Europe's sleepiest capital has a rude awakening in store. Expo '98, the last international exposition of this century, is being staged in Lisbon next year and 15 million visitors are expected - half of them from overseas.
A total of US$1.5 billion is being invested in the project poised to place Lisbon in the limelight for the first time in five centuries.
Attendance has been confirmed by 100 countries and it seems likely the Lisbon World Exposition will be the largest in history. It marks the 500th anniversary of Vasco da Gama's voyage around southern Africa to India - an era when Portugal was a seafaring nation with colonies stretching from South America to Macau.
Running from May 2 to September 30, the Expo '98 theme is dedicated to the nation's golden age of discoveries under the banner 'The Oceans: the Heritage of the Future'.
The ocean theme was also embraced because of global interest in the environment with the United Nations designating 1998 as International Year of the Oceans.
Lisbon's Expo site is particularly suited to the environmental theme because it is being developed in an area on the banks of the River Tagus in eastern Lisbon which was devastated to such an extent by industrial pollution that decontamination has been necessary.