I enjoy reading Nancy Whiteman’s posts about her Portuguese experiences and this week she wrote a cautionary tale about festivals and noise in Vila Real de Santo António, in extreme SE Portugal.1
It made me reflect on our local experiences here in Coimbra. Festivals are a big part of life here and the tolerance for what Americans might call “noise” is on another planetary level. Not that I am complaining; for the first time in my life, my war time acquired hearing deficit may be of environmental benefit.
Coimbra has the Queima das Fitas, or Burning of the Ribbons in May and the Festa das Latas in September. These are student-based rituals somewhat akin to a G-rated version of Mardi Gras. And I really mean it when I say, I can’t explain it. You truly have to be there.
Of course, Coimbra is a city, not a beachside resort town, but comparing our 7-8 day festivals, the Feria da Praia seems like comparing the average high school football (USA) game to the Super Bowl.
I live two miles from the University, but two blocks from a riverside park where “ancillary“ festivities are held. Concerts there go from 9 Pm ‘til 6 AM at almost ear splitting levels for eight days straight.
Two weeks ago we watched 3,000 or more freshman, in the Festa das Latas, drunkenly march through the entire city to the Mondego River for symbolic “baptism”. Of course not everyone was inebriated, but the majority seemed to be. Remarkably, the more sober revelers served as their “brother’s keepers” in an inspiringly compassionate demonstration of harmonic abetment and defiance of entropy.
This ceremony was attended (and seemingly blessed) by their parents, grand parents, god-parents and everybody they had ever met or “liked” on Facebook. (And no, I’m not ever going to call it Meta.)
Here in this city of historic academic tradition, one of the oldest in Europe, there are circuses about every month, Spring thru Fall and then we have concerts, street fairs, and religious parades/holidays. Almost weekly. And those are just the celebrations.
Regular city noise includes nightly motorcycle street racing with modified/ amplified exhaust systems that literally can be heard for miles across the city, occasional random fireworks and incessant construction noise.
However, sleep is a required element of good health, regardless of your tastes in entertainment and Nancy is calling attention to an important element of cultural adaptation. I have several friends who literally feel forced to leave town for a week during some of these events. I have true empathy for those who suffer.
Mostly through dumb luck, my wife and I are just far enough away to be able to enjoy, rather than just endure these threads of auditory animation woven into Portuguese culture. And to be clear, not every native is in favor of the significant resources that go into supporting some of these events. The city sanitation department works near magic to make the mess disappear.
But I am going to push my luck and go out on an acoustical limb. My observation is that personality plays a large part of one’s ability to dance to the music and mayhem. Type-A personalities are going to be revolted by some of the revelry and the inconveniences littered across the landscape. There is some truth in that youthful retort: “If the music is too loud, you are too old.”
So… let the buyer beware. Whatever inconveniences those idyllic little rural villages may suffer, they may be pastures of contentment for those with a penchant for peaceful surroundings. Unless, of course, you may suffer barking dogs, bleating goats, tractors toiling, untimely roosters,and those damn motorcycles are everywhere. Regardless of all the noise and occasional missed sleep, most of the time in Portugal I feel like I’m living in a dream.
expatinportugal@substack.com
You are absolutely right!