A small world

Mudam-se os tempos

2009-12-01T14:25:00.000-08:00

Mudam-se as vontades. E os nomes dos blogs, as vezes. Ja nao me fascina tanto o facto de o mundo ser redondo, e deixei de desejar tanto andar por ele a fora. Serao os 30 a chegarem? Os cabelos brancos a instalarem-se?
O que sinto agora eh que o mundo eh pequeno. Nas minhas voltas encontrei muitas vezes as mesmas pessoas, ou pessoas que, sendo diferentes, sao variacoes de um tema, o que a meu ver eh muito reconfortante. Ao mesmo tempo somos todos diferentes e todos iguais. Ah. Onde eh que eu ja ouvi isto?

Mas que coincidencia encontrar-vos por aqui. O mundo eh pequeno!

Time traveler

2009-11-29T09:33:00.000-08:00

Acabei de ler este romance, que foi um exito tremendo nos EUA e foi recentemente adaptado ao grande ecran. Fiquei dividida, entre o completamente apaixonada pela historia e um pouco irritada pela falta de historia. O comeco do livro eh brilhante. As personagens sao originais, complexas, profundas, por um lado. Mas por outro lado... nao, sao personagens completamente banais. Nao estou a fazer sentido, eu sei. Mas foi isto que eu senti ao ler o livro.

A historia centra-se na relacao entre Clare e Henry. Clare ve pela primeira vez Henry quando ele tem 41 e ela tem 6. Henry ve pela primeira vez Clare quando ele tem 28 e ela 20. Porque Henry viaja no tempo, so que em vez de ser numa maquina a la Doctor Who, com todo o privilegio de escolher onde e quando aterrar, Henry viaja contra sua vontade e apenas consegue levar consigo o seu corpo, o que leva a que grande parte das suas travessias pelo tempo sejam passadas a tentar encontrar roupa, comida e abrigo. Tem uma doenca genetica que o torna "crono-desabilitado". Isto e alguns pedacos sobre terapia genetica, ratinhos mutantes, etc, eh o que leva algumas pessoas a categorizarem este livro como ficcao cientifica, mas o livro eh sobretudo uma historia de amor. A relacao que Audrey Niffenegger descreve seria perfeita, nao fossem as frequentes visitas de Henry ao passado e futuro, deixando Clare sozinha com os seus pensamentos.

A circularidade da relacao da-nos um certo descanso e ao mesmo tempo uma certa vertigem. Descanso porque desde cedo Clare sabe quem eh o homem da sua vida e tem a certeza de que se irao casar no futuro, porque afinal, o futuro ja aconteceu. Isto poupa-a a muita da incerteza sobre o amor que assola a maior parte das pessoas hoje em dia. Da vertigem porque o que ja aconteceu nao pode ser evitado, e isso nem sempre eh bom. Eh como se o principio e o fim acontecessem ao mesmo tempo, e isso da-me calafrios.

A historia tambem me deixou a pensar na incapacidade da maior parte das pessoas, com genomas completamente normais, de viverem no presente, e no seu habito de viajarem no tempo - sobretudo no que diz respeito a relacoes amorosas...
As vezes essas viagens tambem sao feitas contra-vontade, como acontece com Henry, e levam-nos a ver caminhos tortuosos, paisagens desoladas, mas outras vezes sao deliciosos passeios aos melhores momentos ja vividos entre duas pessoas.

Por isso digo que as personagens sao ao mesmo tempo complexas e banais. Niffenegger da-se ao trabalho de construir personagens com profissoes e personalidades fora do comum, uma historia fora do comum, para depois centrar tudo na velha questao "sera que eu estou a fazer a coisa certa?...". A diferenca entre o romance e a vida real eh que no livro a resposta eh geralmente dada por um Henry vindo do futuro ou do passado, enquanto que na vida real, we just keep wondering.

Enfim... Aconselhado para romanticos inveterados...

Doctor, doctor...

2009-11-20T15:30:00.000-08:00

Como me apetece voltar a escrever! Hoje andei nas andanças pelos blogs que para aí há, e dei-me conta das saudades que tenho de mandar as minhas postas de pescada na internet. E assim decidi, talvez não muito sensatamente, voltar a escrever neste blog. E começo em português porque, meu deeeus, o meu português está enferrujado. Bem preciso de o treinar. Aceitam-se correcções... *corando*

Disse que a minha decisão não é muito sensata porque este ano, tcharaaaan, é o último ano do meu doutoramento. Isto é, é o último ano em que me pagam para fazer isto a que chamam ciência. Se isto é ciência não sei. Tenho as minhas dúvidas. Se é de facto o último ano do meu doutoramento, ainda mais dúvidas tenho. Mas lá que deixam de me pagar, deixam.

Mas comecemos pelo princípio… A ciência, em si, o saber mais sobre algumas coisas, ou descobrir o tamanho da nossa ignorância, isso ainda me fascina. O que não me fascina, é a luta diária contra a frustração, é o nosso trabalho valer tão pouco, o nosso tempo ser tão facilmente desperdiçado, às vezes por nossa culpa – decisões erradas que levam a becos sem saída -, às vezes por culpa dos nossos chefes – o que em última análise ainda é considerado nossa culpa porque fomos nós que não fomos espertos o suficiente para os contrariar na sua decisão – e às vezes por culpa do famigerado acaso. Tudo isto leva facilmente uma pessoa, já neurótica por natureza, a sentir-se tremendamente desmotivada, desvalorizada, e às tantas, desgraçada… Quando na realidade aqui não há desgraçados. Somos todos gente crescida, felizmente temos cabecinha para pensar e podemos fazer o que bem entendermos se para isso tivermos vontade. E senão também temos dois braços e duas pernas, toca a mexê-los! Mas por isso mesmo pergunto-me porque é que é tão fácil, como me dizia no outro dia um colega, «acreditar que não temos jeito para nada». Acho que não há aluno de doutoramento que não passe por esta fase.

No entanto, é fascinante a quantidade de coisas sobre as quais se fazem doutoramentos. Tenho um amigo que faz o seu em Filosofia Teórica. Até eu, que o faço em Biologia Teórica fiquei de cara à banda. Então mas há algo não-teórico em Filosofia?? Outros fazem doutoramentos em História, Economia (conheci recentemente um rapaz que faz a sua tese sobre fusões e aquisições de empresas – ele disse-me que os outros colegas de curso dele tinham escolhido fazer dinheiro).

Agora que penso nisso, os alunos de doutoramento parecem-me cumprir um papel fundamental na sociedade. São eles os que têm tempo, paciência, cabeça (big question mark there), e financiamento para se debruçarem sobre coisas que não lembram ao arco da velha mas que até podem ser bastante importantes, tais como… sei lá… A estrutura do DNA. Novas teorias económicas. Comparações de modelos de sociedade. Ética. Ecologia. Comportamento (humano e não-humano). Hoje em dia, em Biologia, embora não tenha aqui dados à mão para o provar, mas tenho a séria impressão de que 70% do trabalho realizado é feito por alunos de doutoramento e post-docs. Enfim, podem-nos parecer 4 anos deitados à rua, em que penámos como almas condenadas, em que sofremos stresses psicológicos estúpidos impostos por supervisores sádicos, e nos deparámos trinta mil vezes com a nossa própria idiotice e com o falhanço iminente, mas talvez isso sirva algum propósito, algum dia, a alguém. Muito provavelmente será a outro aluno de doutoramento, ao citar: Coisa et al. (unpublished work).

I advise...

2008-03-09T13:18:00.000-07:00

Sometimes a book takes over your mind. It makes you dream about places and people, totally different than the ones you know. This happened to me with The Kite Runner, by Khaled Hosseini, a book that all my dutch friends had read already and advised me to read. I waited a bit, I am generally suspicious of things everyone tells me I should read.
But for The Kite Runner the compliments are fully deserved. It is indeed a book that grips you from the first page. It’s so well written, that it makes me want to write again. It inspires me. At some points it makes you laugh, at others cry, and it definitely stays with you. When you finish it, it leaves a void, like a friend you won’t see for a long time, or maybe ever again.
It tells about the story of two childhood friends in Kabul, Afghanistan, pre-Soviet invasion. It tells about children growing up, how they yearn for their parents’ love, and how they fight for it. And then it tells us about the grown-ups these children become. It tells about a country that western culture knows from CNN stories only, and generally associates with the words “fundamentalism” and “terrorist”. I have to say now I associate Afghanistan with “kabob” and “children”. But the book does not leave out fundamentalism or terror. On the contrary, it fully exposes these for what they are: products of insanity, greed and corruption.
So this post is dedicated to The Kite Runner, the book, and to all the kite runners in Kabul. I will for sure go and see the movie, despite my fear of being totally disappointed by the contrast between what I imagined and what I will see.

A rough start

2008-03-05T13:31:00.001-08:00

Whoever thought of this expression, a rough start, never experienced a start of anything in life after being born (which does not really count as a start, since no one remembers it). Every new start I had so far was rough, to the point where one other expression, “fresh new start”, seems a little bit more “freezing new start”.
It’s the moving in itself, the adaptation, the language, the people, the habits, everything… And then there’s the work. Which, as usual, is not easy. And it doesn’t seem to be getting any easier. For now I struggle with plans. I actually long for those days when I’ll be the lab from 6 am till 10 in the evening, because I hate making plans. So far my making of plans has involved talking to people and realizing they are not able/willing to help me, talking to my supervisor and realize he doesn’t really want to help (he’d much rather make me feel like an ignorant twat), emailing my other supervisors and realizing they are too far to help. In the meanwhile I keep reading articles, and more ideas pile up in my head, which is nice, but they seem to be going nowhere, which is not nice. But let’s keep hope alive, and have patience, perhaps one day I’ll finish this PhD without feeling that I did a lame job.
This rough start sets me again to think on what it is to be a scientist and if I really want it. I look around me and I see that it’s dog-eat-dog out there. People tell me to keep cool, have patience, work hard, just do my best. But I don’t feel at all certain that I want to invest so much energy into this job, and for what… Maybe to fail in 4 years, if I don’t get a decent post-doc? Maybe in 7 if I don’t get a tenure track somewhere (WHERE??). And all those years without a home... I want my own furniture, goddamn it!!! Ah, the dramas of the middle class.
Well, time will tell. For now, I will… keep cool, have patience, do my best.
And to show that not all is lost, I leave you with a picture of my spotted housemate and the view from our balcony.

On the road again

2008-02-28T02:39:00.000-08:00

I write this in my new office, with a view over the Lac Lehman and the Swiss alps. It sounds impressive, I know…
I moved to Switzerland for 6 months to do some experiments for my PhD. Having arrived just last Monday I am still getting settled and finding my way around. I also have nothing to do, yet, or better, I don’t know where to start… And that’s why I am returning to this blog. It feels nice to write, as it always did. I had such a full life in Groningen in my last months there that I didn’t even feel the need to write a couple of words here. Now the free time is back, and with it the usual restlessness.
Lausanne, the city where I’m living, is very beautiful, and finally I am back to a real city. I had forgotten how tiring it is to move around in a real city. Groningen feels always like a small town, even though it can be very busy. Here, the buses run past you dangerously, cars honk impatiently, people walk with their heads down, like in Lisbon. And the smoke, the students, the hard-working people, the vagabonds, the aimless youth, it’s all the same. Even bureaucracy is the same, and for everything you have to pay some huge amount of money – transport card, key to the office, residence permit. Sign here, pay there. The Swiss are generally polite, a bit strange, though. Can’t really put my finger on it… But they’re “bizarre”. Perhaps more than the Dutch. At least with the dutchies what you see is what you get. Here people are less obvious, and therefore weirder.
I am living in a nice flat mid-way between the university and the city center. Perfect! My landlady is a woman one year older than me, but much more mature than I am, or probably will ever be. She seems, so far, extremely kind and caring. The third occupant of the house is a dog, a Dalmatian, which makes me very happy, of course. He’s really smart and communicative – he understands perfectly the words “joue”, “promener” and “manger” (to the latter he responds always very effusively)... Everyday he is happy to see me, how simple… I would love people to be like dogs. Easygoing, give me a biscuit and I’ll be content. Anyway, I had trouble finding a decent place, but I was very lucky because I think this is the best I have ever had in terms of rooms. Everything works like a charm, I have my personal space, internet (very important) and also a comfortable living room, fully equipped kitchen, and a TV!!!! Zapping was always my favorite sport.
I’ll keep in touch. In a near future, expect some nice pictures of the alps, the city, and of course, the dog! Oh, and of my ants, too! Both quite nice as pets, actually.

