I am a traveling American who speaks only English and a little bit of Spanish. Andres has pretty understandable English when I spoke to him. He even gave me advice on where to go when I arrived. His instructions were very easy to understand. My stay in Portugal was superb and so was my stay at his lux apartment .
I did take a bus that took me into the city of Lisbon directly and was only a couple of euros. I also strolled about 10 minutes from the expo area where Andres lives to the oceanarium which was only 18 euros to get in .