Friday, March 9, 2012

Around the World: Lisbon

March 9, 1992


Really enjoyed the three hour journey from Porto to Lisbon.  Found a pensione nice and close to the train station.  The most recognizable sign of Lisbon is the towering statue of Cristo-Rei that overlooks the city.  Shortly after the completion of Rio de Janeiro's, Christ the Redeemer, the Cardinal Patriarch of Lisbon suggested duplicating Rio's statue in Lisbon "as a plea to God to keep Portugal out of WWII."




Lisbon is a city of statues, mostly located in the middle of busy round-a-bouts, making it life threatening to get close enough to take a picture.  




On the way back to the pensione, I find a little grocery store and pick up some cheese, veggies and cookies on sale for 69 cents.  It's a great deal, obviously, because the line-up to pay winds around the store and through several aisles.  On the way out, I pass a little wine bar where it seems you can have a drink to reward yourself for enduring the line up to the cash register.  The place is full of men, possibly the husbands of the women fighting for bargains in the store.

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"Accept that some days you are the pigeon, and some days you are the statue."