Category: English

Posted in English

More About iTalki and Lingq

Posted on by Colin Lusk

iTalki‘s comments section continues to be an absolute storm of protest about various changes they’ve made to messaging and to instant tutoring. It’s an object lesson in how not to implement change. They have at least restored the community features I was lamenting in a post a few days ago, so that’s something. In the meantime, I have been using Lingq quite a lot. Its text correction page doesn’t allow as many words but in a way that’s probably not a bad thing. I always find I write too much and then people can’t be bothered reading it all. It also has a slightly annoying feature (I think it’s something to do with unicode…?) that predictive text doesn’t work properly if I use it on the phone in a browser. If I write “nao” for example, instead of letting me click to correct it adds the correction onto the end like this “naonão”. Irritating.

The rest of the site is good for vocabulary: essentially, they have lessons in the form of podcasts and news articles. The difficult words are highlighted and you can add these – very quickly and easily – to your vocabulary list and then revise them. It’s pretty clever as a rough-and-ready way of generating lists of words you don’t know without having to do what I do now, which is note them in evernote and then transfer them to Memrise when I get a free hour. It’s not actually as good as Memrise, but it seems handy as an added extra. I’ll definitely keep using Lingq, but how far it replaces iTalki for writing practice and Memrise for vocabulary remains to be seen.

Posted in English

The Corrections

Posted on by Colin Lusk

OK, let’s have a look at that homework from the other day about reflexive and non-reflexive uses of verbs and see how badly wrong it all was. Underlinings and crossings out are correctios, red text is just highlighting the bit I was trying to get right

1a) Sabe que é preciso pagar para se ser português? [just missing a preposition]
1b) Quer tenha cidadania quer não, não é possível ser um português verdadeiro se não foi criado lá.
2a) O Cristianismo* incentiva os seus seguidores a se serem mais honestos. [missing a preposition but doesn’t need the “se”]
2b) O Cristianismo* ajuda os seus aderentes a serem pessoas melhores.
*=I wrote “cristandade” but although that exists I think it’s more like “Chistendom” than “Christianity”
3a) A frase que se segue é mais um exemplo [this is right but the “se” is passive voice rather than reflexive]
3b) Esta frase segue a frase passada.
4a) Se ganhar o Euromillions, ficar-me-ei feliz? [I seem to have had some sort of senior moment here and chosen completely the wrong verb, but the reflexive aspect is legit (but optional) to give emphasis to the verb]
4b) Se mudar o meu modo de vida serei uma pessoa mais feliz?
5a) Fiquei desiludido com o iTalki e por isso tornei-me membro do Lingq
5b) Fiquei desiludido com o chuveiro e por isso abri o torneira para tomar banho. [another bad verb but more understandable. Portuguese people open (abrir) and close (fechar) their taps, they don’t turn them. I should also confess that when I originally wrote it, I almost put “tornozelo” instead of “torneira”. Confusing: “I was disappointed with the shower so I turned the ankle”]
6a) Ri-me muitas vezes enquanto li este livro
6b) Riu-se quando pensou na sua primeira tentativa a falar português.

So, not very good, really. I think the explanation I gave and wrote into the last version of “Oh Se Can You See” wasn’t quite right.

Rir is basically an intransitive, pronomial verb according to Priberam, so although it’s often seen in the wild without its pronoun, formally (and in the exam) it’s best to use it with the pronoun, much like “lembrar”

The se in “se ser” in 1a and 4a or in expressions like “ir-se embora” is used when you want to stress the verb but isn’t strictly necessary in either case.

Clearly still some work on prepositions needed. I’m going to do some more work on that later. Obviously the thing I need to stop doing is translating english phrases literally, using the same prepositions I’d use in english.

Posted in English

Oh Se Can You See (Version 3)

Posted on by Colin Lusk

This is an updated version of my brainstorm about the four intractable problems (“4 evil exes”) I identified before my first B2 exam, trying to wrestle with the subject by putting it into a post, because explaining something to someone else is usually a pretty good way of learning it yourself. Since I wrote the first version, and then my second my understanding as developed a bit so I thought I’d update this to solidify that knowledge.

