September

The weather is amazing. On Saturday it should be +30 degrees. Today was a hot day as well, my classmate said to me "It's the wrong day to be wearing black clothes." He must be blind.

Today I discovered anywheretv.com and watched Maajussille Morsian <3.

Google Translate

I get a lot of email to my University mail adress. A lot. And 95% of them is in Portuguese. I thought that if somebody had something important to say, they'd write me in English. Well, apparently I've been missing a lot of information about courses and other stuff. Now I forwarded the emails to my gmail adress and use a lot of Google Translate :(

Homeless guy

The homeless guy has started greeting me.

I noticed that he had 6 liters of Sangria.

Pay what you want

Today was a bit random. I ended up to go see a theatre play in Portuguese, then we went to a small place to have some wine and tapas (can't remember what the Portuguese call them...just tapas but different word). anyway, when we asked for the check, the waitress just brought us a small basket, where we expected to find the check. But it was empty, and the waitress told us that they're trying a new method, where they don't have fixed prices, but people just pay what they thought the food and drinks were worth.

Nice idea. But that would NEVER work in Finland, especially when they serve alcohol!!

Gym

After all the eating (and blogging about it) I went to a gym in the centre to ask about the prices. They don't have the prices in the internet, because there are these sales guys working and you need to negotiate a bit with them. I hate it when people expect me to be rich when they learn that I'm from Finland, so I was planning to say that I'm from a poor country. Like Ethiopia.

My roommate told me more or less how much it's going to cost, so I was prepared for bargaining. But since the guy at the gym didn't speak so much English he just skipped the negotiation part and gave me the student discount prices. And after talking to 6 people in the gym (including the owner), signing a contract in Portuguese, and another paper in Portuguese that I understand the conditions of the paper that I just signed (!) I'm a member of Virgin Activity now. The gym is very nice and has a swimming pool and a sauna. On Monday I have a meeting with a personal trainer, that will be depressing ;(

Oh, and I've been trying to find a place where I can fix my lash extensions. That seems to be harder than I expected. A Portuguese friend is already working on that issue, but today at the gym one woman just randomly said that she liked my lashes. I asked her where to go fix them, she said maybe they do it in one beauty salon close by. I went there but they didn't have that service there, but they gave me another adress that I need to check tomorrow. Pheww. Portuguese women are so pretty that they don't need fake (but beautiful) lashes.

Things you don't see in Finland 1

On Saturday when we went to the concert, my friends left their car in a parking place near the centre. Quite an old place, not busy at all. You go in, press the button and you get a card that you need to keep. Just like in Finland.

But then when we left at 2am, instead of paying for the parking in an automat, there was a man working and collecting the money for the parking. How sweet.

Other stuff

Although I spend a lot of time sleeping and eating (I'm really enjoying not having to wake up early to go to work) I do a bit of other stuff, too. On Friday I went to a very nice Erasmus-party, and yesterday I went to a concert of Old Jerusalem (http://www.myspace.com/oldj).

But now I need to study, I have to develop a business idea for tomorrow. Maybe a clinic for foreigners that come to Portugal and eat too much.

1989

Most of my classmates are born in 1989.

Food, again

This is turning into a food blog now, but I think I spend 50% of my time here eating. This is a typical lunch in the school cafeteria: 2,25€.

Great that the lunch break is 1,5 hours. I'm still the slowest eater in the world.

Finlandês

I found this poster in my faculty, I wonder how many students there are in the Finnish classes. I might just email the teacher and ask if there is a student there that would like to do some language exchange with me once I start my language course in a week. As long as the Finnish is not in a too advanced level, because I wouldn't be able to explain the grammar. Finnish is a way too difficult language.

Francesinha

In addition to Port wine the other speciality of Porto is francesinha, or “little French one.” Though there is nothing little about it. Nor French. Well there is a story of a French guy and his ham and cheese sandwich but I really don't know what that has got to do with this heart attack on a plate.

So basically it's two slices of bread around some combination of steak, sausage and ham (I guess normally it's at least five different kinds of meat inside the sandwich). It's then covered with melted cheese and tomato-beer sauce. Adding fries and/or egg makes it “especial.”

This is half portion: 

It's not something I'd eat too often, but it's good. Very meaty. My photo doesn't do any justice to the meat part, check in Google for better pictures. This time we went to a place that was a bit touristy, next time I'll find a more autentic place to eat it. And there are a lot of places to try in Porto. They even have a webpage for it, http://francesinhas.com/.

Today's class 2

I went to attend the practical class of Information Systems, just to find out that in the Office 2008 for Mac there is no Access application.

So if anyone knows how to install a Windows to Mac so that I can get MS Access, call me.

Today's class

Today there was a guy sitting in front of me in the class. For three hours I just wanted to pull out the one gray hair he had sticking out from his otherwise black hair.

Food

I need to start doing some sports, because the food is just too good here. And it's very heavy.

Now I don't know if I just got back my appetite after being sick for a week, or was I extremely hungry, or did I had the best burger of my life yesterday?? I let my Portuguese friend choose the restaurant, when she said "burgers" I was a bit suspicious but it was perfect and I'm going to take all the visitors there.  What was so special about it was the topping of the meat: oninon confit in port wine, topped with traditional Portuguese Serra da Estrela cheese. I was so happy about it that I took a photo. Really, a photo of a burger. Here:

The Great Pretender

My flatmates are so nice, I cannot believe my luck. We went to IKEA together today, they carried my stuff (which was a lot, as usual), and then they made food for me. I tried to wash the dishes, but I was told "just go and relax, you're sick". I wonder if I should just go on and pretend to be sick for some time  longer, the service is just too good.

