As long as the world is running

“In the neurotic, rushed Europe, Portugal remained a corner of attraction and charm. […] The humanism of the Portuguese […] lives together in harmony with their Christian tradition and tolerance. In general, the elegance of their way of thinking and expressing themselves – regardless of social class –, which can be well described only with the word “generous”, clearly highlights this fortunate difference to the mutinous and brutal societies of other countries.”

Émile Servan-Schreiber, 1938

Alcobaça, January 2015

Katia Guerrero: Até ao fim

These Portuguese kings were quite strange figures. How else could it be, if even the first one was Hungarian. For example, they were capable of such unusual things at the turn of the 13th and 14th centuries, like reading, and one of them went even further. Don Dinis learned to write, which was held in quite low esteem in the period. He wrote wonderful chivalry and love songs, cantigas in ancient Portuguese, he translated from other languages, and he composed the gesta of the deds of his grandfather, Alfonso el Sabio, the wise king of Castile. Alfonso was also a strange figure. Before and together with Rudolf von Hapsburg he was also King of Germany, and he started to standardize the Castilian dialect.

And Don Dinis’ grandson, one of our story’s heroes, Pedro, loved. Loved and still loves – the present tense is no mistake, as you will soon understand – a woman, like no one else in this world, and this love prompted him to things, elevated him so high and dropped him so low, like perhaps no one else in this world. The true story of this love, as if it were a Shakespeare play, at once shows the wonders, goodness and dark depths of the human heart, and is still present in the Portuguese spirit, metaphors and daily speech.



The spring sky of Portugal is wonderfully blue. It could not be any different in 1340, when a new, carefully planned dynastic marriage was prepared between Pedro, the Crown Prince of Portugal, and the Castilian Princess Constança. The first marriage of the Crown Prince was not successful. In lack of a much-anticipated successor, Pedro divorced his wife, the Castilian and Aragonese Princess Branca. The new election, Princess Constança seemed a perfect party from every personal and political aspect.

In the delegation there was also Inês de Castro, a Castilian noble maid of honor, who according to contemporary memoirs was a delightfully beautiful, attractive and nice person, so the bright blue sky did not have to help too much so the Crown Prince fall in crazy love with her, and his feelings be reciprocated. The marriage with Constança was made in August. Inês also remained at the court.

Inês de Castro. The Spanish women who reigned after her death, 1944. Directed by Leitão de Barros. Starring Alicia Palacios, Antonio Vilar and María Pradera

At that time the institution of royal and princely lovers was common, and in later ages it was even a honor to be the king’s concubine. It was, however, quite uncommon that two people loved each other so much, to the amazement, jealousy, envy and rage of their environment. King Alfonso soon chased Inês from the court, but the couple’s relationship was not interrupted.

In 1345 Ferdinand, the later Don Fernando was born, and Princess Constança died quite young, at the age of twenty-five or thirty. Pedro had his sweetheart brought back. He placed her in the Santa Clara convent of Coimbra, and they lived together quite openly and happily. They had three sons and a daughter. In 1345 he probably also married her in secret.

Alcobaça, January 2015

Their this-worldly happiness, however, could not be fulfilled. Countless variations can be read as to what intensified the hatred against the couple, from the strengthening of the Castilian influence to the overturning of the order of succession to the throne. I myself think that hatred was the main motor: the court could not bear the harmony of two happy persons. This hatred brought its fruit. Don Alfonso accepted the – false – accusation of high treason against Inês, and sentenced her to death. Pedro, who was well aware of the extent of hatred, quite inexplicably did not take any precaution, even after he was warned of the danger. Thus on 7 January 1355, today six hundred sixty-one year ago, when Pedro went to hunting, it was easy to three “noble” lords, Pêro Coelho, Álvaro Gonçalves and Diogo Lopes Pacheco to kidnap the twenty-five or thirty-year-old Inês, and to murder her in Coimbra, the Garden of Tears, in the presence of Don Alfonso.

Eugénie Servières: Inês de Castro begs for mercy at the feet of King Alfonso, 1822

Karl Briullov: Death of Inês de Castro, 1834

As to what Pedro must have felt at the news, is apparent from his subsequent deeds. He almost caused a civil war against his father, and only by the intervention of the Archbishop of Braga he reconciled with the probably terminally ill Don Alfonso, who died in 1357. Don Pedro took the throne, and from then on we can recognize in every his deed the vengeance of a man who almost lost his mind of pain.