Quite often in Portuguese, the word “Se” crops up in unexpected places, hanging around verbs, and it isn’t always clear what it’s doing there. Here is a breakdown of its possible uses,

As a word meaning “If”

This is the odd one out, really, and the easiest one to spot. In this case, the word happens to be hanging around the sentence and maybe the verb will have to change as a result but in this case it’s not really strongly interacting with the verb, so you can just translate it in your had as “if” and move on. If you’re at B2 level and don’t already know about the subjunctive imperfect, go and have a read. Otherwise, forget it.

Não sei se na vossa casa sobrou muito chocolate dos ovos de Páscoa?

As a reflexive pronoun

Se is one of the pronouns used in the construction of reflexive verbs. Reflexive verbs. Reflexive verbs are just verbs in which the subject and the object can be the same thing. For example, “I can dress myself”. I am the one who is doing the dressing, and I am the one being dressed, so it’s a reflexive verb. In Portuguese and other romance languages, reflexive verbs seem a bit counter-intuitive.Sometimes they are used in situations you wouldn’t expect and sometimes they mean “each other” instead of “oneself”.

Of course, it’s not always “se”. The complete set of pronouns looks like this:

  • me
  • te
  • se
  • nos
  • vos
  • se

Here are some examples of reflexive verbs:

 Standard Meaning Reflexive Meaning
 lembrar to remind lembrar-se to remember
amar to love amar-se to love one another
 apaixonar to fall in love apaixonar-se to fall in love with each other
 deitar to lay (something) down deitar-se to lie down
 levantar to lift levantar-se to get up
 beijar to kiss beijar-se to snog each other
 banhar to bathe (someone) banhar-se to have a bath
 chamar to call (someone) chamar-se to be called/named
 lavar to wash something lavar-se to have a wash
 sentar* to put someone in a sitting position? sentar-se to sit down
 sentir  to sense something  sentir-se to be conscious of something
 voltar  to turn, return, re-do  voltar-se to turn around
 servir to serve servir-se to help oneself to
 vestir to dress someone vestir-se to get dressed
 ** suicidar-se to kill oneself
 cortar cut cortar-se to cut oneself
 achar to find achar-se to find oneself

*sentar apparently exists but it’s not used often

**When I first wrote this article I confidently said that “suicidar” couldn’t exist in a non-reflexive form since you can’t suicide someone else. However, you’ll occasionally come acorss this sort of thing:

https://twitter.com/OhFazFavor/status/774212893189496832?s=09

which my teacher tells me is just crap grammar.

And here are a few that need pronouns with them (to call back to this post)

Infinitive Meaning
aproveitar-se de to take advantage of
convencer-se de to convince oneself about
lembrar-se de to remember about
esquecer-se de to forget about
queixar-se de to complain about
rir-se* de to laugh about
decidir-se a to decide
dedicar-se a to dedicate oneself to
acostumar-se com to get familiar with
parecer-se com to resemble
surpreender-se com to be surprised by

*surprisingly, rir is supposed to be reflexive most of the time. You’re not laughing something, you’re just laughing. There’s nothing on the receiving end of the verb. People often use it non-reflexively but that’s an informal use.

As an impersonal pronoun

When discussing a generalised situation – like the english “one”

One shouldn’t drink too much

It’s not used very often these days because it’s usually felt to sound a bit pretentious, so people will usually use “you”

You shouldn’t drink too much

which of course sounds as if the speaker is admonishing their listener directly to lay off the booze. This is a bit of a loss to the english language, because being able to speak in general terms is useful and avoids a lot of misunderstandings.

The Portuguese haven’t made this mistake and use “se” as an impersonal pronoun, which makes more sense, I think.

Here’s an example that really threw me because it was used with the verb “ser”

Há uma frase inglesa que está sempre presente: “I had to smile“. Significa que se foi obrigado a sorrir

Se foi means “one was”. Some person was obliged to smile.

Similarly

Sabia que é preciso pagar se ser santo?

I was confused because it looks lihe “Saint” is a noun and it’s the object of the verb so it shouldn’t need the se, but santo is more like a condition – an adjective. “Did you know that you need to pay to be [holy]” not “Did you know that you need to pay to be [a saint]” There isn’t really a thing or an object on the receiving end of the verb.

Ou lá o que se faz no Facebook

Or whatever happens on facebook.

