Photo: E.V. Legters left the U.S. for Portugal in 2017. Credit: https://www.essential-business.pt/2020/08/26/portuguese-citizenship-applications-at-all-time-high/
E.V. Legters is an American fiction writer and former English teacher. In 2017, she left America for Coimbra, Portugal. The U.S. Department of State estimates that Legters is one of 10 million Americans living abroad, and one of nearly 7,000 living in Portugal.
Last week, Editor Harrison Kass and Legters discussed her decision to leave America and move to Portugal.
Harrison Kass: Why did you want to leave America?
E.V. Legters: I didn’t want to leave. I wanted an affordable life. I’d always thought I’d live in Europe someday. After 11 years facing six college classes every semester with some 125 new students, and my youngest through college, why not?
HK: Did the timing of your departure, in 2017, have anything to do with Trump’s win?
EV: It did not. My plans were already in motion. I did hesitate, thinking I was abandoning the country when I should be staying to help if I possibly could, but realized whatever I could do, I could do from here.
I actually called one of my sons to ask if he thought I was bailing. He said no, he wouldn’t accuse me of that, because my plans were in place when we thought Hillary would win.
HK: Why did you choose Portugal?
EV: A friend who’d spent time in Lisbon casually mentioned one could live in Portugal for under $2000 a month. Really? Google came up with not just Portugal, but Belize, Ecuador . . . I started, and ended, with Portugal. After only four days, I called and put my house on the market. I do have to say that when I returned to Connecticut and saw the For Sale sign on my house, I was shocked.
Other ex-pats do months if not years of research. I went with my gut, and there have been no regrets. There are pockets of France and Italy that are affordable, but I’d been there and hadn’t found the people as welcoming as the Portuguese. With very few exceptions, even in the bigger cities, we ex-pats found the people remarkably kind and generous and patient. There is a civility here that is missing in much of the U.S. – going back is culture shock.
HK: Would you choose Portugal again?
EV: Yes. Portugal is not for everyone. Europe is not. Living anywhere abroad is not for Americans who expect to come and duplicate their American lives.
HK: What have been the most challenging aspects of moving to Portugal?
EV: The language. Definitely the language. In the states, we rarely hear European Portuguese, so our ears have no idea what to do with it.
Also, the sense of time. “This morning” might mean tomorrow. “At lunch time” might mean dinner. “In January” might mean April.
HK: How do the Portuguese view the U.S.?
EV: One of the first things one realizes is that the U.S. is not the center of the universe. Not to the people living in Europe. There are 100 million more people in Europe than in the U.S. Yes, trade and politics and policies are closely tied, but when Trump shocked much of Europe, Europe – and Portugal – looked on with dismay, and followed events, but also looked away. There was the rest of the world to consider, a fact many in the U.S. can’t seem to remember.
The news from the U.S. is often violent. Because it is violent. As we ex-pats looked on, most of us with horror, at the Trump years, we realized that those living day to day under that administration and under the constant threat of gun violence were doing just that, living day to day. The Portuguese do not understand how or why Americans live under this constant threat. Of course, neither do many Americans. Neither do I.
HK: What do you do with your time there?
EV: The difference between my time here and back in the U.S. has more to do with no longer working 24/7. I do here what I did during time off there: write, paint, read and spend time with friends.
Very different from the U.S. are the hours one can spend at a café over a single 80 cent cup of coffee without a waitperson asking, “are you still working on that?” Dinners – pre-pandemic, and, I hope, post-pandemic – can start at 8 p.m. and last until midnight without anyone standing over us with the bill.
HK: What do you know now that you wish you’d known when you moved?
EV: It’s a good thing I didn’t know how complicated the process would be. How much paperwork would be involved. How many questions. How many guesses as to what the answers were. No one in any American or Portuguese office agreed on anything.
Looking back, selling and emptying out the house, finding an apartment in a foreign city with a lease and all documentation in Portuguese, a language for which I had only conquered por favor and obrigada, was exhausting. It took considerably more perseverance than I ever would have imagined.
HK: What is your favorite part about Portugal?
EV: Coimbra, where I live. At the center is the university, founded in 1290. The town is steeped in history with a strong culture of art and student energy. We are surrounded by hills, are close to the ocean and have a wide river running through. We’re close to Lisbon, and therefore the rest of Europe, and to trains that service the whole country and beyond.
HK: Is there a community of ex-pats in Portugal? What does that look like?
EV: There is a substantial American ex-pat community both in Coimbra and throughout the country, but that doesn’t mean we all belong together. I sometimes think of it as a retirement community where random people have ended up together. Over the months, we’ve discovered where there is common ground and have established solid, satisfying friendships. That said, any of us could call on any of the others for help in an emergency. We are all in this together.
HK: How would you generally describe the people and culture of Portugal?
EV: Although a very small country, there are remarkable cultural and language differences region to region. Not far from the very cosmopolitan cities of Lisbon and Porto, there are tiny, ancient villages. The western and southern edges are coastline, and sea-centered. The interior is rural, with men and women still wearing somewhat traditional garb and farming in traditional ways.
Generally speaking, it is a culture without violence. There is an equality between men and women that doesn’t consistently exist in the U.S. Women are treated with respect. Family is central. I often see children, even teenagers, walking with and helping their older relatives, hand in hand.
HK: Do you miss anything about America?EV: Only my boys. All of us here expected that when we experienced saudade, longing, we would simply fly home for a visit. The pandemic has of course robbed us of this. It has made many of us nostalgic for our past lives that we hadn’t expected or experienced. Expect a flood of us in U.S. airports seeking out our friends and family when it ends.
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