Lisboa

Lun 22 feb (18:20)

This past weekend was the ISA excursion to Lisbon, Portugal. It was so fun! We left Friday morning and returned Sunday evening. We had tours of a fortress, the cathedral, and a panoramic bus tour of the city. And lots of free time. I went to this really cool museum with Julia and Maria. It had a lot of old art from ancient Egypt, Mesopotamia, Greece... and other areas of the world. I think my favorite item there was an old Bible. Every single page had to have been made by hand—-it was amazing! The three of us also went to the mall-—the biggest mall in Europe! Haha we didn´t actually buy anything except we did get desert—-Julia got ice cream, Maria got a crepe, and I found a fondue place... strawberries, kiwi, and banana with white chocolate. It was pretty much delicious :)

The ISA staff told us that many people compare Lisbon to San Francisco. And I could see the similarities. To get into the city we had to drive over a bridge of very modern architecture (as we were crossing someone on the bus went “The Golden Gate!”), it had a tram, and it was hilly, though not quite as hilly as San Francisco.

Portugal definitely has Spain beat in the bathrooms category. It actually is possible to find public restrooms, AND I only went to one that didn´t have toilet paper. If you ever visit Spain, make sure you always have a travel package of tissues with you, because they are pretty much lacking in the TP department.

It was so weird to not be speaking Spanish all weekend! Spanish and Portuguese are similar enough that two people talking can kind of understand each other, but the ISA staff told us that many many people there speak English, and speaking (slash assuming that everyone understands) Spanish is kind of rude, so to just speak English. A lot of people did know English, but I had one waiter who didn´t know very much and a taxi driver who did speak it at all... I felt so dumb! I learned how to say basics, such as hello, the bill, please, thank you... But it was very limiting. When we returned to Sevilla I turned to Geena and Ashley and said “I´m so excited people speak Spanish here!”

So Sevilla has this, I guess you could call it a bike-rental system, called Sevici. There are these Sevici bike stations located throughout the city, and if you have a membership you can pick one up, ride, and then drop it off at any station you ride to, and if you have the bike for half an hour or less, you´re not charged anything. Pretty spiffy. Well, the other day my Sevici card arrived in the mail, and today I Sevici-ed for the first time. I was pretty excited :)

Last note of the day—-running in shorts and a tank top: The weather is appropriate, but Spanish guys still aren´t ready for that much skin.