Here’s a nice example that’s a lot harder to translate but pretty.

O êxito do celebre poema de Florbela Espanca deve-se a maneira como trata o verbo amar como intransitivo. Ama-se como chove. Perguntar: “Mas amar quem?” é como perguntar: “Chove quem?”

autorid01231OK, I said it would be hard to translate but I’ll have a go. Amar is normally a transitive verb (X loves Y.) but here Miguel Esteves Cardoso praises  Florbela Espanca for the way she uses it intransitively (X loves.) and he uses “se” to talk about how people in general love.

The success of the well-known poem of Florbela Espanca is owed to the way in which she treats the verb “to love” as an intransitive. One loves like it rains. To ask “but love who” is like asking “rain who?”

Um… well, I hope I’m not too far off the mark there. Incidentally, I think this is the poem he means.

Notice that he also uses “deve-se”, and that brings me onto the next type of se:

As part of a sentence in the passive voice

Passive voice is when you use a phrase like “it was done”, “mistakes were made”, “a murder was committed” instead of the more direct “He did it”, “We made a mistake” or “Someone committed murder”. I quite like this form of words and use it in writing but some people find it vague and evasive, and for that very reason it’s popular in political speech and PR briefings.

O êxito do […] poema […] deve-se… means “The poem’s success is owed…” [or “is due to”]

“O livro publicou-se” means “the book was published”

Em Portugal bebe-se muito café (A lot of coffee is drunk in Portugal)

or

Fala-se Inglês (English is spoken here)

and in the negative…

Não se fala Espanhol no Brasil

But which one is it?

Now, it’s not always clear whether a phrase like

Em Portugal bebe-se muito café

should be translated as “a lot of coffee is drunk” (passive voice) or “one drinks a lot of coffee” (imperonal pronoun) but, really, is there a lot difference? I think in the more ambiguous cases, it’s best not to worry about translating and just read it as it is, and not think of it as directly equivalent to either english form. The upshot of both sentences is that an awful lot of coffee drinking goes on in Portugal. This is a good way of training yourself not to automatically translate everything into english but instead just try and absorb the meaning from the portuguese words.

Posted in English

Exam Prep

Posted on by Colin Lusk

I’ve got a new exam (or rather the same flippin’ exam I failed last time, dammit!) at the back end of May. I’m making a list of things I want to do between now and then

Speaking Goals

  • Build Confidence: I need to speak clearly and confidently even when I get to a bit I’m not sure about. If I don’t know the word, just guess and keep on going rather than fretting and looking confused.
  • Conversely, don’t be cocky: talk at a sensible speed to give myself time to think, and don’t go off at a tangent that seems interesting if I’m not sure where I’m going with it. Obviously this is in conflict with the point above.
  • Speak portuguese for at least 5 minutes every day between now and the exam.

Listening Goals

  • Listen to videos of people speaking in a range of accents from Alentejo, the rural centre of the country. and the islands (hence that Açoriano video I just posted).
  • Listen to at least 3 video films with subtitles.
  • Get to grips with the Raul Solnado “Guerra de 1908” sketch

Cultural Goals

  • Read at the very least:
      • A Língua Portuguesa (Fernando Pessoa)
      • Mensagem (Fernando Pessoa)
      • Brevíssima História de Portugal (A.H. De Oliveira Marques)
      • Maybe even A construção da democracia em Portugal (Kenneth Maxwell) although that seems a bit ambitious.
  • Make a timeline of portuguese history to get a sense of how it hangs together
  • Write about portuguese landmarks – the Padrão dos Descubrimentos, Torre de Belém, Mosteiro dos Jerónimos and so on.

General Language skills

  • I need to build my vocabulary – Memrise and Lingq daily goals
  • I’m getting better at the ver/vir (which was one of the 4 Evil Exes I identified a year or so back) but need to step up my game on some of the other weirder irregulars like Por and Dar
  • Finish the exercise book I’m on now
  • Do a couple of mock exams to get a feel for the speed I need to be working at to get in under the time limit
  • Practice writing legibly. I type so much these days I need to get my hand used to forming letters or I’ll be penalised for spelling errors.
  • Letter format and forms of address
  • Learn – actually learn verbatim – one song
Posted in English

Bad Sites I Have Known

Posted on by Colin Lusk

While I’m on the subject of silly moves by language sites, can I just rant about the official site run by the Portuguese government? It has a lot of exercises which might be quite useful. So… what’s the problem? You have to do them in order. I had a look at the first A1 exercise and that looks fine for a beginner, but all the A2, B1 and B2 exercises are locked and I can’t access them till I’ve worked through a complete course aimed at total novices, through the pre-intermediate levels to reach the level I’m at now.

