.

wind blows

2011-01-17T14:59:00.002Z

www.soufflee.tumblr.com
www.soufflee.tumblr.com
www.soufflee.tumblr.com
www.soufflee.tumblr.com
www.soufflee.tumblr.com
www.soufflee.tumblr.com
www.soufflee.tumblr.com
www.soufflee.tumblr.com
www.soufflee.tumblr.com
www.soufflee.tumblr.com
www.soufflee.tumblr.com
www.soufflee.tumblr.com

. a dot is a dot. not more, not less. it stays open but it ends with a pallindrome number. 202.

" silence is sexy "

2011-01-16T13:26:00.002Z

I am alive, yeah.

actually it probably feels odd because i feel more alive than i did before.

the difference is that now

it is silent.

on the road.

2010-10-07T16:43:00.007+01:00

these images belong to paulo. as usual, i barely used my camera because he took over the
photographic opportunities. He is what we call a foto açambarcador or açambarcator photographs vulgaris

but they are so beautiful, and i suggested the shots, so i have a word to say no??

hum.

checklist

2010-10-03T10:04:00.002+01:00

. get this thing working .
. read papers get in the car give it a go .
. run .
. get home .
. get the job .
. bake proper scones .

eight weeks to go .

strike the pose

2010-09-04T11:42:00.003+01:00

raphael

ladies in sodaka

family from sodaka

pregnant woman suprised with size of belly

kiwa with movie camera!

waiting for the function to beggin

tsholotsho air strip with moné

Brilliant Ndebele, 7 years old

Decent Ndebele, 3 years old

thembi, mavis, colleen, thoko, mirriam and trezya. learning
how to make food colourful.

. much more better.

2010-09-04T11:20:00.001+01:00

Ma’am

Yes …?

I have a problem in my heart, deep in my heart. How can you make the water spill? How can a woman bring the water for three quilometres, it is fine when it is three hundred metres. Can you make the water spill, I’m trying to tell you because I know you can tell the people. By right this land has these things there is no water and the woman has to walk three quilometres but if it was just three hundred metres, I’m from about fifty-two quilometres from here, dlamini, and there is not many boreholes in my line, you just go to the clinic and ask which line does not have water and that is where I live . and my woman my woman is becoming very thin and then everybody is saying that it is because the tuberculosis and because of HIV but it is not, it is because she is carrying the water everyday, and then she is tired and does not have time to cook my dinner, and then I arrive home and she is tired and sick and I love her but like this it is very difficult. Yes I have this little girl she is so smart, she goes to school and I just want her to be able to do all the things that I couldn’t unfortunately do, by right in this country. You know in this country there are shonas and ndebeles and in here in 1983 it was a very political thing, and there were a lot of killings I wouldn’t know it very well myself because I was very young but then that was why I left school and then my maternal grandmother kept me in bulawayo and I was able to go to school. I wanted to study nursing in Christ cross in England London but I did not get the scores you need maths and maths I never left level 1, never was very good. And the while I was living with my maternal grandmother I had to work in a butcher. And one day I had my examinations so I asked the boss to have the days off and the boss said no and then I said I quit the job. But then he was very bad he went to my grandmother and told her that I was very selfish that I didn’t want to work. Then my maternal grandmother become mad and tell me now you have to go back to where you came from , if you don’t want to work you don’t stay here. So after my examinations I took a bus – I passed this place on the way to dlamini, it is about fifty two quilometres from here. There I stayed and then I went to see my grades and I had passed, I had Cs but I had passed. Now I was starting to understand maths more, not the x equals zero and everything but the simple maths I understood. I wanted to go to England but England then this country was once colonized by the English and then the English has also left and all was misplaced and I tried nursing school - I wanted to study nursing in England – but then the only nursing school was in mpilo in town and it was very hard to get, so I tried the police force, and I made it in the police force, but now ma’am can you make the water spilling? Just for my woman, because I love her and I know that other man go to other many more women but you know I am trying to be better and it would be much more better if you could make the water spill ..

Do you need to be saved or are you ok? I’m fine,

. were you talking to that crazy man?

But do you really think he is crazy?

Yes, I mean if you hear him 2 minutes you think he is a very smart person, if you hear him for 20 minutes you know he is crazy.

Okay, but do you think we can try to build a borehole in dlamini…….?

Thursdays night in tsholotsho.

has anyone mentioned xenophobia?

2010-08-19T10:14:00.003+01:00

"Explaining 9/11 to a Muslim Child

By Moina Noor

Recently on the morning drive to school my 8-year-old son asked me a question I’ve been dreading since he was a baby, “Mom, what happened on 9/11?”

Mass murder is impossible to explain to yourself, let alone a child. But how do I, as a parent, explain the slaughter of innocent people in the name of a religion that I am trying to pass on to my boy?

Bilal was just 8 months old when September 11 happened. He was just starting to crawl and put everything in sight into his mouth, and I remember having to peel my gaze away from the television screen and remind myself to keep a watchful eye on where he lay nearby.

After Bilal was born I viewed everything — especially current events — through the lens of parenthood. I knew the world had changed irreparably on 9/11, and while I mourned the innocent and raged against my crazy coreligionists, my nagging anxiety was for my son.

Even in those early surreal hours after the attacks when images of towers falling and long-bearded men in caves flooded the television screen, I knew that Bilal’s childhood would not be like mine.

When I was growing up in suburban Connecticut few people knew much about Muslims, let alone cared. My parents and their friends would gather in community rooms or church basements for our version of Sunday school. They were devout but weren’t necessarily interested in teaching their neighbors about Islam. We were few in number and invisible.

After 9/11, the spotlight was aimed at Muslims everywhere, especially here in America. Like many Muslims, I felt the need to defend my religious identity. I threw myself into all things Muslim, and explained and explained: “We are like you. Islam is peaceful. Complex sociopolitical factors create lunatics who kill people. Please don’t judge a billion people by a few bad apples.”

I hung tightly to my spiritual rope. I could not let go of a faith has given me and my family comfort and solace for generations.

Since 9/11, I’ve worried how Bilal would feel about his identity as a Muslim living in America. A survey conducted by the Pew Forum on Religion and Public Life appeared in 2007 stating that 35 percent of respondents had an unfavorable opinion about Islam. Could one of those 3 in 10 people be Bilal’s teacher or soccer coach?

Over the past eight years I’ve read about Muslims being deported and pulled off airplanes and mosques being vandalized. My sister, a former middle school teacher in Brooklyn, heard kids taunt a Muslim student on the playground, calling him a terrorist. And even though I fear the possibility of discrimination for Bilal, what I fear most of all is that the din of Islamophobia will rob my son of self-respect and confidence.

So just as I became an activist, I became a proactive Muslim mommy. When Bilal was a preschooler, I took him to Muslim playgroups, organized activities in Ramadan and bought him board books about the Prophet Muhammed. I pushed him in his stroller at peace walks and brought him to interfaith events. These days, I organize local Islamic school classes and give talks about the Hajj at his elementary school. My husband and I read him books about Islamic contributions to math and science.

Over the years, I’ve tried to protect my son from any negative associations made with Islam. I’ve developed lightening quick reflexes — the second I hear a story about suicide bombers or terrorists on the radio, I switch to a pop music station. I’ve made my husband limit his CNN time to after the kids go to sleep. I don’t want to have to answer the question, “Mom, what is the ‘threat of radical Islamic extremism?’ ”

For me, the thought of talking to Bilal about terrorism is a bit like talking about sex for the first time. It is awkward and difficult I’m just not sure how much a child his age is ready to hear.

This year 9/11 falls during Ramadan, the Muslim holy month of fasting. I made Bilal watch President Obama’s five minute long “Ramadan Message to Muslims” on the Internet. President Obama spoke with respect, knowledge and a sense optimism to Muslims around the world. He found the speech interesting but nothing out of the ordinary. For Bilal, who is just starting to become conscious of a world bigger than our front yard, there is no “clash of civilizations”.

Bilal is proud to tell others that he was named after “the Prophet’s best friend,” an African Muslim with a beautiful voice who gave the first call to prayer. He is also a Cub Scout who has learned how to fold the American flag.

I did try and answer Bilal’s question. I relayed the day’s events in broad cartoonish strokes: bad guys attack, buildings collapse. Don’t worry, I assured him, we’ll get the bad guys so they won’t do it again. As I looked at Bilal in the rearview mirror, I explained that good and bad exists in every group, even your own. I think he understands."

NYTimes Magazine, 11 September 2009.

2010-08-03T15:35:00.003+01:00

her name is kate and she always has her nutrition books done on time.

Grizzly Bear - Foreground

2010-08-03T15:34:00.000+01:00

2010-07-25T11:27:00.001+01:00

Beitbridge, 03 de julho de 2010

o que são as luzes ao fundo?

