At the top of a steep, cobbled street by the Moorish castle in the Algarvian town of Silves — a relic of the Muslim world’s former dominance in southern Portugal, completed in the 13th century — is a shop called Al-tannur Ceramica.
Having washed down some grilled sardines by the market — where the waiter, Vikram from Amritsar, was wearing a t-shirt with the map of an undivided Punjab on it, the five rivers all labelled — we entered its door without a plan and left forty minutes later full of life.
The owner Luis spends all day painting ceramics, then drives to the kiln (‘tannur’ in Arabic) at the end of the week in his 1989 Volkswagen Beetle. His wife Teresa paints sea shells, collected from alcoves along the beach on their coastal walks.
When I told him I was a writer, Luis pointed to a corner of the workshop. A small portion of his thousands of tiles depicted the portrait of a man wearing spectacles and a top hat. It was his hero, he said: the celebrated Portuguese philosopher-poet, Fernando Pessoa.
He insisted that we listen to Pessoa’s poetry, which he played from a YouTube video and speakers whilst explaining its significance as a guide to living, citing his favourite poem as The Tobacco Shop.
He also encouraged me to read The Book of Disquiet, Pessoa’s most famous collection of reflections about finding purpose in life’s simplest moments and acts.
Published in 1981, it was pieced together from a trunk full of diaries found after his death.
We bought an espresso cup and couple of painted shells. Luis spent time meticulously wrapping them. Then we left, bidding him goodbye. I couldn’t take photos inside the shop — a sign read ‘no cameras, just memories’ — but I will always remember him.
I arrived back to London last night and my copy of The Book of Disquiet just arrived in the post.
I think what made it all so resonant was how, through the passionate, humble, thoughtful existence he’d created for himself in the shop, and included us in momentarily, Luis was living out the philosophy that he so admired about Pessoa’s writing.
I’m sharing this partly as a reminder to myself to share my diaries more often, or they, too, will end up in a trunk.
Comments
Nothing yet. Say the first thing.
Sign in to join the conversation.