Life Lessons: Things We’ve Learned In Our First Two Weeks

There really isn’t much to say about week two – or the first half of week three. It has been mostly a time of “being home to receive deliveries” without a lot of new stuff to – wait a minute…

We did get out into town again – took a walk downtown where there is a long stretch of “plaza’ that is not offically a park – but is a lovely sort of oasis nonetheless, then down to the Jardim Engenheiro Luis da Fonseca, a green space right on the waterfront which, we discovered, is frequented by fishermen dropping their lines right off the seawall. Turning back toward home, we made our way through our ‘town square”, Praca de Bocage, then detoured through Parque de Bonfim. For a walk right through the heart of the city, there sure are an awful lot of green spaces.

It was a nice outing, especially for me as I had been going a bit stir crazy because – and here’s the new thing! – deliveries don’t work quite the same way here.

If you live in an apartment building in the US, you’re probably used to having a ‘package drop’ – a larger mailbox that the postman will leave packages in. Perhaps even a reception desk that receives packages. And if you live in a house, you may be used to Amazon or UPS dropping things on your doorstep, as I was. The Portuguese system is a bit different.

I get a notification when a package is coming my way.  They’ll try twice to deliver it – then they’ll return it. I get an email or a text message and, depending on the delivery service, they’ll either provide a PIN that must be given to the delivery person, or the delivery person will ask for my NIF (fiscal ID #) and match it to the sale information (or, at least, record it as the NIF of the person to whom it was delivered).

All in all, it’s a sensible system – if you’re not going to be home, you can give that info to someone else so they can validate the delivery. But overall – it only works well for me because I can be here all day. (Not ideal – but imagine if I were on the train every morning for Lisbon to work…)  It made me wonder how many Portuguese households have someone who is home all day… But being able to give the verification info to a trusted alternate, or reschedule the delivery online works – and eliminates porch pirates.

I suspect I’ll do less ordering online – which isn’t a bad thing, I suppose. But it did make me stop to think about what ordinary things I have learned in the short time we’ve been here.

Old Dogs and New Tricks:

Things I’ve learned in the last couple of weeks

The boiler can be both off and on at the same time

Our heat and hot water are provided by a local boiler.  It can be ‘on’ for hot water but off for heat. I’m still a little confused as to its various modes, but “download the manual” is on my to-do list. First impression: it’s much more energy efficient. There’s no holding tank trying to constantly keep water warm – it’s basically hot water on demand at the household level.

There are fewer electrical outlets

But they are 220v and adding a splitter or power bar doesn’t starve the circuit the way it often can in American homes.

Utility meters and cutoffs

I kinda love the way this stuff is laid out.  The meter and the main cutoff are in the same spot – and are all located immediately outside our front door. The main electrical panel is just inside the front door (and of course we can flip the breakers there too). In a crisis, there’s no hunting around the entire property to figure out which thing to pull or turn.

My appliances are frustrating – and helpful

The freezer beeps at me if I leave the door open too long. (There’s no “not getting the door quite closed” and air conditioning the house by accident.)

The oven won’t power on if you haven’t first selected a time on the timer. (It’s impossible to “leave the oven on” and forget.)

I can make toast in the microwave. (It’s a convection microwave. Condense, consolidate, combine functions – very popular in a place where apartments generally don’t have the kind of physical space common in the US.)

The dryer is temperamental – but nobody cares. Dryers are expensive to operate – line drying is far more common. It’s unusual that our apartment even has a dryer (but I’m glad it does because line-dried clothes are stiff.  Being able to pop them in the dryer for 5-10 minutes to fluff and soften makes my spoiled self happier).

The practice of hiding most appliances behind cupboard doors looks cool – but makes it really challenging to pour stuff into the washing machine.

Safety and privacy look different

Buildings here don’t use as much wood as in the US – they are mostly concrete. So it doesn’t appear common to have things like fire escapes or safety ladders.  And all – all – of the building doors seem to open inward. (In the US, doors must open outward so that in an emergency a surging, fleeing crowd can’t trap the doors closed.)

Window screens aren’t really a thing. This bothers me because I don’t know how to keep bugs out – but I’ll figure it out. Meantime, we’re getting used to the metal shutters which most Americans have only seen if they have vacationed in the Caribbean, where windows and glass doors may have metal hurricane shutters. These external metal blinds keep sunlight from reaching the window glass – significantly reducing heat transfer – so they keep homes cooler during the day. And while I haven’t seen info on the security advantages, there’s no question that breaking in would be loud from inside and noticeable from outside.

While there seems to be a lot of car-horn-emotion involved in driving, folks are meticulous about stopping at crosswalks.

Web sites I have frequented for years are suddenly offering me more cookie and privacy choices and even my phone requires less mandatory integration to use basic functions and services. European privacy law rocks.

All in all, safety looks different – but feels better. Portugal is consistently in the top ten safest countries in the world in terms of crime. Some of that is lack of reporting, to be sure – it’s not the only first world nation to have lower reporting of , for example, rape and domestic violence not because it doesn’t happen but because women don’t have an expectation of being taken seriously. But that’s a factor in a lot of places – and Portugal still beats them all out in terms of crime stats. it just feels safer to walk down the street, though that won’t cure me of being cautious of things like “walking the dog after dark over by where all the semi trucks park overnight.”

The food is awesome

Tighter, consumer-oriented regulation means produce tastes fresher and more vibrant, and meat seems to be of higher quality (and definitely lower prices). Processed foods make up a smaller section of the grocery, with fewer items and fewer options.  Fresh meat, fish, and produce make up a much larger percentage of the store.

