Poor Akasho, he knew we were getting ready to leave, and he didn't know whether to be excited because he might be going on an adventure with us or whether to be upset because we were leaving him behind. He did a lot of moping and following us around. Then when it came time to put stuff in the car, and we didn't get his leash or anything, he bolted out the front door as we were struggling through it with our stuff and ran to the car. When we opened the doors to put stuff in, he jumped in the back seat. Pitiful pup. We practically had to drag him back inside. The worst part of this trip is going to be not having Akasho around. On the bust to JFK, some other chorus members were having similar anxieties, so there was one point where everyone was just passing around their phones sharing pictures of their pets.
We were more than a tad late to rehearsal prior to boarding the bus, and there seem to be ever more forms to sign on this trip. Seriously, how many damn times and ways can I legally affirm that I will not sue SCSU if I die in Portugal? Moving on...eventually everyone got on the bus and off we went to the airport. Or so we thought. The bus broke down a little over half way there and we had to wait for another one to pick us up. They clearly hadn't had time to clean and prep this one from its previous trip, because there was trash around and the whole bus smelled a bit like the toilet at the back. It did get us there in time to check in, get through security, and get on board the plane. For most of us anyway. One member of the choir seems to be lacking in the common sense department and left one of their bags at the school -- the one containing their passport. Despite multiple warnings to have your passport in your hand once we got on the bus, this person didn't notice theirs was missing until check-in time. So, they'll be going back to New Haven, getting their passport, and flying out tomorrow. I mean, really. Whatever, their loss. I kind of feel bad that Dr. Gemme has to stress about this person's stupidity and the problems it creates for her and the tour company, but I'm going to file that under, "Not my problem".
The plane ride was pretty uneventful. We left at a little before midnight and flew through to Saturday morning. Because of the time difference, it was about 11:00am when we got there, local time. I slept on and off on the flight, but not very well. The food was decent, especially for plane food. The travel company managed to not put people rooming together anywhere near each other on the plane, and all the married couples and other groups were just scattered throughout. Some managed to switch with people (and some people came to tears over it) to get next to the people they wanted, but not everyone. Bobby and I were both middle seats of the middle section, four rows apart, and anyone who switched would be giving up an aisle seat for a stranger, because not even all of our group was in the same section of the plane this time around, and that's not something that many people would do. We were fine, though, not sitting next to each other. It was a pretty short flight (about 6 hours). The biggest down side for me was that the person in the aisle next to me wasn't part of our group and slept like a rock the whole time, so I couldn't even climb out to stretch my legs.
We disembarked the plane directly onto the runway, where they had a shuttle waiting to take passengers to the actual building part of the airport. Of course, they didn't think to bring enough busses for the entire passengership, so our group got separated before any instructions were given out, which meant that left to their own devices, some of the group waited at baggage claim and others went on to exit the airport and meet up with our tour guides, and then the people in charge thought we were still waiting for those people who had gone on ahead, so there was a lot of needless waiting around. My guess is that those who had left already couldn't go back in through customs to find and tell those in charge that they were waiting outside, but whatever. My biggest complaint was that the airport in Lisbon didn't have anywhere to fill up water bottles on the way out. I wound up buying one later on at lunch, but I don't want to have to buy water the whole time I'm here.
Eventually everyone made it to the tour guides and got on the bus, which had USB chargers in the ceiling, so we could charge phones/cameras without a converter while we rode. Pretty convenient. They took us to a big main square, the name of which I forget, but it had the national opera house there, along with the obligatory statues and fountains, because it is a square in Europe and that's what they do. They pretty much dumped us there and said, "Meet back here in an hour; go buy yourself some lunch." Which would have been fine if they'd said anything like, what's good to eat, how do you order, do you go up and pay or do they bring you the bill, should you tip, do they do to-go bags here, etc. But, they didn't. The one thing they said is that you have to tell your server that you only have an hour because it can take a while to get food here. We, of course, forgot to tell our server that, but we were fine anyway at the place we went to. They have this big pedestrian concourse full of shops and restaurants, and it was all rather too much to take in. Someone came up to us with a menu, speaking pretty good English, and asked if we wanted to try the lunch specials at their restaurant around the corner and have non-tourist Portuguese food. I bet they say that to all the tourists, but we were hungry and any place was fine at that point. The prices on the menu were pretty good and at least the titles of the food were in English (no descriptions and few pictures).
We went there and got a table inside as opposed to outside, and I'm glad we did for two reasons. The first is that it was getting pretty windy, and even though it hadn't started to rain yet, it's more comfortable to eat when you're not cold. The second is that we saw peddlers coming up to everyone seated on the sidewalk and trying to sell them junk. No thank you, I just want my meal, please. Bobby had a small steak with an egg on top with rice and fries, and I had a kind of potato-codfish-egg scramble thing. It was pretty good. I got water with the meal and found out that they don't really serve tap water for free at restaurants, but they sell you a bottle of water and give you a glass. I didn't finish my bottle at the restaurant so I took it with me. I don't know if you're supposed to, but I was pretty much out of my own water, so I didn't care about custom at that point. After the most confusing encounter with wait staff ever, we paid and left. Walking around a bit, we passed by probably a half a dozen pastry shops, which we'll have to go back to later on when we have more time on our own.
