Comments on: cultural differences: a brief guide

By: Emma

Emma — Tue, 11 Jan 2011 16:06:50 +0000

Vera, you are right. I write with considerable irony and sarcasm, which is fortunately mostly taken by readers as humour, and I am surprised (and happy) that I don’t get any comments like yours, because, yes, some of what I write is offensive. If you continue reading the blog you’ll see that I really do love the country and people (why else stay here?) and I respect it. But I am also honest, and every place has its faults and its stupidities and if I were to be polite about everything then this blog would be boring and no one would read it. I have been to the cities many, many times (and more than 250 other cities of the world) and I do make a point that my village is special in comparison to the rest of Portugal. This post is about cultural differences: indeed humour is one of those differences. Thanks for taking the time to comment and I appreciate you coming forward to defend this great beautiful, diverse and slightly crazy country.

By: Vera

Vera — Wed, 05 Jan 2011 18:54:17 +0000

I’m sorry but I came across this blog and as a Portuguese I must say I feel offended. Emma, you cannot generalise that way, specially when you are (or were) living in a village. You know villages are basically inhabited by old people who still live in a different era. I live in Porto and I’ve visited the capital – Lisbon – many times and other cities (Have you?) and I can assure you that, according to my travelling experience, WE are one of the most welcoming and nice peoples in the world. Obviously, there are always bad things to point out but that happens everywhere and it also happens with people, right? Depending on the person’s perspective you can be considered super cool or a total moron, am I right?

By: Ana

Ana — Sun, 14 Nov 2010 19:02:46 +0000

@Zolmira: do you live there [Madeira]? do you know one street ot the whole island? I have family there and they all love their pets, who are treated as part of the family. Please don’t generalise like that.

@Fernando: I get what you said, but I also get what Cristina said. My family also spreads through a lot of different places, all with their good and bad sides (sometimes it’s even the same thing, it just depends on which side of the bed you wake up in the morning ). I hope you don’t take this on a negative side, but you don’t need to say “I am Portuguese and I belong to a family that happens to exist before Portugal, I know that it is not our tradition to invite people who belongs also here but came from around the world to get lost or to go away.” – it sounds like you want to say your better then the rest (or at least Cristina) though, by what you wrote afterwards, that doesn’t seem to be really the message [the being better one] you want to pass It’s our country too, independently of where we do live now.
All countries have open-minded people, all countries have people who don’t see one small step away from their reality. Emma for sure is likely to know that – both from australia and from Portugal. And, most important in this case, we all have different humor types – it’s life. And we all survive those differences with dialogue like they did

@Emma: keep on enjoying live!

By: Zolmira

Zolmira — Tue, 13 Apr 2010 04:43:35 +0000

@Cristina,
Read all of Emma’s blogs, then comment. MADEIRA PEOPLE DO NOT CARE FOT THEIR PETS. I have had first hand experience on that. COME ON PORTUGAL, keep up with the rest of the world concerning pets.

By: Zolmira

Zolmira — Tue, 13 Apr 2010 04:39:29 +0000

@PAULO REIS,
Yes I totally agree. I live in Sydney and have done so in Madeira. Im in the middle right now – My heart wants to go back and live in Madeira but my head say NO. I just don’t know what to do anymore.

By: Fernando Baena

Fernando Baena — Mon, 08 Mar 2010 11:23:25 +0000

@Cristina, I’m sorry to be stupid enough to be involved in a ‘public’ discussion, or conversation. It’s why we call it WWW, do you get it? since Berckley. The point is that even if you feel free to post anything at all, you have to have that small capacity to ‘listen or read’ the contradictory and in that case you are out of our culture or even any culture at all, I don’t mind if you both live together, what you can say in Internet may be against you or at your side depending of your’s real power of answer (and culture) or your smallest version as human as you showed to the www not only to me. It was not my intention to interrupt your understanding so please forget it, I really don’t belong to your tribe.Cheers

By: Cristina

Cristina — Mon, 08 Mar 2010 00:30:54 +0000

Dear Fernando. In reply to your dear email I have to say you are to small to me to boder to have a proper reply. Emma is a big girl to know to defend herself and you weren’t so close minded you would noticed we got to an understanding. You too have a nice life and don’t interfer with other people’s conversations.

By: Emma

Emma — Thu, 04 Mar 2010 17:33:46 +0000

greetings fellow escape artists!

By: Emma

Emma — Thu, 04 Mar 2010 17:30:44 +0000

Thanks nando

By: Anna

Anna — Thu, 04 Mar 2010 07:00:36 +0000

The comments about your weight are so Portuguese.Portuguese don’t think it’s rude like we do in western countries to talk about one’s weight,to them it’s just conversation.
If your too skinny they say you’ll waste away to nothing but if your too fat they comment on that too & say “oh your too young to be fat,you should lose weight”. I’ve been fat & thin 7 either way you cop it.The thing I do do is just smile.