Portugal
Campo Grande

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    • Day 8

      Olive oil, pizza, and communists

      October 15, 2023 in Portugal ⋅ ☁️ 21 °C

      Today was a grey, drizzly Sunday, not exactly perfect weather for exploring our neighborhood, but we did. Joe's phone shows he walked 5.3 miles, slow and steady, but he did it!

      An important part of my Portuguese ritual is to buy olive oil for the Berkeley crew. There are three grocery stores within 1.5 km of here, all in different directions. Joe went with me to two of them and rewarded himself with a chocolate bar. The olive oil crisis here and in Spain is extreme. "Quien tenga un olivo, tiene una mina" was something we heard on the news. Prices have really skyrocketed, but not enough to break my habit. I read that Spaniards are coming to Portugal to buy olive oil, since the prices are 28% higher in Spain, but that seems like a bit of false economy to me. Anyway, today's shopping resulted in about 12 L of oil and one chocolate bar.

      The only thing nearby open for dinner was a pizzaria, and it was fine. Sunday is still a day of rest for most restaurants.

      On the way back to the hotel we passed a multi-story building with an elaborate tile and painted mural extending across the front. The sign in front told us that we were standing in front of the national headquarters of the Portuguese Communist Party. That's quite a building they have! Right across the street from our temple of capitalism, the Sana Metropolitan Hotel.

      The news is so awful it's hard to digest. Every day seems to bring new horrors. But on we must go.

      Vacation is over, tomorrow I start to teach. We are busy setting up visits with our close friends here, which seems a bit more urgent this year as our possible last time, and we will stay in town this weekend to see as many as possible! Hoping to see our former Champaign buddy Peggy in Ericeira, then there’s Luis, Eugenia, Nuno, and of course my Camino buddies!!!
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    • Day 10

      Moving into Work Mode

      November 5, 2022 in Portugal ⋅ 🌙 13 °C

      We had 300 kms to drive and all day to do it. So we had a big and very yummy breakfast in the hotel and then got confounded by Google maps, which must not have been up to date on all the horrendous construction in Porto. We finally made it out of the city, only to be messed up again by intersecting super-highways and weirdly placed toll booths.

      But finally we were on the right highway heading in the right direction. I gave Joe several choices of places to stop en route, and he chose Conimbriga, a Roman city founded in the 2nd C BC. Things were great there till the 3rd C AD, when a wall was built to stop the invading Germanic tribes. But the city fell in the 5th C. What remains are some really nice mosaics, ruined baths, a forum with a few columns standing, and a big part of the wall. What’s especially nice about this site is that it’s totally out in the countryside, so you can really get a sense of the layout and the expanse of the city.

      Now here we are in Lisbon, in the same old same old hotel. Two of the doormen recognized us —not surprising since they have been working here for 18 years, which is as long as we’ve been coming!
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    • Day 18

      Persistence and Resistance

      November 13, 2022 in Portugal ⋅ ⛅ 17 °C

      First, the persistence. Joe kept insisting he was sure where he left his glasses, so I decided the best option was to go take a look. It would have been a great story! No luck, though the woman in the park’s café told me she had a huge ring of keys, including two car keys, that someone lost yesterday. So I think we got off lucky, just losing glasses.

      From there we decided to go to the Aljube, a former political prison during the Salazar dictatorship. It has been turned into the Museum of the Resistance. We had been there ten years ago when it first opened, and it was just as chilling as before. So many displays of inhumanity. The last rooms of the permanent exhibition end with an upbeat recounting of the Carnation Revolution — deposing a dictatorship without firing a shot. I thought the museum struck the right tone — not too pollyanish but clear in its message that there was a good side and a bad side.

      I found a public elevator I had never seen before — takes you straight down into the middle of the Alfama, the old moorish neighborhood below the castle walls. We hadn’t been down there because there are just too many uneven surfaces, ups and downs, nooks and crannies. But Joe was game, so dowon we went. We did wind up doing a fair amount of up and down through tiny narrow passageways. It is becoming quite the trendy area — lots of Air BnBs, restaurants, souvenir shops, etc, but there are still real people living there, all of whom seem to do their wash on Sunday and hang it outside.

