Thirty minutes in Viana - part I

In Viana… my city here in Portugal…

My friend Daniel (Danilo), who is in Rome now – studying hard canonic law – missing home and his pastoral work… as he is a devoted priest.
We had a lot to chat – our theologies, our search for God… he’s my friend and my councilor – and we laugh and joked because that is how serious things are dealt among us…


As the square is becoming full with people – we stare at the building with the caravel of the fifth empire, the cross of the order of Christ over the coat of arms of the nation and the armillar sphere… the people and the old traditions right in front of us… the new that never is, ever echoing the old that never was…


The people… the young and the old around the music of ages, the song of tradition… we are “Minhotos”, our colors red, black and white… gold in our hearts


As the spirit desperately searches for the water of life the tired body is well fed by those women with many skirts and laughing faces marked by the work of the sun…

Where Daniel? Where can He be? In the people, maybe? In the people?...

The afternoon starts to go dim, and I move towards the river side. The Letes as the Romans called it – the river when we forgot what we were if we dared to cross it… was Brutus who had to defy the legends of old and keep advancing towards the celt’s heart – the altars of Lhugh. Now the River is called “Lima”, as the capital of the Gallician of old is called – "Lugo". The echoes persist, the names change… but maybe not so much.
The garden, the flowers and the mark of discoveries from Portuguese service to the One world in old times…

As the gardens near the “Marina” keep going, a nice music place decorates the view for the wanderer… the …armilar sphere and the dove on it’s top. The five circles interlaced with spirit of the new world. Lets hope so… lets hope

Crossing a little iron bridge we may see the marina of Viana – with boats of recreation in the main line and the old bridge of the train in the bottom…

As the Sun gently moves to it’s ending step in this journey, we may see the dome of Santaluzia's basilic on the top of the hill and the city at it’s feet.

On the marina – parents play with their children… or are the children who play with their dormant parents?

World of contrasts, realm of appearances, dream of a summer’s eve…

Echoes...

How did it all start?

With the first Man who didn’t know how to listen to the first Woman’s dreams?
With the first Woman who didn’t understand the first Man’s fears?

How did it start may ever be veiled… but how it may end has to be answered…

A same language so we may understand other’s ways more than criticize or shape them on our same confusion - keeping, still our own way to name things…

A similar respect to the worship of values from within, that we all expect to manifest outside…

A similar recognition of a meaning to this journey called life…

Respect, truth, honesty, devotion, trust, hope, commitment…

From the values of cultures, societies, religions… all of them a means to walk honorably or a tool to rule those with faith under the cloak of will to dominate…

When does it end?

When we make it happen inside…

When – more than preaching – we do.
When – more than telling others to fill what we dreamed and never dared – we have done it before.

When the fight becomes truthful enough so we understand both fighters have to win.
When competition is a way to feel challenged to give our best and to demand the same from our companion in fight, more than to prove we are better, we were right, we are stronger…

When the ends do not justify the means.
When truth is always and just truth and always lie when truth is not.

When we recognize all we wish is to be loved and we do so with us; with those we can love; with those we still do not - acknowledging though they hold the same longing even when lost in their quest as they may seem.

When we look at the deepest sin of the one in front and we see our own failure, when we dream with the highest virtue of the one in front and we recognize our true nature.

When sin is just the promise of the home we miss and virtue the open door to the hearth we were searching for.

When hope to unite the heart with the heart is stronger than the will to define which roads must be taken, how many steps will be given, when to walk and when to stop, whom to question about the right paths to follow….

When we need not to read things as these to feel, to be…

When no one needs to write them…

The walls outside… the walls within…

Why do I stay in my room?
Why do I feel so heavy, so drained… so transparent… fragile… that stepping outside is as being a thin glass of ice, walking under the sunlight - in a square full of noise… I may be melt, I may be broken…

Why to endure a realm of our own?
Why to become prisoner of our minds?
Because – outside, there beyond these walls – we may find colors, we may find joy, we may find day… but we may be in an empty place… a place where no one may truly see us, a place where no one knows no one…

Staying inside is becoming able to accuse something or someone of our pain, of the echo of sorrow that is around each time we feel broken… with a part missing…

They say we have to adapt.
They tell us how to honor values and virtues – still, they are paid to say so…
They teach about things they never saw or tasted… things that I know are ever shifting and never defined… though – they always paint them as “truth”… and so they doom me in to a realm of lies… those teachers of nothing, those rulers of shades, those chiefs of no one… no one exists, nothing around is the truth…

They say we must be truthfull – still, they lie in each breath they may take…
They do not love – still – they tell us that’s the truth…
They tell us we are loved, we are the center of their existence – still, they are never with us, always selling their life as an excuse to not take hold of the reigns of their own destiny… slaves who feel so alone they doom others to slavery so they are not alone… liars! Parents of deceit...

Why to leave the room?

Here I may pretend nothing else exists.
I may pretend – the world around – that living lie of hollow voices and shades they call truth, is a nightmare existing far away…

Why I don’t keep in here so?
Because it becomes hard to breath.
Because the space around seems to become so tight, because I believe…

I believe – beyond all this chaos, all this fun fair of appearances – the only thing a human being wants… it’s most deep desire – it is to be loved…

What is it important if not that?
All the power, all the meaningfulness isn’t a sad shade of that?

Why does the child stay inside the room?
Ask the reverse… what is it outside that can be true for the child?


The child is the only truth, still - what happens when people doesn’t want to be waken up from a dream?

What happens when the child speaks and no one understands?
When everybody is so filled with “truth” no one listens…
When you open your heart but you find out that the world already is as it should be… why am I here so?

When the space this realm demands you to fill is so little you have to choose – or to be chopped in pieces, or to pretend and deceive you fit, or to die…

When all of them fail – you see you will fail as well...
They tried so hard to make you a copy of their own lack of sense – that, in the end – you lay down your tired soul and let it go as waiting for relief for such a burden, such a meaningless journey around the wheel of time.

As a rat running in a wheel that’s inside a cage...

That is why it is a sin when a child comes in to this realm– because those who bring them do so by egoism.
They do not know what they are doing – they do so still.
And the truthful cultures still cry when a child is born and still rejoice when it has been released…

Where is the famous love of the mother who wishes so much to hold a baby she will open a door towards heavens so a soul may come here... in to this?
Does she really know?...