“estás a ver aquelas luzes ali ao fundo? aquilo é a Africa do Sul”

há muito espaço entre as coisas em Beitbridge, parece que é assim uma terra meio coalhada, que alguém tentou misturar mas não deu, dispersa e sem harmonia. típico das cidades fronteiriças, diríamos que Beitbridge é assim desconfortável e fascinante ao mesmo tempo. não chega a ser intercultural, o espaço que existe entre as coisas é isso mesmo, fossos entre culturas e entre ideias. as pessoas em Beitbridge não se querem interseccionar, querem passar a ponte para a outra margem, a margem que tem luz.

parece que há muita coisa a acontecer debaixo dos nossos narizes, mas depois é tanto silêncio e ausência de movimento coerente, gente e coisas a fluir em todos os sentidos.

obviamente será difícil criar raizes e rotinas quando se está de passagem – e os embondeiros aqui tão grandes e há tanto tempo residem que devem achar tudo isto muito estranho. fugidias as gentes e os carros; todos parecem estar de passagem em beitbridge, tudo efémero a passar-se entre as rodas dos carros e o asfalto recente, no momento em que se tocam. breve,

e de facto a imagem que transparece é esta de uma luz automóvel vir do outro lado da estrada e a silhueta encurvada de uma pessoa que caminha na direcção referida. Nao há muito mais para referir neste preciso momento, nem sequer uma história, já foi, já era, não se sabe nem quando nem porquê, e já ninguém se lembra

na Estrada durante o dia veem-se carros amontoados de coisas de casa, aceleram no asfalto enquanto podem até chegarem às estradas de terra vermelha dos sítios de onde vêm. Joanesburgo vai enviá-los de volta para casa de mãos vazias e casas queimadas – dizem. África do sul, terra de luz e de chama lá ao fundo e do medo da xenofobia. E as nações celebram a magia do futebol e o que pode fazer por Africa.

ambiente de fim de festa.

há um cheiro insuportável a urina e a vómito – alguém esvazia a bexiga sem pudor em frente a uma parede do lado de for a da casa. mulheres a vender cigarros, ovos, preservativos, tudo milimetricamente disposto e cima de uma caixa de cartão voltada ao contrário.

sentadas nelas ou no chão ou em bancos improvisados com lixo acumulado a 20 metros de distância, sós ou acompanhadas de outras mulheres e honestamente, não consigo descrever o olhar.

tento retrospectivar, identifico, mas porque não entendo, não assumo nada, nem julgo, porque não sei do que se trata. nem creio que olhares se possam assim descrever em palavras, especialmente os olhares alheios, digo, demasiado subjectivo e depois, quem olha para os olhos não olha para dentro e a treta do espelho da alma foi criada para ficar bem em crónicas de revista, na realidade não resulta.

conformadas, posso supôr. ou ansiosas. podem ser ambas as coisas, já que do olhar não lhes tiro nada, posso imaginar que estejam algures entre estes dois extremos. deixa-me segura esta certeza de que estão entre algo e algo que reconheço . na verdade é ridícula a necessidade que temos de ter certeza das coisas, alias, é isso, aqui respira-se atmosfera de incerteza crónica, mas ninguém parece muito preocupado com isso.

conformadas, de um dos lados da linha, e o conformismo é uma doença. Não só de algumas geografias, afecta-nos a todos, e às vezes pode ser a única forma de sobreviver a situações-limite, quer seja no conforto ocidental – e acidental – das sociedades do norte, quer seja algures entre a Africa do Sul e o Sul do Zimbabwe, a terra onde se diz que todos perderam a esperança.

fogos acesos no meio do nada, aquecem estas mulheres e estes homens que dormem sempre a esperar que a espera lhes traga melhores dias – deste lado da ponte ou do outro.

“não vendem só ovos, tabaco e preservativos, vendem outras coisas tambem. Os ovos, o tabaco e os preservativos são uma desculpa, um understatement. São prostitutas.”

há homens numa roda de cabeça baixa, pessoas que riem alto.

e honestamente nao vejo muita diferença entre estas pessoas e as pessoas nas cidades de onde venho. digo,

faríamos o mesmo, e é por isso que nos amedronta, que nos impressiona. as fotografias não saem bem. as únicas fotografias que tenho de Beitbridge são na Estrada de terra que dá para o norte, com embondeiros por toda a parte.

é por isso que gosto de Beitbridge. não há redoma de vidro a separar as pessoas de um lado das pessoas do outro.

pode acontecer-nos a todos, e todos encontraríamos uma forma de sobreviver, quer fosse conformista, anarca ou ansiosa. a única coisa que se pode concluír é que sobrevivem sempre os mais fortes. os que conseguem atravessar a ponte e os que deste lado, vendem o que podem. tudo, até a alma que não se vê pelo olhar.

night

2010-07-12T11:56:00.001+01:00

We do not know how things work

We do not know where you go

In the night

Through the door

Through the door that holds you

Through the door that holds you

Out of the blue

We do not know

The door that holds you

Silent as glue

We stand under it

But we don't understand it

We stand under it

But we don't understand it

The door that holds you

Silent as glue

And stars fall on

Stars fall on

Silent as glue

bill callahan

1

2010-07-02T17:12:00.000+01:00

Nao me lembro quando é que começou, ou pelo menos a idade exacta é uma ideia que se me foge da memoria --

.Não sei se todas as crianças sentem aquilo que sentia quando ia para a cama à noite e imaginava que um certo dia acordava em cima de uma tábua de madeira no meio do mar. .E que, pouco a pouco, não sei muito bem como nem com a ajuda de quem, conseguia recomeçar tudo de novo e sobreviver. A verdade é que nunca me consigo lembrar se havia um motivo para as coisas todas terem desaparecido, não havia referência a laços nem a perdas, só que tinha de iniciar a recolecção e construção de uma qualquer vida que imaginava cada dia.

Depois cresci, ..vi a Pequena Sereia e fazia apneias na banheira e na praia de galapos a ver se me crescia uma cauda género dourada. Parece-me então um mundo demasiado injusto, e debaixo do mar tudo se revela tão azul, límpido e silencioso. Depois de aprender básicos de física na escola, descubro então que parece que o som se propaga melhor dentro de água por causa da densidade e imaginei que se tivesse gritado mais alto da praia do creiro – que tem menos interferência do ferry boat que vai para troia – o rei tritão me tinha ouvido.

No liceu disseram-me que era muito mais fácil tomar ácidos. Nunca tentei, tinha medo dos ataques de pânico.

E depois de deixar de querer ser mulher-peixe, decidi querer ser médica. Demorei mais tempo a perceber que não era bem isso que queria – comparado com o tempo que andei de jangada no mar e a querer ter guelras. Agora queria um estetoscópio

pendurado no pescoço [ quando as minhas amigas queriam colares da parfois do metro da alameda – ] e nada me demovia da necessidade vital de ter 20 a biologia e a química no exame nacional. Tive crise da adolescência enquanto aprendia o reino animal e estudava a espermatogénese das alforrecas. Escrevia muitas coisas que hoje em dia não me fazem absolutamente sentido nenhum – a sério, havia vezes em que usava tempos verbais desconhecidos – e o pior é que o fazia conscientemente, género rebeldia literária [se não estupidez temporária antes].

Obviamente

e por mais paroxetina que me prescrevesse o neurologista, não fui capaz de entrar em medicina -

e pior a emenda que o soneto, fui ser enfermeira, curso tirado ao lado do hospital de santa maria, a passar em frente ao doutor egas moniz todos os dias, um ano, trezentos e sessenta e cinco chicotadas nas costas, ao estilo Indiana jones e o templo perdido, incluindo o vilão que estropeia o peito às pessoas para lhes arrancar o coração em pankot palace.

Só que era na avenida das forças armadas, em lisboa, e foi durante dois anos, entre desgostos amorosos, ataques de pânico no comboio da ponte, muitos cigarros por dia e trabalhos precários para pagar bilhetes para o paredes de coura e afins.

Lembro-me quando tudo fez sentido em três alturas.

| Na primeira vez que vi um bebé a nascer no hospital são franciso Xavier|

| Quando entrei numa casa de 50 metros quadrados num bairro social em Chelas zona H e naquele buraco fedorento viviam 11 pessoas, 9 crianças. |

|e no dia em que percorri Camden Street em Dublin com quatro cópias da minha tese de mestrado na mão. |

muitos mais outros acontecimentos me motivaram, mas são mais emocionais que simbólicos – uma vez num carro de amigos a caminho das Ardennes belgas escrevi que a única forma de conseguirmos saír do nosso ambiente, desapegar-nos momentaneamente e deixar o corpo ir para outros hemisférios é saber que podemos regressar a um sítio onde o conforto – físico e emocional - nos recebe. Quem não tem nada não tem nada a perder mas quem tem e dá valor pode dar mais.

E apesar de achar que estas palavras são um bocado literatura de casa de banho, acho que até me safei bem na semântica. Não dei erros, e respeitei sujeito e predicado. Se me pudessem chamar rebelde agora, chamar-me-iam por outros motivos.

Estou demasiado abaixo do equador, e há algumas coisas que quero contar.

exactly

2010-06-30T10:42:00.000+01:00

The question is not whether we can end hunger, it's whether we will.

– Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton

there are sitting days.

2010-06-28T17:15:00.001+01:00

my ass hurts . training preparation ongoing. soundtrack

2010-06-28T12:32:00.001+01:00

south africa despite vuvuzela

2010-06-28T12:24:00.001+01:00

Zalmai / UNHCR

june part one

2010-06-28T08:24:00.002+01:00

outras coisas que nao sejam domingos .

2010-06-28T08:03:00.000+01:00

Qualquer coisa que me entorpeça agora é válida. Não e opcao ficar simplesmente a olhar ou a contemplar algo que se move ou qualquer outra coisa que nao faca nada.

Um copo de vinho, um cigarro que nao posso fumar, um charro que nao tenho. Musica alta em que so a musica se ouve, sem ruido de fundo. Falas.me do mar e eu tive o mar tao perto tao perto e agora sinto tanto a falta dele. De o ouvir mesmo que nao saisse da areia. Porque é o som, sabes, e o sabor e a força. A puxar a areia para tras e para a frente concomitante e inevitavelmente.

É uma gente ligada à terra, uma gente com medo da água e do ar , uma geografia plana e concisa em que nao há marés nem bonanças.

Que complexidade aqui dentro, quao a quero afugentar com palavras, ja que gestos estao presos pela distancia e pela qualidade dos seres ocidentais que me rodeiam. Imobilidade e como podemos aprender com ela. Qualquer coisa que me entorpeça e me faça deitar lagrimas pelos olhos. Sentir, sem justificar nada.

Pelo trabalho as horas e pelo sacrificio o corpo e a educaçao da mente. Árduo, ninguem nos prepara para isto e também ninguem nos diz que acontece a todos e que todos o escondem como se fosse fraqueza, que quem não o sente é ou insensivel ou louco.