      Our plan was to walk down to the center and catch a cab back to the hotel. But there was no traffic going through the streets. I thought surely there must be some huge political demonstration going on, but after walking a mile or so up from the center towards our hotel, we saw that it was an Antique Car Association gathering that had blocked off the main drag in town and essentially stopped traffic going into the historic core. The cops we asked about it were not big fans, but some of these cars were real gems.

      Finally, about two hours later and three more miles walked than hoped for, we found a cab and made it back to the hotel. Teaching starts up tomorrow bright and early.
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    • Day 13

      Our favorite pizzeria

      November 8, 2022 in Portugal ⋅ ⛅ 16 °C

      Two days of teaching, which I am enjoying immensely, and a lot of rain. Today at about 3 pm, the skies cleared, and we hopped in an Uber (there were no cabs outside the hotel, so we had no choice) and headed for the historic center. We walked and walked, feeling quite at home and happy to be here. Down Avenida da Liberdade, through Rossio, down to the river, and over to Casanova, our favorite pizzeria in Lisbon. It’s kind of hidden, across from the Santa Apolonia train station, right on the river.

      We have been to several of our favorite places — Carvoeiro da Palma for grilled fish and fresh mango; Treco Lareco, a hole in the wall place with good home cooking but best of all for Joe, mango mousse; and tonight Casanova, the pizzeria with yummy pana cotta. If you are sensing a sweet tooth trail, you would be right, but it’s not mine!

      The Christmas lights are all in place, and I’m hoping we will get a chance to see them lit up. I love Lisbon!
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    • Day 17

      Tram museum and some wandering

      November 12, 2022 in Portugal ⋅ 🌙 16 °C

      The Tram museum is not a 5* attraction but it’s really interesting. It’s housed in the actual huge Carris maintenance and garage facility. You can see some of the original cars (and actually get a ride on one of the very first electric trams from the early 1900s), but it also gives a very good history of the transformation of the company. From a few horse drawn wagon type trams (called “americanos,” perhaps because one of the two owners was from Brazil), and then the laying of rails throughout the city, lots of fascinating pictures. It was also really interesting to see how different the ethos of the company was back then. There was a barbershop on the premises and all employees were required to be well shaved and coiffed. All men in dress shirt and ties.

      Our plan was to visit the Arte Antica museum next, but when we got there they told us that the Hieronymus Bosch painting (which is really the stand out of the European collection) was on loan, and that the entire floor of Portuguese painting (which has some medieval work that I like) was about to close for a two hours lunch break. So we went to Plan B, which involved walking around through the fancy embassy neighborhood and then having lunch in our favorite Lisbon park, Estrela. We were then able to get on the tram 28 for a ride across town to some of the great Miradouros over the Alfama and the Tagus river.

      Joe lost his glasses, which is quite the bummer. But he is having some laser glaucoma treatment when we get home so he may need new glasses anyway. Nothing to be done about it for the time being.

      Still waiting for some election results!
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    • Day 14

      Tile Museum

      November 9, 2022 in Portugal ⋅ 🌙 15 °C

      Since I’m teaching from 10-1, mornings are out. But I try to get us out and about in the afternoons.

      Today we went to the Tile Museum, where we hadn’t been for 15 years. It’s in a 17th C convent with an over the top baroque church (is that redundant?).

      We enjoyed it very much, especially the 18th century tiles depicting Lisbon before the 1755 earthquake. And there are lots of beautiful tiles from the 14C forward.

      We had taken an Uber to get to the museum. But getting back to the hotel was a challenge, because the museum had no wifi, and I have no telephone service. And it is in the middle of nowhere. Luckily, I had Peggy and Mike’s unused transit cards, so we hopped on a bus to the center. After walking for a few kms, we picked up a cab and got back to the hotel.

      Tonight we went to one of our two favorite hole-in-the-wall places. Freshly caught fish, garlicky green beans, and for the sweets-lover, a leite creme.
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    • Day 16

      My class

      October 23, 2023 in Portugal ⋅ ☀️ 17 °C

      A couple of my friends want to know more about the class I’m here to teach. I guess I shouldn’t be surprised, since they are educators themselves! So here goes— The class is part of the Universidade Católica’s undergraduate transnational law program. Students who complete a certain number of hours in the program get a little notation on their undergraduate law degree. The courses are wide ranging, and include a lot of slightly random snapshot classes, depending on the country and expertise of the professor. All classes are in English, which means that the Erasmus students (EU exchange) can participate. The main goal of this transnational curriculum is to open students’ eyes to the broader international context that has become so much a part of the Portuguese legal profession. Since the law degree is their undergraduate degree, most will take another year or two for a Masters, and the transnational program is a nudge to them to consider some of the Global LL.M programs that are offered.