Before you open a door – can you really love someone you do not know - more than your own desire to open it?
Oh Pandora – what are you doing?!...

And – then – the soul is here.
First silent as the realm above.
First ready to be nursed and hold in the arms of those who do not know they do it because they have already lost that same essence… and so they need to see a mirror of what they were, of the realm they too were dragged from… but then…

As the process to shape the flesh in to the image of those around becomes finished, they start to be scared of the reflection of their own making, of their own face.
Then becomes really difficult to love anymore…

Yes – we are all the same baby.

Why can’t we love each other then, when we become this entity who screams it’s pain on the streets, whom builds it’s love in hate and destroys much more than creates?

Why can’t we smile and embrace – as we embraced before the helpless baby – all those babies around, those that hurt as they were hurt, who oppress as they were oppressed, who kill the baby around as someone killed their own inside, long ago?

Why was childbearing set as sin?
Isn’t it easy to see?
Because of our pain, because of our own need and despair, because of our own lack of meaning to this slave existence we keep opening portals to souls so they descent.

Is it a peaceful journey?

Think how it is painful to come in here, feel your own birth, feel how you cried when you first entered in the realm of flesh and bone.
Why do parents desire to bring beings in to here and then shaping them on their own image?
You - vane ego - that needs to endure it’s existence as a disease, passing from one shape to another, from one human face to another...

Can we love all those who are here right now?

Can we love ourselves fully?

No?
So, when that egoism tells you to doom another to your own doom – think more than twice!
Feel – when opening the portal – or you are the master and you are filled with essence, or you are making the worst sin of all – to keep and guard pain on this world while humanity exists as it is.

And – if you truly love – then sacrifice your own egoism, the fear of ending as an identity if you do not spread your seed in time and space; loose the vanity to shape humans at your own image and making... and become humble – accept death and oblivion.

Do not rebel against the nature of things.

Your existence is rebellion... you know that.

Lucifer was cast away because She didn’t bow to creation – so She spread her seed on earth and pain was planted where the garden was.

They didn’t noticed it yet – but they will do.
The time for open war is arriving.

When they realize who brought them here, who raised them, who made them who they are – they will stop being manipulated by the only true Lord of this Realm.

Lucifer was Female...

The light bearer... the life bringer.

Both principples had to be equals and rule. But one tried to take the dominant position and the other denied – so the war started and the realm of time and space was opened.

There is a war that ever existed.
The reality we are told is a deceit – it has been re-invented since ever. The only thing you learn in school is how to turn deceit in to reality, lie in to truth...

Both sides have used it to keep their rule and both are with hands tied to reveal it.

The way of the Sun and the way of the Moon will have to converge.
Eclipse will have to wash their vanity and arrogance away.
Harmony will have to come – if not by love and devotion, then by being both broken in their stiff will to endure as they have.

One way or the other – the war has to end.
Enough of numb ears, enough of stubborn will.

Enough of manipulation as well as brutality.
Both angels will sheath their swords or the swords will be broken, their beings shaded in to humbleness.

Michael and Lucifer will have to embrace again – they will have to be as one once more.

Eclipse – no more night, no more day… no more moon, no more sun… no more God, no more Goddess… ONE

Thirty minutes in Tuy - part II

Crossroads among streets of wonder, among echoes of the past. Sudden squares of light, with artistic houses and vibrant colors within the flowers… the icons of the hidden church sprouting everywhere – the cross of changes, the world, the man who dies in one hand, the woman who holds him dead or being (re)born in her lap on the other side… the two side of the same coin of destiny… Moira for everyone who sees…



And the arrows of light, of yellow, or the way of James lead towards a medieval temple, with a sacred garden guarded by two trees, and a window over the river where two towers guard the passage of the one bridge…




Over one hilltop – Tuy, and it’s fortress and Cathedral. On the other – the ancient Contrasta, now called Valença… the place within which walls I came in to be. In the middle the river Minho, upon him the bridge with Gustav Eiffel stile… a river port, a garden and the column of the temple make the rest of this piece of time…


In these gardens of time, with river, and stone and bells ringing in the distance I wandered so many nights. When the god Pan layed his flute to all the spirits of nature to follow, on the roman amphitheatre which used to be where I stand now to take this picture. How many times I wandered protected under the veil of the Lady, how many times I danced with the waters on the shaded shores of the ever flowing river of life…


Past the gardens, an avenue of stone – with playgrounds filled with children and their parents… on the right side another little garden where a woman feeds her baby… all around gipsy chants echo as the “Philadelphia” evangelist church celebrates another of their meetings – gipsy community that I admire so much by their inner strength and will to embrace the “payo” who passed there once and quickly was dragged inside by the children on the door…

Above – in the end of the stone avenue – an equestrian statue… homage to the main square of Vigo (the city of my mother). Echoes of the ancient gods and the old rule, the sacrifices to those on the waters by those stranded in the new earth… the womanhood thinks those from above do not remember of the ritual promise of the fruit of their womb to the ruler of this world… but we know… we know… and – still – we embrace them in compassion… by compassion we fall… not by power from below, but by compassion from above…




The “corredera” – the avenue that will be soon filled with people as the work schedules get in to their end. So pleasant to merge within the multitude, feeling their energy, pretending to be one of them… so good to be a pilgrim on these lands of veiled hope…


The final step - to rest in this beautiful square, with a book and a tonic drink. To look and to keep watching how the cosmic charade takes place... inside, and echoing all around.

How the human child feed the dove…

The truth Within

(by compassion we fall)

Why do we suffer and die?
Why do we keep fighting still?
What’s the hope?
Where does come from the faith in humanity… in our humanity?

Sometimes I let myself go… by myself, I would never make it.

I’m simply too distant to be touched… but You…
If we can love… if we can feel we may give, simply give… someone to whom we really feel linked in to… the magic starts… we are taken far above, far inside, far within…

Why do we keep fighting?…
Because we still didn’t loose faith in people.
Because we keep loving – even when we are not aware that’s the only reason that keeps us going.
It is not fear that moves our world – it is hope.

