Tenuous Saturday

I was sleeping soundly until a random woman rang the doorbell incessantly, wanting to know if I could move my car that was blocking someone. I’ve never owned a car, so not only was I dishevelled and barely coherent, I was of no help. At least it was Portuguese practice with someone with a voice I’m not used to. Tenuous benefit.

I was due to attend a churrasco (BBQ) to celebrate the 40th birthday of my landlady’s brother. Tenuous social links (Helena has been guilty of randomness before) but I geed myself up to attend. Then I had a lift-sharing failure, as the party was a fair distance away, and a faff to organise. I relaxed instead in the apartment and in the nearby gardens where I finished a slow-going book and listened to a musical group practising their talents. In the evening I watched the fascinating film Boy Erased with Lundula. It’s about gay conversion therapy. The film estimates that 700,000 Americans have been subjected to this practice in some shape or form. What an entirely humongous and deluded waste of everyone’s time to think that the natural course of events can be changed via this method. I feel for the 700,000, whose lives will have been filled with more shame and resentment as a result.

Every time I walk past Maputo City Hall I think about how austere it looks, and today was no exception. I think it’s because I feel adult and that I know about architectural styles when I use the word austere.