Domingo em latitude 22, noite com vento e vozes graves lá for a, sempre vozes quentes, sei. Neste momento quero-te ouvir a voz, mordem-me as formigas, mas nao quero que saibas que às vezes sou fraca e choro muito porque quero aninhar-me ao teu colo e nao posso, porque continuas ai e eu – por escolha – aqui.

Porque amo aquilo que faco aqui também. Certo que te amo mais a ti, mas nao suportaria o facto de nao ver aquilo que vejo todos os dias, de saber que o sinto e acomodo na minha mente como se quisesse arrumar por arquivos de significado, algo que me constroi agora, algo que quero conseguir montar. Já nem sei, nem sei se o que que quero fazer é simples, complexo ou concreto e significativo ou insignificante.

Tenho tantas saudades tuas e dos nossos sitios,

E as vezes so o silencio e a solidao absoluta me conseguem tirar esta sensaçao de que devia estar ai e nao aqui.

Evolution, dizem os cinematic orchestra.

mudar tudo.

2010-06-25T09:20:00.002+01:00

nao sei,

parece-me exagerado o que vi hoje de manha na sky news.
alias, os britanicos enojam-me todos os dias, e se nao é por uma coisa é por outra.
nao faço puto de ideia o que é um Apple Geek, nem o bem que isso pode fazer ao mundo.
e nao vejo como é que um modelo novo de um telefone móvel faz quase tudo menos chamadas pode

mudar tudo. outra vez.

a mim parece-me que nao há crise nenhuma na europa. se houvesse crise estavam na fila para comer e nao para comprar um iphone, seus hipócritas.

isto poe-me nervosa.

udokotela day.

2010-06-04T15:37:00.000+01:00

shopping list 29 of may 2010

2010-05-28T16:03:00.004+01:00

chocolate
butter
flour
yeast
condensed milk
cinnamon
bananas
amarula liquor
whipping cream
juice
wine
milk
yogurt
fruit
mince meat
soya chunks
macaroni
tomato puree
potatoes
mazoe
tuna
cereal
oregano
maize
baloons
bread crumbs
paprika
rice
onions
margarine
green beans
sugar beans
carrots
salad cream
kidney beans
cow peas
peas

and

a tea spoon.

(the image brings us back to 2007, all that is in this list can now be found in zimbabwe. the items in bold were the ones that you could eventually find and pay 100 USD for each unit. I still believe that tracey and thoko - the housekeepers - would find a way to cook something out of milk and cow peas.....)

2010-05-16T12:45:00.003+01:00

it's
very
cold .

2010-05-15T09:46:00.002+01:00

12 maio 2010

durante todo o dia quero escrever mas os solavancos não permitem. Chego à noite e estou exausta – só de imaginar escrever fico cansada.
13 de maio - dia da nossa senhora de fatima e do papa em lisboa (como se isso fosse importante - ribeiro, diz a maria para atirar o molde de sapatos ao papa movel e outra coisa igualmente pesada a multidao de anarco-comunistas hipocritas) uf, que fuerte.

Distância que se mede em horas, dizem eles. Estou há dois meses no Zimbabwe e aprendi que nao vale a pena falar em quilómetros
ou milhas –
que isso foi uma coisa que os brancos inventaram para medir uma coisa que efectivamente é subjectiva. Distância mede-se em km quando se pode calcular o
tempo que se demora a percorrer
um certo determinado numero de quilometros a uma velocidade constante. Ora hoje disse ao Mandla que se visse um bebé a voar na parte de tras do land cruiser,
que era para ir mais devagar.,
mas se vai mais devagar, os 60 km que separam Sikente de Tsholotsho demora uma hora e meia em vez de uma hora. Do I make myself clear?
Há várias coisas que me passam pela cabeça
enquando ando a saltar de um lado para o outro com a equipa médica.
A maior parte delas esqueço-me
quando chego a casa, as variações de comida no estômago têm um efeito amnésico na minha capacidade narrativa e apenas fico com boas memorias de pensamentos olvidados.
A vida aqui é simples,
sempre uma noite tranquila,
a não ser que haja linhas trocadas na rede de telecomunicações móveis nacional e decidam ligar às quatro da manhã para falar uma lingual estranha
e eu ainda tenha o discernimento para dizer sorry wrong number em ingles e tudo.
Acorda-se
com o despertador ou então com os burros –
já que me parece que os galos andam com os sonos trocados – e a primeira coisa que se faz é
café.
Uma das vantagens dos catalães é que gostam tanto ou mais de café que os portugueses, e se não há café no período de meia hora entre acordar e meter um pedaço de pão na boca a coisa está preta.
Torradas, quando não há pão há
panquecas –
quando não há ovos
azar,
come-se manteiga de amendoim com os dedos. Mas está bien, que o queniano da logística também não se queixa muito, diz que quando era puto caminhava 10 km ate a escola e a hora de almoco
ia a casa.
Às vezes caminhamos para o trabalho, às vezes não. São quinze minutos mais na cama,
a beberricar café, a ver as notícias da sky news que são irritantes comá merda mais os ingleses cheios de preocupações com eleições, vulcões e mais a pita de Yorkshire que decidiu recusar usar a burka numa mesquita e foi apedrejada.
Bom, talvez não tenha sido apedrejada, mas que era bem feito acho que sim, que quando me recusava a celebrar o st patrick’s day também me chamavam ignobil e coisas assim.

Lembrei-me de uma coisa
de ontem,
que fomos à clínica mais longe de todas, que se chama Sodaka. Lembro-me de pensar que todas as pessoas valem a pena e que não sei quem se lembrou uma vez de achar que valemos pelo sítio de onde somos.
Lembro-me das crianças a correr e a gritar
bye bye kiwa!
E a desaparecerem numa nuvem de pó atrás de nós. E de pensar que nunca as levaria dali, nunca, nunca pensaria que o sítio de onde venho é melhor do que o sítio onde estou agora. É mais meu. Tal como este sítio de aqui é mais de todas as pessoas que aqui estão.

É só uma pena que queiramos que todos sejam como nós.
Chama-se supremacia de culturas.

eu nao me sinto suprema em nada. apenas melhor, porque agora se quero pao faco, se nao ha nao tenho, se quero ir
vou.

as coisas que se aprendem

how about that?

2010-05-01T11:13:00.003+01:00

A WORLD THAT IS FIT FOR CHILDREN.

that's what I want for Christmas.

from zimbabwe to zambia - april 2010.

2010-05-01T11:11:00.000+01:00

vic falls

2010-05-01T11:06:00.000+01:00

Word sequence #1

2010-04-10T13:05:00.001+01:00

She promised me a pumpkin.

What have you got at home? - Nothing.

She couldn’t visit the hospital today because the river is full.

Was your first mission in Portugal?

It takes a lot to makes us cry.

I got used to having bread with nothing. Now it’s strange to have butter.

Her name is Florence. She’s 29 years old. She weighs 20 kilos.

A little bit of globalization never harmed anyone. Or maybe it did, actually.

Here’s a toast on the world’s greatest contradictions: skin colour and wallet contents.

Horray.

geography lesson

2010-03-27T14:51:00.001Z

Aguanta la respiracíon y sumérgete en este libro, como quien se lanza a una piscine oscura. Toma aliento y enfrentate a estas fotografias formidables, que son una ventana despiadada a lo que ya sabemos pero nos empeñamos en ignorar, al reverso de lo que somas, a la zona en sombre de la vida.

Ánimo. Mantén la Mirada en las laminas. Que no se diga que, viviendo en el provilegio como vives, ni siquiera eres capaz de soportar por unos instantes el dolor y la desazón del reconocimiento. Los privilegios son así. Embotan las conciencias y nos embriagan con la dulzura del olvido. Porque el privilegiado se empeña en vivir ignorante de su condición, sin recordar jamás que su abundancin se asienta en el desposeimiento de los otros. Así es que aguanta y mira.

Escuece. El reconocimento escuece, desde luego. El comprobar una vez más que son hombres y mujeres como tú. Niños como los tuyos. Ahí están, con dos ojos, un corazón, una mente llena de miedos y de ambiciones de felicidad. Como la tuya. Perfectamente humanos aunque los perfiles de su cuerpo padezcan una deformación grotesca. Son los estragos del sufrimiento. Tú, que sabes del dolor puesto que vives, imagina la cantidad incalculable de dolor que es necesaria para triturar así a una persona.

En realidad es una cuestión de geografía. Todo consiste en haber nacido en éste o en aquel lado de la Tierra, por encima de un determinado paralelo o por debajo. Un puro azar genético, una loteria paritoria te ha convertido en el lector de este libro y no en protagonista. Pero podías haber estado ahí, encerrado en los perfiles de la foto y en la miseria.

(…)

El reencuentro con lo oscuro siempre duele.

(…)

…Escucha, lo unico que puede perpetuar esta situación atroz es el olvido; el estremecerse momentaneamente ante las fotos para luego borrar-las de la memoria con diligente alivio. (…) Estremezcámos menos y recordemos.