Behold the energy that drags this ragged body, this bleeding soul – one step after another – to keep going, reaching…

That is the force that moves me to embrace – even when thorns shred this flesh time after time…

Oh how I fear – I fear each of those who hurt me – and still, I love them.
Each who left behind a blade inside me - still I take it with both hands.
A blade which, after, would wound someone else when I tried to reach… and touch… and feel… and open…
Still, time after time, the hope takes me - from the ashes the fire is reawaken - and I’m dragged again upon my mortal legs, the ragged body which limits are so many, that keeps walking, keeps reaching, dragging on the floor so many times, dishonoring my true nature… still, going towards where the Sun Raises in the West…

(With hope we endure… and we linger)

From living pulsating hearts of flesh and light in to armored giants we may pass...
Beings unaware, that hurt so much when following the need to hold and become hold in someone’s arms…

Hurts then - to take out all those blades, all that iron steel garments we – unaware - assumed all over the years of being stranded from home…
Hurts the loneliness, hurts the presence… still – what else we may do, unless endure in this long march towards home?...

So much noise, so much confusion over the symphony that springs from the free spirit…
How less we may hear from the echo of this Cosmos inside the hollow mind helmet…

How much filled with love we become on those providential moments – Kairos – as love bursts from within and becomes tears, and smile, and feeling of belonging… when we become the home we long for…

Open chest, bleeding heart… that is being alive.
It is not the safe environment the mind offers instead – it is not the safari of emotions offered behind an armored glass…

It is to dive, to jump, to come in to this realm of existence and to cry… to really cry – moved and touched from within with all the humanity around… that is the one that blossoms within…

It is to cry and to praise life because of our mortal nature – so capable of being lost and so able to cry aloud and shake the heavens with it’s intense feeling, it’s burning love…

I don’t now – I truly don’t.
Each step towards what I feel inside seems madness to the mind.
All the clues say I’m being trapped and getting lost… raveled in a realm of chaos, ignorance, wandering souls going nowhere… a plot to enslave the free spirit… and, still…

How many times we are warned - the voice of the call, the sound of creation – has lost it’s sense in this veiled place? And, still…

Still – sometimes shines a flame – so clear, so bright, so intense it trespasses me as a living lance… and I bleed, feeling compassion, feeling really inside that moment, that humanity... inside that reaching people of stranded children trying to find way in to home…

How lonely, how lost those who come here and are brutally introduced in to the ways of ignorance from above, of numbness to the sound of eternity.

How torturing when our wings are thorn apart by the force of the noise from this realm, by it’s gravity, it’s overwhelmingly weight, the iron chains holding the soul, the torturous paths loosing the sight of the green hills far beyond..

How reaped in to wounds, as we try to embrace and thorns are there to welcome – killing the life within and turning it in to a vane fog, a cold empty cave of shades and twisted visions where glances of light shift in to dense particles of deep obscurity…

Still – one moment lights eternity, one second unleashes the tears long held inside, one simple gesture embraces a vast plane of sorrow and loneliness…

How deep it is the nature of Man – as deep as the fall to truly embody it’s essence – and strange, when contrasts define the nature of the one who thinks and feels it is – then being not so anymore…

This ever shifting entities. running under the forest of dreams, turning in to light or shade as their wandering soul passes under the trees of knowledge or the sun light of warmth belonging. So many curves and crossroads to travel here… so magnetic the descent… wonderland of smiling cats and tyrant queens of hearts…

Hold me in your hands – YOU who gave existence to this essence of mine.
Hold me as I wander in this strange place… hold me when - so many times - I loose sense of home...

Still – I believe, I believe the path keeps open… maybe hidden, maybe veiled by so much noise… but it is still there…

Oh YOU who dwells within, oh YOU who waits beyond…

Listen to those who search light, love us within this shifting realm of entwined natures… we will blossom… we will…

(May we by love be redeemed)

“Crash” the movie of contrasts and shifting colors with “Vincent” from Don McLean…

Thirty Minutes in Tuy- part I

As I dive in to my preferred places, in to my realms of joy – I always remember Tuy as one of the most special ones.

Starting in the main square, we will step in to ancient stony streets, in to cathedrals and medieval churches, in to the echoes of faith, religion, history and culture, as well as the magic of the hills and the river, the spirits of shaded places under Autumn rain drops falling sloth from the rooftops of narrow streets.



There is joy and pleasant feeling as the children invade all - with their parents at the side. The end of the afternoon is filled with colours, laughter and children’s voices everywhere. Good to see this relaxing family moments – since in the other side of the river – people is still working and then going home to another day of work… no place to see this in my home town Valença.



As we advance through the ancient stones, we finally get our steps upon the yellow arrows and shelves of the Camino de Santiago – Portuguese branch.
It leads inexorably towards the Cathedral of Tuy – major point of the road with Braga. Two Episcopal places of much importance since the time of Adrian – the Roman Emperor



The gates tell the silent story only understood by those who know how to read on the book stones of old. Inside cloisters, gardens, myths and legends… The famous “Torquemada” - the bishop who led the inquisition in the middle age, is buried inside…


There is always magic – even in simple things. We turn a corner and there’s a little square with vases and flowers and granite walls with iron worked windows… here a little window of my personal likings – settled apparently in mid of nowhere – it gives beauty to a nude wall… the beauty amongst the harsh… the flower on the sidewalk of the city…



I follow now the setting Sun rays on the maze of streets and echoes that lead towards the river bank – down the slope of the hill that harbours the cathedral and the most of the old part of the town. Churches, crosses, history and religion melt in one over the streets of the simple, the homes of the brave…



There’s always a special corner, a new square filled with echoes of other times. This square is right in the “refugio de peregrinos”. The double crucifix – Mary on one side and Jesus dying on the other – is an ever-present icon all over these galician streets…



Shades and echoes which become laughter and young groups meeting during the night. Lonely streets filled with joy when the numerous pubs open their wood and iron doors to the lovers of the Lady, the Citizens of Shadows, the devoted souls of Pan…





Streets of contrasts in which I lay my spirit to wonder over the echoes of my footsteps. They lead inexorably to the river side and to the temples of old and the new ports that guard the slope of the hill…




As the turn abouts lead from shades to light, from light to shades, I advance on the Minotaur’s maze of the mind following the delicate voice of my own Ariadne thread… a route filled of delicate and subtle messages which demands the full attention from the wandering soul to fill it’s journey towards fulfilment…


Now - Blogger blocked the upload of pictures... so I will have to post the rest of the journey in anew post.
Always a new light, always a new space to unravel, a new hope to be reborn...