CocoRosie

2007-11-18T14:44:00.000-08:00

It was brought to my attention that according to my weblog, I was still in Copenhagen... Well, Copenhagen is a beautiful city, but I've left it a long time ago! Since then I've been to some new places, like Uppsala, Sweden and Krakow, Poland. But then I returned to my "dear" old Groningen... And here I am!

But this little town is not that bad... Sometimes really interesting stuff happens here. And last week my peak was the concert of Cocorosie in the Oosterpoort. I was introduced to this band through a friend of mine, who took my musical education quite seriously. Cocorosie are two sisters, half-Cherokee, who (in my view) basically live in a world apart. Seriously. They cannot live on the same planet as I do. But I wish I lived on their planet... Cause it sounds fun. Free. Their concert was several things... Weird. Original. Beautiful. Fun. Mainly I felt like I was listening to something I had never heard before. Which is very true because I didn't know most of the songs... But also the music was... different from anything else.

Enjoy the video, I will try to post more if something interesting comes to my mind...Doesn't happen that often, though. :)

In the land of Vikings

2007-06-02T15:18:00.000-07:00

Hi all,
This time I write from the most north I have ever been in the world. Denmark! Yep, Copenhagen. I was very curious about this city ever since Aniek stayed here for 6 months and totally fell in love with it! I am here for a PhD course on evolutionary biology of communication. The course itself did not yet start, but my introduction to Danish life, has. First a stroll around the city at 9 am after a very early flight departing from Amsterdam at 6h55, told me that:
a) on a Saturday morning you are more likely to find late birds coming out of pubs than early birds going out to work
b) no self-respecting place will be open before 11… and it will close at 15h00.
After this first encounter with the Danish way of life, and a few caffe lattes later, I was received by a PhD student here at Copenhagen University, guess where from… Amsterdam! So for a few moments, he thought he could speak Dutch to me, since I was coming from the Netherlands, then quickly understood he couldn’t and from there on greeted me with Dutch hospitality in English, and no, no sarcasm implied.
In the afternoon, I went for another stroll in the city center, and discovered that Copenhagen would be a dangerous city for me to live: far too many interesting shops, with far too high prices… I keep having the experience of giving huge notes and getting back very small coins. Don’t know why. But I also noted the extremely beautiful architecture, relaxing spaces and very fashionable people. Danish design? I guess so. Also, the ease with which you get around is quite amazing… Public transports are efficient, clean, and even not so expensive… But still, lots of people go by bike, which is also a nice way to go around, since the city is pretty much flat and biker friendly, with bike paths everywhere.
Then later I joined the same PhD that received me and another student of the course, an Italian, for dinner. It was actually a nice and cheap meal (note to self: ask where to go in Copenhagen…), in a very cute little place. And then, the true Dutch nature of our “guide” was revealed, as he took us… beer drinking. Turns out it’s also quite a Danish habit, and so I felt very much at home, specially when a german couple, also working here, joined us. Boy, it feels like Groningen. A stroke of destiny made it so that this very same night Sweden and Denmark had a football match here in Copenhagen. Everywhere, people with crosses painted in their faces, either red and white or yellow and blue, poured beer down their throats, to celebrate defeat or victory, according to nationality and/or alcoholic state.
A few beers later, I was back in my room, feeling sleepy and happy. Tak, København!

Konninginedag

2007-05-01T03:53:00.000-07:00

Hello hello!
It was Queen's day and very appropriately I spent it in Amsterdam. Purely coincidental, actually. I was there on occasion of the visit of my friend Maya's mom, and also passing through on my way to Portugal! I read somewhere that spending Queen's day in Amsterdam is one of the must-do's of the purposeful tourist, and what can I say... It's something between utterly annoying and utterly fun! Annoying because you don't have one single moment of peace and quiet, and all the nice shops are closed. Fun because you get to see some strange and amazing things while trying to walk around in the bustling streets full of very tall and very drunk people. Traditionally, Queen's day belongs to the youth, I think. It's the day when kids come out to the streets and show their talents or just sell their parents' junk, since it's allowed to do so without any particular licence. Hell, even I could do it. Maybe next year, if you come to Groningen, you will see me singing fado to passers-by.
Some kids are indeed amazing, others are just ordinary, but always it's fun to watch what they do, if not only because they try so hard. And of course, the flea markets (or vrijmarkt) everywhere are always interesting to find cheap and entertaining stuff.
Negative points: the ongoing rave throughout the whole city. Can't get no sleep. Indeed. And way too much orange.

Me and Maya on Leidsestraat (notice the lack of orange in our personas)

A kid playing the guitar in Vondelpark. Rock on, dude!!

Some bigger kids, but still, no more than 17, playing amaaaaazingly some jazz music. Roy Hargrove, you've got competition coming!

O Povo Unido

2007-04-11T04:32:00.000-07:00

Palavras para que? Desde que soube do resultado do concurso "Grandes Portugueses" que andava com vontade de fazer um post a arrear no povo portugues, ou pelo menos nos portugueses que votaram no Salazar como o Grande Portugues da nossa Historia. Mas, como sempre, o Gato Fedorento adiantou-se, rapido no gatilho. Por isso limito-me a deixar aqui o video de Fernando Tordo a cantar uma versao mais congruente com a presente realidade lusa do "Portugal ressuscitado".

E aproveito para relembrar uma das mais bonitas Cancoes Heroicas de Fernando Lopes-Graca: "Acordai". Diz assim o primeiro verso:

Acordai, homens que dormis...

La vie en rose

2007-04-05T04:24:00.000-07:00

Everything seems wonderful when you're about to leave for Paris to meet the people you love the most. And that's what I'm about to do! I'm curious to see Paris for the second time in my life. The first was when I was 15 and my mom had a work meeting there. We all went with her, my father, me and my sister. This was my first trip abroad, and I saved every memory in a small white envelope. The metro tickets, receipts from the Galleries LaFayette. In the pictures I look as happy as my pessimistic 15 year old self could ever feel, which is to say a lot. For once I saw la vie en rose, and discovered that traveling can really change you inside.

I hope this long Easter weekend brings a pink view of life for everyone. We need it, from time to time. Enjoy the sunshine, everyone.

The Long Blondes

2007-03-19T14:45:00.001-07:00

I don't think I ever talked much about the club Vera here in Groningen. It's a pitty, because it's quite a cool club, and as a colleague of mine emphasizes, has a very prestigious hall of fame: Metallica, Pearl Jam, Nirvana, Red Hot, they all played there, back when they were unknown bands trying to make a name. The same colleage told me Vera is even known in Canada as a cool alternative music club. Groovy.

Well... I go there from time to time (but actually my friend Maya was the hard-core Vera addict), and I always see really good concerts there. The best concert so far was from a Dutch band called De Kift. Not The Gift, please... For those who don't know, The Gift is a portuguese band also very famous within the alternative music circle, but honestly I can't stand their music, despite having no clue why. It's just not my cup of tea. Anyway, De Kift, yeah, are indeed very cool.

But last Friday I went to see a concert of The Long Blondes. Britpop at its best. I liked the music, but disliked the associated crowd of heroine-chic wannabe teenagers that filled Vera, as if an MTV show had jumped out of the small magic square (where it is kept for everyone's safety) into real life! But everything washed away with a couple of beers and in the end the concert was very nice.

By the way, I think I'm becoming more and more dutch - ALERT, ALERT, danger!!! Signs of dutchness: cycling everyday and a sudden love for really bad beer. I now discovered the "fluitje" version (the same as a mini in Portugal) and it is giving me many joys, because I can actually finish it... :P

Gone with the wind

2007-03-04T15:17:00.000-08:00

Procuro um tema.
Não interessa qual, o objectivo é comunicar,
seja lá sobre o que for.
As palavras não são mais do que paredes falsas
para a emoção que quero expressar,
nem sei eu bem qual é…
É só um daqueles dias,
em que a vida parece ficar quieta, à espera que eu caia.
Ou pior ainda, sem nenhuma expectativa.
Às vezes parece que a vida desiste de nós,
e não o contrário.
Cruza os braços e abana a cabeça
em jeito de reprovação, como quem diz:
“É escusado… Mas porque é que eu ainda tento?“.
Vá lá, vida, não desistas de mim. Não ainda…
Prometo que ainda tenho coisas para te mostrar.
Grandes feitos para realizar. Ou não.
Talvez apenas feitos medianos e coisas banais,
mas são as minhas coisas
e tenho o direito de as viver.
Vai buscar grandeza a outra freguesia,
aqui levas somente o corriqueiro monólogo da solidão.
Esta parece ser a palavra-chave que define o ser humano…
Sós.
Fechados dentro de cada um de nós.
Intocáveis, invisíveis.
Indiferentes a tudo o que não seja nosso,
ainda que só por extensão de sentimentos.
Gritamos para que nos ouçam
e não percebemos o que nos dizem
devido ao ruído que tantas vozes juntas fazem.
As palavras, perdem-se no espaço e no tempo.
Verdadeiros veículos virtuais,
assobiam ao meu ouvido
como moscas, zumbindo, zumbindo,
para desaparecer de vista logo em seguida.
Perco-lhes o rasto. Não vale a pena tentar apanhá-las.
De qualquer forma, a nossa recordação
seria sempre uma interpretação
possivelmente torta do que nos queriam dizer,
gritando, por isso mais vale esquecer,
deixar a mosca voar e cair em alguma sopa
mais nutritiva que o nosso cérebro.
Importantes, importantes, são os actos,
o que fazemos.
Isso sim, deixa marcas. Isso sim, é perene.
Estas palavras que escrevo aqui,
leva-as o vento. Ou levaria,
se houvesse vento a passar pelo meu computador.
Esta é a maior patranha do homem,
a escrita.
Uma tentativa de fazer parecer
sério e duradouro algo que é apenas ficção.
Acreditam em mim?
Olhem que é melhor não...

Diferente

2007-02-16T05:10:00.000-08:00

I promised the whole story on the Gotan Project concert, and here it goes. I only wish I had the skills of other bloggers to write about music, like Bicho do Ouvido (second compliment in a month, huh??) because this concert would certainly deserve a good description. I’ll do my best.
My company for the concert was the other Ana in Groningen and some friends from the University. Ana took some pictures, she posted one in her blog, luckily.

First of all, let me tell that there are some differences in going to concerts here in the Netherlands and going to concerts in Portugal. Not due to the smell of weed everywhere, no, that’s the same in both countries, but more to the fact that the priority in Portugal when you arrive at the concert hall/place/whatever, is to get a good place. You consider where is the best location for a perfect auditive and visual experience, and you go for it. Then you sit or stand impatiently waiting for the concert to start, clapping and screaming histerically before, during and after it. If the band doesn’t come back you go from cheering them with profound love, to booing them with profound hate. Basically, yah, you got it, “passion” is the key word.
Here, priority is to get a beer. Then chat a bit. Then finally, “ah, the music is starting, we better go in”. You go out in the middle because you ran out of beer. Chat a bit more. Maybe you will rock your shoulders a bit back and forth, but never really dance. You will clap, yes, but with moderation. In the end, if the concert is good, you will cheer for the band to come back but not too much, because they will do anyway what they want to do, so it is pointless to insist. Key word is “dead”. Exceptions to this are for example the Lowlands festival, where music rules, people party like mad, and they cheer every band as if they are their favourite in the whole world. Those are the two extremes of Dutch people as an audience, they can be really cold but when they’re alive, not even heavy rain slows them down! They will dance in the rain, slide in the mud, and be as happy as little children.

