I'greja.... mentaga....limau.... sabun????

The Portuguese came to Malacca back in... errrr (can't remember the date but it was a long long time ago) and so I went to Portuga, last week end. That's only fair.

The firm organised the handover meeting for the project which has been keeping me awake for the last 4 months in Lisbon. So I got Tina and Sook to join me in Lisbon last week end.

The weather in Lisbon was a nice warm 16 degrees Celsius. I had forgotten how warm that was - given that I've been freezing my not so tiny tush off in London. It was so nice to walk around and not have a million layers on.

Sook suggested that we try to find some similar words in Malay (since the Portuguese had some influence on our national language) and so a word hunting we went.

I first spotted I'greja when we visited the Castle George on the hill and yes - that was the root for geraja (meaning church).

Then Tina found limau on a menu (meaning lime) and then she was really on a roll. She subsequently spotted mentaga (which was butter) and sabun (which is soap).

Poor Sook - was trying desperately to sell us that perigi (meaning well) also had a Portugese origin. Unfortunately, she was unable to corroborate this.

So we came away with 4 words - not bad I must say.