The three murderers sensed the danger in time, and fled to Castile. Pedro, however, could reach that in 1361 the Castilian monarch released him two of them, Coelho and Gonçalves. A terrible fate awaited them.

Detail from the film Inês de Castro, 1944. Directed by Leitão de Barros

The king announced his secret marriage with Inês, and subsequently declared her Queen of Portugal. He had her corpse digged out, dressed her in royal regalia, and had her sat on the throne.

Detail from the film Inês de Castro, 1944. Directed by Leitão de Barros.
In the role of Don Pedro, Antonio Vilar

The murderers had to appear before the skeleton, bend knee, and kiss her hands. Then Pedro made them bring to Porto, where he had their hearts publicly torn out.

Pierre-Charles Comte, The coronation of the dead Inês de Castro, 1849

During his reign, Pedro took care of his people, and laid the foundation of all what a few years later meant the centuries old maritime and world power of Portugal. However, he compensated the horror with other horrors, cruelties, violations of right and violence, and according to the memoirs, he often found refuge in wild parties and roistering.

And yet, at the end of his ruined this-worldly life, he did two things that cannot be told without emotion. The third, escaped killer, Diogo Lopes Pacheco asked for mercy. He must have been tortured by saúdade, which chases away those living in Portugal, and calls back those living far of their homeland. And Pedro pardoned him. In 1365 Diogo Lopes was allowed to return to Portugal. He lived thirty more years, surviving all the actors of this story. He will be a diplomat in the service of Don Fernando, he intervenes again in the king’s marriage, he has to emigrate again, he is pardoned again, again he can return…

Tomb of Inês de Castro, Alcobaça

For the Portuguese, it is natural, that the body will rise again. You cannot watch without emotion in the vaults, next to the coffins those practical or beloved everyday objects, which were important to the deceased, and which he or she will certainly need at the resurrection. Pedro, at the age of only 47, sensing the end of his earthly life, ordered his final resting place to be in the Monastery of Alcobaça, which had been under construction since 1178. He wanted to rest in front of his sweetheart, “as long as the world is running”, so at the resurrection it should be her, Inês de Castro, whom he glimpses the first.




His will was fulfilled, and the two sarcophagi have stood against each other motionless for about six hundred fifty years, as one of the most important monuments of the country, where here has been no serious war for about a thousand years, and where millions and millions of material and spiritual monuments connect the living present with the living past. As long as the world is running.

In January I was for the first time in the monastery, already knowing the story of the couple. The sun was beautifully shining, the sky was incredibly deep blue, and the first flowers were blossoming.

The Mass was still being celebrated in the monastery, so we had to wait an hour before we could go close to the two sarcophagi behind the main altar. Everything came alive, and I immediately understood and felt how Pedro loved and still loves this woman. The barriers did not let me in reality, but in thought I caressed the two sarcophagi. Let it be so: the two coffins will open, and the happy couple will see each other again, for they have incessantly loved each other ever since – as long as the world is running…



Amalia Rodrigues: April

Polaroids of Rabati

Jacopo Miglioranzi does research in the anthropology of religion in the Southern Georgian town of Akhaltsikhe among the local Armenians and Georgians. About the Jews of the town he has earlier written in río Wang. His further essays can be read here.

“and lo
it moves it crumbles it spreads
and lo
it moves it crumbles it spreads
the one declares independence and leaves
the other closes itself in its intimacy
the third proclaims a total detachment”

Tolerance. A new word. Until some times ago, you could see it, written in great letters, on a large panel. Tolerance, this was received by the citizens and visitors who entered Rabati. The oldest neighborhood of the city of Akhaltsikhe. To enter the neighborhood, you have to cross a wide road, then take a narrow road under the bridge of the old and disused railway. Two streets. Two forms of tolerance. To the left, the fortress of Rabati, a symbol of tolerance. Tourists, travelers, backpackers, border-crossers. Young people taking photos and letting themselves be photographed. Brides dressed in white. To the right, Rabati. The neighborhood. Tourists, travelers, backpackers, border-crossers. Young people taking photos and letting themselves be photographed. Brides dressed in white, a few. Men smoke their cigarettes nervously. A yellow marshrutka, without wheels, lies dying on the railway embankment. I climb up to the dying tracks. Armenian men. Georgian men. Turkish men. Armenian taxi drivers. Georgian taxi drivers. Turkish buses. Georgian buses. Cars. Police patrol. More taxis. Shopping bags. Women with children. Armenian boys. Georgian boys. Armenian girls. Georgian girls. Russian tourists. Polish tourists. Couples on motorbikes. Cyclists.