And so, a useful site is rendered worthless for a big chunk of its potential punters.

 

Posted in English

Farewell iTalki, Hello…. Lingq?

Posted on by Colin Lusk

I’m a bit sad to see what’s happening on iTalki. They’re on the cusp of launching a new version of their site and they’ve released a post explaining it to end users. It’s pretty daft: they’re rationalising a lot of their service and binning some of the peripheral stuff like instant tutoring (which I’ve used in emergencies a couple of times but apparently is some people’s bread and butter), and they wanted to bin 45 minute lessons but did a U-turn on that one at least.

The maddest thing, though, is not really mentioned in the post itself, just the comments: There’s no community tab on the beta site. In other words, all the free sandpit area where users coudl ask questions and practice writing is going. This probably makes sense in a short-term way: why should they want to supply free services when they can concentrate on the paid content? But it seems like a terrible idea to me. The free section is the glue that holds the site together: a lot of people start there for a while, take their first baby steps, have some language exchanges, meet teachers who are good at making text correctrions, and generally build trust and loyalty to the site so that when they get comfortable enough to take the plunge with a paid lesson they see iTalki as the obvious choice. That’s all going to go now and it just seems crazy.

I first heard about this through a former teacher of mine who was of the opinion that “vai acabar tudo”. She mainly cultivates students by talking to them in their notebook comments after correcting their work; in fact, that’s how I met her. We had a good, long chat about how mad it was.

Well, a while ago, I heard from another user about another site called Lingq which I’ve been meaning to get into for a while and this seems like an opportune moment. It seems pretty good and has a lot of the things a decent language community needs: A writing exchange like the one iTalki is binning, online tutors, lessons (like Memrise, which is another site I use a lot) and various other bells and whistles. It is also prettier than iTalki and has a better app. On the negative side, it’s not the easiest thing to use: I can’t get it to just show me the Portuguese lessons. In fact, it’s mainly showing me english lessons even though I’ve told it I’m a native speaker. I tried to watch the power user webinar to find out how to filter out the irrelevant bits but it was so boring and faffy that I decided I’d rather use trial and error, but basically, I think it’s looking like a strong contender to be my new language home.

The main thing it lacks, of course, is the very thing iTalki has that I actually pay for: native Portuguese teachers from this side of the pond. But that’ll change soon enough if iTalki insist on pruning their site back to nothing. Give it a couple of months and the tutors will start showing up.

 

Posted in English

Two New Expressões

Posted on by Colin Lusk

Agradar a gregos e troianos – “please the greeks and the trojans”. Obviously means find a solution that pleases everyone

A vida é uma corda bamba – “life is a tightrope”. Pretty obvious really.

Posted in English

Portrait of the Artist as a Young Homem

Posted on by Colin Lusk

At work the other day, in an effort to make my tasks stand out better in the planning software, I decided to swap my default icon from the orange disc with LC on it to a picture. Usually I use a small picture of someone waving the Bandeira portuguesa* but I couldn’t find it so I opted for this instead.

Fernando Pessoa

So far, so whatever, but the next day when I was arriving at work, my email pinged and when I looked at the company email app, there was the six-year-old Fernando Pessoa looking at me, from the corner of the screen. As it turns out, the software is part of office suite and they’re all linked together, so the picture had become my official photograph on the intranet. I got rid of it later that day but a few people were curious as to what had happened.

I sort of miss it actually. It was the only black and white icon there which made it really easy to spot. One of those times when professionalism and efficiency are in opposition.

*I suppose I should really say “The Flag of the Portuguese Republic” since there are still monarchists who insist that the old royalist flag, a blue cross on a white background, is the real Portuguese flag.

