Our friend Gayle celebrated the last night of her visit - the first evening of truly good weather in weeks - by taking us to the Alfama neighborhood to Clube de Fado for dinner and Fado music.
One of the many things that makes Portugal, Portugal - besides jacarandas, cabbage, vinho verde, beaches and bureaucracy - is Fado music. Fado (pronounced fuh-doe) is a type of melancholy song accompanied with mandolin or Portuguese guitar, which looks a bit like a pregnant regular guitar with twelve steel strings. The musicianship I’ve observed in the two Fado performances I’ve attended is extraordinary. It’s clear they aren’t performing from a set list, either - the singer suggests a song and the guitarrista launches into it. Apparently a good guitarrista is expected to know at least a hundred of the fados standards, in any key requested by the fadista.
Why is it call Fado, Gayle wondered. I looked it up, apparently the word itself means destiny, or fate. That seems appropriate - I can’t understand everything the singers are saying - my Portuguese isn’t good enough to catch more than every fifth word - but they seem to be singing about fateful things. I read a quote by an aficionado that said the music portrays a mix of love, betrayal, sorrow, death, hopelessness, and passion, to which I’d just add, seemingly all at once. Fado music also references Fado music, something I didn’t know. I kept hearing the singers say words I knew - agora, (now) , janela (window) tudo (all) , dor (pain)…and fado. But I thought I was mishearing, ‘til I looked up some lyrics to a number of Fado songs, and each one of them mentioned Fado. Fado is very self-referential which makes sense when you think how self-referential dramatic people are, and Fado singers are very, very dramatic (in a good way).
Fado was born on a day,
When the wind barely stirred,
And the seas elongated the skies.
On the main rail of a sailing ship,
In the chest of a seaman
While sorrowful he sang.
When the h asked the waitress, Fala Ingles her face fell. Onlee a leetle, she said, enunciating carefully. Tudo bem, estou a aprender Portuguese, I said, and she spoke very fast and cheerfully after that, not noticing my look of dismay. Or maybe she thought I just looked like that. We muddled through, me asking her to repeat herself a few times. When the time came to order we agreed that we’d share a salad and then pick main courses we could share. But, after having wine and cheese while looking at a nice view beforehand, I wasn’t very hungry. So I ordered for the table, saying the salad was for me, the pasta for the h, the shrimp for Gayle. The waitress became very concerned and put her hand on my arm. A salada mais pequeno, she said. I tried to explain I was full of wine and cheese but she kept shaking her head. One does not eat just a salad in Portugal, apparently. We were in fact surprised to see it on the menu, which is the main reason we ordered it. A bowl of leafy greens is hard to come by in most of the restaurants we’ve been to. I can say with authority there is not one to be had in our entire village, which is why we grow so many leafy greens.
The music was wonderful - there were three singers, two women and one man, each performing for 20-30 minutes between courses. Maybe the best performance, though - certainly the most fiery - was the waiter who was serving brandy. I took a video so you can see for yourself. It was an effective marketing strategy - after the first brandy warming ritual, three more people ordered it, including the man at the table behind us, who was very very into the Fado performances, moving to sit at empty tables in front of the performers so he could video them.
None of them seemed to mind though I personally would have found it off-putting to have a black rectangles just fifteen feet away, at eye level. The restaurant the he took me to on my birthday had strict rules against video and photography of the performers - there the singers were dressed formally, the women wearing elaborate traditional black fringed shawls; in the club last night, the women wore black, but with a modern twist, the tops bejeweled, the black pants with rhinestones down the side. When the man ordered his brandy his wife gave up trying to stay awake and just leaned her head against the wall and fell asleep.
The singers were accompanied by a stand-up bassist, a guitar player, and a Portuguese guitar player who occupied a place of honor at the center of the stage. He was amazing, not just his guitar playing but his ultra sensitive hearing; while the singers were performing if anyone made a sound - spoke to a table companion, clinked a water bottle against a water glass, touched a napkin - the guitarists’ head would swivel around and he would contemplate the noisemaker with his expressionless shadowed brown eyes. After the fourth time, no one moved during the performance (except for the brandy-breathed picture taker, who at least scampered to new video vantage points between songs).
We went into town a few hours early to walk around Lisbon. Mostly only souvenir shops were open; I was disappointed the store that sells only fancy tins of sardines was closed. We admired the tile buildings and walked the narrow, winding, hilly streets of the Alfama, taking pictures. There were very few people about, it being the shoulder season and dinner hour. It was lovely to walk around without heavy jackets, rain gear and guarda chuvas.
We’ve had two whole days without rain, so Gayle and I trekked to the park - the big one with trails and a creek - with Jake. Jake rolled in the wet clover and bounced through chest-high puddles but I didn’t have the heart to stop him, it’s the closest he’s been to actual swimming in a few months. Often when we encounter dogs around town, the owner will lead their dog away, shortening the leash, leaving Jake wagging forlornly after them. But at the park there was a dog walker with a whole phalanx of dogs off leash, and Jake waded into the middle of them, putting his nose right into the dog walker’s fanny pack. Can I give him a treat? she asked, and Jake sat, and everyone laughed.
