# Has anyone else noticed?



## travelling-man (Jun 17, 2011)

As much as I love Portugal and the Portuguese people, has anyone else noticed how they couldn't sell a 20 minute liaison in a house of ill repute?

We've been doing some research for a website over the last few weeks and have noticed that it's very common for the local tourist board websites to be written entirely in Portuguese only?

How I wonder can they expect to sell Portugal to the world when the site visitors cannot read a word of the info and the people who can read the site, probably know the info already?


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## canoeman (Mar 3, 2011)

To take a stage further try https://www.visitportugal.com/en the official site, all very pretty but many links to regional tourism don't work, finding anything is a nightmare, so much missing it's unbelievable, email request for info have to be followed up and up and although available in other languages no option to select.

But there are some great sites out their


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## travelling-man (Jun 17, 2011)

I find it simply staggering that it hasn't occurred to so many tourism sites that they need to present the info in languages from around the world if they want to sell PT to the world!


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## canoeman (Mar 3, 2011)

Well they must know as ok it took nearly 2 years for the penny to drop that this was reguired but they produced this excellent site for Visitors Tolls Home - Portal de Portagens

Think the only Portuguese cities I've seen with a English sites are Lisbon and Porto, Coimbra has a great site but Portuguese but staff are multi lingual.

A new mission in life for you getting the message through to them suggest a visit to Docs first for some Valium


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## travelling-man (Jun 17, 2011)

You might just have a point....... they do certainly need someone to get their ducks in a row!


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## canoeman (Mar 3, 2011)

I find the problem is that very few Portuguese employees are empowered to make or action decisions and getting feedback to the hidden manager/owner/person responsible virtually impossible.

Remember recently a member "holidaying" asked about fishing licence, well as we all know the info's not published except for Residents but thought I'd tackle Tourist board as zero information on fishing, licences etc, to paraphrase 

Q How can I buy a fishing licence/s for a holiday in Portugal
1st reply Don't Know
Q2 Why not you promote Portugal and should know
2nd a reluctant try this email address
Q3 I asked you, you should have information available, tried and no reply
3rd try this direct email please give us feedback
Tried and got an answer yes you can buy a F/Licence from abroad and procedure
Q4 Feedback that got answer , the information but not where to actually find that information on site, and procedure so complicated and expensive to be ludicrous, reply still waiting

I've gone through same rigmarole with Clay Pigeon shooting, Canoeing, every major river and lake in Portugal has some type of canoeing available, try and find that info some of it's there but so well hidden Ebay could take lessons on security


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## robc (Jul 17, 2008)

I think we need to be careful here, if they get too slick at marketing and promoting and then we will have the whole world here....................................

And then what would we do......................

What about the great wine, food, climate etc.

Portugal is Europes best kept secret´, shouldn´t we keep it that way


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## canoeman (Mar 3, 2011)

That's ok as long as country can survive without some external income and good tourism could fill a bit of the gap and supply some employment to keep the younger generation here rather than having to go abroad looking for work


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## travelling-man (Jun 17, 2011)

Rob

I certainly see your point but I hate to see so many young people forced to look overseas for work, so many houses left abandoned and so many empty or nearly empty villages........ What the country needs to survive in the long term is prosperity and one way to get that is to exploit all of the tourism potential.

At the moment, they seem to bend over backwards to stifle tourism and other industries in my area at least! 

As an example, I was talking to my local tourism board recently and asked him why the Cabril (if that's the right name for area between the two dams) is devoid of water tourism vessels and he told me that such vessels are only legally allowed to operate on bodies of water that are fully navigable and the dam wall means it's not, so no tour boats....... honestly, what a ridiculous rule. 

I worked in the tourism industry in various parts of Africa for over 3 decades and even with the disorganisation of Africa, any country on the continent would be exploiting that tourism potential to the absolute max.


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## robc (Jul 17, 2008)

I agree with both you and canoe.

The old adage holds true....................
"You can lead a horse to water and all that ...................."

The problems are structural throughout Government. Civil Service etc.
I believe it will change, but it will take time and unfortunately in the current 
financially challenging times it will take even longer.

