| Sara and Carlos had meetings to go to at the University so they invited Margaret and us to join them on the trip to Évora. The hour and a half + trip through fields of sunflowers was filled with lively discussion. When we arrived Carlos gave us a brief tour of the university reconstructed from the original medieval architecture - complete with elevated lecterns for the esteemed professor to reign their intellect down upon their students. As expected, the walls have beautiful tile mosaics throughout. Afterwards we treked to a square with the ruins of a Roman building. Carlos went off to his business leaving Margaret to visit a local museum while Jo and I roamed the streets. A very aesthetic town where, unlike Messejana, the white-walled buildings tend to feature yellow stripes. According to Carlos, Messejana is a bit of an outlier in the region, bucking the tendency in the South towards yellow. We enjoyed peering into store windows but most of the shops were closed for the mid-day so we went for lunch. The sandwiches were tasty, especially the pork Bifama but the pastries were exceptional. We went for the renowned Pasteis de nata as well as a flakier custard filled Cavecas de frade which was even better. The small shots of espresso were very strong and wonderful. When we got back to town Carlos met with us to plan a project of ours: Lanterns with patterns we have found locally cut out via the laser cutter. Another meeting the next day was our first attempt at a prototype - which was rejected - but Carlos stayed late to create a new design for the cardboard lanterns lit by votive candles. We found a small park near the Matiz church on the hill that will work wonderfully for the installation of around 30 lanterns. Unfortunately this means we will be spending more time on Photoshop designing images than we would prefer but the project could be great. |