Lost tourists in a lost place. Perhaps me too. Perhaps not. Self-confident people. People with steady work. People without work. White collars, safe in the City. White collars, insecure, here. An Orthodox priest.

A guide in the hand: “Lonely planet”. Information. So much information, so many certainties. Here, so much information, so few certainties. Hidden places. Mistaken hotels and museums. Taxi drivers driving. “Guide?” Taxi drivers guiding. Sixty lari. “Taxi driver, guide!”

“Traveling the wayfarers, traveling the losers,
more adapted to the changes
travels the dust, travels the wind
travels the water of the spring”

A station. Women shouting. Marshrutka. Places to be assigned, places assigned. “რამდენი?” “ლარად”. Tickets. Oral contracts. Business. “No one’s business.” Business on the skin of the tourist. Natives. Aims. Observers. Observed. By whom?
The city. The neighborhood. The neighborhoods. Tracks and stations. Disorder and disorders. Mud and asphalt.


The city. Queen Tamar. A church. “ვისოლი”, “სმარტი”, “გარფი”, “ლუკოილი”. Smell of gasoline. The courthouse. Pedestrians on the pedestrian crosses. Cars, trucks, standing. The police station.
Mud and asphalt. Streets being filled. Orthodox priests. Orthodoxy. New and old orthodoxies. “More than new.” Concrete. New and old concrete. Monument “1941-1945”. Orthodoxy. “C.C.C.P.” War. Wars. “The war is cold.”
Religious conflicts. Churches. New churches, blooming. Old churches, blooming again. New ones in an ancient manner. Ancient ones, ancient again. “The peace is warm.”
Bodies consumed by the sign of the cross. Looks and souls donated to the sanctity of the church.

“Jerusalem, Holy Jerusalem,
my heart yearns to the Anastasis, along the Via Dolorosa,
to a Holy Sepulchre, which never was a sepulchre, but it is holy
through the faith of the faithful, in the grace of the Lord, my God
my Lord, Child Jesus, flesh from the young Virgin Mother
unto Thee I bow, Thee I worship
for Thou kidnapst my heart, O Lord, my God”

Religious pedestrians. Pedestrian religious people. Attention! Holiness. სამება, the Trinity. To donate time, moments, seconds. Prayers. Even when there is no time. Even when one runs to shopping. At the wheel. While walking.

Community. Humanity. Identity. Tourists, travelers, traders, sellers, street vendors, shopkeepers, hucksters, drivers, students, workers, players, unemployed, priests, monks, nuns, sisters, Jehova’s Witnesses, Apostolic Believers. Journalists and TV cameras. Cameras. Cars, vans, trucks. More students, teachers. Chinese, Georgians, Armenians, Jews, Russians, Turks. More Georgians. A few Chinese. Many Armenians. Jews. Returning. Meskheti Turks. Diasporas. Departures. Italians, Poles, Christians, returning. Musulmans, returning. Jews, departing.

“crippled clean air and sterile bazaars
taxi drivers, nomadic camel-drivers, listening to the radio
how the weather is going to be
in the beginning was the word
in the beginning was the “Pravda”
word and truth, word and truth”

CCCP – “Radio Kabul”


Boys, children, old men. Sidewalk. Tourist bar. Cigarettes. The same men as before. “რაბათი?” “აქედან”. I’m in the neighborhood. A boy comes out of a shop. He looks at me. They look at me. Travertine houses. Tired houses. Old houses. A Mercedes. Clothes hanging. Scrap, wood and tires. “A huge landslide,” Rabati. Rabati is. Rabati are. Lost. Old women, Armenians. “ԲարևՁեզ ქალბატონო, ექლესია, სად არის?”, “იქააა”, melodiously.

Georgians, Meskheti Turks, Armenians, Jews, Turks, Ottomans, Russians. Once. Paskevich, Pushkin. A taxi passes by me at high speed.

