We totally noticed the lack of apparent friendliness among strangers. I think it was especially jarring because we'd been fed this steady stream of "The Portuguese people are the friendliest, nicest, most welcoming people on the face of Planet Earth" on Facebook, only to arrive and find most people on the street wouldn't even make eye co…
We totally noticed the lack of apparent friendliness among strangers. I think it was especially jarring because we'd been fed this steady stream of "The Portuguese people are the friendliest, nicest, most welcoming people on the face of Planet Earth" on Facebook, only to arrive and find most people on the street wouldn't even make eye contact, much less say hello.
However, we've found in actual face to face situations, people are really nice and helpful. We were trying to find an access road to a beach one day and a guy could tell we were confused and jumped out of his car to come over and help us find where we were going. We've also had several really nice interactions with employees of various businesses who were willing to suffer through our terrible Portuguese to try to help us, as well as give us tips on our pronunciation and word choice.
There truly are plenty of super nice people - they're just not necessarily going to greet you as you pass one another on the street. Just one of those things that can be different...
We totally noticed the lack of apparent friendliness among strangers. I think it was especially jarring because we'd been fed this steady stream of "The Portuguese people are the friendliest, nicest, most welcoming people on the face of Planet Earth" on Facebook, only to arrive and find most people on the street wouldn't even make eye contact, much less say hello.
However, we've found in actual face to face situations, people are really nice and helpful. We were trying to find an access road to a beach one day and a guy could tell we were confused and jumped out of his car to come over and help us find where we were going. We've also had several really nice interactions with employees of various businesses who were willing to suffer through our terrible Portuguese to try to help us, as well as give us tips on our pronunciation and word choice.
There truly are plenty of super nice people - they're just not necessarily going to greet you as you pass one another on the street. Just one of those things that can be different...