Ouça 9. The Flag de HISTÓRIAS DE PORTUGAL de Saudade e Outras Coisas #np na #SoundCloud

Ouça 9. A Bandeira de HISTÓRIAS DE PORTUGAL de Saudade e Outras Coisas #np na #SoundCloud

Posted in English

Latest Musical Obsession

Posted on by Colin Lusk

I’ve got obsessed with this song by Márcia (she’s the one in the video I posted a couple of weeks back). I don’t like this one as much, but it has a hidden secret: it has a Spanish pronoun (“Usted”) in it for no reason I can fathom. It isn’t needed for a rhyme, and no other Spanish words appear in it. She uses a more conventional “você” in a different verse. It’s well random. It’s as if an anglophone singer just decided to say… Oh I don’t know – “Though I put you on a pedastal, they put vous on the pill”

Anyway I made a translation (not a good one, I think) to try and get to grips with it to understand why, but I’m none the wiser.

Posted in English

Applying for Dual Portuguese Citizenship

Posted on by Colin Lusk

Updated 12/3/19 in light of what I learned in Porto

15/01/2022 – there is a sequel to this post that is worth reading since it has some important updates about payment methods.

Well, it looks like some people voted for a national act of self-harm and those of us whose families straddle more than one country need to think about planning for the future. In our case, we’re doing that by applying for dual citizenship (me, daughter, both currently british) and leave to remain (Mrs L, Portuguese) to ensure we’re all in the same boat and can act together in future if some future government decides to make life properly difficult for EU citizens or punish them financially or it becomes difficult to live and work in the countries we used to be able to move around in freely, all thanks to the actions of a bunch of divs who didn’t do the homework before getting into the voting booth.

I thought I’d write down the steps here in case it’s helpful. I’m going to focus on UK citizens living in the UK. If you’re an expat, you’re pretty well covered by other sites like this and of course if you’re Portuguese in the UK there’s a lot of info here.

The obvious point first of all is that it’s almost certainly going to be easier while we’re still in the EU than it would be after we leave and britain is towed across the ocean to be moored off Mar-a-Lago or whatever these idiots have in store for us. In other words, if you’re reading this, you’d better get your skates on.

Basic Approaches

Have a think about how you are going to submit your applications because that will determine some of the later choices you make. Options are:

  1. Go to the consulate in London. If at all possible, avoid this option.
  2. By mail. This is obviously a bit slower and you’ll have to figure out the logistics of how to get your documents validated unless you are mad enough to post the originals, which I don’t recommend, but if you can suss that out, this might be the least hassle option.
  3. Visit Portugal itself. Obviously this is the most fun option because you’ll be in Portugal, and the offices shut 3 hours before the bookshops and about 7 hours before the restaurants so you’ll have plenty of time to unwind.
    Several towns have offices where you can register. I think the smaller the town, the less time it takes because Lisbon and Porto are already swamped with Brazilians, Venezuelans and Brits. Presumably Faro has a massive backlog of “expats” too. Book a few days away. Maybe one for any preliminaries (say, get a NIF, meet with a Translator if you have any documents being translated) and leave two days for the process itself in case you have any problems with that and need to follow up.

Length of marriage

You need to have been married for 3 years to use the marriage route so if you’re not already hitched, tough (but there are other routes you can use – see below). If you got married in the UK, make sure the marriage is registered at the Portuguese consulate too. You will probably have done this if your other half updated their citizen card with a new surname. It’s slow and awful because it involves the consulate. They require all the same documents as described in this blog post, plus you’ll have to use their bloody awful online appointment booking, both turn up in person, and deal with various indignities.

Payment

The cost for an adult is €250. When you go to download the forms (“modelos”), there’s a big warning up front. Translation:

IMPORTANT WARNING

Applications that are not accompanied by the required payment will be rejected outright with all the documents. If payment is made by cheque, it must be a certified cheque or bank cheque issued in Euros from a company with representation in Portugal to the order of “IRN, IP” [this just means the Institute itself] issued on portuguese banks.

This seems a bit repetitive but basically, get thee to a bank that has branches in Portugal (Santander for example), open a bank account if you haven’t already got one, and ask for a banker’s cheque/banker’s draft.