Rosa Montero

In Sahel – el fin del camino

first impressions of a red dirt road

2010-03-27T14:50:00.001Z

it could probably happen anywhere in the world. and perhaps it's scary perhaps makes one wonder how vulnerable can one be without even perceiving it.
imagine a land,
fertile prosperous somewhat
happy - no matter how subjective this concept might be anyway.

where people receive the same education as we do. they think mostly the same as we think, do mostly the same as we, by other means.

and then everything just slowly sinks down. no one can say the real reasons that led to this political, economical, social and psychological turnover, but what can be said is that no reasons seems valid enough to justify such daily violation of human rights.

i land in harare on the 10th of March 2010 and an awkward feeling invades me. it's like it's alright but it's not.
since i've landed many things seen thought done.

and as i sit in this comfy office in the center of Bulawayo i think.
as i lie in the big room that was kindly conceeded for my weekend i wonder

as i sit early morning in the sofa reading the book about this hungry stunted empoverished people in Africa.
rosa montero is right about geography,

but she forgot how thin is the line that separates misery from sloth. and sometimes you just have to drive 1 hour to see the world change before your eyes.
it of course depends on how and what are you willing to look at.

beyond work -------- more than a thousand words

2010-03-27T14:17:00.003Z

2010-03-27T14:15:00.000Z

2010-03-27T14:09:00.002Z

2010-02-26T00:52:00.002Z

em portugal pela última vez em nove meses.

e, na primeira viagem de carro a lisboa pela estrada nacional, reparo que conduzi tantas vezes pelos mesmos sítios e nunca os pisei com os pés.

estranho, pensar nisto em vez do habitual choro de emoção quando o avião dá a volta em cima do Tejo.

estou feliz por estar aqui,

mas preferia não me sentir tão responsável pelo vazio que se sente, por não poder lutar contra ele, ainda.

e esta, posso?

2010-02-22T12:48:00.001Z

2010-02-21T20:58:00.000Z

Coisas bonitas para se dizer à avó #1

2010-02-19T18:05:00.002Z

"Elton John claims Jesus was gay

"Sir Elton John has claimed Jesus was a "super-intelligent gay man" in an interview with a US magazine.
The singer also told Parade Jesus was "compassionate", forgiving and "understood human problems".
A spokesman for the Church of England said: "Sir Elton's reflection that Jesus calls us all to love and forgive is one shared by all Christians."
"But insights into aspects of the historic person of Jesus are perhaps best left to the academics," he added.
Sir Elton said in the interview: "On the cross, he forgave the people who crucified him. Jesus wanted us to be loving and forgiving.
"I don't know what makes people so cruel. Try being a gay woman in the Middle East - you're as good as dead," he added.
In the interview, the singer also said he did not like being a celebrity any more because "fame attracts lunatics".
"Princess Diana, Gianni Versace, John Lennon, Michael Jackson, all dead. Two of them shot outside their houses. None of this would have happened if they hadn't been famous. I never had a bodyguard, ever, until Gianni died," he said.

The full interview will be published on Parade's website on Friday.
Story from BBC NEWS:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr/-/2/hi/entertainment/8523538.stm"

2010-02-08T10:02:00.002Z

i read the short story by orwell and could not find any rationale for comparing it to the documentary i have seen yesterday in verdi park cinema, barcelona, spain, europe.

i believe that whoever still needs to see dead children in gaza to understand the seriousness of human rights violation happening in Gaza (and in so many other parts of this world) does not deserve those images and will not make any difference at all in these children's lives.

i believe in helping the people rather that explicitly broadcasting faces of victims whose consent was not asked. i am sure they plead for help but is this the advocacy we aim for? every tragedy reported in the developed world tries to inform and to show facts but never exploring identities. there was no dead body face shown in the September 11. why do we think that in developing areas should be any different?

i believe that, as any conflict in this world, the one in the Gaza Strip affects civilians indiscriminately - when it should affect politicians and military forces only. But are we really acting upon it when we strip children men and women who are nothing to blame and show it to other civilians (ourselves) who weap and feel sorry and go home sick but can't really do anything about it?

i care for the people. i care only for the people. and i do not need to see them dying to know that they exist. and that the value of each one of their lives is worth as much as mine.

do not fight fire with fire, Mohammad and Alberto. instead of shooting the elephant, go to the elephant, feed it and show the other shooters that there is no single life that is not worth sparing.

shooting an elephant - by george orwell

2010-02-08T10:00:00.001Z

In Moulmein, in lower Burma, I was hated by large numbers of people – the only time in my life that I have been important enough for this to happen to me. I was sub-divisional police officer of the town, and in an aimless, petty kind of way anti-European feeling was very bitter. No one had the guts to raise a riot, but if a European woman went through the bazaars alone somebody would probably spit betel juice over her dress. As a police officer I was an obvious target and was baited whenever it seemed safe to do so. When a nimble Burman tripped me up on the football field and the referee (another Burman) looked the other way, the crowd yelled with hideous laughter. This happened more than once. In the end the sneering yellow faces of young men that met me everywhere, the insults hooted after me when I was at a safe distance, got badly on my nerves. The young Buddhist priests were the worst of all. There were several thousands of them in the town and none of them seemed to have anything to do except stand on street corners and jeer at Europeans.

All this was perplexing and upsetting. For at that time I had already made up my mind that imperialism was an evil thing and the sooner I chucked up my job and got out of it the better. Theoretically – and secretly, of course – I was all for the Burmese and all against their oppressors, the British. As for the job I was doing, I hated it more bitterly than I can perhaps make clear. In a job like that you see the dirty work of Empire at close quarters. The wretched prisoners huddling in the stinking cages of the lock-ups, the grey, cowed faces of the long-term convicts, the scarred buttocks of the men who had been Bogged with bamboos – all these oppressed me with an intolerable sense of guilt. But I could get nothing into perspective. I was young and ill-educated and I had had to think out my problems in the utter silence that is imposed on every Englishman in the East. I did not even know that the British Empire is dying, still less did I know that it is a great deal better than the younger empires that are going to supplant it. All I knew was that I was stuck between my hatred of the empire I served and my rage against the evil-spirited little beasts who tried to make my job impossible. With one part of my mind I thought of the British Raj as an unbreakable tyranny, as something clamped down, in saecula saeculorum, upon the will of prostrate peoples; with another part I thought that the greatest joy in the world would be to drive a bayonet into a Buddhist priest's guts. Feelings like these are the normal by-products of imperialism; ask any Anglo-Indian official, if you can catch him off duty.

One day something happened which in a roundabout way was enlightening. It was a tiny incident in itself, but it gave me a better glimpse than I had had before of the real nature of imperialism – the real motives for which despotic governments act. Early one morning the sub-inspector at a police station the other end of the town rang me up on the phone and said that an elephant was ravaging the bazaar. Would I please come and do something about it? I did not know what I could do, but I wanted to see what was happening and I got on to a pony and started out. I took my rifle, an old 44 Winchester and much too small to kill an elephant, but I thought the noise might be useful in terrorem. Various Burmans stopped me on the way and told me about the elephant's doings. It was not, of course, a wild elephant, but a tame one which had gone "must." It had been chained up, as tame elephants always are when their attack of "must" is due, but on the previous night it had broken its chain and escaped. Its mahout, the only person who could manage it when it was in that state, had set out in pursuit, but had taken the wrong direction and was now twelve hours' journey away, and in the morning the elephant had suddenly reappeared in the town. The Burmese population had no weapons and were quite helpless against it. It had already destroyed somebody's bamboo hut, killed a cow and raided some fruit-stalls and devoured the stock; also it had met the municipal rubbish van and, when the driver jumped out and took to his heels, had turned the van over and inflicted violences upon it.

The Burmese sub-inspector and some Indian constables were waiting for me in the quarter where the elephant had been seen. It was a very poor quarter, a labyrinth of squalid bamboo huts, thatched with palmleaf, winding all over a steep hillside. I remember that it was a cloudy, stuffy morning at the beginning of the rains. We began questioning the people as to where the elephant had gone and, as usual, failed to get any definite information. That is invariably the case in the East; a story always sounds clear enough at a distance, but the nearer you get to the scene of events the vaguer it becomes. Some of the people said that the elephant had gone in one direction, some said that he had gone in another, some professed not even to have heard of any elephant. I had almost made up my mind that the whole story was a pack of lies, when we heard yells a little distance away. There was a loud, scandalized cry of "Go away, child! Go away this instant!" and an old woman with a switch in her hand came round the corner of a hut, violently shooing away a crowd of naked children. Some more women followed, clicking their tongues and exclaiming; evidently there was something that the children ought not to have seen. I rounded the hut and saw a man's dead body sprawling in the mud. He was an Indian, a black Dravidian coolie, almost naked, and he could not have been dead many minutes. The people said that the elephant had come suddenly upon him round the corner of the hut, caught him with its trunk, put its foot on his back and ground him into the earth. This was the rainy season and the ground was soft, and his face had scored a trench a foot deep and a couple of yards long. He was lying on his belly with arms crucified and head sharply twisted to one side. His face was coated with mud, the eyes wide open, the teeth bared and grinning with an expression of unendurable agony. (Never tell me, by the way, that the dead look peaceful. Most of the corpses I have seen looked devilish.) The friction of the great beast's foot had stripped the skin from his back as neatly as one skins a rabbit. As soon as I saw the dead man I sent an orderly to a friend's house nearby to borrow an elephant rifle. I had already sent back the pony, not wanting it to go mad with fright and throw me if it smelt the elephant.

The orderly came back in a few minutes with a rifle and five cartridges, and meanwhile some Burmans had arrived and told us that the elephant was in the paddy fields below, only a few hundred yards away. As I started forward practically the whole population of the quarter flocked out of the houses and followed me. They had seen the rifle and were all shouting excitedly that I was going to shoot the elephant. They had not shown much interest in the elephant when he was merely ravaging their homes, but it was different now that he was going to be shot. It was a bit of fun to them, as it would be to an English crowd; besides they wanted the meat. It made me vaguely uneasy. I had no intention of shooting the elephant – I had merely sent for the rifle to defend myself if necessary – and it is always unnerving to have a crowd following you. I marched down the hill, looking and feeling a fool, with the rifle over my shoulder and an ever-growing army of people jostling at my heels. At the bottom, when you got away from the huts, there was a metalled road and beyond that a miry waste of paddy fields a thousand yards across, not yet ploughed but soggy from the first rains and dotted with coarse grass. The elephant was standing eight yards from the road, his left side towards us. He took not the slightest notice of the crowd's approach. He was tearing up bunches of grass, beating them against his knees to clean them and stuffing them into his mouth.

