"Portugal Happened"
( Travel Around Portugal )
I have a friend name Lyanne. A month ago, she told me her story about travelling around Europe specially Portugal & Paris. But now, I tell you about her story in travelling around Portugal.
She had only landed in Portugal a day before coming face to face with those ill-fated chickens, and so far, everything about the country had been real and alive and unflinchingly raw. People ate well, stayed up drinking and dancing and laughing late into the night, and smiled at strangers on the street.
On their first night, my friend and her another friend sat perched at a tiny table outside a tapas bar until midnight, drinking glass after glass of dessert wine until the bottle was finally empty. Scruffy dogs begged for her attention and bites of her dinner, women dressed casually and wore little makeup, and she couldn’t care less about the open blisters on her feet or the peeling sunburn on her nose. She was too busy taking it all in.
She had given up eating meat four months before she arrived at the Mercado de Bolhao, an enormous market in Porto, and came face to face with those doomed birds.
My friend stayed 15 days in Portugal. And she said that strolling around Portugal was the best moment she ever experienced. She told me that, "passing endless stories, carrying more stories. Maybe an ending, maybe a beginning.
Second chance perhaps or a hope."
When Lisboa awakes.. My friend and her friend sit at the edge of the hill.
Their eyes gaze over the bridge
in silence while sun stretches its colours
and disappears into the moonlight as Lisboa awakes slowly into a beautiful night.
Covilha train ride and Walls of Covilha.. Deep solid strokes, some soft sweeps, giving life to empty walls, throughout the city, filling up people’s eyes and lives, with colours beyond the rainbow.
From the mind to the hand to the walls of Covilhã. A beautiful art gallery, on the back of the Estrela mountains.
* * *
A Sleepy Town With The Heart
There’s a small town somewhere in Portugal. Where life feels like an eternity of waiting. The stillness is so calming, you lose in space and time. A remedy for a city life. In her morning, she leaved the windows open. Inviting the light to come through. Sunshine so warm and golden. A morning that confirms the beauty,
beauty of life. Walking through the rolling hills, to the castle on top of the hill. Passing pine wood forests, with a smell that says home, it’s a feeling.
Moving slowly from stone to stone, she look back from top of the castle. Sun setting on one side, with a beautiful view
of the Figueira de Castelo Rodrigo.
* * *
A Magical Place On Earth
Dawn of the day, driving the long winding roads, reaching a magical place
called Sintra. She wonder, why it’s magical as people say? Up they go, to the heart of the fairy tale, expecting an epiphany. No two trees are the same. No two branches are the same. As if a paradise on Earth, showing off the diversity. Mist-soaked forests, pine smell welcoming, royalty rising through, with Atlantic, deep blue sea.
After dusk, walking in the dark, walking in silence listening to trees whisper. She wonder, why it’s magical as people say? Now she know, it’s where nature and the man become one.
* * *
A Walled City
Lifted from the pages of a fairy tale,
the walled city of Óbidos, a medieval charm of romance.
Walking along the cobblestone alleys, passing colourful doorways, smiling at bougainvillaea, all she can think of is falling deeply in love, love with Portugal.
* * *
Where The Sky Touches The Sea
Standing where the cliff ends, meeting a rebellious sea sending wave after wave. One might run away, but her feet,
longing the adventure. Only the greatest of wave goers touched these waters that
makes you relinquish your dominance,
becoming one with the sea, she hear.
Midst of all the grit and the thrill, an endearing charm exists. A beauty that puts her in reverie, yearning for their presence. Meet her in Nazaré,
where the sky touches the sea.
* * *
She's The Summer Rain
After the dust and heat, in the heart of Lisboa, where they met for long walks through the endless roads. Summer rain greets Lisboa with a smell of comfort.
Makes them think of your smile. Come over so we can cafuné.
Notes:
Cafuné (Brazilian Portuguese): the act of tenderly running fingers through someone’s hair.
