Last considerations on the Cape Verde trip ...

As I was handing out the last  letters the Cape Verdian children wrote to their "godparents" and some of the "delicacies" ("feijão pedra" typically used in the making of the traditional catchupa and "doce de leite" cakes) they kindly sent I wondered how many of the Portuguese "godparents" who got these did really grasp and understand the scope of the gestures on the part of these genuinely beautiful Cape Verdian villagers. 

I have recently written an article on the Calheta project which will soon be published in the enterprise magasine so as to sensitize those who haven't yet had the chance to go to Calheta and experience the overall atmosphere (not that everyone who has gone there did). 

Whether it is important to understand the local people we are trying to help or not may be irrelevant, so long as we continue helping them but I feel they deserve to be understood in their essence ...  and beauty ... 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Looking forward to ... or Dorset here I go ...

I can't deny I am really looking forward to getting to know a Southern UK region I have never been to but which looks like it could be rather interesting judging from the photos Mia has sent me recently ...

But most of all what I am really looking forward to is seeing her again ... and finding out in loco if she is as happy as she seems to be since she left three weeks ago ... and maybe get to know some of her working colleagues ... try out some of the cooking specialities ...

Four days may not be enough to get to know Dorset ... but they'll certainly be more than enough to hold my daughter in my arms again and whisper in her ear how much we have been missing her ... 

The latest film I have watched ...

The Lady in the van is a rather humorous film based on a true story of Alan Bennett's friendship with an eccentric homeless woman  (a former gifted pianist and novice nun) whom he  allowed to park her Bedford van in the drive way of his Camden Town temporarily (which ultimately turned into an expected fifteen year period). 

 

 

The role of this rather inconvenient  guest is played by Maggie Smith, whose interpretation is second to none with Alex Jennings in the role of Bennett being equally outstanding.

 

 

 

 

 

There were times throughout the film in which I didn't know whether to laugh or cry especially those in which people's pre-judgemental ideas in regards to people who temporarily find themselves out in the open surfaced, but as a whole the film is worth being seen, if for nothing else at least for the main characters' interpretations.

 

 

A temporary photo exhibition at the Belém Cultural Centre, Lisboa - The 10th of April 2016

I have been to a temporary black and white photo exhibition at CCB this morning, which I thoroughly enjoyed, despite the fact that there weren't but a few photos in display. said to be a sample of the author's photo archive of over 30,000 images pertaining to a collection named Walls of the World.


Burhan Dogançay is a well known Turkish photographer who recently passed away (2013), whose work has been praised for its focusing on structures, signs and symbols subject to no geographical, political, cultural, racial and styllistic limitations.


In his own words "Walls are the mirrors of society. They are the surface where every emotion, news and event is written for the world."

  

Looking for Portuguese books written in English and French ...

Because of my daughter's exquisite request I have been looking for Portuguese cuisine books she would like to offer the English Chefs she is working with in England. I didn't come across many I would personally buy, especially after having read The taste of Portugal by Edite Vieira, I consider to be among the best (if not the best) I have seen so far and which is now only available in hardcover version and therefore a lot more expensive than what she was prepared to pay .

I nevertheless ended up buying some rather interesting ones, two of which I had never seen before. Three completely different approaches to the Portuguese cuisine but which I am sure will delight the ones they are for.

Amidst this search, which has been going on for almost two weeks, I have come across a very interesting French book on Lisbon and some of its less known stories and history associated facts, which I have read in one go, having been made aware of a number of things I must confess I didn't know. I have decided to buy one for a French couple I 'll be staying at on my return from Vietnam.  

I have also bought a bilingual edition (Portuguese originals and English translations) of some well known Lisbon poets of the past, recently edited in Portugal  which I had intended to offer a friend of the ICAEA association I will soon meet at an International Aviation gathering but I have once more got disppointed, as I have realised that possibly having English translators is not be the most accurate approach to convey the Portuguese soul. The poems are clearly well translated but lack something ... that something that could identify them as being Portuguese. I will therefore use some of them in the English classes ... and have my students 'opinions on those English versions as compared with the Portuguese originals.

The latest book I have read ...

I had almost forgotten how pleasurable it was to read books written by the Cape Verdian author Germano de Almeida. If many of his previous novels, all of which I have read, were based on "second-hand" experiences  Back to Paradise is a trip back to his childhood and adolescence in Boavista island and the myriad of traditions that are no longer part of people's daily lives or if they are they certainly have a different "face".
 

Though I haven't lived in Cape Verde during the same epoch of many of the characters in the novel I came across some of the many traditions thoroughly described in it, particularly when in the eighties I ventured into some remote areas of the various Cape Verdian islands and mixed with the local people, thus getting a different touch of things ... those I had got to know by reading some of the few available Cape Verdian authors in the Portuguese bookshops. 

 

 

 

I ended up reading Back to Paradise in two days as I struggled to make it last but prior to my drama I lent it to Sónia who read it in one evening as we were waiting to board the flight back to Lisbon (not exactly back to Paradise) and throughout the  actual flight which lasted four hours ... so if this doesn't say anything about the interest conveyed by the book, then there isn't much more I can say ...

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Praia, Cape Verde (fifth day - morning and afternoon) - Around Quebra Canela beach and Plateau - The 27th of March 2016 and arrival at my service, Lisbon Airport (early morning) - The 28th of March 2016

We didn't get up too early in the morning, as we would have spend the entire day strolling about till the evening. Soon after having checked ot and left the baggage in the reception hall of the residencial hotel we hopped onto a bus heading to Achada de Santo Antonio, to see the Parliement and the Embassies' area, having then walked down to Quebra Canela beach. 

We were followed by a dog which happend to have befriended Noëlle as we walked along the bay towards Plateau via Prainha, the Government Palace and the Sucupira market, which we reached early in the afternoon.  

We stopped by the high School square briefly before having decided to have lunch at Quintal da Musica, which we went back to later so as to have an ice-cream. Noëlle and I still made it to Fazenda on taxi to get to know one of the best city bookshops (I was really impressed with) and try to buy a book, we hadn't been able to find anywhere else.

Killing time, is what we did afterwards till it was time to board the late evening flight. We landed at Lisbon airport in the early hours of the 28th and as Sonia headed home and Noëlle to a flight back to Nantes I walked all the way to the Training Centre, in time to meet the guardian, whom I handed the first letters and presents to (Filomena happens to be the "godmother" of five Cape Verdian children) and get ready to teach.

Whenever I come back home after having been to Cape Verde I always have a feeling of fulfillement and the sense of a mission accomplishment, and yet in the back of my mind there's (also) always a hammering feeling of "I wish I could do more" ...