Palavras lidas #368

History Lesson
by Jeff Coomer

My grandfather left school at fourteen
to work odd jobs until he was old enough
to join his Lithuanian kin chipping
anthracite out of the Pennsylvania hills.
Nine hours a day with five hundred feet
of rock over his head, then an hour’s
ride home on the company bus
to a dinner of boiled cabbage and chicken.
When the second big war broke
he headed “sout,” as he pronounced it,
for better work in the blast furnaces
churning out steel along the shores
of the Chesapeake. Thirty-two years
and half an index finger later he retired
to a brick rancher he built with his own hands
just outside the Baltimore city line.
The spring he got cancer and I got a BA
from a private college we stood under
a tree in his backyard while he copped
a smoke out of my grandmother’s sight.
“Tell me, Pop,” I said, wanting to strike up
a conversation, “how did you like
working in the mills all those years?”
He studied my neatly pressed white shirt,
took a long drag on his cigarette and spit a fleck
of tobacco near my shoes. “Like,” he said,
“didn’t have a thing to do with it.”

Sem título #98

These days in Ghouta, east of Damascus in Syria...

when will the world get tired of seeing these images?

Por estes dias em Ghouta, a leste de Damasco na Síria...

quando é que o mundo se cansará de ver imagens destas?

Espantos #538

Friends tell me Spring has sprung in Tennessee, pink trees abound.

here it has not....

snow instead was in view as I walked out the door this morning.

For once the Canada geese are seen when not eating... they don't seem that happy with the scenario from the "motherland."

Parece que estou a ouvir #250

Still on the ongoing conversation about Caetano...

me: "the lyrics are sad in all songs I sent you, but that's the Caetano I like"
her: "I like fun Caetano too"

me: "I do too, but for me that's like milk chocolate... I like dark chocolate SO MUCH that I almost never eat milk chocolate"

Praia da Areia Branca, Lourinhã, Portugal

_______________

Debaixo dos caracóis
letra & música de Roberto e Erasmo Carlos (em homenagem a Caetano)
canta Caetano Veloso

Um dia a areia branca seus pés irão tocar
E vai molhar seus cabelos a água azul do mar
Janelas e portas vão se abrir pra ver você chegar
E ao se sentir em casa, sorrindo vai chorar

Debaixo dos caracóis dos seus cabelos
Uma historia pra contar de um mundo tão distante
Debaixo dos caracóis dos seus cabelos
Um soluço e a vontade de ficar mais um instante

As luzes e o colorido
Que você vê agora
Nas ruas por onde anda,
na casa onde mora
Você olha tudo e nada
Lhe faz ficar contente
Você só deseja agora
Voltar pra sua gente

Debaixo dos caracóis dos seus cabelos
Uma historia pra contar de um mundo tão distante
Debaixo dos caracóis dos seus cabelos
Um soluço e a vontade de ficar mais um instante

Você anda pela tarde
E o seu olhar tristonho
Deixa sangrar no peito
Uma saudade, um sonho
Um dia vou ver você
Chegando num sorriso
Pisando a areia branca
Que é seu paraíso.

Debaixo dos caracóis dos seus cabelos
Uma historia pra contar de um mundo tão distante
Debaixo dos caracóis dos seus cabelos
Um soluço e a vontade de ficar mais um instante

Retirado do contexto #243

Apesar de não ter graça nenhuma passar tempo no trânsito

sempre que vejo um sinal de "diverted traffic"

só consigo pensar no divertido que vai ser ;-)

Caprichos #472

Jacintos que recomeçam

Parece que estou a ouvir #249

My Italian friend said to me "I fell in love with Caetano's music," which made me think "It's been so long I've listened to Caetano!!"

Sonhos

Caetano Veloso

Tudo era apenas uma brincadeira
E foi crescendo, crescendo, me absorvendo
E de repente eu me vi assim completamente seu

Vi a minha força amarrada no seu passo

Vi que sem você não há caminho, eu não me acho
Vi um grande amor gritar dentro de mim
Como eu sonhei um dia

Quando o meu mundo era mais mundo
E todo mundo admitia
Uma mudança muito estranha
Mais pureza, mais carinho mais calma, mais alegria
No meu jeito de me dar

Quando a canção se fez mais clara e mais sentida
Quando a poesia realmente fez folia em minha vida
Você veio me falar dessa paixão inesperada
Por outra pessoa

