Speak!

‘Another language is another view of life’ (Frederico Fellini)

More than 7000 languages are spoken today. Calculating the part that a language plays in the world is not an easy task. One of the possible ways to calculate the number of speakers is to consider how many people use a language as their mother tongue.

Following this criterion, Mandarin (Chinese) leads the world ranking, followed by Spanish, English, Hindi, Bengali and Portuguese according to data from Ethnologue, a reference that provides detailed information about world languages.

If we count not only the first language but also the second language of the speakers of a given country, Portuguese falls from the 6th to the 7th place, according to the same source.

The first Portuguese text dates from the 17th of June, 1214 and concerns the will of the third King of Portugal, Don Afonso II. Before that time, people always wrote in Latin. Due to the discoveries in the late 14th and early 15th century and the colonial conquests, Portuguese is now spoken on four continents.

The Camões Institute of Cooperation and Language calculated that in eight of the nine Community of Portuguese Speaking Countries (CPLP) – Angola, Brazil, Cabo Verde, Guinea-Bissau, Mozambique, Portugal, Sao Tomé and Príncipe, East Timor – Portuguese is the official language and spoken by more than 240 million people. There is no data available for Equatorial Guinea.

In addition to the nine CPLP countries, Portuguese is also the official language in Macau – one of China’s special administrative regions since 1999, the other being Hong Kong – but it is estimated that less than 1% of the population uses it as their mother language.

Brazil – a country with 213 million speakers – is by far the largest territory where Portuguese is spoken and within it the many variations that the Brazilian-Portuguese carries. A language in which there are at least three names for the staple food cassava: aipim, mandioca or macaxeira.

The introduction of the Portuguese language in Brazil was fast. In less than two centuries it became the official language of national understanding – after a decree of the Marquis de Pombal in 1758 – overlapping the approximately 1500 indigenous languages that were spoken when the colonizer arrived.

Since the second half of the 17th century in the islands of Curaçao, Aruba and Bonaire (Dutch Caribbean) Papiamento is spoken. A creole language containing a considerable lexical collection of Portuguese origin, mixed with Dutch and Venezuelan Spanish. It has official language status along with Dutch in the Netherlands Antilles.

Most linguists now believe that Papiamento emerged from the Portuguese-based Creole languages of the West African coast as it has similarities with Cape Verdean and Guinea-Bissau Creole.  

Enjoy the week (of the Portuguese language)                                             Approveite a semana





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51years

From symbol of modern technology during Salazar to symbol of revolution

Fifty-one years on, revolutionary anthems will be sung again on the 25th of April when Portugal celebrates its Carnation Revolution, which in 1974 ended the Estado Novo (New State) of dictator António Oliveira Salazar, Europe’s longest-lasting dictatorship of more than forty years.

After an almost bloodless transition, a military junta promptly abandoned the unpopular colonial wars in three African countries (Angola, Guinea-Bissau, Mozambique) and paved the way for democracy at home.

The carnations delivered 51 years ago to the military in Lisbon’s Largo do Carmo were produced in the Algarve at a time when Guilhermina Madeira was in charge of the CEAT (Tavira Agricultural Experimentation Center).

‘At that time we were the only ones producing carnations in the country. Flowers were sent on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays in a truck coming from Vila Real de Santo António to be sold at the Ribeira market in Lisbon’, she recalls.

It must have been there that the carnations were bought to celebrate the first anniversary of the restaurant where Celeste Caeiro worked, the woman who, in order not to spoil the flowers with the closure of the place due to the revolution in the streets, gave them to a soldier who put the carnation into the barrel of his gun.  

‘They were carnations but could also have been tulips or gladioles, also produced at the time in the agrarian post’, Guilhermina, now 79 years old, admits with a smile. ‘Of course, those who made 25 April were the military and all those who fought for freedom but the flower eventually became the symbol of peace and freedom.’