“it’s a side path, a fluid divinity
a convergence of style with the prehistorical primitive
the actuality is the actuality
normal boredom
mortal boredom”

Neighborhood(s). Tolerance? “ԲարևՁեզ, სინაგოგი სადა?” “ნახე, იქ”, “մերսի”.


No more tourists. No more travelers. Synagogues. Mosques. Churches. Once. Now diasporas. Resistances. Returns and departures. A little Jerusalem?

“obsessions settling upon
the shining cities
of past raids
of future spectacles
the solitary journeys
the arrogant paths
all have ended badly
without proclamations
without jubilees
in the small stories
of the thinking heads”

Houses. Dogs. A woman with her daughter. They do not look at me. A stranger. “The actuality is the actuality.”
Ruins.
Along the road. Almost nobody. This is not the city, this is Rabati. The neighborhood. Stories. Frontiers. Identities at stake.
The bell does not ring. The minaret does not sing. Silence.

“The Sufis turn in circles in space
in time
The verticals rise, the monks in seclusion
motionless
the low and the high travel without embellishment
they fall off dizzy…
they fall off dizzy…”


I climb upon what is left of the street. The old synagogue. Empty. Soviet past. Empty. A ruined house. Mud. A child at the window. Hens. Another synagogue. A padlock. More houses.

“vanishes the city, fades the traffic
fades
poetry dominates: the moon rises
and goes high
and falls off”

Խաչքար. Crosses. Stars of David. Biblical passages. Evangelical passages. New and old testaments. Koranic passages. Imperialist passages. Socialist passages. Biblical presents. Evangelical presents. New and old testaments. Koranic presents. Imperialist presents. Socialist presents: “l’atmosphère n’est plus la même”.
A hill. No trees. An old shack. A drawing: Mickey Mouse. Tombstones emerging. High grass. Dead names. Armenians.
A little further. A wall. A padlock. Tombstones emerging. Dead names. Jews.

“Sow, sow – even if far from the borders
like the stars, like the waves, sow.
So what if the sparrows ravage your seeds –
God will sow pearls in place of them.”

“They fall off dizzy…
they fall off dizzy…
they fall off dizzy…
they fall off dizzy…”


All quotes in italics, except the penultimate quotation, taken from the poem “Sow” by the Armenian poet Daniel Varujan, are songs of the Italian bands „CCCP – Fedeli alla linea“ and „C.S.I.“. The titles, in the order of quotation, are: CCCP, “Depressione caspica”; C.S.I. “In viaggio”; CCCP, “C.C.C.P.”; CCCP, “Guerra e Pace”; CCCP, “Paxo de Jerusalem”; CCCP, “Radio Kabul”; C.S.I. “Depressione caspica”; CCCP, “Noia”; CCCP, “B.B.B.”; CCCP, “Noia”; C.S.I., “In viaggio”; CCCP, “Campestre”; CCCP, “Inch’allah – ça va”; C.S.I., “In viaggio”.

Lenin lived

Namely twice, at the same time. This sensational discovery is the due to the Russian blogger alexiiru. It is to his merit that he has carefully studied the archive photo presented in our previous post, which so many had seen and overlooked, and from which through some tiny anomalies he reached such important conclusions, that the history of Russia in the 20th century must be fully rewritten.


In this photo there is apparently nothing special. Lenin in 1925, dressed in woman’s clothes together with his daughter Natasha, is traveling to the Finnish border. We know the critical mental status of the old Lenin, therefore we can understand his morbid passion for female clothes, as well as his desire to see once more before his death, and so that his little daughter might also see the nostalgic scene of his youth, where he first met his friend Stalin.

However, the blogger points out, Lenin, as his secret letter written to the CC of the Party attests, did not any more consider Stalin a friend at this time. And if that alone were not a convincing enough argument: we do not know that he would have had a daughter at all. What is more, by 1925 he had been dead for a year. So what is this mindboggling conundrum?

The blogger guessed with an instinctive sense, that the key to the solution lies in the initials of Lenin’s name. The caption calls him S. I. Ulyanov. However, our Lenin was V. I. This is therefore not our Lenin. This is another Lenin who is the spitting image of him. But who is he?

