 Good old U.S. greenbacks are great for such vacation spots as the Bahamas and Panama, but a move to Europe means there’s currency exchanges in your future. Doubly so if you’re going to be sending over funds to buy a house, a business, or rent an apartment. This post takes a look at what that involves.
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 As with most European countries, Portugal is slowly and cautiously edging out of lockdown. We've gone from a State of Emergency to a Calamity (actually one step down) while resuming some of the activities of everyday life. So what has it been like? Let's take a look at how this country of 10.3 million souls has coped during this pandemic.
 Our plans to post about the trip to Tomar and our time in Lisbon at the Embassy have been set aside by the pandemic caused by Covid-19. Like other European countries, Portugal is on the front lines. Rather than discussing the disease, we'd like to talk about how our new home is handling this crisis.
 We're off to Tomar for a few days to check out this remarkable city, home of the Knights Templar (Ordem dos Templários). They were a much revered Order (at least by Christians) who participated in the Crusades and guarded pilgrims on their way to/from Jerusalem. Then they fell from grace, the leaders were tortured and executed. Wikipedia has more on why that happened. (Hint: it had to do with someone who owed them money.)
"The Portuguese king, Denis I, refused to pursue and persecute the former knights, as had occurred in all other sovereign states under the influence of the Catholic Church. Under his protection, Templar organizations simply changed their name, from "Knights Templar" to the reconstituted Order of Christ and also a parallel Supreme Order of Christ of the Holy See; both are considered successors to the Knights Templar." (Wikipedia) We'll be sure to post photos of Tomar this week on our Facebook page and then I'll do a full post down the line.  The old adage “hope for the best and plan for the worst” has served us very well during and after our move to Portugal. Now that we are residents and own personal property here, we needed to direct how those assets will be handled in the event of our deaths. This post covers that process in Portugal and also includes some information about U.S. Wills for ex-pats.
 One of the questions we’re frequently asked is just how good is the healthcare in Portugal. An earlier post covered Harold’s time in the emergency room of one of Porto’s big public hospitals, and this one is about my experience in a private hospital. Let's find out how that went.
 BePortugal recently offered an overview of the various regions of Portugal in regards to retirement. Large city, smaller town or village, this country has them all. (Photo courtesy of BePortugal)
 I posted this on our Facebook page because it's a fun look at Portugal's incredible history, amazing people and unique geography.
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=mq6L8CnNJXc  Olá!
It has been a while since our last post. It's been a bit busy, folks. Here's a few things that have been going on: 1) I (Jana) spent over five weeks back in the U.S. and have some thoughts about that trip which I'll share in a future post. 2) And then I had surgery on both my hands, which means typing (or pretty much anything else) has been on hold for a time. I'll be writing up a post on how that experience went which included an overnight stay at one of Porto's private hospitals. Meanwhile Harold has been been doing all the cooking and cleaning. ;-) 3) We had our Portuguese wills and powers of attorney drawn up. There are significant differences between the US and Portuguese versions of these legal docs and we will be discussing those in a post, as well as the procedure for making this magic happen. 4) We are currently in the process of setting up a Trust in the U.S. to handle what liquid assets are there as well as my intellectual property (I'm an author). Again, a post is definitely going to written about this process. So much to write about. Hope you all have had a grand fall. It's definitely heading toward winter here.  Hi! Harold here. A recent personal experience has led to this blog post and it’s all about Portugal’s healthcare system. Let’s face it, there’s no better way to learn about something than doing it yourself. Let’s dig in…
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Your HostsHarold is a former software engineer. Jana is an author. Together they're exploring their new life in Portugal. Archives
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