Neighbourhood

Downstairs, on the other side of the street from the prostitute, there is a homeless man. But he has made some effort to make himself comfortable: he has a matress and a blanket, yesterday when I passed him he had hung his socks for drying, and he was sitting on his bed, chilling and reading the newspaper.

Super Bock

They serve beer in the school canteen <3

Survivor

I survived the first 12 hour schoolday. Though I wanted to escape half-way, because this flue is really getting me tired, but the professor of the second last class didn't have a break in 3 hours (omg, the 3 most boring hours of my life, where 60% of the lecture was in Portuguese) and I was sitting in the middle of the row so I just didn't dare to leave. So once I had to stay there until 5pm anyway, I went to the last class as well. Luckily, the last class of the day was really interesting and the professsor was really good. And funny.

And my Portuguese classmates seem very nice as well. After they gathered some courage they were very chatty. Once I get over the flu I might talk back to them.  I have 5 courses and all of them require at least one group work. Good way to meet people.

But now: painkillers, allergy medicines and sleep. Tomorrow, if I'm feeling better: a party.

Supermarket Sweep

I wanted to make a nice goat cheese salad for dinner. Out of the seven ingredients I wanted to buy I could't find four. My dinner was finally a yoghurt :(.

MasterChef

I live with two MasterChefs. They're going to be so disappointed when it's my turn to prepare the dinner.

Speak me Portuguese

Inspired by todays nightmares I just signed up for an intensive Portuguese language course. 3 hours a day, 5 days a week, 4 weeks. Intensive indeed.

Welcome to the circus

I went to my faculty today to register and get a student card. When I arrived, it was like a circus. The entrance  hall was full of people, I took a queuing number to the academic services, there was 120 people before me. I saw the people working there and was hoping that it wouldn't be that older lady who would call my number, because I was sure she couldn't speak any English. Well, of course it was her. And she didn't speak English, when I said "hello" she panicked a bit, tried to call somebody that didn't pick up and then...she disappearred. Sweet. But because I'd been already waiting for 1,5 hours I just waited the poor thing to come back. So she explained me stuff in Portuguese, I got the idea that I couldn't get a student card from there. Finally, there were three people explaining me in Portuguese where to go, and at that point I wasn't really sure anymore where they were telling me to go and what for.

And btw the Portuguese tend to wave their hand to some direction, and you never know if the place is 50 meters or 5 kilometers away.

Well I went to the direction they were pointing at, and by a miracle I found the place, they spoke excellent English there and I got my student card (after queuing, of course) and a bunch of passwords and PIN-codes that I'm not yet sure what to use them for.

After that I had a meeting with the professor who is responsible for my master's programme. He was mainly showing me where the shopping centres and the cinemas are, nice man. Tomorrow I'll have my first lectures, we'll see what kind of classes he gives.

Tomorrow I'll be queuing in three different offices.

Now I'll sign up for a Portuguese class.

Crazy Fridays

Who says the Portuguese are lazy? On Fridays I have classes from 8.30 am to 8pm. One hour break. Later I'll have some classes on Saturday morning 8am.

Well, from Mondays to Thursdays I'm mainly free.

Home

My buddy and his friend picked me up in the middle of the night from the airport, very sweet from them. When we arrived to my new home, the first thing I saw when stepping out of the car was a prostitute (which is quite funny if you think of the finnish word portto, heheh).

My new roomies were here, they seem both very nice. I got a beer and a delicious welcome sandwich. The flat is very nice and cosy, the location couldn't be any more perfect.

I slept like a baby here, today I only went to the supermarket, made quite safe choises there. Before I'll learn some Portuguese going to a supermarket will be a small adventure each time, just like it was in Poland when I was living there.

Tonight I'll eat codfish with my roomies. Life is good in Porto.

Lufthansa

I managed to smuggle my extra bag in the plane, they were being very strict about it, announcing that only one hand luggage is alloowed and measuring the sizes of the bags. I looked so innocent that they didn't check mine.

In the first fligth from Helsinki to Frankfurt they were serving nice Thai style vegetable wraps. I thought they were nice. After I had finished eating I saw the expiration date. I refuse to believe it's true.

Waucher

My cute friends got me a voucher for a massage in Porto. Hope they didn't spend too much time finding this, since none of them speak Portuguese :S Sweeeeeet crazy friends they are.

 

I also got these post-it's so I can leave messages to my roomies :D

Now. last night in Helsinki.

Last day

I'm cleaning my desk, admiring my Office calendar and planning a great out of office message.

Portugalilainen kimppakämppä

This is where I'm going to move to. In the other room is an Irish guy and downstairs a Portuguese guy. It's right in the centre of Porto and it all sounds good. I hope it is in reality as well. Come visit me!

Photo by C. Pinto.

Couchsurfing

I've been surfing on my friends' couches for 1,5 weeks already.

Why haven't I done this before? It's just perfect!!

This morning one friend made me a beautiful breakfast, which was far better than an average brunch in a restaurant in Helsinki, and in the evening when I returned to stay with another friend she had prepared a nice evening meal and with a delicious dessert from apples she had picked herself.

If I'll find people in Porto that are even half as lovely as my friends are here, everything will be just fine.

It's here.

Now it came. Panic. I'm feeling sick to stomach. I was alone for a whole hour and had time to think, and this is the result. Have to keep myself busy for six more days so that I won't have the time to worry about things.

Accommodation is still work in process, I have outsourced it a bit so hopefully I'll get some good news tomorrow evening.

I'm pricey

Yesterday I spent around 950 euros on insurences. It's expensive to be this accident-prone.