Clube Ferroviário

One year ago I watched Real Combo Lisbonense play music here, it was an amazing concert. This is, I think, a more nighty space, but it can be pretty nice in the evening. The sits outside are old plane seats, there is some beautiful light piercing through the nets, blankets for cold nights, a foosball table and a projection screen (rooftop cinema anyone?)

But if you don't have a car and you live in the suburbs, this may look a bit boring to access. If you want to eat something cheap, this may seem overpriced. And if you want to get drunk, well, don't come here and go to Bairro Alto. This is the problem: the price. We are no kings, we had to share a toast and still we paid 3€ for HALF. Note: a salty muffin is the same price as half sandwich.

Stating the obvious: whoever comes has some money. When we asked the size of the sandwiches the woman open the palm of her hands and described a not very convincing diameter. We told her we wanted to share, she said that they were not that big but if we were hungry we could ask another one.

Hello?! That is why we are sharing one in the first place! Not because I am fat or something.

Then there was the pão polar (polar bread) problem. They can't cut it in half, so we had to ask for another bread. For what I paid, it was disappointing, it had chicken, tomato, lettuce and mayonnaise and it came with a mixed lettuce salad with pineapple. I hope that polar bread would have made this a magnificent and exotic sandwich.

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I was hard on food but I really like Clube Ferroviário, I understand that its pricey menu includes the view and all the managing costs that they have to spend to maintain the place. So if you have money what makes sense is to go there and have some savories of different kinds.

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Open from monday to thursday from 16h to 2h, thursday and fridays and saturdays from 16h to 4h and sundays from 12h to midnight.

Pensão Amor

I have a curious relationship with this space. First time I heard about it, it opened along with two other cool bars in what I considered to be a sudden cultural movement in Lisbon: the pink street, named as so due to its manly pink color.

This fostered a very interesting mesh of people, on the one hand, the squalid people that hang out in the sleazy bars that dominated that area before, on the other hand, the high classes that eat tapas and caviar, that began do be attracted to this filthy street due to is new fancy places. And there was harmony, go figure!

Then, when I returned from my first trip to Budapest, Pensão Amor seemed like a wannabe Ruin Pub with selective clientele and boosted prices. And I became more disappointed, because my expectations came high. 

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Nevertheless, I still can enjoy this place. There is a cabaret feel, kitschy stuff and furniture decorating the place. In the big room there is some space to dance and a bar with night and day prices (so watch out and don't be fooled!). On the wall a big deer head is staring at us. It is lightened by a spotlight so it comes as an important piece of the room. There is also a more kinky room near the erotic literature and accessories shops, with leopard print, psychedelic ceiling, a strip pole and mirrors.

It is not the same as the ruin pubs, but it sure is over crowded on fridays and saturdays.

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Open from monday to wednesday from midday to 2h and thursdays and fridays from midday to 4h.

Banana Café Kiosk

The rehabilitation of the Liberdade avenue kiosks is one of the things that made me happier these last days. I walk this path a lot of times to go to the center, down from Marquês. You can take a peek at all this fancy places and drool a bit seeing people eating all sorts of good looking food (20€ brunch in Ad Lib).

Now I have yet another reason to do this by foot. I like to see the kiosks full of life. Little by little Lisbon is healing its wounds, baby steps, we are getting there.

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Banana Café repeats itself, one near Marquês and another one near the Restauradores, I went to this last one. They have HUGE toasts that you can even split by three people and they are 3.50€ (but not the best in the world). The cold tea is 1.80€ (it was pretty nice). The salads and pies are also good.

Each kiosk has its personality. My idea initially was to go to Time Out Kiosk and hear some jazz by the Hot Club students, but due to facebook divulgation, it was completely full. Anyway, getting some sun and fresh air in either one is priceless.

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Open everyday from 10h to 2h.

Miradouro do Adamastor (Adamastor's Viewpoint)

This is actually called Miradouro de S. Catarina (Saint Catarina's Viewpoint), but it got the nickname of Adamastor due to the statue that is place in the little garden that here lies. This is undoubtedly the most unusual sightseeing place. It may not have a weird owner, but the people that come here are so diverse they make any artist feel totally ordinary. At night, it gets completely crowded.

It is impossible to leave without a funny story, whether some crazy guy comes to tell us all his life, or a bunch of welsh people decide to have a bachelor party semi naked and taking beer baths, while the husband-to-be talks with us smiling, apologizing the fact the we had to see him drunk into super mario dungarees:

We're not from England! We are Welsh, and we couldn't care less about them and football. Kinda like Portugal and Spain. You know soccer? We are all soccer players!