Ok, enough of comparisons. The concert. So, it started with “Diferente”, from their last album, Lunatico, and right there and then I realized the concert would be amazing. There are 10 musicians on stage, 7 of them playing instruments traditionally used in tango music: the piano, violins, cello, guitar, and of course, the “bandoleon”. So, basically it’s a small tango orchestra, and then a singer and 2 DJ’s, adding the beats and samples. It’s all done right there and then, and you wonder how can it be that it sounds even better than when you listen to the record in the comfort of your home?? It’s because each member of the Project is just so damn good… They are also a mix, half Parisian, half from Buenos Aires, and addressed the audience in spanish, french, english and even a couple of Dutch sentences! Behind them, in a white background, a visual show of taste and class. Everything matching, perfectly, daring, impressive, bold… Creating a real tango atmosphere, that you can groove with.

The Gotan Project lead us on a journey to Buenos Aires seen through the eyes of 21st century musicians. They played old songs from La revancha del tango, new songs from Lunatico... Each one better than the other. And the seemingly impossible happened. People danced! Some actually danced tango, others were moving their bodies to house beats. This is the merger that characterizes Gotan Project, the old revitalized. The room was both a tango salon and a club.
In summary, it was one of my happiest moments here. If music can cover long distances, tango at least covers the Atlantic Ocean, because suddenly I felt like I was in Argentina. And if it wasn’t for a group of those typically annoying drunk dutch guys (significantly different from the typically annoying drunk portuguese guys, believe me) standing behind us, I would have totally forgotten we were in Groningen. Luckily at some point we decided to move to the front, to have a better view, and aaaaah. Whaaaat a view!!! Ana and I found out our next goal in life: to become groupies of Gotan Project, because the pianist and the bandoleonist (?) are just “bons como o milho”. Papacitos. Hot. I’m still recovering from the shock.

I leave you here with a taste of tango/gotan, for the road.

Gotan Project

2007-02-06T04:08:00.000-08:00

I'm going! 11th February, Oosterport - I'll let you know how it was. But I expect una musica brutal...

Looking back

2006-12-29T08:56:00.000-08:00

New years’ Eve is the perfect time to look back. One year ago, I was nervous because I would be going to Houston, Texas, for 6 months. I would be away from family and all my friends, away from Portugal and also away from the now friendly and familiar dutch surroundings. I cried when I left my house in old Siriusstraat. It would be a plunge in the darkness. It turned out to be nice, in the darkness. The sun was shining all the time, surprisingly enough, there were really cool people around and I made one or two true friends (treasures more precious than gold). When I left Houston, I cried too. Ironically, two years ago, I was dreading the day I would have to return to the Netherlands. I had been there for 4 months and still it didn’t feel like home. The Netherlands grow slowly on foreigners. But they eventually grow, and little did I know that I would cry one year later for fear of leaving my life in Groningen. Funny how life goes. Obviously, saying goodbye to my parents at the airport, I cried.

Am I a crybaby or is it all the time hard to leave things we are used to? Is it love that binds us to people and places or habit? How can we tell the difference?

By my experience, human beings can get used to pretty much anything. But there is a difference between real connections between people and just good old habit. I missed my habits, whenever I changed places. I missed going for coffee with my friends at the beach, when I left Portugal. I missed drinking beer with my friends, when I left Groningen. I missed going for tango every Wednesday and the party life, when I left Houston. But the people… First it hurts. It feels like you have no air to breathe. Their absence is so omnipresent, it is everywhere you look. They are not there. Their laughter is not there, their tears are not there, their advices are not there. New people start coming into your life and you create new habits with these people. But whereas the old habits drift away, people remain with you. Always, like a crowd of memories behind you, whispering softly in your ear. You are never alone, because of the love that binds you.

Sometimes I laugh by myself, because I remember past situations, or what someone would say if they saw what I was seeing. Other times I cry for painful moments long passed. And when I’m sad I can hear clearly what each person would tell me, because I knew them so well. Those are the moments when I realise that I left no one behind. I brought them all along for the ride.

Ao amor!

2006-11-26T12:01:00.000-08:00

E especialmente para a minha mui velha amiga Marta-que-ri (quer dizer, velha não é ela, a amizade é que já é tão velha que coitadita, mas a artrite ainda não lhe chegou, nem chegará tão cedo!...) e para o seu futuríssimo amantíssimo esposo Zorze-valente. As notícias correm depressa!! Conta comigo para o casamento, ou deverei dizer para o copo d'água, porque isto comer bem é que importa :) Votos? Qué isso?! Parabéns Martita........ Snif. Já estou emocionada... Isto vai ser chorar baba e ranho, ó caraças.

«Não vá embora», Marisa Monte em Memórias, Crónicas e Declarações de Amor

Piled Higher and Deeper

2006-11-11T09:17:00.000-08:00

My status within the Rijksuniversiteit Groningen has changed. Behold, a new PhD student has emerged from the troubles of her MSc! First task: selling myself as the best thing in town to NWO (Dutch Foundation for Science). That means coming up with ideas, then writing them in a way that makes them seem more interesting and useful than they really are, then putting emphasis on every little thing on your CV as if Hercules himself would have to try really hard to reach your level of hard work. Then I will send this brilliant grant application to the scrutiny of NWO, but so will most of my classmates, who are really good, all of them, not to mention the dozens of students from other universities that will apply… So, the chances of getting the grant are anyway tiny. Ah… The joys of science.
But in the meantime I went to meet my new supervisor in Lausanne, Switzerland… Yep, I went from flat Dutchland to the Alps!! I loved it!! Lausanne is great, it’s like… a real city. And the University has a wonderful view over lake Geneva and the Alps… Hmmmm. I felt like Fraulein Maria, only without that ridiculous haircut. Nor the powerful voice… But even so I felt like singing… The hiiiiiiiiiiillllllllls are aliiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiive… With the sound of muuuusic!
More developments soon: will Fraulein Maria get the grant or not? And how come Captain Von Trapp fell for that uninteresting creature? We all know in real life he’d go for the baronesse… Don’t miss the next episode!

All the graduating topjes. From left to right: Elske, Sanne, Laura, me, Aniek, Saleta.

Finally Portugal! With a detour through Turkey…

2006-10-12T12:09:00.000-07:00

Here I am finally, in Portugal. I’m not staying for long, but still, I want to let you know a bit of my stay here. But that will have to wait for a future post, because before coming here I was for a week in Istanbul, with my Turkish friend Maya.
Let me just tell you my impressions of Istanbul: WOW!!!!! A really exciting and beautiful city. Sometimes it reminded me a lot of Lisbon, specially the architecture of the late 60’s til 80’s. It added to that feeling the fact that, just like in Lisbon at this time of the year, there are people selling roasted chestnuts on the street. This smell, mixed with the sea breeze, pine trees, olive trees and oaks, brought me right back to Lisbon. Then again, the unfamiliar sound of a man calling people for prayer at the local mosque made it quite different! I was totally astonished by the monuments we visited. Namely the St. Sophia Museum and the Topkapi Palace… St. Sophia was initially a Christian cathedral, built in the days of the Roman Emperor Constantine (when Istanbul was yet Constantinopolis) and then it was turned into an Islamic mosque around the 14th century (correct me if I’m wrong). In the 1930’s it was secularized by the then President of Turkey, Ataturk, and turned into a museum. The most beautiful thing about this place is the peaceful cohabitation of Islamic and Christian symbols. They are recovering the old Christian panels and now you can see the Virgin Mary and her child hovering over fantastic “vitrals” with Arabic writings about Allah. Here and there you find Christian symbols, like fishes and the Holy Family, but you cannot help but stare in awe at the huge panels in Arabic on every corner of the … mosque? Church? Ah, history confuses the mind!! On the very same stones characters such as Emperor Constantine, King Richard the Lion Heart, and all the Sultans of the great Otoman Empire have stepped and kneeled and prayed.

St. Sophia, ground and first floor.

The Virgin Mary and Islamic "vitrals" in St. Sophia.

The Topkapi Palace (which by the way is misspelled but I don’t have the right letter to spell it correctly) was built almost next door to St. Sophia. It was the most important palace of the Otoman Empire for centuries, home of the sultan and his family. Maya and I were extremely curious about the Harem, the part of the palace reserved for the Sultan and his family, where no one could enter without permission. Also the famous place where the Sultan’s wives and concubines were guarded from the outside eye. It was a bit disappointing… It seemed actually pretty small and tight, none of that luxury we were used to see in Omar Sharif’s movies. Well, the architecture was indeed beautiful, the tiles luxurious, but they did not put almost any furniture, so we had a hard time imagining where the others got the ideas for the movies, in the end… Maybe not from that Harem in particular… But here’s what we’ve learned… Fact or myth?
- The Sultan had 200 wives! - MYTH. The Sultan had by Muslim law at most 4 wives. But he did have around 200 female servants or concubines, although most of them never saw the Sultan ever in their lives. The Sultan’s mother (the most powerful woman in the Harem, by the way) could choose, however, among those 200 concubines, up to 8 women who would be the Sultan’s “favorites”. If these women got pregnant, they would have the same rights as an official wife.
- The concubines were drowned in the Bosforus after they lost their «appeal» - MYTH. The Sultan’s concubines retired in their 30’s, but went outside to have a normal life, or were married to some officer. Only in very rare cases did a woman spend her whole life in the Harem.
- The only men allowed around the Sultan’s wives, concubines and family were eunuchs - FACT. There were only black eunuchs attending the family, wives, and concubines. But they were not slaves, they were paid for their job, as were the concubines. Castration was only partial (whatever that is), and usually it had been done before they came to the Harem, and they had also received special education, according to our guide.
There. Hope to have been of some service for those who were curious about what a Harem actually is!

Courtyard of the concubines.

Reception room of the queen mother.

Last but definitely not least we attended the wedding of Maya’s cousin, who was getting married to an English bloke! :) This was the main reason for Maya to go to Istanbul, and she invited me to come along as well. The wedding was a beautiful ceremony in a palace located on the Asian shore of the Bosforus, with a wonderful view over this enigmatic stretch of water that separates Europe from Asia. I leave you a picture of us, all dressed up and looking drop dead gorgeous!! Of course, Maya’s family was there and I had a chance to meet them. No comments, they are, as we say in Portuguese, five stars…

Maya & me.

Bridge over the Bosforus, between Europe and Asia.

Also, I have to praise Turkish food. If you think we have good food in Portugal, go to Turkey!! OH MY GOD… That’s why I say, tesekur ederim (misspelled, again…), Istanbul!! Hope to see you again.

View over Istanbul from Topkapi Palace.

New house… new house?

2006-09-05T15:52:00.000-07:00

Ok, reasons for not writing in such a long time… I’ve been working like a dog to finish my masters on time. I moved out of the flat where I had been living these past 2 months with Maya and occasionally Sinan, and in to a small yet gezelligge room.

These were 2 very nice months. I came back here with the “I left Houston” blues, but after a couple of Palms I fell right back into my old self, with some improvements. I know more recipes now. Sicilian ones. And I have memories that no money can buy. Of sunsets watching baseball, of Ferraris and tanned middle-aged men driving them, of spanglish in every corner, of smiles and looooooooong draaaaaaaaaawn vowels. It seems almost like a dream, and a strange one indeed, but it is still there, in the back of my mind. Houston, Texas.

As I was saying, these were 2 very nice months. The high point was of course the Lowlands festival, but I hope to make a post about it when I get the pictures revealed. I hope they show more than mud. That seemed to occupy most of the weekend, somehow.
Besides Lowlands, it was really cool to live with one of my best friends. I thought it might become a bit dangerous (my first MSc project was on evolution of territoriality, and one simple way to test this would be – put 2 neurotic girls in a house and see what happens), but in the end we became even more part of each others’ family than we already were. I even managed to get a jacket from her using the same strategy as with my blood sister – wear it to exhaustion, eventually she will forget she ever owned it. It works. ;) Just kidding, Maya B. I also have to say that our domestic evenings with Amigo Sinan, watching Seinfeld and eating popcorn (well, they ate, I scorned because I don’t like popcorn), were among the best I ever had. We really had a small family going on there.

And now I’m living kind of by myself, in a small room, surrounded by stuff!! I always thought I had too few things, when I lived in a huge classroom, now I have too many…That’s relativity for you. The moving went exceedingly well, it only took 40 minutes in total to load and unload my ten boxes and additional junk to my new room, thanks to my helpers (people I bribed with beer/threatened with physical injury/etc).