I had halted on the road. As soon as I saw the elephant I knew with perfect certainty that I ought not to shoot him. It is a serious matter to shoot a working elephant – it is comparable to destroying a huge and costly piece of machinery – and obviously one ought not to do it if it can possibly be avoided. And at that distance, peacefully eating, the elephant looked no more dangerous than a cow. I thought then and I think now that his attack of "must" was already passing off; in which case he would merely wander harmlessly about until the mahout came back and caught him. Moreover, I did not in the least want to shoot him. I decided that I would watch him for a little while to make sure that he did not turn savage again, and then go home.

But at that moment I glanced round at the crowd that had followed me. It was an immense crowd, two thousand at the least and growing every minute. It blocked the road for a long distance on either side. I looked at the sea of yellow faces above the garish clothes-faces all happy and excited over this bit of fun, all certain that the elephant was going to be shot. They were watching me as they would watch a conjurer about to perform a trick. They did not like me, but with the magical rifle in my hands I was momentarily worth watching. And suddenly I realized that I should have to shoot the elephant after all. The people expected it of me and I had got to do it; I could feel their two thousand wills pressing me forward, irresistibly. And it was at this moment, as I stood there with the rifle in my hands, that I first grasped the hollowness, the futility of the white man's dominion in the East. Here was I, the white man with his gun, standing in front of the unarmed native crowd – seemingly the leading actor of the piece; but in reality I was only an absurd puppet pushed to and fro by the will of those yellow faces behind. I perceived in this moment that when the white man turns tyrant it is his own freedom that he destroys. He becomes a sort of hollow, posing dummy, the conventionalized figure of a sahib. For it is the condition of his rule that he shall spend his life in trying to impress the "natives," and so in every crisis he has got to do what the "natives" expect of him. He wears a mask, and his face grows to fit it. I had got to shoot the elephant. I had committed myself to doing it when I sent for the rifle. A sahib has got to act like a sahib; he has got to appear resolute, to know his own mind and do definite things. To come all that way, rifle in hand, with two thousand people marching at my heels, and then to trail feebly away, having done nothing – no, that was impossible. The crowd would laugh at me. And my whole life, every white man's life in the East, was one long struggle not to be laughed at.

But I did not want to shoot the elephant. I watched him beating his bunch of grass against his knees, with that preoccupied grandmotherly air that elephants have. It seemed to me that it would be murder to shoot him. At that age I was not squeamish about killing animals, but I had never shot an elephant and never wanted to. (Somehow it always seems worse to kill a large animal.) Besides, there was the beast's owner to be considered. Alive, the elephant was worth at least a hundred pounds; dead, he would only be worth the value of his tusks, five pounds, possibly. But I had got to act quickly. I turned to some experienced-looking Burmans who had been there when we arrived, and asked them how the elephant had been behaving. They all said the same thing: he took no notice of you if you left him alone, but he might charge if you went too close to him.

It was perfectly clear to me what I ought to do. I ought to walk up to within, say, twenty-five yards of the elephant and test his behavior. If he charged, I could shoot; if he took no notice of me, it would be safe to leave him until the mahout came back. But also I knew that I was going to do no such thing. I was a poor shot with a rifle and the ground was soft mud into which one would sink at every step. If the elephant charged and I missed him, I should have about as much chance as a toad under a steam-roller. But even then I was not thinking particularly of my own skin, only of the watchful yellow faces behind. For at that moment, with the crowd watching me, I was not afraid in the ordinary sense, as I would have been if I had been alone. A white man mustn't be frightened in front of "natives"; and so, in general, he isn't frightened. The sole thought in my mind was that if anything went wrong those two thousand Burmans would see me pursued, caught, trampled on and reduced to a grinning corpse like that Indian up the hill. And if that happened it was quite probable that some of them would laugh. That would never do.

There was only one alternative. I shoved the cartridges into the magazine and lay down on the road to get a better aim. The crowd grew very still, and a deep, low, happy sigh, as of people who see the theatre curtain go up at last, breathed from innumerable throats. They were going to have their bit of fun after all. The rifle was a beautiful German thing with cross-hair sights. I did not then know that in shooting an elephant one would shoot to cut an imaginary bar running from ear-hole to ear-hole. I ought, therefore, as the elephant was sideways on, to have aimed straight at his ear-hole, actually I aimed several inches in front of this, thinking the brain would be further forward.

When I pulled the trigger I did not hear the bang or feel the kick – one never does when a shot goes home – but I heard the devilish roar of glee that went up from the crowd. In that instant, in too short a time, one would have thought, even for the bullet to get there, a mysterious, terrible change had come over the elephant. He neither stirred nor fell, but every line of his body had altered. He looked suddenly stricken, shrunken, immensely old, as though the frightful impact of the bullet had paralysed him without knocking him down. At last, after what seemed a long time – it might have been five seconds, I dare say – he sagged flabbily to his knees. His mouth slobbered. An enormous senility seemed to have settled upon him. One could have imagined him thousands of years old. I fired again into the same spot. At the second shot he did not collapse but climbed with desperate slowness to his feet and stood weakly upright, with legs sagging and head drooping. I fired a third time. That was the shot that did for him. You could see the agony of it jolt his whole body and knock the last remnant of strength from his legs. But in falling he seemed for a moment to rise, for as his hind legs collapsed beneath him he seemed to tower upward like a huge rock toppling, his trunk reaching skyward like a tree. He trumpeted, for the first and only time. And then down he came, his belly towards me, with a crash that seemed to shake the ground even where I lay.

I got up. The Burmans were already racing past me across the mud. It was obvious that the elephant would never rise again, but he was not dead. He was breathing very rhythmically with long rattling gasps, his great mound of a side painfully rising and falling. His mouth was wide open – I could see far down into caverns of pale pink throat. I waited a long time for him to die, but his breathing did not weaken. Finally I fired my two remaining shots into the spot where I thought his heart must be. The thick blood welled out of him like red velvet, but still he did not die. His body did not even jerk when the shots hit him, the tortured breathing continued without a pause. He was dying, very slowly and in great agony, but in some world remote from me where not even a bullet could damage him further. I felt that I had got to put an end to that dreadful noise. It seemed dreadful to see the great beast Lying there, powerless to move and yet powerless to die, and not even to be able to finish him. I sent back for my small rifle and poured shot after shot into his heart and down his throat. They seemed to make no impression. The tortured gasps continued as steadily as the ticking of a clock.

In the end I could not stand it any longer and went away. I heard later that it took him half an hour to die. Burmans were bringing dash and baskets even before I left, and I was told they had stripped his body almost to the bones by the afternoon.

Afterwards, of course, there were endless discussions about the shooting of the elephant. The owner was furious, but he was only an Indian and could do nothing. Besides, legally I had done the right thing, for a mad elephant has to be killed, like a mad dog, if its owner fails to control it. Among the Europeans opinion was divided. The older men said I was right, the younger men said it was a damn shame to shoot an elephant for killing a coolie, because an elephant was worth more than any damn Coringhee coolie. And afterwards I was very glad that the coolie had been killed; it put me legally in the right and it gave me a sufficient pretext for shooting the elephant. I often wondered whether any of the others grasped that I had done it solely to avoid looking a fool.

2010-01-21T15:21:00.000Z

5 am

2010-01-21T14:22:00.000Z

i wake myself uncomfortable in the sofa, not because of the cold or of the rudeness of one’s movements, but because of the lack of air provided to my chest as I remember the words of my father today.
He did not say anything exceptionally important, you know? Just the usual stuff related to basic needs and how the call was being so cheap and how he could call all the time without spending too much.
It’s something very funny, the premises in which we base our relationships with people we love. The one I have reserved for my father is spaceless car. It has no walls or ceiling – and I guess this ties in with the fact that most serious conversations we’ve had took place in cars in many different geographic locations. Guess genetics is fucked up, I like cars, not new of fast or pretty cars, but any car that still moves, because it has the ability to move me from one place to the other bringing whoever I want with me.
I once heard my mother say that my dad was an eternally dissatisfied man. I did not agree with her at the time and that was probably because of the intonation she gave to the statement. But now, not only I corroborate that opinion, I say yeah, me too. And I am so proud of it, because even though it hurts to be like that sometimes, if you really try to solve your endless dissatisfaction, you get happy so many times more. Same with orgasms, if you keep on you can have five. That’s what happens when your limit is a bit further. you probably reach longer distances and seize different horizons.
But this is just me after a bad dream. Most times I am just a regular minded person.

5 am

"Honestly-I think she's jealous of me. I've seen it before, I was in a sorority "

2010-01-12T15:50:00.003Z

about mad men, the tv series of which me and p. are addicted to at the moment. even though i persistently fall asleep at some point, i can not stop noticing that the sad thing is
it is not fiction.

but at least Matthew Wiener has realized that. and we are all thankful.

2010-01-12T11:00:00.001Z

see the equator . right below that.

