Grand Café opens
The new “Grand Café” opened its doors yesterday on the seafront in the centre of Funchal, in the former TAP offices on the Avenida do Mar (below). The “Grand Café Penha d ‘Águia” deliberately lends its name from similarity-named establishments around the world – but wasn’t the Golden Gate previously known as “Grand Café”? The business, which employs 30 people, has a restaurant, café, cocktail bar, wine cellar, and ice cream shop with handmade Italian ice cream.
President of the Regional Government, Miguel Albuquerque, attended the inauguration, and congratulated Dénio Fernandes and his family on the venture. Presumably the establishment has something to do with the other successful Penha d ‘Águia cafes already operating in the centre of Funchal and Ajuda?
Carnival
Having checked a number of websites it doesn’t look like Carnival will be spoilt by rain, although most forecasts agree there will be some cloud.
Unusually detailed article on the Diario website detailing the resources required to clean up after the two main Carnival events:
Today, Saturday , from 8.00pm to 3.00am, will be of service 70 workers and 17 vehicles operating to tidy the streets after the main “Allegorical” parade, whilst on Tuesday from 3.00pm to 10.00pm, there will be 76 workers and 16 vehicles on duty after the “Trapalhão” (slapstick) parade.
The full program for Carnival is available as a PDF here: PROGRAM
I don’t know where you got the translation ‘slapstick’ from, because I have just looked it up being unfamiliar with the word, and it refers to a kind of extreme comedy. it has nothing to do with the portuguese word ‘trapalhão’, which in this case simply means disorganised or even better unorganised.
The word “slapstick” has been in use in connection with the “Trapalhão” parade for a number of years to my knowledge – indeed it is used on the official Visit Madeira website:
http://www.visitmadeira.pt/en-gb/what-to-do/events/search/carnival