Bad side of new room: it’s on the top floor. This means that running to the bathroom (on the bottom floor) may result in a life-threatening situation – we are talking about dutch stairs, ladies and gentlemen. Now I think about how desperate I really am before going down 3 flights of stairs. “Do I really need to go?… Maybe I can hold it in.” It’s a bother. But hey, better than nothing. And it’s pretty close to the city center, now I walk to the shops, muahahahahah. I share bathroom and shower, but I have my own kitchen. Well, a kitchenette. Or more like the granddaughter of a kitchenette. Kitchenetteje. It works, ok???? Nothing wrong with being small. Gotta go, I leave a picture of the view I have from my window of the Martini Toren.

A minha avo

2006-08-09T08:38:00.000-07:00

A minha avo tem maos de princesa, apesar de nunca o ter sido. Tem olhos azuis do mar que a viu nascer, e a voz suave dos ventos que passam por esta terra sem deixar grande marca. A minha avo le livros. Le tudo o que lhe passa pelas maos, desde Jackie Collins a Saramago, passando por Salman Rushdie.

A minha avo eh daquelas pessoas que tratam o Eca de Queiroz por tu – “Nao ha ninguem como o Eca…” e cujos olhos se fecham quando pensa em tempos antigos. A minha avo escrevia. Agora ja nao escreve, mas nos tempos em que a criatividade lhe corria nas veias, escrevia livros, romances de cordel na maioria, mas livros, que as suas irmas encadernavam com prazer e gostavam de mostrar a toda a familia. Menos ao meu avo, que nunca leu um unico texto da minha avo.
A minha avo resiste a mudanca como a rocha resiste a agua. Lentamente, a coisa vai. Eh orgulhosa da sua neta que foi para tao longe, e da sua boca nunca saem as palavras “devias arranjar um marido e assentar, filha”. Em vez disso diz “Es uma lutadora, filha”. Mas a sua televisao so tem dois canais, que eram os que existiam quando ela a comprou. Ao principio desconfiava do Multibanco, mas agora ja se rendeu as maquinas que tanto trabalho lhe poupam.
Quando o meu avo morreu, eu nao dava nada pela minha avo. Agora sei porque. Porque sempre a vi a sombra do meu avo. E agora sei porque estou a escrever isto, agora sei porque de repente me lembrei que fizeram ha pouco anos que o meu avo morreu. Eu devia ter uns 12 ou 13. E pensei na altura que nao restaria muito tempo ate a minha avo se juntar a ele, tao destruida pelo desgosto eu a vi. Passaram 14 anos desde entao. Vivemos todos a nossa vida, certamente nao da mesma forma que se ele ainda estivesse connosco, mas vivemo-la. Fomos capazes de prosseguir. Inclusive a mulher que tao fragil parecia, arranjou forcas para continuar. E agora penso, quem era a pedra de base da familia? Quem eh o mais forte? Aquele que luta contra moinhos de vento, ou aquele que dedica a sua vida aos seus amores e aos seus livros?

Start spreading the news...

2006-08-02T03:21:00.000-07:00

You Are New York

Cosmopolitan and sophisticated, you enjoy the newest in food, art, and culture.
You also appreciate a good amount of grit - and very little shocks you.
You're competitive, driven, and very likely to succeed.

Famous people from New York: Sarah Michelle Gellar, Tupac Shakur, Woody Allen

What American City Are You?

Yeah, so I guess I spent 6 months in the WRONG city... Actually, a true New Yorker I met in Houston told me, very seriously: "You'de be a lot happier in New York!" And he added: "Houston is a city of leftovers..." I don't agree with that, but as for the New York bit, maybe he was right all along. I'm just not sure if Sarah Michelle Gellar and me could share the same city. :-)

By the way, what is there to say about someone who should be writing a report but is blogging and taking tests on the internet instead? (million stoned faces)

On the effect of the flu on the ability to communicate

2006-07-17T09:21:00.000-07:00

You Communicate With Your Ears

You love conversations, both as a listener and a talker.What people say is important to you, and you're often most affected by words, not actions.You love to hear complements from others. And when you're upset, you often talk to yourself.Music is very important to you. It's difficult to find you without your iPod.

How Do You Communicate?

Another lazy day in sunny Groningen. Sunny? Yes, you heard me. However, enjoying the Dutch light is not for me!! I'm at home, enjoying another kind of light, the one you see at the end of the tunnel after you've taken enough paracetamol and Actifed to make your brain go "--.--mipmip--.--". And wandering through the internet I found this test on Correio Verde's blog, and couldn't resist to take it.

I communicate through the ears. This is mostly true, especially because right now I have no voice and no sense of smell and taste. So ears is all I've got. But it got me thinking. This is dangerous, i know. It got me thinking about what is most important to us. Lately I've been feeling words shouldn't be as important to me as they have been so far. I mean, it's nice to lose yourself in them once in a while, but I'm now feeling inclined to take people more for their deeds than for their sayings. I mean, everyone can come up with a good punchline. But not everyone can take a good punch. See? There you have it.
And this was today's moment of philosophy. Blame it on the paracetamol.

The return of the Dutch

2006-07-12T07:48:00.000-07:00

Yes, here I am, back to the cozy (gezellige) city of Groningen, north of Holland. Elected this year as the best inner city of the Netherlands. Hmmm. Definetely it is a lively, interesting city, and I am happy to be back. I’m reacquainting myself with my old habits – riding the bike everywhere, that was the first, of course. I missed my city bike so much in Houston, and the ease with which bikes flow here, when comparing to the nerve-wrecking adventure that is riding a bike in Houston. I’ve been to the University already, to have a meeting with my supervisors… God, how I missed fruitful conversations without the fear of committing a mistake… I re-encountered all my friends here, had nice long chats with most of them, listened to all the gossips, and slowly, but steadily, I start to feel at home once more. I even went to the sneak again, and had the pleasure of watching a Thai martial arts movie about a guy looking for his two elephants in Sidney, Australia. Mostly spoken in Thai, I didn’t get a word, but still, I liked it. It brought me back to childhood, when I saw this Portuguese TV show called “Duarte e Cia.” (totally unrelated to me, I swear). The sound of breaking bones, kicks and punches was THAT fake.

But… something seems to be missing… Is it my impression or is the sun not shining enough? Is it just me or does everyone speak Dutch, instead of… say… English, Spanish, Vietnamese, Italian, Hindu, Japanese? And why did people suddenly stop apologizing (“Oh, I’m sorry, sweetie!”) when they block my way or step on my foot? Yep. I miss Houston.

Or is it just like Antonio Variacoes said: “So estou bem aonde nao estou, porque eu so quero ir aonde nao vou…” – I only feel fine where I am not, because I just want to go where I don’t go…

Hoje foi assim

2006-07-01T15:23:00.000-07:00

Palavras para que? O homem alem de lindo ainda nao me desapontou. CASA COMIGO CRISTIANO!!!!!!!!!!

Hem hem. O jogo foi um bom jogo, improprio para cardiacos, e eu estive a beira das lagrimas quando fomos a penalties. Agora eh bola pra frente, e acreditar! Afinal, eh so um jogo, mas la que move coracoes, move.
Ja agora partilho com vcs um piqueno aparte. Eh a primeira vez que vejo futebol rodeada de gente que sabe menos do que eu! E nao eh que dei comigo a explicar o que eh um fora de jogo, e porque eh que eles nao substituem todo e qualquer jogador que se aleije no dedo mindinho do pe (doi, pois doi). La fiz entender ao americano que me perguntou isso que eles tem um numero limitado de substituicoes, e a tactica ai eh mto importante, e tal. Ele percebeu. Ha gente que nem sabe o que eh um cartao vermelho. Ha gente que nem sabe que dois amarelos equivalem a um vermelho. Credo, estou nos USA. Depois ainda tive que aturar uma americana a torcer aguerridamente pela Inglaterra, ainda por cima convencida de que sabia de futebol. A gaja nao faz ideia do perigo que correu. So me deu vontade de lhe enfiar a t-shirt da seleccao inglesa num sitio onde nao faz sol. Contive-me.

English summary:
- I'm in love with Cristiano Ronaldo.
- Americans don't get soccer, or how we (soccer fans) love it. They just don't.
Really, this was pretty much all I said.

Don't cry for me, Texas...

2006-06-17T09:53:00.000-07:00

I think this will be my last entry in Houston, Texas. I predict hard times ahead, trying to write my report at the same time as collecting my last results. The first obstacle to surpass is this horrible laziness… After weeks in which my life was all about amoebas, I finally start to have some time for other things that I should use to write my report, but honestly… I feel more like going shopping. And this is bad, specially because I don’t have the money for that.
Well… It’s time to make a summary and draw conclusions from my experience here in Houston. As usual for me, what thrilled me more about this place, are the people that I’ve met. And now start the first goodbyes. I already said goodbye to Marco, and Italian friend, great company for tango and great photographer, and I said goodbye to Rodrigo, who in these past few weeks had won the title of Best Roommate in the World, for services ranging from wake up calls to free therapy. I can't even imagine saying goodbye to Clea, we've become very good friends very quickly, which for me is a weird thing, and now I wonder "do I really know her only for 6 months?" cause it seems like a life time. Clea, I will most likely see again, there are already plans of visiting Sicily (this is the best part of international frienships - free housing all over the world!!), but the rest are people I’ll probably never see again, and this really upsets me. That’s why one of the lessons I learned here is that I never want to leave the people I care about behind again. At least, let’s all stay on the same side of the Atlantic Ocean, how about that?!
The professional experience was also very… hmmm… fruitful. It taught me many things. First, that the Netherlands, and Groningen in particular, is an excellent place to do science. Second, that difficult people are not impossible to deal with. I learned I am good enough and strong enough to deal with whatever I set my mind to. It’s just a matter of how much I like to suffer… Eheheh. Not much, actually. I also learned in a very practical way how important it is to have a good relationship with your supervisor, and to trust this person. This, I also have in the Netherlands, where my supervisor is someone that I admire deeply and that understands me perfectly. Finally, I learned that some things will always look better in theory than in practice. Work with Dicty is one of them. It’s a bitch.
All in all, it may sound like these 6 months were a waste of time. But no… I really needed to see for myself, and now I know better what I want, and that’s extremely important. I also learned that sometimes, the glitter that you see just around the corner is only that… glitter. Nem tudo o que luz eh ouro… I’ve learned how to feel content with what I have back home. It’s AOK. I can’t tell you how happy I am with that.
Then, last but not least, I learned tango. Ah, you may think I’ll give up on that, but I’ve been checking out where I can do it in Groningen and guess what… there are tango nights at Huis de Beurs, one of my favorite little corners of Groningen! I may have to give up on the close embrace tango, because close embrace with 2,00 m tall dutch men is not quite the same thing… Let’s all keep our imagination to ourselves…
One last thing… I’ve been looking at my results and although they show something different than what I had expected (what a surprise…..) I think I see an interesting pattern there… So, who knows, maybe this WAS a fruitful experience after all!
More news perhaps soon, perhaps in 3 weeks, already from the other side of the ocean, and perhaps in Portuguese, as I still get complaints that English is such an impersonal language, yada, yada, yada… But then again, to keep updated with the people I met here, I’ll still have to write in English! Ah. Offfffffff… decisions, decisions.

Poetry section

2006-06-04T12:58:00.000-07:00

Here goes, my first try at poetry in English. Because feelings are to be shared.

New born

If there is such a thing as reborn
I am it.
If there is such a thing as a new day
I have seen it.
The lights are out
And I shine,
As special and beautiful
As everyone else

Just like a birth
I came new from tears
This time my tears,
My sweat,
My blood.
Finally ready to be
The promise of me.