Mas não tem revolta não
Só quero que você se encontre
Saudade até que é bom
Melhor que caminhar vazio
A esperança é um dom
Que eu tenho em mim, eu tenho sim
Não tem desespero não
Você me ensinou milhões de coisas
Tenho um sonho em minhas mãos
Amanhã será um novo dia
Certamente eu vou ser mais feliz

Coisas que não mudam #437

Um pato reflectivo e outro no vai não vai

Numa sala perto de mim #363

Last Flag Flying (2017) on a father's drama of losing a child in a senseless war and knowing that such episode has been repeating generation after generation. Besides the remarkable performance of Steve Carell (the father of the deceased), who has much less lines and much more emotion than his fellow actors, the movie made me think about (a) what you miss of life is not the old days, is your younger self, (b) decades may go by but certain traits of character do not change, (c) long or short lives, we should focus on what we have rather than what we failed to get.

Retirado do contexto #242

Vilamoura, Algarve, Portugal

Recently at a UK Post office counter:

me: I'd like to send this package to Portugal.

him: Of course! 

[he reads the address and types it on the computer] 

he: So this 1700 is the zip code?

me: Yes.

him: Lis-bo-a... whereabouts is that? Anywhere near Vilamoura?

me: No. Vilamoura is in the Algarve, which is in the south. Lisboa is in the centre by the sea on the West coast. You've been to Vilamoura?

him [with the most candid smile]: I LOVED it!! A tad expensive... but very beautiful!

me: I am sure :-)

_______

Let's face it: Britons go to Portugal because of the bad weather they endure... not much else :-)

Caprichos #471

Uma prenda de natal muito útil!

Hoje vi um pássaro que nunca tinha visto antes!

Pelo que leio no livro, o dito pássaro ou era fémea ou ainda não era adulto porque tinha muito mais tons de cinzento que a imagem do pássaro adulto que é preto e branco.

Caprichos #470

Chocolate diferente

Numa sala perto de mim #362

Darkest Hour (2017) shows the first three weeks of Winston Churchill's mandate as Prime Minister of the UK. The movie portrays a difficult moment in that country's history, when the threat of foreign invasion was non negligible and the alternative of negotiating peace was tempting given the potentially devastating effects of the loss of 300,000 troops at Dunkirk. 

Churchill is portrayed as moody, temperamental, and resolute, as he was in Churchill (2017), but the comparison of the character in the two movies is contrasting. In Darkest Hour, we see a determined political leader in the first days of the War gaining the confidence of the public, his party, and cementing his own, whereas in Churchill we see the same man worn out by four relentless years of war. In both occasions Churchill vehemently questioned the establishment, but while early in the war he proved right, later on he proved wrong. Both movies have a slow pace, perhaps conveying the inordinate amount of time involved in the delicate political maneuvers at the backstage of the war.

Brian Cox and Gary Oldman each play a good Churchill, but it was Gary Oldman who got the nomination for best actor in a leading role for Darkest Hour.

Ditto #379

Whatever the fight, don't be ladylike.

--Mother Jones

Palavras lidas #367

The Good Life
by Tracy K. Smith

When some people talk about money
They speak as if it were a mysterious lover
Who went out to buy milk and never
Came back, and it makes me nostalgic
For the years I lived on coffee and bread,
Hungry all the time, walking to work on payday
Like a woman journeying for water
From a village without a well, then living
One or two nights like everyone else
On roast chicken and red wine.

Coisas que não mudam #436

A generosidade herda-se

Espantos #537

Recentemente Maria João Pires anunciou que iria terminar a sua participação em concertos durante o ano de 2018... não é a primeira vez que o anuncia, mas alguma vez será verdade. 

Sábado passado (e também na sexta e no domingo) no Auditori de Barcelona, Maria João Pires tocou o concerto de Mozart para dois pianos e orquestra (nº10 em Mi bemol maior, KV 365 (316a)), acompanhada pelo jovem pianista Ignasi Cambra, que, é cego. O concerto em si é já um árduo trabalho de coordenação dos dois pianistas com a orquestra, recaindo no maestro a tarefa de fazer com que todos estejam no tempo certo... ora com uma pianista de renome, será sempre a orquestra a segui-la, mas com o outro pianista cego é impossível a coordenação entre os dois sendo o mais provável que ela o siga a ele. Um óptimo espectáculo e se foi por ventura uma das últimas oportunidades para ver Maria João Pires ao vivo, ainda mais memorável.

