After a fun and somewhat chaotic year in Lisbon, I am spending a year living in different towns in Portugal. I want to get to know this beautiful country and its people even better and to experience life in different areas. I am eager to see what the next chapter might look like…and where it will happen.
What you ask, might entice me back to Lisbon for a visit? Well poker night of course!
An Offer I Could Not Refuse
Poker night at Ryan’s is one of the things I miss most about Lisbon. A group of mostly rookies to the game, would sit out on his large terrace in the shadows of the Castelo de São Jorge, cook on the traditional outdoor grill, and fill up on food before getting “serious” about the game. Ryan would lead a couple of practice games where he taught any new players the basics. Then it was time to pay the 20 euro buy in and ante up!
For a new immigrant who had yet to establish a friend group, poker night was heaven. It was during these evenings where I met wonderful people who helped me navigate the day-to-day challenges of life in Lisbon and feel like I was finding my way in my new country.
One day, as I was walking down the streets of Viseu, trying to “bring back the bom dias”, I received a text from Ryan. He was trying to get the band back together for one last poker night before he moved to his new apartment, and we lost our ideal poker terrace. Quickly, I bought a bus ticket to Lisbon, booked a hotel and confirmed that I would be attending poker night.
It felt strange to be returning to this city where I’d spent my first year. I’d been through so much during that time with all the challenges of building a new life in a country where you don’t yet speak the language while living in an apartment you rented from Satan. This would be my first time back and I was excited to see friends and visit my favorite spots. I would, of course, keep my mini-Louisville slugger in my bag in case I ran into the landlord from the dead center of hell.
Two Star Experience in a Five Star Hotel
When booking my hotel in Lisbon, I took advantage of a good rate for the 5-star Editory Riverside in my old neighborhood. It is located at the Santa Apolónia train station which holds fond memories for me. Not only was it my closest metro station but also the home of my Pingo Doce, the popular Portuguese supermarket chain.
Lisbon immigrants tend to be a little sentimental about their “Pingo”, possibly as it is the first thing you master about your new life. Anyone can look at the pictures on food labels and know what they are buying which is far easier than navigating the local water or electric department or getting your health care id number. We spoke of our Pingo’s with an odd sense of pride. For example, if someone stopped by the Loureiro Pingo Doce to grab a contribution for poker night food, Ryan might say “Hey, that is MY Pingo!”
When I learned my room was above ‘My Pingo”, I was strangely excited about that. I was also happy to have a view of the station which had been the starting point of my explorations out of Lisbon that first year. The hotel described the rooms as “soundproofed” so while I was sure I’d hear some noise with the windows open, I was certain to have quiet evenings.
That might have been true if it weren’t for the train to Sintra which leaves as late as 12:15am and as early as 5:19am. If you wanted to sleep in that room, the time between those two departures was your window. Otherwise, the entire bed shook regularly and not in a “I brought someone home with me last night” kind of way.
As an added bonus, when you sat on the toilet you were faced with a full-length mirror sending an image of you doing your business back to you. I really do not want to know who enjoys that experience but it definitely is not me. So I shut the door, which seemed ridiculous in such a tiny room.
Luckily for me, as I sat shut in the closet of a bathroom, I had something to occupy my time. There was quite the collection of pubic hairs lining the space behind the door I just closed. I sat there, trying to count them all, wondering if this modern new hotel was going for some sort of edgy art installation for which I was not the target.
Returning to a Favorite Neighborhood Local
After settling into my hotel torture chamber, I headed out to visit my old haunts. Waves of nostalgia hit me as I walked through familiar routes, remembering my time in this beautiful city. As the memories came flooding back, I mostly remembered, as is often the case, the good times. Some of the best of those were with my buddy Cezar.
Cezar runs a small café in my old neighborhood and was my very first friend in Lisbon. The walls of his bar are covered with the characteristic blue tiles that often catches the eye of tourists who pop in, snap photos and leave. Never do this by the way. It’s annoying and rude.
