Back to the Azores: We Found Cousins!!

Last summer, somewhat impetuously, I booked flights to the Azores on our way to Boston.  Since I had been cornered by my family to vacation someplace we could see my sisters (Tia and Sasha had a major hand in this effort!), I was determined to use this opportunity to visit our long-lost homeland, a goal talked about by my mom for years. (Click here for that blog.)

Our Portuguese homeland

The Azores are spectacular, and I fell in love with them.  I became determined to find any long-lost relatives that I was convinced must still exist in these verdant islands.  Suzi and Simone were willing to help find them AND meet us in the Azores to meet them!  After much searching, including hiring a private investigator on the island of Terceira, we found my great-grandfather’s sister’s great-granddaughter and great-grandson and made contact.  I wrote Facebook messages in Portuguese (cheating a lot with Google Translator) and arranged to visit.

This doesn't really help you learn the language, though...as I discovered!

Getting to the Azores from Puerto most cost-effectively entailed flying first to Barcelona, then on to Porto and finally into Ponta Delgada on São Miguel Island, all on RyanAir.  In Barcelona we spent an entire day devoted exclusively to Antonio Gaudi, visiting Sagrada Familia, La Pedrera as well as Casa Batlló on Passeig de Grácia, and ending the day at Parque Güell, all famous examples of Gaudi’s work.

Tia buys a selfie stick

We liked the inside better than the outside

Stopping through Porto on our way to the Azores, we met my third cousin, Ivo Machado.  A charming, stocky grey-haired-and-bearded air-traffic controller, he bought us coffee while we traced our family lineage, and he recommended his book, Nunca otros ojos, published in both Portuguese and Spanish.

Cousin Ivo

Here's the Amazon link to his book!

Once landed on São Miguel, we zipped over to Maria Resendes’s marvelous bed-and-breakfast, where I had sent Suzi and Ethan and the boys to stay, as they had landed two days earlier.  Maria prepared a true Azorean feast, sending Suzi and Ado to the calderas to bury the cozido in thermal pits, returning 5 hours later to pick up the cooked goods.  Later that night we watched a local soccer game between village teams—remarkably good for such a small place! 

Nossa Senhora de los Remedios, next to Maria's house

Maria and Dorotea, her helper.  Best hostess ever!  Makes you feel like she's your long-long aunt. 

Before we left the next morning, we hiked to an old sugar mill that Maria’s friend had just sold. It made me yearn to buy something similar and create my own little paradise.

The calderas:  Azoreans cook dinner here!

On our way to the west part of São Miguel, we stopped through Vila Franco de Campo to swim in the nearby caldera of an extinct volano, now a circular lagoon.

No sharks in this lagoon!

In Mosteiros, we lounged on black sand beaches, the kids playing pick-up soccer, and enjoyed several soaks in our favorite ocean thermal pools.  These pools were just as great as the first time we found them, hot towards the back, with gradients out towards the ocean until you found yourself in open and cool turquoise seas.

Tia shows her soccer moves

Thermal beauty

The tiny town of Mosteiros happened to have a town fair, and we hung out there before hopping our flight to a new island—Pico—and home of my great-grandmother, Tereza Pereira. 

Island beauty from our little cottages on Mosteiros's black sand beach

Simone and Chris met us in Pico at the lovely black-lava-stone houses of Adegas do Pico.  Pico is so named for the enormous volcanic cone that dominates its skyline.  It is sparsely inhabited, and the inland roads are lined with cows and hydrangea, while the coastal road weaves in and out of picturesque villages.  I swam each morning in cool silken waters off an exquisite black-sand beach.

The volcano dominates the island of Pico (pico=peak)

We celebrated my 53 birthday at a lovely fish restaurant in Magdalena, stopping first for a little wine tasting, then an unexpected find: a place to jump into clear water from a dock.  The kids loved it.