‘In the late 60s all the varieties of flowers we had in the agrarian post were plants that did not exist in the area’, Guilhermina continues. ’The objective was to test the cultivation of the flowers to the conditions in the region’. The carnations – imported from Cap d’Antibes in the south of France – did very well. They were of the ‘American type’ with a large and elegant stem. We had whites, reds, orange and pink ones.’ She still remembers the trade names, from Scania red to Flamingo pink.

What once started as a ‘new technology and a symbol of modernity of Salazar’s Estado Novo with major investments in greenhouses and nurseries in Tavira to stimulate the flower production – which was very underdeveloped in Portugal – ended up becoming a ‘symbol of the end of the regime and the start of the revolution.’  

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Poetic

‘Doctors – like poets – need to be in touch with their feelings’

The poet João Luis Barreto Guimarães (1967) is a breast cancer surgeon, who uses poetry alongside medicine to help trainee doctors empathize with their patients.

In 1989 he made his literary debut with the collection Há Violinos na Tribo (The Tribe has Violins). In 2020, the English version of his bundle of poems Mediterrãneo was awarded the Willow Run Poetry Book Award in the USA. He was the first author of non-American origin to receive this honour. In Portugal, he received the Pessoa prize in 2022 in recognition of his contribution to the arts.

‘Poetry has a unique capacity to help students connect holistically with their future patients, as opposed to viewing them as a medical problem in need of fixing’, explains the 56-year-old surgeon to the Guardian.

‘Doctors often don’t have time to stop and think, so everything quickly gets reduced to the technical and mechanical. What I try to convey to students is that – as with a poem – each of their patients is unique,’ he emphasizes.

For his poetry course, Guimarães obtains his material from the British publisher Bloodaxe Books, to ensure every class has at least a handful of poems that link to medicine. Poems about doctor-patient scenarios or familiar healthcare settings offer students an easy bridge to their medical study. ‘I get students to look at poems that talk about empathy, compassion and solidarity.’

The reading list includes well-known poet-medics, like Júlio Denis (Portuguese surgeon), William Carlos Williams (American paediatrician), Gottfried Benn (German pathologist) and Miroslav Holub (Czech immunologist).    

Guimarães’s teaching is not limited to the most accomplished poets. He is a keen advocate of exposing students to the ‘evil’ of excessive sentimentalism, a habit they should avoid once they go to patients in the wards.

Since launching the course, Guimarães has received various requests to teach at other medical faculties across Portugal. Nor is he alone, Barcelona’s Pompeu Fabra University recently introduced a course in literature for its second-year medical students.

The poem Meditação (Contemplation) is from the collection Voçe está aqui (You are here, 2013)

The afternoon: I spent watching the war
on television. None of us are
missing
while in those places the missing are counted.
No one
of our generation was in the revolution. Others
(before us)
waged our wars (by the time
we arrived the war was over
when we came to fight
the dictator had fallen). The only thing
left for us was a
different kind of battles (lifting each
morning
the immense weight of your eyelids)
running for a place in the trench
of the bar.
All afternoon I watched the war
on the television (on this side of the
screen there is no hunger
nor cold).

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Endangered

The Algarve houses the largest colony of Audouin’s gulls in the world

The Audouin’s gull is declining around the world but flourishing in the Algarve, establishing there the largest colony in the world. Year on year this threatened species has increased since settling in the Ria Formosa a decade ago. More than seven thousand nests were counted this year, three times more than in 2019 when the LIFE Ilhas Barreira project started.

This grey-legged gull is identified by its red bill and -unlike other species of gulls- continues to feed mainly on fish and rarely consumes waste from skips, bins or other types of human waste. Worldwide the species only breeds in a small number of colonies, which leaves it very vulnerable to human disturbance.

In Portugal, the Life Ilhas Barreira project – funded by the EU LIFE programme – has minimized this threat in the species’ main breeding colony, the Deserta/Barreta island. The results are visible. Not only has the breeding population of the Audouin’s gull increased every year, the species has expanded to the neighbouring island Culatra.

‘This new colony in Culatra provides more security for the future’, says Joana Andrade, coordinator of the LIFE project and the marine conservation department of the Portuguese Society for the Study of Birds (SPEA)
‘By safeguarding these areas, we guarantee that the birds have alternative places to nest in case of human disturbances or environmental changes’.

