Portuguese autumn is chestnut scented. The streets are smoky and the sky has stubble. Sometimes the clouds grow bored, drift away and drench the city with a burst of summer. Coffees are drunk and people watch people. Queues twist and writhe like snakes outside the citizens bureau. People chit and chat about the crisis. Pigeons accessorise the cities spaces and places. The walls of the old neighbourhoods hide behind layers of graffiti. Terrible stuff. Angry, bored, lazy words on walls.
Tourists panic on the metro. Elderly women peer angrily at my trousers. I feel free and occasionally sombre here. Today I found a beautiful old house with pink flowers crawling over its face. I thought of a time wasting amble and a tree.
A tree in an island. A disgusting cigarette fogged island, laced by a moat of taxis. A nowhere sort of place that was once a stepping stone to homesweet Porto.
