Never, as on December 31, do I feel this urge to be in Madeira, my favourite place in the world and the very best place to spend New Year’s Eve. It’s not only the fireworks, but the festive environment as well, the friends, the traditions – all of them contribute to the most unforgettable New Year’s Eve of all. I do have unforgettable memories of this night of all nights in Madeira! I never stop dreaming that one …
Tag: pandemic
There are times in your life when it seems nothing much happens; you just go on with your life, your well-established routine, day after day, month after month, year after year. Deep down you know you’d like a few things to change, but you are too lazy or too scared to take the initiative. Then one major change comes, and things begin to unravel, and suddenly you find yourself in the midst of great disruption, that will change …
A divine being once said it would be a curse for humans to be able to predict their future, and in fact we cannot. But some people make such accurate predictions that I wonder if that curse has not befallen them. It is the case of Chris Antone, the author of Vicilization: The Fall, a book first published (in French) in 2011 that amazingly predicted the gilet jaune (yellow vest) riots, that took place several years later with an …
Now that it has been almost a month since we began the “comeback”, a few conclusions may be reached. Different reactions The first one is that people have been reacting to this slow return to “normality” (whatever this means now), in very different ways. There are those who, fed up with confinement, believe it’s time to put all of this behind our backs and start leading a normal life. They make the most of the new liberties that …
A year ago, on this very day, as pilgrims among the thousands that filled the Sanctuary of Fátima, not even in our wildest dreams – or rather nightmares – could we have imagined a day like today. The empty sanctuary Last year, like the year before, May 13 was an explosion of faith, of light. Last year it was a warm, sunny day, more like Summer than Spring. We talked, we prayed, we cried, we thanked, we begged, we …
A May Saturday. Warm, like a summer day. It’s dusk now. I stay a long time at my window, feeling the early evening fresh breeze and watching the sun set over the sea. I never tire of this view; every day the colours are different. There are days with silver-blue and orange, others with deep-blue and pink, and then there are those days when you can see silver in the sky and the sea, only in different shades. …
I go for my late afternoon walk. I stand over the beach and look at the sea, inhaling its smell. It’s not too strong, here, as in other places by the sea, but it’s unmistakeable. I just stay there, filling myself with so many sensations – the light blue of the sky, the still bright light of the sun, already low on the horizon but still warm; the sea breeze on my face and my hair. The sensation of …
It’s driving me crazy. De-contamination, I mean. All the disinfection procedures we have to put in place so that we may be slightly – only slightly – reassured we have not brought the virus into our home. It began with washing my hands every two minutes. Every time I touch anything, I wash them. After two or three days of this regime, I noticed some small cracks appearing. My hands were sore, red, dehydrated. I even had …
Another glorious Saturday. The bluest of skies in the darkest of times. Or is it? It seems we have grown used to this new routine. It’s called acceptance. In the beginning, all we talked about was “when we return to normal”; now, we have realised that what used to be normal will probably take a long time to come back, so we wait, resigned, for the crumbs of freedom that are expected to start making an appearance, come May. …
A week has passed. Rain or shine, days are very much the same, and it’s a good sign. We are home, we work, we sleep, we eat, we see our friends during WhatsApp video calls… we should feel privileged to be home, healthy, comparatively safe, while other people are fighting this battle for us, in hospitals, risking their lives a million times so that one day this nightmare may pass. I cannot help picturing my cousin, the doctor, who sent …