Um Dia na Loja! By Ruth L. Ataide

 

ü  Leite – Check!

ü  Porco – Check!

ü   Frango e Peru – Check!

ü  Legumes – Check!

ü  Azeitonas – Check!

ü  Tortillas – Check! What? Tortillas in Portugal?!?

Last fall we had the opportunity to visit Portugal for about six weeks. This was the fifth or sixth time I have visited Portugal now so I have some familiarity with life there, but this was to be different in that we had rented our own apartment. With a car available as well, this meant we were to have more independence than in previous trips when we stayed with friends. What would “ordinary life” be for we Americans living in a neighborhood in the small town of Mealhada near Loures? What would "um dia na loja" (a day at the store) be like for a country girl?

Our flight arrived in Lisboa on time at 11:00 p.m., and  our dear friends the Ekks met us with smiles and a camera in hand!  We greeted, hugged and drove to our new "home" and unloaded our 4 suitcases (weighing the airline limit) and carried them up a flight of stairs into our apartment - where is an elevator when you need one???  Oh well, the elevator would have been too small anyway and would “tell” us we Americans are too large…but that is another story!  The apartment was waiting and ready to be inhabited.  Marjorie of course had some food in hand so we wouldn't starve before getting to the store in the morning, and so we unpacked a few things, took showers and were in bed by midnight.  The next thing I knew, I woke up, looked around, remembered where I was, looked at the clock and was surprised -  we both slept a good 8 hours!  8:00 a.m., how could that be??? We don't sleep in, ever!  We were in Portugal!

Soon the apartment smelled of fresh brewed coffee... ahhhh!  We rolled up the shades and saw that it had been raining over night.  A beautiful cloudy rainy day in Portugal in a sweet cozy Portuguese home!  We eased into the day with coffee, (did I mention how good it tasted?) a small breakfast of fresh baked bread, butter and jelly around our tiny kitchen table. 

After lunch at our favorite restaurant here in Loures, we went grocery shopping.  Now I thought we were going to have to navigate this adventure by ourselves, but Marjorie, who loves to grocery shop and wouldn't pass up the chance to go, went with us.  Otto came along for the ride (not his favorite thing to do!), and we cruised through the aisles with grace and ease and of course with the 'system' she knows best.  Is it the same as in San Diego? Of course not, but the similarities are enough for one to figure out in due time. We found all the items on my list…milk, chicken, turkey, vegetables, and other items from across Europe. Wonderful and plentiful and the most striking thing is that while some grocery items in Portugal are very expensive (beef and cosmetics for example), other things, many of them the staples of the Portuguese diet, are very inexpensive. And there is the ever present smell of the fish in the stores ... Hello! 

We discovered that in Portugal they do indeed have everything needed to survive:  Fresh fruit, coffee, rice, flour, olives, olive oil, sea salt, hot sauce, and more. Our first trip was a success! And if I can do it, I think just about anyone can do it as well!

The tortillas? Well, they don’t really exist in the Portugal, and how can we Californians survive without our beloved Mexican food? What about half and half for our coffee? Well, we brought ‘mini moos’ from Smart and Final, two large boxes, and flour tortillas from Fresh and Easy! Problem solved!

A Path of Opportunity for Portugal? By Randy Ataide

Last fall I had the privilege of visiting Portugal for an extended period of time, culminating in twenty of my colleagues and students from our MBA program in San Diego joining us for studies in Portugal and France. Not only did we visit our old favorites of Sintra, Monsaraz, and Lisbon, new wonders were discovered in Azenhas do Mar, Colares and Tomar. The wonderful country of Portugal continues to amaze me.

But besides the pleasures of touring Europe in fall with family, friends and colleagues, it was also an opportunity for many meetings with Portuguese, German and French business leaders, economists, church leaders and pastors and most importantly the ordinary people of Portugal provided me with information and commentary that is simply unavailable in North America. Stated simply, the future of Europe is at much more risk than I would have supposed.

 Crazy talk, right? Rather than attempt to provide you with some great economic and business details and projections, I thought I would share some snippets of conversations which I have recorded below. These may give you some idea of what is happening in Europe. Consider:

“People here have long concluded that a single Euro for the Euro Zone cannot continue.” – Portuguese man, 11/7/11

“Yes, we have fine roads and bridges, but there are no businesses and commerce to support them. We are like a child given a pair of oversized basketball shoes to grow into but we have no ball to play with. ” – Lisbon CEO comment to me over lunch, 11/29/11

“The EU provided us much but the price we paid was abandoning our industries such as fishing, clothing and cork. Now what do we do?” – Said to me by a Portuguese man, 11/25/11.