Letter of a Fallen Angel to a Wandering Soul

If you are there for us – if I feel you have a little bit that listens and doesn’t fight back – I would stay all night long, I would stay until I fell to the side – just giving, fighting, as well as reaching further to listen to you above my own noise…

I love you for all you are.

I simply melt when you cry, I rejoice when your crystalline laughter invades all my being.
I love your simplicity as well as smile as a proud watcher to your childish ways.

I get as the warrior though, when the child that is hurt inside develops all that power to bend the world around.
When the “seductive you” comes in to the surface – not as the irradiation of your heart (that is freedom, gentle harmony echoing everywhere) but as the one that bends all in its way.

The one that puts people in to serve, the one that faces those that resist as a challenge.
I feel I may release you from that… as much as you are releasing me from my own willingness to keep and not “raise” after the “fall”.

My child let itself in your arms. It laid down helpless as you took care, as you let me cry and feel fragile… I was freed for moments of the tension of being in control, of the fear of being hurt, of being manipulated…

And I feel we still have to dive in – to recognize which part is hurt there, which part feels so much pain it bends love in to magnetism so reality is controlled in a way it doesn’t hurt anymore.
This is killing the power of the Universe that exists to teach us – bending reality to our own will is accepting that the “Dark Lord”, the “Guardian of Mind” – knows where it is going so it may use any means to achieve it’s ends.

Sorry but I do not trust “Mind”…I do not trust that any mind knows the truth or the way.
“Mind” is a tool that became too powerful when fear induced defensive behavior…

Talking honestly about how I used tools to defend and bend the world around is admitting my responsibility about choices that could have been done different and acknowledging the trust and hope they will be well done and well chosen.
I believe in humanity as well as my own humanity – though I suffer so much when it hurts itself and humanity around because of fear.

I’m aware the tricks of mind exist… how I know I may be “low” when threatened…
I try to expose my self so you may see, truly understand…instead of fearing me: so you start to embrace me as a whole.

I believe we walk together and may heal each other, we may be free together, we may truly love in each step – truly reaching beyond the bounds I thought were impossible to breach…

For you to enter I need to let you in – any effort will reinforce the defense… and so happens with you.

As much as I believe you may be free – from fear and the illusion of a reality distorted by it - I can’t use too much strength to try to show it to you.
The noise of the friction between those two forces – the ego that’s being exposed and my own will to expose it so it may be loved – healed - will make the harmony we truly are too distant to be “heard”.

Fears and ego based responses happen in any means possible.

I try not to judge – accepting the responsibility of having chosen to hide something I could reveal as a way to guard my ego under the excuse of guarding you…
Though trusting I may always learn and progress - so stepping forward, taking the risk, paying the bill, feeling the pain and then being free…

Fearing to expose who you are or how you behave is using reason as an excuse to keep deceit; is a way to reinforce the ways of the fearful ego – that simply defends a part of you – a part that denies, a part that doesn’t admit it may deceit, lie, hurt – and is fearful to be also denied by other people around.
A part that doesn’t forgive itself and seems to believe there’s no redemption, no meaning, no truth behind suffering on the passage from appearance of lie and mind to truth of heart and life.

Not true – reveal it, jump in the void so you may see the illusion: being denied by what you are is false.

You are loved… be free.

I want to embrace you as a whole – for that there has to be a whole to embrace, you need to let me in and to be naked and exposed… so do I.

All this war is not as much to be “right” or “wrong”, though it sometimes becomes that and I’m so sorry for those moments I let myself go on the mind game and it’s reign of ignorance and fear.

But these moments are meaningless compared to those others…those when I feel so much relief by being hold in your arms helpless, so much freedom from laying down control and the borders I assumed towards people (those same borders that were killing life in me, strangling the stream of existence in to thin lines of pale light).

By saying "borders" I do not mean being physically alone though. You could be a “socialite”, recognized by many persons because you are sensitive enough to feel what people wish to see in you… that is the ultimate deceit and the absolute loneliness – surrounded by people, living under a mask, expressing half of you – still – never fully loved, never totally embraced.

To build a character based on what people wish to feel, using the gift of sensitiveness (the same that makes you so vulnerable to people’s shit and lies) as a way to control situations and avoid exposure and being hurt – this is the “Gollum trap”: the alternative life, the “sensible way” to live, the reasonable path, the “mature” pact to keep life exactly as it is – nowhere.

As – when you fear to enter in an environment where you represent a role – where people feel you are a “saint” – fearing the mask may fall and suddenly become “judged” by what your relation with life truly is.
“Return to Innocence” – fight truthfully, be free.

Truth will set you free – appearances will doom you, me, all those you love, everyone around – to a world that never existed… that is the hollow world, the world of shadows and echoes, the world built over the life robbed from the spring of life itself – a spring the ego needs to drain to survive.

This is the “disease” of our time, the one we need to embrace and vanish in the warmth of love, over the solidness of truth, under the ocean of hope…

I know this disease too well and I believe as much you can set me free, I may set you free…

We are ONE.

And I know better than anyone the beauty of your child unleashed, the harmony of your laughter - free over everything and everyone – because my child touched yours and they smiled to each other long ago… our mind is the one having trouble with it.
The redeemed child will tear apart most of the world based on appearances and illusions, on power and control built over fear of not being accepted and not accepting fully what we are in the moment.

“The king is naked!” said the child among the people as the royal troupe passed by.

Be free – to love or to feel friction. Each time friction is within (and you may use other word – that doesn’t change the base feeling) you hate. And there is no problem with that – stop punishing yourself because of it…

Not loving is hating, yes.
Truth is always truth, when it is not is lie – no middle term to make it easier for the mind to use it as deceit.
Love or hate, live or die, lie or be truthful – let me embrace you whole.

And – I love anyway.
When you deceit – you are beautiful.
Deceit is not denying truth – it’s the promise of truth to come if you start acknowledging the lie in first place.

When you fail in an effort – that’s because you may do it next time or simply because you got in to a border of yourself.
One way or another – failing is being in motion towards the center, towards truth.

Children never use creative imagination. They never needed to.

They are in the center, they are in the Eden, they don’t need the Serpent to tell them they can be as gods if they eat the apple – they are the all loving ONE, the “one in it’s center”, that which IS.