2010-01-12T10:53:00.001Z

2010-01-12T10:52:00.001Z

I wonder if that’s really it, brother. Is it me that’s wrong or is it the rest of the world? I risk the latter. Isn’t the world as we know it wrecked enough to be morally incompetent in telling people what to do or what path to take. Is this the principle of anarchism or just another way of seeing the problem? They say if you can’t beat them, join them. I say this is the easy way. But I say this at the age of 26, with no job by option, with a degree and a post degree and having seen quite a lot of what are my options. Is this all you got for me? Sorry, it’s still not good enough, and I have been trying all this time to fit in, but seems to me it’s not working. I’ll risk the rest of the world being wrong, and I risk it being sure that everybody has something to say about this. The only reason we don’t hear is because there is too much purposive noise around us. Looks kind of schizophrenic, but I can assure you that I am not hearing any voices. I sit alone and everything is quiet. All I hear is myself thinking. And I cry, and wrinkles grow around my eyes and mouth, but I guess that’s healthy, it means I care. I choose a different attitude towards the problem, I choose to look at it from the outside instead of from within. It’s a bit cold and weird, and it takes a while to get friends and a job, but I’ll never know if I don’t try. or it gets too late.

christmas for all

2009-12-25T11:22:00.000Z

http://msf.org/source/annual/world_migration_day/2009/slideshow/index.html

2009-12-25T11:20:00.000Z

é natal - e agora?

was about time it got back to life

2009-12-19T19:30:00.001Z

All the times i wanted to write about Dublin and here i go, leaving Dublin and commencing to write about something else.
I guess that’s what happened to all of us who stayed here for a certain period of time anda t the same time vaguely nurtured some kind of literary sense. I guess the cold somewhat paralises the fingers and freezes the ink of the pen. You find endless excuses to something yo don’t do just because you don’t feel like.
Indeed, there is more to think and to feel than there is to write when in Dublin. At least for me there was.
I might say that for the purpose any place would do, but honestly i don’t think so. This city strangely kept me here for all this time and now that i’m leaving I don’t miss it, and the reason why is because i will actually never leave it completely.
When everybody started leaving the place, a friend told me that the only person which she truly believed that would come back to Dublin was me. I asked her why and she stated because you were the only one of us who actually saw the city as your own. You were the only one who actually lived this.
Yeah, i guess most of the times i loved this city, since the first day at malrbourough street (the murder corner?) until the last day in middle gardiner street, hearing the street voices from nackers, druggies and drunkers.
I started and finished my stay in Dublin in two of the probably worst places of the city and still i love it as it is.
I lived in Rathmines with all the family houses and shopping centers and yummy mummies and the south city posh teenagers and grand canal portobello at the doorstep and i loved it. I loved biking down camden street early in the morning grabbing a coffee at simon’s place, checking out the bargains in George market árcade and walking in st stephen’s green rushlessly.
I lived in Inchicore next to a social housing block and to a celtic graveyard, almost got sacked by 8 year-olds asking me for cigarettes, got the luas everyday and sometimes the driver waited for me while the ticket took to long to come out – this never happened to me anywhere in the world. I cycled to and from work through st james’ street and cursed on the 120 km/hr wind which made me cry and think the whole world was against me. But in the end, i loved it too.
I lived and loved near the Liffey, looking out my 2 metre bedroom window and seeing the city waking up and going to sleep.
I was robbed, assaulted, bullied and cheated. But i was also nourished, loved, admired and carefully treated by mostly everyone, stranger or close friend.
I have met extraordinary people, who made me believe in extraordinary things.
And i am leaving.
Probably if i’d stayed longer I wouldn’t feel this way. But i’ve seen both the brightest and the darkest side of this place and still, i love it.
Dublin, we’re even. Thanks a million.

dublin airport, december first two thousand and nine

2009-11-21T11:53:00.001Z

I am extremely afraid.

2009-11-15T14:46:00.001Z

so long suckers

verbatim

2009-11-15T12:15:00.003Z

YOU CAN ACHIEVE YOUR GOAL IF YOU PERSISTENTLY PURSUE IT.

'Cha Sa Soon, a 68 year-old South Korean woman who passed her country's written driver's lincense exam on her 950th try'

Time, November 2009

ramblings at the queen of tarts

2009-10-25T18:01:00.003Z

ask yourself one question. what's your one priority in life? don't answer subjectively, metaphorically or with poetry. a metaphor could be too comprehensive and poetry has never actually answered any of the world's questions. don't name a person or a group od people, you wouldn't be able to take such responsibility. don't even mention yourself.

it took me a while,

but i finally figured it out.

2009-10-25T17:58:00.001Z

ALL DAY BREAKFAST.

2009-09-28T17:03:00.001+01:00

2009-09-06T21:52:00.002+01:00

vale a pena fazer alguma referência ao facto de ter estado nos açores e de estar com sintomas de abstinência do cheiro da terra?

acho que já todos nos fartámos de me ouvir.

by the way, achei os lisboetas uns presunçosos de merda quando pus os pés em lisboa, dia 4 de setembro deste ano. há coisas que não mudam, infelizmente.

creating is nice

2009-08-18T11:26:00.001+01:00

an old man's mad dream or a man made out of man's greatest will of creation? the perfect movie.

2009-08-18T11:12:00.000+01:00

IT'S DONE.

2009-08-13T09:22:00.001+01:00

i love coffee with milk boiling in the morning a tender light sweeping through the big windows and the city outside shaking . but i prefer you, really.

2009-07-29T14:58:00.002+01:00

'(...) - ok, Dr. Okamembe? Were you the one who requested statistics for the nationality of patients between 2001 and 2006?
- ah... this is Elsa Afonso, a staff nurse from the NICU, yes I placed a request for those statistics, and I am aware that there are some doctors requiring similar data. But mine is for a differen purpose..
- Oh... alright.... because... I have a request here from Dr. Okamembe.... So yours is a different one?
- Yes, Elsa Afonso. E-L-S-A A-F-O-N-S-O
- Ahhhh . Alfonso, ! I have it here.. So can you pick them up this afternoon?
- Well, I was there this morning, I tried to talk to Fiona, but she wasn't in 'til 9 o'clock, and because I am on nights, I thought' I'd ring you a try to find a solution. Is it possible to post them internally to the NICU? And I would have them when I got there, at 8 pm..?
- Oh, yeah, sure! I'm actually on my way home, I'll drop by in the NICU and leave the package for you at the front desk...!
- Oh that'll be great, thank you very much! So my name is Elsa Afonso, E-L-S-A A-F-O-N-S-O. Staff Nurse, I'm a staff Nurse in the NICU.
- Ok, got that, .. i'll drop the stuff there for you, don't worry...
- Thanks, thanks, bye-.!
- Bye, take care!"

A couple of hours pass, I reach the NICU lockers room at around 7.55 pm and this is what I hear:

- Elsa? there was a lady dropping something for you, [laughs]
- Oh really ? Cool!
- Yeah, Bernie has it, it's quite fun.
- Fun? hum.... why?
- Well, just go and check it out,,, we took a while to figure out who was that for,, but then we got it.

(intrigued--- i run to get the envelope)

..
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.

:::::::::::::::::::::::::::::: DR ELFONSO::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::
:::::::::::::::::::::::NATIONALITY STATISTICS:::::::::::::::::::::

i rest my case.

2009-07-25T17:48:00.001+01:00

2009-07-25T11:53:00.002+01:00

Rock paper scissors

nunca tive uma alcunha

2009-07-24T20:46:00.002+01:00

será que as mães que, nos anos 70 e 80, chamaram Ana às suas filhas, sabiam que mais tarde ou mais cedo elas iriam ser ou a Ana Grande ou a Ana Pequena ou a Ana do peugeot amarelo ou pior ainda - Ana Banana ? nunca simplesmente Ana? Há vantagens em ter um nome foleiro e invulgar: uma delas é que não dá azo a pseudónimos constrangedores (o nome em si já faz o truque)

- a cena é fazer um "tick" na caixinha "gosto de mulheres"

2009-07-19T11:17:00.000+01:00

Diz o presidente do Instituto Português do Sangue, convicto de que está a providenciar informação imprescindível e actualizada.
Isto tudo porque anda uma discussão acesa em Portugal em relação a haver ou não descriminação para com os homossexuais que são dadores de sangue.

"Por razões anatómicas, os homens estão mais expostos a doenças graves que possam ser transmitidas".

Gostava de poder dizer ao senhor que esta afirmação não tem valor científico absolutamente nenhum, até porque há evidência que a transmissão homem - mulher é muito mais provável do que mulher - homem, devido às "características anatómicas" das mulheres e a sua vulnerabilidade fisiológica.

A razão pela qual o vírus é associado às relações sexuais homossexuais é a ausência de um método barreira de protecção (e.g. o preservativo). Ora, isso é um risco que todos nós, independentemente da nossa orientação sexual, podemos correr.

However, o estigma em relação ao VIH e aos homossexuais tem 30 anos e fundamentalmente não há factos científicos que contradigam o preconceito profundo. O preconceito é irracional, infundado e ridículo. Fiquemos então no nosso cantinho pequenino a remoer nas nossas catalogações mesquinhas e vamos ignorar todas as recomendações internacionais porque essas, obviamente, são erradas e - uma expressão que gosto imenso - "anti-naturais".

já diziam os dEUS . "everybody's weird"

Yeah Yeah Yeahs - Zero

2009-07-14T18:11:00.001+01:00

e isto é para celebrar o facto de hoje ter comprado um par de ténis cinzentos e azul turquesa. estava em shuffle e foi esta que tocou.

sim, é o pior corte de cabelo do mundo e eles são super hiper pirosos. mas são maravilhosos a dançar em cima de carros.
get your leather on

jejejej

2009-07-13T12:38:00.001+01:00

in a peculiar search in google.

what i found

{the last} polaroids of dublin

as lilis deste mundo.

2009-07-08T11:12:00.001+01:00

estar vivo é o contrário de estar morto, versão Sarah Palin.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2009/jul/07/sarah-palin-resignation

2009-06-26T17:43:00.002+01:00

o michael jackson morreu. pronto, pronto, já passou. há toda uma parte do nosso cérebro que só se lembra dos passos do billie jean e dos milhões de cópias que vendeu o thriller. era um ícone. era bom, muito bom. era provavelmente o melhor e como disseram já muitos, parte da pop morre com ele.

honestamente, acho que Michael Jackson já tinha morrido há algum tempo, agora foi só um detalhe físico que estava por acertar. talvez para onde tenha ido possa ter uma Neverland sem que ninguém o chame de pedófilo.

.