The implications are fairly sobering for the smaller and less prominent countries of Europe such as Portugal and Ireland. At present they simply lack the economic dynamism of critical mass that is often needed to compete in the 21^st century, and when they attempt to venture into the world of high finance and global business, the results can be disastrous.  The data is clear that Portugal is in for an extended period of economic stagnation if not actual decline. As the gross domestic product of Portugal is roughly the same as the California city of San Diego, one can imagine how challenging it can be for Portugal to act decisively on the global economic stage. In the current system, they are, at best, a supporting actor.

What to do? The answers are neither simple nor painless, but one can imagine a future where Portugal is prosperous once again. A country with an incredible beauty and climate, significant natural resources, and an emotionally and politically stable national personality, Portugal has experienced both eras of great wealth and  as well as long droughts of decline and challenges. This is nothing particularly new to the minds of most Portuguese.

But from a North American geo-political and economic perspective, I believe that there is significant opportunity—actually, even game changing opportunity—for this small country that straddles Europe and Africa. Just as Turkey is the bridge between Europe and the vast continent of Asia, Portugal is similarly situated as a unique bridge between North and South. It is a shorter route from Portugal to Morocco, Tunisia, Libya and other countries than often traveling to various points within the state of California.

Many entrepreneurs, business leaders and forecasters I listen to point towards the coming ascendency of Africa, and with skilled leadership and good fortune, the long history of communication and cooperation with North Africa can provide a point of extraordinary opportunity for Portugal, one less reliant on the political, financial and economic powers of Northern Europe. There is additional opportunity to bridge the vast differences in these regions between the great world religions, cultures and languages, and Portugal can do this as well as any country.

Portugal may be down, but this country should not be counted out just yet. Better days are ahead.

Alentejo In My Heart! By Jose Arrais-Velez

When most people think of Portugal, they speak first of Lisbon, the large capital of our country, and the second oldest city in all of Europe. But there is so much more!

I am Joe Arrais-Velez, and I live in Massama, Portugal, with my lovely wife Paula and our three children. My parents were both born in Alentejo province, south of Lisbon and the River Tagus, in a village very close to the Spanish border. In this prime agricultural area of Portugal, you can imagine that I grew up appreciating and enjoying the bounty of Alentejo products; goat and lamb cheese, chorizo, proscuitto, wine, olive oil, bread and many other amazing products.

When you look to Alentejo it’s a bit like Kansas. It is very flat, very hot in the summer, very cold in the winter, with long fields of  wheat but also large and beautiful groves of olive trees and cork trees. What I like about Alentejo is the fact that you always feel relaxed when you visit that province, the amplitude of the horizon gives you a feeling of peaceful easy feeling, specially in Spring and Fall, when colors literally “explode” around you.

The taste of the Alentejo products are absolutely amazing, of course.  With the rich diversity of Portugal present in such a small part of the country, Alentejo things look and taste unique and different (at least to me). And one thing that the Alentejo and its hardworking citizens are very proud of  relates to the Mediterranean diet. What the rest of the world has ‘discovered’ in the past ten years has been a part of the Alentejo for thousands of years.

The foundation of the Alentejo diet is very simple. In the South, the people don’t like very much to cook with regular oils used in most parts of the world, like canola, corn or soy oils. For them,  olive oil is always a must, almost a “religion”!!! They fry with olive oil, they put olive oil in the salads, and other dishes they make, but it could never be considered to use anything but olive oil.

But the interesting part is the high quality of the products they grow and then use, and with that you can have excellent and very tasty food. A favorite is  “Açorda” (a bread soup that uses hot water that was boilled with a slice of dried cod fish or haddock, then some olive oil, smashed garlic and cilantro. Another is “Ensopado de Borrego” (young lamb cooked in hot water with olive oil, garlic and some herbs, then the tasty water that is soaked with hard wheat bread.  “Sopa de Cação”  is shark soup, again with slices of hard wheat bread and cilantro.

Of course there is much more than food, for Alentejo is also a great place to see old walled villages, cities, monumental old churches, palaces and castles, most of them with at least 500 years old. When a Portuguese talks about walled villages or cities with the castles above them on bluffs and mountains in the Alentejo, because of the flat geography the expanse of our land can be seen from many miles away...making these walled villages like “lighthouses” in flat fields. You don’t see that in Kansas!