Further down the trail we spotted a house hidden behind a wall and large copse of trees. We continued walking a muddy path and two large dogs bounded up to us. Their faces were friendly, and they were beautifully groomed - clearly they belonged to the house we’d just passed. Jake gave a welcoming wag, but the dogs were shy of us, and simply watched Jake with interested eyes. When a man came running up the dogs trotted over to check him out but pulled up short and shouted obscenities, then threw stones before running away. I was relieved to see he was a runner and not the dogs’ owner coming to abuse them for following Jake.
The park was fresh and green and damp; we saw many people running, walking dogs, and a group of kids heavy with camping gear in scouting uniforms though it was only the middle of the week. A worker from the municipality watched Jake closely then made kissing noises at him. He trotted over and she cooed over him. We spoke a bit - she had no English, and patiently repeated herself when I told her I’m still learning.
Ukraine? she asked me. Americana I told her, and she nodded with evident surprise - Americans are not common in the village. So far we’re the only ones I’ve seen. I didn’t quite catch something she said and she reached out and touched my hair, gesturing at Jake. Oh yeah, he has silver hair, I agreed. Ele tem doze anos - treze in Junho. She admired his good manners - A good boy, she said slowly and distinctly - then complained in Portuguese that some dog owner had let a dog do a poo without cleaning it up. She waved her hand in front of her nose for emphasis.
It is a bit of a surprise, that so many dog owners don’t clean up after their dogs. One has to watch where one steps, even on the sidewalks, as poo bombs abound. If we run across doo and I see someone headed our way I will pick it up though Jake is innocent, as I don’t want anyone mistakenly thinking that Jake is the culprit (though at 74lbs, Jake’s signature is, shall we say, unmistakable relative to the mostly smaller dogs we see around the village).
On the way home we passed a chocolate lab that is leashed at the front of a mechanic''s workshop. The dog is handsome, and often barks at Jake, who will stop and stare, his tail wagging slowly. I’ve thought about crossing the street so the dogs could meet, but am unsure about the dog’s intentions - the bark doesn’t sound friendly. Today, though, the mystery is solved. Upon seeing Jake, the chocolate leaped up and disappeared into the garage, then reappeared with a ball smushed into his mouth, wagging hopefully. I burst out laughing. Next time we walk past I’ll cross the street for a meet and greet.
Next we passed the churrasqueria where Carlos and Elaina were readying for the lunch crowd. A young woman stood at their open door chatting with them, a little girl with long curly hair sat on one of the chairs for when there is a queue of customers. Elaina, who used to avoid speaking to me other than to say Boa tarde and tchau, maybe feels more confident that I understand Portuguese better now. Meet my daughter, she said in Portuguese, all smiles And my neta! I ask for their names, introduced Gayle, and we all said our pleased to meet yous. Jake bumped Carlos’ shins for attention, then galaavanted into the butcher shop for a quick hello. Everyone was smiling, happy to be done with the rain.
There are two more days with showers forecasted in the next few days, but the temps are projected to climb to 85 by the end of next week, so I won’t let the mild threat of future rain dampen by spirits.
The h has been hard at work with Tiago and Paulo erecting the greenhouse, a task that first required the rebuilding of a wall that crumbled with the weight of all the rainwater. Our garden is producing like crazy - for lunch yesterday we had braised spinach and broccoli and a lettuce salad on the side. Today we pulled the first carrots and onions, and tomorrow we will need to harvest more lettuce before it grows tough.
Meanwhile the parsley and cilantro are ridiculously tall - surprisingly the chickens aren’t at all interested in herbs. Gayle tackled the weeds in the front garden beds, as well as planting the spring onions Alberto brought over. I was grateful that when he came over to inspect the progression of the greenhouse he saw the onions were in the raised beds and grunted his approval.
Princess Leia has grown amazingly in a week. Whenever she spots one of us looming over her, she jumps onto the top of her chick warmer and attempts to fly out of the box. She spends her days pecking around our floors and sleeping on our shoulders under our hair while we work. I take her into the garden to scratch around in the dirt when I can be sure we won’t be surrounded by roosters - I don’t trust them. When the temperature rises about 50F at night I will attempt to reunite her with her mom; or, I may find her a home among my neighbors who have been preparing a small coop.
All in all it’s been a great two days - Jake getting treats from strangers and meeting new dog friends, the vegetables and flowers coming in, the greenhouse taking shape. Tomorrow I have my rescheduled meeting with the SEF for my residency card, and I’m nervous. Don’t be, the h says. He’s had his meeting, and received his card, and there should be no problem. And to make things easier we now have a printer, no longer will we have to save all the necessary documents on a flash drive and take an Uber to Staples, then on to the agency in Cascais. If all goes well - wish me luck! - we will have lunch at a great little pizza joint run by an Italian man. I receive ingredients from Italy every day, he told us when we ate there last. Then we’ll come back home and the h will finish erecting the greenhouse while I tackle the weeds that have sprouted with alarming density along the sidewalk and the driveway.