      My topic is an introduction to US common law property rules. We read actual judicial decisions, just like US law students do. The goal is to both expose the students to some of the most important rules about the basic property rights to use, exclude, and to transfer, and also to show them the steps of common-law decision making. The traditional Portuguese law curriculum is heavily lecture-based, but I try to make it as interactive as possible. The quality of the students is really very high, but they are so young in comparison to the typical US law student!
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    • Day 17

      Friends

      October 24, 2023 in Portugal ⋅ ⛅ 19 °C

      Still raining, but the sunshine comes from the friends. We’ve been lucky to see many of our good Lisbon friends this year. Eugenia, Peggy, Nick, Nuno, Maria João, Rui, Henrique, Maria Inês, Luis.

      I am so glad that we didn’t head off from Lisbon for what turned out to be a rainy weekend, but rather stayed here to enjoy our amigos. I look back on all these many years coming to teach in Lisbon with a lot of wonderful memories, and many of those memories come from our friends.

      One more class, one more rainy day in Lisbon tomorrow.
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    • Day 15

      Rainy day at the palace

      October 22, 2023 in Portugal ⋅ ☁️ 16 °C

      About 8 Km outside of Lisbon, the Queluz Palace is “Portugal’s Versailles,” much as La Granja is Spain’s. None of the crowds and not as excessively ornate, with gorgeous gardens that we enjoyed when the rain dropped to a drizzle. There’s also a long tiled canal where the royal family used to go boating. The castle was built in the 18C and is full-on baroque/rococo, just a little shabbier than other similar palaces.

      There were several Brazilians visiting, and they were very interested to read about where the first Emperor of Brazil, Pedro of Braganca, had come from. In a surprise move, this king declared Brazil’s independence from Portugal, which seems a little counter-intuitive. He then abdicated, making his son the new emperor, and returned to Portugal, where he died in the same Queluz palace room where he was born. As you. might guess, he wasn’t too popular in the circles of those who were in favor of Portugal’s colonial empire.

      After a couple of hours there, we went across to the pousada where there is a small bar for those with a sweet tooth and a coffee craving. We stayed in the pousada many years ago, but I had forgotten that it was once a part of the palace complex, the place where the army and some high ranking palace staff lived. It is, like the palace itself, a little bit of a faded lady, but the building is historic and the decor is consistent with the style of Queluz. We had contemplated going on to Sintra, which is just a few more kms along the highway, but the weather refused to cooperate, so we headed back to the hotel, where fitness center and naptime await, one for each of us.
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    • Day 14

      MAAT

      October 21, 2023 in Portugal ⋅ 🌧 17 °C

      That stands for Museu de Arte, Arquitectura e Tecnología. We met an old friend from Champaign there. She has been living in the Lisbon area for 4 years but it was only last year that we reconnected. There was a special exhibition of work by Joana Vasconcelos.. She is a Portuguese artist who has won a lot of acclaim for her work. It’s hard to describe, so I’ll let the pictures do the job. Beautiful, whimsical, sparkly, it was a lot of fun. She does with fabric what Chihuly does with glass.

      The MAAT is actually two buildings. One is the old coal-powered original electric plant of Lisbon, with all of the machinery still completely in tact. Adjacent to it is a modern white concrete building with curvy lines, and great views from the top. We went through both buildings, and though the electric power plant had tons of explanatory panels, I could not even begin to comprehend how electricity was produced in that building. Some of the machinery was so beautifully ornate that it seemed to be a continuation of the art exhibit.

      The museum is right on the river, and there is a great walk/bike path that goes along for miles. It’s a wonderful amenity for city dwellers, and it was really getting a ton of use. After a very long lunch, we said goodbye and made plans for next year’s visit. Maybe.
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    You might also know this place by the following names:

    Campo Grande, Кампу-Гранде

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