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The best thing here for me is the sangria, so refreshing, the prices are amazing: 1€ (small, 22cl), 1.5€ (medium, 33cl) and 2€ (big, 50cl), same for beer. They also have tasty salty pastry for around 1€ each, which means with 2.5€ you get a nice little lunch while contemplating a wonderful view. The toast is 4€ and can be shared by two not-so-hungry people.

When I went there last time someone decided to give a red heart to the monster, it was an initiative called Aqui Bate um Coração (A heart beats here).

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Open everyday from 10h to 4h.

Alface Hall

There are many things which we can use to rate a place and an experience and that I always take in consideration. I don't write them in a paper, it is kind of an emotional process. So they are:
- Physical space (architecture/design/concept);
- The place where it is located on the map (the area);
- The people that belong there (and their niceness);
- The food (but maybe less relevant);
- The company I take with me (can turn a bad place in a wonderful experience);
- The extras (music, events, games, interactive stuff).

When all these requirements are fulfilled we know we are in a perfect place. We feel it. And this place nailed it.

First time I came by accident. We passed by it and the wonderful free jazz lured us inside. We asked for a cocktail that was a mix of lemon ice-cream with vodka. They let us try first which was pretty awesome, and served it after it had our approval. They won me completely, so I quickly planned my return.

The second time, I came back for a working session, we got to talk a little bit with the bartender and we got some neighborhood knowledge (they want to close the convenience stores at 20h to stop the botellón).

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Between tables and sofas, we can chose what best fits us: are we drinking? Eating? Jazzing? Or working?

It is incredible the number of details of Alface Hall and the ways they use the material. The t-shirts, instead of being shown in a boring way are hanging like drying clothes and help to fill the empty space left by the high ceilings.

Over the door there is a motorcycle, and there are also some old gas pumps, telephones, bottles, radios, cameras, dolls, and the barber chairs (my favorite detail, no doubt about it).

I asked for a ham and brie toast, it was the best toast I have ever eaten. For 4.50€, I don't care really, any price, feed me this. Then the jazz started around 21h and I was in heaven.

Before leaving I decided to leave them a gift, and so my first cat from a small series was born. The Alface Cat (yes, that is a lettuce, sorry).

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This place also ends up being more multicultural as it is connected to a hostel. You can hear english frequently. It is also near the erasmus corner (if I am not mistaken).

Funny how the word hostel creates by itself a kind of erasmus world where freely socializing is normal. We don't randomly talk to people in cafés, we have our folks, but we do it in a hostel, we are more polite and have more guts to ask some questions and they are somewhat well received.

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Open from 16h to midnight everyday.

2 ao Quadrado

After Café Saudade closed the door at midnight, we decided to look for something else. The owner of the place felt a bit bad for sending us away and suggested 2 ao Quadrado (2 squared).

This is the classic bar. Noisy, with a little cheapness touch to it (we call it "tascas", but this was not quite) and you can feel the comradeship between the people that frequent this place.

The posters on the walls are amazing ice-breakers, and I always thought the more stuff a place has, more conversation topics you can pull out of the bag. Well, I am not insinuating people need them but it is always interesting to look around and comment. SAY IT!

They have cool prices, but not so cool people (at least for me). A three ingredient toast is 2.60€ (you can choose from mushrooms, ham, cheese and tomato). A mini beer is 1€, a mug with double is 1.90€, a Licor Beirão is 2.50€ and a port wine is 2€. They even have half doses for half price.

Here I drew a cat and baptized it, if you see it there, send a picture for Tarzan Urbano/Urban Tarzan e-mail given on the left column, I would love to check if it's still present.

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Monday to thursday from 18h to midnight and fridays and saturdays from 18h to 2h.

Café Saudade

The word "saudade" is such a portuguese thing. It has a melancholic vibe and refers to the deep feeling of missing something or someone. I use it a lot when I am away from Lisbon, it is not only the people but the city itself, it has some kind of mesmerizing power only understood when you explore it deeply.

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I asked for this super big super sweet lemonade (1.60€). It was amazing. It was painful (I have loads of aphtae) but I survived. A hot chocolate was also our demand (the girls), and the boys shared some tea (how awkward does that sound?). There is no rule that says that men can't share a teapot.

We didn't stay long in Saudade but it was long enough to explore the place. It has an exhibition space, rooms with stuff for sale, and a kitchen situated in the middle of everything. They usually have some events but the facebook should have information about that, since their blog is a bit pointless.

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Monday to wednesday from 8:30h to 20h. Thursday to saturday form 08:30 to midnight and sunday from 08:30h to 20h.