Technical article
A Full Week: What Older Residents of Portugal, Greece, Malta and Bulgaria Do With Their Days
Almost three in ten older residents (28.9%) report no get-together with friends in the past year.
Picture a couple named Dana and Paul. Both are 66. They have the money side worked out and they like the sun. What they cannot picture is a Wednesday. Who do they see? What fills the afternoon?
No government counts "small pleasures." Eurostat, the statistics office of the European Union, does count how often people aged 65 and over get together with family and friends, and how many give time to volunteering. I read those tables on 10 October 2026. The figures are from 2022 and cover everyone aged 65 and over who lives in each country, not only retirees from abroad. So they describe the world a newcomer would step into. They say nothing about what newcomers do.
How often older residents see family and friends
Share of people aged 65 and over (Eurostat, 2022).
| Family: every day | Family: every week | Friends: every day | Friends: every week | Friends: not once in 12 months | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Portugal | 30.4% | 39.8% | 26.4% | 31.9% | 10.3% |
| Greece | 26.9% | 33.1% | 22.0% | 35.7% | 3.7% |
| Bulgaria | 29.3% | 26.5% | 19.8% | 33.9% | 2.8% |
| Malta | 21.1% | 38.7% | 9.0% | 23.3% | 28.9% |
My arithmetic, adding "every day" and "every week":
- Seeing friends at least weekly: Portugal 58.3%, Greece 57.7%, Bulgaria 53.7%, Malta 32.3%.
- Seeing family at least weekly: Portugal 70.2%, Greece 60.0%, Bulgaria 55.8%, Malta 59.8%.
The Maltese number for friends stands out. Almost three in ten older residents (28.9%) report no get-together with friends in the past year. In the other three countries that share is between 2.8% and 10.3%. The page does not say why. It could be a matter of how the question was understood, or of household and island life. I would not draw a conclusion from one table.
Who gives time to others
Share of people aged 65 and over (Eurostat, 2022).
| Formal volunteering | Informal volunteering | Active citizenship | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Malta | 8.4% | 7.6% | 9.6% |
| Greece | 6.0% | 3.7% | 2.8% |
| Portugal | 4.1% | 9.3% | 4.9% |
| Bulgaria | 1.9% | 1.6% | 1.1% |
"Formal" means through a group or organisation. "Informal" means helping people outside your household, on your own. "Active citizenship" is Eurostat's name for things like taking part in a local campaign or a meeting. The Greek row was read again on 11 October 2026 from Eurostat's data service with each value labelled (formal 6.0%, informal 3.7%, active citizenship 2.8%).
Malta has the most volunteers and the fewest friend visits. Portugal has many people helping informally. Bulgaria has the lowest numbers on all three lines. Again, these are people who have lived there all their lives. A newcomer who does not yet speak the language or know the neighbours starts from zero in every one of these columns.
A day in hours: the one country where Eurostat has the age line
Eurostat's time-use table (dataset tus_00age, with values for 2000 and 2010) holds an age line for people 65 and over only for Greece, 2010. Bulgaria, Malta and Portugal have no value on that line. The Greek figures are hours and minutes in an average day, for everyone aged 65 and over, so they include people who did nothing on a given activity.
| Activity | Average time in a day | Share who did it that day |
|---|---|---|
| Sleep | 9 h 28 min | 100% |
| Television and video | 3 h 35 min | 97.4% |
| Preparing food (not washing dishes) | 0 h 59 min | 67.6% |
| Visiting and feasts | 0 h 38 min | 44.2% |
| Other social life | 0 h 35 min | 52.5% |
| Shopping and services | 0 h 23 min | 41.1% |
| Gardening and pet care | 0 h 19 min | 20.4% |
| Walking and hiking | 0 h 15 min | 17.0% |
| Hobbies and games (not computing) | 0 h 13 min | 13.7% |
| Reading books | 0 h 09 min | 9.6% |
Television fills more of the average day than all the visiting, walking and hobbies together. Two in five older Greeks did not go shopping on a given day, and fewer than one in five walked.
What is left open
- Hours per day for Bulgaria, Malta and Portugal are not in Eurostat's age line. The national statistics offices may hold them. They are not among the sources here.
- What retirees from abroad do. The official tables do not split by country of birth.
You could…
- Write down your own week today: how many days you see friends, how many you see family, and what you give time to.
- Ask yourself which of those you would want to carry over, and which you would want to start fresh.
- Spend a few weeks in one place in the quiet season and count how many days you spoke to someone you knew.
What would a full week look like for you after the first year?
Figures are estimates for planning, based on public data. Date read: 10 and 11 October 2026.
Sources
- Eurostat, "Persons getting together with family (relatives) or friends by sex, age, educational attainment and frequency" (ilc_scp09), and "Persons participating in formal/informal voluntary activities or active citizenship" (ilc_scp19), 2022
- (database pages read through the Eurostat dissemination service, ec.europa.eu/eurostat/api/dissemination). Eurostat, Time spent, participation time and participation rate in the main activity by sex and age group (tus_00age), read 11 October 2026
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