Sintra

This past week, I’ve been in a town called Sintra, which is about a 40-minute train ride northwest from Lisbon. It is a gorgeous, mystical, spiritual place with massive ferns and copious castles. There are two Indian/Italian places right next to each other. To clarify, I am referring to two neighboring yet separate restaurants, both containing Italian and Indian food under one roof.

I’m staying in an AirBnB room in the house of a woman and her two dogs. My host, Isabel, lives a yogi lifestyle. She fasts every Saturday, Ayurvedic knowledge dictates her diet, and her house is filled with statues and books pertaining to yoga and meditation. My second day staying with her, she graciously let me join her bi-weekly yoga cohort (which she has been attending for seven years!). At 7:50 in the morning, she led me to the yoga studio, which is less than a 2-minute walk away from her house.

We walked through a small semi-hidden door, down paths of dense moss carpet, past eucalyptus and palm trees, into a detached room with big, beautiful windows overlooking the forest. Heat from the yoga room’s wood-burning stove suffocated me instantly upon entry, and I felt like I was stepping into a scene from the film Midsommar (in a neutral, not scary way). There were four other people there, aged 35 to 75, all either blonde or with the type of grey hair that suggests blonde was its predecessor, mostly wearing loose, white linen clothing.

After the yoga and meditation session, we filed into a separate detached room (the kitchen) back down the dense moss path. Together we cooked a delicious Ayurvedic feast and ate it on the floor. Most of the group members have either lived in India for a substantial number of years, or travel there on a yearly (or nearly-yearly) basis. It was fascinating to be immersed in a group of people who are so passionate about a very specific way of living.

Isabel, my host, has two dogs, Mel (which means honey) and Mondego (the name of a Portuguese river). Due to shoulder problems, she cannot walk both dogs at once, so she usually joins forces with her neighbor. The neighbor walks Mondego, Isabel walks Mel, and the neighbor’s 4(?) dogs and 1 sheep (Clara) follow along, leash-less. It is quite a spectable and one of the highlights of my time so far.

Yesterday, I embraced my tourist identity and visited one of Sintra’s main attractions, the Park and National Palace of Pena. I had a magical time frolicking through the castle gardens and pretending I was a dinosaur among massive moss-covered-dinosaur-egg-rocks!

Later in the evening, I walked to a medieval-themed bar with live music that I found on Google Maps, and asked a group of Portuguese youngsters if I could join their table. It turns out they are all in the circus (what??)! I ordered a sandwich with peanut butter, mushrooms and olives, and it surprisingly tasted pretty good! It was difficult to motivate myself to go out when I had to walk 30 minutes in the dark, but the oddness of a medieval bar intrigued me so much that I just had to check it out — and I’m so glad I did!

Ok, now here’s some stuff I saw in Lisbon since I last posted (I was in Lisbon until Jan. 25):