Portuguese is tough...

You can fake your way thru most of Europe.  For example, the word for "chicken" in French is "poulet"... in Italian or Spanish it's "pollo".  In Portuguese it's "frango".  What the "F" ??? You do not need to know a language - you will do just fine with English or English subtitles (menu's etc) EXCEPT for when they don't give you the subtitles.  
Take this morning... I went to buy a bus ticket called the Viva card.  I'm in front of a vending machine, sans subtitles and after 1.5 minutes, I can't figure out if I'm buying a ticket or a tampon or a pack Salem Lights.  Fagitabout it... I'll walk.

It's a little muggy out, so I start walking towards the sea.  It's foggy and warm, but at the ocean's edge, there is a cool breeze.  I turn right and end up at the train station (Cais do Sodre).  I want to take a train to Cascais, which is a beach town 40 minutes west.  Frankly I'm just in it for the train ride.  (It's the journey comrades, not the destination).  So I head to the ticket window and encounter Filipe Augusto.  I ask for a round trip ticket (in English) to Cascais.  In perfect English, he asks... "do you have one of these?" as he holds up a VIVA CARD.  "NO, but can you sell me one?" I reply.  "Sure", he says.  Then he asks how old I am.  I say 66.  He looks at me like I'm one lying Yanqui.  He says - "Prove it".  I show him a photocopy of my passport and he gives me a 50% old man discount... 2.20 euro for a roundtrip ticket.  
I mention to him that I was in the Navy and that I was stationed in the Azores.  He pauses, grabs is Galaxy 5, thumbs it, and produces a picture of his father in a Navy uniform.  His dad was in the Portuguese Navy Special Forces for 36 years.  I could tell he was VERY proud of his papa.  I told him 4 years was plenty for me.  We laughed.  

And so my journey, on the 09:40 to Cascais, began... not quite like I had envisioned it, but clickity-clack, clickity-clack, I'm headed down the railroad track, stopping at every dairy along the way.  Don't care - I just enjoy the gentle rocking of the car as it plods along its steel highway, lulling me into a semi comatose state, where I have no past, no future...