2009-06-20T17:31:00.006+01:00

Iran . Paolo Pellegrin . Magnum Photos. 2009

kant once said that we do not see things as they are, but as we are. honestly, this is my pedestal at the moment. and i truly believe that it is just a matter of reciprocity and reslessness of heart until this apparently narcisistic sentence becomes altruistic enough to be considered organic,

because there is no other way

all that you can do is watch them play

confirmation

2009-06-11T12:47:00.000+01:00

hi i am elsa and i have issues with exercising power

2009-06-05T00:10:00.002+01:00

mae, a tia elsa anda de maneira engracada
tia, os pirilampos sao anjinhos?
anda jogar a bola no corredor!
se la onde estas faz frio porque e que nao vens para ca?

as vezes lembro-me

it's roastin t'day

2009-06-02T17:56:00.002+01:00

esta um calor que nao se pode. ou pode-se. pode-se muito !! adora-se !!!!!! NAO SE CONSEGUE PENSAR NOUTRA COISA.!!!!!

ou entao sim....mas isso fica para depois

grande 128

heheh

eleven years after

2009-05-23T07:11:00.001+01:00

98. o ano da expo. o ano de santiago de compostela. o ano da elsa do sudoeste. o ano do decimo ano e das cagadelas de pombo a passar no estadio do bonfim. dos tenis da nike azul turquesa e das aulas de matematica as 7 da tarde. de uma noite sozinha na sala a meia noite a ver o canal dois e de repente esta musica toca. that was how it started

2009-05-21T15:11:00.001+01:00

a nuca debaixo de agua traz o silencio.

2009-05-02T20:34:00.002+01:00

According to the 2007 Census, population in Ireland has augmented considerably between 2001 and 2006. This evidence is vindicated through the boost of immigration observed within this time frame, and a change of this nature will inevitably alter the make up of the population which requires healthcare.

The subject of migration and health is a mistreated one. In the specific case of Ireland, there is a dearth of documented information regarding the manner how immigrants access healthcare and how does this influence their health status.

As per Rafnsson ‘the unique challenge for health services is to reach out to all people equally, migrant/ethnic-minority groups and populations alike. (…) It behoves us to take the actions now that will make Europe a more cohesive and successful place in the years to come’.

yet...
this article was published in 2005.
...and i believe it is the biggest atrocity ever said by an irish . and it proves how racist the irish health system is.

‘Dublin now safest city in world for births’

By Niall Hunter-Editor

A major drop in the number of non-national mothers from outside the EU giving birth here has been recorded since the ‘yes’ vote in the citizenship referendum last year, according to the National Maternity Hospital in Holles Street.

Former Holles Street Master Dr Declan Keane told irishhealth.com that prior to the referendum, 16% of the deliveries at the hospital were to non-EU women and five per cent were to women from other EU countries.

He said that since the referendum, this figure had been reversed, with 16% of births now accounted for by mothers from other EU countries and five per cent to mothers from outside the EU

"The citizenship issue has changed things around dramatically-it has been a complete turnaround, with many of the EU mothers coming from the new accession states and fewer Nigerians now giving birth." The hospital delivered about 8,400 infants in 2004.

[article can be found at
http://www.irishhealth.com/article.html?id=6796]

Tropfest NY 2008 winner, "Mankind Is No Island" by Jason van Genderen

2009-04-28T20:04:00.001+01:00

i could write something about it
i might

2009-04-28T19:51:00.001+01:00

H O W A B O U T S O M E H O M E M A D E ANTHROPOLOGY ?

and look closely again on to the nearest corner

a very interesting sound

2009-04-28T19:49:00.001+01:00

2009-04-18T19:12:00.000+01:00

2009-04-18T19:06:00.002+01:00

' for gammas, deltas and epsilons had been to some extent conditioned to associate corporeal mass with social superiority. Indeed, a faint hypnopaedic prejudice in favour of size was universal. hence the laughter of the women to whom he made proposals, the practical joking of his equals among the men. the mockery made him feel an outsider; and feeling an outsider he behaved like one, which increased the prejudice against him and intensified the contempt and hostility aroused by his physical defects . which in turn increased his sense of being alien and alone.'

Aldous Huxley, Brave New World (because of everything in my mind now )

- ou o reler de livros escondidos atrás da mesa de cabeceira [e não saber onde se pôs o que se estava a ler anteriormente]

2009-04-17T08:31:00.002+01:00

ha uma little Britain street em dublin.
and now for something completely diferent.

para os putos de doze anos que me ouvem. o que quer que queiram ser quando forem grandes, sejam. não dêem ouvidos aos irmãos. what goes around always comes around.
[orientação sexual incluida]

vou dormir

moka midi madness

2009-04-15T19:30:00.002+01:00

if only all holiday where like last year's , when mom and dad didn't have any money and we kind of hung around in town, there were some sunny spells once in a while
aunt rosie got us a plastic pool for the backyard and we played all time long and had microwave popcorn for tea time
and i met this cute neighbor amber and we sat there playing all summer , then she moved to australia in october, and
that's when it started to rain again - they said that summer had fell off on the 16th of june but for me it was cool to see the trains that go to the city with amber both feet soaked in mud and leftovers of crisps in our pockets
but then we had to go to the south of france i don't understand these guys, it's fucking raining since we got here i'm having a coke in a cafe in a town that kind of looks like scotland without sheep
i wish i had my backyard filled with rusty bycicle wheels sharing cheese and onion snacks and marbles with amber my neighbor that moved to the other side of the world
dad just said recession was to blame

because of the things

2009-04-03T09:48:00.003+01:00

frankie vallie-beggin (pilooski re-edit)

2009-03-19T22:56:00.001Z

and here's for the good re-edits and fuck the shitty cover

cheers arritmia !

nerdices

2009-03-17T10:21:00.001Z

st patricks day.
parade.

fico em casa. não sei muito bem o que é que isso diz de mim...

2009-03-15T09:45:00.004Z

 'We are at an unprecedented watershed in human history: In 2008 the urban population of the planet will for the first time overtake the rural. At the almost the exact same moment, the number of people living in slums is passing one billion, or a third of every person living in a city or town. The United Nations predicts that over the next few decades, the world’s slum population will double, meaning the urban slum is perhaps the fastest growing human habitat on the planet. 

 
 This story leads the reader through one of the largest of Mumbai’s slums, Dharavi. Presenting plenty of squalor right in the middle of the ever-modernizing city, the slum has also always been a place where new arrivals found their footing, made business, and started a life. 
 "Mumbai," wrote V.S. Naipaul, "is a crowd". Dharavi, with people oozing out of every crack and countless quarters of artisans and small industries, is often referred to as the throbbing heart of the city. From garment sweatshops to big trash recycling facilities, Dharavi is a beehive whose yearly economic output is estimated to be in excess of five hundred million dollars. The fact is that many of the biggest megacities of the planet could barely do without their slums anymore, home to so many cogs of the great logistical machinery of keeping enormous cities ticking. 
 Today Dharavi slum, home and workplace of up to a million people, is at the centre of a tug-of-war between the residents who have built their lives there and city planners, who are seeking to redevelop the valuable piece of real estate. If these plans go through, for good or bad, everything that is currently Dharavi will be demolished. 

 What does it mean to be an urban citizen on planet earth in the 21st century? For more and more millions of people, it means one of the world’s innumerable Dharavis.

2009-03-10T19:35:00.004Z

' there is milk of humanity flowing in you '

quote of the week by A.A.

2009-02-22T23:43:00.001Z

tinha de ser

2009-02-20T09:13:00.000Z

aparentemente, na terra mãe, as discussões não mudam muito.
de acordo com fontes multimedia a que acedo regularmente, a força política portuguesa sugere referendar o casamento homossexual.
tenho uma ou duas coisas a dizer sobre isto.
primeiro, acho que não, tal como acho que o aborto não devia ter sido referendado. Há um certo poder de decisão que não pode exercido através da força da moral e do senso-comum, pelo simples facto de que não governam nações e não se criam leis há algumas décadas com base no que diz o pensamento popular. Normalmente tem-se em conta a legislação e discussão internacional, a ciência e o contexto, unica e exclusivamente no sentido de aplicabilidade, nível de aceitação e sustentabilidade das leis.
Quando um bispo vem para a praça pública afirmar que ser homossexual "não é normal", as coisas estão graves. porque, quer a gente goste deles quer não, eles existem. e existem há muitos anos, e existem homens a ter sexo com homens, homens a ter sexo com homens e a voltar para casa para as suas esposas e filhos, homens a ter sexo com meninos, homens apaixonados por homens e, tal como uma mulher apaixonada por um homem, querem poder exercer o direito de viver juntos maritalmente.
Esta semana ouvi um catedrático a questionar um gay se ser gay era uma escolha ou uma predestinação, ao que este respondeu. ser gay não é uma escolha, tal como ser heterossexual não é uma escolha, tal como gostar de threesomes não é uma escolha, ou usar roupas de mulher à escondida não é uma escolha. É simplesmente humano, na complexidade toda que implica ser humano e perante a linha ténue que separa o normal do anormal.
há uma lei em alguns países asiáticos que condena a homossexualidade a pena de morte, quando descoberta. esta lei foi criada pelos colonizadores britânicos há duzentos anos atrás e ainda não mudou, levando a problemas socais graves de integração social e até de saúde pública, uma vez que há toda uma promoção de saúde sexual e prevenção de DSTs que não é feita porque este grupo não tem acesso aos serviços de saúde.
na irlanda, os homossexuais não poder ser dadores de sangue, porque supostamente são grupos de risco para o HIV. mas na irlanda também não se pode fazer abortos, a contracepção é para os ricos, as mulheres são ostracizadas quando não casam ou quando se divorciam e no entanto a percentagem de mães adolescentes está perto da do reino unido, o consumo de tabaco e droga aumenta a olhos vistos e o de álcool nem se fala.
há questões que só a moral justifica, e da mesma forma que alguns países muçulmanos a mulher é um ser inferior e incompreendido só porque tem um par de mamas e carece de pénis, não pode mostrar a cara, não pode votar e pode ser apedrejada na rua porque mostrou um pêlo do nariz, nos países ocidentais fazemos exactamente o mesmo com tudo o que não processamos na nossa mente pequenina.
meus caros, há uma recessão mundial, e apesar de vós achardes que é uma grande desolação perder dez por cento do salário, deixardes de comer fora uma vez por semana, ou de satisfazer os vossos desejos mais fúteis, há alguém na costa do marfim que em vez de viver com 1,25 por dia vai passar a viver com 75cent. provavelmente vai morrer, e who cares?
vamos deixar-nos de tretas mais uma vez, deixar de olhar para o sócrates e para o caso freeport como se fosse o centro do mundo e como se os tremoços de fossem acabar amanhã. o mundo vai além de elvas e da cova do vapor.
acho que não devia ser referendado.
acho que alguém se devia chegar à frente e dizer. meus caros, não há motivo válido para proibir o casamento entre homossexuais. não vai matar ninguém, mas vai chocar muitos. a mim também me choca muita coisa, but isn't life just like that?

