Portugal - Arrival and Shabbat in Porto

We arrived in Porto at noon on Thursday and after clearing customs and collecting our luggage, we rented our car and were off to our accommodations in the BoaVista section of Porto. 

We are staying at a serviced apartment and it is modern and beautiful. It is a 15 minute walk from the shul and as a fully equipped apartment, it makes keeping kosher much easier. 

After unpacking and settling in, we were off to the Kosher Corner, a project of the Hotel Da Musica, which is located in the Mercado Bom Successo not far from our apartment.

It is the very first store with kosher products in the country,  both for guests and the general public. The store was created in partnership with the Jewish Community of Porto and aims to familiarize Kosher products to the general population. Porto Kosher Store is under the supervision of Rabbi Daniel Litvak, Rav of the Mekor Chaim Synagogue of Porto and is closed on Shabbat.

In addition, Hotel da Música will provide freshly cooked weekday or Shabbat meals with 24 hour notice under Rav Litvak's supervision. 

When we visited the store, we were a bit surprised by the lack of variety in the store and queried the young lady who was in charge of the store. She explained that the store opened a few months ago and had a wide variety of products available but there was a slew of visitors and tourists who depleted most of their stock. Currently many items are on order and they hope to expand the offering in the future. 

As experienced travellers, we are aware that many small towns charge exorbitant prices for kosher products because of the difficulty of importing these products and also because of the small size of the interested market. As a result, we were a bit surprised at the competitive prices of whatever they did carry and it was explained to us that making these items available at reasonable prices as well as the availability of a hotel that offers kosher meals would help put Porto on the map for the observant Jewish traveler. 

The hotel is not a kosher hotel not is it owned by Jews, but they are operating on the principle of "build it and they will come"; with the current interest in the history of Portugal's Jewry which basically disappeared from the early 1500's to the mid 1900's, there are many Jewish and Israeli tourists and a facility like this will attract the Jewish and kosher crowd. When you walk thru the lobby of the hotel, you cannot help but notice the musical theme but then you also notice the Jewish theme of the hotel. Quite remarkable in a city with just 200 Jews. 

Look at the Hechsher on the wall in the lobby bar

And the musical theme continues in the breakfast area with a Hebrew sign 

"And you shall eat, be satisfied and bless Hashem your Lord".

Quite amazing!

We then drove over to the Mekor Haim Kadoorie Synagogue a few blocks away. As expected the shul was closed, but we marvelled at the size and beauty of the outside of the building. It is the largest shul in the Iberian Peninsula, and has a very interesting history which we will cover in one of the upcoming posts.

We had spoken with Yoel Zekri, a dental student from Har Nof, who together with his wife, had been working hard to attract young blood to the shul in the 18 months that they had been in Porto and he had told us that the shul had a kosher store (specifically for the members of the community) which carried many more items including cold cuts, frozen chicken, cheeses, wine and grape Juice, challot, cakes, tuna, sardines, etc., and that we were welcome to come on Friday to buy whatever we needed for Shabbat.

As well, we received an email while still in London, inviting us to dinner in the shul after tefillah on Friday night, as the shul was hosting a dinner in honour of the Israeli Ambassador to Portugal, Tzipora Rimon, and MK Amir Peretz, who was attending the Parliamentary Assembly of the Mediterranean Conference in Porto. We naturally replied that we would be honoured to attend. 

While driving back to our apartment that evening, we noticed a couple walking along the sidewalk, and it was apparent that they were a religious couple. We pulled over to say hello and offered them a lift to where they were headed. Abe and Debi from Monsey were touring like us and they too had received an invitation to attend Friday night's dinner in the shul. 

We mentioned to them that we had arranged a walking tour of Porto for Friday morning which would highlight some of the Jewish sights and they asked if they could join the tour with us. 