We’ve also learned that there are a lot of no/less sugar options – and not all of them are labeled. That’s a down side for me, because fake sugars are a problem. My body rejects them; even if I can’t taste them, ingesting them will make me start to feel physically sick within minutes. We learned quickly to read the ingredients list and look for sucralose.

This mango iced tea got me – but i also noticed the “nutri-score” on the front. I haven’t yet figured out what the criteria are for including it, but it does appear on many processed/packaged items. What a great way for harried parents to quickly make good choices for their kids!

As for non-grocery items, the only thing we’ve looked for and not found was prepackaged bleach wipes – apparently the Portuguese figure we can just get some bleach and a rag. The pharmacy on the other hand, will be a big adjustment. NOTHING is in front of the counter here. You speak to the pharmacist, explain the problem, and they hand you the thing that you need.

Bernie took a paper copy of his prescription (from his US doctor) to the pharmacy. They filled it within a couple of minutes. Before we left the US, I got a ‘GoodRX’ card discount and knew I could get a month’s worth of this drug for not more than $50 if I had to pick it up after our insurance had timed out. With no insurance and no health system ID number, they charged Bernie 9 Euros.

Finally, it seems like everyone delivers. Even the little boutique shop where we buy Angel’s dog food will send it around to our house if we ask.  Car ownership is not assumed, and anyone who sells things that are large or heavy allows for the need to get it to where people live.

Pets are people too

Well, not people exactly – but the law recognizes them as living things, not just property. All animals are microchipped and recorded in a central database. One person is listed as their responsible human (guess that settles custody disputes!) and that person is responsible for ensuring they get appropriate care, vaccines, etc., and for notifying when they are no longer alive so the record can be closed out. At both the vet and the pet store, we found that staff learned our dog’s name immediately. Whether they would learn ours – or even tell us theirs! – is a variable, but they remember and focus on their furry customer.

Lessons in Portuguese Bureaucracy and Efficiency

All of the expat forums and such warned me to expect ridiculous bureaucracy and inefficiency in Portugal, and advised that I’d need to learn patience. They’re right – but also wildly wrong. Rather like the package deliveries, it’s different, both in process and philosophy; but in some cases at least, I suspect those descriptions may say “inefficient” when they mean “unfamiliar” or “not the way I want it to work.” (Disclaimer; we haven’t tried anything complex like permitting to build a house, so those folks might be 100% right. But for our basic experiences – it just doesn’t match.)

Passport controls were swift and efficient – possibly the smoothest and easiest passport and customs experience I have had, including the fact that this is the first time I have included a pet in the process.

When we went to our local Parish council to apply for our residency document, the process took a long time – primarily due to the lack of a shared language. (Neither Bern’s nor my Portuguese will be up to “government processes” for a long time!)  But I had done my homework in advance, understood what they’d be asking for and why, and therefore arrived prepared.  So, while pantomime (and I resorted to my translator app once) might have made the conversation take a little longer, it was a very smooth process. It took about an hour to do all the documentation for both of us – and might have taken half that if we had better local language skills. Even so, knowing what was needed made it easier to figure out what was being said. For example,  I knew that one of the 2-3 things I’d be asked for was a utility bill in each of our names. So when she asked for a document, even though I did not understand the sentence – I caught one word that sounded more like utilities than it did “passport” – and was able to hand over the correct sheet of paper. Knowing my part made it much easier to do the right thing.

Same process at our local bank – prove our info, and they quickly updated our address info and submitted a request for debit cards.  Which will arrive in the mail sometime this week.  Is it frustrating to work in cash or in a US credit card that charges conversion fees every time we use it? Sure. That’s why before we left the US, we ordered a small supply of Euros to ensure we had grocery money – and the banker helpfully let us know that until our cards arrived, we could withdraw cash from a specific machine in the branch using our web site credentials.

Each of these processes works *differently than they do in the US, with less instant gratification – but they also work logically, securely, and in reasonable ways. Had we not done our homework and walked in prepared with the right documentation and expectations, our experience might not have been as smooth, but overall – it wasn’t “worse” just “different.”

That said, Portugal is not yet a country taking full advantage of systems automation, and very clearly tradition is valued over efficiency – which means you can have an entirely different experience doing the same thing in a different office/branch location. But that approach also means that each interaction is, first and foremost, relational. The nicer you are, the more time you take to engage with the human, the better your experience is. A brusque, all-business American approach probably generates a different response, too.

The less exciting stuff

While waiting home for deliveries, I did manage to entertain myself. Bernie did all the “town” errands while I was, as he put it, in charge of ordering and receiving. One of those deliveries was a massive amount of stuff from Ikea. Since I last updated, I’ve assembled:

And attached canvas screening to the length of our balcony rail (which is designed to add privacy, but in reality, makes both puppy and me a little less nervous about being out on the balcony; it can be a bit imposing with an open fence and poor 3D vision).

Our bed isn’t here yet – but we have sleeping space for 8 (9 if one of them is pre-teen-sized) and our first house guests will be passing through town at the end of the month. Hopefully the darn rugs will all have arrived by then!  Puppy has mostly learned not to try to jump up on a sofa from the heavily-waxed wooden floor, but has gone sprawling more than once – he’d very much like a few strategically placed options for solid footing. But with one last bed and some bright rugs, we’ll be ready to call this house a home!