No need to use creative sentences, no need to use will to bend the world – they are in the center of the universe, they live in their hearts – not in their minds… we are the ones who teach them how to come outside of the center, we are the ones that force them by magnetic energy to get out of the kingdom and “fall” in to this realm… the realm of lie until we fully embrace truth.

Ego desperately needs to reproduce itself inside the silence of the child – otherwise that truthful mirror may reveal the deceit of a realm of shadows.
So the first thing we teach to children is to smile and to avoid tears, to respond to our will for them to be happy, to separate in two what they are as ONE.

The blind become the guides, the ignorant become the teachers and the lost become the rulers.

The “neverending story” until we lay down all that was not truth and become naked in front of the waters of life, hold by the hand with the one who loves us, our true name spoken clear so we may pass to the other side.

To go from “here to there” children do not need to bend space and time so they come closer… the space and time run towards them because they love, they are in the heart, they are in the center.
Space and time spring from child’s heart, the child doesn’t dwell in space and time.

Coincidences, feeling things are as they had to be, the realm of the simple, the world of the innocent, the universe of those poor in the mind, accepting all and embracing everything… not needing, not running towards any end, no effort to become as we already are… just being…

The power of will serves to give itself to love. No other means…

Our will serves us to die to the moment – to give away our fear and to embrace the pain. Gethsemane and the Cross as the way to enter the kingdom…
Using the power of will otherwise is denying our true essence – the power of love.

It is to believe we are in the peripheries when we are exactly were we have always been… in the center.

This is the deceit the mind needs to endure – otherwise the divine reveals itself and the mind is melt on to the wholeness… but this is spiritual transcendence and philosophy as well as the true wisdom of the soul that only a child may teach to any adult.

To enter the kingdom we must be as the child… the child inside.

Grasp my hand, smile gently to me.
Show me your nakedness, show me your soul and all it’s wounds…
I wish to love them all, to kiss them all, to embrace them all…

And I also know I wont do this by simply saying it – because some wounds simply overwhelm our power to reveal them.
I will do this by learning devotion, commitment.

By listening carefully and truthfully. Being “MOMO” to you…
And I know I’m still a bad student in this – but I trust I will learn… I truly do.

I had to say all this now though – as I say what I feel.
I need to learn balance in order to keep this above intact AND to learn how to listen to your truth… help me with this please.

Thank you for this good fight – we are revealing the true fighters here.
The mind is learning how heart may beat it in any field.

Fight with me and let us feel united in one embrace – mind, heart in one.
Child hurt, child singing in one – free from pain, from fear, from bondage of mind work.

Die Unendliche Geschichte

The world it is not as it is… now – for any that reads this – it is as we see it.

The truth can’t be torn, twisted, forced in to bend so it may fit the desire of the mind. Fear can’t use truth – it will always be a lie that way…

There was a boy – who loved so much books – that one day he did what any Man does when passion knocks on his door – he stole a book from a bookstore.

This was not any ordinary book – it was THE book – and he knew that deeply since the first moment he saw it upon a table, read by the bookkeeper.
It could be his most precious book… but Bastian had to do it, he had to take it.

This boy was fat, he had no mother, his colleagues had beaten and insulted him frequently, he was not good with exercise nor with any other subjects at school, his father was a dentist always absent in his work… still this boy could tell stories, he had imagination… and he loved books and stories of adventures.

And then he knew Fantasia.
And he knew about the Child Empress and the “Nothingness” that menaced to destroy Fantasia forever.
And he met Atreyu, the olive skin boy with purple mantle who had no father or mother and was the child of all…

He found that the very essence of the “nothingness” – is what we call “lies” in this world.
Each part of fantasia that was taken by the nothingness was twisted in here as a lie, each fantasian that jumped in that magnetic void was transformed in to a lie – used to any means in the human realm.

He cried, he laughed, he went all along with Atreyu until the end in his quest to save fantasia and the Child Empress…


And then – the end was a new beginning… and Bastian (this was the name of the boy ) started a new world.

He wished to be strong. He wished to be smart. He wished to be powerful.
And so he was.

Using the symbol of the empress – the Auryn - he discovered a sentence on it’s back – a sentence Atreyu seemed not to notice when he himself used it: ”Do what you want”.

All his wishes started to build a new fantasia… with them grew different new stories and different new realms.

He learned about all this but there was a hidden truth in Fantasia – as much as he desired, as much as he forgot about who he was before or where he had come from.

As much powerful and self sufficient he became, as far distant he was from Atreyu.

In the end – he fought Atreyu, and he hurt that who he loved.

He wanted to become emperor of fantasia – and that meant oblivion since all those who desired it before became as hollow lost beings forever.

Atreyu saved him risking his own life in an epic combat in front of the Ivory Tower – the place of the Child Empress.

And then – Bastian – alone and naked, wondered… trying to find out his last wish – the one that could return him back to his world, his last memory…

It was the memory of his father…
But it got crushed by these strange entities he had transformed – in vane ignorance – from sad and horrible beings, in to strange bizarre ever laughing creatures…

Then he was all alone…
No hope, no memory of home…

On the last moment – when all desire was gone, and all that he thought important (as strength, good looks, wisdom, power) was useless; when he had to face the waters of life and to step in to the heart of both worlds – it was the hand of Atreyu, mortally wounded but not dead when Bastian fought him – that took him and said his real name to the ever lasting waters.

And so – Bastian – returned.
And he brought back those waters.
So we may drink, so we may be free from the appearances of this “NeverEnding Story”.

Esquecimentos...

(Timorense vendendo cartões para telemóvel em frente à embaixada Portuguesa)

I beg for pardon about this post that follows in Portuguese.

I gladly sent my opinions to “Timor Online” – a Portuguese blog that I had previously linked here and in which information that respects East Timor is periodically published.

As ever – I try to give my scope of the situation.
This time though – maybe by technical problems (I would like to think so) my post was cut, so just the first part - concerning the contrasts of the Australian external politics towards the field in conflict – were post. The rest was omitted.

To repose the truth of the post and its view, I had to post a comment explaining the total content of my thoughts about the situation.

Now – as I feel that justice was not made and possibly information was manipulated – I want to post the original text as it was sent to the “TimorOnline”.

Timor has troubles, and troubles come from external interference.
They have always been so and maybe they will keep.
Still – I trust the Timorese spirit more than any other means - to endure chaos and restore peace.

