O Meu Diário de Coimbra

Wednesday, March 12th

My daughter, Nina, called last night from Oregon.

“Daughter!”

“How’s Portugal, Pops?”

“Gotta tell you, sweetheart, it’s wonderful, but not everyone here speaks English as fluently as I was promised, and, more disappointing, while there’s nothing unfriendly about the city, I pass people on the street and many have their heads down. Not a lot of smiles unprovoked smiles here.”

My daughter has spent years in France, months in India, and traipsed around other countries in Europe as well, so her experience, while not definitive, is greater than mine. A few years back, as were leaving the POLIN Museum of the History of Polish Jews in Warsaw — the word POLIN means “Rest Here,” which is quite lovely — she expressed her continuing displeasure with the country. And she had good reason to. There were more than 3 million Jews in Poland before World War II. There are between 10,000 and 20,000 now.

“On the the other hand,” I remember telling her — and this was right after Russian invaded Ukraine — that of all the countries in Europe, Poland was the most supportive of Ukrainians, “they let in like a million refugees who crossed the border without documents and gave them benefits, housing, education, so maybe they’re trying to make amends for their past.”

“Whatever” she replied. “Fuck Poland.”

All right-y then.

But back to the phone call.

“My impression, father, is this . . . “ she said about the apparent dourness I was encountering on the streets of Coimbra, “. . . people in Europe don’t go in for all that fake ‘Hi, how are you?’ bullshit we do in America.”