Monday, October 13, 2008

EVeryDay LiFe

Now that my computer is un-fritzed-well, I can continue with my portrait of Portugal (oooh alliteration!)

I was absolutely fascinated with not only the local sites, but with the every day life of people who lived there. Europe is SO different from the US and even though I live in a city with a metro population of about 3 million, my life here is VERY different than the people who live in the large cities of Europe......so here's my view of the every day life in Lisbon & Funchal...(warning-contains many photos!)







People, people everywhere.....lots and lots of people...

Narrow streets, I loved the narrow streets. I don't want to live there, but they were fascinating!The cobblestone streets and sidewalks. How on earth the women walk around with their European pointy toed shoes and spiky heels, I will never know....I love 'em but it's mighty hard to walk on them.

Your local produce store. Most of the shopping is small specialty shops. Lots of jewelry, shoe shoes, tiny clothing stores, everything you need, even a store that looked like a mini Target. These fruit stands were all over Funchal....Interestingly enough, the supermarkets were located in basements wherever we went. You could smell them before you got to them....ugh...nice fishy fishy...

Clothes hanging outside windows...I think I have a dozen photos of these. I was obsessed with illustrating the fact that the people hang out their freshly washed clothes outside these dirty, old buildings....

the requisite satellite dish!Everyone drives tiny cars. We saw lots of Smart Cars...

Because there is no parking....and we saw lots of very creative parking....

Your local AM/PM/7-eleven/QuickTrip/Circle K

Woah-look at the price of GAS! No....wait........that's per liter!

We saw lots of cranes, parked in truly bizaare places, one in a tiny narrow street that probably would have had our state Industrial Commission in hysterics...an accident just waiting to happen.

Lisbon had a lot of graffiti. We were very surprised and disappointed to see so much in this beautiful historic city. But it seemed like around every other corner....

There were beautiful fountains....

And plazas with large sculptures of historic figures...

And incredible architecture..

A lovely, lovely place to visit. I am so grateful I had the chance to go!

7 comments:

Patrice said...

I think we take for granted our spacious everything . . . especially streets and supermarkets. I noticed the same things in Russia. How fun to see your many photos . . . doesn't quite look like the 500 you took!

Allyson said...

those cars are so tiny, I am loving the pictures, keep em coming!

linda crandall said...

Love, love, love the look of it! It is so interesting to see how other people live :)

Nancy Face said...

Well, hello! I sure did enjoy this post...wonderful pictures and captions! My friend's son served his mission there, so that made it even MORE fun for me to see all your pictures! :)

Pancake said...

I love all the pictures! The small streets, wow, that would be tough to get used to driving!

Lori said...

Amazing...love the cobblestone walk ways! It is so fun to see another country and how people live. Thanks for sharing!

Randi said...

See? You ARE a magical woman!!

I loved Portugal!! My dh served his mission there, and we took all our kids 2 years ago. It was amazing!