Originally posted by: ricarleite
European Portuguese (which is basically, well, from Portugal) have some differences on how words are spelled, the way some verbs are conjugated (not gramatically, but the use of those verbs), and a very distinct vocabulary. The accent is so much different that sometimes it gets hard to understand what a portuguese is saying. Brazillian portuguese is spoken in a more clear, well pronounced manner, while in portugal sometimes vowels have different sounds ("a" sounds like "oo" and "e" sounds like "ah" in parabéns - congratulations) parts of a word are not pronounced at all.
Portuguese and Spanish have the same origin. On one way we have spanish, and the other we have a second language that derived in two: galician and portuguese (which are very similar).
I've been around Portuguese quite a bit. The town I live in is about 40% Portuguese, and the Godfather of my daughter is Portuguese and we were good friends for quite some time; I have an ear for languages (was very conversant in French after 1 semester in College, never took another language before that) and I STILL have great difficulty with it. Another friend, who is Cuban, also has no clue with it. He frequently said that Portuguese sounds to him like the people are very nasal, like they're trying to speak through their nose when he hears it. I just find it a fascinating language in general.