So when you come to Portugal, make sure to visit Lisbon, Fatima, Porto and the other famous sites. But come and soak in my dear Alentejo, as it is one of the 10 other provinces we have in Portugal...all completely different with their own “DNA”!!!

An American Family In Portugal. By Marjorie Ekk

I am Marjorie Ekk and my husband Otto and I have lived in the beautiful country of Portugal for over 23 years.  While Otto was born and raised in Brazil, he had lived in the U.S for many years prior to our arrival. On a cold and foggy morning in January 1989, we arrived in LIsbon with our 3 small children and 20 bags of personal belongings. Now years later, we have come to feel just as much “at home” there as in our native California.  

The Portugal from when we first arrived is a far cry from the Portugal of 2012.   Oh yes, the castles and fortresses can still be seen in lots of the quaint villages, and yes the coffee and pastries are still the best ever and still baked fresh every day.  But other changes have entered that have changed the face of Portugal. 

I would like to share in this blog a few simple changes that I have observed through the years.   

When you come to live in a new country and culture it is surprising at the little things that you find yourself missing from your “old home”.  We had just been in Portugal a few days when one morning at breakfast our 5 year old son started crying.  He refused to eat his buttered bread.  This went on for days until we realized it was because this was not the pre sliced “Rainbow” bread that he was used to.  I looked all through the grocery store and could not find sliced bread only the fresh baked round loaves that you sliced at home.  He eventually grew to love the Portuguese fresh breads and within a couple years we noticed that grocery stores were starting to sell sliced bread in a plastic wrapper called “Bimbo” bread.  I have now seen this bread being sold here in California.  But I will say nothing beats the taste of fresh baked bread from a Portuguese bakery! 

Another change is that of television, which has come a long ways in 20 years.  Buying our first television in Portugal was a real experience!  Our friends agreed to go with us and show us where the “best deal” could be found for purchasing a TV.  First, it was over an hour and a half ride in traffic to get into downtown Lisbon, and then it took literally 45 minutes of driving around to find a parking place.  We eventually squeezed our van between two cars onto the sidewalk. (In America this is a guaranteed way to get your car towed away!)  As we got out of the van I whispered to my husband that no matter what, we were buying a TV today because of all the work it took our friend to get us here.

We went into the store and I was shocked at the high prices of TV’s, but as I vowed, we brought it home and promptly set it up. It was only then that we only got 2 channels!  The first one started mid morning and ended around 9 pm and the other channel started mid afternoon and ended around midnight.  There were programs like the “Invisible Man” from the 1950’s and a few other shows from that era, but also lots of local programming of “festas” in the villages and some news.  The Portugal of today is so very different! Now, televisions are affordable and in every home with cable that allows the Portuguese to see programs from around the world in their original languages. 

These have been a few reflections of my perspective with more to come from the “memory banks” of Marjorie along with some simple reflections of spending years in Portugal. While much has changed, much remains the same and the impact of television and bread are only an indication of many other changes that Portugal has experienced during our years there. Some change is good but for others I am not so sure.

 

One thing is for certain: What an adventure this has been!

Are the Portuguese Sad? By Randy Ataide

The headline from the past few days of a recently completed EU survey seems compelling: The Portuguese are a fundamentally glum people, ranking only above a few eastern European countries. Such news only reinforces the existing notions of the Portuguese as a melancholic, somber, and negative people, manifested in its beloved fado and the culture of the sea. Here is a link to the a report of the survey: http://www.globalpost.com/dispatch/europe/090604/portuguese-unhappy

But are the Portuguese really sad? Is this something inherent in the DNA of the people, perhaps cultured and reinforced in both the public and private lives of the nation? I am not so sure of this conclusion that is often laid on the Portuguese and while I would not think of them as exuberant (perhaps think of Australians?), I think that there is some level of stereotype going on here.

My starting point is that happiness is difficult to define, and not easily captured in survey questions. A quick internet search indicates that many nations and people groups appear to have high levels of sadness or unhappiness. In the U.S., our penchant for prescription drugs to medicate us for any actual or perceived ailment is not what I would call a manifestation of national happiness. And while there is some evidence that economic prosperity and wealth does correlate with personal happiness, the message of history and experience is that this is not always so either, for there are many miserable weatlhy people as well.