This question did not let the blogger rest. He began a long research, during which, like a jigsaw puzzle pieces, the randomly surviving pictures of a family album which had been assumed lost, were found all over the world. And as usual, persistent research is finally crowned with a stunning finding. On the site of the Russian painter Rinat Voligamsi, the blogger found twenty-one photos which undoubtedly belonged to the lost photo album, and which lit up, as with a bright beam of light, the darkness of the historical mystery. With the help of these, as well as documents from the archives of the KGB, he managed to reconstruct a breathtaking story, which Stalin and his henchmen believed had been consigned to eternal oblivion.

The photos and the documents clearly show that Vladimir Ilyich Ulyanov, the future Lenin, had a twin brother, Sergei. The two children can be seen together in the original family photo of the Ulyanovs, from whose available copies Sergei, sitting at his mother’s feet, was later retouched out of the picture, following Stalin’s well known method.

The Ulyanov family, 1879

The earliest pictures of the album fragment surviving at Voligamsi reveal the shared childhood and the divergent paths of the two boys. While Volodya followed his revolutionary vocation, Seryozha settled in the Ufa governorship. He started trading in wax, married a local girl, and converted to Islam.

After the fall of the 1905 revolution, hard times came to the young Communist party. Amid this low point, in February 1906 Vladimir Ilyich wrote the famous letter to his rich merchant brother: “For lack of financial means, the revolution dies!” In response to his brother’s call, Sergei sold off his wax business, and with the money earned, he travelled to St. Petersburg, where he completely devoted himself to the revolutionary cause.

S. I. Ulyanov carrying money, 1906

After Lenin’s death, Stalin launched a manhunt for all the close relatives and comrades in arms of the leader of Communism. The bloody list had in the first place Sergei Ilyich, who thus decided to emigrate. As you can see in the first photo, he managed to cross the Finnish border in disguise together with his daughter. Then a long odyssey began. He fled to Lithuania, from there to the royal Romania, and then, following the route of the Russian exiles, to Switzerland. “I fear only that they would silence me, and I cannot serve my country any more, and I cannot continue the work of my brother”, he wrote in his diary. In search of allies, he toured all over the advanced world, from Mexico through Baghdad and Kabul to Cuba.

S. I. Ulyanov in his antiquarian shop in Zurich, 1937

Here, in Cuba ended the path of the revolutionary committed to the cause of internationalism unto death. He died in 1965, under the blow of Khrushchev’s replacement, with whom he forged a common plan to overthrow the citadel of imperialism, the United States. Had Khrushchev only remained slightly longer in power, the whole thread of 20th-century history would have been different.

In his garden in Santiago de Cuba, 1964

Daughter of the 21st century

A little girl from the 21st century. Written by K. Bulychov, drawn by K. Bezborodov

In the new year you look back to the past for a moment. And you find that the past looks back at you. This Soviet slide from 1977 predicted to its contemporaries how a little girl would live in 21st-century intergalactic Moscow, Alisa in Wonderland.

In 21st-century Moscow lives a little girl, Alisa. Let us try to fly ahead in time and get to know this little girl. Who knows, perhaps she happens to be the great-great-great-granddaughter of one of you…

Her father is a biologist researching alien beings, her mother designs houses on other planets. And the little girl is an ordinary Moscow girl, who, like everyone else, keeps in her room a dachshund, cats, a hedgehog and a Martian praying mantis, and from Sirius she has received a big-eared shusha, a real living cheburashka, whom she teaches to speak and read in Russian. The most attractive dream for those of us, who at that time – I mean, not in the 21st century, but in 1977 – grew up on Gerald Durrell and Dr. Dolittle – Doktor Aybolit –, had the same desires, and prepared to be exobiologists in the 21st century, if ever such a century would come to be.

Alisa’s father – Professor Seleznev – is the director of the Moscow zoo, where he studies the animals of the Earth and of the cosmos

Yes, something like this...

Nevertheless, if you look back after forty years, in this alternative 21st century it is not the alien animals that are the most interesting, nor even the eighty-storey cities. And not even the great dream which came true with the production of oranges and bananas in the kolkhoz of Podmoskovye (although it would be probably more profitable to deliver it by rocket from Tau Ceti, but nevertheless – it is ours!) But the fact that, despite the astronaut scenery, in daily life nothing has changed, everything goes on as in 1977. Just like in the postcards of a hundred years ago which dreamed about the 2000s, life in the happy time of peace goes on amidst the scenery of Jules Verne. I do not even dare to consider how hopelessly old-fashioned they will find the imagery and lifestyle of Star Wars in the period when that epic takes place.

