Rude in Portugal

Matters of Manners

By: Bruce H. Joffe

Narrated by: Virtual Voice

Who's the rude ones: us or them?

“Traffic jams, badly behaved children, disagreements between couples, red tapes, and queues all add up to make the Portuguese the mount irritable, bad tempered, and explosive nation in Europe.” This was among the shocking results of a public survey carried out in 17 countries throughout the European Union by Reader’s Digest in conjunction with leading universities. The leading question made in the survey was this one: “What irritates Europeans the most?”

According to Jorge de Sá, professor of sociology and an expert in vox pop surveys, the conclusions of the study don’t reveal anything surprising. “The Portuguese are generally conformists in the sense that they like to have rules to follow, and (they) follow them blindly,” he said. “On the other hand, the Portuguese also like to enforce and impose rules on others that them themselves aren’t prepared to obey or follow. This is partly down to years of an organized and totalitarian society, whereas other democratic countries, which have had more time to taste freedom and behave like individuals … are more laid back and tolerant.”

But we've evicted them from their family homes at prices they cannot afford or choose to live in gated communities; we've increased their cost of living; we expect them to communicate in our language; too often we don't treat them with respect.

And they, for their part, drive like hellions, aren't particularly welcoming, don't smile, block the aisles in supermarkets, tie up traffic while chatting with friends from their cars, straddle two or three parking spots, and are loud.