Rob


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## Sharoncf (Aug 20, 2012)

A great thread and I agree with all of the above. My husband is Portuguese and when we were in Australia we would help man the Portuguese kiosk in the EU group in the Canberra multicultural festival. The Portuguese Embassy had very few resources, mainly posters which said very little. They seem to promote Portugal to the Portuguese but not anywhere else. Other booths had tee shirts, give always, food and a whole lot of things. Not the Portuguese.


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## aloewy (Sep 8, 2014)

I hope it's not the mind-set: "It's OUR country, YOU learn the language." It would be a disservice to those wanting to visit but are unable to learn the language.


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## travelling-man (Jun 17, 2011)

aloewy said:


> I hope it's not the mind-set: "It's OUR country, YOU learn the language." It would be a disservice to those wanting to visit but are unable to learn the language.


Not at all. The VAST majority of Portuguese are remarkably easy going about language and even if they don't speak English, they'll very often go and find someone who does so the conversation can continue.

There's a lot of really good things about Portugal but the very best thing is the Portuguese people.


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## canoeman (Mar 3, 2011)

The other point is that TM raised the issue because of most Portuguese sites not catering to attract Non Portuguese speakers to holiday here by making information available in any language bar Portuguese not about "expats of any Nationality" making an effort to learn or communicate in Portuguese


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## aloewy (Sep 8, 2014)

I know that whenever my husband and I have traveled to other countries, I've made an effort to learn (at least) enough of the language to get around. I definitely noticed the difference in how we were treated. That's not to say we have ever been treated badly, but it appeared that it was greatly appreciated by the locals that we were making an attempt. (I'm sure there's plenty of stories about how my Italian slipped into Spanish a number of times!)

I have noticed that the Europeans really are great and generous people. I have yet to come across anyone who's been rude to us; and we've been lucky enough to travel to a number of other countries.

Should we decided to move to Portugal, I most definitely will learn Portuguese, not only out of courtesy, but would make it easier on day-to-day-life.


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## canoeman (Mar 3, 2011)

I agree with your sentiments but this thread started as how bad the Portuguese are at promoting themselves and the country , yes a truly lovely people generally will jump in a car to show you the way somewhere but also would rather say Amanha than actually say I'm really busy can't do that job for you for at least 6 weeks, let alone understand that a 10:00 appointment is 10:00 not 16:00 or at all if your wanting to promote the country or events to foreigners and attract those people then it's self defeating to not make information easy to find or in multiple languages


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## aloewy (Sep 8, 2014)

Yes, I believe that changing the mind-set would be difficult... How would you go about it?


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## robc (Jul 17, 2008)

aloewy said:


> Yes, I believe that changing the mind-set would be difficult... How would you go about it?



There is a saying/question amongst the Portuguese business community around here and it goes thus.

"How do you make a small fortune in Portugal....................................Start with a large one"

Sadly it seems all too often to be true.

Rob


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## canoeman (Mar 3, 2011)

aloewy said:


> Yes, I believe that changing the mind-set would be difficult... How would you go about it?


Not easily as if you read earlier in post one of problems here is actually getting to the people that actually might make a change or a decision.

An example Moviflor not the furniture business they where but this illustrates point.
Items displayed on floor but purchased items collected from warehouse, in our case not on same site.
Given map to find
Followed map, couldn't find, phoned warehouse after 30 frustrating minutes, someone actually drove to where I was to direct me.
Warehouse not anywhere close to map, map totally inaccurate
Staff oh yes we know this happens often
Why don't you change map?
Shrug
Returned to store and raised hell with Manager, everyone knew but wouldn't do anything about it, 4 weeks later still hadn't been changed, Complaints Book

Sure lots of other will have similar experiences, stories


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## robc (Jul 17, 2008)

canoeman said:


> Sure lots of other will have similar experiences, stories


Would like to share my experiences, sadly I do not have enough life left to write them all down !!!!!!


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## RoystonB (Jan 18, 2012)

"How do you make a small fortune in Portugal ....................................Start with a large one" 

*Good one*. 

Never been a business man, and not knowing the first thing about business matters, especially in Portugal, but I have noticed that many many many items that sell quickly here, very rarely get restocked. 

Now, if I know that I want a certain number of items, I buy that many items, not buy some today and get the rest next week. Especially DIY, Electrical, Food. Once sold never to be replaced. 

Surely, if it sells well, get more and sell them and make a profit. Having said that, if it sells quickly, then you have to pay someone to restock the shelves…….. less profit.

RB


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