School ended over a week ago now. I spent the first five days after exams finishing calculating grades and going to places in Florence I still hadn't been, like the Boboli gardens and an exhibit of Picasso, Dalí and Miro. I knew I didn't want to spend the rest of my time in Italy just sitting in Florence alone, especially now that the Jersey Shore has invaded, so I met up with my friend Allie in Spain and we spent 5 days in Portugal. Everyone keeps asking me if I went to Lisboa or Faro, but no, we went to the thriving metropolis of Vila Real de Santo Antonio, the first town across the border from Spain. Though small with not much to do, the town is cute and has some awesome beaches. Allie and I spent most of our time lounging around, reading, watching horrible television like MTV's "Moving In" and getting tan on the beach. There were some highlights to the trip though. One I would consider to be when Allie and I walked from our town to the next town over, Monte Gordo and went to an ice cream buffet, where they weigh your ice cream and charge you by the weight in grams. Somehow my ice cream, which I found similar in size to Allie's, cost 7.82 euro (about 12 US dollars) and I somehow managed to pick the worst flavor of ice cream ever, zuppa (do not even try it). I was satisfied afterwards though when we went to a cafe where beer was only a euro. That same day José and Megan arrived from Spain and we all went out to an Indian restaurant for dinner. The food was good, but we had the weirdest waiter with a terrible sense of humor. After dinner we went for drinks at a bar close to the beach, where we witnessed the most terrifying car accident I have ever seen. A drunk driver without his lights on hit a horse and carriage, the driver of the carriage flew in the air and landed on the sidewalk, the horse ran away, the car hit two more pedestrians, then hit a tree. Then the driver tried to run away, but was caught. What was even more horrible, beside the accident, was the fact that the ambulances and police took more than ten minutes to show up, then did not leave until an hour later. We were stuck at the bar watching this spectacle that had literally happened right in front of us, extremely grateful that we had not been hurt, especially in Portugal. We were amazed at how slow everything was, and wondering why it wasn't like in the US when an ambulance shows up quickly and immediately takes the victim to the hospital. I hope everyone involved is alright and still living.
The day after witnessing the terrible accident, we spent the day recuperating at the beach and eating delicious seafood. Then José drove us all back to Spain, and me straight to the airport. It was a lovely trip, very relaxing, and a great way to spend my last few days in Europe. I just hope that if I ever go back to Portugal that I am not involved in any accident.
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