portugal – Page 13 – Citizen Reporter

Dr. B On the Move

A little over 2 years ago… I send an email to a then little known but highly contreversial blogger by the name BitchPhD. At the time I was compelled by her stories and opinions which included family stories as well as commentary on current events with a particular focus on feminism and reproductive rights. I emailed Dr.B to say hello and also to help with a technical issue since I was, at that time, a masters student with plenty of time on my hands here in Amsterdam.
From there I remember Dr. B responding in a very positive way and from there we exchanged lots of emails and frequently caught up with each other via IM. Yet another one of these instant friendships that I’m sure many of us have experienced since the dawn of blogging.

I mention this because I hadn’t thought about it in awhile until I was riding through Portugal reading my favorite newspaper – O Público. Their magazine pullout section had a special article on feminism and blogging. Many of the blogs were in Portuguese, which of course didn’t surprise me. But to my surprise, right there on the first page of the article in big letters, a link and a description of BitchPhD’s blog. Instant smile on my face to see the good doctor getting recognized, even in Portugal.

So of course yesterday I emailed her to let her know and catch up a bit. She was happy to hear the news and I passed along the bibliographic info. We talked a bit of her upcoming adventures that I had read about on the blog. That brought back memories of when we first became friends long ago when her blog and my blog were still young. Speaking of age, here’s one of my most favorite of her posts from this summer, entitled: 40 is the New Fuck You .

bmtv16 Grandpa’s Garden – A Vlog from Portugal

Now that I’m back.. after a long long frustrating journey home, I’d like to change gears for a moment and share a few vlogs capturing the beauty of the Portugal I know and love.

This one was filmed in Pero Moniz, Cadaval. My mother’s hometown, where my grandparents live and where I spent many many summers.

Leaving the Lisbon

The digital thermometer on the wall reads 32 degrees celcius. Needless to say, I’m very glad my visit to Portugal has come to an end. As much as I love this city, my Lisbon, and travelling around the country with my family, I’m ready to get back to Amsterdam and the cool weather and the rain and back to doing my life’s work — observing the world and being a watchdog for injustice…. like the three amigo’s only I don’t have the uniform and I’m only one.

My time in the south of Portugal was a very disconnected time, hence the first 48 hour lapse in posting in… I don’t know how long. I’m also still catching up with the latest reports and developments in places besides Lebanon, the UK and the US. (tv news only seems to give me that)

As I warm up and get back into podcasting/blogging form, I have a few links to share: first, there’s my former professor, mentor, and friend Steve Shalom who wrote a piece related to Lebanon-Israel on ZNet.
then there’s Rupert Murdoch who’s made some big deals in Italy and Turkey and still seems bent on taking over the world’s media.
And finally, on a non-news related note… the beloved Della and her man have arrived in Korea, and you can follow the adventure of another in the growing number of expats out here in the world.

Catch you when Im back in amsterdam.

The Portuguese on Lebanon

Since this blog is written in English, I’m going to guess at least some of your other media consumption is also in English. And I’ll go out on a limb a little further and guess that perhaps you don’t often hear what the Portuguese people (nevermind the media) think about the sad state of affairs in Lebanon and Israel. Well I have had the privledge of spending many days with constant contact with the Portuguese elderly of my family; grandparents, cousins, great aunts and uncles, and occasionally after all the pleasantries have passed – they express strong opinions on what is happening.

Before I head in to what they say, I should first point out why it matters. To me, it matters because the elderly of Portugal lived most of their lives under a dictatorship. Beyond that, most of them also lived and fought in the nightmare of wars in Mozambique, Angola, and Guinea-Bissau of the 60’s and 70’s… where a still unknown and vast number of people were killed, frequently in gruesome ways. Those wars eventually ended in stalemate and eventually withdrawal by the Portuguese, returning home to a country that had been extremely impoverished and who’s population had dwindled thanks to the government’s obsession with fighting those wars.

I kept all of this in mind over the past days, as relatives and friends in their golden years, spoke about their disgust with what they understood to be happening in Lebanon. My great uncle in particular, who served in the military during colonialism and had even settled in Mozambique until war drove him from his home, he had a particular sadness for the images on the news. I had expected him to support the action of the Israeli military… self-defense, as they call it. I figured he’d support that.

Instead he looked on in frustration:

“There’s no real goal. They have no real goal, and thats obvious from the evidence we see before our eyes. All this destruction and death; They just drop bombs and make war with these unattainable objectives. I’m no fan of terrorism or murder of any kind, but this military strategy is crazy. And of course, (he turns away from the TV to look at me now) you know who makes lots of money on this, don’t you? Besides all the parties involved, it’s the companies that make bombs and tanks and planes that cash in on this. Now they’ll have lot’s of new orders and plenty of money. And the American government is very good friends with these companies, you know BM?”

Of course you can write him off. He’s old. He’s not your great uncle. And surely he’s not a first hand observer, or Israeli or Lebanese for that matter.

But I listened with special attention… because of the life experience he has had. A man who knows all about what military sactioned violence has done and can do. Sure terrorism is terrible, and attention should be given to its causes and to reduce terrorist acts. But clearly if we look to history and those who lived it, there is much to indicate that the stategy of the Israeli military is more dangerous and misguided then noble or necessary.

bm146 Truth, Reconciliation, and Cambodia

Should the show go on if Pol Pot and other key members of the Khmer Rouge are dead? In this program I discuss the history of the KR, the plan for an international tribunal, and what function a truth and reconciliation type court serves a society shattered by mass killing on an unimaginable scale. Once again this program is recorded on the road, this time from a hotel room in Coimbra, Portugal.

Putting the Old in Old Country

Part of being in Portugal means visiting very old relatives in very old little villages. I’m an expert at that since my parents and I have been doing this practically every summer since I was a toddler. Naturally it is a very interesting and enriching thing to do mentally and spiritually, for the obvious reasons. But the sad and confusing thing underlying much of the emmigrant-family dynamic, is what happens to the elderly who stay in the country of orgin.

I’m referring to caring for the elderly… who will do it.. who can do it.. and how to handle it if you live on the other side of the ocean, or.. say.. europe. A daunting issue.. with lots of mixed feelings, guilt, fear, bittersweet moments. It is rather amazing to see how some families do it. While it is depressing to see how many elderly are left stranded in tiny towns, isolated from the world other than kind hearted neighbors who check up on them occasionally.

It leaves me planning in my head… daydreaming.. of how to handle different scenarios. And being one of the few younger generation located somewhere in Europe (as opposed to the US) I think of myself as the first line of emergency response, should anything ever happen here in Portugal. But what kind of emergency response would I be? How equipped am I to handle whats needs to be done in that moment of need?

But as I mentioned earlier… this is not just about me or my family. This is a global tradition.. handled in so many different ways. It is the way of the world that individuals or families migrate to a new country for professional, political, financial, health, etc. reasons. Lots of attention is given to that reality. But what of the older generation seemingly left behind. How do they cope with being so far from their children and younger family?