Stories

Today I dreamt on my memories.

My father, when I was small, was owner/director of a sports magazine, four thousand prints per month. We were going, every month, to the printer shop, where big cylinders printed the pages, put them together, staple them, cut the borders and, at the end, an example was out. Repetitive noises. While waiting for my father magazine to be ready I walked around and mainly school books where printed. It was now time to put one magazine in one envelope, already addressed to the subscriber. There was a box of envelopes per zip code, first the islands (Azores/Madeira), then the North, then the South, then Lisbon, where there was a box per neighbourhood. Maybe it was the other way around, I don’t remember. We were usually three to help – my father, a friend and I. After couple hours we charged our car with the boxes full of envelopes full of magazines. The printer shop was in a narrow street, somewhere in Lisbon, I could not say anymore where. The car was full, almost touching the ground. It was a Citroen Visa 10E. I had to go somewhere in the middle of the boxes, bent to shape with them. Next step was the post office. Take out all the boxes from the car, give them to be sent. Last point of this monthly journey was passing by the stadiums of Lisbon where we would leave some copies of the magazine to be sold directly to the people.

This monthly ritual end one day abruptly. I was in London with my grandmother. I just discovered that, against my initial will, I was going to the university in Coimbra. On the return to Portugal my mother, father and I went all to a bar, Pavilhão Chinês, at Bairro Alto. My father tells me he had sell the magazine.

Talks over lunch, body combat, Lisbon, strange exhibitions, many very nice moments we spent together over the last years.

But there was a night, few years ago, Joanne showed up with K in a bar where I was having an excellent night with L. It was, seems, a private birthday party but L and I were there, having free cocktails, looking at the people, dancing the tubes. Joanne and her friend arrived already a bit happy. Joanne and I laugh and danced, danced until dawn. One of the many good moments I spend with you, for sure you remember. You are leaving for a new life next week. I’ll be doing the same in about one month. I will certainly not forget moments like that night.

Keep in touch Joanne. Ce n’est pas toujours facile à dire ‘à la prochaine’.

Now that I need to become a citizen again, leaving the cern paradise, I find again the bureaucracies in Portugal. And how they try to improve the system by having several web pages with lots of information, talking about lots of laws and using their jargon, but not helping much when you want a simple thing.

Then I find the portuguese systems in general with so many complications that I understand how time is lost trying to find which case suits you.

Again I understand why I got married and divorced in another country and my own country never got to know it.

In Portugal now there is a identity card (or citizen card, as they call it) which comprises many numbers in one. Basically there are four different numbers in the card. One for identity, other for fiscal reasons, other for heath system and last one for social security. I wonder if I’ll have them all, because I never paid social security neither I will start this year in a voluntary basis. Hope this does not crash their system. Anyway, soon I will try to make this new citizen card and first task is to find the least queue possible.

In the all-in-one shop (called citizen shop) in Lisbon there was 4 hours average wait time for doing the card. Well, not for doing, for requesting, because then it will be ready in couple weeks. And forget about the ‘urgent’ mode, even paying more. It does not exist yet.

But my last few days were passed in a good part of the free time on looking how to become citizen and if/how I can get social security number. One phone call, fill the form on the web page, link X. Filled and next day an email:
——————

O (A) benef (a) não consta inscrito(a),
Conforme terminação do NISS da Entidade Empregadora
0 , 1, 2 , 3 – fax 21 842 42 73
ana.afonso.teixeira@seg-social.pt ou
lia.p.carvalho@seg-social.pt ou
m.ceu.dias@seg-social.pt
4 , 5 , 6 – fax 21 846 04 81 – OU por email para
m.clara.cunha@seg-social.pt ou
alcina.c.cunha@seg-social.pt
7 , 8 ,9 – fax 21 842 42 10
m.lourdes.povoa@seg-social.pt ou
m.joaquina.marques@seg-social.pt ou
maria.c.vaz@seg-social.pt
Deverá enviar a seguinte documentação;
Sendo de Nacionalidade Portuguesa ou da União Europeia
-Boletim de Admissão (mod Rv-1005/2008),
-Cartão de Contribuinte e Bilhete de Identidade ( em tamanho AMPLIADO e LEGÍVEL)
Para Estrangeiros
-Boletim de admissão (mod Rv-1005/2008),
-Boletim de trabalhador estrangeiro (mod Rv-1006/2008)
-Cartão de Contribuinte ( em tamanho AMPLIADO e LEGÍVEL)
-Passaporte com visto ou Titulo de Residência( em tamanho AMPLIADO e LEGÍVEL )
Na falta do visto, deverá enviar o contrato de trabalho assinado pelas partes e devidamente autenticado com fotocópia de BI do legal representante da firma .

Clara Cunha
Centro Distrital de Lisboa -Areeiro
Identificação e Enquadramento de Pessoas Singulares II
Terminação 4 – 5 – 6 ( NISS da Entidade Empregadora )
———————–

This is the copy/paste of the answer. Even if you dont know portuguese you can understand the difficulty on understanding. Where to find the mod RV-1005/2008? No idea. Maybe I should ask this lady of the “termination 4-5-6 (social security of the employing entity)” as she kindly signs. Maybe she is playing to much the lottery.

