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While it's obviously essential to learn Portuguese both as respect to the country that welcomes and to function, there are some services that can be accessed in English, which can help alot in the beginning.

One example for families who have recently arrived and want their children to access music classes, is English Piano Studio Lisbon (also in Coimbra)

I've found that in Lisbon it's almost always possible to find doctors and accountants who speak good English, but that is not always true in rural or smaller towns.

I live already 24 years in the Algarve, Now I speak portuguese, I've learned it  with  listening to  people for ex. at the market place and on the terraces, like that I speak a little bit, enough to go shopping or eating out in that time.
In this moment almost all the young people speak english because they learn it at school., but near the spanish border many older people speak french ,  the docters in the private hospitals speak minimum 2 languages, or some of them 3. There are also foreign docters, and dentisst so English, French, Spanish, German , Dutch.  Algarve is for me more flexible in languages then the Lisbon area.
But ofcourse its important that you learn portuguese, people apreciate that!

hi
   as I have experienced linguistic barrier is major problem for non-portuguese people or those who are not familiar with portuguese language.sometimes it makes me feel like some people intentionally do nt want to speak English though they can speak in english .

We have lived in Braga, Portugal for two months with another 3 weeks before in prior visits.  We speak basically no Portuguese yet, except for very basic introductory phrases, and have had no problem whatsoever in living here.  In the situations where you have to interact with someone and give them explicit directions, like getting a haircut, or mailing a package, we just write out a script in English, use Google Translate to convert it to Portuguese, print it out and take it with us.  Then in worse case scenarios, we use Google Translate on our mobile phone while there.  So far, everyone has been extremely helpful, and eventually we communicate.  Typically, anyone under the age of 30 can understand English, and halting speak it.  Stay near a touristy area, and someone will nearby will also speak English.  We are going to learn Portuguese, but you can survive just fine without it as long as you are in a decently sized city.  As to being in a rural area, we haven't experienced that yet.

I believe most of the portuguese citizens under 30/40 will speak a decent english if you are in urban areas. In rural areas, it will be more difficult, because they don't interact so much with foreigners.

I’m a regular visitor to various parts of The Algarve and whilst it is true to say, you cam be understood in English on the coast, that’s not always the case even a few miles inland.

I’m now learning Portugeuse with the help of a free app called Duolingo.

Even a geriatric old f**t like me can make progress! 

I was recently contacting Marinas about a berth for my yacht and the Capitanio’s office in Faro said in no uncertain terms, if I wished to speak with them, do it in Portuguese!   I have a lot of eastern European immigrants around where I live so I do sympathise with the office...

Fortunately, other marinas were more accommodating!

Hi

I’m not sure if you know that Duolingo is Brazilian Portuguese. I had started learning with it but someone alerted me to this and I researched further and found that this is the case! Perhaps the basics are the same!
Pimsleur is another app and it does European Portuguese.

Thank you Majella21,

I was aware but it was the only free app I could find.

Thank you for the heads up on Pimsleur, I’ll check it out! 

Kind regards

Tony M

I must confess, I haven't done much on it yet.

But plan to start soon!

Good luck with it!

Majella