Coincidence and Asterix in Lusitanie

Every few days I download the podcast from Radio France International, their daily news in Français facile...easier in that they speak more slowly and clearly. It's my way of keeping some ability in the language, and keeping in touch with that world. Indeed. Today as I walked home from the nearby Reservatório Museum (closed--they're on strike!), I heard the RFI report about the newly-released book of Astérix & Obélix, the famous comic-book characters of ancient Gaul. The new book is titled Astérix en Lusitanie -- the Roman name for Portugal!

And, my walk home would pass by our neighborhood French bookstore, Ma Petite Librairie (really geared to children's books). And indeed they had the new book prominently displayed, so I had to go in and purchase it, and then read it, cover-to-cover. Great practice, and great fun as it plays with the language and the stereotypical Portuguese -- and French, and Roman -- characteristics, using the old Roman names for Porto (Portus Cale) and Lisbon (Olisipo), and Obélix complaining about bacalhau. They sing fado to prove their Portuguese disguise as well as to sadden their Roman pursuers. They play with the cognate words, like tradição and discusão. Great fun.

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String Quartet Broken String

We attended a marvelous concert last night, at the Porto Museum of Casa do Infante , a beautifully-renovated 1325 building near the river. At one point it served as a customs house. The government sponsors Portuguese musicians to return from other European orchestras to perform in their homeland. We heard and saw this group play a traditional piece – Haydn string quartet Opus 20 #2. Then the modern Benjamin Britten's Three Divertimenti – the stunning last movement of which they performed as an encore. They performed (and I recorded) the Shostakovich Quartet #9, during which the first-violinist broke a string (it features several strongly-plucked chords!) and had to retreat&repeat!

EUA: tanto estrago em tão pouco tempo

As part of my effort to learn about Portugal, both the country and the language, I'm subscribing to the centrist newspaper, O Publico . There are plenty of newspapers: conservative tabloids, and socialist and communist-sponsored daily papers; I find O Publico to be most sober, with consistently interesting columnists and opinion pieces, in addition to some local (Porto) news, with just enough sporting news to keep me chatting with the taxi driver. Today's opinion piece sums up, I think, European pundits' view of the U.S. government. As the title puts it: so much damage in so little time. I shudder at the rank incompetence and corrupt behavior, demonstrating a cynical attitude toward public service, showing indeed that the cruelty is the point. What scandal, what damage will be the tipping point to collapse this government? And what will it take to recover from the damage? Who will be able to trust the US government again, ever? Only ni...

Música Tunas e Boémia

We attended an unusual concert last night: Música Tunas e Boémia (bands and parties) University student folk-music groups — big groups of 40 and more each! put on a great show of singing, playing, flag-twirling, tambourine-swinging, all at the major (private) concert hall. The most unusual thing about it was that nobody used any electronic device (except for microphone amplification)—no electric guitar or keyboard, no big drum set…every instrument and prop was hand-held. The singing was quite good, given the effort to synchronize 40 voices.

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