Perhaps only one thing has really changed: how the scientists look. Instead of the typical thick-necked alcoholic institute leader apparatchiks, the arrogant and servile lecturers of the late Brezhnev era, by the 21st century finally all the scientists have taken on intelligent facial expressions that witness a real interest and proficiency in their subject. And if for no other reason than this, it was worth it to wait for this wonderful twenty-first century.

But who is that Hittler?

“Here’s the Fresh News! The Fresh News! The great trial, whose heroes are Hitler and Ludendorff! Hitler and Ludendorff!”
“But who is that Hitler?”

Pál Sándor: Régi idők focija (Old-Time Football), 1973

Because every child knows who Ludendorff is. Chief of the General Staff of Generalfeldmarschall von Hindenburg in the recently ended Great War, initiator of the unrestricted submarine war against Great Britain, by which he attained a US declaration of war, and inventor of the idea of sending Lenin home on a German armored train to destabilize Russia, and we know how that turned out. And most recently, on 8-9 November 1923, one of the leaders of the so-called Munich Beer Hall Putsch aimed at overthrowing the Weimar Republic.

Hitler and Ludendorff! Hitler and Ludendorff!

But who is this Hitler, of whom the Hungarian monthly Tolnai Világlapja cannot even find a good photo to publish?

Tolnai Világlapja, 1923

“6. The soldiers of Hittler wanted to march against Berlin with trucks. 7. Hittler, the leader of the Bavarian coup ( × ) and Baron Roszbach ( ×× ), leader of the nationalists, after the failure of the coup attempt”

“The arming of the citizens of Munich. Hittler, in whom a mere paint slopper became a nationalist leader, and Ludendorf, the former German Chief of General Staff, as is well known, wanted to put an end to the German Republic, and march against Berlin. Their plan has failed, and their undertaking ended in a miserable fiasco. Our photo shows the scene, where, on Hittler’s command, they distribute weapons to the applicants.”

“Hittler’s soldiers drove trucks to the designated locations to prevent the imperial troops from marching in. However, their resistance soon ended in failure. Our photo shows the preparations of a Hittler troop in a suburb of Munich.”

“One of Hittler’s mortars on the streets of Munich. Hittler and Ludendorf wanted to repel the attacking imperial troops with heavy mortars, and then march against Berlin. Fortunately, they have been prevented in due time in their nation-destroying intentions. Our photo shows a mortar with two heavy cannons (Kevstone) on two sides.”

Fortunately, in spite of all these transitional, sinister and forgettable episodes, Germany was able to maintain its former dignity. There even the Socialists are not alien-hearted, but real irredentists, who march with the party flag in protest against the shameful Versailles treaty. They do not besmirch the name of the country, like this … what’s his name … Hittler.

“A funeral march for the Allied occupation of the Ruhr area. Throughout Germany, somber, silent and dignified protests have been staged due to the occupation of the Ruhr area. Our photo shows the scene where the Socialists of Munich march with their flags to the place of the protest.”

I wish you freedom

Thus begins the New Year’s greetings of the popular Russian photo blogger Ilya Varlamov. Of course, he immediately explains it, lest anyone misunderstands him:

“The car is freedom. Without freedom, we do not go anywhere nowadays. In the new year I wish you all good and comfortable public transport, safe cycling infrastructure, wide and clean sidewalks, proper zebras and, of course, jam-free roads, where you can quickly and easily drive along by car. I wish you all freedom, convenience and safety in any city. This is not mere fantasy. This will certainly be so both in Moscow and in the other cities.”

Nevertheless, the pictures from the post, not devoid of overtones, portray how far removed the reality is for the time being from such ideal conditions. We are, however, captivated – especially in the wake of Boris Indrikov’s post, where the bicycle becomes a symbol of freedom – rather by the first picture, the lonely bicycle on the neglected, but deserted road with a boundless perspective, in the direction opposite to the mass of cars creeping along, or rather just stopped on the one-way road. To the metaphor, if you want, you can also add the fact that in the given situation the cyclist photographs the cars and the whole context, and not vice versa. This freedom I wish to you all in the new year.