Porto works

Geetanjali Krishna walks around Porto and comes back enchanted by the people, food, wine lodges and the relaxed pace of life.

It looks like a gigantic spaceport. Steel girders on cavernous ceilings, gleaming silver lights and hollow, echoing sounds … Suffice it to say that we were expecting to land in a quaint little Portuguese town called Oporto, but the Francisco Sá Carneiro Airport looks too terrifyingly modern to be it. When we learn that it was rated Europe’s best airport in 2008, and amongst the top four best small airports (with less than 5 million passengers) worldwide, we aren’t surprised. But its cathedral-like hush and singular lack of hustle-bustle make me think it doesn’t seem to have the two things that all airports need — people and planes. Waiting for our luggage, I chat with a co-passenger from Porto. “Who is this airport named after?” I ask. The man, eager to practise his English on me, says, “A Portuguese prime minister was killed in a plane crash while going to Porto — so they named their new airport after him.” Am I glad I didn’t ask him that on the flight, nervous flier that I am? You bet. But I still puzzle over the peculiar Portuguese wisdom of naming airports after people who have actually died in air crashes.

In contrast to the airport is the Sao Bento metro station in Oporto’s old quarter where the super-efficient airport metro takes us. If the airport is a spaceport, this is a museum gallery, with its walls covered by ancient glazed murals. These azulejos, blue painted tiles, are an architectural specialty of the region, and may be seen on many buildings in the old quarter. As we step out of the station, I realise why Porto is considered one of Europe’s most atmospheric cities.

Its cobbled streets look like millions of feet have walked on them; and weathered buildings seem as if history has unfolded in front of their faded facades. Unsurprisingly, its exceptional architectural heritage earned Porto UNESCO World Heritage status in 1996.

We are to meet some local friends at the riverfront, Ribeira, so we enter the dense maze of streets behind an austere Romanesque church. The lanes are so narrow that the colourful boxes of flowers and rows of laundry flapping on either side seem to intermingle above. White sheets, socks, T-shirts and underwear are hung with an innocent lack of embarrassment. It seems as if nobody keeps their front doors, or their private lives, shut. Soon we see glimpses of the river when the densely packed houses let up a little. Huffing and puffing in the hot Portuguese sun, we finally reach the River Douro, and stand enchanted.

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The river front has tavernas with bright umbrellas spilling with joyous abandon all the way to the water. Across its blue swathe, there are port wine factories as far as eyes can see. Just then, our reverie is broken by the shouts of our friends. Joyous reunions taken care of, we get on to more important matters. “Sagres... Two more bottles por favor!” they shout. The beer arrives, cold and crisp. With it comes our favorite local sausage, chorizo, flambéed in pure alcohol, crackling in its own fatty juices. A smoky, luscious bite and I am in carnivorous heaven. Bacalao, or salted cod, baked to perfection in great slatherings of fresh olive oil, completes a meal fit for kings. “So what do you like best about Porto?” I ask my friend Elena. “It’s pretty and has great weather throughout the year — but I love Porto for its amazingly warm people” says she. From Lisbon originally, she has opted to live in Porto. “And I love its relaxed pace of life. There’s something about the Ribeira that instantly takes stress away,” she adds.

Elena is right. As we chalk out plans for the next few days, I feel Porto’s insidious languor steal upon me. But our friends assure us that Porto’s work ethic is the staunchest in the country, quoting the local saying, “Coimbra studies, Braga prays, Lisbon shows off and Porto works”. As we watch two boys kick a ball around, our friends begin talking about the national obsession — football. There’s strong rivalry between Porto and Lisbon, vented on the football field by Portugal’s premier clubs, Porto and Benfica. Their debate heats up, and they lapse into bullet-quick Portuguese. “It’s not easy to argue in English,” they say apologetically. We don’t mind, lulled by the Ribeira’s charm.

The next day, we set off to the port wine lodges of Vila Nova de Gaia to explore Porto, the birthplace of port wine. The first we visit is Sandeman, simply because its logo looks like the masked hero Zorro. The ports are nice, if sweet — a bit of an acquired taste. By evening, we’ve been to Taylors, Ramos Pinto, Croft, Offley and a few more. As we come back to the riverfront, we are grateful for Elena’s suggestion not to take any of the pricey port wine tours. Instead we’ve walked into all the lodges and been welcomed everywhere — for half the tour price, and double the fun.

The next few days are a blur — we explore the Baixa (downtown Porto) with its fascinating old shops, art galleries and more. The pastry shops tantalise us with delectable custard tarts, and we learn that nobody there has even heard of Bebinca, the dessert that Goans insist is true blue Portuguese. Our last afternoon in Porto, we eat the now-familiar chorizos and bacalao with hearts as heavy as our tummies are soon going to be. An old man begins strumming a guitar and singing fado, the mournful music that the Portuguese love. Trying to capture the moment, we buy a CD of Amalia Rodrigues (Portugal’s best loved singer) and as many bottles of port as we can legally carry back. So now, every once a while, we listen to fado and drink some port — and for a brief moment, recreate memories of the magical time we spent in Porto.