"New Born", Origin of Symmetry, Muse

The Sports Section

2006-05-21T19:41:00.000-07:00

It’s the final countdown! And in the last weeks I spend here I’m rushing to have all the “American” experiences. So, I went to the ball game. Yes, BASEBALL! What else could it be? Don’t hold your breath for pictures, because my camera is still out of service. This is just a picture stolen from a website.
The stadium is HUGE, I mean HUUUUUUUGE and we were at the top of it. Cheap places, surrounded by true fans, who were very much into the game. Now, first, the stadium, called the Minute Maid Park, after its sponsor, is not only huge but it is also like a small shopping center. You have all kinds of fast food, stores where you can buy t-shirst, hats and all sorts of baseball souvenirs, it has escalators as well, to go all the way up to the top seats. It reminded me more of the bullfight arena in Lisbon (Campo Pequeno) than of a football stadium… Strange. Anyway.
Baseballl is for everyone. Top executives, white collars, blue collars, no collars whatsoever, they’re all there, united by the passion of this game. You see friends together, couples, families, from 5 months babies to 80 year old grandmas. Why are these people so interested in this sport? Well… honestly… I guess because it’s… challenging!! Really. Ok, the games do last around 3 hours, where ¾ of the time is spent looking at a guy swinging a bat and missing the ball, or not swinging at all. Now… let me try to explain the rules to you.
There’s a square, right? With 4 bases in each corner. The home base is where the batter is, swinging his bat. Or not. The pitcher is in the center, and he tries to throw the ball to the batter, or not… (at this point it helps to clarify that batter and pitcher are from opposite teams), but it is only a valid throw if the ball goes above a small area marked on the ground beside the batter. Now… the batter, if he swings when it is not a valid throw, it’s a strike – meaning a bad thing for the batter’s team. Because 3 strikes, make a batter go out. Each team has, I don’t know, around 10 players… I don’t remember, but every player has to bat. Now… When a player hits the ball, and it’s a valid throw, he can run to the next base. If he gets there before the opposite team’s players return the ball to the base where he is arriving, he can stay there. I saw a player actually making it to second base from his own batting, which apparently is great. And I understand why… Other things may happen, like they can hit the ball and it can go outside the field (fowl), or he can hit the ball really well and it goes really high and the opposite team catches it in the air, before it touches the ground and that is BAAAD – the batter is immediately out. What happens when a batter is out? Another batter comes in. When a team who is batting has 3 players out, then the teams switch. I believe this is the end of an inning (but I’m not very sure).
Why the hell is it so difficult to bat well? Because there are many types of throws that a pitcher can do. He can throw a fastball, a slow ball, a curved ball, etc… The batter has to guess where the ball is gonna be at the time he swings, if it’s gonna be valid, etc. Owf. I would say baseball is not a big emotion game. It’s calm and nice. There is very little contact between players, except when they are running to the bases. Then you get to see them sliding like seals, exactly in the same way, because they’re also a bit chubby, baseball players… And they may accidentally or on purpose bump into the guy who is receiving the ball. Last time that happened was a recent event, and both teams got into a huge fight, it was like rugby, everyone in a pile.

The goal of the game is to "bring home" as much players as possible. This means that a player (who started batting at home base) returns to the home base. And now I think the significance of home run is clear. I'm not sure, but I guess it would be when a player hits the ball and can go all around the pitch and return to home base in that one hit. How the hell do they do that, I don't know.
So, let’s end, because I already see heads tilting and saliva running down the corners of my virtual audience’s mouth. Playing: Houston Astros versus Texas Rangers (a team that was owned by George Bush, son). Another reason for me to support the Astros. Goooooooooooooooooooooooooooo, ‘Stros!!! That was the ridiculous cheer they had. They lost. I'd go for changing cheer. Or players.
In the end, we had a lovely sunset over the Houston downtown skyline. Very nice indeed. So I liked the game, I liked the sport, it’s nice and gives you time to go get a hotdog or something… Not like soccer where my heart jumps every second (I just don’t know whether from emotion or from my sister’s screams – this time I’m not watching the World Championship with her… * sigh * ). Which brings me to the next topic!!! Soccer!!!!!!! I’m looking forward for the Championship! Everybody, let’s do our best! But anyway it will be fun to watch the games, no matter who wins. Hmm, I wonder if there will be a Portugal – Netherlands. Cause we’ll kick your ass again, ehehehe.

This was this blog's Sports Section, dammes en heren, have a great day and hope to see you soon. :)

On the existence of cell phones

2006-05-16T18:43:00.000-07:00

It’s eight o’clock and I just finished my lab work for today. Instead of going home I feel like writing even though I’m really tired and the pain in my arm is bigger each day from both using the laptop and pipetting every day. But I can’t help it, the words are waiting impatiently to being written. And they’re not even wise words. Not even deep, not even interesting. Just random thoughts in my mind. Quoting Catarina Fonseca in her recent book “Clube das Encalhadas”, if you don’t want to read, skip to the end, but don’t complain you don’t get anything of the story.
Last Sunday I dropped my cell phone, my beautiful Nokia 6101, sorry for the advertising. It was inside my bag so I didn’t see the effect of the drop until I pulled it out to see what time it was. At this point I should tell you that all my watches are broken, and I rely solely on my cell phone to tell me what time it is. I tried guessing by the position of the sun, but it just didn’t work out. And people tend to get angry if you set appointments to “when the sun is setting down”. I looked at my cell phone. Nothing. I tried to turn it on and off. Nothing. It was alive, yes, I could hear the little beeping noises created when I pushed every key in the hope of reviving it, but it showed nothing on the screen. My cell phone was…. BLIND!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! And I felt blind with it. My contacts, my pictures, my CLOCK! The very thing that allows me to wake up in the morning, the alarm clock, was impossible to set. Ok, I had my differences in the past with this alarm clock, and I do tend to ignore it most of the time, but I still feel close to it, like to a relative that you hate to see at your doorstep, but still let in, quickly hiding your favorite cookies out of sight. On Monday, I relied on my housemate Rodrigo (yes, he’s new) and on Clea to wake me up with heavy knocking on my door and phone calls. Yes, because I could receive phone calls, I just couldn’t see who was calling, which can be dangerous.
Monday went by and my phone was still as blind as a mole. I asked everyone, in the hope that the brains studying here at Rice University could come up with a solution for my cell phone. “Buy a new cheap one”, they said. As if I could do such a thing. First, because there is no such thing as cheap, second, because I really liked this phone, it has a deeper meaning to me, since I bought it from Maya, who was eager to buy her new phone, the recently recovered from a drinking problem Motorola RZR (see comments of last post). No way I was going to give up on it that easily. Clea suggested “Drop it once more, maybe it will work again”, in that wisdom that decades ago made people face high voltage as a good solution for problematic behaviors. I sniggered.
On Tuesday, while I was pouring plates and thinking of how I will manage to make my new undergraduate student (yeah, I got one, they’re also known as “slaves”!!!) actually help me instead of destroying my already sensitive experiment, my phone, sensing my desperation, took a plunge to the ground from the back pocket of my trousers. “Shit”, I thought, “as if it wasn’t broken enough…”. When I turned it to me, I saw…. It was telling me: --:--
My phone could see again!!!!!!!!!!! I could see as well! He had come out of his vision-coma, and was asking me “Where am I?” and “Who am I?” and “Please insert time and date”. So I did, and the world shifted back to normal.
What is the take home message of this story? Cell phones have mysterious ways. They seem connected to us at a level that not even cats and dogs manage. Not even boyfriends! You can count on them to wake you up, to give you detailed messages from dear friends, to put you in touch with the world, and if they are dropped they eventually come back to you without big complaints, which is something a boyfriend hardly ever does.
However… Sometimes, when you’re expecting that call, cell phones can be a bitch, and give you the impression that you’re lonelier than ever. Just because they’re not ringing.

Homesickness - part II or some other kind of sickness...

2006-05-02T16:57:00.000-07:00

Today I feel sick. I know this weblog is supposed to make my friends know how I am, without them thinking I’m collapsing, but today I have to say I feel sick. Not sick in the sense my body is sick, but my mind feels sickened by many things in the lab where I’m working. All I can say is that I look forward to leave.
Sometimes I miss the Netherlands as if it was my home, I already said that. I miss the biking without the feeling of facing a danger beyond reason, I miss being able to do simple things without a car, like going to the movies, or better yet, going anywhere without a car. I miss Dutch people and their cold politeness, I miss what used to be my home, I even miss the rats in the kitchen, because rats are way better than cockroaches. Here there are a lot of cockroaches, which are probably the only living being that I would promptly choose to condemn to extinction, had I such powers. Keeping with the melancholic list of things that I miss, I miss my friends in Groningen, I miss the coffeeshops, I miss meeting Maya in the Grote Markt for another pathetic adventure ;), I miss talking to Saleta in galispaniguese (for those who don’t know, that’s a mix of Portuguese, Galician and Spanish), I miss the long coffee breaks with Aniek where everything from science to hopes and dreams is discussed thoroughly. I miss the sunsets in incredible colours.
But the other day I had a dream. I dreamt I was in a city, living there. The city had hills, converging to the center, and a light like I never found anywhere else but in Lisbon. The sunlight reflects on the white, yellow, baby blue buildings, and on the red tile roofs, creating a warm glow that tells me “you’re home”. And everyone in this city (which I still wasn’t sure to be Lisbon) spoke Portuguese. The little man in the kiosk selling newspapers, the ladies chatting on their way to the subway, everyone I met spoke Portuguese. In the dream I was astonished by this! How convenient, a foreign city where everyone is Portuguese. That’s just what I need. Then I realized I was dreaming about living in Lisbon, and woke up.
Truth be told, I am now so used to being away that it’s hard for me to name what I miss the most in Portugal. The habits are gone, and this is what we always feel that we miss. It was a long process of breaking the old habits and creating new ones, in fact creating a whole new life, from scratch. The only things left now of my life in Portugal are feelings. Feelings for people, feelings for places. And going back to these people and these places is like putting on a pair of old and extremely comfy shoes. You may feel sexier in a new, more fashionable pair of shoes, but these still hurt in critical places of your feet. The other shoes are so worn that they know where to bend, where to be soft, where to be hard. But perhaps you need both types of shoes.
Enough with the shoe analogy. Why am I thinking of this now? I don’t know, honestly, but anyway… I would already feel better if I could go as quickly as possible to my second home (Groningen) and just stuff myself with stroopwaffles, or drown my sorrows in a bottle of Palm. But going to Lisbon and stuff myself with Pasteis de Belem and drown my sorrows in Moscatel would be infinitely better.

View of river Tejo from somewhere in Chiado, Lisboa.

PS- I just remembered now that my dream could mean that I feel like a foreigner in my own country. Buahahhahahaha.

25 de Abril Sempre!!!!!!!!!

2006-04-25T15:10:00.000-07:00

Salgueiro Maia e outros capitaes de Abril. Photo from here

Para uma celebracao do 25 de Abril como deve ser vejam a pagina da minha mae. Nao tive tempo para nada, snif... Mas nao me esqueci e o 25 de Abril estara sempre no meu coracao. E hoje sem pensar nisso, vesti-me de vermelho-cravo, nem sei bem porque... :) Segue-se uma explicacao para turista do que eh o 25 de Abril.

Sorry for that small paragraph in portuguese but today is a very special day for many portuguese. For others it is a hateful day. Anyway. Today, 32 years ago, there was a revolution in Portugal. This revolution was done by the army, mainly by lower rank officers - they are now called the Captains of April. For 40 years before that day, Portugal was under a fascist regime which had led us into never ending wars in our colonies throughout the world and to being openly ostracized by democratic governments. Portugal was isolated (proudly alone, was the motto for this regime) and kept in darkness. Due to our isolation, a lot of regions were pretty much as developed as in the 19th century, and poverty was abundant. People were obviously not allowed to speak their minds against the government, and there was only one political party allowed. We had the same prime minister for something like 30 years. The one time when a real opposer tried to run, not for prime minister, that was a sure assignment, but for President, he lost misteriously and died not so misteriously shortly after. My grandfather used to listen to his campaign on the radio. My mother was very young, still in primary school. Her teacher asked them who used to listen at home to the political campaigns on the radio, and my mother said innocently her father did. After that, my grandfather was taken to questionning by the political police. He was "lucky" because he had no affiliation they could prove to any forbidden organisation, but members of the then underground Communist Party and Socialist Party were often put in prison for years, questioned and tortured. Many died there.
In 1974, the politicized faction of the army decided to take a stand and in few more than 24 hours, with no support from higher ranking officers, the Captains of April made the perfect revolution... In the dawn, they started to move and take all the important points where resistance could be met. When people started to wake up, they heard warnings from the revolutionary movement to stay at home. But they just couldn't. They came to the street to show their support and agreement, and to finally express their desire for freedom. In the frantic hours after that, the only bloodshed that occurred was caused by the political police forces who tried to resist and shot randomly out of a window to a square filled with not an angry but hopeful crowd.
The street sellers were selling red carnations. I don't know and no one will ever be sure who thought of it, but somehow red carnations were placed in the soldiers' machine guns. For me this is the most emblematic image of this revolution, also called the Revolution of Carnations, and even though I never lived it, I will always be very happy on this day. Because I know it was one of the happiest days in my parents' life, my grandparents', my uncles', and it makes me happy that they could see it, they were there, they watched this amazing change in the face of the people and turned to the mirror in surprise at their own expression of happiness to be at last, free.

