Cities have always been like people, they show their different personalities to the traveller. Depending on the city and the traveller, it can strike a mutual love, or an antipathy, a friendship or enmity. Only through travel can we know where there is something that belongs to us or not, where we are loved and where we are rejected.
(Roman Payne)

Of course I haven't forgotten about WEEKEND EXPERIENCE.

How could I!

Exceptionally I have decided to publish on Saturday for this week.

@galenkp this time, like pretty much all the others, really got me into trouble; I would have liked to exploit at least a couple of themes... something I may not do in my next writings eh eh!

So I thank him for the many sources of inspiration he gives me, as well as for this fantastic "Friday" opportunity.

In the end I had to make a choice so I'll tell you about the most beautiful country I've visited, or at least that I liked the most.

In Europe I have been able to visit many places while, as far as other continents are concerned, I have been practically only in Africa and only in Tangier.

the country that bewitched me among all was Portugal; specifically I loved Porto; I also got to visit Lisbon but, if I had to choose, I would opt for the former all my life.

I had the opportunity to spend almost a month in Porto, while visiting a friend who was there for Erasmus... so let's talk about my university days and several years ago.

The thing that struck me most was that the city was very reminiscent of Italy in the late 70s and early 80s, or at least it gave me that impression.

Right from the start I found myself at ease in Portugal also because, as far as communication is concerned, I had fewer problems than in English-speaking countries; in those days, as much as I struggled with English, it was much more difficult than today.
Portuguese, on the other hand, came to me immediately simple.

I confess that I spent the first three days in Porto practically in silence, but slowly I began to gain confidence in the language and in the end I was able to communicate quite easily; I am convinced that if I had stayed there for a couple of months I would have learned to speak Portuguese easily.

I've always thought that the best way to learn languages is to spend a lot of time in the country, do you want to learn English? Spend a couple of months in England.

Of course, it must be said that in any case learning a language at the "spoken" level to communicate does not lead you to knowledge of it, given that writing and grammar are quite another thing.

However let's not digress and come back to us; another thing I appreciated was the economic side since, at least at the time when I was there, things cost a lot less than here in Italy. Just think that I left with one suitcase and returned with two, of course one was full of gifts heh heh!

The Portuguese people seemed very kind and welcoming to me; I confess that, if I had to change country, I could really consider Portugal as a destination.

as you well know, with Reny we have the dream of moving to Tuscany for our old age so we are not considering other destinations, but if I had to do so I think Oporto would have several points in favor of her.

Obviously I tasted the local cuisine, here you can see my favorite dish of the place, the Francesenhas accompanied by that delicious sauce called "piru piru", on top there is a fried egg and, in the version I used to , there are fries as a side dish... as they say in portugal "a cascada"; in those days this dish, which was a complete meal, cost 3.50 euros, add a bottle of water and with 4 euros you had lunch lol!

Well, I'll stop here for today, with my Dad we are doing some work in the garden (always the same, very long and tiring but will give a fantastic result) and I don't want to leave him too much alone, I don't want him to get too tired... the mule and I'm the cement mixer, I'll leave the finishing work to him. 😉

Ah, before saying goodbye, I can't find a photo of that trip anymore, we're talking about 15 years ago anyway; as cover image I put my 104th plasma donation made this morning, I know that's another story... but maybe it can inspire someone to start donating!

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As always, thank you for coming this far, but tell me, do you have a favorite country apart from the one you live in of course?
It's a half that you would choose for vacation or sooner or later Would you like to go and live there?
If you want to. let me know your answers and thoughts in the comments below.

Hug You!

🔘 🔘 🔘

"Yes, I too was born among men. I had never seen the Jungle. They passed me food from behind bars in an iron container until one night I felt that I was Bagheera, the Panther, and not a plaything for men. I broke the stupid lock with a swipe of my paw and left. And since I had learned the tricks of men, in the Jungle, I became more terrible than Shere Khan."

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The texts are translated with simultaneous translators; for the avoidance of doubt I have decided that they will all be translated exclusively with Google Translate.
Of course, English is not my first language but I try, forgive any mistakes and imperfections of Translate.