Another endangered bird as a result of habitat destruction is the owl. Only seven out of a possible 250 species worldwide can be found in Portugal. Owls generally breed in winter, making that season a more vocal and active season for them.

The Short-eared Owl (Coruja-do nabal) is between 34 to 43 cm in length and widely distributed across Portugal.

They mostly hunt in daytime when voles, their favourite meal, are active.

The Little Owl (Mocho galago) only measures 21-23 cm in length.
Except swooping down silently on their prey, they also hop around, pecking in search of insects, small reptiles and frogs.
They have the most extensive range and population of any owl in Portugal.

Euroasian Scops Owls (Mocho d’orelhas) are tiny owls – a little smaller than the Little Owls, measuring only 19 cm in length – that feed mainly on insects (crickets and beetles).

By contrast, the Euroasian Eagle Owl (Oehoe) is a top predator and the biggest in Europe, measuring 66 to 71 cm in length and a massive 2m wingspan. They prey on small mammals and birds and are at their most vocal in the autumn and winter, with the male’s territorial ‘oehoe’ call, deep and resonant.

Barn Owls (Suindara), 34 cm in length, tend to inhibit abandoned barns.
Farmers love them because they keep the property rodent-free.
Their screechy sound is more reminiscent of a hawk. They can carry prey up to 200 grams

The Long-eared Owls (Bufo pequeno), measuring around 34 to 40 cm, are also known as Cat Owls because of their cat-like facial features.
They are tough to spot. During the day, they usually hide upright against the trunk of a tree.

In urban areas – particularly in areas with wooded habitats – you may found Tawny Owls (Coruja-do-mato), circa 38 cm in length.
As nocturnal hunters, they remain silent on perches and locate their prey by hearing.

Owls are predators, developed to capture and kill. Under the feathers the owl has a sharp hooked beak and eight strong arched talons – sharp hooked claws, one per toe, four per leg – excellent ears and most can fly in absolute silence. They are best known for their typical hooting calls.
Young owls (owlets) leave the nest before they’re able to fly and climb into nearby branches using their beaks, claws and wings. Five to six weeks after they hatch they start flying and hunting on their own.


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Crisis

‘Prime minister Luís Montenegro got himself into trouble’

Damaging soundbites in the media over business connections of the Prime Minister (PM) Luís Montenegro ( and other members of the executive) helped along by revelations in the renowned weekly newspaper Expresso that the PM’s family business Spinumviva receives a 4500 euros monthly retainer from the Solverde casino and hotels/spa franchise.

The weekly Sábado even goes further by suggesting that Montenegro’s Social Democratic Party (PSD) is creating a ‘familygate’, a scenario seeing numerous husbands, wives, cousins, sisters- and brothers-in-law promoted to high positions in government.

Political authorities have emphasized to give up on Spinumviva completely but this did not happen. Rui Rocha, leader of the liberal party (IL), stated that Montenegro has to decide ‘whether he wants to remain PM or to have a business, as the two things cannot be combined.‘

But it was the right-wing extremist party leader Ventura who further complicated the matter by saying ‘resign or present a motion of confidence, unless the Prime Minister is comfortable with being the new (corrupt) José Sócrates of Portuguese politics ’

Last Friday Montenegro declared that he is turning over his business to his sons without winding it up or giving up clients, something that various political parties had asked for. On Saturday night, the PM gave an address to the nation at the start of the news bulletins on TV, informing the country that he would be presenting a motion of confidence to Parliament.

However, by admitting a motion of confidence, he effectively puts the future of his minority government on even thinner ice as the country’s largest opposition party – the Socialists (PS) – are not willing to support this government and therefore cannot support a motion of confidence.

If the government falls, the country will be on its way to new elections – in a year which already has two election campaigns ahead – municipal elections in the autumn and presidential elections in early 2026 – at a time when Europe is in turmoil as a result of the US betrayal over Ukraine.