On Friday morning we together with Abe and Debi met our tour guide Gonzalo Lima in front of our building Gonzalo is a graduate lawyer who is involved in real estate, renovation and guiding and has many Israeli friends and business associates. He was born in Porto and knows the city like the back of his hand. When we asked him why he was so interested in Jewish Porto, he replied that he had a Jewish grandfather and that certainly some of his ancestors were Crypto Christians or as they are sometimes called New Christians; ie, they were Jews who identified with Christianity in public but who observed Jewish customs and rituals in private. In fact, he estimated that a large percentage of Portuguese citizens have Jewish roots; later in the week, we heard numbers like 50 to 60% had Jewish blood in their genealogy. 

We spent over 5 hours walking and talking with Gonzalo (close to 9 Kms) and visited two of the three old Jewish Neighbourhoods.

In the oldest Jewish Neighbourhood, at the beginning of the Edict of Inquisition, the Church moved into the district (Judairia in Portuguese) and built massive structures used as convents, monasteries and churches. It was sort of like squatter's rights to the area. Today on the side of the huge Monastery, there is a plaque that was erected by the municipality in memory of the Jewish community who were given the "choice" of being forcibly converted or put to death.

Gonzalo shared with us the history of the Jewish community in Portugal and rather than use up a lot of space in this posting, I will dedicate the next post to speak in detail about the Jewish History of Portugal as well as highlight a number of heroes of Portuguese Jewry; Rabbi Avraham Zacuto; Captain Artur Carlos de Barros Basto; Samuel Schwartz; and Aristides de Sousa Mendes. 

We then visited a Catholic Church-owned senior's residence where they had uncovered a "heichal" or what we would call an Aron Kodesh in the wall of the building while doing a renovation to the dining room of the home.

The only ways to visit the Heichal is to knock on the door and request entry by the care givers/ professionals running the home, or if you happen to know the priest who is in the church next door. Gonzalo knew the priest and we were granted entry.

The following week when we returned with the group from England, our guide indicated that we would not be granted entry because we were such a large group. We volunteered to take Rabbi Garson and Rabbi Kelly as clergy to see the Heichal. When we knocked on the door, we were granted entry and then Rabbi Garson requested permission for the entire group to enter, which was surprisingly given. 

It was the site of an old synagogue and we were shown the secret stairs that were used to enter the shul from the small alley way in the back of the building rather than through the front door. 

We then walked down the narrow Escadas da Vitoria (Steps of Victory) which was previously named Escadas da Esnoga or Synagogue Steps which helps one navigate between streets in this very hilly city. 

We saw the old streetcars that are still in use in Porto...they make the TTC's cars look like something out of the space age.

We walked to the train station, said to be one of Europe's most beautiful, with huge tile murals covering all the walls, depicting ancient and modern Porto history. Portugal is famous for their tiles. They are everywhere; the sidewalks are all made out of hand cut and hand laid tiles; and many buildings are covered with beautiful intricate tiles; many hand painted. 

We walked toward the centre of town and down an old shopping street that is now being gentrified and we learned about cork, one of Portugal's largest exports. It seems that you can make almost anything out of cork and we proceeded to buy a number of items in cork.
Below is a picture of a cork tree and shoes and sandals made from the lightweight, waterproof natural resource. 

And here is a picture of us with our cork hats, surprisingly light and very comfortable. On top of the pedestal to our left is the statue of Prince Henry the Explorer, pointing to the sea and the New World. Born in 1394, Henry is credited with transforming Portugal into a major naval power. The monument was built in 1894, on the 500th anniversary of Henry's birth and is located just up the hill from the river promenade right next to the historic Stock Exchange Building. 

We walked down toward the river and by this time the sun was shining and it was quite warm. 

The atmosphere was alive with many visitors and people sitting in the outdoor cafes that line the river walk. 

When we returned with the group a week later, we crossed the river to the other side where you can get amazing views of Porto on a sunny day including the gondola boats that transport tourists up and down the river as well as the bridge built by a student of Eiffel that now joins the upper hills of both sides of the river. It is a particularly beautiful setting. 

And by now, we saw that we were approaching 2 PM and so we "ubered" back to our apartment, said goodbye to Gonzalo and we drove to the shul to do our shopping for Shabbat lunch.

We met Mrs. Zekri and we did our shopping. Once again, we marvelled at the very reasonable prices, and we also had the chance to see the inside of the shul and take some pics. 