Pictures were added to this blog edition.

"Poderão dizer o que quiserem.

Disseram que os GNR são “pontapeadores de cabeças”.

Poderão sentir que – realmente – não fizemos muito pelas colónias.
Escreviam que apenas tínhamos uma estrada em Timor… é verdade.
Só esqueceram um pequeno pormenor – é que as estradas que tínhamos em Portugal nem eram melhores nem muitas mais comparadas às necessidades.

Não apoiamos a invasão Indonésia.
Não fizemos acordos petrolíferos com eles enquanto os Timorenses morriam pela independência.

Sentem os Timorenses esta aversão para com os ex-colonizadores?

Sentem distância relativamente aos Malae de 20.000km mais além?
Ou sentem distância relativamente aos Malae do lado?

Agora…

Quando se montou evacuação, quando se pretendia por toda a gente para fora… sabem quantos Portugueses abandonaram voluntariamente o famoso Dili em conflicto?... Nenhum.

Enquanto se passeava nas ruas assistindo ao queimar de casas, óculos de sol e automáticas em mão vendo algo que não diz respeito durante uma semana – os GNR (os famosos pontapeadores) começam a fazer o seu trabalho.
Prender quem queima e destrói em falta de uma polícia efectiva.

Não se pinta o português com intenções de boa vontade e de companheirismo – obviamente, estados não fazem favores nem aos seus próprios cidadãos.

Contudo – um visto para nacionalidade entre as duas nações – marca a diferença de distância.
Quem está realmente mais longe?
As distâncias – meus queridos Aussi – medem-se por dentro.

Não é só que se apostem carros e motas em Díli pela selecção portuguesa durante o Europeu.
Não é só que se encontrem gentes de idade que – orgulhosos – mostram os documentos antigos de nacionalidade Portuguesa como mostra de orgulho durante uma ocupação ignorada pela Austrália.

É que – no fundo – as distâncias vêem-se por dentro.

(o post foi cortado aqui - tal como as correntes e grades da porta da embaixada e as filas ao Sol de gentes que procuravam o que era seu por direito antes de '76)

Quando todos os interesses na zona se evaporarem, quem ficará?

Se todo o petróleo se esvaísse e o comunismo fosse tão bem aceite como o capital-neo-liberalismo – quem ficaria?

Se o Islão fosse visto com a mesma condescendência que o catolicismo romanizante – quem ficaria?

Quando já não houver governos a pagar ONGs para os representar no terreno – quem permanece?

Hoje Portugal é um mal menor para o povo Timorense.

Mas – no fim – só ficarão aqueles que amam, os que estão perto… por dentro.


Agora – um apelo à lusofonia de terras entre Minho e mar:

Não pensem que se luta pelo orgulho português encarando o Australiano pintado nas notícias.
Como nós – há gente que critica duramente a actuação do seu próprio governo e que mexe as mãos fazendo algo para ajudar, além de estadismo ou crítica gratuita.

O orgulho português não se salva no fetiche másculo de armas a entregar como tampouco se salva na defesa das quinas atrás de um couro em campo relvado.
O orgulho português salva-se quando se exige melhor qualidade para os serviços a que – constitucionalmente – temos direito.

Salva-se quando sabemos exigir qualidade nas nossas vidas para além das primeiras companhias e das quintas dos famosos.

Salva-se quando exigimos justiça social, quando salvaguardamos as tradições portuguesas do assalto anglosaxónico – SE, E SÓ SE – sentirmos que temos algo positivo a contribuir para o bem-estar comum… global.

Por isso – irmãos de sangue – olhemos para o nosso nariz, para o nosso olho, e vejamos se há lá algum cisco a apontar antes de ver traves algures.

Lembrem que temos Lages à muito.
Que cedemos à OTAN à muito.
Que nos vendemos a postas às medidas comunitárias à muito.
Que somos campo de férias para o mesmo “turismo internacional” que – agora – queremos rebater.
Que temos quota-parte de responsabilidade pela desorganização Timorense, visto nunca termos formado quadros de raiz que fossem viáveis como governo próprioquando tivemos oportunidade.

Se fizermos o trabalho de casa, talvez sim – depois – possamos dar algo a alguém.

Por enquanto – a vã glória de mandar – seria um fracasso total.
Nada podemos ensinar lá fora – a Mauberes ou “Aussis” – se nada temos cá que sintamos ser verdadeiro e verdadeiramente “nosso” para se partilhar.

Como dizia um Peça algures no tempo…
Já agora – vale a pena pensar nisto.

("Che", uma criança Timorense e um Jipe U.N - sempre escolhendo males menores para este povo de homens-criança que lutam arduamente pelos seus valores desde à séculos)

Mas – realmente – a forma como somos recebidos pelos Timorenses, leva-me a crer que somos um mal menor.
E que eles também sabem disto.

Daniel Almeida Pinto"

Maubere

I remember… and I feel…

I remember when I first contacted the people… freedom is an expression we will never know fully here in the “westernized nations”, until we meet and live among those as great as the Maubere… in Timor Lorosae.

I learned with them… about my half life, about the half choices my land seemed to offer me.
With them I learned what it seems to be truthful, honorable, whole...

I learned what’s peace… because – when a Timorese in Oe-Cusse approaches - you will feel tender, curiosity maybe, kindness, silence… peace…

You will feel an ocean around and inside… as much as the deep routes of the land… and the echoes of ancestral sounds.
Tradition, culture, truthfulness.
Something we started to forget among all these rituals from other places…

I have nothing against meeting people (I love this) and other cultures.
But I feel – loosing the routes to the land we are is loosing the routes to the soul we belong.

Then I knew Díli.
In there I coordinated a Mission in an NGO that was part of a vast web of interests concerning more with echonomical foreign benefits than with people’s identity and capability to self-determination.

There was always the thought – Timorese can’t do it by themselves.
There was always the look from top to down.
There was the virtual feeling our so called politeness and developed technology were greater than their simple ways and humble appearance.

In this I saw the budgets of projects born from dust – never from demands or needs expressed by Timoreses themselves.
Saw how reports were not read or simply ignored, since Lisbon had the idea of what they intended before the intention came from the field.

