Meetup in Lisbon

The Café Study Groups & Meet Ups
#1

Olá a todos

There are a couple of posts about this but nothing recently.

Myself and my girlfriend are English and Swiss respectively, we moved to Lisbon last summer and have done an A1 and A2 course at a school. I’m now doing the PP online course but she’s not massively motivated, and I’m not finding myself in many real life situations where I can practice with my level, other than casual phrases in bars and shops, so I wondered if there were any fellow learners in Lisbon that would be up for a casual meet up and relaxed chatting to practice our Portuguese?

Be good to hear from anyone keen

Saudações

Dom

1 Like
#2

Hi Dom
I was in the same situation a couple of years ago. I live in Switzerland and wished to practice with portuguese people, not with people not knowing Portuguese. I then found sprachtandem.ch. There you can find Portuguese people wishing to learn German or English. Maybe there exists something similar in Portugal or you could do tandem online with someone living in Switzerland or England.
I was VERY lucky three years ago. I got to know a wonderful young Portuguese (I‘m 73!) only one day after my subscription on sprachtandem and we have met every week since then in a cafe or at home or online for one hour. In the beginning we spoke German for half an hour and Portuguese for half an hour. After two years we changed and now he speaks German all the time and I speak Portuguese. We became friends and have a lot of fun talking about anything.
This helped me a lot more for my Portuguese than talking with other beginners. By now Miguel and myself speak quite fluently the language we wanted to learn.
Maybe you can find a tandem partner who would like to improve his knowledge of English resp. German. I wish you good luck.

3 Likes
#3

Hi Barabara

Thanks for your reply. That’s quite interesting actually, I was just in Davos a few weeks ago, and actually there is a Portuguese bar there and lots of Portuguese workers, so it would have been quite ease to practice more there. But yes, the tandem thing is the way to go, although I found when learning Spanish that I need to find people that I would be friends with and want to go for coffee with, regardless of just wanting to do language, otherwise the incentive to meet up wasn’t really there. Your situation sounds perfect though with your wonderful young Portuguese :wink: I guess if you never try you never know right? Thanks again for the insight. All the best. D

#4

This was so helpful. After reading it, I searched language tandem and found Tandem.net. I now have a European Portuguese language tandem partner I can practice my Portuguese with! Thank you!

#5

Ótimo! Estou contente por poder ajudar-te

1 Like
#6

Thanks kitjoychin, I haven’t tried tandem.net, I will give it a go!!

1 Like
#7

Hi Dom,
I am A1 level and live in Lisbon and I would like to practice :grinning:
Eli

#8

Hi everyone,

I’m not sure what my level is because I only started a few months ago but I would assume it’s A1.

I’m starting to learn some past tenses etc but I also rarely practice my Portuguese despite living here.

I would also be keen to meet up and practice with anyone. It would also be nice to meet some more people here.
Connor

#9

Hi kitjoychin, I just looked at Tandem.net but only see Portuguese with the Brazilian flag available. Would you mind sharing how you found a European Portuguese speaker? Thanks!

#10

Olá davidkingcollage,

Yes, unfortunately, there is only Portuguese language with the Brazillian flag available. But you can use the filter to search for people in Portugal to look for people who speak European Portuguese. In the filter section, under ‘Show members from…’, select Portugal as ‘Country or Region’.

What shows up would be a mixture of Brazillian who live in Portugal and Portuguese themselves. I made it clear in my profile that I wanted to learn European Portuguese specifically. And I would always ask if they spoke European Portuguese.

I was on the app for a week chatting with 20+ people until I found a suitable one where we get along well and we’re both serious about improving our language learning (being committed, setting aside time to have video calls, doing our homework).

Hope this helps. And I hope you’ll find a suitable language partner eventually! :slight_smile:

1 Like
#11

I am definately very interested in meeting with anyone who has time to paractice speaking the language!!! I wish I coul find a native speaker with whom to do this, but a group of learners could be helpful as well. I arrived in Lisbon on March 8. It’s now the 29th and I’ve spoken very little Portuguese, and I get very frustrated and give up too easily. i just read the comment from kitjoychin about tandem.net. I’ll sure be checking that out.

#12

Hey Roy/Connor/Eli

Thanks for the messages. Let’s get together and embarrass ourselves at our probable lack of language skills hehehe.

I signed up for tandem, it’s a slow process… most of the Portuguese speakers seem to be Brazilian, but I’ve started chats with a few Europeans, so let’s see how we go.

#13

I really look forward to meeting up and practicing in person. I live in São Domingo de Benfica near the Jardim Zoológico Metro station, but It is easy to get almost anywhere on the metro.
I do not work, so I can meet any time of day. Although I am not very verbal in the mornings. LOL
When can we start?
Roy

#14

I am ready and willing any time. I live near the Jardim Zoológico metro station. When we want to meet in person I can go anywhere. There is also video chat.
I look forward to this.
Roy

#15

I also would be interested in joining a Lisboa-based group. I have been here for a year and really do need to force myself to practice.

#16

Hi Roy,
Yes, that would be great, I am living no far from the Jardim Zoológico :grinning:
I am not sure how to send here a private message, you can reach me in facebook Liran Biton. Ate breve :grinning:

#17

Hi Andy,
I am not sure how to send here a private message, you can reach me in facebook Liran Biton. Ate breve :grinning:

#18

I am here in São Domingo de Benfica not far from Jardim Zollogico station.
I can be reached at [email protected]. I hope one or two others from Parctice Portuguese chat group will be interested as well.
Roy

#19

Hi all, apologies for radio silence for a few days. Have any of you met up yet?

I think in terms of practising, for me at least, it’s better one to one, but no reason we couldn’t meet up to get to know each other a bit first. Anywhere central is easy for me. How does this Tuesday afternoon sound?

By the way, if you want to send a private message, just click on someone’s name and then click message in the top right of the window that comes up.

#20

Hi Dom and girlfriend

I am English and after I sort the kids out at uni I am, hopefully, moving to Portugal full time.
I will be in the Carcavelos area if you know to.

DebsS