the sea
My beloved homeland
The city where I live surrounded by nature
its parks
Its streets
flowers and plants
Inspiration
2 comments
All Posts Tagged ‘city’
Muse
What subject keeps you coming back? This week, show us your muse. I love taking pictures of my neighbourhood and its people.
Muse.
Exploring my city
What’s your travel style? Are you itinerary and schedule driven, needing to have every step mapped out in advance or are you content to arrive without a plan and let happenstance be your guide?
If I could travel I would go without a scheduled plan other than visit my family abroad and spend as much time as possible with them. Because of family circumstances, I can’t leave my city, even for a weekend. It’s been so long since I’ve traveled last time that I’m not sure I’ll know how to behave in an airport with the new security measures.
I used to travel all around the world, mostly because of my job as Journalist. I had to have a clear destination and a plan of action to find a good story. But once there, everything could change in matter of seconds. I had to be always ready to the unexpected, be flexible. I learned a lot that way and best of all, got to know pretty well the people of the countries I visited. That was the richest part of the experience.
So when I travel, I avoid organised tours and scheduled plans. I prefer to explore by myself new places, at my pace. I guess a day will come when I’ll get the chance to travel again. Meanwhile I’m exploring my city. Everyday I take my backpack and my stroller walker and I try to go walking everywhere. There are nice places to visit. I often find in my way pilgrims who are in a stage of the Way of St. James or groups of tourists in a tour. You can see in the picture above one of its squares on the old quarter near my home, with the arches of the fortified church of St. Nicholas.
Mother
Beach, mountain, forest, or somewhere else entirely?
It has been so long since my last travel, that I only can think on get out of this city at least for a day. Where? I don’t mind. Any change would be welcome. I’m stuck in this city. I can’t leave its maze of streets. I like my city. I’m lucky it has plenty of parks and green spaces I can enjoy. It’s also in a privileged place near stunning nature spots. But for me is difficult to leave the city even to go to those places, no matter how close they are. And this situation is gonna last for a long time. I was gonna say: I’m afraid. But I’ll rather say: I hope. Or better: If that is what God wants. Because what ties me to my city this way is my mom. She needs me every day to take care of her. And I feel lucky to be able to help her to have a better quality of life now that she can’t move by herself.
I have a lot of memories of wonderful places I visited when I was free and had the means to travel. Once, I won in a raffle a trip for two to spend a week in Cuba all paid. My mom was then saying that she didn’t want to die without seen her homeland again, so I asked in the travel agency if I could change the tickets from Cuba to Croatia and they say yes. We got a trip to spend 10 days in Dubrovnik all paid (out of high season). It was great. She told me a lot of exciting stories she lived in the medioeval city during the war. I got to know her courage. We enjoyed the art, the culture, the blue mediterranean sea. We took advantage of our trip to go to Kotor Bay in Montenegro to visit my dad’s family in Kotor city and Dobrota. We had long conversations at my aunt’s orchard next to the shore, feeling the evening marine breeze. Kotor Bay is a wonderful place where you have the sea, some islands, and high mountains together. It was a great trip. I would like to go back. But I know it only will be possible without mom and then I don’t know if I will be able to overcome the emotions and the sorrow.
Sad city
Today my city is sad. Our local football club Osasuna descended to the second division. A big drama.
Besides during the last match, when the fans were celebrating the first goal of their team, they stormed the barrier, that didn’t resist and tumbled to the ground leaving up to 60 injured. Luckily none of them serious. The match had to be suspended for half an hour. A disastrous day.
Osasuna finally won the match but the results of other matches between other teams made that victory useless. The team ended in the third post at the end of the classification, which means an automatic descend to the second division.
For the fans and the city is a big blow. Now instead to play against the renown teams like Real Madrid or Barcelona, the team will have to go to play against unknown teams. Less spectacle. Less fun. And also less revenues for the city.
People in the streets are sad and serious, discouraged. It’s a pity to see it.
.