I saw the donors – IPAD, ECHO.
Then I heard the international community in personal talks.
Portugal is a non neutral supporter.
National Bank, (re)Construction Contracts and Oil interests…

I saw the money USAID and other entities flushed down the toilet of draining people from their independent kind of life so they became prisoners of external founding and foreign contracts.

I saw how tribal traditions were hardly tried to be washed away by the so called “Universal” new church of democracy…

I saw how international interests used everything at hand to bring mayhem and chaos as an excuse to stronger inner interference and rulership.

When I came back from Timor, barbed wire was on the main streets of Dili and brother against brother in ignorance fighting – seemingly under the excuse of Religion – truly under the money and advice from external potencies.

AlKatiri was the target then.

AlKatiri is the target now.

Not supporting him or other – I must say it is such coincidence with similar actors behind this I simply feel stranged…

The need for hurried U.N end of assistance.
The oil contracts definition ending right now and then… this.

From foreign military bases denied in Timorese Soil, to oil contracts frustrated by the government’s decisions…

There are so many influences…

I would dream a nation in which Maubere could simply live their own way.
No need for Portuguese as official language, no need for democracy instead of tribal traditions, no need for foreign judges or laws instead of local family clan rule…

Wise and strong as the routes of very old trees… which endure dry season and rejoice with the first rains.
This “children” people, this deeply human land would be – more than a “under aid” land – a “teacher of nations”…


I give them my most profound recognition.

I tell them how I admire, how I recognize their freedom and their character.

How I do know Maubere have no war inside… the weapons that entered there always came from different far countries, from far and not so far people.

In this world of alliances that are dark and grey they need support to endure.

Hope they may endure as free as I knew them.

I do not wish for their smiles the ones I saw in Bali, in the streets.
I do not wish for their freedom the bondage of a taxi cab as a way to serve the “Malae”... us.

Guerra “la hia” no coração Maubere.
There was never war in the Maubere’s heart…

Quem a leva consigo para além mar – que volte para sua casa…
Those who bring war in their hearts – may return home…

Ontem as desculpas para armas nas ruas são as mesmas que hoje…
Yesterday – the excuses to put guns on the streets were the same we have now…

Não parece que aprendemos da história.
We seem to learn nothing from history.

There we do again those “help” missions that endure years of weapons walking the streets…
Repetem-se as ajudas para manter a paz que duram anos passeando armas nas ruas…

Missing my little village on the woods…
Saudades da minha aldeia no mato.

There was no weapon on the streets… never would be…
Onde não havia armas nas ruas… nem nunca houve.

Awakenings

Awakenings…

Not, not the movie… the real ones… if there are such things…

In the morning… what do we feel?
What drives us to leave the comfort of our dreams and jump in to imperiousness of day stream?

What?

May we feel hope? May we feel the unexpected is about to jump on us after turning the corner?

Do we feel the magic of the unknown vibrating on the new air as we breath after the death of the senses and the peace of mind?

Or – are we trapped?

By the same day of yesterday?

As if repeating the moment – an eternity?

Feeling the same walls…

The same water of the shower running through our half asleep skin?

The same numbness… the same taste of oblivion… the lack of a dream waiting outside…

Commanded by need, by routine or simply by fear of letting all behind and simply… stay.

Daring a totally different day. A day in which the faces would be different, the feelings totally new…

The unexpected everywhere… the eclipse of mind over the burst of light when letting all go… challenging death by simply jumping on it… the death of the world known for the desire of the darkness in front…

Stepping in the nothingness… nothingness that can be a whole new universe… just by missing work… just by missing that appointment… just by taking the car, the bus, the train – with no direction….

Taking the first one… and go. With no clothes, with the money we have in the wallet… just going…

Defying the rule of usage, taking the farthest road possible…

Do we ever thought about this? Craved for this absolute insanity of entrusting our steps to unknown moments, unknown persons, unknown landscapes?

Would there be a “straight path” that would lead beyond the circular world we step each day?

Some distant shore in which there was no sea but just the nothingness… so we could jump… and be… and be… until being no more?

Then what?

Do we really know?

Do we really know where we are going? What we do in here? Do we really feel that certainty?

No?...

Then why do we hold on so much to these days, these moments we already know about? What do they give us?

How cheap do we sell our freedom for the comfort of the slavery… the known feeling of security that kills the moment… that ends the circle and closes the world upon us…

How much do we value ourselves.. how much costs a second in our lives…

How much do we feel and think about this in the numbness of the new day?

The Bridge of Khazad-Dum

There is a path – a thin path to travel.

The only way out possible from the maze of Moria… that – in greek – is linked to "Moira" - the three women that decide Men's “destiny”.

Led by a pale light, nine companions fly from horror…

There are two main figures that oppose on the bridge…

In one hand there is shadow and flame.
A Balrog - “demon of power” - was standing in one of the bridge ends…
This is a creature far more scaring and threatening than the movie of Peter Jackson may show...

It was a vast and dense void, a moving shadow that scared both enemy and ally.
In it – a human shape could be guessed and – within – flame sprout and threatened…
Whip of fire stings in the dark and a horrid cauterizing sword of flame destroys the world around…

It is a “Maiar” – an “angel” of fire lore from Tolkien's realm.
A fallen conscience whom serves oppression and is mounted in power and will.

In front we have Gandalf… the “Olorín” from Valinor – his name means “Dreams”…
He’s also known as “Mithrandir” – the "grey wanderer", or as “Incanus” – "the ruler of mind".

He’s another Maiar.
Another “angel” of fire – this one dwelt a long time on the forests of Lórien – the Lord of Dreams.
When he “resurrects” he does so in “Lothlórien” – the blossom of Lórien - in this Middle Earth… the realm of Galadriel.

His shape is that of an old man dressed in ragged garments. It’s power is advice and counsel against evil.
He has a walking staff in one hand and an elvish sword that glitters in the dark if orcs are near.

Now – the interesting.
Gandalf is “a servant of the secret fire, a wielder of the flame of Anor”.

He serves the fire that will never be known by the mind and he wields the flame of Anor – the Sun.
The Sun – on Tolkien’s realm – is a female… so truth.

She lights the way – and it is the male principle – Ithil, the moon – which is empty and reflects the light of life within.

The power he wields is light…
It is harmony – and so appears in P.J movie when facing the “Nazgul” (the wraiths) and their dreadful power in front of the walls of Minas Tirith - a delicate song and a stream of light that drive the shadows of despair away.

