Reflections from two weeks in France

After two weeks in France, I realized a few interesting things:

1. Northern France is pretty.

2. There is a noticeable difference in how people treat you when you are a lone male.  American traveling versus traveling with three cute girls.  I've seen some French stereotypes come true this week.  I caught a dirty look when I asked for my steak medium-well (which is basically raw), and couldn't get into an empty restaurant because it was too "busy" :).  It also might be because I was traveling with a Brit and German though.  Either way, interesting.

3. Spending almost two weeks in a dog food factory made me realize that (a) I miss Lolly, and (b) I'm glad I work with cereal.

4. Haagen-Dazs Ice Cream is awesome (as is the factory)!

5. There are no bread plates in France.  It is customary to put your bread directly on the table.

6. Lastly, there were a couple notable similarities to Italy:

      a. Your change is always put on the counter (not in your hand).

      b. There is a lot of graffiti.  Someone even graffitied my picture:

Portugal Impressions

1. The Portuguese people are great.  They were overall very welcoming and open.  They were enamored with Jeryn's blonde hair.  No less than 10 people came up to her to touch her head over the few days of our visit.

2. Almost every vertical surface in Lisbon is graffitied.  It's likely a result from the 30-50% unemployment rate for people under 25 for the last several years:

Portugal Youth Unemployment Rate:

3. Meals are much much later than America, and the UK.  Dinner usually begins around 10pm.  We were usually the only people in the restaurant at 8pm (accept for some other Canadian Expats).  In fact, most places don't even open for dinner until 7:30pm.  We took this photo out our apartment window at 10:18pm.  People were just starting to gather for dinner.  Notice the people with the baby buggy:

4. The weather and landscape is awesome.  It looks and feels like California or Italy, but significantly cheaper than both.  The trams, suspension bridge, and hills of Lisbon reminded us of San Francisco:

5. Portuguese pastries are incredible.  They are called "Pastéis de Nata", and they are something straight from heaven.  No surprise that the main ingredient is egg yokes:

6. Lisbon is also home to the oldest operating bookshop in the world (established in 1732).  It was great for a look around, but since we don't speak Portuguese we ended up with a local copy of Where's Waldo (Onde Esta O Wally?)

Other area highlights...

Sintra is a 40 minute train ride away (or 3 hours if there is a train strike over the Easter weekend).  There are some amazing sites including two palaces and a castle:

Cascais is similarly about 50 minutes by train from Lisbon (again, subject to Portuguese train strikes).  It is an equally beautiful area with some small and unique beaches cut into the city: