March 16th: Portugese Odds and Ends

Here are the few odd items that didn’t fit into the other blogs.

Chapel of Bones

In the town of Alcantarilha was a chapel with walls, floor and ceiling made of human bones. These were dug up from the church graveyard several hundred years ago when it became full. As far as I could discover there was no more to it than that. It made a gruesome sight, but the occupants all looked happy enough and I did check the photos afterwards for “red-eye” in case one of them gave me a cheeky wink.

Cork Harvesting

The last inland walk took us past lots of stripped cork oaks. The number 8 in white indicates that these trees were de-barked in 2008 so the grower knows they need doing again in 2017, i.e. every 9th year. It seems that, despite the plastic revolution, the market for cork is as strong as ever and we saw in the local shops cork wallets, shoes, handbags, skirts even. It’s obviously a more robust material than you think. The heap below is a typical pile of cork bark.


Ajulejos

This is an example of Portuguese blue tile panels found everywhere, azul being the Portuguese word for blue. You may recall the photo from the disused nunnery in an earlier blog. The tiles are still being produced in a great variety and most houses seem to have at least one feature block of them, usually quite a classy enhancement. They also appear in volume in souvenir shops where the artistic value is more questionable.

Portuguese Language
In written form the vocabulary is similar to Spanish so you can make a fair stab at the meaning if you know some Spanish. There, the similarity ends: the pronunciation is nothing like, and sounds more like Russian to me than Spanish. The main sound effect is caused by the letter “s” being mainly pronounced as “sh”, for example 6 coffees= seis galaus, pronounced “saysh galawsh”. Fit your teeth with anti-spray guards before attempting!

On the whole Portugal was very interesting, especially the walking where we were lucky enough to be included in an experienced group. Parts of the coast are like Spain, very touristy. We could have been luckier with the weather but I think that would have applied to most of Europe. And now back to España.