In the suburb of Iraq (Carrazeda de Ansiães, Trás–os–Montes) there lives a community of about one hundred twenty Gipsies. As far as the nineties, they used to wander from village to village repairing things, selling baskets or horse instruments. When traditional agriculture was over, their way of living ended too. Evicted from their camping site in the centre of the village, they had to move to the top of a hill where a German tungsten mine used to be at work in the forties and is now a dumping site for building materials. They only have access to  electricity from the poles when the roads are lit. Besides social support, families live on junk business, working in the fields, selling goats and other animals.There is so much wind and cold on the top of the hill that the walls of the huts are worthless. AP

the 28th of January 2011, inspired by the events happening in Tunisia, the inhabitants of Cairo stopped feeling afraid of the dictatorship they were living in and came out massively to protest against the regime. After eighteen days of demonstrations and confrontations with Hosni Mubarak’s supporters, the dictator yielded to pressure in Tahrir square and withdrew from power. Thus began a stage of transition in the largest Arab country in the world. JCP

On the first of December 2011 the fishing boat Virgem do Sameiro, with six men aboard, was reported missing off the coast of Figueira da Foz. The shipwrecked were all from Caxinas, Vila do Conde, except a Ukrainian immigrant. On the second of December, a helicopter from the Air Force, which was not included in the search and rescue operations, found them in a raft. It was pure luck but for many it was a miracle; for these men, the skipper José Manuel Coentrão, João Coentrão, Prudenciano Pereira, António Fernando Maravalhas, Manuel Oliveira and Tereskhov Vladyslav endured three nights in the cold, with no food, in the middle of a storm, praying. NA

In June 2011 the Prime Minister José Sócrates faced a new election fight. With the country plunged in a deep economic crisis, Sócrates travelled from North to South looking for votes from Portuguese electors. The final result meant the Socialist leader’s defeat and afterwards his withdrawal from political life. MC

The birth of science was the death of superstition.
Thomas Huxley

Man has always looked for answers. Throughout history, in the course of times, we have always tried to find ways to justify our existence, reasons to justify what our mind could not. A long, long time ago, other truths were undoubted. Then, men and women of faith proclaimed the cure for all evils, the answer to every concern. They were masters, they possessed a truth and wisdom the ordinary mortal could hardly imagine. They seem to have gone today. Pushed by civilization into oblivion, they stay there, hidden from the eyes of the modern world. MP

Ninja is 42 years old and he has been a drug addict for twenty. Nowadays he is living in a shack in Olhão which looks like paradise when compared to the cells he went through. Many people are welcome there, people like him. He has had many women but he is only faithful to one: his heroin. From every corner of the house spring stories in shatters, pieces of other lives pouring into his own void. Down there some stairs lead to the terrace where, whether sunshine or rain, he washes his body in a kind of closet improvised in the open air. It’s a long time since he has given up washing his soul! Ninja assumes vices and crimes. He knew practically every jail in the country where he lived behind bars through which the sun peeped but never shone. His memory is blurred, his eyes blink and his voice hoarsens. When night becomes real night, he falls into creeping nightmares. They are always the same. He is dragged into the dark by narrow passages. He is subdued. Silence is a never  heard roar. JF

It is the most recent method of body conservation. It consists in a set of techniques applied to a corpse, such as washing and injecting preservatives which avoid the risk of infection. Restoration and cosmetics give the body a more composed and healthy outlook. This way the loved one is prepared for the funeral rites. RG

From an old textile factory located on 341, Alegria Street, Porto, was born in 2005 ESMAE (Escola Superior de Música, Artes e Espectáculo), a factory occupied by eight new theatre companies, like PELE, the Theatre Erva Daninha and Radar 360 and a film producer, all willing to develop their professional activities. The “cultural tenants” of the space pay no rent, electricity nor water and, in return, are challenged to preserve the factory, making minor repairs. RMO

Portugal Fashion – a three day monitoring of events, an approach to backstage and fashion show. PM

For several days SONAR Festival brings together thousands of young people in the Galician town of Corunna anxious to listen to the latest djs’ performances and electronic and progressive music bands trendy at present. MR

Mozambique is a country rich of forest, most of them are located in the Zambesia region and close to the Gorongosa Park. Today the situation of Mozambique forests is dramatic and in case nothing will change they will disappear soon. The Chinese buyers are actually not the guilty one, they are basically taking profit of a certain situation. The reasons of the disappearing have to be looked in a lack of conservation lows and in the corruption of the authorities. Forest licensing of 50 years of use are sold at relatively cheap price, and, in same case, the expensiveness of the licensing could be the income of one year of woodcutting. Very often the exploitation of the forests is not verified by the authorities or the authorities are corrupted; the consequences is that several woodcutter cut the tree that doesn’t allow the regeneration, fire is used to discover the best tree to cut destroying the undergrowth and in same case, when the proper tree are missing, young tree are cut. TR

This set of photographs is based on my work for the international project Meet Your Neighbour, which brings the studio outdoors and photographs wild animals against white backgrounds, using a flash technique which allows this outlook. Nevertheless, this project is a derivative from Meet Your Neighbour’s, once these are captive birds from the Falconry belonging to Tapada Nacional in Mafra, and they were photographed in a studio improvised there; so they do not fit in the project. However, I was interested in exploring the contrast developed by the technique in order to promote and present the birds. JA

Pelo menos uma vez por semana um aldeão de Tete morre devido ao ataque de um crocodilo no rio Zambeze. Morrem cerca de oitenta pessoas por ano e centenas delas ficam estropiadas. Mas o número de vítimas deve ser bem maior, pois quem desaparece no rio raramente é dado como morto. Eis a ironia da relação homem/réptil. Matar um crocodilo sem licença é crime punido pela lei em Moçambique mas não por motivos de conservação da espécie. O delta do rio Zambeze é o local favorito dos caçadores estrangeiros dispostos a pagar milhares de dólares por uma licença para caçar crocodilos e levá-los para casa como troféu. VS

Mozambique has a total area of 799,380km2. This territory is built of men and women, children and old people, natives and foreigners, Christians and Muslims, Zionists and Atheists, sick people and healthy people, families and orphans, employers and employees, beggars and donors, honourable people and outlaws. This set of twelve portraits is a mosaic which illustrates the territorial, social and imaging occupation of a country. The space taken by the individual, his presence in the landscape and in the social tissue are his existence materialized. Likewise, the portrait materializes codes and values associated to one’s image and one’s social performance. Job or leisure pose in the body of the person portrayed and the camera lens fixes every singularity of a profession embodied by the best model – the one doing one’s duty. FB

In 1993 I carried out a photography project in a Primary School at Cabanelas (Vale de Cambra). It was a very poor school with eleven pupils and a teacher. There was only one room for the four classes. Eighteen years have gone and I didn’t come back to the village. Invited by the television channel SIC, I accepted the participation in the programme Perdidos e Achados (Lost and Found) based on my photographs. For months and months I looked for the children of Cabanelas and their teacher, until I managed to gather them together in the old school, now abandoned. It was a day of celebration. With memories deep down under one’s skin, I photographed the children again, now men and women. It is the portrait of memory, of the document and affections. AM

Report on the best spots for the practice of surfing in Portugal. PC

Congress of the International Riding Competition in Oporto – CSI. RM