Well Hello Sailor…

A Primer on Portugal

Lisbon, late afternoon

Portugal is known for the being the world's first global empire during the Age of Exploration.  In its prime, Portugal was a major political, economic, and military power.  Their success in trades such as lucrative spices started a race for riches among many nations.  At one point, the two Catholic countries of Portugal and neighboring Spain had territories decided by the Pope resulting in Brazil in the East of South America, and Spanish speaking nations in the Western side of the continent.

Are these pastries for um, an ethnic gathering?

To support this trade, the sailors discovered took to drying cod or bacalhau as it's called to provide food on long journeys.  It was so abundant, that it made the perfect meal before refrigeration and Tupperware. It seems to stay edible indefinitely or can be used to shingle a roof or make repairs with its long thin fishy sheets.  Oddly, cod is a cold-water fish and only found far from Iberia. That does not stop the locals from eating the fish pulp up. Just add two days of water.  Cat food tends to have more texture. Seemingly every other dish is made from re-constituted cod.  Cod cakes, grilled re-constituted cod, cod in mashed potato and egg…  The Forest Gump of Portugal could probably name dishes for hours. All kidding aside, the stuff ain't bad.

Our cool stage-set apartment, a mixture of reclaimed materials and theatrical amenities.

Another curious food are these little custard tarts called pastéis de nata.  They are everywhere, quite simple, and delicious (especially when warm).  The custard is thick and made from only the yolk of the egg.  What about the whites?  I'm glad you ask all the right questions!  It turns out the local nuns were starching their habits with them.  Who knew? History can be wacky with unanticipated outcomes.

Stu on the couch with a distressed wall conveniently centered behind the couch.

So why don't we know much about the place today?  Glad you asked again!  Damn you're an inquisitive bugger. In brief, it was conquered by Napoleon, late to industrialize, and most devastatingly, prone to earthquakes.  In 1755, the city of Lisbon was struck on All Saints day at 9:30ish in the morning with one of the largest quakes on record.  Many people were in church to celebrate the holy day when the 9.0 earthquake hit Lisbon and many parishioners were crushed by collapsing churches.  The quake was not much smaller than the devastation caused on Boxing Day, 2004 in Indonesia by a 9.1 quake that left over 200,000 dead and a tsunami of 100 feet high .  The Lisbon quake lasted between 3 and 6 minutes leaving a 16-foot-wide gap in the center of the city.  Forty minutes later, a massive tsunami washed away much of the city as well as many people.  The city burned for as many as five days.  By week's end, possilby 100,000 people were dead and 80% of the city was rubble.  Conquest clearly took a backseat to recovery and soul searching.  Did they bring this upon themselves?

Today in Europe, Portugal is seen as one of the countries recovering from the Euro hangover.  Like Greece, it accumulated massive debts compared to its economic potential--Amounts that were unlikely to be paid back.  Tough monetary belt-tightening was finger-wagged from Brussels in exchange for €78,000,000,000 Euros in aid.  When the Euro-zone was created, no one even expected economies to slide so far away from each other.  Germany did quite well since it produced products priced in Euros whereas countries like Portugal did not enjoy the same economic output in trade.  The austerity lead to a contraction of the economy and an unemployment rate of 15%. Today, the average wage is $1,000/month and the minimum wage is roughly equal to 60% of that.  This is an oversimplification but the results as clear; Portugal is still recovering ever so slowly from their financial crisis.  Much of the infrastructure, like Greece, can use some love.

Some interesting facts about Portugal include that it was the first country to abolish life imprisonment in 1884. The maximum incarceration is 25 years.  The country was also among the first to abolish the death penalty.  In 2001, Portugal decriminalized all common drugs for personal use.  The result has been a decrease in drug use and new diagnoses of HIV.  In addition, the country has some of the most progressive LGBTQ laws.