Humanity, on a piece of rock spiraling through space | Lisbon, Portugal
July 23, 2022 2 Comments
Humanity, on a piece of rock spiraling through space, wow! On day 9, when I arrived to a green space on the property of a university, I decided to sleep there, my sleeping bag tucked into a canvas bag to be more discrete about being ‘homeless’. The grounds had all these cats, really funny. Upon waking and standing up, decided to head up the hill, turned a corner to see that I was in front of the Prime Minister’s home, glanced across the street to see several cameras perched on the sidewalk. The Prime Minister was inside discussing the environment with another diplomat, and the journalists were waiting for him to appear.
Actually, it was about “decentralization process“, said Prime Minister António Costa at the signing ceremony of the agreement between the Government and the National Association of Portuguese Municipalities for the decentralization of competences in the areas of Education and Health, at the headquarters of the ANMP, in Coimbra.”
I left, then saw two blond-haired students towing their luggage, they told me of a hostel…then after investigating the gay man who owned the hostel on the ground floor of this building pointed me to a place to eat upon my inquiry, which he recommended.
It was a lovely environment, lovely food and ambience. Very well dressed, genteel clientele. Here in the café I interacted with a toddler and her parents, and later starting chatting with the mother. Turns out she and I have a very similar perspective and I really appreciated her opening up. She reminds me very much in attitude and spirit of the French woman I met in Montpellier, seriously.
When I left the café, in the heat i reached the park finally where I had intended to sleep the night before (which I never found) – fortunately – because it would have been closed > gates close at 7pm. Fascinating place, I walk in to see and hear chickens, then learn from reading the signs that it had last been a convent, and from an elderly local woman, that once it had lots of dogs in the dog kennels. Seems that the convent wished to make it a sanctuary for animals. I was amused to see the chickens walking around and clucking. They calmly tolerated the cats walking around. I had heard the peacocks with their strange almost human sounding screams, and in the dusty walks among parched vegetation, I then happened upon this mini oasis of water, with ducks and species of birds I didn’t recognize. I bothered to keep pulling out my ipad to take photos, decided to walk up these stairs, and there they were, the peacocks. https://www.lisbonportugaltourism.com/guide/tapada-das-necessidades.html “pink palace standing on a hilltop facing the river was completed just five years before the Great Earthquake of 1755, and was the only royal residence that remained standing in the disaster. Over the years, it was also used as a convent and as a hospice, which explains the cross that tops the portico. Today, it’s home to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and is not open to the public.”
I left as it was closing and decided to leave there and dutifully head back to Starbucks for internet to search for housing. I walked by and into a little terrace with music. I didn’t want to take pictures as a voyeur although I really wanted to. A speaker sat in the dust. Three girls no older than 7 danced in front of a fountain, sort of doing a dance routine that was much more mature and provocative. I turned to see two women. They were in silk type long dresses, had dark skin, both had home-bleached blond hair, and appeared to have gotten married (the 2 women). They posed showing their tattoos on their ankles from the slits in their dresses. An obese woman in a flashy colored top sat facing the little girls, adjusting her false eyelashes that were falling off. I think these were Roma, gypsies.
Then bicycled along a path by the water, and then suddenly discovered an impromptu bar, dj’d with beats, very Berlin style with the mannequin. It was at a metro stop, right on the track platform. They sell beer and pizza. There was a massage table, some people sitting around smoking joints. Met an Italian guy who actually identified and recognized my X patch, asking if that was “extinction rebellion”? I was pleasantly surprised that he knew.
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