There are two other alternatives. One is to get a “Vale Postal” (postal order) which you can buy at a post office (CTT) in Portugal. Again, make sure it’s made out to IRN, IP and has the correct address. The Vale Postal route is relatively straightforward if you have all the bits you need – the details of the payee (on the form itself) and the recipient, but on the downside, you have to do it in Portugal 3 working days before you submit to give it time to reach them. This is because a Vale Postal doesn’t work in quite the same way as a UK postal order. They mail the slip to the recipient and you need to note the reference number (and keep the receipt) as proof, and then wait for the order to show up at their office.

You’ll also need a “contribuente” (also known as Número de Identificação Fiscal – Or NIF) if you have one. If you don’t have one, you can pop down to the Serviço de Finanças and get one. It takes 20 minutes and costs €10. And if all else fails, just use your UK Unique Taxpayer Reference instead which seems to work.

The final option, if neither of the above is suitable, is the simplest of all, but you can only do it if you go to the office in person: bring cash.

The Modelos

The main hub for the different “modelos” (forms) is on the site of the Instituto dos Registos e Notariado.

Choose the one that best fits your situation. In my case, they were these:

Templates and forms regarding nationality

Model 1C
For children of a portuguese mother or father born abroad that registers their birth in the portuguese civil register or declares that they want to be portuguese.

Model 3
For a foreigner married for more than 3 years with a portuguese national or who lives in a de facto union for more than 3 years.

You need to print the first two pages double-sided and the third and fourth pages are just guidance. Fill it in in black, in Portuguese (Duh!) and using crosses, not ticks in the boxes. I’m not going to translate the whole thing I’m afraid. You can use GTranslate can’t you? Most of it is pretty straightforward, but there are a few weird ones:

  • Quadro 1, Questão 6 includes “Naturalidade”, “País” and “Nationalidade”, which seem to be asking the same thing, but I chose to interpret them as Place of birth (Scotland, in my case), Country (Stretching a point: the UK), Nationality (British)
  • Quadro 1, Questao 8 asks for countries you have lived in previously. You will need to provide criminal records checks from all these countries, so don’t even mention any you lived in as a child or if you weren’t there long enough to be registered and leave a paper trail.
  • Quadro 2, Questão 3 is a bit enigmatic “Do you have an effective link to the portuguese community”. This is exceptionally sketchily described in the form guidance as it stands and I have heard various theories, “new rules” and suggestions but what it seems to boil down to is this: for expats, resident in Portugal, married for 5+ years, there’s no language requirement if you can show something like a deed to a house, a contract with an employer or some other evidence of being a fully fledged citizen, to show you are integrated into society. If you’re non-resident, about the only proof of integration you can produce is a certificate of proficiency in the language, so effectively for us there is a language requirement. I quite like this: you can demonstrate you are integrated into the language and cultural life of the nation rather than the legal and economic life.
  • Quadro 2, Questão 3 again. A bit further down it asks if you’ve performed functions for the state that were not predominantly technical in character. I had to ask my wife about this one as I couldn’t see what it was driving at. I think we decided it meant performing the offices of an MP, say, or a civil servant. The suite of questions seems to be trying to establish if you have any competing duties that might mean you retain an allegiance to the former state, I guess, hence the questions about being in the armed forces, being a terrorist and so on.
  • Quadro 4 needs to have the answers copied from your other half’s birth certificate, and even then, if it’s anything like my wife’s it’ll still be baffling. I just handed it to her and asked her to do the necessary.
  • Quadro 6 needs to be signed and witnessed by someone. Since I was planning to visit, I left this blank to sign in front of the person I handed it to, but you can also do it in front of a consulate employee or a Portuguese solicitor if you are mailing it in.

Documentation

Some of this isn’t really spelled out because portuguese bureaucracy can be a bit hatstand sometimes, so it’s best to go the extra mile and do more than it requests rather than less