We headed back to our apartment and prepared for Shabbat. 

We returned to the shul at 6:30 PM and there were about 40 to 50 people in shul; mostly locals, except for the 4 of us; a couple and their daughter from Israel; he was attending a conference in Porto, and the 3 or 4 Israelis accompanying the Ambassador.

The tefillah was conducted in the sefaradic style and because of the presence of many local University age students who also served as shlichei tzibbur, the davening was spirited and lively. 

At the conclusion of davening, we all headed upstairs where tables had been set for the dinner and there were many salads on the table. We were seated together the other tourists and with David Garrett who is a local, a criminal lawyer and a member of the board of the shul. He welcomed us warmly and during dinner shared with us the vision that he and the other board members have for expanding the Jewish population in Porto.

We sang Shalom Aleichem and Eishet Chayil and made kiddush and hamotzi. There were a number of waiters present and the subsequent courses consisted of boiled vegetables, meat and couscous, followed by chocolate mousse. There was plenty of food; lively singing of many zemirot and a brief speech by the Ambassador and by MK Amir Peretz who was the former minister of defence and leader of the Labour Party in Israel. 

He explained how he as a Moroccan immigrant to Israel, from a poor family growing up in a poor city of Sderot rose to a position of leadership and how that speaks so well of opportunities in Israel. It was announced that he had been elected that morning to be the deputy head of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Mediterranean Conference, a very high honour and important recognition for an Israeli, especially as the conference includes many Arab countries, who voted for him. As well he spoke about his involvement in securing the Iron Dome technology for Israel and how Israel is always there to protect its citizens. 

During dinner, David Garrett, the shul board member sitting with us, told us that in recent years the shul had been under utilized and the current board together with its Rabbi Daniel Litvak and with Yoel Zekri had made changes to attract new blood to the shul. The city had 50 residents a few years ago and no regular minyan. Today, there are 200 members and they are proud that for the past 18 months, they have not missed having a minyan on Friday night and Shabbat morning. The shul offers its members free burial rights, an operational Mikvah, and a well stocked kosher store (open only to members) offering products at cost, to the extent that over 50% of its members now buy kosher food. 

He told us the community has no money problems and they are not looking for outside help. In fact, they are eager to spend money to make people feel welcome and have hopes that with a good first experience, people will consider moving to Porto.

It is a very safe city, inexpensive place to live, there is no anti semitism, and there is now a basic infrastructure for Positive Jewish Living. There are plans in the coming months (before Pesach) to erect a building behind the shul that will offer kosher food at cost to visitors as well, and to operate a kosher restaurant at very reasonable prices, so as to attract visitors to the city.  His enthusiasm and drive reminded me of the movie Field Of Dreams and the concept of Build It And They Will Come. 

It was really one of the most warm atmospheres that we have ever been in as a Shabbat traveller.

When we returned on Shabbat morning, David came over to me and said that I would be honoured with maftir Parshat Shekalim. I explained to him that I could only read it in the Ashkenazi style and he immediately said it was OK as they are a very inclusive shul; in fact, if there is a large visiting Ashkenazi group who outnumber the locals, they will switch the nussach to Ashkenaz so as to make everyone feel very welcome and comfortable. 

After davening there was a large kiddush complete with warm bourekas and cholent and we were so full that by the time we reached our apartment, we ate very lightly and had a wonderful Shabbat rest.

In the late afternoon Abe and Debi came over and after Havdalah, we had a melave Malka and then went over to their hotel where we had a drink in the roof top bar which commanded an amazing view of the city.

All in all, it was a warm, wonderful Shabbat. Good food, good friends, beautiful tefillah and wonderful zemirot. We did not have a high bar set in our expectation for Shabbat in Porto. The actual experience far exceeded our expectations. It is a great city to visit and a great place to spend Shabbat. 

And a final picture of Henry the Explorer.

Sunday we are off to visit a number of towns in the mountains bordering Spain which have clear evidence of Jewish life in the 14th Century. Our next post will be a history of Portuguese Jewry and a number of its most important citizens. 

All the best

Fran and David