Braga - prayers and newspapers

Coimbra studies,
Porto works,
Lisbon shows off
Braga prays.

During the last weekend I went to check out if the part about Braga is true, while visiting my friend Sara. At first, we were looking for each other for a while around the city coz every square in Braga seemed to have a city hall, a fountain and a cafeteria in the middle. Our first touristic target was obviously the most famous church of Braga - Bom Jesus do Monte (Good Jesus of the mountain) with a baroque stairway.

The weather was also typical for Braga: sunny for every 2nd 5 minutes, while during the rest of time it was a raining. However, the mountain view facing Braga was very clear and in the moments of showers we were a bit envious about the sun above the city.

On the way down we've noticed a group of Portuguese scouts wearing characteristic scarfs.

Other sights of Braga didn't let me forget of the religious reputation of this city... There are too many churches to name and present here.

And now dear follower a short quiz:
What did the nun buy in this little green, but not forgotten by God, shop?

I suspect she must have bought the traditional mint candies from that region!
Only 1 Euro per package!

I have to mention that during this trip I didn't take any pictures of food coz it looked so delicious that I didn't even think of taking pictures of it before eating... Mmmm.

After touristic and gastronomic part we went for a coffee to the famous A Brasileira, which sells coffee since the 17th of March 1907. The waiters there, are as elegant as 1 century ago! We had a super exclusive table by the window and enjoyed our coffees with milk - galao and meio de leite.



Few other things, concerning Portuguese culture that are worth to be mentioned, were loads of flower shops on the streets and local men reading newspaper not only in a traditional way.

At the evening Sara and I started preparing ourselves for the next day's hiking adventure.

Nascente do Este - where the river is born

On Sunday morning, Sara, her friend Filipe and I went hiking. As soon as Filipe saw me standing next to Sara, he asked if I'm Mexican too. The whole trip was organised by an organisation connected with environmental issues and planned for approx. 5 hours.

The aim of our trip was the spring of the river Este that crosses Braga. At first we took a route of the ancient road from the roman times. Afterwards we've passed the forest, few hills and a village.

After getting to the place where the spring is we had lunch and short siesta. Then continued hiking up and then dramatically down. The views around were lovely as well as the weather.

What I've learned during this trip is the fact that the trees of Eucalyptus grow not only in Australia from where it comes from. The European boom took place around 20 years ago when people started growing eucalyptus in Portugal and Spain. I was told that this kind of tree grows very fast and in 3-4 years reaches significant height.

My personal conclusion of that day is not to hike in my Spiderman's shoes. It seems they are rather made for climbing not hiking.

Turkish coffee - Türk kahvesi

"Coffee should be
black as hell,
strong as death,
and as sweet as love."

- A Turkish Proverb

Turkish coffee and the most necessary accessories.

Unseparable part of drinking Turkish coffee is fortune telling. When there is nothing left to drink in the cup, you turn it head over feet and watch carefully what you see inside of your cup and plate. There is a traditional Turkish saying for doing it:
Kahve Pir
Kalbime Gir
Kalbimden Çık
Fincana Gir
Neyse Halim
Çıksın Falim

Another Turkish coffee tradition is connected with the first visit that the boy pays to the family of his beloved girl for the first time. During that visit the girl prepares coffee for everybody but instead of adding sugar to the boy's cup, she put salt. If the boy really loves the girl, he has to drink the coffee. And then they live happy ever after in the house with pink windows (Sena told me that such house is a dream of every Turkish girl)!

Some people say that a cup of coffee and a cigarette should always go together.

Portuguese TV Commercials

I used to hate commercials but actually here I've noticed that they can be a really good way to discover another country's culture. Here are some of them:

Sumol is something similar to well known Fanta but seems to taste a bit more like natural fruit.
The city that appears in this video is my dear Porto!



Super Bock is the most famous Portuguese beer!
This commercial was directed by Ze Pedro from Xutos e Pontapes.



Nescafe! Pretty old commercial i've found on youtube... right now this brand seems to be replaced by Nespresso. This add is somehow very Portuguese for me: lazy morning, coffee, good piece of music and sunrise at the beach.



The Galp Energia is a Portuguese corporation involved in activities concerning distributing energy. This commercial shows quite a lot of famous places in Portugal.

Easter Holidays in Poland

The polish tradition that my cousins and I enjoy and cultivate is painting eggs for Easter. If somebody has any doubts: we were born in '85, '86 and '87 which means that this is not only practiced by children. It is a significant part of our folklore. These are some of this year's pieces of girls Easter art:

If you want your Easter egg to become brown or orange- boil it in hot water together with dry parts of onion. If you prefer other colors try grass for green or betroots for purple.



Easter basket, which is taken on Saturday to the church to bless the food, usually consists of eggs, bread, sasuage and salt and pepper. This food may be eaten during Sunday breakfast.

If you look carefully at the eggs in the basket below, you may see an egg which looks like a flag of Portugal!

My cousins who turned simple eggs into such colorful "things" are Ela and Ula (for curious people- those short forms of their names come from Elżbieta - like Elisabeth and Urszula - like Ursula). Thanks to them for sending the pictures of eggs! :-*
If you're interested in your wedding's professional photo session, french and vegeterian cuisine or you have any problems from the computer science field they may help you!