Technotronic - Get Up! (Before The Night Is Over)

2009-02-19T09:30:00.001Z

a pedido, vai agora uma série diária de tesouros dos anos oitenta e noventa. é de salientar que tenho irmãos altamente envolvidos no mundo da musica na altura do extremo mau gosto, esta não é a minha opinião, afinal,
de onde emergiu o brit pop?
e antes de criar um blog sob a temática das casas de banho - será que vou ser next big thing em saneamento básico NOT
dispara-se a primeira bala de technotronic
o seu primeiro hit foi pump up the jam, mas os únicos vídeos que consegui arranjar no youtube estavam demasiado pixelizados e no caso de algum de vós querer aprender a coreografia, era lixado. então o get up get up get busy get up and move your body pareceu-me catchy o suficiente para ser representativo.
here goes something

2009-02-15T20:56:00.001Z

such great heights.

consigo imaginar cursos intensivos de medicina ali para os lados de ballymun dublin 11

2009-02-12T00:14:00.003Z

Rectum - Damn near killed 'em
Cauterize - Make eye contact with her
Barium - What you do after they die
Pelvis - A cousin of elvis
Urine - Opposite of your out
Morbid - A higher offer
Dilate - To live longer
Enema - Not a friend
Nitrates - Cheeper than day rates
Bacteria - Back door of a cafe
Caesarian Section - A neighbourhood in Rome
Siezure - A roman emporor
Artery - The study of paintings
Cat scan - Searching for lost kitty
Vein - Conceited
Medical Staff - A doctors cane
Tumor - An additional pair
Terminal ilness - Getting sick at the airport
Bowel - A-E-I-O-U
Vericose - Nearby
Iris - The cleaning lady
Colon - A punctuation mark
Navel - Ships and boats
Capillary - The young life of a butterfly
Humerous - Funny or amusing
Noble gas - Conversation at a royal dinner
Diaphragm - A technical drawing

é isso e pedirem um fag love e um 'loiter'

tudo isto ao som do pump up the jam ,technotronics, agradeçam por não pôr o vídeoclip. relembra os momentos áureos das festas de garagem em fato de treino na casa da vizinha . and the dance oh lord.

2009-02-08T16:12:00.000Z

esta noite vi o tempo a passar muito depressa e decidi abrandar.

2009-02-08T15:51:00.001Z

2009-02-08T15:32:00.002Z

nunca estiveste muito perto, mas estavas sempre cá, e eu sabia sempre com as cartas que te escrevia com zero erros - sempre zero erros - que havias de estar de volta outra vez de madrugada.
e íamos ao aeroporto e eu saltava muito quando o aeroporto da portela ainda me parecia muito grandee um lugar com luzes gigantes onde as pessoas se reencontravam,. se calhar por isso é que gosto tanto de aeroportos. davas-me um abraço muito forte - eu era a mais pequenina dos três, ficava com a cara cheia de pintas vermelhas por causa da barba [ainda hoje fico] e depois íamos comer torradas e galões para uma pastelaria da joão XXI.
depois ficaste algum tempo.
ganhaste hábitos estranhos de quem viu o mundo antes dos outros todos. e ninguém te percebia quando falavas de áfrica e de todos os sítios que visitaste só porque sim. entravas-nos nos quarto às nove da manhã de sábado, e a minha irmã ripostava., tapava-se com o edredon de corações rosa verdes e amarelos e tu mesmo assim incomodava-la com um carinho imenso traduzido nas palavras 'já é quase meio-dia-ninguém dorme nesta casa!'. e ria-me que nem uma perdida, e adquiri aquela sensação que depois chamei 'sensação de sábado de manhã', que é quando estamos mesmo muito muito felizes e uma comichão agradável nos atravessa o peito, quase um estado de pós beber água quando temos muita sede.
foi assim durante algum tempo, de galochas a cortar árvores de natal - nunca te lembravas em que ano é que eu estava a estudar, mas isso nunca me pareceu importante. a fingir arranjar a bicicleta só para te imitar a ti e ao mano.
desenhaste o telhado e só acreditaram quando o montaste.
mostraste-me um bocadinho do mundo à tua maneira - dentro de uma auto-caravana a caír de podre, que sobreaqueceu nos pirenéus, ficou sem bateria no sul de frança, foi comida pelos mosquitos em espanha e quase caíu ao canal em amesterdão. ensinaste-me a guiá-la nas ruas estreitas de lisboa.
quase nunca estás perto. mas estás sempre ao pé de mim quando preciso, ainda hoje que sou eu que estou longe.
lembras.te desta música? que mostraste ao avô zé da pampilhosa da serra que tocava trompa na banda da aldeia ? ele gostou. e é por causa dele que sempre que me perguntam se prefiro beatles ou rolling stones respondo 'beatles, definitely'.

obrigada, pai
e parabéns..

é bom ter nome para dar às coisas

2009-01-27T18:59:00.001Z

2009-01-23T08:12:00.002Z

- ouve, não te quero mais a fazer pesquisas em motores de busca na net. primeiro descobres hostels maravilhosas no meio do nada com velhas que vão ao bingo a quarta e feira e nos acendem a lareira. depois é casas com vista para a o liffey e plasmas embutidos na parede com dvd integrado. isso é o quê? pagas ao google para te dar prioridade em relação aos outros? e não é ténis que se diz, é sapatilhas foda-se.

para a próxima, ler os contratos e gravar os documentos, everything else is fine !

no matter what . don't panic

2009-01-16T19:05:00.004Z

hoje, correria no quarto, correria na mente -
sete da tarde,
statement from phantom 105.2
'ireland is closed for business'

e depois no pc a radar passa animal collective na mais perfeita das harmonias

ain't this world beautiful?

welcome to air, 2009

2008-12-22T12:39:00.003Z

o natal vai passar-me ao lado, vou queimar os últimos cartuxos deste blogue com nostalgia do ano que passou, um texto escrito no 22 que faz o caminho entre o aeroporto e o marquês de pombal, e uma sequência de fotos de michelle hayes com uma máscara de pai natal com cheiro a pessoas mortas e a comer pancheta , uma espécie de noodles filipinos. uma iguaria quando misturado com torta dan cake marca tesco com sabor a morango.

2008-12-22T12:24:00.002Z

lisboa, dez da manhã de dia útil de nariz eriçado à porta das casa das paragens de autocarros e nas rotundas dantescas as pessoas deambulam gélidas como que se inequívoco fosse o amanhã ser igual ao hoje e ao demais que decorre
fascinante esta inércia que faz com que o resto do mundo chegue aqui desigual tinta da china sobre cera nos desenhos do jardim de infância não se reconhece o ar que ficou imbuído de densitude leve os minutos são mais longos provavelmente porque o sol se esconde uma hora depois do habitual , claro. horas de sol . a força do hábiro.
pinto um polegar de encarnado como se de talismã se tratasse enrolo o cachecol ao pescoço e subo a rua do elevador às vezes tento entender
o que se passa aqui e a única conclusão a que chego é a de que só consigo ser contemplativa, mais nada o criticismo voltou-se para o outro lado
abanam os ramos despidos um frémito abandonado em prédios e jardins e a boca das pessoas que custa a sorrir custa , não sorrimos muito, desiludam-se os optimistas.
é surreal penduraram-nos ao pescoço uma medalha de participação , a coroa de mérito da tentativa, os louros da meia viagem e caminhamos indiferentes por fora, em ebulição por dentro.
a querer atravessar o muro num sono surrealista preso ao quente da cama entre paredes brancas de friso amarelo e azulejos centenários
dezembro, dez e quinze em lisboa, a cidade da luz às vezes cinza preguiçosa e pecadora, paradoxalmente apaixonante . o café nicola, o cigarro
saudades , engrenagem desta terra que suspira por um messias, sem saber que ele já cá está
mas ficou esquecido nas mãos de um velho que ganhou pânico ao mar e pavor de ir em
frente

doze do doze de dois mil e oito que está quase a acabar

2008-12-22T12:21:00.001Z

last night [mare] before christmas

2008-11-18T13:47:00.003Z

'we do not look directly at a particular society .it is not possible. we are more likely to look at individuals that are part of that society and the way they interact with each other and with the environment that surrounds them.'

dr Beth Ann Roch

in a bus heading to the city centre, all faces seem familiar and at the same time, they are actually strangers. the boy with the scar on the upper lip, the man with no socks. the bus stops in front of phoenix view and some drunkers try to open a blue door with a hole. people's clothes.
a night off to see the way the sky crashes above our heads and realise there is nothing we can do about it but gaze.
the thing here is to actively gaze... ?