"All things true, honest, just, pure and lovely", Scene 2, Take 2011

sure, we'll make it this time round.

Aviso à tradução

tradutores en-pt deste país. ouvi-me:

mughals ou moghuls são mogóis
mongols ou mongolians são mongóis

vejamos então: a mesquita acima, na índia (e não na mongólia), será o quê? mogol. isso mesmo, parabéns.

ficamos conversados, sim? irra...

Sail away

no fear. seasickness won't get to you when you're homebound.

Alembrava-vos eu lá?

marido
e como!

ama
.............. agora, aramá!
lá há índias mui fermosas;
lá faríeis vós das vossas
e a triste de mi cá,
encerrada nesta casa,
sem consentir que vezinha
entrasse por uma brasa,
por honestidade minha.

marido
lá vos digo que há fadigas,
tantas mortes, tantas brigas
e perigos descompassados,
que assi vimos destroçados,
pelados com'a formigas.

gil vicente, auto da índia

Arc-en-eau

un cadeau c'est un cadeau c'est un cadeau.

Cortesia Zero

sumário das conclusões de exaustivo e cuidadoso estudo científico realizado na minha sala de estar (população: 1)

percepção:

1a. desde a sua chegada ao delta do rio das pérolas, o informante afirma-se atingido por ou testemunha de uma quantidade inusitada de actos de descortesia;

1b. o informante reputa por "uma sorte dos diabos" [sic.] a ausência de marcas físicas permanentes resultantes de: a) encontrões de tipologia diversa; b) recontros forçados com paredes no decurso da sua circulação no passeio público; c) atropelamento (iminente ou efectivo) em passadeiras de peões; d) esmagamento em locais públicos fechados (e.g., elevador, transporte público, centro comercial) ou abertos (e.g. praça, escadaria, rua comercial);

análise quantitativa:

2. cotejando este período de 20 meses com os 28 anos em que o informante residiu noutras regiões do globo, observa-se ser a incidência de actos de descortesia dirigidos ao participante no delta do rio das pérolas consideravelmente superior quer em termos de token (caso) quer em termos de type (tipo);

análise qualitativa:

3. os actos de descortesia elicitados podem ser classificados nas seguintes categorias: a) os que contrariam os princípios fundamentais da partilha pacífica de espaço (e.g. persistente mito da opacidade própria, bloqueio de saída de elevador, imobilidade em espaços públicos congestionados, preferência pelo trânsito em passeio público num ponto equidistante das suas extremidades) e recursos (e.g. não-reconhecimento de filas organizadas por ordem de chegada ou qualquer outro critério, recusa de avançar para traseira de autocarro em processo de enchimento); b) os que contrariam a inteligência (e.g. tentativa de forçar entrada em elevador antes da saída de passageiros, tentativa de garantir entrada prioritária em avião/autocarro/comboio/barco com lugares marcados, tentativa de garantir saída prioritária de avião/autocarro/comboio/barco enquanto este ainda se encontra em movimento, avanço em massa para o espaço reservado para a paragem do autocarro forçando o mesmo a imobilizar-se na via de rodagem);

auto-avaliação:

4. confrontado com a proposta teórica de que a elevada densidade populacional possa estar na origem do fenómeno, o participante: a) rebola os olhos; b) emite breve riso sarcástico; c) produz estalido com a língua; e d) profere a fórmula "yeah right"* [sic.].


*Em Ptg. "tá bem, abelha".

Blackout

it seems the chinese people at large still have not heard about the latest nobel peace prize. and while hong kong has been staging daily 'free liu xiaobo' demonstrations before the china liaison office, the chinese language press of macau has either been shy reporting the event, transcribed beijing's self-righteous press release (press release?) or not at all.

abram o olho, meus amigos. vamos lá.

Novamente

de casa às costas.

