Staring Through Time and Space

Kate on the Road: Day 28

Date: 19th April

Day: 28

Location: Porto

Weather: Hot

I visit the Porto photographic museum, it is filled with every kind of camera, from tiny pocket watch espionage cameras, to brownie boxes, to Kodaks. But today an exhibition is on from a man, who forty years ago, took photos of a little community on the edge of Porto — bare feet, shacks, horses, children with huge eyes. They stare through time and space at me. I can feel their longing to reach through the photo and hold my hand. That’s what I’ve realised from this trip — the past blends into the present and bleeds into the future, all that exists is one long, tangled moment where my great great grandfather from Portugal reaches out and touches me now, saying olá Kate, how are you?

I sit outside afterwards and stare at the barred windows, the museum used to be a prison. The signs explained to me that photography was for the rich and for the delinquents. The rich posed in elaborate studios with props and lighting, while prisoners sat against bare walls, stripped of any context or meaning. But their eyes — again — look into the lens and into my eyes. A woman pleads with me. A man tells me his life story. A child tells me he didn’t do it. I watch the world for a while with my greyish-bluish eyes. A proud father watches his little girl toddle around in the square, a pigeon decides whether to eat my shoelace, a spider crawls onto a strand of my hair, a seagull accosts a woman eating hot chips.

Later that afternoon I walk past another shop selling photos of your own iris. Europe seems to have an inordinate amount of shops that take high resolution photographs of your eye and blow them up huge on a canvas or piece of glass. It’s weird and freaky walking down the street to see a window full of giant eyes staring at you.

I go to the supermarket to find some things for lunch and I discover what must be the absolute joy of Portugese children — loaves of crustless bread. It looks naked to me. It’s like selling a banana out of its skin.

I have some Portugese blood in me. My great great grandfather sailed to New Zealand from Lisbon in the 1800s. We all have blood from all over the world, does that mean earth is our home, rather than an arbitrary landmass we have drawn lines on? Am I inextricably linked to this country which I am visiting for the first time? Should it be called my mother land?

I walk Porto’s streets and listen to a saxophone player, guitar player, singer, and cornet player. One man has a little sign next to him that says, street performers are like wildflowers — brightening the side of the road, brightening the way. I agree. I put a euro in his guitar case. I have given more money to street performers here than I have in my entire life. Here there seems to be no shame in putting yourself out there. In New Zealand we have tall poppy syndrome, where if your head appears above others, if you are seen to be doing well or trying hard, you’ll soon be cut down to size. Children learn to cut themselves down to size before anyone else can. We put our heads down and we work hard, quietly. Somehow New Zealand punches above its weight on the world stage, but it isn’t without an underlying fault line. A crack in our foundation which has caused our country to have one of the worst youth suicide rates in the world. A speaker came to tell us about it when I worked as a teacher. He couldn’t believe the stats when he first heard. I couldn’t either. In little ways I’m trying to be proud of what I’m working on, I’m trying to share my words and photos, I’m trying to celebrate the success of others. What would the world be like if we weren’t all so scared to share our talents?