Easter Holidays in Portugal

This year's Easter Holidays were different from all the previous ones....
For the first time in my life I didn't spend them with any member of my family. I missed them a lot and it was hard not to imagine what are the doing, what is the weather like where they are and most of all how my cousins painted the eggs and how does the cheese-cake taste this year!
During this year's Easter, one of my AEGEE friends - Sylwia - invited me to join her and her friends. I've arrived to Porto on Saturday noon and met Sylwia at the Bolhão Market. She kept on looking for chives, necessary vegetable for easter dishes, and I took some pictures of the place. The whole market was full of energetic and very convincing ladies trying to sell all kinds of food - fruit, vegetables, meat (including birds in cages) - the air smelled like a mix of fish and... strawberries!

After doing the shopping we still had a lot of time for further exploration of Porto and other side of the Douro river called Vila Nova de Gaia. It is there, where the cellars of famous Port wine are located. The wine is stored there after shipping it on special boats from the vineyards of the Douro Valley. Most of the tourists stop by the first cellars (caves) near the river bank and pay around 4 euros to try Sandeman's wine, while at Croft's they may get a guided tour around the cellar for free.

As soon as Sylwia and I went up the hill to Croft it turned out that we can visit its caves with spanish speaking guide or wait 40 minutes for english one. We've picked the first option, drank some white Port and the tour started. The guide was a lady from Panama and she lead us through the corridors of gigant barrels filled with wine and told about the procedures of making good Port. At the end the guide said that she has never seen such a quiet Spanish group. Well, none of us, neither Scandinavian guys, German girls, Itallian couple, told her the truth. We were just enjoying the second glass of Port...

The activity of wine tasting was very tiring so we went back to Sylwia's flat were her Indian flatmate - Qadir - was preparing Pav Bhaji, a typical dish from his country. It turned out that there is a shop with real Indian spices in Porto, so thanks to that he doesn't miss his mum's cuisine too bad. I've also found out that curry is a european invention. Qadir told me that he discovered what curry is when he left India. Curry is simply a mix of all possible Indian spicies but nobody uses them all together there. We ate Pav Bhaji with bread by the use of our hands. This dish convinced me that vegetarian food can be really tasty. Meanwhile, Qadir was looking forward to his first Easter Holidays!


As soon as the Sunday morning came we started preparing jajka faszerowane (eggs with top-secret filling) for the Easter lunch. Sylwia and I didn't boil eggs for a long time so it was hard to predict when should we take them out of the water. Other parts went without any problems and after approximately one hour the eggs were ready. Sylwia, Qadir and I took a bus and went to join the rest of our compagnions. Each person prepared a different dish, so the Easter table cosisted of: EGGS, chicken soup, 2 kinds of salad, chocolate cake... and a rabbit! At first we thought that rabbit is a typical Easter dish of Portugal but at the end it turned out that it's French. Still, everybody found it exquisite!

After the lunch we took a walk to the nearby ocean side. It was pretty windy but sunny. The Easter food and sun rays made us a bit lazy so we've headed up for a coffee...

Thanks to (from the right) Sylwia, Dorota, Qadir, Aga, Ada, Sara and Piotr, it was unforgetable Easter!

Algarve - place on Earth

When I saw the surroundings of one of Portimao for the first time I was about to cry... Where were all the charming hotels with the ocean view, pedestrians with lovely restaurants and lively people enjoying their holidays. Instead of that I've found huge block-buildings facing each other, pedestrians with empty restaurants and staff not very encouraging to enter.
Luckily my disappointment didn't last long. As soon as the morning sun appeared I've discovered that Portimao's beach - Praia da Rocha is worth its fame. Long, wide, sandy, surrounded by amazing rock cliffs beach is much more than I expected from it.

After exploring the coast my flatmate Paulina and I took a break in one of the Pastelaria's and continued discovering Portimao afterwards. The center of Portimao reminded me of Cuba. It gave me a feeling of the forgotten city, full of very old buildings that lost their glory a long time ago. After seeing all the melancholic images I couldn't believe my eyes, or actually ears, when I've heard on one of the streets an old man playing Beethoven's "Ode to joy" - the anthem of Europe.

For thos who follow my blog regularly, as you see the black Smart is always with me!
On that day, we've discovered the train station which gave us an opportunity of going to the great beaches of Lagos for just 1,35 Euro one way! We were very excited about taking one of the silver trains woohoooo! They not only have double sits inside, but also triple sits - perfect for long legs of polish girls.

Before arriving to Lagos I had no idea what to expect from it. The story of it is quite complicated. An ancient town founded by Carthaginians, colonized by Romans, occupied by Visigoths and Byzantines, fortified by Moors and finally completely captured by the king Afonso III in 1249. The king gave himself the title "King of Portugal and the Algarve" because it was considered as a foreign country after the Moorish times. Lagos became very significant through centuries as an important port on trade routes. Many historical buildings still remained, such as Forte do Pau da Bandeira from XVI century, which personally for me looks like the fortress El Morro in Havana de Cuba. The historical area is full of places that are very attractive for tourists - wide variety of restaurants, self made products shops, modern statues, carousel for children.

Nevertheless, the best reason for coming to Lagos are definetly its beaches. Incredible rock formations make those places very unique. I've visited few of them...

10:00 am - Praia dos Estudantes - great place to lay down in the ocean waves on the hot summer day avoiding the crowds, it's nicely hidden from the wind.


1:00 pm - Praia do Pinhão - great place for amateurs of water jumps! Can you see the rock behind me? If look carefully you may see crazy Brits climbing and jumping into the ocean.
This beach is also a very cool place for lunch, turned out not to be as expensive as I expected- Tosta Mista costs 1,75 Euro.


3:00pm - Praia do Camilo - i'm speechless about this one! Its rocks absolutely rock!

After speding time among such a natural surrounding it's hard to believe that Algarve is a place on Earth - full of concrete buildings and hard working people.