  • As I said above, a certificate of proficiency in Portuguese shouldn’t be needed if you have been married 5 or more years but if you are non-resident it’s likely to be your only proof of an effective link to Portuguese community.
  • You need a recent police check certificate in the UK and any other country you have lived in as an adult. The UK police certificate costs, and requires quite a bit of paperwork in its own right.
  • All the other documents it asks for – birth certificates, passports and so on – need to be translated, and officially, not just by you. As it turns out, it wasn’t necessary for my process because the chap said if it was written in English it didn’t need a translation. TBH, I’d suggest you’d better do it anyway since that’s what it says in the instructions and it seems to vary from one person to the next, how rigorously the rules are followed, but it’s up to you. You could save a couple of hundred quid if you skip this step and get away with it, but you might prefer to play it safe. I know of at least one other person who couldn’t get through the process because they didn’t have certified translations of all their papers. They’re also sometimes a bit funny about the certificates being recently issued (especially at the Consulate), so even if you have your original certificate, you should write to your registry office and get a reissued copy too and bring it along. If you’re not sure how to get a new certificate, Google the name of the local authority you were born/married/whatever in and “replacement certificate”.
  • If you do decide to get then translated, it’s quite a complicated process (but don’t worry, with the right help you can get through it)
    • Firstly, the translator can do the translation based on a photocopy, and that’s probably the first place to start since you can do it by email.
    • However, to get it certified, you need to give them either your original documents or a copy that has been authenticated by a solicitor or notary.
    • When they have that, they can attach the translation to the original or verified copy and take them all to a solicitor at their end who can certify the translation as well
  • Now, I didn’t trust the mail with my documents but also feared that if I got them certified in the UK the portuguese authorities might not recognise their authoritah, so what to do? Well, I sent my documents to a couple of translators in Portugal and got the quote I was happiest with (CS Traduções) and sent the documents by email attachment. She then took care of everything basically, and I arranged to pick them up the day before I had planned to submit the application. It was all completely hassle free and she was very patient with all my questions.
  • I already mentioned that if you were married in the UK you need to get your marriage registered in Portugal, so the proof of that is probably enough on its own but I took a translation of my UK marriage cert too, just to be on the safe side.
  • For children, both parents need to sign and both signatures witnessed.
  • For children, birth certificates should be recognised in all EU countries but since the UK might have left before the form gets processed it might be a precaution to get it stamped by the Portuguese consulate in the country of birth. This isn’t written down, just the opinion of one official I spoke to, so take that as you will.
  • As stated above, you’ll need your cheque, Vale Postal receipt, or cash if you’re an adult, but it is free for minors.

The Visit

If you’re visiting the consulate, you’re probably doomed and will have been driven to insanity within a few weeks. I pity you. If you’re visiting Portugal, the addresses of the offices are in the last page of the guidance on the Modelo. Since it says “Balcões da Nacionalidade instalados nas seguintes Conservatórias do Registo Civil” and doesn’t give any addresses for the offices in smaller towns outside Lisbon, I went to the wrong place at first. This seems to be the place in Porto, anyway:

SEF Porto

Av. da França 316, 4050-276 Porto, Portugal
+351 22 207 3810
https://maps.app.goo.gl/fL7zP

It’s a kind of one-stop citizen shop and there are several different services in the same office, so ask at the desk if you can’t find the right option on the machine that dispenses tickets (the tickets are known as “senhas” not “bilhetes”) . Ask for Conservatória and you should end up with a senha with a number that starts with a Q.

Make sure you arrive between 8AM and 8.30AM or you’ve no chance.

Obviously don’t be rude or anything, but do be prepared to be assertive. My wife gave me some samples of indignant customer dialogue to use in case of intransigence but I was quite glad I didn’t need to use them. Apparently the tone to go for is polite but with a menacing air of superiority.

Minha senhora /meu senhor. é preciso ser razoável e justo.
Ora eu já cá estive na sexta e nada foi resolvido ou esclarecido. Isto não pode ser.

Veja lá por favor o que pode fazer porque sinceramente eu estou a ficar desorientado e preciso clarificação

The process can’t even be started without payment. If anything else is missing, you’ll get a case number and can submit the missing docs by post, but the one thing you can’t forget is the money. Owing to the large number of applicants expect to hear back after a year – or 18 months for children. We’ll have left by then but hopefully they won’t have started stoning remainers to death in the public square yet, so we should be OK, I think.

Well, that’s the sum of all my knowledge. I hope it’s some help to someone. Good luck.

I’d like to thank my friends Barbie (who gave me a lot of advice on her own family’s involvement in this process) and Marcos (who by amazing luck happened to be very close by the SEF on Friday and actually came to help out with communication, which was incredibly generous of him)