Equally numerous as the pastry shops were the number of shady and still very brazen drug dealers. We got asked multiple times on our walk if we wanted to buy hash, marijuana, or an assortment of other illegal drugs. They just go up to you and flash you a little pouch, and they're kind of pushy, too, for someone who's doing something illegal. Make no mistake, it's not legal what they're doing. When we passed by police officers, nobody was offering us anything. Think like the way hawkers in New York will go up to you and ask if you want to buy a map or go on their tour or buy their "real" name-brand sunglasses. It's annoying, you don't want what they're selling, and you do your best not to make eye contact. Now imagine that they're hawking illegal mind-altering substances. Add in the fact that the old cobblestone-like streets and sidewalks are uneven, making you have to watch where your feet are going at all times, people who will just stop and stand in the middle of the street/walkway without any warning, cars trying to push past mobs of pedestrians on streets that should not be wide enough for motorized traffic, and pickpockets looking for a mark, and you've got what it's like to walk around the streets of Lisbon. Also, you can't understand a damned word of what anybody's saying, because despite having similar spellings of some words to Spanish and other romance languages you've studied, the pronunciation of Portuguese is so fucking weird that even words you memorized for this trip that you should be able to pick out are unintelligible.
It's not all bad, of course. After lunch, the group was split into two groups to go on walking tours of the city, and we got some history of Lisbon and Portugal, looked at the the older and more famous churches (of which there are a fuck-ton, despite the earthquakes, fires, and tsunamis that apparently plague the city). The sidewalks and streets, as I mentioned, are cobblestone. Or, something like it. I don't know if there's another word for it when it's a different type of stone and I don't feel like looking it up right now. Anyway, they are made of black and white and sometimes other colored limestone, and they're arranged in interesting patterns on all the sidewalks. Our guide told us that no two streets have the same patterns of stones, and I thought that was pretty neat. A lot of the houses have interesting colored tiles on them instead of paint, brick, cement, or other wall siding, and some are built on ancient fort and church walls which survived the various disasters so they got built on top of. So your apartment could have a gargoyle on its wall or something. Kind of neat. Except when you realize how hilly the city is, how tall many of the buildings are, and that most of them don't have elevators or a place to park. No, thank you. Although it is kind of neat that people will put baskets on ropes out their windows to buy stuff from the shops below and the keepers will send up the goods. We didn't see any of this in action, but we were told about it and saw some ropes tied up on the sides of windows. At one point on our tour, there was what looked like a parade at first (they had a band playing as they marched), but it was actually a protest kind of march for women's equality, and they were escorted by the police to keep them safe. I thought that was pretty cool.
There was another guided church tour listed on our schedule, but we didn't do it. We'd been running behind schedule all day, and there wasn't time. Plus, everyone was cold and tired and hungry and just wanted to check in to the hotel to shower and sleep and eat. So, we did just that. Our hotel is on the outer part of Lisbon, which is the more modern part, and it's pretty good so far. We've got wifi in the rooms, which is a nice bonus, because I would be annoyed if I could only post stuff from the lobby. And, our room has a balcony. It was a bit cold and windy to just hang out on there this evening, but maybe I'll get some use of it. The shower was kind of meh: low water pressure, inconsistent temperature, but still useful after a long day of traveling. We had time for a cat nap before supper, which was a buffet in part of the hotel's restaurant which was reserved for us. Again, they served bottled water only. I asked the tour guide where we could fill our waters up before tomorrow's rehearsal, and he said that the tap water is safe but tastes bad and everyone just buys water. Ugh. No, thank you. If I had known, I'd have brought a portable water filter like what we use when we go camping. Anyway, supper was good. They had fish, chicken, vegetables, some platters of ham/cheese/fruit/salad, soup, bread, and dessert. I had pretty much one of everything. I couldn't finish my lunch earlier in the day (they don't do doggie bags, btw), but at supper I was starving. It was all good. Or at least, I was hungry enough that it all tasted good to me. Dessert was flan, jello, strawberry mousse, rice pudding, or fruit medley. I had a little of most things, but the strawberry mousse was by far the best.
I thought after supper I was home free to go blog and go to bed, but Dr. Gemme volunteered me to fill in for one of the "dancers" for one of our songs, who had hurt herself on the cobbled streets and didn't want to move on stage for the song. Calling it dancing is a bit of a stretch, but we're wearing scarves and there are some choreographed arm and body movements to parts of it. I went to the lobby of the seventh floor where the group was rehearsing the steps, and they're not complicated, but I just feel awkward moving/dancing while singing, especially choral music. I don't mind dancing in and of itself. I've performed various dances before with no problem(ballet, belly, aerial arts), and I love singing. You would think that the two together would make me happy, but no. It's like mixing meatloaf and chocolate. I love both of those things, but they should not be taken in at the same time. But whatever. I mean, I could flat-out refuse and put up a big stink and she'd find someone else, but that's not really who I am. They said my yellow scarf would be switched to a red one, which is the part I like least about this, but if we're allowed to keep the scarves like we've been able to in the past, I'm taking home the yellow one, damnit. While we were rehearsing, the power in the rooms on that floor went out (the lights in the hall where we were stayed on), most likely due to someone trying to plug something in that wasn't rated for that outlet despite all information to the contrary. This derailed things a bit, and I got back to my room later than I wanted, but I'm still awake enough to type all these thoughts out.
This blog is really just for me to ramble about my adventures so that I can remember them more clearly later on, but if you've read this far, thank you for joining me on my trip, and I hope I haven't bored you.
Going through pictures is always a pain because I take a million of them, so for now I'm just going to see if I can put a few of them up on here, and I'll share whole albums elsewhere later on.
1-Platymoose by a fountain at a main plaza in Lisbon
2-A gargoyle
3-A house with pyramids jutting out of the walls
4-Limestone designs on the sidewalk
5-View from the hotel balcony
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