Perspective

My grand grandparents: two World Wars, a financial crisis and an incipient communist dictatorship;

My grandparents: financial crisis, one World War and almost 45 years of dictatorship;

My parents: communist dictatorship, a never ending transition and this financial crisis;

Me: 15 years of communist dictatorship and 20 years of transition to the crisis time.

Really, so far I think I am luckier than the preceding generations!

Toys for grown-ups or how about slowing down a little

I had the opportunity to work at World Mobile Congress by mid-February. It looked quite interesting for a global research about nowadays "civilised" society. A research about how addicted we are to technology and its gadgets, to the point of getting to ignore what surrounds us.

I made my mobile phone contract with Movistar a few months ago, over the phone, at a time when my number belonged to another company.Lady Bermudez, the customer service employee who attended me, wanted me to choose my ideal phone from a whole list of technical marvels. Smart phone or BlackBerry, I could have chosen any of them to be included in my contract. Or maybe not any, I don't know much about these things. For me telephones are what their name says: telecommunications devices that transmit and receive sound, most commonly the human voice. (according to Wikipedia). And to Merriam-Webster too, pretty much the same definition. Britannica says: an instrument designed for the simultaneous transmission and reception of the human voice.

Apparently mobile phones are a whole different story, they transmit voice, video and data. You can play games on them, find your way, send and receive money, and God and telecommunications engineers know what. Sincerely, I feel more carefree and free in general with a phone that only serves its original purpose, to talk. I'm not very fond of text messages either as I am more at ease with computers, that offer me the same dimensions, more or less, as a letter size sheet of paper. And I prefer to read on paper rather than on computer screens as I like e-mails more than chat, for allowing me to develop my ideas at a different pace. At the end of the day it looks like it's more a question of time and space: speed and text size. I'd rather go slow than fast and rather long than short. Most probably I belong to the paper cultureand I get addicted to technology applications that remind me of it. Obviously, I am not a busy business person. From their point of view I totally agree with the necessity of smart phones.

Now, back to the congress. At some point I was at a welcome desk and the three girls around me were busy with their phones, buttoning and reading the screen. I felt like an alien, or rather like a normal flesh and bone person among aliens, the busy business world. But somehow I felt comfortably so, floating in my bubble, free to watch the beautiful museum hall and observe the people around me, ready to make eye contact and welcome them when necessary. At the congress a whole pavilion was dedicated only to applications, Skype had a stand there, a free coffee bar, tables with phones and even mini-computers/over-sized phone screens from where you could call anywhere in the world for free. Google Android had a whole stand for itself in the hall where I worked every day. It looked like a fun park, all green, with a big slide and huge Android toy like replicas everywhere. There were green fruity candies in all congress locations, at the stand they were giving away pins and fruity smoothies named after Android features, the litchi-honey one was called Honeycomb for instance. There were also Gingerbread and Donut flavours. They were also giving away mini-Androids designed by Andrew Bell, on the box one could read that it was an art object and not a toy, recommended for 15+. All together most places looked very colourful and had great visual impact, with lots of big screen and different types of projections. It was hard to believe it was all about this small personal device we all use.

On the last day I went out for a beer with a friend and a guy at a bar had a funny fluffy toy bird, looking like a plush ball. I asked him if it's a grown-up toy and he was amazed that I didn't know what the Angry Birds are, and even more so when I told him I use my phone only for talking. It reminded me of my Canadian boss at the Hilton in Romania who couldn't believe that I had no idea what Macy's was or what an amazing Christmas parade they had. Our cultural references seem to move farther and farther away from the word culture, or the meaning me personally I give to it.

Giving all this a common sense I would say we are becoming more and more addicted to toys and technology gadgets, absorbed by our phones and computers, finding harder to get closer to people in more direct and simple ways. All these games and applications make us less observant, lazier, dependent on accessories that are not really a necessity, but that we consider so and feel lost and nervous without. We are also becoming more selfish, less responsible and responsive, behaving like big kids, for whom entertainment is their main interest. Obviously we become easier to manipulate too. And to me here is the clue, to transform us in a crowd willing to work more so we can consume and play more, without any deeper thoughts.

Between 2010 and 2011

Barcelona (Montjuïc)


Bucarest (from the plane)

I had a two months break which haven't brought many news. The winter cold joined to the lack of general heating in most Barcelona homes tempered my initial enthusiasm that gave way to reason and pondering. Against all odds my good mood stands still, facing the gloomy situation. I live with little, but enough for housing, food and going out every now and then. I suffer for having lost my routine, soon there will be a year since then. Mornings are terrible, I stopped enjoying having them to myself, I need to be active, to have something to do, somewhere to go to , that's not the library or the seaside. Nevertheless, I can't stop enjoying Barcelona, disfrutar is a good word. Just the way you enjoy an exquisite meal, Thai for instance, every bite it's an opportunity to savour the different flavours reaching perfection.

Luckily enough, I go on with my Catalan classes three times a week and my poetry group performances, which got great press coverage lately, partly due to my efforts to get in touch with the local newspapers and people interested in poetry. I keep meeting fantastic motivating people and this keeps me convinced that I made the right choice, even if my job search seems a neverending job itself.

Even the apartment I live in now it's a life lesson per se, I found an announcement in the Romanian goodies shop. I love my room, it has a balcony , the light I was longing for and enough space for a desk, beside the big bed and the huge closet (plenty of place for all my skeletons). My roommates are the most unusual I've ever had, they belong to the Romanian working class and came here from different smaller cities, like many others, to make money they invest in housing in our beloved country that we don't live in. Or to bring half of their family here, if it's the case. So they don't care much about going out or doing things, as they care about saving to the limit. Enjoying life is a strange concept to them. They're people I had very tiny chances to meet anywhere else but here and now. It's touching and a bit scary at the same, to see how different we are, and to notice that I am so lucky after all to have studied and traveled the world. Having enriching friends and relationships and good interesting jobs on top of it.

