CitizenReporter.org

My mother went to school at a time in Portugal where you weren’t supposed to question or challenge a very sexist, classist, and politically repressive nation. Yet throughout her education she took on one challenge after another, making it her tradition to fight against the rules and the limits placed upon her. This podcast is about that experience, in her own words, as we sat in our living room in Caldas da Rainha, Portugal, last week.

We discuss:
- Girls and School
- Access to schools
- Private and Public schools during the dictatorship
- Class and privledge
- Getting to school
- Gender inequality
- Challenging the norms
- University in Coimbra
- Secret activism against the fascist state
- Pamphlets
- Access to power
- Corruption

Music:
Waldemar Bastos - Sabores da minha terra
Tom Brousseau - Unfamiliar Places

 bm216 [40:20m]: Play Now | Download

I’m still not fully recovered from several days of wedding, but thankfully I’ve had the pleasure of speaking with pioneer videoblogger Ryanne during her travels (with Jay of course) in Cambodia, Vietnam, and Thailand.

Instead of listing the large amount of reasons I recommend her posts, I’ll just say that it is inspiring to see my colleagues in the world of podcasting travelling and speaking to new audiences about what we do and why… and how it can be useful or interesting for them. Furthermore its not about making money or selling a product of any kind… it is about making the big world a more connected place where people communicate and understand more about each other at home and abroad.

Anyway I digress, watch Ryanne’s vlog entries during this fantastic journey. I hope one day.. nee.. I promise that one day I too will go to Asia in the same spirit that they have.

While it may not qualify as citizen reporting, anyone who’s been reading this blog for some time knows about my friend Dishwasher Pete and his first book that is taking the world by storm. Pete will be a guest on an upcoming podcast where we’ll discuss the world of work, and the future of labor.

For now, though, this being my last saturday in Portugal this summer, I present to you a clip of Pete on the David Letterman Show recently. I think he’s the most refreshing guest they’ve had on that show in years, take a look and see for yourself. (beware, clip is long)

Click To Play

Click To Play

Much like I do on a daily basis in Amsterdam, this morning I hopped on my bike and rode into town here in Caldas da Rainha, Portugal. And much like I do in Amsterdam, I’m sure to load up my mp3 player with recent podcasts so that I can learn about the state of the world while weaving past crazy drivers… crazy being the operative word for Portuguese drivers.

The one recent podcast that I soaked up today was from the program Amsterdam Forum, focusing on the Zimbabwean crisis. While I’ve spoken about and spend a good amount of time learning about conditions and developments in that country, I still seek more and more explanations to understand not only how this happened but creative and potentially effective solutions. In this program Amsterdam Forum, yet another great production from Radio Netherlands, brings in alot of interesting voices who managed to teach me more and give me even more facts and history regarding why and how Zimbabwe got to where it is. There are even some interesting theories which I had never heard about why Mugabe has allowed the country to slip into such a terrible situation.

To hear the whole thing, and I do highly recommend it, go to the Amsterdam Forum website. You can either read or listen.. me I love to listen.

As I sit down to lunch with my parents at a beachside resort famous for having a huge population that immigrated to Newark, New Jersey, the waitress walks over with a bottle of wine. “This one is compliments of the gentlemen sitting in the back of the restaurant.”

My dad is already smiling as he looks across the very basic and typical Portuguese establishment, he starts talking and suddenly I realize he’s talking to me as he looks at the man “Don’t you recognize M? Mr. M who has the so and so business in Newark?” I turned to look at a familiar yet unfamiliar face.. already coming my way with a hand extended. He sat down next to me and immediately began going over all the old Newark stories that he remembers involving my parents, going all the way back to 1960.

Of all the stories he told at the lunch table, one in particular kept coming back and stuck out in my mind. His time in Vietnam. As he showed me scars all over his body, from bullet and grenade wounds, he spoke about his Portuguese friends who had grown up with him, immigrated, and died in the jungle. My dad followed each name, seemingly going through his own list of which Portuguese neighbor who he knew from grade school in Portugal that had wound up serving in the US military and dying in Vietnam.

As he spoke about the day he was ambushed, and the coma that followed, and all the people who thought he was dead… he would occasionally come back to the present, talking about all the young kids and immigrants serving in Iraq. “We had kids with us back then, but they were surrounded by adults, people who could take care of them and teach them… not like how they send them out today.”

Seemed like hours that he spoke, story after story.. and I kept thinking about all those immigrants.. Portuguese people who hadn’t been in the country for more than 5 years, and how they ended up - of all places - in Vietnam.

I sat and listened to Mr. M’s stories well after lunch was over. Sad as it may have seemed, there was a tone of quiet satisfaction…. to have lived a full life since then and to be able to remember each person and tell about them.

I’m on the road in Central Portugal… Aveiro to be exact. On family business. Posting will resume faster than you can say blueberry pancakes. Ok not that fast.

I leave you with a photo of BadHareDay’s kids, because they asked me “Are we going on your blog?”