I am not a citizen of Portugal but travel there frequently, and the photo above of a festival in the Alentejo does not look like a manifestation of an unduly sad people. I was raised in Fresno in a very close and extended Portuguese family, many of whom were first generation immigrants from Portugal (Porto and Aveiro). Most of my Sundays as a youth were spent with my aunts, uncles, grandparents and others who would enjoy a long day around the table following mass, and even through my young eyes I could see the interesting and peculiar dynamics of being Portuguese. Loud? Certainly. Opinionated? Absolutely? Sad? I am not so sure.

What I think the Portuguese do have is much sharper and deeper sense of history than most other citizens, certainly far more than most Americans. In our family, my great-grandmother's property in Aveiro was not sold until the late 1960's, even though she emigrated to the U.S. in 1916, following her husband who came to the U.S. in 1910. Why in the world would anyone keep property in a country in which you had not visited for over 45 years, and had no chance of ever returning to in your life? This is certainly not an American habit, but I think it gives us some insight into what others perceive to be the sadness in the Portuguese. There is something deep within all Portuguese, even those dispersed throughout the world, that the they have always been a people of history, and we cherish and long for those reminders of our past.

Are there formidable hurdles in front of the Portuguese in the 21st century? There certainly are, and it would be wise for the Portuguese to confront these challenges in an honest, direct and forceful way, which may not be what they are accustomed to. But there is nothing inherently in them that can or should prevent them from persevering and ultimately having a more positive future. So tune up the Mariza, enjoy the sun, embrace life and look to the future with joy, regardless of your nationality! Saude!

Welcome to Friends of Portugal! By Randy Ataide

Bem vindo aos Amigos de Portugal!

On behalf of all us in Portugal and North America who have begun the Friends of Portugal organization, thank you for taking the time to see the website, our projects, people and now our blog. We are united in one common purpose--helping this wonderful, historical and important country and people during a very difficult time of economic, social and political transition.

If you have not visited the Friends of Portugal website, please go to http://www.friendsofportugal.net/

In these blog posts, we hope to provide our readers a view of Portugal from both sides of the Atlantic. Some of us are native Portuguese, some are non-Portuguese individuals who have lived many years in Portugal, and some are Portuguese Americans whose parents or grandparents emigrated. Still others will be the occasional visitor or even simply someone who is interested in Portugal. Regardless of our backgrounds, ages and traditions, we all share an interest, curiousity, hope and desire for this country that is so often overlooked by the rest of the world.

Few who visit Portugal come away without being deeply touched. For those who know little about Portugal, I would suggest you see the short promotional film I placed at the bottom of this post, which while a video to promote tourism, still captures some of the essence of this small but complicated country...a curious blend of exuberant and winsome, of bustling cities and still countrysides, of ancient and contemporary. It is equal parts captivating and maddening!

Portugal has had a long and important relationship with North America, and Portuguese Americans and Canadians are some of the finest, most industrious, capable, faithful, passionate and positive people in the world. In the Fresno area of California where I was born and raised, the Portuguese are often known to be highly prosperous and successful entrepreneurs and businesspersons, most particularly in agriculture but also in finance, professional services and other fields.

Yet this very relationship does in fact explain part of what is going on in Portugal in 2012...for hundreds of years the Portuguese explored North America, Africa, South America and many other regions throughout the world. Many returned to Portugal but many remained and shaped these new lands, which meant that with time that most precious capital of any country--it's people--found new ventures, traditions and lives. With decades and ultimately centuries passing, and the forces of politics, war and history, the Portugal of 2012 can seem ill-prepared and lacking the creative, dynamic and independent energy that the 21st century can demand.

Conversations across the Atlantic led some of us to decide to work towards a new model of support, encouragement, engagement and interchange with Portugal. While the organizers and leaders of Friends of Portugal share the Christian faith, we will move between and even beyond religious, social and cultural barriers for the benefit of Portugal. There are exciting opportunities to work and collaborate in Portugal together, and the Friends of Portugal website explains all of this in greater detail. Additional information can be found in my wife's blog of our journey to Portugal and France in the winter of 2011 at http://jornadaderla.blogspot.com/

We hope that our inagural event in Fresno on June 2, 2012 will provide a good opportunity for you to come and visit, enjoy some coffee, conversation and good food, and talk about how we can assist the Portuguese in creative, entrepreneurial, and contemporary ways.

Bem vindo and saude!

Randy M. Ataide

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FIkUmzLFVio