Yesterday I swooned over a Cascais busker whose tiny dog collected change in a bucket while his Portuguese master played the accordion. Here’s a picture:
You see something like this one day and think, “What a precious slice-of-life!” You see the same thing the next day and you think, “I’m so over this. And P.S. – poor dog.”
Then I walked a block further and saw another accordion player with a nearly identical dog who also cooled his haunches on an upside-down shoebox. But this second dog had not been trained to collect euros in a plastic bucket in its mouth. Still, I thought, one of these busker dudes must have totally copied the other busker dude’s routine. Aren’t there vigilante street laws for that kind of thing? Can’t you get shot for stealing another dude’s accordion beat?
Then I remembered that I’m no longer in the United States. Maybe two cute dogs can coexist on the same urban block without someone getting shot. I walked by the rival buskers later and they were talking to each other like brothers while their tiny dogs played amicably at their feet.
Still, I’m disappointed I didn’t witness some kind of authentic Portuguese street fight, with the two dogs in the middle collecting blood and teeth in their kitschy plastic buckets. I am a tourist after all. I live for that kind of stuff.
OMG, these two serenaded us on our last day in Lisbon!! Seriously, I’m not kidding!
I’ll have to tell you about it when you come back.
That’s wild – I guess they’re moonlighting in Cascais these days. Those poor dogs need a vacation. Maybe I should take them back to the States with me.
Hi, I
Hi, I´m portuguese and I lived in Lisbon all my life and never seen none of this “Authentic Portuguese Street Fight”. Now I live in LA and I don´t see any violence either! I think someone have been a little brainwashed by a life of movies…