O meu telemóvel português, o bom e velhinho Nokia 6100, caminha para horas da morte por todo o abuso que levou na sua longa vida. Por isso resolvi comprar um telemóvel inglês barato para ter por casa com o cartão SIM tuga e ser usado por visitas com SIM original. Na altura pensei que tivesse de comprar um telemóvel bloqueado para conseguir um bom preço mas quando fui ao mobiles.co.uk, um site com reputação de ser o mais barato no Reino Unido, fiquei chocado com a oferta.
Por £14 (€16) consegui comprar um Nokia 1661 com £10 de saldo, entregue em minha casa pela DHL gratuitamente. Nem pestanejei.
Uns dias mais fiquei ainda mais surpreendido quando descobri que o telemóvel vinha já´desbloqueado:)
O telemóvel em si já traz muitas das coisas que o 6100 tinha como calendário, jogos, memória para contactos e adiciona lanterna e rádio (vinha com phones/microfone incluído). Impressionante o quão baratas as telecomunicações se tornaram... há 10 anos atrás, em Portugal, eram precisos uns 50€ para se comprar um tijolo ranhoso.
Since my teen days I get my hair cut with clippers more or less once a month. Not only is convenient (I don't have to comb) as it is cheap. But moving to London deprived me of two things, my hair clippers and my hairdresser (= mom) meaning I had to go shopping. What did I get? This:
The great thing about it is it's made to cut your own hair so the head rotates 180º to reach the back of your head more comfortably. What can I say... it works! It could be a bit more powerful but nothing is perfect.
Now you are thinking "he proposed a major project that will save his company several thousand dollars per year" or "he optimized a business process making it 50% quicker"... not really, but let me tell you the whole story to make you suffer a bit.
On Monday I talked with my manager for the first time since I joined the team and we started with some casual conversation. He asked me how was to be back in Portugal after having worked in London. I explained to him some of the professional and cultural differences like having long lunches (essentially eating away from your desk) during weekdays.
Today, on the street, as I was walking to get my takeaway lunch I bumped into him walking the opposite direction (with his takeaway lunch). He asked me what I was going to get and then, to my surprise, he pulled Monday's topic and asked if I didn't miss the Portuguese lunches and Portuguese food. An obvious YES was my reply but I added "we should do a team lunch now and then to improve team bonding". He said "good idea" but I thought he was just being polite.
Some hours later I receive a calendar invite for a team lunch next week! He was serious :)
After 7 months here I am again, not my original plans but life is unpredictable... :)
This time I planned my farewell to Portugal very well. On Friday I spent the morning at Galapos beach with my parents. Afterwards we went for some grilled fish in one of Setúbal's typical neighbourhoods, Fonte Nova. Then said goodbye to my grandmother, our family's authority. The night was spent in Palmela during Festa das Vindimas. A lot of people showed up to say goodbye and offer me a glass of Moscatel, thanks everyone! I think I arrived home at 6 or 7 am...
A few hour later my brother took me to the airport. During check-in I found out I got the executive seat upgrade I asked a few days before (to use my expiring miles) :) Spend some time in TAP Lounge eating and drinking... Unfortunately I didn't have much appetite for the alcoholic beverages which were available with a good variety... Later at the boarding gate we had to wait a long time before actually getting on-board and we ended up arriving one hour late. From there, straight to my assigned accommodation near Bethnal Green (where I am now) and then a little drinks event with old friends and new colleagues :)
The place where I am now temporarily is quite nice, it's a very compact studio but very functional. Here are some photos:
My ironing board:
The smallest dishwasher ever:
And the bathroom:
Today is cloudy for a change, but the temperature is not bad.
In Portugal we have a proverb that goes like this "Never say from this water I shall not drink" (Nunca digas desta água não beberei). It basically means you never know how next day will be, so don't deny something as you may need/do it later.
7 months ago I was saying I wouldn't live in London again. I was careful enough to keep my doors open, but honestly I didn't think I would comeback. Tuesday I was proven wrong as the good old proverb goes...
Don't get me wrong, London is a lovely city, with lots of attractions and full of professional opportunities (and in my case friends). But at my current stage I don't feel it's an advantage over living in Portugal. The personal trade-off balances the professional one.
On Tuesday I started my afternoon cancelling my contract for London and ended it saying count me in. What happened? I had an unconfirmed offer from the same company to work in another city and I decided to bet on that one. But when I said no to London I entered a corporative game. Immediately that unconfirmed offer became void, I was pressured to accept London and get an opportunity to be transferred one year later to that city. I wasn't satisfied with that and expressed an "opportunity" wasn't enough. A few hours later I get a call guaranteeing they would do their best to secure my transfer as it still depends on a visa and my performance, without any traps or stunts. So that's it, London for a year and a new place afterwards :)
Almost one year since my last post! It's been a long time... Interestingly this almost looks like the continuation of my previous post.
