Church of Our Lady of Grace

Because it abuts a life-threatening cliff, you'll have to walk about half a mile down to Martim Moniz to get a decent picture of the Igreja de Nossa Senhora da Graca. Nothing remains of the medieval structure that dated to 1271. The church was rebuilt in the 1500s and then got pretty beat up in the 1755 quake and had to be restored again. It was founded by Augustinian hermits and turned into barracks for awhile. There's a single nave and some interesting azulejos leading into the sacristy.

The Baroque facade, right, and old vestibule stand at right angles. The detached belfry is a little unusual in this part of the world. I like the choice; it's easier to see and photograph. A mammoth monastery that can house 1,500 people is out of view.

Most of the people here ignore the church and instead focus on a terrace that overlooks the city ― one of Lisbon's dozen or so miradouros. There is a cafe and large shade tree. Street musicians politely take turns, and you can hear their noodlings inside the church. Another miradouro is visible at the top of this photo. This is Lisbon's highest hill.

Afternoon light splashes into the apse.

If you walk behind the cafe you will find a staircase leading down to the tiny Canto do Sol (Sunny Corner) neighborhood, which shows off its proud residents in a series of photo tile transfers. What a blessing and statement of pride they are. I wish my city did more of this.

Stopped for an espresso and a couple of pastries at Pastelaria Lagares, where the barista tought me how to say "carryout." Phonetically, it's PAH-ra loo-VAHR. That will come in handy.

At the bottom of the hill is Martim Moniz, where I saw a lot of different people and things to eat ― empanadas, goat curry, halwa puri. Seems like a fine cultural exchange. God forbid Jesse Watters finds out about this place. (EUROPE UNRECOGNIZABLE reads the chyron.)

A handy escalator awaits should you wish to return to your cruise ship.

Comments

Diary

Each morning begins with a stroll through Alfama, climbing to this vista or that. The people of Alfama are not blessed with good humor and do not naturally make eye contact with outsiders. They do seem grateful to be able to get up and do a day's work, or to greet their neighbors on their way to the corner store. Outside my tiny windows after midnight I can recognize some of their voices without peeking: The washroom attendant delivers a searing staccato of insults when she has been slighted, and the local madman howls for deliverance. When dogs need to be wrangled, the restaurant workers at Antu Alfama take up the mantle. But the conversations that stick with you ―the ones that escort you to dreamland ― are tender, muffled exchanges that seep almost transcendentally through the walls from unknown directions. These murmured confidences continue until about 5 a.m., followed by two hours of true silence before the wagtails and sparrows awake. What you never hear in Alfama, an ...

Europe's art racket

I just wanted to get in the door marked "Europe." Lisbon is great, but I'd be equally happy in Split or Bucharest or Lubeck, were the fare as reasonable. The blood and soil of a place, its creeds and ancient loyalties, are not intrinsically interesting. The castle on the hill behind me was really important to people trying to stay alive 800 years ago, but it's just a bilheteria and a turnstile today. Now, when a shady art collector like Calouste Gulbenkian wants to serve up his collection on any number of leopard-spotted, hyacinth-embossed platters ― this is when things get interesting. Bring it on. I am a porous visitor, here to soak up the continent. He was a strange dude. The day after the Earl of Carvanon died in 1923, Gulbenkian was on the phone trying to scoop up his collection of antiquities. A prominent art dealer reminded him the body was still warm. Gulbenkian was born to a family of wealthy Armenian kerosene merchants in Istanbul. Under the tutelage of a ...

A trip to prison

Of all the European dictators of the first half of the 20th century, only Francisco Franco of Spain held on to absolute power longer (39 years) than Portugal's Antonio Salazar (32 years). Stalin clocks in at 25 years, Mussolini at 21, Hitler a mere 12. What strikes me about Salazar's reign isn't its brutality ― that's a job requirement ― or even that it harnessed a vast propaganda machine that wrenched all the levers of society ― in the family, at school, at work and play. It's that he's the only one who did it while wearing a suit and tie. These are the things one thinks about lying in bed after a visit to the Aljube prison in Lisbon, which opened to the public as a museum in 2015. It was here that thousands were brought to be interrogated and tortured on the suspicion of opposing the big guy, whose bankrupt political philosophy manifested itself by spending 40 percent of the national budget on the armed forces while keeping his subjects poor and illiterate (p...

336 hours in Lisbon

Search This Blog