Archive for October, 2007

Visiting my city

Published by
andrew
at October 21, 2007 in Lisboa. 0 Comments

Friday, Nathalie was here in Lisbon. We visited the city and saw some wonderful places (I should do this more often).

Lisboa rocksWe started walking to the castelo, but stopped at this amazing miradouro. I don’t know the name, but it is a really nice one. They have couches, chill lounge music and a breath-taking view of Lisbon. You can see where it is on this google map.

We spend some time there chilling & relaxing before we climbed the streets up to the castle. From the castle I took this picture of the miradouro.

Castelo de São Jorge

Liefje at CasteloGreat news when we bought our tickets to see the castle: It’s free for students studying in Lisbon and 50% off for other students. We started by walking around in the little town inside the castle walls. There are some beautiful narrow streets with cats and old ladies standing by the windows.

As you can see I took some really nice pictures of Nathalie here. The light was great and she’s so beautiful with her “Portuguese” tan.

View from the CastleFrom the walls we saw even more breath-taking views than earlier. You could see Praça de Figeuira and Praça de Comercio, as well as an amazing overview of Lisbon with the 25 de Abril bridge.

A guy was playing medieval music on his guitar creating this medieval atmosphere in the castle. I could imagine knights and kings living here.

Mandala necklace guyJust outside the castle a german man was making Tibetan influenced Mandala necklaces. In Tibetan Buddhism Mandala is a term used for a representation of the cosmos. The necklace has 5 (or 6) folded positions which represent a state in the creation of the cosmos. Jewelry with a deeper meaning. We liked it.

Belém

Jerónimos MonasteryIt was already late when we hurried to the other side of the city to see Belém. Belém is a parish of Lisbon famous as the place from which many of the great Portuguese explorers set off on their voyages of discovery. Too bad we were too late to enter the Jerónimos Monastery, the Padrão dos Descobrimentos and the Torre de Belém. We will have to come back some day to see these from the inside.

We had a nice time in the park surrounding the tower.

Sunset in BelémWe saw a beautiful sunset. It’s amazing to see that the colours of everything around you change when the sun is going down. Lovely. Near the Tower there is a controversial monument in memory of the combatants of the Colonial war.



I had a great time today with my darling visiting the city I’ve been living in for the past month. I saw some interesting sights and breath-taking views. I also learned a lot by writing this blogpost and researching stuff on Wikipedia. :-)

Please take a look at the other pictures I didn’t post in this entry on the usual Flickr set.

Airport fun

Published by
andrew
at October 16, 2007 in Family. 5 Comments

Sunglass patrolMy brother and I left Belgium yesterday. Bruce went back to Barcelona, and I took a plane back to Lisbon. Luckily we both had to take our plane around the same time.

We had some time left at the airport and passed this store where they sell sunglasses. In the euphoria of the weekend we became victims of impulsive buying.
We both bought these super cool Ray-Ban® sunglasses.

Yes, we look like Starsky & Hutch now.

La mama goes fifty

Published by
andrew
at October 14, 2007 in Family. 2 Comments

It’s great to be in Lisbon with all the new people I’ve met and the friends I have. But from time to time you think about the people who are still in Belgium, in your hometown. Especially family: my mother & father, my brother Bruce and my little sister Daphne. Bruce is also studying abroad, in Barcelona.

The Family at 4x50This weekend we were all reunited in Ghent for a big party my mama was throwing with 3 friends of hers. All 4 of them are turning fifty and they wanted to celebrate. They studied pharmacy together in the 70’s in Ghent. My mama made a website for this party with some hilarious pictures of that time. She’ll probably update the website with pictures soon: www.4×50.be

The food was nice and student-like: pitta! hamburgers & fries. The ladies even had to drink a beer ad fundum. Lutje was the winner in this mini-cantus.

Crowd going wildA belgian cover band, Coco Spirit, kicked off the dancing with well played covers of famous songs. The crowd got wild during some french meezingers! The dj’s did a nice job in keeping the party mood afterwards. The 4 ladies sure know how to organize a great party.

I had a lot of fun with my old mate Jérôme. What a welcome surprise to see him yesterday! It was really nice to chat with him and my cousins again.

The ArtCube, the venue where the party was, is a nice, big and yet cozy place. It felt like an old warehouse that has been revived for these kinds of parties. You can take a look at the pictures I took with this flickr guestpass.

Today I changed my plane tickets so I could stay one more day. I had a wonderful time here. But it’s cold in Belgium so I’m also happy to go back to Lisbon tomorrow.

Impressions of Coimbra

Published by
andrew
at October 11, 2007 in Lisboa. 0 Comments

This weekend I visited Coimbra, a student city where Nathalie is studying. I had a really great time there. Coimbra is a very different city than Lisbon is. You can compare it with Leuven in Belgium. Too bad I was in such a hurry I forgot to take my camera with me. (I’ll try to update this post with pictures Nathalie took)

The student city

Friday I took a train from Orient station in Lisbon to the Coimbra-b station. The Intercidade (IC) train takes 2 hours to get there and costs 15 euro’s. A bus then took me to Praça da Republica where Nathalie picked me up. She lives in a flat with 13 other girls (my god, not easy!) , but most of the time she’s at the hostel down the street. The Grande Hostel de Coimbra is run by some amazing young people (an artist, an architect, a doctor and a lawyer). It has a design interior, wooden floors, good kitchen, playstation(!) and a wonderful garden with BBQ and sitting bags. Now I understand why liefken works there. Go there if you want to visit Coimbra!

I had a really nice time walking through the town with Nathalie. It was very relaxing. There’s this calm and easy atmosphere in the city, but this was probably because most of the students leave during weekends.

The population of Coimbra consists mostly of students, it is home to one of Europe’s oldest universities. The hill where the university is built on offers some breathtaking views of the city. We had the luck to see a gorgeous sunset. I hope Nathalie uploads her pictures soon. Very romantic.

Mondego River

Saturday was one of the hottest days since I’ve been in Portugal: 32°, so we searched for some refreshment near the river. The Mondego river is much nicer than the Tejo in Lisbon. You can sit in a park by the river bank and enjoy a good meal while you hear the water flowing. (well almost). Nathalie dropped my knife in the river while we were eating: that was fun :-) luckily the waiter didn’t notice it was missing. Great sopa do dia & hamburger with fresh fries.

After 21:00 the restaurant where we ate transformed into a lounge bar. I had a caipirinha (which wasn’t as good as the 2euro ones from Lisbon).

Sunday we spend most of the day chilling in the garden of the hostel with Nathalie’s friends. They are really nice people. I had a good time. Nathalie made a delicious carbonara to please our stomachs: the weekend was perfect. Too bad I had to get back to Lisbon that evening because I had classes on monday.

Thanks liefje for a wonderful weekend!