in Porto
I live here since seven years, brought to the Fine Art School to learn Communication Design by an exciting need. With almost 1 million habitants next to the mouth of Rio Douro it's the second biggest city in Portugal. But Porto was never a cosmopolitan place to be and I'm not sure if it is right now. When I arrived here for the first time, there were no blacks nor eastern country people, and the only "outsiders" were the students a and a few chinese restaurant owners. Things are changing, and that has to be good because extreme-right-wings are starting to get on my nerves.
Porto grew from lots of small neighbourhoods with their own local rules. Today, the feeling you get when travelling randomly through streets is still similar to the one you get when walking in a very poor interior portuguese village. Or worse, because it comes with places full of junkies, car parkers and homeless people. After a while you have to know when and where to be to avoid being robbed everyday. Keeping an hand on your pocket thinking that there is more good in the world than bad helps you get through the end end of the street with your back straight and upped chin. The growing economic crisis is affecting the middle class and the precarious employment life style is starting to make people go insane.
A Sunday evening in a shopping mall is enough for distinguish all the casts that nobly carry their specific dress codes and transport their original life style to the new social zoos... There, they have a roof... and air-conditioned, Timberland and Nike. That's the normal Porto. I live the shamelessly arty Porto and every weekend we have two new bars, four different openings, ten new club parties, twenty live-acts and fifty new something else. It's too much. It's too much offer to play the same game. And focus can be lost when sitting in the right chair in the right snack bar... The southern European 5 minute café ritual can easily be extended to a three hour conversation on design, plus going for a beer with friends and waking up with another hangover. Making a list of things to do for the day is now the only thing that allows me to keep up to the rhythm of this city. Sometimes I write down the word dinner so that I don't forget to eat, seriously.
I've been five months way, and I lost a big part of the healthy routine I had. But in trade, I learn a better way to use solitude. Today I'm going to post this text and e-mail a recent friend, clean up the living room, lunch in Belas Artes Café at half past noon. I'll sketch some basic furniture to organise CDs while there is nobody there, meet with a teacher at 5 P.M.. One hour later I'l meet that recent-friend and co-worker on a Festival organization to discuss the program with the owner of a cinema/club. I hope to have that done at half past seven, when I'll probably meet my girlfriend on the way back home. I wish I had the time to mail a box to a record shop in Lisboa but I don't. I also should design four covers to two magazines and two books, plus one new house style with logotype and all that jazz. I wish I could write another Nova Emoção song and I wish I could go with my brother to the studios at his school and work with my computer over his drum beats. we will put a show together. I wanted to meet with a friend to exchange some information about my staying in Holland and to know about Porto while I was gone, and meet two friends to talk about the work to an individual exhibition... but I can't. I also have to work on the next VEC album and co-produce an E.P. for a possible CDR release and go to the Erasmus office to check some paper work... I should lose at least an hour listening to music and read an article that doesn't talk about the Oscars. I will not talk about the Oscars, a lot has been said already. I want to e-mail Meinhard and visit the atelier of J. Marçal to see his new china ink strips. I have to free some space in my Hard-Drive and buy nice trousers and I would love to visit my first sex shop to buy a nice little present to spice things up... I should pay the electricity bills but I will be very glad if I have the scheduled things done before meeting Silvina. Wish me luck.
P.S.: By the time I posted this, I was able to read the article, lunch and post this. I got 8 hours left untill I'm exhausted. Good thing I woke up at half past ten.
Porto grew from lots of small neighbourhoods with their own local rules. Today, the feeling you get when travelling randomly through streets is still similar to the one you get when walking in a very poor interior portuguese village. Or worse, because it comes with places full of junkies, car parkers and homeless people. After a while you have to know when and where to be to avoid being robbed everyday. Keeping an hand on your pocket thinking that there is more good in the world than bad helps you get through the end end of the street with your back straight and upped chin. The growing economic crisis is affecting the middle class and the precarious employment life style is starting to make people go insane.
A Sunday evening in a shopping mall is enough for distinguish all the casts that nobly carry their specific dress codes and transport their original life style to the new social zoos... There, they have a roof... and air-conditioned, Timberland and Nike. That's the normal Porto. I live the shamelessly arty Porto and every weekend we have two new bars, four different openings, ten new club parties, twenty live-acts and fifty new something else. It's too much. It's too much offer to play the same game. And focus can be lost when sitting in the right chair in the right snack bar... The southern European 5 minute café ritual can easily be extended to a three hour conversation on design, plus going for a beer with friends and waking up with another hangover. Making a list of things to do for the day is now the only thing that allows me to keep up to the rhythm of this city. Sometimes I write down the word dinner so that I don't forget to eat, seriously.
I've been five months way, and I lost a big part of the healthy routine I had. But in trade, I learn a better way to use solitude. Today I'm going to post this text and e-mail a recent friend, clean up the living room, lunch in Belas Artes Café at half past noon. I'll sketch some basic furniture to organise CDs while there is nobody there, meet with a teacher at 5 P.M.. One hour later I'l meet that recent-friend and co-worker on a Festival organization to discuss the program with the owner of a cinema/club. I hope to have that done at half past seven, when I'll probably meet my girlfriend on the way back home. I wish I had the time to mail a box to a record shop in Lisboa but I don't. I also should design four covers to two magazines and two books, plus one new house style with logotype and all that jazz. I wish I could write another Nova Emoção song and I wish I could go with my brother to the studios at his school and work with my computer over his drum beats. we will put a show together. I wanted to meet with a friend to exchange some information about my staying in Holland and to know about Porto while I was gone, and meet two friends to talk about the work to an individual exhibition... but I can't. I also have to work on the next VEC album and co-produce an E.P. for a possible CDR release and go to the Erasmus office to check some paper work... I should lose at least an hour listening to music and read an article that doesn't talk about the Oscars. I will not talk about the Oscars, a lot has been said already. I want to e-mail Meinhard and visit the atelier of J. Marçal to see his new china ink strips. I have to free some space in my Hard-Drive and buy nice trousers and I would love to visit my first sex shop to buy a nice little present to spice things up... I should pay the electricity bills but I will be very glad if I have the scheduled things done before meeting Silvina. Wish me luck.
P.S.: By the time I posted this, I was able to read the article, lunch and post this. I got 8 hours left untill I'm exhausted. Good thing I woke up at half past ten.
posted by joao at 14:27
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