in no particular order, to Richard, Pam, Kat, Rob, Rick, Bill, Mike, Tom, Amy, Hannah, Ben, Dionne, Jacob, Emma, Steve and Nat, and all the other people coming to see us soon.

2. Enjoying all the scenery the Algarve has to offer – and soaking in water from the cold (lake under the waterfall at Pego Do Inferno,) to the warm (Montegordo in August.)

Portugal - eating out in the Algarve

3. Eating and cooking – from fish feasts at the cheap and wonderful Vela 2 in Tavira, to barbecues on the terrace, and tapas over the border in Seville. The gastronomic wonders of this part of the world have lived up to all of our expectations.

4. Meeting people - Portugal has made us very welcome. Various people spring to mind: friendly neighbours in Tavira who put up with our slow Portuguese, a certain bar owner who offered us advice and encouragement during the wobbliest of our early days (you know who you are,) and all the lovely people who provide advice on the forums and here on this blog. There are some very good people in this part of the world. I must also give a special mention to the surly young shop assistant in our local mini mercado, who now greets us with a smile and saves her visible disdain for the tourists

5. Small victories: Finally getting our residency, finally getting our broadband and cable TV, successfully building on our limited Portuguese, and finally getting a smile from the girl in the shop (see above.)

THE LOWS

1. Winter 2009. Finding out first hand, by enduring the wettest winter since 1870, that Portugal is a cold country with hot sun, and NOT a tropical paradise. Our first four months in the mouldy disaster that was our house in Tavira are not a period of my life I would be keen to repeat.

2. High Summer. Realising that the Algarve just gets TOO busy in July and August.

Mouldy memories - Portugal 2009

3. Trips to England. A means to an end, but it would be great to have less of them – they really mess with your routine.

4. Red Tape. Although when you finally get the piece of paper you need it feels like a triumph, getting there can be hellish – and you do end up having a sense of foreboding with regard to your next encounter with officialdom.

5. Meeting people. Figured I would put this in both sections. Most people we have encountered in this past year have been great, but as ever there have been a few exceptions. Cliquey, gossipy types, jobsworths, people who push you out the way in Easyjet’s speedy boarding queue and people from HM Revenue and Customs who can’t read forms properly have all made my shit list over the past twelve months!

So what advice would we offer to those considering chasing their own dream to Portugal or another sunny location?

Do your research, make sure you are sure, then save some money and do it – and when you are going through the hugely stressful last six months before the big move, always remember to soak up every minute of the adventure – you may come to miss the non-stop raw, emotional, scary excitement of changing your life. I’d certainly do it all again

It is now just over a year since we waved goodbye to Old London Town, and got on the plane to Portugal, leaving our old life behind.

Needless to say, the year has been one of the most eventful of our lives, and I’m finding it surprisingly difficult to work out how to summarise our first year in a blog post.

When you move abroad, especially to somewhere you have fallen in love with on holidays, it is surprising when, after a few months, you realise that you haven’t at any point felt that

Boats at Olhao - Moving to Portugal

undiluted happy holiday feeling.

If holidaying somewhere you adore could be likened to the electric, lustful feelings of the start of a relationship, going to live there is rather more akin to the deep rooted contentment gained through a happy marriage.

This is no bad thing, and there have been plenty of wonderful moments along the way that have lived up our initial hopes.

One day a couple of weeks ago, my wife and I were both frantically busy with work and within seconds of closing our laptops were both leaning over the kitchen sink – I was shelling prawns while she scaled sardines, ready for some guests coming over for a midweek dinner. We were both stressed. It wasn’t until I remembered we were preparing cheap and fresh seafood within seconds of finishing work, rather than fighting through the crowds on the way to a tube station, that it occurred to me that we were in fact living the dream we waited for.

This does go some way to illustrating my point. When you go to live somewhere, real life moves there with you. When you are on holiday, real life is put into a state of suspended animation until you get home and pick up the big pile of bills on the doormat. We ARE living our dream, but those bills still arrive on a daily basis, and wherever you live you can have weeks that suck and leave you thinking you need a HOLIDAY – even if the beach is ten minutes away.

Our one year Portugal anniversary has caused us to look back at the last year, and we do feel we have made substantial progress in integrating here, even if sometimes this progress happens so slowly you don’t notice it at the time.

Speaking Portuguese is an example of this. Now when we go into shops, restaurants, garages, we speak Portuguese without it occurring to us that we ARE speaking Portuguese. We didn’t actually realise this until some relatives pointed it out after observing us in a supermarket, and it was a very rewarding feeling. Even more pleasing was when I picked up a Portuguese cooking magazine the other day and realised that there were entire paragraphs I could understand. Compared to my wife I thought I had been decidedly slack when it came to learning the language, so I am encouraged by how much does seem to go in without you noticing.

Sunset over the Algarve near Barrill Beach

Another pleasing change which started to occur after about six months was that we stopped having those wobbly days or weeks when we questioned our decision to move. These are now few and far between and affirm our decision.

I figured the best way to look retrospectively over our first year would be to list five of the year’s high points, and five corresponding lows…stay tuned for my review of the first year, coming on Friday.