Cascais Saturday

I went to Cascais because I could not allow myself to leave without smelling again the bark of my dear aucalyptus trees. For a second I wanted to give up, it was crazy to go to a city just to smell some leaves and barks. Who on Earth does that? ... I went to my dear Cascais park, full of flowers and peacocks and filled my lungs with the lovely smell. I think I must have looked like a lost, crazy person walking around with her nose in the air, but to be honest, I did not care. On my way back I took the train, made friends with the policemen and finally missed one train. Of course, like an authentic tourist, I stopped in Belém to get my pasteis de Belém with me to Romania. For a few minutes I had a huge panick attack when I could not Picture myself without being able to take my car and drive it on marginal again. I managed to get away from those feelings but they were quite powerful. I got my pasteis, I jumped into the bus and went back home. I started to pack and unpack, and pack and unpack again trying to make the best choices so that I would not take more than 20kg with me. And then....I went to Bairro Alto for a short night out, a night with caipirinha and wine. I got back home, woke up early to get the plane, said goodbye with tears all over my face to my dear Tejo and my flowers and went away....got into the airport and as every single thing stopped working before I left (it all started on my birthday when I had a car accident, then my whole house kept falling apart piece by piece, the bucket broke, the heater stopped working 2 days before I left, the tv receiver refused to start working again one week before I left, the bathroom bulb exploaded one night before, everything was falling apart and I was only assisting at this show of events ....silently, smiling, wondering-what next? I even thought about people who did not want me there anymore....), the car battery collapsed and the driver had to call somebody else to move the car back home. At the airport I managed to negotiate nicely and efficiently so that I did not have to pay extra luggage for the 27kg luggage (when the maximum was 20kg) and I wished the guy at the counter the very best in life. Madrid was a nightmare. I kept receiving goodbye sms that only made me realize more and more what I have lost, I could not stop crying and I was alone in this turmoil of feelings. And then I got angry on the Romanian flight attendants, I wanted to make them understand what genuine kindness means, how genuine smiles come from the heart but I gave up on that battle.







Crossroads. Shinny crossroads that I met. Some look not as glamourous but I know deep in my heart (to be honest very deep, where I can hardly see) that they hide opportunities. I have to say my “thank you” for all the bliss that I lived, for being one of the few who were chosen to be allowed to dream with open eyes, to be one of the few able to have a way too special connection with the Portuguese air and sky and Sun that to feel that I was in tune with everything and everybody. In the meantime I have turned into a frightened hedgehog who is waiting silently for other opportunities, who sometimes wishes it could erase memory like in “Eternal Sunshine of A Spoteless Mind” and move on, but who knows that erasing all these will make erase all the beautiful, unique moments. A colleague of mine asked me before I left “why are you so sad? Have you left behind a Great love?”, another one asked me “hey, if you left a guy behind I will make him keep you here” – I have no idea but I know that as childish and naive and now repetitive it may seem, the answer is “yes”, I have left behind a great love of mine ... and maybe something else as well. I had rituals and things that I wanted to take with me hoping that keeping them will make me go back in time – there is no replacement though for the real thing so I am quietely and wisely waiting again for the 'real thing'. I brought with me Portuguese cheese, quijadas de leite, quijadas de requijão and ....imagine....a box of Carcavelos sand, in which I imagined I would immerse my toes and go back again straight to the beach. I love you Portugal. I am learning a lesson now, a not very pleasant one, the lesson of being humble. I think this is because for a while I thought that I belonged there, maybe I dared for too much when it was not the case....

Anyhow....I will be back and in the meantime I will get so happy that you would believe I have forgotten Portugal, but that will only be a trick – the trick of being happy before something very special. I have learned that success and failure are equally important, that love and loss are equally powerful, that beauty and lack of it are equally fascinating and I have learned that life takes you where you should be every single moment. This is where I have to be now, grateful and happy for everything. I am sending all my love for those special people in the Algarve and further South :-) for all those dear ones from O Porto and Alentejo, for all those hidden ones in Lisbon, for all those who have certainties and huge doubts, for all those who are not capable of taking the “right” decisions, for all those who listen to their hearts and not their minds, for all those who made me learn something during all this time, for all those who made me think about Sting’s words “I must love what I destroy and destroy the things I love”, for all those who made me believe and live the present moment and less the future, thank you all for letting me meet you. May your lives all be as beautiful as I want mine to be. Bless you. I will wait for you all, one by one to climb with me the beautiful Romanian mountains and then to sail the sea in the Azores and ride the motorcycles on Marginal. See ya! :-)) kiss kiss

Saturday Lisbon day

Saturday was the marathon day. I thought that if I did that, some kind of secret mechanism will be triggered and I will be able to magically push a button that would instantly take my mind and soul to Lisbon whenever I wished to. I don’t push any button now, but I somehow walk silently in the streets of Bucharest and all of a sudden I am in Lisbon, in Principe Real, taking tango lessons next to Santa Apolónia train station or smelling and tasting the beautiful Pasteis de Belém sprkinkled with cinnamon-my heart knows where she is :-)
....I woke up and went to Alfama, not before having a coffee with a friend of mine in Praça das Flores(one of my favorite Lisbon places) and saying goodbye to São Bento.....






