Thursday 6 July 2017

Lisbon in July

Warm and windy. Wonderful! So much to see and do.
We find the Portuguese people we meet extremely friendly and mostly speaking excellent English and eager to help us benighted travellers whose Portuguese comprehension remains slightly minimal!!

We are in a delightful marina, small and quiet, in the Parque do Nacoes. Splendidly located, there is a waterfront walk all through the Parque and nearby is one of the best Aquariums we have ever visited (a cut about Dubai and Valencia and Monterey!).
We make frequnst expeditions into the centre of Lisbon, visiting monuments and wandering up the black-and-white paved streets of the Alfama district (topped by the Castle of Saint George, Castelo Sao Jorge).
I need to devote an entire section to the fado music and museum; and another to the food...

Here some short poems to whet the appetite:

Lisbon heat
In the still heat of the southern afternoon
there remains nothing to be said 
Too hot to argue or pronounce
and certainly to sing.
But the wind chivvies, stirs up
the dry seeds sheltering in unseen corners
eddying them into life
and lifts the dry leaves from
their lodging places in gutters and
cracks of pavements...
Let the music begin

Fado songs 

I understood but could not catch the words
to hold them in my memory.
I watched the faces of the singers:
their eyes closed to hold inside the memories
of pain, of grief, of jealousy, of rage...
The translations into English
appeared on the screen below:
"I sing of life
and all its mysteries"

Vinho Branco

In the shade, on a hot afternoon
A glass jug and three beakers
The wine a palest gold
and cold, moisture gathers on the jug's outside
We drink...
The joy of coolness quenching a hot day

(Written on 2-7- 2017)

Our plan is to stay here several weeks on the boat in the marina, visiting Lisbon every other day. We have also booked a couple of nights in Sintra next week.
I record the sights on my smartphone and manage to transfer the pix onto this laptop (not always!) which makes life easier.
Not yet a mistress of the intangible ether, but progressing...

So much to tell, so many thoughts during the hours of waking, and of course there are also the bright dreams!!
Feeling good in this corner of the world.