The shadow of the possible scenario of early elections though hovered over the country for just a few hours, when later that evening it turned out that no opposition party met the Prime Minister’s demand to admit a motion of confidence. Luís Montenegro was quick to consider this to be sufficient to continue governance. Nevertheless, the probability of early elections remains high.




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Shame

The impact of teenage pregnancy is much greater in girls

In the past eight years more than eight hundred cases of child marriages – early or forced – were identified in the country. Although most of the teenagers who got married are between 16 and 18 years old, there are 126 situations that involve children between 10 and 14 years old and 346 between 15 and 16 years old. The average age on the date of marriage was 15 years for girls and 17 years for boys

Of the total of 836 cases identified, 493 were child marriages, 261 early marriages and 82 forced marriages. These data are based on the responses of 224 public and private entities and published last October in the White Paper: Recommendations to prevent and Combat Child, Early and /or Forced Marriage.

To get married in Portugal, one must be at least 16 years old, and requiring authorization from parents or legal guardians.
Due to pressure from childhood and youth organizations, the minimum age for marriage has only this year been raised by Parliament to 18 years.

The impact of early marriage is much greater on girls, who see their rights to health, education and development denied. The withdrawal from school often works as a form of pressure for marriage, explains the Commission for Citizenship and Gender Equality (CIG), which published the White Paper

And further: last year health authorities detected 238 cases of female genital mutilation in the country. Each year more cases are identified. The identification occurred in several areas: pregnancy checks, childbirth, hospital and primary health care consultations. The victims were from Eritrea, Gambia, Guinea, Senegal, Sierra Leone and Somalia.

The United Nations assume that there are 4.4 million girls at risk of genital mutilation, the equivalent of more than 1200 cases per day.
Only a quarter of the survivors of genital mutilation had contact with a health professional.

It is estimated that in Portugal some 6500 women – mostly from Guinea-Bissau -are victims of a practice that is ‘a flagrant violation of human rights with permanent damage to the physical and mental health and a terrible act of gender-based violence.’

Currently, there are only three specific support offices for victims of harmful practises such as child, early or forced marriages and female genital mutilation, the National Center for Migrant Integration Support (CNAIM) in Lisbon, the Algarve and the north of the country


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Santa

Europe’s oldest ceramics factory

The Sant’Anna factory – established in 1741 – is Europe’s oldest ceramics factory, renowned for producing traditional Portuguese hand-painted tiles (azulejos) and ceramics, using entirely handcrafted methods.

Sant’Anna was born in the neighbourhood of Lapa and initially produced bricks. In 1755, after the apocalyptic earthquake (terramoto) – that completely whipped out the lowest part of the capital – the factory began to produce tiles to cover the facades of the buildings and help in the rehabilitation of the capital.

It’s been 125 years since the factory moved to Calçada de Boa Hora in the Ajuda district, a clayey area where the raw material was easily extracted and where the artisanal production of tiles and ceramics could be continued.

‘Our collections, nowadays, are mainly reproductions of the 18th century’, says Mariana Felício, graphic designer in the newspaper Público, ‘but of course we do everything the client wants because when we talk about manual work, we can make things a machine cannot.’

For the production of the traditional Portuguese tiles -without relief – a roller, a mold, and a knife are used. ‘The process is similar to that of making Christmas cookies’, says Mariana. ‘With the roller, the clay is pressed on the table, placed in an eight-millimetre gauge, which is the thickness of the traditional tile, and cut one by one with our square mold and knife.

After four to six weeks of drying, the tiles are ready to go the oven for a first two-day cooking at 1100 °C.  After cooling down the next stap is made by a single person, who focuses on listening to the tiles one by one to find out if the tile is good or not to be glazed and painted, explains Mariana.

‘To do this, you hit the tile with a small piece of wood. If a metallic noise sounds, the tile is in good condition. On the other hand, if the tile has a more hollow sound, it means there are air bubbles inside that can lead to breaking in the next cooking step.’