New year, new Pearl Jam tour and more concerts - Escalation! as my good friend Luís puts it. This idea started very stupidly as all great ideas do. Pearl Jam announced an European tour and I told Luís "I'm planning to watch Oeiras' concert and London's so I can visit some friends. Why don't you pick another concert and I'll go with you". His answer: "Why not watch more?". I told him to pick which ones he wanted and we ended up with 5 in continental Europe (we skipped the London one). By January we had all tickets except for Portugal.
In good Portuguese fashion we started planning our trip one week before. Plane tickets were already too expensive so we bought InterRail passes. As we were both busy that week we barely managed to plan our outbound trip. The rest would be done while travelling. On Friday I took the SudExpress and then the TGV to Paris and met Luís on Gare du Nord as he had job training in Switzerland the day before. Took some typical Portuguese food with me :)
Paris. On our thin plan we intended to meet Vivi, spend the night in Paris and take the 1st TGV to Brussels but the seats were all taken, damn! Alternative: 3 normal trains and spend the night in Brussels. That allowed us to see Lille before we anticipated and a little ghost town called Tournai. I call it ghost town as we barely saw any people till we arrived the centre.
Brussels. How to spend a night in Brussels without spending too much money on lodging? By spending it drinking some of the 2000 beers available in Delirium! They even have Sagres and Super Bock! By 7am Delirium was closing and we were on our way to the station to catch the train to Amsterdam.
Amsterdam, beautiful Amsterdam. Here we met our limp (due to teared meniscus) friend Ivo who welcomed us to his place and took us to our first concert - Rock In the Park, Nijmegen. We didn't go immediately as I forgot the tickets and we had to go back:$
Upon arrival we had this brilliant idea of filling our camelbaks with wine and martini to avoid dehydration during the concert. Unfortunately the festival's organization didn't agree with this and they threw all of it away :( A horrible sight... Apparently it was forbidden to bring alcohol inside so they can capitalize by selling their own, bastards! Apart from that we watched Ben Harper singing Under Pressure with Eddie Vedder. Pearl Jam opened the concert with "Evolution" setting the pace for a breathtaking concert. Things only calmed down when they reached the 6th song "In My Tree". Vedder didn't lose too much time talking and they were able to squeeze 19 songs in 90 minutes. When their time was up we could see on their faces they didn't want to leave so early... Setlist
Tuesday morning was spent in Düsseldorf sightseeing.
By 19:30 we were in Berlin. Found a hostel, checked in and ran for a biergarten to watch Portugal lose against Spain. Seeing Portugal leave the World Cup took all our motivation to go out so we got back to the Hostel.
Next day we strolled a bit around Alexanderplatz and then we went to Wuhlheide. We had fan entrance which gave us early entry and also access to a fan area where we could talk with other fans. Because of that we were able to secure a nice place right in front of the stage. First Ben Harper which performed brilliantly, he really is an amazing guitarist! And then Pearl Jam. Here they played a more "relaxed" concert, more songs (31) and more talk with the audience. An amazing setlist including "Spin the Black Circle" which I heard for the second time and its terrific live. The most incredible moment from all the concerts we've seen was the way Black ended. The crowd kept on clapping and singing tut, tu-ru-ru, tut tut tu-ru-ru for a long time while Eddie put his hands on his face looking very touched. Afterwards he thanks the crowd and at some point, while talking he stops and cries. Then, by Gossard's suggestion he asks for a moment of silence for the Roskilde victims who perished 10 years before. Unforgettable!
Next day was spent walking in Berlin which is much bigger than I ever imagined, totally worth it!
At night we caught the night train to Amsterdam to spend another day with Ivo after his knee surgery. Watched Netherlands beat Brazil and spend the evening in the park with new friends. Before going to bed we still had time to check some train schedules for the next day.
Saturday morning we left early. It was pouring so we took a taxi to the train station. How come on a 10 day trip the only day it rains is the day we are camping? Murphy's law I guess... Stopped in Brussels, ran to our next train which we barely caught and a few hours later we were back in Lille. Here we had another TGV ticket reservation adventure, this time to get back to Portugal. Initially there weren't any more InterRail discount tickets available and they wanted to charge us 72€. But later after playing around with the computer they got us TGV tickets going through Paris with discount. Still each one of us paid 36€. From Lille we caught a train to Arras.