Alfama as charming as it can get







It was the end of October and I was still getting tanned, even burned from the crazy, Lisbon Sun, that I adore. I walked in Alfama like a tourist, taking pictures, I did all the things that a tourist would do, I even ate sardines-to be honest, I think the most delicious ones, of course I made friends with the waiter, who invited me to a free Fado concert.



I took a walk to Terreiro do Paço watching the seagulls, enjoying the Sun reflections in the water...and all of a sudden.....surprise.... I could hear men screming and see men swimming in the dirty water of the river.....I got closer and closer and there they were....four guys completely naked and completely drunk screaming and enjoying themselves. Of course I have pictures from all the possible angles but I will not post them here for reasons of decency – but for those who do not believe me, I have the proof :-) only I can get to walk in a city and see naked women in Rambla Santa Mónica in Barcelona or naked men in Lisbon one day before leaving....







And then I took the train to Cascais for a single reason that I did not want to miss...u know why?

Friday

My dear ones, I am in Romania now. I have been busy lately and I didn't have time to write - I regret this now. It is incredible how a place can offer you good, creative energy and others can't do that. Cities are like people-they can offer you love or not, they can offer you joy or not, they can offer you everything, or not. Lisbon filled my soul with EVERYTHING I needed instantly. For me it was pure 100% magic for 2 years and a half. I have lived in a perfect state of grace for all that time, I don’t know if you can understand how somebody can be overwhelmed with happiness by his own feelings-I was like that, I used to walk in the street hand in hand with my muse, hand in hand with all the good vibes of the world. I was lucky to make secret wishes that have been nicely fulfilled by the Universe-I saw places blessed by God, waves and sunsets that made me cry, I was free and happy and sooooooo in love with Portugal. I realized over and over again that life knows exactly what you want, that you don’t have to repeat a wish over and over again, you don´t have to become obsessed with something, you just say it once and let it go. That wish will become reality one day. I still want to know, though, what in my life made me attract my departure, because I did not want it. Some questions have no answers when we want them to have.

The last week in Portugal was the most intense. I was still in denial, hoping that some kind of miracle will happen that will make me stay there, I wished for that, wanted that, craved for that, but it didn’t happen. The funny thing is that I was sooooo happy, I made my wish and let it go, knowing that if it is meant to happen again, it will happen,




The last Friday in Lisbon.
I woke up and went to Jardim da Estrela, I took pictures of my dear lovely pink tree and discovered a house made out of wood in the middle of the garden- a nice project of some Portuguese designers, a house that you could rent for a night and get to sleep there, in the middle of the green nature. I couldn’t believe my eyes. I have this wish everytime I go out in open air, to be able to go and sleep under the naked sky full of stars. I did sleep in tents, I did sleep in a sleeping bag once in the middle of nowhere and I would do that all the time if I could. For a while, my wish was to sleep on my balcony in Lisbon, next to my dear Tejo and caressed by the morning rays of Sun, but I did not do it afraid of the mice-I had a nasty experience with them once and I did not want to repeat it. I did not sleep in the garden house neither, as I was supposed to book the room in advance and I was running out of my Lisbon time.






That day I discovered the building of the National Archives, an amazing construction, made out of marble and with huge rooms, very strict architecture and very beautiful. I was not allowed to take pictures.

I went then to take a walk around the house – I floated over the city, literally. I was so happy and could feel so much good energy around me, that I thought for a moment that I would see the Word “love” written on the sky. I did not see that, but I saw a red heart on the sidewalk, for me it was a normal and expected “sign” – I was surrounded by love. I took pictures of the beautiful streets, people looked at me and at the things I was shooting, I have no idea if they were seeing what I was seeing. I walked and walked and enjoyed what I love most in life-freedom and love.

Irrational Monica in dreamy Portugal-the country where the buildings of the State institutions are painted in pink, where you go to work at 10 o'clock just to have a place from where you could go away and have a "bica"-this is my favorite coffeeeeeee-well, it is just an espresso but I love it-and the place where you socialize with the grocery sales persons and all your neighbors.

I know I am passionately in love with this place because I am irrational-yes, I have to confess-but I know it will go away (not my love, nooooo), just my crazy irrational state of mind. I discovered this today when I was thinking that I should breathe this air more properly and fill up my lungs with the fresh and clean air of Portugal.... so I breathed in carefully and thoroughly and enjoyed that for a while ....and then I realized that I was in the middle of a street full of cars....so this is when I figured out that this must be crazy love. But I like my love and I like thinking that all these beautiful feelings that I have must go somewhere in the Universe and stay there, just to come back when I need them most or when it is their time :-) The dilemmas of the day are: how strong do you have to wish for a thing so that it could become reality and what happens with this love I told you about....I haven't discovered the secret yet, but if I do, I will let you know the answer so that you can fulfill your beautiful, secret dreams too.

The Day

I think God wants to cheer me up in the morning so the first thing He does when I wake up is to offer me different kinds of presents-knowing that I like colors He sent Monet and Turner and other great painters at the same time to paint the sky for me ... and I was happy :-))