Besides the lovely tiles, there is an old stainless-steel counter that takes up most of the room. There are some very uncomfortable bar stools that snake around the counter which do not dissuade anyone from staying a while. Inside the counter is Cezar’s stage. He moves around, engaging with the patrons as if he were performing an act. After you get to know him, you realize he is exactly the opposite of a showman. Instead, he is a gentle family man that just wants to cook bifanas (Portuguese pork sandwiches) that people enjoy, charge a reasonable price, and make enough money to pay his bills and take care of his wife and children.
Cezar was always a welcoming and engaging host. He could entertain the drunk stag parties, couples, and of course, locals like Ryan and me. If the bar was not busy, you might find him sitting outside on the sidewalk in one of the café’s plastic chairs. There would usually be someone sitting next to him, likely a local just stopping by for a chat and maybe or maybe not, a drink or a bite. You could come to Cezar’s for a chat and sit for a while and never buy anything. He didn’t mind as long as you didn’t snap a bunch of photos and leave. Again, this is VERY rude.
A Night in the Old Neighborhood
No one has Cezar’s number. You just show up as he is there every day. When I popped my head in without any warning, he was in the middle of entertaining a very drunk group of guys. Without skipping a beat in his hosting duYies, he said “And this is Lisa, my good friend”, in a way that sounded like I still lived a 4-minute walk up the street.
I took a seat near him and we chatted about my travels and the latest happenings in the neighborhood while he kept the booze flowing for the drunk guys. When they started talking about catching electric scooters to their next location, we explained that was simply not something we could allow and offered to call them a Bolt car.
The evening fell into a familiar pattern, making me feel like I’d never left. A friend joined me at Cezar’s and we headed onto dinner, picking up more friends as the night progressed. We wandered from one neighborhood to the next, hitting old haunts, and catching up on our lives. The night ended as they usually did, having a nightcap or two in our favorite local bar in the old neighborhood. We sat on stools that spilled into the alleys of the Alfama. Eventually, the trash trucks appeared and we had to pick up our stools and crowd onto the narrow sidewalks as they passed.
It was good to be home again in the old neighborhood if only for a night.
Poker Night in Lisbon Arrives!
Poker night finally arrived. It felt like old times. I got to see even more friends as well as meet Ryan and his girlfriend’s new baby. Ryan had even eased the chip embargo as the ridiculous number of bags of various flavors of chips brought by everyone as snacks had finally cleared out over time. We could have easily done away with the grilling part of the evening given all the chips we consumed while playing poker.
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The snacks were one of the best parts of the evening as we always ate things we normally would not. The first poker game I ever went to, Ryan said to bring whatever I wanted to snack on while playing. So I brought a bag of almonds and some dried apricots. When I offered them to others, I was openly mocked for my healthy food choices. “It’s poker night!” they would say as they laughed at me. From then on, I brought bags of crisps or something else we should probably avoid.
What was NOT fun and did NOT feel like old times, was losing my shirt in poker. I always won or at the very least, broke even. That night I not only lost but I bought in an extra 10 euros and lost that as well.
I guess the universe set my poker account back to even.
Will I Return to Lisbon?
In the end, I could not decide if I missed Lisbon or if I was happy to be on my journey. I loved my old neighborhood and my friends, but things have, as they always do, changed. My favorite old neighbor has already been forced out of his home by Satan, aka my former landlord. I’d likely live in a different neighborhood anyway as the tourists have overrun the Alfama, slowly making it unlivable for the locals and turning it into Lisbon Disneyland. Since I left, a new overpriced cafe has popped up and my old local spot where my morning galão cost one-fifth of what the new places were charging, had tacked up signs outside to attract more of the tourist business.
As I was headed back to Viseu, I was not super excited about returning there. Viseu was comfortable for a month but outside of a few local spots I liked, it did not feel like a place I wanted to live. Perhaps that made me a little more nostalgic for my Lisbon life than I might otherwise have been.
Where I will end up is still a mystery. For now, I will continue my explorations of Portugal.
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