I’ve seen a lot of changes and a lot of things that should have changed but didn’t. I was here when they built the CCB and when Os Belenenses Football fell to the bottom division… and I’ll be here to see it return to where it belongs, the 1st division.
I started going to the Restelo stadium when I was 7 or 8 years old, accompanied by my grandfather who quickly infected me with a huge love for the Azuis da Cruz de Cristo, a love that burns today in the same way it did on those Football afternoons in Restelo with my Avô Zé.
I’ve lived in houses and apartments, I’ve had a backyard and I’ve had a balcony overlooking the south shore. I’m a simple person and, as I grew up, I realized that space is what we make of it. My grandfather used to tell me that happiness doesn’t lie in “how much we have” but in recognizing that “we have enough”.
Among the things that have never changed, there’s a huge stone: the issue of housing, with its one-way, rising prices, in contrast to its ever-decreasing size.
The last time I was in the process of moving houses, which I hope was for good – I’m too old for these things – a long-time friend told me about a discovery of his that turned out to be a real “tidy-up” for the “huge stone” that takes up so much physical and mental space. His find was “cubes”, which turn out to be “kuboos”, mini-storerooms that have come to complement my home, where I keep many achievements and memories that, despite always being there, no longer fit under the same roof as me.
At KUBOO in Carnaxide, I know that the first letters I exchanged with my wife, the old Belenenses shirts and scarves that my grandfather left me, and the bottle I’m saving to celebrate when they’re back in the first league, are safe and well kept.