The Sun that gives life.
The Sun that nurses life on the dusty earth.
The Sun that lives in each cell of this planet… “Fusion” it’s the name of the miracle, using science terms.

Against it stands the will of power and dominion.
It is shadow and obscure human shape.
It is “Fission” and nuclear power in a twisted and abominating form.

The two sides of the bridge are a mirror image.

Each a path, each an end…

We have nuclear Fusion – the energy we receive from the Sun – which creates and maintains life and harmony.

We have nuclear Fission – the energy we create from nuclear weapons - and which causes death and aberration, an energy that comes from fear and will to dominate…

Both at the ends of the bridge…

The “Angel that rises in power” against the “Angel that wields life”…

Notice as well…

Sauron - "(Lord) of Abomination" , who was also called “Annatar” – "lord of gifts" - has no shape at the time of the Third age – he’s as lidless eye…

The Wraiths are shapeless again – they are terror and hollow servants of power…
Their victims become wraiths as well and pass to the shadow realm as hollow servants of power… naked in the dark, with no Sun to warm you… no light of life… just shadows and despair…

The Elves are different incarnated entities… they travel both realms and know the “straight path” towards Valinor after the closing of the world.
They are immortal because they do not dwell in time – but may be killed by war or melancholy…

Mankind is a middle step.
Incarnated – they may turn to the light or to the shadow, they have free will to choose one or the other.
No Elf ever turned to the Shadow by their own will – though they did lots of mistakes and wrong deeds.

Then you have the Orcs…
Elves corrupted by evil until they turned to animals that prey and war everybody including themselves.
They hate nature and all existence – they are trapped and are ruled by fear of their masters – not by hope or any value or virtue.

Think how much your back has bowed because of fear and pain in these last years… until your heart is so veiled that you start to seem as an orc – walking with low shoulders, hidden chest, fearful of sunlight and doing things in life ruled by fear of non having, non being…

"Ser astronauta... e voar"...

A night in the world of “Wonderland”… that’s walking around with Telmo…

He’s a gifted lad… he is smart, sensitive, good friend and an artist… and he’s a looney… a free young man, prisoner of this insanity around… this disconnected world…

I went to see him in his new place of work. He has hanged around bakeries and pubs. Now he’s on a coffee shop.

(me and Telmo- this night - in front of the coffee shop where he works now)

We went to his home (his mother and step father’s home). Then we went to Tuy and walked a bit on the night environment. This person has such an easiness to make friends; he’s so pure and given to give… and – still – he’s not adapted… he’s one of that crescent group of young people who do not believe on the values their predecessors try to pass them – without deeds – just with words and rules…

Walking with this gentle soul, with all his way to be different, is to question so much the world in which we make concessions to deal with each day. In which we don’t embrace life until life finally drops us. Is to question the direction my life takes in each moment I detach myself from being who I am… I have part of the responsibility to destroy lives as these using my truth as a lie…

I am part of the example of non fulfillness that leads to disappointment and revolt on our youngsters. I am the illusion that guards their way in to freedom. I am the spoil in the eye that keeps people from seeing…

But – now – I want to change.

Now I want to be as the song says, to dream again and become an “astronaut” and to fly; to wake up, put the feet on the ground, take the first clothes at hand and go. To cry in front of those I love when I feel pain;

Eu queria ser astronauta (I wanted to be an austronaut)
o meu país não deixou (my country didn't let me)
Depois quis ir jogar á bola (after I wanted to play football)
A minha mãe não deixou (my mother didn't let me)
Tive vontade de voltar á escola (Ihad desire to return to school)
Mas o doutor não deixou (but the doctor didn't let me)
Fechei os olhos e tentei dormir (closed my eyes and tried to sleep)
Aquela dor não deixou (that pain didn't let me)

Ó meu anjo da guarda (oh my guardian angel)
Faz-me voltar a sonhar (make me dream again)
Faz-me ser astronauta e voar (make me become an astronaut and fly)

O meu quarto é o meu mundo (my bedroom is my world)
O ecrãn é a janela (the screen is the window)
Não choro em frente á minha mãe (I don't cry in front of my mother)
Eu que gosto tanto dela (me who loves her so much)
Mas esta dor não quer desaparecer (but this pain doesn't want to go away)
Vai-me levar com ela (it will take me with it)

Ó meu anjo da guarda (oh my guardian angel)
faz-me voltar a sonhar (make me dream again)
Faz-me ser astronauta e voar (make me become an astronaut and fly)

Acordar, meter os pés no chão (waking up, put the feet on the floor)
Levantar, pegar no que tens mais à mão (getting up, taking what's closer at hand)
Voltar a rir,voltar a andar (return to laugh, return to walk)
Voltar Voltar (return, return)
Voltarei (I will return)
Voltarei (I will return)
Voltarei (I will return)
Voltarei (I will return)

Voar, Tim (xutos e pontapés)

This is the way to free the world – to be, to feel, to do – what I really am.
Any excuse it’s a lie – with them, beautiful souls have to cry and be twisted by the majority of us whom stay in the shades. I want to light up the Sun in me… will you join?

The child in us

Another day in which the Man inside tries to transcend his inner state by the force of will…

Another day in which I’m broken in the attempt… and then they appear… and teach the path of simplicity with silent wisdom…


Someone said – in the past… a past always present – those who wanted to enter the Kingdom, had to become as a Child…
The kingdom of plentiful ness, of truth… that’s their kingdom… and they come here to teach these minds of ours the truth about ourselves, our nature - the non conditional love…

So I’ve hold them, I’ve dived in their absolute wisdom.

This is a homage to them – in each of us…

This is a reminder – honor the child in you - it will show you how much we become distant from the heart by following the spirit of will and power…

(he's Daniel... it is a "me" distant and far... however so, so near... thank you big being, for helping me to remember what I have forgotten so many times... the truth is silence... is peace... the truth IS)

Just that – enjoy what you like, share what you love…

Just this – enthusiasm and spontaneity…

Just being little - so much that we never question - the size or aspect of our outside garments since we are so big in the size of our inner truth…

Ave YOU – the child in us…

(the day ends - I pray to the "Sun that is born on the West"... to hope from dispair, to truth from the illusion... to silence in the noise... to the miracle among the discipline of effort... to that we call Love - the warmth that burns inside each of us is the same Sun we see each day outside)