Christmas home was delightful, after 6 years of absence at this time of the year. And still, the gray Bucharest, the general feeling of laisser-aller that reigns in the streets and most public spaces filled me with sadness and disgust. Even the Health Insurance Bucharest headquarters were a shameful mess, bordering an area of dull apartment buildings and humble houses where street dogs still roam dangerously free. On the other side the first shopping mall that opened in 2000, Bucharest being the same patchwork of miserable baroque post-communist post-modern post-civilised world. I managed to feel the season's joy only by leaving the outside behind the closed doors, sharing with very special friends and close to my family, now richer with my sister's new born son. Although I don't have a home there in Romania anymore, our home is now rented and I had to run between four houses at some point, looking for my winter clothes, staying over with mom and visiting my sister and the baby. In a way it's better to know that somehow I cut my way back, didn't I always wanted to live by the Mediterranean, cradle of European civilizations and cultures? Well, here I am, now I have to live up to it, or better said, to work out my place here.

The Europe without borders, now and then

I got the idea of this brief posting when I saw in the Prado Museum the portrait of Isaac H. Sequiera, made by Thomas Gainsborough, whose doctor he was. Born in Portugal in a Jewish family, he emigrated to Bordeaux and studied medicine in Leyden, Holland, getting to settle in London where the portrait was made.

I found it weird when some people wonder how comes I lived and traveled so much in more than a country. Or when they affirm the world has changed, with this continuous movement beyond borders. Since the antiquity, merchants, scholars, warriors and explorers/adventurers have traveled extensively, looking for either wealth, knowledge or distraction. Artists, monks and mercenaries for instance were very active since the Middle Ages.

A great example is Saint Anthony, known as "of Padua", who was actually born in Lisbon. Even professionals like Dr. Sequiera changed places many times. Not to speak about artists, Caravaggio, Da Vinci, Ribera being but a few. There was no tourism, as we understand it now, traveling without an exact purpose, just for the sake of sightseeing and spending money elsewhere. I guess it's during the XIX century when it became very fashionable for the wealthy classes, especially for people from the Northern European countries to go South to France and Italy, extending later to Spain and Portugal. Not even the Erasmus student exchange programme is such a novelty; when universities were founded there were very few, so people who wanted to study had to travel far for that.

Briefly, the ways to travel changed, but traveling is still the same.

No November rain

Barcelona, full of sun, full of colours, a few warm autumn shades here and there. I was in Madrid for a job interview, it had a stronger autumn smell, matching the season's foliage, more obvious than here. I look at my photographs from last year's hike in Vermont, the trees branches were already nude and the mountains turned brown. It seems like ages ago, so faraway, in a different life. And still, I feel a little nostalgic when I think about the firtrees smell and the bright blue lakes. Nostalgic and grateful for all the great moments I spent there.

Today I went for another hike through the Collserola area, less green and dustier, more urbanized, but still pretty woods.



Life is made of different patchwork like places, people and experiences, what matters is to know nothing is forever, you have to let go when you can't hold on. And be grateful for what you get, I am probably one of the luckiest people I know.

Tourist 2.0

Barcelona beyond Sagrada Familia, Ramblas, Parc Guell, Mila and Batllo houses.

Monasterio de Pedralbes




Hospital de Sant Pau i Santa Creu, by my favourite architect, Lluis Domenech i Montaner



Sarria neighbourhood, under Tibidabo - former hotel, former clinic, possibly a future office building



Teatre Grec garden with some nice neighbourhood people who just came to play and sing some rumba catalana and flamenco, a sunny Sunday afternoon

Lingering

No time to waste, no time to linger, precious moments of intense activity until you drop dead. Working, seeing people, watching films, cooking, always doing something, keeping crazy busy. Having the cell and Internet always at hand. Too busy to think.

These months of laziness and zen attitude fed my soul alright for the times to come, beyond the tears and the doubts. I feel like a dot under an exclamation point, complying only with the fact of existing. Life is so complicated, applying for jobs, using rigid words to express your professional exceptionality, trying to find a dignified subject for a PhD thesis, when it could be so simple - this is what I know, this is what I can do, take it or leave it, just don't make me wrap it and sell it. Sometimes my hands are restless, I enjoy cooking and ironing, I regret not having learned a manual profession, something with a practical meaning, really useful. A words' child is clinging to relativity itself.

The other day a hostel receptionist was explaining me how bad it is to live in Catalunya and that he would consider moving to Canada. I think that anyone that hasn't lived in another country would think his is the best, or the worst of all, not appreciating its positive sides. And it's always a very personal choice, that involves taking risks, again, not something everyone would do. There are always miscalculations that you have to take the philosophical way. I didn't realize that my Canadian Master of Arts degree needed to be legalized in Spain because there is no bilateral agreement. As Maître Pangloss used to say Tout est pour le mieux dans le meilleur des mondes possibles.

Catalunya is amazingly beautiful, joining the Pyrenees with the Mediterranean. It's drier and less green than Romania or Canada, but we can't have it all, right? Spain was a target when I was 20, then I first visited Italy which got me under its spell. Now Costa Brava conquered my senses with its crystal clear cool waters guarded by the yellowish green hills that form long bays all along the shoreline, up to the French border. Living on the shores of the Mediterranean has been an old dream of mine and like every dream becoming real it has its price, which I cannot even evaluate right now.