Into the abyss.  Lava pools like this are everywhere on these gorgeous islands

But the best for me was finding long-lost relatives.  On Pico it wasn’t easy; I had traced my great-grandmother’s family back to their ancestral home, but the trail went cold there.  “Just go there, you will find someone who knows something!”  said João, the investigator I’d been working with.  And so we did.  Walking down a tiny village road in São Cayetano, we began asking folks randomly for my great-grandmother’s house.   Fortunately for us, we met Paula, a Boston-based transplant from this very village who spoke perfect English.  “I don’t know, but I know someone who does!” she told us.  And so she introduced us to Clara and Anabela ,two novagenarians who had lived on that very street all their lives.  Clara suddenly turned to me.  “Manuel Rico?  Si!  Manuel Rico!” I was astonished and elated—this was my grandfather!  It turns out that they clearly remember his visit to the island in 1957, when he came to collect soil from his mother’s yard to bring back to her. Sadly, my great-grandmother Tereza died just days before he returned. 

They remember our grandfather's visit in 1957!

The  Portuguese, and in particular the Azoreans, are exceptionally warm and friendly.  Before we knew it, we were invited to the singing of the rosary in preparation for the festival that Saturday, and then to our new Bostonian friend’s sister’s birthday party.  All 8 of us stayed for cake and drinks before returning to our lava cottages. 

In-house altar

With Barbara, our long-lost relative?  She thought we were related through Tereza Pereira Rico 

Our final island was Terceira.  While Pico was lush, with cliffs and lava fields, Terceira was much more populated as well as agrarian, with many more houses and fields.  We stayed in a beach house owned by Azoreans now living in California, in San Jose, my home town.  The owners had created a darling Californian beach house on the cliffs of (name of town), complete with “This Way to the Beach” signs and American flags. 

Terceira's agricultural beauty

We swam from the rocks, avoiding the occasional jellyfish, and feasted on seafood and soupas, a dish we could remember from when my mom made it based on my Aunt Lolly’s recipe.  We went to an Azorean “bullfight,” more of a fun crazy celebration involving a bull on an enormous rope that runs around the village square while daring young people (almost always men) taunt the beast with cloaks and umbrellas. 

The Azorean bullfights are mostly funny and quite humane--no bull meat afterwards here!

No swords here, only umbrellas to tease the bulls with.  And a rope to keep the bull from stomping someone!

But the most wonderful and exciting experience by far in all of our Azorean travels was finding our third cousin, Filomena.   My great-grandfather, Manuel Rico, left the small village of Biscoitus on Terceira sometime in the latter part of the 19th century.  He married and had a boy, my grandfather Manuel, only to die (probably of appendicitis) 6 months later.  His sister, Ludovina, remained on Terceira and was Filomena’s great-grandmother.  

My great-great-aunt Ludovina, my great-grandfather Manuel's sister

Filomena’s mother, Maria João, is ailing and on oxygen, but she clearly remembered my grandfather’s visit to Terceira with my grandmother back in 1961.

My grandfather, Manuel Gonçalves Rico, circa 1954

“Can you come back for a snack after you swim?” Filomena asked us when all 8 of us descended on her to introduce ourselves.  So, after heading down to “The Abyss” for a swim in black-turquoise waters amid lava cliffs and coves, we climbed the stairs to her mother’s house.  

This is where we went swimming!  Amazing.

Inside was a feast fit for long-lost cousins, complete with several kinds of Azorean liqueurs and wines, home-made tuna tartar, local cheeses and bread, cucumbers and tomatoes from the garden, and the crowning dishes:  limpets from the sea….and soupas!!

Soupas, Azorean style like I remember it.

Limpets from the sea, a delicacy here

We chatted and laughed, everyone happy with our new-found relations.  Cousin Clara, Filomena’s aunt, came by to say hi and regaled us with stories she remembered as a 6-year-old awed by the American Manuel Rico’s visit.  Her memory was sharp and detailed, and she reminded me of  the vague impressions I still have left of my grandfather. 

The Rico sisters with Filomena and daughter Mariela

I could almost follow what she was telling me....

I left Terceira determined to return, and even better, determined to perfect my Portuguese!

