So, let's talk about Lisbon.

After our Spain trip, we had to return here to wrap up a few things, and get our stuff out of storage. Because our life was total chaos, we actually did surprisingly little touristy stuff while "living" here - I think we went out a day or two at most. But coming back gives me a complicated feeling. This place put me through hell, so part of me wants to never see it again. Ella was of the opinion if we lived here, we might as well see the city. I knew she was right, and I'd regret it if I didn't see anything - Lisbon isn't a big tourist destination for nothing, after all.

And we can start by introducing maybe the most touristy area, the Alfama district where we used to live. As I overheard from a tour guide once, its name is actually Arabic, which means "hot spring". (I looked as hard as I could, but the last hot spring here closed in the 70s - too bad). But I can believe it. Lisbon is a hilly city overall, but this district and the surrounding ones are particularly so. According to one random person the internet (so you know it's reliable), there is still hot water underground, but isn't commercially viable to extract. I would say, you don't have enough Taiwanese or Japanese living here then. Tell them there's natural hot spring water below their feet, you'll have a bathhouse open in no time. Alfama is the oldest part of the city, and Lisbon itself is one of the oldest cities in the world. So there is no sort of rhyme or reason to the roads, because they were probably laid out long before the USA even existed. They wander wherever they want, and are small even by European standards. Most of the "big" roads are one-way out of necessity, and probably 80% of the "roads" are narrow alleys that even a bike barely fits in. The rest of Lisbon isn't really like this. As my understanding, Lisbon had a big earthquake about 200 years ago, which pretty much wiped out the city - except Alfama. Hooray! Lisbon still gets earthquakes now and then, but nothing serious. Plus, building codes have made just a little bit of progress. I guess this narrow maze of alleys and unique look are why it's popular with tourists. The streets are cobblestone, so when we lived here, we would regularly hear the click-click of rolling suitcases down the street.

But you know I gotta talk about transport - our place was about 5 minutes walk to the old train station called Santa Apolonia - kind of like Hua Lamphong for my Thai folks. It's still used a lot, and you can get pretty much anywhere in Portugal within a few hours. For trains to Spain and beyond, you need to go two stops up the track to the shiny new station, literally 5 minutes. Santa Apolonia is also the terminal for a metro line, and in general, it's fast to get around the city. Many of the interesting spots are on this (blue) line or the green line, which is an easy transfer. Actually all the metro stops are quite close, sometimes only a few hundred meters. So we've actually been doing a lot of walking, because some of the other cool hangout areas are only about 20 minutes away.

Speaking of hills, the other method of transport in Alfama is the tram system. I really like these, as they haven't changed in a hundred years - kind of like the ding dings in Hong Kong. Locals use them probably just as much as tourists, cause when they go by you can see a very bored salaryman playing on his phone, while all you see next to the back window is a sea of cameras. They are pretty iconic, being made of wood, and zipping through the small alleys. They've become sort of the symbol of the city, and they're commonly featured on T-shirts, mugs, etc.. They're actually a lot of fun to ride, banking back and forth, rising up and down, sort of like a budget roller coaster. Still, I think Lisbon is pretty blessed for transit. The downtown core is quite compact, so often times it's faster to walk than to use the metro.

When we arrived, it was pretty late (or dinner time, if you ask the locals). We just ate dinner and went to bed, and planned on going out the next day. But actually, Ella wasn't feeling well, and we were tired from traveling all over, so we stayed in the next day too. And the following day we got our stuff from storage and did a bunch of errands, basically "closing out" our life there. Now that that was all done, it happened to be the first weekend of the month, which is when a lot of tourist places in Lisbon have free hours. We sat down to plan out a strategy in order to see the most free things we could, so here's what we came up with. I'll keep it down to just a picture or two each, but there are a lot more on Facebook.

Medeiros and Almeida Museum: Basically a Victorian (but not because I don't know enough about Portuguese history) era home that some rich doctor lived in. He must have been lonely, because this place was huge, the size of a museum itself. This was surprisingly cool, and we had the place pretty much to ourselves. Everything was very beautiful, and there was even a room indoors with a fountain and Italian marble statues. Also a very amazing collection of clocks, because why not. I didn't expect to like it as much as I did. 10/10

Calouste Gulbenkian Museum: This is apparently a quite prestigious art museum, closed for renovation. However they moved a lot of things into a temporary gallery that opened just after we left, so that was fortunate timing. Also I think a rich guy's private collection, I saw some art done by several of the Ninja Turtles. It was only a small collection, but overall kind of nice. They also had a modern art exhibit which was so weird and creepy I didn't want to take a single photo. Basically, it was architecture where parts of it had been cut away to reveal like, muscle fibers or organs underneath. I'll put a photo of the most tame part, as the rest was just gross. The classical art, 7/10. Modern art stuff, 0/10.