This is where the story ends, and I say they lived happilly ever after. But that's bulshit, everyone knows THAT!
Anyway, hope you enjoyed this bit of portuguese recent history. If not... ah, what the hell.

Elevador da Gloria, Lisboa, on April 25th 1974. Photo by Victor Valente

Back to life...

2006-04-12T17:34:00.000-07:00

Well, mom came and went. She left a lot of things with me, the most precious were all the hugs that I missed so much. Now it's back to routine, back to the fruitless experiments in the lab, back to tango! :), and back to my crappy appartment. I stayed in the studio my mom rented in a nice hotel for the time she was here. For some time, I had the comfort of a real living room, with a dinner table and all, a television, a normal bathroon with some ventilation (I usually almost choke to death in mine, after a shower, and no I can't leave the door open... Not good if the housemates catch a glimpse of my behind in the shower, for a lot of reasons). Now it's back to the slum. Anyway, this won't last long. Fortunately my friend Clea has now a nice appartment, with a very cool kitchen, so I can put into practice my recipes (I bought recently a vegetarian cuisine book) and my old favorite, the famous Duarte pie (thus named by Maya, who associates this pie with the Duarte family). It's a pie made with condensed milk (yuuuuumiiiii), crumbles of Maria cookies, and whipped cream. Hmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm. Oh my God.
I'd like to have some pictures of me and Mrs. Alice Duarte in the land of Cowboys, but no can do. My camera is out of batteries and I couldn't recharge them for some misterious reason. And my mother didn't bring any camera. I know, intellingence obviously runs in the family. Anyway. We visited lots of places, which I never had seen before, like the Museum of Fine Arts, the Zoo, the Galleria (the biggest shopping center in TeXas!!), and.... oh, yeah, the Museum of Natural Sciences. Well, Houston isn't very prolific in places to see. Plus it was very hard getting around without a car, taking cabs everytime... By the end of the first day I was already tired of talking to rude cabdrivers and deaf/dumb/just plain stupid telephone operators. There is something very wrong when you call a cab to the intersection of Rice Boulevard and Kelvin Street and the person tells you, "yes, but I need a physical address". Apparently, intersections exist on a metaphysical plane, not really a physical one. I tried explaining that two perpendicular lines only intersect in one point, but that seemed far-fetched to the operator, so I just told her a number on that street. That made her happy.
My mom liked Houston. With the exception of the Zoo, where she kept saying, "oh, the Lisbon zoo is waaay better than this... Look, OUR koalas had a baby on their back!!", everything was fun for her. I think the highlight was a Japanese festival we went to after the zoo, maybe because koalas with no babies were a poor match for a true japanese tea ceremony, where "Cha-do", the way of tea, was explained to us in detail and in the end we were served a taste of the japanese green tea. It tastes like freshly mown grass, with a touch of dead fish. But it wasn't bad. I found it quite cleansing. My mom nearly threw up, but it opened her mind to a whole new world of flavours.
By the way I strongly recommend the Fine Arts Museum if you're ever in Houston. It really impressed me. I specially enjoyed the collection of african gold pieces they had there, and an exhibition of an american sculptor, whose name I forgot..., but anyway, his pieces were simply beatiful and they really made my day. Joseph something. Whatever...
The Galleria was the dream of any shopping-aficcionada, such as me and my mom. We searched the grounds thouroughly for our prey, and we got it!!! I got a new jacket and my mom loads of stuff, mainly presents for others. We then walked in Saks Fifth Avenue and came out utterly depressed about the amount of things we couldn't buy. But it was nice. For me, some of the outfits I saw there were shoulder to shoulder with some paintings at the Fine Arts Museum.
Mom gone, all I can do now is do my best (a very tipical japanese phrase...ehehehe) and wait until I'm again with my family! Only in September!!! Ai ai ai... To compensate for the lack of photos, I'll leave another song. This one reminds me how far away I am but also of good things that I lived and hopefully will live again!! Like for example, LOWLANDS FESTIVAL!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Enjoy!

"Oh my God", Kaiser Chiefs

Saudade...

2006-04-04T09:43:00.000-07:00

But Mom is on her way!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

A Oeste nada de novo...

2006-03-30T17:07:00.000-08:00

Another week went by here in Houston, Texas. No news to tell. It rained heavily. Some days the sun shone. Some thoughts have gone through my mind… Why the f*&^% am I here, for example? The answer comes to my mind immediately. To learn tango. Wait a second… Didn’t I come here to learn more about social evolution? Surely not. Or to do a decent experiment in the lab (one, just one, Lord…) that actually produces good, useful results? My poor Dictyostelium look at me sternly, shaking their little fruiting bodies in a feeble yet determinate negative movement.
Learning tango has become the goal of my whole stay. To hell with Biology. I’m moving to Buenos Aires and I’ll live a bohemian life for the rest of my days, dancing tango on the streets with a short strappy black dress and high heels. (Damn, that must be uncomfortable…)
The sad part is that there is no tango lesson this week… As a result of these depressing events, I turned to C++ once again and started playing with it in the hope of one day modeling what I apparently cannot make Dicty do in a Petri dish. Today I created a virtual amoeba. *sigh*
What else can I say?… Maybe I should just leave you with one of the most beautiful tango songs I ever heard. Enjoy!

Balada para mi muerte (lyrics: Horacio Ferrer, music: Astor Piazzolla, interpreter: Mina)

Moriré en Buenos Aires, será de madrugada,
guardaré mansamente las cosas de vivir,
mi pequeña poesía de adioses y de balas,
mi tabaco, mi tango, mi puñado de esplín.
Me pondré por los hombros, de abrigo, toda el alba,
mi penúltimo whisky quedará sin beber,
llegará, tangamente, mi muerte enamorada,
yo estaré muerto, en punto, cuando sean las seis.

Hoy que Dios me deja de soñar,
a mi olvido iré por Santa Fe,
sé que en nuestra esquina vos ya estás
toda de tristeza, hasta los pies.
Abrazame fuerte que por dentro
me oigo muertes, viejas muertes,
agrediendo lo que amé.
Alma mía, vamos yendo,
llega el día, no llorés.

Moriré en Buenos Aires, será de madrugada,
guardaré mansamente las cosas de vivir,
mi pequeña poesía de adioses y de balas,
mi tabaco, mi tango, mi puñado de esplín.
Me pondré por los hombros, de abrigo, toda el alba,
mi penúltimo whisky quedará sin beber,
llegará, tangamente, mi muerte enamorada,
yo estaré muerto, en punto, cuando sean las seis,
cuando sean las seis, ¡cuando sean las seis!

Ten Thousand Villages

2006-03-21T14:46:00.000-08:00

Continuing with the theme “Multicultural Texas”… I want to tell you about my volunteering at Ten Thousand Villages. Yes! I decided to do something useful for the world. Ask not what mankind can do for you, but what you can do for mankind. Or something like that.
There is a shop here at Rice Village, just a few blocks away from my house, called Ten Thousand Villages. It belongs to a non-profit organization that sells products manufactured in developing countries and all the products sold there are fair trade products, meaning that the people who produced them got paid fairly for their work. There’s no middleman between the organization and the artisans and the whole thing is more or less run by a religious association. I can see my mother frowning on the other side of the Atlantic. Yes, mother, like priests and nuns, missionaries, whatever.
To tell you more about the mission of Ten Thousand Villages, here are the key principles of fair trade:

1. Creating opportunities for economically disadvantaged producers
2. Transparency and accountability
3. Capacity building
4. Payment of a fair price
5. Gender equity
6. Good working conditions
7. Care for the environment

Seems ok, doesn’t it? I like it. There are Ten Thousand Villages shops all over the US and Canada. The shops work mainly based on volunteers who take care of everything, from receiving deliveries, store decoration and cleaning, taking care of costumers, and above all, letting people know what is the goal of Ten Thousand Villages.
Check the website to see some of the beautiful products they have for sale. Personally, I never leave the store without buying something. So, I’ll leave the US as a true humanitarian and broke. Luckily, all volunteers have 15% off in all the products they buy at the shop. Hehehehe. I can still see my mother frowning on the other side of the Atlantic. No, that’s not the main reason why I’m volunteering there, mom.
I’ve been there only twice, though, due to my intensive (and utterly non-productive) lab work lately… But it’s really nice, the people are very friendly, mainly women in their 40’s, housewives… The concept of housewife that I had forgotten all about is very real here. Although Portugal is a Catholic-majority country, and most people think that therefore women should be more submissive there, women cannot afford to be just housewives. One salary rarely does the trick to get a family through the month. Portuguese women know their place very well, don’t worry, and that’s working like hell both at work and at home. I really think most Portuguese women are some kind of Super Woman. Here in the US, however, wives can be just that. Wives. Why? Because salaries are high, and especially “oil” wives, don’t really need to move a finger. It is really absurd how rich some people are here. Anyway, most of the volunteers at ten Thousand Villages are women who don’t have to work therefore they give their time to this and other non-profit organizations. I think it’s a good spirit to have… Now I just have to get used to the extreme enthusiasm people greet each other with here. Every time a costumer enters the store I should say “Hi!!!!! How’re y’all doin’ today??” as if I wished for nothing else in this world than having those particular persons entering the shop that day. Damn. I could barely get the hang of the extremely cheerful/irritating/cheerleader-like Dutch “doeiiiiii”. I don’t think I’ll manage this. I’ll just stick to wrapping stuff and sipping my 100% Fair Trade Colombian Coffee, while keeping a lookout for new earrings in the jewelry section… All for the good of developing countries!

Culture Fair - The whole story!

2006-03-09T11:52:00.000-08:00

It was a sunny day in Houston, Texas. The birds sang, the trees swinged their leaves quietly to the slight breeze, the resident squirls of the Rice University Campus engaged in their normal mid-day activities (running around like crazy while surveying for potential food sources). But something was cooking. Several things, actually. At the culture fair, food from all over the world was being tasted by hungry crowds and bits of culture were traded and shared among very different people, just like that. As if it was a very simple thing, really. None of that "my country was attacked by yours" kind of talk that usually gets you nowhere. People just wanted to show what was good about their countries, and everyone was entitled to enjoy that.
It was a very nice atmosphere, and the pictures speak for themselves. I'll just add some comments here and there...

The African Students Association at Rice.

A flower dance from somewhere. One of the girls (the blond) is Michelle, an undergrad in our lab!

Japanese dance, my kind of thing. :) Domo arigato gozaimasu. It was particularly funny because one girl was very good and the other sucked but was utterly unpreocupied about it - she laughed the whole way through the dance. It was more or less like an example - "ok, and here is how NOT to do this dance". I liked it!

Our belly-dancing teacher, Victoria. She's really good. Damn, it's a difficult thing to do...

Aha! The Indian Students stand was dressing up people in beautiful typical hindu costumes, so we decided to give it a try. Here we are, Clea and me, looking totally ridiculous in such beautiful clothes... We're just not the type, I'm afraid.

This is Charlie and Camila, two people I met at the Portuguese lunches of Prof. Suzana. He's obviously american, but speaks perfect portuguese, with a strong brazilian accent. She is from Rio!!!! Totally "carioca", from tip to toes, and very nice. Through her I found out brazilians also have a passion for codfish, they inherited it from the portuguese. Funny, huh?

