Conservation Area - Build if you can!

I was out yesterday in the Serra de Arrábida, doing a spot of Geocaching (of which more on another occasion) and was amazed to find, up on the top of a hill, apparently new houses. All along the road that crosses the summit are markers defining the limits of plots.

The markers are painted with the red letters "AXL", which everybody south of the Tagus knows stands for António Xavier de Lima, known for being the major landowner ever since the 1974 revolution. How he can possibly have registered the land and a zoning plan in a Conservation Area beats me, but there is definitely construction going on up there. Does Setúbal council know, or just choose not to look?

Another example of the sad culture of getting away with as much as possible...

Mythical beast from Funchal

BANIF's new image has me rather baffled, I'm afraid, not helped by the coincidence of the teaser campaign, that had the Centaur image but no name, with RTP's screening of the Chronicles of Narnia, featuring large numbers of centaurs, fauns and other mythical animals.

So having established that the stylised centaur logo represents the Banco Internacional de Funchal, I still don't understand. Could it be that the Mad Hatter who runs the archipelago has decreed that centaurs do, in fact, exist, and thus needed one of his key local businesses to support him? Does anybody have a better idea?

Golfing on a Wii

Saying how wonderful the Wii games console is would be a post that's only two years overdue, though we only got one for Christmas, but I'll say it anyway. Despite the inferior quality of the graphics processing, the Wii, with its Sports games and innovative wireless game controllers, is great for getting us couch potatoes on our feet and leaping around.

And having gone and hit some golf balls today, after a sickly month of January, I find an interesting side effect. While playing Tiger Woods Golf 2004 on the PS2 was disastrous for my golf, the 2007 version where the Wii obliges me to practice a full, slow golf swing, appears to actually improve my game! Strangely, after playing the real sport, I can't hit a thing on the Wii...

Unfortunately, the console is right to tell us to take a break every so often. The realistic sports actions do tire muscles, despite the light weight of the controller, and seem to aggravate my injured shoulder almost as much as the real game: extra realism I'm not sure the game developers were aiming to simulate!

Publicidade Parva

What on earth do MediaMarkt think they are doing, using an actor dressed in full Scout uniform to portray the fool (parvo) in their recent advertising campaign? The Scouts simply cannot be depicted like this. It's a scandal!

Of course there are two guilty parties here, the company and the idiots from their advertising agency. Unfortunately, the scouts are too restrained to react. On the other hand, it would be easy for irate parents to block access to the stores. Hope they do!

As Intermitências da Morte

English review of a Portuguese book - poor start because I can't translate the title!

As a package, the book is somewhat over-the-top. With its dust cover endorsed by Greenpeace as being made from environmentally friendly paper and its dense text implying that fewer pages were needed to print it, we quickly conclude that this book is unusual.

It is very difficult to get into, mostly because of Saramago's refusal to use conventional ("correct") punctuation and layout. And it goes through stodgy patches where the author seems to be regurgitating a thesaurus that he swallowed earlier. But overall it's an interesting read, with a satisfying ending. So if you are prepared to put up with a Nobel laureate showing off his technical ability just for the sake of it, in Portuguese, this may be worth a read.

Oh yes, what's it about? Death, I suppose, not from a metaphysical standpoint, but more an essay on a hypothetical idea. As I said, literary technique above all other considerations.

Blameless

Everybody knows that corruption is rife in Portugal. Now the President of the Lawyers Association has gone on the record to say so, to be promptly called by the Attorney General to clarify his statement.

Fortunately Jose Socrates has cleared the air by stating categorically that the members of his government are not involved. So it must only be all other parties, prior governments and levels of the State structure that are corrupt (I dare not use the word "bent"). That's a relief!

Strange Goings On

While wandering round the "Mata dos Medos" above Fonte de Telha beach, looking for photo opportunities, I found numerous locations where, seemingly, a group of people get together to drink whisky and smoke cigars, leaving carnations and a dish/ashtray at the scene. This was one of three, apparently recent locations about 10 metres apart beside a path.

I found many more, so it is not a one-off activity. Very strange, I thought.

Timming and Tunning

It is wonderful that my native tongue is that which is misspoken by more people worldwide than any other.

This week received a proposal for professional services, in Portuguese, which included a timetable for carrying out the work labelled "timming", and passed posters advertising a "tunning" meeting. This notwithstanding a rule in Portuguese that double consonants are only used with the letters "r" and "s".

Both errors are unacceptable. Coming from a professional firm that boasts that the staff involved in the project will have significant international experience, specifically in the UK, I can only conclude that the Partner did not read the proposal that he signed off on, since the word "timming" does not exist.

On the other hand, "tunning" is a word, derived from tunn, an archaic liquid measure. Probably not relevant to the car modification scene. The organisers of a tuning event, should really know better! One thing I think I'm sure of though: if their timming is off, their tunning won't work!

BCP Privatisation

The BCP farce has also emphasised a sinister side to Portuguese politics. With the Government putting forward a Board of Directors for the bank, it is easy to conclude that such a move represents the privatisation of the second largest Portuguese bank, second only to the State's "official" bank, the CGD. But that, in itself, is not the sinister part.

The sinister part is the argument among major political parties as to who, from each party, should be appointed to the Board of BCP. Does either party have members qualified to fill such a post - apparently not! Never mind. It is in "the national interest" to ensure that all political parties are duly represented. What a load of bull****! The national interest lies in ensuring that the Board is competent.

As the State is not a BCP shareholder, what has the government got to do with the matter? Apparently the politicians do not understand the difference between Government (the elected representatives at one particular time) and State (the structure set up to run the country, irrespective of who is in government) - the majority are only in politics to make a quick buck anyway.

Fortunately an alternative list of candidates has emerged. It will be a shame for Santos Ferreira to have resigned from the CGD and end up without a job, but that's politics!

BCP Directors unfit?

Once again the genius who runs the Bank of Portugal (BoP) leaves us amazed. After many, many years of supervising BCP, he reaches the conclusion that no former Board Directors (Administradores) of BCP may run for office in the new administration! However, no details are released of formal action being taken against any of them, for breach of statutory duty, negligence, fraud, tax evasion....

Hang on a minute. If the BoP has such sweeping powers to disqualify directors, what took it so long? If not, as appears obvious, where is due process?

Once again, he had descended from his ivory tower, issued inane statements and retreated, leaving everyone to wonder what is really going on. How did the BoP inspection teams fail to analyse the loan write-offs to related parties? What does the BoP really do, other than pay fat salaries to its staff? I said he should go two years ago. How much longer must we wait?