‘Sometimes, the artist works seven, eight hours just on one tile. What happens is that we will waste eight hours of the artist’s work if the tile is not good. That’s why it is important to do this type of – most traditional and original possible – test before proceeding to glazing, painting and firing up the oven again.’

Today, 85% of the production is exported abroad, mainly to the US. In addition to private customers – who make up the majority – the factory also works with architects and interior designers on projects such as hotels ( the Ritz, for example) and requalification of buildings.  

Visitors can observe artisans crafting tiles using traditional techniques and purchase pieces ranging from classic 18th century designs to contemporary styles. The factory (www.santanna.com.pt) also offers tile painting classes.

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Literacy

‘Literacy is earned through fun, provocation and stimulation’

About 40% of adults in Portugal can only understand simple texts and solve basic arithmetic problems, according to an Organisation of Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) study from 2023, comparing 160.000 people in 31 countries. Only Chileans turned out to have more difficulties in interpreting texts or performing mathematical calculations.

The study shows that 15% of the more than 3000 Portuguese participants are able to understand short and simple sentences and that another 27% understand short texts. Thus, 42% of the population – representing 6.6 million people between 16 and 65 years old – has a very low level of literacy.

Four out of ten adults can only do basic calculations with whole numbers. They do understand the meaning of decimal places and can add and subtract small numbers but they have difficulties in understanding rates and ratios and calculate proportions.

Another area analyzed was problemsolving, in which over 40% of the Portuguese obtained very low results as they could only solve simple problems with few variables and little accessory information.

Researchers point out that adults with better numeracy skills are more likely to be employed, earn higher wages and are more satisfied with their lives than low-skilled people. ‘However, despite efforts of governments to strengthen adult education, the survey reveals a very unequal picture of skills with a growing number of people poorly prepared for the future’, warns Andreas Schleicher, OECD director of Education and Skills.

In the last decade, only Finland and Denmark have recorded significant improvements in adult literacy, while the other participant nations recorded stagnation or decline.

The skills of Portuguese adults in literacy, numeracy and problem solving already begins to decrease from the age of 25 whereas the youngest adults – those between 16 and 24 years old – have the greatest capacities in the three areas, before dropping considerably and reaching minimums in older adults between 55 and 65 years old.

‘But surprisingly – unlike other European countries – this proficiency already drops considerably in the group of 25-34 years, whereas in most countries the top of skills is in the group of adults between 25 and 34 years’, highlights João Queirós, one of the national coordinators of the study.

Reasons might be the relative high rate of school dropout as well as difficulties in access to higher education.

Another worrying fact is that adults with higher education in Portugal obtained lower results than adults with secondary education in Finland. The value of the university degree differs between countries because it is also related to the quality of education.

‘We need to understand why in some countries students are acquiring training without the necessary skills’, says Claudia Tamassia of PIAAC (OECD’s Program for the International Assessment of Adult Competencies).

Her observation is shared by the National Education Council (CNE). ‘It is necessary to innovate in teaching and assessment practices and environments in which students are challenged to critical thinking, to be autonomous and to be able to integrate knowledge and skills’, declared its president Domingos Fernandes recently.

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Vista-Alegre

‘Porcelain is essentially made of kaolin, sand and the mineral feldspar’

Vista Alegre – the country’s most famous porcelain brand – celebrates its 200th anniversary.
The factory in Ílhavo, founded in 1824 by José Ferreira Pinto Basto, has remained relevant for two centuries thanks to its quality, ability to reinvent itself and focus on the future.
 

An exhibition celebrating the bicentennial can be found in the Ajuda palace in Lisbon, where even today tableware from Vista Alegre is used in state dinners. ‘We not only want to show the finished products, that represent the history of Vista Alegre, but also elements from the factory itself, such as the carts in which the pieces are waiting to go into the oven or the moulds’, says Filipa Oliveira, who shares with Anísio Franco the curatorship.
  

‘Many Portuguese have a close relationship with Vista Alegre porcelain because it passed through their homes’ argues Anísio Franco, warning future visitors about the possibility that there are few pieces they will recognize.