All of us on our island of Terceira, home to the Ricos!

The Azorean black-and-white motif

My Friend Janice

In 1986, just as I was graduating from St. John’s College, falling in love with Todd, and winding down my grueling aerobics schedule, I was seized by the unquenchable desire to go back to Germany.  I applied for and got a Fulbright Scholarship for a year of study at the German university of my choice, to study the German educational system. 

This stroke of luck led me to the Universität Tübingen and to Fichtenweg 11, the ugly student housing up on the hill overlooking the picturesque town of Tübingen.  There I—to my horror—found myself surrounded by other foreign exchange students, including a slew of Americans and Canadians, most of whom were determined to speak English.  

Back in the day:  Fichtenweg 11

But not Janice.  She, like me, was there to LEARN GERMAN, and really learn it, I mean, really become fluent.  She says she doesn’t remember, but I do:  we made a pact right from the beginning to only speak German to each other, awkward as that was.  The amazing thing was, we actually stuck to it. 

Some things never change

Janice lived down the hall from me, majoring in German from Newcastle University in England, but she’s actually Scouse.  Like from Liverpool.  Or better said, Elsemere Port, just across the river.  She and I became fast friends and even hitchhiked to E’Port from Tübingen during Spring Break to pick up her car, a tiny Austin Mini, so that we could drive it back to Germany and have even more fun for the rest of the school year.  It was the first time I’d really heard her speak English, and vice versa, and to my shock I could hardly understand her.  

We drove this cute little thing through the Alps, too, all the way to Vienna--with 5 people inside!

After that year in Germany, I saw Janice only sporadically, a couple weeks in DC and California, a quick few days in London, an afternoon in Los Angeles.  But like true friends, it didn’t matter.  I was thrilled when we moved to Spain to be within reach of easy visits back and forth.

Janice and daughter Lili back in 2012, our first visit to London

But that Janice…she had developed a phobia of flying, and even though we invaded her London house a couple of times, it seemed like there was nothing I could do to convince her to come see our palace, until—FINALLY—at the 11th hour, in the last week of our time in Spain before we left on vacation…she booked tickets.

British Airways, the only way to fly?

We had a full week of glorious Spanish sunshine, perfect to lounge by the pool.  Janice showed up with her friend Theresa and her daughter Lily, and we enjoyed our palace and its massive garden and pool. 

Our awesome palatial pool

Next we planned a trip up to Cueva de Gato, a secret place discovered by our friends Linda and Vida.  We organized an outing to this enormous cave, out of which flowed a river, icy icy cold in comparison to the summer’s heat.  We splashed and lounged, with the girls jumping off of the high rock.  We plucked figs from the loaded trees with an improvised fig-picker, and relished the icy water.

Enjoying the sunshine

JUMP!

Vida is the same age as Sasha and a year younger than Tia.  We invited Linda and Vida to join us at the Fin de Curso dinner that was organized by our flamenco professor, Jaime.  But first, I was determined to show my own music skills off to Janice by arranging a final Vale That concert back where we started, at Bar Milord.  Juan, the owner, was thrilled to have us, and we again marshaled all our friends to cheer us on.  Janice, Theresa, and Lily hung in there all the way through the last song!  What troopers.

The last gasp of Vale That

Coming full circle at Bar Milord

The next night was the Fin de Curso.  We arrived for the dinner at 9 pm, a fashionable Spanish hour.  In proper Spanish form, dinner didn’t start until 10:30 pm, and finished up at 12:30.  The show got started about 1 am;  Janice, Theresa and Lily hung in there.  By 1:45, still waiting for Tia and Sasha to dance, Vida went to sleep in the car.  I sang my Mal Alma solo around 2 am, and Tia and Sasha danced their magnificent alegria about 2:45.  by the time I got onstage at 3:30 am for the Fin de Fiesta and my chance to dance the bulerias, Linda, Janice, Theresa, and Lily were in the lobby, on their way out.  What a way to learn how the Spanish throw a party! 

Getting our flamenco diplomas late, late at night