The Pepper Palace: A mix of a lot of soso things with some really impressive things. I didn't dislike it, it did have some really cool photo ops. The rest of the museum was kind of soso. They had a lot of peacocks in the yard, and a 50 cent coffee, which was pretty great. 6/10.

Lisbon Military Museum: We actually lived around the corner from this place, but, you know, life, chaos. An old barracks, I was surprised to find out there is still a military presence there, so some parts are off limits. It started out kind of interesting, with a bunch if cannons. But then for some reason, the upstairs is like a French palace. Ella remarked that this place actually was more pretty than the Palace of Versailles outside of Paris, which is more of a dig at how underwhelming we found that place compared to here. Still, it was surprisingly cool, and they had some really impressive things there. 9/10

Prazeres Cemetery: Perhaps an unconventional pick, but sort of nice. Ella really likes churchy architecture, a cemetery is full of little examples of it. These are more like small tombs (mausoleums?) than grave stones, so it was interesting to see the different styles. But it didn't really do it for me, the only thing I appreciated was benches of cats and the great view of the Lisbon bridge. 3/10

Basilica of Estrela: Of course there's a church. Being a basilica, it was very impressive. Still, there wasn't much to do except to take a few photos and say "Yep, there it is." If we hadn't just come off of seeing some of the most beautiful churches in the world in Granada, I'd be more impressed. Still nice though. 5/10

The Geographic Society of Lisbon: Online I saw some amazing photos showing "mappy" things, which I couldn't pass up. We got some bad news when arriving though, as the door guy said they are closed for renovation. However, there is a library that is open to the public, and we could visit that if we came back after lunch. I was a little disappointed, but no problem, the library will have some interesting stuff. So we killed time by going to the world's largest Zara, while I inspected the quality of their sofas. Going back, the librarian was pretty much the nicest person in the world. She said they had a few things in the library, but the really cool stuff is in the museum. She said that she would call her colleague and see if she couldn't get us into the museum anyway. We insisted that we didn't want to trouble them, but she insisted right back. A few minutes later, she had us moving through the back hallways of this ancient building, to see some amazing globes and maps. 10/10

The Lisbon Cathedral: Another €5 cathedral, that according to websites should be free on that day, but for some reason wasn't. Ella went, and thought it was pretty good. Later she said you can just tell them you want to go in and pray, and they'll let you in for free - although that doesn't give you access to the museum parts. Based on her attitude, I'll say 6/10.

The Church of St. Dominic: Maybe the oldest looking church I've ever been to, at over 1000 years old. It almost looks like it was carved out of a cave, I suspect from the many centuries of wear and tear. It actually burned down, collapsed, and who knows what else. I really liked it here just because it looked so different from the other glitzy churches we've seen. Plus it was right in the city center. As far as churches go, it's a winner. 8/10

Dr. Anastacio Gonclaves House: What is it with doctors having really nice houses that are now museums? As far as I can tell, he was a doctor in the Ph.D way and not the medicine way, as he was an artist/architect that decorated a lot of this house himself. Overall just a nice old house that is more family sized. The lower levels were a lot of cramped hallways and small rooms, which made the large open studio on the top floor more amazing. The museum workers were EXTREMELY nice here, and had so much enthusiasm to explain everything and anything. One even asked us to come outside to the street so she could point out other buildings he designed. Normally 6/10, but the staff made it 8/10

Well, that just about covers it! The last night we got to spend some time with friends who used to live across the street from us. They made our crazy stay in Lisbon much more special, and honestly leaving them will be the hardest part. But with some wine down by the river and a few beers, it was a perfect way to end our time there, and our travels for now. I'm not really sure where we'll end up next, although Bangkok is certainly at the top of the list for now. It would be nice to get back to some place to stability after all of this, and Bangkok is as close as anything Ella and I have to home. Until then, bye Lisbon, bye Europe. We'll be back, but next time just as tourists.