The Vista Alegre factory initially began by manufacturing utilitarian objects in glass, such as jars and bowls but always with a quality that can be seen in the execution and decoration. In 1880 it discontinues glass production and starts dedicating itself exclusively to the manufacturing of porcelain, of greater importance to the national industry.

The first pieces were of imperfect soft paste porcelain, called ‘stone powder’ crockery. To produce high-quality porcelain, a clay capable of supporting the fusion of components was essential: kaolin. In 1832 a white clay – until that time used to whitewash homes – was accidentally discovered that later proved to be the sought-after kaolin.

The factory then hires specialized craftsman and accomplished painters and the factory establishes itself in the 19th century as a producer of true porcelain executed to tremendous perfection. Victor Rousseau, a prestigious French draftsman and painter who was exiled in England, is hired and gives the factory its own directive. He founds the factory’s first School of Painting responsible for teaching generations of masters to uphold the high level of artistry.

‘It is very important to know the genealogy of the masters of Vista Alegre to perceive each production period (f.e. neoclassical forms or already romanticism)’, says Anísio Franco. ‘Each one brought knowledge and taste of their own that marked what came out of the factory.’

In the 80s, a partnership with the businesswoman and collector Mildred Mottahedeh gives Vista Alegre access to the North American market, allowing the company to make pieces for the White House and the Rockefeller family.

This year, Portugal’s most famous player in the history of football– Christano Ronaldo – bought 10% of the capital of Vista Alegre with the aim of extending the company in the Middle East, where Ronaldo is playing nowadays.

The turnover of Vista Alegre in 2023 amounted to 130 million euros.
Seventy percent of the production is exported, especially to Germany, France, Spain, Italy, the US and Brazil.

The exhibition brings together 400 pieces and can be seen at the Ajuda Palace in Lisbon, until May 31.

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Garranos

‘Not just part of Portugal’s history but part of the world’s history’

The rare Garrano is an endangered breed of pony within the Iberian horse family from northern Portugal mainly used as a pack horse, and for light farm work.

Members of this emblematic breed are usually dark chestnut in colour, with a straight facial profile and stand on average 1.35 metres. In the 1940s there were over 40,000 Garranos in Portugal. Current estimates put the total population at less than 2,000.

An exquisite, stocky species dating back to the Ancient Bronze Age and unchanged for thousands of years but in decline since the middle of the 20th century as farms were mechanised and horses replaced by tractors and cars.

‘A horse needs a function’, says Jose Leite, a vet and technical adviser of the Association of Garanno Horse Breeders (ACERG) in the Guardian. ‘The need for the horse as an agricultural tool has ended and its intensive breeding as well. The Association is trying to ensure the breed’s survival by highlighting its potential: it can pull buggies, do dressage and – because of its size  – is an ideal horse for novice riders.

Garranos are well known for their hardiness, physical resilience and ability to thrive in harsh environments, making them perfect for living in the northern mountainous regions of Portugal.

Native to Minho and Trás-os-Montes, the pony is a herbivore that plays a fundamental role in the prevention of bushfires, consuming fuel material in large areas as it is tradition to release and breed the horses in semi-feral state. Some herds are even completely feral in nature reserves like the Peneda-Gerês National Park.

Obsolescence however is not the only threat to the Garranos. The mountains of northern Portugal are also home to Iberian wolves, comprising some 300 animals. Like the ponies, the wolves have been in the area since at least Roman times and protected since 1988.

Gerrano foals are easy picking for the wolves. The Institute for the Conservation of Nature and Forests (ICNF) – a state body that pays farmers whose livestock are killed by the carnivores – has launched a range of projects to support farmers in preventing wolf attacks, such as the use of traditional Portuguese livestock dogs and the building of fences.

But the Garrano breeders argue that neither measure is suited to roaming ponies and say the only sustainable solution would be the introduction of other animals for the wolves to eat, such as goats. In the meantime, many breeders are bringing their pregnant mares down from the mountains to raise their foals in safety.

Enjoy the week                     Aproveite a semana                (pic Pixnorm)

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