Arras, a small city in France. Upon arrival we went to the camping park to set the tents. Luckily it wasn't pouring any more, just some drizzle. Afterwards we went to the Main Square. The festival area is located in a sort of old town which Vedder would later tell us it was some sort of military facilities. Military or not it was nice scenario for the concerts.
When we arrived Julian Casablancas was playing but the sound was terrible. It was so loud everyone was buying ear-plugs (which the organization sold for 5€!!!) and the highs were distorting. We couldn't get close to the stage and at that point we feared the other concerts would be like that. Luckily we were proven wrong. Phoenix gave a very good concert and Gomez was good as usual. Then we saw a bit of a French aberration called -M- which his music resembled some of Pink Floyd and Queen classics though the lyrics were French. And then Ben Harper. This time he started the concert alone and slow, just playing his guitar. You could feel the crowd was anxious and a lot of excitement was piling up. When he started singing there was a burst of joy. Great reception from the French crowd, it made that concert amazing. Later Pearl Jam. Highlights: brand new song called "Of The Earth", looks promising. After the encore Ben Harper joined the band to play Red Mosquito with the characteristic sound of his guitar. One of those moments... The concert itself was short, only 17 songs. That night the tent floor felt more comfortable than usual, maybe because it's better than sleeping on a train seat:D
Next day we were up early to catch our train to Lille. Unfortunately the train was late and ruined all our scheduling. We would end up arriving Werchter 2h later than planned which cost us the Alice In Chains concert:( In Gent we took the chance to leave our backpacks and stroll around a bit. It was almost deserted though they had lots of bikes!
Inside the festival. The barriers were set in a funny way. The area near the stage was confined between barriers and to access it there was an entrance similar to road tolls with green/red lights. Basically one could only access this area if it wasn't too crowded. Luckily we were able to get there before Them Crooked Vultures started and they gave an excellent concert! After that and still on the same spot we watched Pearl Jam. The setlist was a bit similar to Arras', but still a very good concert full of energy. Highlight: Alain Johannes and Dave Grohl collaboration on "Kick out the Jams".
As the concert finishes I receive very good news, a friend of mine got me a ticket to Pearl Jam in Portugal, they were sold out at that time:) From then on we started our retun home. Slept on Leuven's train station while we waited for the 5:30 train to Gent. Picked up our bags which we left in a locker and got on a train to Lille. Bought some groceries and had breakfast on the station. TGV to Paris. TGV to Irún. Went to ticket office and we're told the SudExpress to Lisbon was full. The other SudExpress would leave 24h later, trains to Madrid only in the morning, argh. We asked for an alternative and he suggested we ask the train controller to let us in and so we did. First the guy told us he wasn't sure if we could go in. We stressed and put our best abandoned dog faces. 10 min before the train left he told us to get in and warned us we might have to go up if there were no seats at a given time. Well that never happened and we had a nice trip home. Arrived Lisbon at 10:20, had some time for two Super Bock Minis and then bus home :D Never a shower felt so good!
4 days later, Luís discovered he didn't actually have a ticket for the Oeiras concert but only a voucher which was already too late to exchange. Sometimes life is unfair... I ended up going alone and it turned out to be a fantastic concert, quite different from the previous four. So many good songs which are not always played like: Release (one of my top 3 opening songs), In Hiding, Glorified G and Smile. During the past concerts we were always watching the technical team tune up an standup bass but Ament never used it and we keep wondering for what song was it. In Oeiras I got the answer: Nothingman:) The whole concert had great moments with Vedder talking a lot to the crowd. "You guys are the best singing crowd in the world!" that was really something special and a confirmation of what me and Luís had been saying all along. In Portugal Pearl Jam doesn't sing for the crowd but sings with the crowd! There was the scary/sad part where he sad it would be the last show in a long time. Hope it's just a pause for their personal different projects and Cameron's Soundgarden. The end of Black was great. The most magical moment was Betterman. Vedder let us sing more than usual and before he "joined" us he says "Can't find better crowd". And then of course, there is the good old "Portugal Portugal Improv" (lyrics below) which I heard live for the first time, but was the third they played. Beautiful concert. Setlist.
During all concerts I noticed two sets of microphones pointing to the crowd. Does this mean they are doing bootlegs of all the tour like they did on previous years? Certainly hope so.
We have a many friends from here Makes us feel like home Since the first time that we landed Here in Portugal
Portugal Portugal
And now it's coming to the end I dont wanna know/go? If you let me I will move here and live in Portugal