“Certains signes ne trompent pas: du 1er au 15 août, le cinéma Central projette des films arabes, en version originale non sous-titrée. Le ticket est à 40 francs.”
(in Tribune de Genève – Faut-il décaler les Fêtes à cause du ramadan? – 6.August.2008 –
http://www.tdg.ch/pages/home/tribune_de_geneve/l_actu/geneve_et_region/detail_geneve/(contenu)/250225)

What is a music band, kids playing in the street along their mother, a giving away of clothes and books mean in front of a building in this city? Another squat is about to end. They invite everyone to the last party and last breakfast (today at 10am). A bit more towards a squared society ruled by the capitalism and evicting any different way of living (which, by chance, is more communal and less profitable for the whole economy).

L’autre jour j’ai lu sur Tribune de Genève que pour lutter contre les taggers, la meilleur façon est de effacer les tags des bâtiments dans les 24h. Comme ça leur objectif de visibilité est pas atteint et, on espère, arrêtent de faire des signatures dans les murs.

Un de ses jours (hier, avant hier…) les lumières d’avant et d’arrière de ma vélo ont été volés. Je les laisse toujours sur la vélo, même qu’elles sont facilement décrochables. Mais ici les voleurs prennent pas seulement la lampe, mais aussi le support, fixé par une vis. Je crois que l’objectes volés sont après vendues dans les foires, marchés aux puces…

Pour lutter contre ça je vais acheter aujourd’hui, dans un magasin, des nouvelles lampes et les mettre. Et les personnaliser au moyen d’un stylo correcteur ou même de tatouage avec le couteau.

I sent a gift to a friend in Spain: t-shirt inside a big envelope. Took it to a swiss post-office (www.poste.ch) and paid 3 euros. Seven days later a letter from the post-office says I paid too less. It should have been 5 euros (because was more than 2cm thick). Not clear if they had sent the envelope or not. In post-office they did not accept their error and could not tell where the envelope might be.
I did not pay the 2 euros difference. Twelve days later my friend did not receive yet his gift. Swiss post sucks. What a pleasure to say.

(this comes in consequence of my birthday gift, sent in Swiss express mail due to arrive before 9am my birthday, arrived on mid-afternoon and I could only pick it up the next day).

L’histoire de l’hôtel.. Mon collègue Dawid avait réservé l’hotel, je
savais déjà que était une chambre ‘double’ mais j’attendais que serait
quand même de 2 lits, car ils avaient pas la choix de ‘twin’. Arrivé
là, un indien qu’avait aucune envie de aider, connaissait rien au tour
(quand demandé pour où prendre le petit-déj, ou un pub), nous donne un chambre. Nous demandons aussi pour petit-déj: seulement dans la chambre et seulement
continental et 10pounds chaque(!). Dans le chambre une seule lit et pas très large non plus. Retour à la réception et il nous dit que est le seul type de
chambre qu’ils on, qu’il n’y a pas d’autres chambres disponibles, etc…
Heureusement il avait une dame, aussi façon indienne mais plus
anglaise que, très sympa, tout de suite a voulu savoir le problème et a
découvert qu’ils avaient un chambre ‘famille’ avec une deuxième lit.
Après, ils arrivaient pas à réserver sur l’ordinateur et nous on dit pour
aller prendre un truc au resto/bar de l’hôtel. On va et… un autre
indien. Le resto/bar est un peu posh. Mon collègue voulait une guiness
(fair enough). Guiness? Non, je connais pas, on a x, y z. Mais une
bière foncé? Ce quoi ‘foncé’? Cette couleur. Non, on a pas, on a x y
z… Nous sommes partis. Réception, avec la femme sympa. Bon, on vous
donne la chambre et après on verra. La chambre est plus cher mais tout va bien.
On va, chambre normal, un peu froide. La poubelle de la salle de bain
était pas vidé. On part vers le centre (que la femme sympa nous avait dit) pour
chercher un pub. Trouvé dans une ville tout moche. Le pub, par contre, sympa et
pas fumeur, repas sympa, retour, dormir, simple.
Lendemain matin… petit-dèj? rien. On va pour faire le check-out et
chercher ailleurs mais ils essayent de chargé le prix du petit-déj et
font pas de confiance (un autre indien) que nous n’avons pas eu. Il téléphone
et un autre indien, plus sympa, ‘very sorrry, on a pas l’heure ici mais
dans 5 minutes dans votre chambre’. Ce pendant je vais préparer ma
présentation dans la salle de la conférence, de retour ils avaient amené
seulement 1 petit-déj. Téléphoner à la réception et 5 minutes après
arrive l’autre… Et je crois que été suffit pour une aventure de plus
de hôtels en angleterre que marchent jamais bien.

Not part of holidays.
Police in switzerland sometimes we see them in a band playing covers of known songs with drums, electric guitar and voice in neighborhoods parties. Other times in roller blades they go with the crowd in monday night skating. The other day I saw one still with the clothes, gun, handcuffs, taking a class of something in a school migros. Nice also when they are eating/buying kebabs.

Coming to portugal is fixing computers. Today, however, I managed to break my father desktop, which stopped printing. Still there I know the problem is the windows which is not legal, even if he has a legal CD which was never installed. I’ve to check educational prices of SW to see if it worths buying. And then loose a weekend installing everything back in Lisbon. Other computers this holidays were my aunt, my grand-mother and my father laptop.
Not everything is bad, however. I had to take train and bought its ticket in an ATM at metro station, took the metro to the train station (new line) and was really very quick.