Clea decided she would sing. Then she decided she wouldn't. Then she went back on that last decision, and forward again, and back again. Etc. Marco (an italian friend of hers not shown on the pictures) and me weren't very supportive, i think because we were both afraid she would get nervous and screw it up... Then she decided to go, and that was her last call. She went and sang "O sole mio". It was amazingly good. I had already heard her sing before, but not in front of so many people. I was impressed at her nerve, and at how good she can sing opera without having had any previous training... Amazing. Some people are just born like that, I guess. That was the only Italian representation, actually, because despite there being A LOT of italians at Rice, they are all too lazy to organize something, or at least this was Marco's explanation... "hey, we're italian!"... What more can I say?
No, I didn't go to sing fado. Are you nuts?????! Ai Mouuuuuuuurariaaaaaaaaaaa... I leave that for the shower. Ehehehe. Portugal WAS represented, together with the brazilian stand, there was a flag there and all.

Here's the photo of the flag. It's underneath the Brazilian flag. Look carefully or you might miss it. I guess we also have the italian spirit, because we didn't bother to do much. But we can always blame it on excess of work... Yes, yes... On the left is Manuel, the other portuguese student here. He looks guilty, doesn't he? Perhaps because he spent the whole fair eating food at other stands instead of standing by his flag, right arm against his heart singing the national anthem? Could be, could be...

Ok, that's it for now. I hope the blog still works with these many photos!!

Sorry hoor

2006-03-03T17:49:00.000-08:00

Hey guys,
Another week without a proper post. I've been busy all week doing megasized experiments, and today I realized it was in part for nothing because something went wrong. I know where it went wrong, I know why, more or less, and it's not entirely my fault. But a little, and it makes me feel that all my effort was pointless.
To cheer me up, I decided to change the image of the weblog, and I like it better like this, but with the old template went the old links to the Other Worlds out there that I like to visit from time to time. Now I have to put them all again. Sounds similar, somehow. Maybe this is a cursed week. I shouldn't do anything, because whatever I do turns into more trouble. I should stay home and eat icecream all day. Because the weather really asks for it. It's sunny, and warm, and the sky is blue (except for now because it's night time). Not that I've had chance to enjoy any of this. I think I'm sounding more and more like Marvin, the depressed robot from Hitchiker's Guide to the Galaxy, but maybe that's just because before sleeping I like to read the book.
Meanwhile I had a very good news! Maya was accepted in Cambridge! She may very well be going there to do her PhD. She is not yet sure about the scholarship, apparently, but I hope things turn out for the best!! Anyway, they say that she can always use the acceptance as a good thing for her CV, even if she never goes there. I can imagine Maya in a job interview in the future - "yeah, they accepted me, they really wanted me there, but you know how it is... a girl's gotta do what a girl's gotta do".
And really, there's not much more to tell. I keep going to dance tango, I'm getting better at it, fortunately... Salsa is put aside for sometime because last time we got bored to death in our very own Taco Milagro. Today was the Culture Fair, but I hope to tell you more about it when I have a picture illustrating it... I didn't bring my camera, so I'm waiting for someone to send me some pictures. But I can say how it ended. When we were leaving, Clea and me, we went by the stand of the Latin American students and they started to play "Macarena" and we ended up dancing the macarena in front of everyone there, with all the Latin American students gathered there. It was fun! But weird. Even more because after macarena they started playing Daddy Yankee, a Reggaeton group/artist/whatever, and his famous hit... "Gasolina". Need I say more? To some, I'm sure the picture is now complete, to others, maybe it's better that stays incomplete...
See y'all real soon and have a good one! (this is how texans wish a good day!)

Tango and samba

2006-02-22T09:48:00.000-08:00

Howdy folks!

Long time no post. Ok, ok, I admit it, I was too lazy to write a proper post… But I have great news! I started my experiments in the lab, and so far I managed not to screw up entirely the whole thing! Let’s see what the results will be…

For those who want to know, I’ll explain briefly what my research is about. Those who are not interested may skip to the following paragraph, and go directly to the reason why I named this post Tango and Samba. Well, I’m working with Dictyostelium discoideum, which is a cellular slime mold, also called social amoeba. Why social? This interesting little bugger has a somewhat complex life cycle. It undergoes vegetative growth living independently in soil and god knows where else, predating on innocent wandering bacteria. When it starves, however, this microbial lone wolf starts to emit signals of cyclic AMP (don’t ask me what THAT is), and cells start to aggregate and form a slug that actually moves towards better conditions, ie, towards light and away from ammonia. When these conditions are reached, they form fruiting bodies, with 20 % of the cells in the aggregate forming a sterile stalk and the other 80% or so, forming spores which are held aloft by the stalk in structures called sorus. Now, my biologist friends, you already see the point here, don’t you? It’s all very fine to die in the stalk and not go on to the next generation if all cells in the aggregate are in fact of the same clone (remember they divide several times, so cells aggregating may all be the same, essentially). But what if the cells in the aggregate come from different clones? They would be dying to help others that may not be related to them. And in fact the joining of different clones in an aggregate (technically determined “chimaerism”) is possible! And different clones co-occur in nature, although chimaeric fruiting bodies have not been reported in nature, because they are quite difficult to get, sensitive little things they are. Also, cheating has been reported with lab strains. This means that some clones actually work their way to become preferentially spores rather than stalk, leaving the other clone to do the dirty work of dying in the stalk. So, what I’m doing is seeing in what way the relatedness between cells in an aggregate influences the success of these cheater strategies, and I hope to see that increasing levels of relatedness will decrease the success of cheaters. How I’m going to manipulate relatedness exactly is enough for another post. I’ll tell you when I know if it works… Because Dicty doesn’t have a sexual stage… So I can’t simply cross them, so we’re going about it in another way, which I’m not sure it will work. Anyway…

Tango!!!!!! I’m having tango lessons. I never really was a tango person, but a friend of Clea’s is giving tango lessons for free for some people, and all we have to do is pay for the space, which ends up being 1.5 dollars each! Bargain!!! Heel goedkoop!!! Therefore, I’m there, to learn how to tango… Against my expectations I really like it. I thought it would be very complicated from the start, because I had already once tried tango, and it seemed extremely complicated, and a good way to end up with a twisted foot and your face in the floor. But she started from the very beginning. We learned that tango is a matter of balance between two people. It seems as the dancers are actually pushing each other, but no, it’s all a matter of each dancer leaning forward and putting his weight slightly in the upper part of the body, but never so much that he or she loses his balance if the other person moves away. This way the woman feels where the man is going to move, and when, and moves along with him, predicting his steps. Isn’t it beautiful?? It’s hard to actually give up on looking at my feet, but that’s rule number one, in any dance. Never ever ever EVER look at your feet, or your partner’s feet. A good analogy is that when I first started driving I always had to look at the gear to see if I was putting the correct one. Soon I realized that only made it easier for me to crash against a tree. Same for dancing!! The tango lessons are also a nice place to meet other people, and it’s always fun to watch the others making a fool of themselves in these very early stages of learning a dance… Ehehe. Of course, I also make a fool of myself, but at that moment I’m not watching. J
Speaking of learning new dances, I am also going to start learning belly dancing. Again, it’s a friend of Clea’s who is giving lessons for free. I heard she is quite good, so I will see how it goes. At least it will give me a good excuse to shake my booty!

Samba!!!! I don’t think I mentioned it here before, but there is a Brazilian teacher here at Rice University. She teaches Portuguese (now, now, Portuguese people out there, don’t frown… I know what y’all thought just right now!!), and she is an extremely nice person. She is the typical Brazilian that we, Portuguese, now from the soap operas. Very friendly, very cheerful, charming and pretty! Also she has a strong faith in God and communicates directly with Santa Marta. Ehehehe, this actually reminds me of a LOT of soap opera characters. But she is a very sweet person, she has 3 daughters and her husband is American, but they all speak perfect Portuguese. They suffer from the immigrant syndrome, though. Their conversations are half English, half Portuguese, although they are fluent in both. I’ve seen this so many times in Portuguese emigrated in France, spending their summer holidays in Portugal, that it has become a joke. “Michel, tu vas tomber!!! Nao te disse que ias cair, meu idiota?!” But I see it now as a sign of a very difficult struggle… People really try to cling to their own cultural identity but it’s difficult because slowly the culture of the country where you are also becomes your own… and then you’re this cultural hybrid that no one really understands except for other freaks like you. Really!! It’s a pain. I’m already a Portuguese-Dutch hybrid, in fact… Some people in Portugal already think I have a not-so-Portuguese attitude, but for the Dutch I’ll never have a totally Dutch attitude. Argh… Anyway! This teacher organizes a weekly lunch for Portuguese speakers at Rice and this Sunday she invited us all to her house that is where Judas lost his boots (direct translation from Portuguese, you shouldn’t miss these expressions, they are the best…), to have brazilian “feijoada”. That’s black beans with all sorts of meat, cabbage, rice, farofa (no translation found), etc… Yummiiiii, in summary. The food was really great, and it reminded me of home, because we eat a lot of brazilian food in Portugal. I got the chance to speak my language and try to convince all the Brazilians there that Portugal was a beautiful country. The people in general are all really nice, and maybe I will ask one day that they teach me how to dance samba properly, since my way is just a cheap imitation. But I think you have to be born in Brazil to have samba in your blood. Ah, Brazil, Brazil… So I leave you with the group photo of the lunch (many people, so I won’t tell you who all of them are, even I don’t know!!), and with a song by Chico Buarque, for me simply the best songwriter ever! This song celebrates a special event in Portugal (the revolution on 25th April 1974) and wishes for a connection between the 2 countries, for a breath of rosemary to travel across the ocean…

Happee Valenteen's Dae

2006-02-14T14:59:00.000-08:00

In the US, Valentine's Day is very important. I really start getting sick of all the heart shaped things around me, and all the pink and red stuff glowing, glittering, blinking out of every window shop. I never really got the hang of this day, for reasons better left unexplained, so I'll do my best at trying to think what would be my Valentine's Day message, if I had a Valentine... (Buaaaaahhaaaaaaahaaaaaaaaa). I think this is what it would be like. ;)

What d’ya know?

2006-02-07T17:06:00.000-08:00

Houston may actually be a fun place to be. I just found out this weekend where to dance salsa, no entry charged. Goodness gracious. And I thought I would die stupid here. Turns out I may even learn some moves!
Anyway, last Friday I went to dance salsa with Clea, another italian girl who works in my lab. It was great fun! We thought there would be a salsa party, but it turns out that the party was only on Saturday. Ooooohhh. But there was a band playing… With 6 musicians!! And… they played really well!!!!!! First song: Me libere (I wanted to be able to put a mini-player so you could listen to it, but no luck there... I hope I can do it in the future). Last song: Rebelion. Weeee, I was in heaven, transported back to the company of my Colombian fellows in Groningen, shaking what my momma gave me at Hemingway’s! And I was reminded of my dearest friend Saletinha. Especially because the guy who was singing was extremely cute and I thought she would appreciate the style. And also because salsa and Saleta will always be associated in my mind! : )

The crowd there was mainly Latin Americans. Mexico, Cuba, Puerto Rico, Venezuela and Colombia were all represented there. So it was a very nice atmosphere, and no one would stay sitting down shaking their feet, because no respectful Latino lets a woman sitting down when it’s obvious she feels like dancing! I’m also getting familiar with Spanglish, the strange combination of English and Spanish words, in current conversations. “Oye, people, vamos, don’t be shy!” On Saturday, Clea challenged me again to go to the same place, finally to the salsa party. Logically, the band playing was much worse, and the music was not as nice as on Friday. The singer (a different guy) was even cuter, though.
Well, we had a lot a fun, plus 2 Coronas and a Margarita, so next day I was rewarded with a major headache. Life cannot be perfect.
I am writing this at a café called Salento, a really nice place with free wireless internet, jazz music playing, students around me silently typing in their laptops or pouring over books, so, all in all, a very cool place to spend a Sunday afternoon. It’s also really close to my place, in the heart of Rice Village, which is more or less the “chique” shopping area, a bit like Sunset Boulevard for LA (come on, you all saw Pretty Woman, don’t deny it!). Yeah, I live close by, ain’t I lucky??? No, because I’m a shoppaholic. It’s like Diego Maradona living close to a cocaine plantation. Bad, very bad. And everything faaaaar too expensive.
Well, this is it for today, now I’m going back home and meet my Italian neighbours for a walk and maybe dinner later. So hasta la vista, folks!!

