Week End

Weekend in Cascais On Cascais glittering Saturday bay, slowly rides a rust stripped bulk-carrier, sailors on the deck look at the town and think it is Paradise, from the soot hallooed green stacks, whispering smoke dissolves their dream of ever going home. Tourists, fishermen and drunks, the eager and the weary and the sad eyed mills about. A blind woman sits on a folding chair sings Fado, Portugal`s blues. her voice is cracked, but full of soul, she keeps score with a tiny triangle the little plink a feint echo above the crowd. When footsteps fade its faint sound becomes cymbals clasped together by men of steel, her voice a storm which cleanse streets clean. Every morning Cascais is reborn, a wet pearl arisen from the green seas, before sandaled feet descend and drown the day in a cacophony of disharmony.