O pulo do tigre

early in the morning, under a slight drizzle, we set foot on the high trail of the tiger leaping gorge, where the chinese west starts clambering towards himalaya and the secretive tibetan plateau. the yangtze, increasingly below, roars greenishly along.

num desafio ao pulmão carbonizado, o trilho vai subindo de curva em contracurva - devagar devagarinho, está bem de ver, que a perna também se urbanizou - e a cada passo vai deixando para trás os vestígios das gentes e os derradeiros arrozais.

ahead of us, across the water, the cliff gradually straightens up into an immense black wall, pushing head first into the cloud cover. on our gentler side, a sudden twist of the trail reveals tiny hamlets in the distance.

uma vez lá chegados, damos conta de que em torno das eiras vazias circula finalmente alguma vida. vida animal, já que, ao que parece, a de outro género está concentrada no restaurante da aldeia a engolir sopa de fitas.

goats - those elusive things - occasionally rain down from the steep cliffs along the road, as carelessly as one might glide down sand dunes for a leisurely dip in the sea.

o vento ganha pujança, o que nestas serranias não parece incomum. apesar de nos salpicar com os ribeiros que descem a encosta e nos obrigar, volta e meia, a agarrar os pedregulhos do caminho em busca de estabilidade, tem pelo menos o condão de dissipar as nuvens.

as the clouds part, we can finally see where the black fortress ends. jade dragon snow mountain. jade, to be fair, is nowhere to be seen, and the dragon did not make an appearance; but the white matter drizzled on top rescues the wisdom of the namers.

vindo o lusco-fusco, é tempo de arranjar um abrigo e trocar historietas com os camaradas caminheiros. e cama. de madrugada, com um chá de gengibre entre as mãos, observamos a respiração do rio a trepar a montanha.

as we stand watching the yangtze slowly carve the gorge, very close to where the proverbial tiger leapt across it, a series of explosions go off around the corner. the trail, it appears, now joins a road under violent construction. soon, we hear, it will allow coaches to cart mass tourism into this wilderness.

as for us, low-income sweating trekkers who are too early to enjoy the delights of modernity, it would be wiser to roll down to the river bank as quickly as possible, find the ferry crossing and drive back to lijiang. there is more to see elsewhere, and this stretch of the gorge has been corrupted just a tad too much.

Não sei por onde vou

não sei para onde vou

sei que não me ponho a caminho enquanto não parar de chover

Silence now

'it was a great joy, christmas time was', mr. Rosario said into the microphone, reminiscing about when neighbours would gather to sing the 'jinjri nona' and dance to the sound of guitars, violins and harmonium.

that day, back in 2007, mr. Rosario glowed. he seemed genuinely delighted to finally speak his mother tongue again, even to a complete stranger who had just shown up on his doorstep, clumsily trying to explain how he'd heard a rumour that the last speaker of creole portuguese in the whole of cochin might live there. mr. Rosario confirmed: that he was, yes, to the best of his knowledge, ever since his friend mr. Paynter had passed away a few years earlier.

that day, back in 2007, mr. Rozario showed no sign of discomfort. the next day, however, he was in intense pain from his back, and it rhythmically broke his voice while he apologised for not being able to help me with my recordings.

that day, back in 2007, i was immediately touched by the warmth of mr. Rosario's welcome and the easy smile of his family. three years and a few letters later, when i returned to their vypeen cottage, i was treated like an old friend and shown right through to the Rosarios' dinner table. their remarkable generosity, i could see, was still vital, and so was mr. Rosario's patience: he agreed to spend nearly a week teaching me about that language he alone carried around.

that was last january. and now, late at night, an email (how unfittingly prosaic!) arrives announcing that 'Mr William expired on the 20 of August at 1.15 am'.

i cannot find the right register to simultaneously report the demise of a kind friend and the death of a language: one is worthy of primal grief, the other probably requires cool and composed factuality. but i mourn the two. mr. Rosario is gone, leaving his family and friends lonelier. and gone is also the mother tongue of five centuries' worth of cochin families, modest witness to an encounter which changed the order of the world. leaving us all that much poorer. and i will leave it at that. silence now.

Canapés

for your weekend enjoyment we offer you a lazy stroll in the museum. so sit back sink comfortably in your couch and savour our select delicacies from the asian civilisations [plural] museum, singapura. no text no context no labels no geotags just aesthetic bliss from the continental treasure trove of creativity.

Hey, Johann Sebastian!

if you were gonna make me feel this way you might as well have stabbed me through the heart. you'd've saved on ink.