Coisas que não mudam #435

Por aqui continua a comezaina...

qüem, qüem, qüem!

Espantos #536

Em Gràcia...

este Marxismo sim ;-)

Espantos #535

Eis senão quando, exactamente 8 anos e 11 meses depois,

um misto de granizo e neve volta a pintar Barcelona de branco...

já não se pode dizer que não há neve no chão em Barcelona!

8 de Fevereiro de 2018

Caprichos #469

Quick Heathrow moments:

a piano that begs to be played but the passers by are too busy,

lovely advertising,

a sushi train!!

The welcoming (and life sized!) Harrods bear

(click on the picture to see the price tag)

at least he is not trapped inside a phone booth...

Paddington bears!

Beautiful tea boxes.

Leaving the commercial area behind, on the way to the gates there are images that evoke travel and need no words.

Parece que estou a ouvir #248

Still from 3 Billboards... this time from the very beginning

Last Rose of Summer

sung by Renée Fleming
poem by Thomas Moore
Irish traditional tune

'Tis the last rose of summer,
Left blooming alone;
All her lovely companions
Are faded and gone;
No flower of her kindred,
No rosebud is nigh,
To reflect back her blushes,
And give sigh for sigh.

I'll not leave thee, thou lone one!
To pine on the stem;
Since the lovely are sleeping,
Go sleep thou with them.
Thus kindly I scatter,
Thy leaves o'er the bed,
Where thy mates of the garden
Lie scentless and dead.

So soon may I follow,
When friendships decay,
And from love's shining circle
The gems drop away.
When true hearts lie withered,
And fond ones are flown,
Oh who would inhabit
This bleak world alone?

Espantos #534

"The Berlin Wall has now been down longer than it was up"... is the title of an article yesterday on The Economist. And all of those who remember it coming down in 1989 are so much more aware of their age after reading that sentence!

Numa sala perto de mim #361

The Post (2017) tells the story behind the release of the Pentagon Papers on the Washington Post, after the White House barred the New York Times from publication of the said papers. To risk one's freedom, company, and hundreds of jobs depending on it is no easy task... especially being a woman in the 1970s when men were the default decision makers. You really have to believe you are doing the right thing. Katharine Graham did not end up in that position by choice, nor did she ever dream of being a newspaper publisher. But she did rise to the occasion.

Q: Wouldn't you go to prison to stop this war?

A: Theoretically, sure.

Parece que estou a ouvir #247

From 3 Billboards comes a beautiful country ballad, right at the end

Buckskin Stallion Blues

by Amy Annelle (original by Townes Van Zandt)

I heard her sing in tongues of silver
I heard her cry on a summer storm
I loved her, but she did not know it
So I don't think about her anymore
Now she's gone, and I can't believe it
So I don't think about her anymore

If three and four was seven only
Where would that leave one and two?
If love can be and still be lonely
Where does that leave me and you?
Time there was, and time there will be
Where does that leave me and you?

If I had a buckskin stallion
I'd tame him down and ride away.
If I had a flyin' schooner
I'd sail into the light of day
If I had your love forever
Sail into the light of day

Pretty songs and pretty places
Places that I've never seen
Pretty songs and pretty faces
Tell me what their laughter means
Some look like they'll cry forever
Tell me what their laughter means.

If I had a buckskin stallion
I'd tame him down and ride away.
If I had a golden galleon
I'd sail into the light of day
If I had your love forever
Sail into the light of day

Numa sala perto de mim #360

Three Billboards Outside of Ebbing, MO (2017) tells the story of a mother in need of answers relative to her daughter's death seven months prior, in a case that is turning cold. Nominated for seven academy awards, the movie shows conflicting feelings of anger and complacence, intimidation and generosity, stupidity and kindness, evil and redemption... the evolving characters have the viewer's sympathy shifting throughout. Also, many things in the movie ring true after living 8 years in the south! 

Frances McDormand's (Mildred Hayes, the mother) nomination for best actress is not surprising but that two other actors in the same movie were both nominated for best supporting actor is remarkable. Hats off to Sheriff Willoughby and Officer Dixon! Noteworthy soundtrack too.

Ditto #378

Memory is the story. Memories are what make us.

--Tobias Wolff

Caprichos #468

Surprise chocolate gifts

and from no other than Turin

even though coming from a London store!