PS – the sun keeps on shining here… I was told this was the best time of the year, because in Summer it is too damn hot. I leave you with a picture of me in front of Lovett Hall, a building here at Rice University. The University is old... around 80 years old... Ok, nothing compared to Lisbon University nor Groningen University... it is still a baby compared to those ancient homes of Knowledge and Science (pompous background music sounding...). But do not neglect the power of youth... As Dumbledore wisely says to Harry in HP and the HBP.

Code speaking. Reference to fictitious characters to validate arguments... Yeah, Potter-mania goes on.

Born to be wild! Or not?…

2006-02-01T11:13:00.000-08:00

Ya, of, ya… as my friend Maya would say. It’s been 3 weeks already since I arrived here, going on 4.... I have to admit that adapting to Texas has been somehow easier than my adaptation to the Netherlands was. The house, though simple, at the lack of a better word, is already my house. The lab, although still mysterious, is already my lab, and the university campus, although truly American from head to toe is already my university campus. Probably because it is my second “adaptation”, and I am no longer the crybaby I was when I went to Groningen. Or maybe things are just easier, here. However, I have made some serious thinking about the reasons why I keep postponing my establishment somewhere, for good. Now the two things that occupy my mind constantly are my project, finding a PhD and… sorry, the THREE things that occupy my mind are my project, finding a PhD and Harry Potter. Hehehe. For those who know me, they already have realized that this is a serious situation, because every time I turn to Harry Potter as a scapegoat, it’s because my head is fuming…
The important thing to realize here is… whether Snape is really the bad guy!! No, just kidding, the important thing to realize is… what do I really want. This is complicated to ascertain, and in fact I have good reasons to believe I came all the away from across the Atlantic to find out what I want, which is kind of stupid. Sitting in my comfortable U-shaped couch in Groningen, or in my living room with my 2 cats in Oeiras, I would have figured out what I want, all the same. I just had to ask Myself. But Myself is always very evasive, the little bitch… Anyway. Just to say that although adaptation is going more or less smoothly, my head wanders to my two homes, and my heart wishes I would stop confusing dreams, which are nice to have and sometimes to follow, with its desires, which are much more important for happiness and peace of mind. Very deep, I know. And don’t get me started on Harry Potter.
Last weekend I finally got the chance to see some of the nature outside Houston. My supervisors are teaching a bird lab, and told me to come along if I wanted. Food, transportation and entrance in the Brazos State Park for free! Yiipiii! Minor drawback, I had to get up at 6 AM. And I’m not a birder… But anyway, I have done enough of these fieldtrips to know they are usually very interesting, even for the Common Backpack Walker. Ehehe. This was a joke that probably no non-birder or non-biologist will get, but helas…
And I wasn’t wrong! The park in itself is not breathtaking, but it has some untouched gallery forest, along the Brazos River, and several ponds, marsh-like kind of landscape, well, the usual of these bird areas… The day awoke submersed in deep fog, and I thought I would have done better in staying in bed, but when we got to the first spot, it took us only 15 minutes to see at least 20 different species… Weee! And at 9h30 it was already 20 degrees Celsius and the sun was shining.

My enthusiasm was even greater when I saw a sign saying: caution – alligators in the area. But I really thought it would be one of those signs that were there just to prevent people from going into the water, that I wouldn’t be fortunate enough to see one… But there they were, looking as pacient as only a species that is a living fossil could look. We didn’t get to see the big crocky snatching its jaws at any bird though… Too bad, but anyway, the birds were really nice. We saw loads of different ducks, herons, egrets, warblers, flycatchers, kingfishers, snipers, killdeers, titmice, cormorants, kestrels, even vultures and very very far away some pelicans flying in the horizon…

The temperature rose to 28 degrees and I think it must have reached 30 somewhere in the afternoon. Ahhhh, January in Texas…
Now, if I were a proper birder I would provide the scientific and common names of all the species I saw, but boring you to death is not my goal, although I may be accomplishing it anyway, and I don’t remember the names of all the species anymore. So you’ll just have to appreciate the pictures and say “uuuhhh, look at the pretty birdy”.
And by the way, I’d like to thank everyone for their warm comments. Some of you I haven’t seen in quite some time, but the hope to meet you again never dies, believe me. See y’all later, alligator! :)

The American way of life

2006-01-28T13:39:00.000-08:00

I live in a very small apartment built at the back of a house, looking not so much like the plan B in the architect’s mind than plan Y, but still a cosy place, as you can see in the picture. It shows the "garden" as we like to call it, and my door, and ALSO - the window to my room!! :) One important detail about American construction: it is fast. In 3 months, they can build a “hacienda” from scratch, but mind you, if the three little piggies had chosen an American house to hide from the big bad wolf, they would have become crunchy slices of bacon before they knew it. The walls are very thin, and seem to be made of not much more than paper. Maybe it’s just Texas… after all, this is a hurricane area. Maybe people got tired of building solid things that got blown away anyway, I don’t know.

Back to the point. In my apartment there are other 2 people living, a Colombian girl named Karen and a Mexican guy named Lohengrin. Do you see a pattern here? What became of Maria and Jose?! Well, Karen’s story I don’t know, but Lohengrin has this name because his father was very fond of Wagner’s music, and therefore decided to name him after one of Wagner’s operas, much to his happiness, I’m sure. Luckily, I bet that Lohengrin’s school companions did not know this is the opera the famous nuptial march comes from, otherwise his childhood would have been much worse... Anyway, both Karen and Lohengrin are nice people, friendly enough PLUS, they don’t have the bad habit of playing drums loudly like my previous housemates. Hehehe. Not that I minded… I mean, here, with these shaky things mimicking solid surfaces they call walls, you can hear everything, as if it were in your own room. And I shall say no more.
And with Karen I had the first attack of “Europeanitis”. Two weeks ago, I was invited to go to a pub by my Italian neighbours and also invited my housemates, and Karen replied with a “I can’t have beer”. I left with the feeling that the poor girl was sick, maybe taking antibiotic, which is more or less the only reason why I would deny a beer… Then I found out she was underaged, that is, less than 21, and that was why she couldn’t drink. This was the first detail that really made me realize I am in America now. I don’t know anyone in Portugal, or the Netherlands for that matter, that would let a minor thing like “laws” get in the way between them and a bit of fun.
Therefore, while sitting in an Irish Pub in Houston, TX (yes, Irish pubs do look all the same everywhere), I sipped my Corona (produto importado de Mexico) with extra pleasure, happy that the wisdom that apparently comes with age allows me to do the same stupid things any teenager would do, right under the approving eye of Law and Order.

So, you may ask, what IS there to do in Houston? Well. Not much. I heard the museums are very good, though. The only thing I saw so far was the Butterfly Tower, which is a building located at the Natural History Museum that simulates a tropical environment and where you can see hundreds of butterflies fluttering around you…

Needless to say I was deeply in love with the place at first sight. You enter this extremely moist place, with exotic plants everywhere, and butterflies, like the one in the picture, flying around you, almost landing on your hands, shoulders and head, of all colours and shapes… It is really beautiful… There is also an iguana, and I managed to take a picture of it, which was quite difficult despite it being very still, because there was a swarm of people around it saying in a very American way: “is it real???? Yes, it’s real, look at it moving!!! It’s moving, dad, come and look!!” Well, shiiiit, I thought to myself, why would they put a plastic iguana there? I mean, why not then put plastic plants and plastic butterflies? Dude, these guys are like soooo stupid. Yeah, they really talk like this. And then I managed to squeeze in and take a picture of the poor iguana that was probably feeling like a scaly greenish version of Lady Di. By the way, in the Natural History Museum there is also an exhibition about Princess Diana. Don’t ask why... Dinosaurs to the left, Diana to the right… makes A LOT of sense.

After you leave the butterfly greenhouse, you step into the entomological exhibition, which is extremely good, I must say. It’s like Entomology ( = study of insects) 101 and it really touches every important point there is to know about insects… If you want to wander around, you can, and don’t pay much attention to details, but if you’re curious to know more, you can spend your whole afternoon there, reading the posters, with very accurate information about mimicry, plant-insect interactions, mutualisms (a whole poster dedicated to leaf cutter ants in Texas, ANIEK!!!), life-cycles, development, wow! I loved it. My Italian neighbours, with whom I went, weren’t that much interested in the giant cockroaches (the biggest are the ones from Madagascar, I shit you not, I’m never ever ever going there…), black-widows and horned-beetles, and I had to hurry through the exhibition so that they wouldn’t be waiting for me eternally…

My Italian neighbours!!! I still didn’t tell you about them. Valeria and Alessandro are both computer geeks and working in networks. They are here for 6 months like me, but Alessandro has already done almost all of his time, ehehe. He’s leaving in the end of February. Valeria will stay here the same time as me. They are both very nice, and so far my weekend plans have been with them. They live in the same 2426 Quenby, but in other parts of the house, actually you can see Valeria's front door in the next picture. They are lucky enough to have their own studio each, with private space, private bathroom, etc. No, I’m not complaining. Well, ok, I am.

Ok, that’s it for today. I’m going to the University now to plate some Klebsiella aerogenes! Ehehe. Great fun, really. Seriously.

This may be the beginning of a beautiful frienship…

2006-01-23T12:49:00.000-08:00

Between me and my brand new blog! That’s right, folks! I decided to take a leaf out of many other’s books and write a weblog to maintain everyone who is interested informed of my life here in the other end of the world (a.k.a., USA). Of course, it’ll have to be in English, otherwise I would receive angry emails from my non-portuguese friends, so… This is the beginning.
I’ve been in the US for two weeks, now, more specifically in the wonderful city of Houston, state of Texas. My first impressions match completely the famous saying that everything in Texas is BIG. From cars, to streets, to houses, advertisements, malls, and the campus of Rice University, where I’m doing my second master thesis, everything is really huge. And they have space for that and much more, and still have immense national parks, where Nature is barely touched. So you can imagine, coming from the spatially challenged country that is the Netherlands, I felt quite relieved at the beginning to finally be able to see wide open space, huge trees, and most of all, the SUN!!!!!! 21 degrees Celsius welcomed me to Houston. What else could I want?!
Only 5 days later, however, my feelings towards the excess of space that exists here were a bit different. Given the difficulty that arises with going from point A to point B without a car (and by car I mean of course at least a station wagon, nothing small, please…), I started to consider the distances abusive and personally insulting. Why the hell did I leave the Netherlands, where I could easily get on my bike and cycle for forty minutes under rain and wind to get to my university, to come here where I have to WALK for forty minutes under the steaming sun to get to a minimally interesting place, intellectually-wise???? Hmmm. It gives me something to think about, that’s for sure…
Now, don’t get me wrong, I’m not complaining. I even bought a second-hand bike to keep the tradition, but the truth is it will not get me further than the university, because going anywhere further than that involves a serious risk of being run over by a speeding Land Rover. There are no special ways for bikes, and there is no special respect for people on them… It is a battlefield out there, ladies and gentlemen, so don’t forget your helmets and always give way to the big fast car coming towards you! Luckily (?), the buses here are less dangerous than in the Netherlands, but that is only due to the fact that there are so few of them. They go by at least every half an hour, which is great if you are time constrained, as you can imagine…
As for the question you have all been dying to ask: are Texans really as stupid as they are depicted? Well, I’m afraid I can’t help you there. In my lab, only one guy speaks with this terrible Texan accent, and while I’m always expecting to hear extremely daft things from his mouth (hey, he even looks the part: big, blond, muscled, typical jock!), he keeps disappointing me by saying quite intelligent things… :( So that’s one myth down the drain. The rest of the people here are from all sorts of places in the US. Plus, in my lab there is only one republican, as my supervisor was quick in telling me, as soon as I got out of the plane. That means the chance of finding stupid people is even smaller… Oh, well. I’ll keep you posted, though, as my search for the true Texan proceeds.
For those who are wondering, I’ll let you know more about where I live, how I live, with whom I live, etc, in further posts. For now, I think I’ll rest my case. Ana versus the USA, the verdict is… not guilty. There is reasonable doubt, for now…