Showing posts with label pain. Show all posts

Santiago's Path


If you ask me, what was Santiago's Path for me?! 


I don't know very well how to speak about it now...maybe it's too early or I'm too tired or I'm still in an amazing  euphoria - that same euphoria that was part of me these 5days...

Santiago's Path is too much, it's too amazing, it's intense and grateful. It's painful but make you thankful for everything: your health, comfort, friends, family, love, clean clothes, food...I could go on and on.

I don't know anybody that has ever regret to do the Santiago's Path - and now I know why. 

Some of my favorite pictures are here...I can't write much more now...
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Santiago

In December 2013, a little over a year ago at Sé do Porto, when turisting around, I saw a little colorful painted square in a wall. These were two arrows: One blue and the other yellow, representing Fátima and Santiago paths, respectively.

I took a picture of them. I wished in that moment to walk the Santiago path, I wasn't sure though if I would be able to do it one day. 
The truth is I thought about it several times during 2014: the fact that my sister is doing the path from Lisbon in stages, that another good friend did it from Valença certaintly kept the idea around me throughout the year. Even though, I guess, the major life changing decisions that 2014 brought me (or that I brought to 2014?!?) convinced me that I had to do it too.

And so I decided. In 2015 it is. In January 2015, in the exact same spot at Sé do Porto, we bought our compostela or the pass for the hostels.  We took a picture today with both arrows again. 

Will had me as his motivation, he says. If I really think about it, I'm not sure what is my motivation, I just know and feel that I need to go. We will be following the yellow arrows for at least 100km in the Portuguese path to reach Santiago. From Valença do Minho until Santiago de Compostela.

Happy and adventurous 2015 everyone!!!
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the first last day

5 and half years after,12 notebooks after, many many many many but many emails after, some other many-many conference calls after, my first run after, experiences for life after...

Yesterday was my last day at Nike. 

One side of myself is extremely sad, i will miss it - the vibe, the relaxed work environment, the gym classes, the brown big table, the green small tables, the big windows aside my desk, the coffee machine sound coming from the kitchen, the employee store, the first sample sale craziness, the dutch jokes (oh well maybe not this one...), the Nike night bus (nope, also not going to miss this one), the smell of fresh cut grass,  the people I met.

The other side of myself is extremely happy, I will always remember it - I did my first interview without being completely sure I wanted it, but this was my first real job/second home and I enjoyed it as much as I could! I met amazing people, I exceeded my own expectations and I managed to experience soooo many cool things.

last selfie
I was sad and happy on my last day at Nike. The duality I felt, and I still feel a bit, makes me strange, weird, confused, tired. I kept thinking "How bizarre are these feelings?!"

I will have many other last days. This first last one though, will always be somewhere stored, saved, remembered as part of myself.

Au revoir. 
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The Things that We Carry for our Lives

I got a tattoo! Or should I express myself more clearly, I payed someone to mutilate my epiderme with striking fast mechanical needles that inject a black oily ink in my dermi and as it goes in, blood comes out. Liters. I never thought I would experience pain in other levels since it usually just hurts. I got plenty of time coping with it: I relaxed all my muscles and let it dissolve in my body, sometimes I tried the opposite and contract all my muscles and concentrate the feeling at precisely the needle point and nothing else, other times I just relied on my phone to distract me, listen to the chit-chat of the other customers and their own pain, I even caught myself humming to the sound of the machine in some kind of escapism trance. I hope nobody saw that last part tough.

After two hours of this intense mental effort, two short smoke breaks and two chocolates for lunch, it was done. It was beautiful and it's first picture was on the social media. The adrenaline afterwards was also skyhigh! I was so hyped, so alive, I was walking everywhere in the streets of Amsterdam! Eventually it wore off and it was replaced by exhaustion and a sunburn sensation drawn on my leg. I collapsed and slept like a rock on the train back home.

Now I'll carry this drawing, proudly with me, and all it represents, for life. A drawing that is at the same time much more than what people think but also much less. Now, after the deed is done, I realise that it is two things at the same time: It is just another funky drawing in just another skinny leg. But it also portraits some part of me, now in form of graphics in my flesh. If anyone is interested enough, I promise it's a worthy subject. Specially if I feel inspired by telling the whole story.


There are many things we carry for our lives and like it or not they make us who we are. It defines us, put boundaries, describes, make us truly unique and make us connect to each other. Most of the time we can't even decide by our selves what to carry and not. Life just makes us carry it. Part of what I carry is now represented as a tattoo and somehow, it feels the burden is a bit lighter to carry.
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