Observations from Portugal

So how can you not be a grouch when you travel to one of the more interesting small cities of the world - Coimbra, in Portugal - an old, especially charming place, with memories of one of the better cafés I've ever seen anywhere - garbage on the floor, newspapers being read, wood panelling, true "intellectuals" in large numbers, a couple of hundred years of history - and find that it has been replaced by a store selling Guess jeans, with the old Brasileira sign still there as a tease.

But not everything is so bad. Sometimes there are still treats in available, when it all comes together - excellence, beauty, quality - so that even rushing through the cold, windy alleys of Coimbra in the middle of the night leads to an historic 14th century chapel converted to a modern space for music. A cappella it is called, in the chapel. And a trio of men performing in an old tradition, Coimbra fado -beautiful voice, Portuguese guitarra, and Spanish guitar blending together with such sentiment and you say, see, not everything in modern life has deteriorated to having to listen to Norah Jones background music in some restaurant in Portugal.

And so I will write about contrasts - not just the overwhelming mediocrity and ugliness that is taking over the world, the blandness and the lack of awareness, but also those pockets of excellence and beauty which still exist. The latter is far more difficult than the former, but I will try my best.