A birthday journey beyond guidebooks

Sometimes it pays just to go with the flow. After a disappointing start to her birthday, CAROL GRANT ends up celebrating far from the tourist trappings of Lisbon.

I sat alone drinking beer and eating flaccid salt cod fritters outside the Cafe a Brasiliera in Lisbon.

It was hot and the incessant drilling of Lisbon's builders pierced my hangover. I couldn't spot a building where the tiled facade wasn't crumbling into the street. I couldn't escape the attentions of the African men who sidled up to me offering "hashissssh" as I sat and waited, and waited.

It was my birthday.

"Postpone everything. Never do today what you can likewise do tomorrow. In fact you need not do anything at all today and tomorrow. Live your life, don't be lived by it."

So said Fernando Pessoa, Portugal's most famous poet. His statue is opposite the cafe, and his implacable smile taunted me. Pessoa practised what he preached, and published only one book of verse before he died in 1935. The rest of his work lay in a trunk until it was edited by his more diligent and less relaxed colleagues.

That day, I couldn't share Pessoa's point of view. The day before had been different. I'd arrived in the city for the weekend, alive to its possibilities, a signed-up disciple to its philosophy.

I'd met my friend Jose and his charming entourage and soon my brain was spinning with the range of options set out before me. Tomorrow we would catch the tram up the hill to the winding streets of Alfama. Tomorrow we would drive to the picturesque village of Sintra. Tomorrow we would go to a monastery. Tomorrow I would see the real Lisbon.

Tomorrow was now, today, and today was my birthday.

All of a sudden, from nowhere, Jose appeared at my elbow like a ghost in a crumpled grey jacket, his black hair slicked against his tiny handsome head. There was no apology, just a nervous, bobbing, double-cheeked kiss and another half-hour wait while he sipped his first coffee of the day. It was now too hot to take the tram to Alfama, he said. His friend with the car was sick today and couldn't take us to Sintra. The monastery wasn't worth seeing, a tourist trap, nothing more.

He produced a damp concertina of an envelope from his pocket and pushed it across the table towards me. I opened the grubby card with little enthusiasm and more than a share of bad grace. I said nothing as I looked at my watch and saw my birthday plans evaporate like heat haze off the cracked tiled pavement.

"OK, now we must go," he said, throwing some coins on the table. He pulled me through the afternoon crowds and into the backstreets of Rossio. Large groups of portly middle-aged Lisboetas stood on street corners, debating vociferously. The traffic was almost at a standstill and animated people jumped in front of motorists, offering to find the last remaining parking spaces in exchange for money. The streets were thick with the reek of salt cod as it lay in leathery piles in shop doorways.

I turned round to talk to Jose and found myself alone, until a grey arm appeared from a doorway and dragged me out of the melee. We were in the Ingreja de Sao Domingos, a 13th-century church ravaged by fire about 40 years ago and only partly renovated. All the stained glass had been blown out and replaced with a clear glass that let in a gentle autumn light. The walls and pillars were still charred from the conflagration, their flaky blackness contrasting with the rich ochre of the ceiling which deepened into red as it domed over a magnificent gold altar.

It lacked the coolness of most city churches, as if the flames had left their legacy. The warm air was thick with incense and the light of hundreds of votive candles. Jose called me over to sit beside him on one of the thick wooden pews. "I love this place," he said. "It's Lisbon's secret. It will never be repaired but ... " he shrugged. "I think it's beautiful, the way a scarred face can be beautiful."

"And now," he said, taking my hand, "we make another trip." And he led me out of the church and down the narrow streets towards the port. We took a ferry, its long wooden benches polished smooth from thousands of commuters making their daily trip across the River Tagus, almost empty now on this late Saturday afternoon. We landed at Cacilhas and made our way along an inauspicious riverfront, lined with derelict warehouses. Even the most devoted fan of Lisbon's decayed grandeur would not have seen the beauty here.

And then, as if from nowhere, we reached an open terrace, dripping with purple bougainvillea, lined with a few tables and backed by the smallest beach I have seen, packed with children playing. We sat in the shade at the bar Atira Te Ao Rio, literally "jump to the river", and drank cold white wine, watching the late afternoon light play across the terraces of terracotta roofs over the river.

From our vantage point I could see the pattern of the city. Lisbon works on so many different levels, literally and metaphorically. The districts are built on hills and the areas are linked by lifts, funiculars, trams. Maps, signs and even the well-meaning guidance of Lisboetas are largely useless. The topography conspires to slow you down and make you think.

"Now, food," said Jose, draining his glass as he continued the rare show of purpose that had marked the second half of the day. We walked along the riverfront and into a restaurant tucked away behind the rows of commuter ferries. It was called Farol lighthouse and inside its gloomy interior we could see the early evening clientele of three wizened men drinking beer at the bar.

"Here we celebrate your birthday," said Jose, ordering more wine and scanning the menu in consultation with the waiters. As we waited, fishermen came and emptied the day's catch into tanks and shallow sinks already bulging with fish and shellfish, lobsters, mussels, clams, stone bass. Within minutes the catch was out of the tank and into the pan. By the end of our meal the table was a mass of plates, bones, bread and empty wine bottles.

We stood on the deck for our return ferry trip, the wind buffeting our cheeks hot with alcohol, the clouds deepening to crimson against the skyline. "Good birthday, yes?" asked Jose, leaning across the rail as we reached the other side. "Do you feel refreshed and ready to start the day properly now?"

- INDEPENDENT

Portugal