Atrito

recomenda-se a aplicação frequente de itinerância para uma correcta lubrificação do eixo.

Neon town

i've made a brand new start of it
in old whatever
if i can't make it there
i'll make it elsewhere
it's up to you

what-ever
wha-at-ever

[shan-shan-shan-sharan]
[shan-shan-shan-sharan]
[shan-shan-shan-sharan]
[...]

Ainda falta tanto

"já fui ao xxxxxx
xxxxx e xxxxxx
xxxxxx xxxxxxxxxx
goa e macau
ai, fui até xxxxx
já fui um xxxxxxxxxxxx"

da vinci

Idos

vejam bem que sobreveio sem avisar uma saudade dos idos de fin-de-siècle quando os dias se gastavam nos corredores acarentos e benignos deste casarão e as noites nos lados b e c da cidade. fazem falta as boas vontades e solidariedades e as descobertas, a solidez dos bancos de pau e a curteza das vinte e quatro horas.

se este acesso de nostalgia for o que temo, estou bem arranjado daqui em diante.

Night falls

over china, and tomorrow threatens to dawn an old day.

30

para a frente é que é caminho.

To sleep

(pressingly)

and leave dreams to chance

Cérbero

é mesmo assim

quem guarda a entrada guarda também

a saída.

esse mastim de muitas cabeças tanto mantém o dia lá

fora

como a noite

lá dentro.

yin yang impermeável.

e qualquer das bandas

faz muito mal à pele.

eh cão xô

xô cão

xô

One year ago

this is where i was.

and we'll have to leave it at that

for now at least

memories ramify in an unmanageable amount of directions

Kung hei fat choi!

this weekend, macau put on its finery (complete with disneyland beasts, electric plum trees, paper lanterns and oversized gold coins) and rolled out the red carpet for the year of the tiger. today, i take you on a short walk through the city centre, under a slight drizzle.

in the meantime, the lobby of my building pays the ultimate homage to cultural syncretism. under the watchful eye of the god of wealth, traditional lai si hang from the branches of an engineered kumquat tree - while nearby a music box continuously renders a happy medley of 'hark the herald angels sing', 'o tannenbaum' and 'jingle bells'...

Ano do tigre

dissidentechamemos-lhe, por exemplo, liu xiaobo.

Morning catch

do forgive me, i implore, but we shall begin with a morsel of linguistics. for many speakers of south asian languages, you see, the distinction between an f and an aspirated p is rather tenuous. and so it comes to pass that, as i make my way to tellicherry fort, the rickshawala obsequiously drops me off at

thalassery port.

now, no need to worry. forts and ports tend to stick together in these parts - geographically as much as phonetically -, we can't be too far away. and we appear to be just in time to see the morning catch come in, so will you join me for a brief walk down the muddy lanes of the harbour?

look. i've seen this before. those rainbow boxes are all set to be filled up with freshness, orderly waiting in the early morning sun. an all-male company silently assembles, at a gentle pace, their mundu unfolded so as to cover their ankles. but, as we move a bit further, we notice some commotion ahead. come come, jog along.

judging by the abundance of silver in those boxes - and it keeps pouring in -, it's been a good night. no wonder the men are in such good spirits, see how they joke and pose triumphantly around their treasure.

i gather from the experts that these are no sardines, but the proper name of the fish eludes me. poor (standing for nil) proficiency in malayalam may be to blame, but there is more. truth is, no attention is left as soon as the yellow truck back-parks a few metres away, to the electronic sound of jai ho.

ah, it's time for the big boys. for, to the delight of ever more onlookers, out comes an enormous truckload of sharks, which the fishermen glowingly display for the camera, as proud as peacocks.

all around, makeshift benches spring up, laden with all manner of fish and crustaceans. and so it is across a spontaneous, increasingly rowdy street market that we reach the end of the wharf and leap onto the sand.

the crowd thins out. here, lulled by the lapping of the waves, some fishermen slowly pull their boats ashore and chat in a quiet cadence. their cargo is offloaded, the nets checked and mended, their boats safe from the tide. soon, very soon, it will be time to rest.