MY ELEGANT HOSTESS IN PORTUGAL
Tiago, Isabel, and I are home by the end of our conversation, after this brief ride. Teresa's apartment is very elegantly and artistically furnished with lots of antique artifacts from both of her and her husband's families. Antonio is also a physician, a surgeon, always smiling and much more relaxed than Teresa. With Teresa's fire, she really needs a laid back man to calm her down at times, just like Bill used to do with me. When I puttered around the house for too long, he'd come upstairs telling me "I feel guilty working on my project downstairs when you run up and down doing things aroudn the house." He would then wrap his arms around my waist from my back and pull me onto the sofa gently ordering "Sit for a while, it will feel good". That is the lovely man he was. We would chuckle and I would indeed slow down a bit and with his help we would finish up with everything in no time.
Yet, I am nowhere near Teresa. I have never met a woman who is more of a go-getter than Teresa, of course this makes her constantly multi-tasking and problem solving even when she is socializing. Antonio jokes about his wife's traveling schedule. "When she returns home, she is home only to start planning for the next trip". Teresa is one of the most unique women I have ever met in academic life. She is short, slender, beautiful (another Portuguese woman with royal beauty) and elegant. With all these outwardly deceptive features about who she really is, there is an amazon inside of her head and heart. She is as assertive as can any woman can get without jeopardizing her feminine elegance, remarkably intelligent with an extremely high mental, social, and emotional Q. She is a born-organizer and leader, one of the main locomotives of the field of child protection as it relates to forensic sciences in Portugal. It is a delight to work with such a soul mate in terms of what our aspirations are.
At the 19th World Chidl Abuse Conference Teresa, Antonia, and I attended in Istanbul.
Jose and his girlfriend Diena are also home, sweet, the entire family is meeting me this time. Jose has grown quite a bit since I last saw him, more manly now. Diena is very sweet, too. Of course since she is younger than Isabel there is an adolescently innocent air to her. Teresa calls her "Lady D". Thinking of Isabel's royal beauty I chime in "well, it looks like you are gathering royal girls under your wings". Isabel jumps in and says "There is Queen Isabel, too." We all laugh, I can tell how proud Teresa is with the girlfriend choices her boys have made. What I am looking at indeed is a perfect family picture.
The greatest surprise is to see Patricia with her 3 week-old daughter Maria Carolina walking in 15 minutes after my arrival. Patricia is a junior faculty at the Institute of Legal Medicine, the head of which is Teresa. I had hosted Patricia at my house when she did a mini-fellowship at my program at the University of Iowa over a 3 week period, two years ago. We became two sisters and enjoyed each other's company greatly during that time and she has a special place in my heart. It was so sweet to meet Maria Carolina and have our pictures taken with her. As we are finishing our red Porto wine, Patricia decides to go back home to have dinner with her partner Diego and keep her daughter's schedule uninterrupted. Warm hugs and good byes. I will have to give my gift for Maria to Teresa's secretary Maria to be delivered to Patricia when she can.
Maria Carolina, Patricia and I, with my mask I was using to prevent my laryngitis virus from making the little baby sick.
We have a delicious zucchini based soup as the first dish for our dinner along with a lovely bread Jose cooked for us. Portuguese cuisine has so many lovely vegetable based pureed soups, I love it. Main dish is cod fish baked in a creamy sauce and covered with a crunchy, delicious cheese crust. It is delicious along with Teresa's salad. Teresa explains she made the soup and prepared the fish the night before only to warm up one and bake the other after her meeting at the TV station. This is her efficiency, which is quite familiar. We exchange our gifts, which has become our routine. I brought a Turkish hand made ornamental plate for her, and she gave me a pair of ear rings, that look quite royal as well. I will wear them to the conference for sure to bring a smile to Teresa's face. In a little bit, their cat climbs up on the table where Teresa placed the plate I brought. It is sniffing the plate, Antonio explains: "She has to familiarize herself with anything new that comes into this house." How perceptive of him, and another evidence every pet has a personality of their own.
We chat about economy in Portugal. It looks like they still are not out of the woods. Income tax rate has been increased to 50%, a lot of benefits for state employees are being eliminated. I learn that Portuguese health system is one of the best covering all expenses even for transplant surgery. Another surprising piece of information I obtain is that for decades in Portugal, state employees had received 14 salaries for working for 12 months a year. One of the two extra salary bonuses was for vacation expenses and the other for education. What a humane state structure. But no more, all of these are disappearing. They are now moving toward introducing co-payments into the health care system. Unfortunately, they are also looking into reducing the costs of the educational system as well. And they are back to 13 salaries instead of 14 this year, most likely to go down to 12 in the near future. As a result of unemployment reaching 20-30% for first-time employees that is for young people, a lot of professionals are moving out of Portugal to countries like England, Switzerland, Belgium, and Germany. Finally around 11 pm, we decide to end this lovely reunion and Tiago and Isabel drop me off at my hotel to rest in order to be ready for the big day tomorrow.
Third national Child Abuse Conference organized by the Portuguese Society for Prevention of Child Abuse & Neglect led by Propfessor Magalhaes
The conference goes very well. The audience is impressive. There are two high rank administrators from the National Children's Services, two high rank prosecutors who are employed by the Ministry of Justice, physicians, lawyers, psychologists, social workers, etc. I am glad especially the high rank administrators hear my comments on how corporal punishment lead the way to physical and emotional abuse but more so my comments on multidisciplinary, interagency approach to address child abuse. I can't believe how the key individuals in the audience share my comments on multidisciplinary approach almost verbatim. Another wonderful news is that apparently the Portuguese government has signed into law the European Parliament's directive on how European countries should address sexual exploitation of children, which also focuses on multidisciplinary management and Portugal reportedly has to implement this multidisciplinary approach until the end of 2013. I am very hopeful for Portugal in terms of improving their response to child sexual abuse to start with. Teresa is delighted with the presentations and discussions. So am I. Another aspect I am very happy about is that the little Spanish I have turns out to be so helpful. I can follow about 95% of what is on the slides and I am gradually understanding more and more of the spoken language, too. Here is my resolution, I will get back to my Spanish studies as soon as I get over my jet lag when I go home.
Tiago, Isabel, and I are home by the end of our conversation, after this brief ride. Teresa's apartment is very elegantly and artistically furnished with lots of antique artifacts from both of her and her husband's families. Antonio is also a physician, a surgeon, always smiling and much more relaxed than Teresa. With Teresa's fire, she really needs a laid back man to calm her down at times, just like Bill used to do with me. When I puttered around the house for too long, he'd come upstairs telling me "I feel guilty working on my project downstairs when you run up and down doing things aroudn the house." He would then wrap his arms around my waist from my back and pull me onto the sofa gently ordering "Sit for a while, it will feel good". That is the lovely man he was. We would chuckle and I would indeed slow down a bit and with his help we would finish up with everything in no time.
Yet, I am nowhere near Teresa. I have never met a woman who is more of a go-getter than Teresa, of course this makes her constantly multi-tasking and problem solving even when she is socializing. Antonio jokes about his wife's traveling schedule. "When she returns home, she is home only to start planning for the next trip". Teresa is one of the most unique women I have ever met in academic life. She is short, slender, beautiful (another Portuguese woman with royal beauty) and elegant. With all these outwardly deceptive features about who she really is, there is an amazon inside of her head and heart. She is as assertive as can any woman can get without jeopardizing her feminine elegance, remarkably intelligent with an extremely high mental, social, and emotional Q. She is a born-organizer and leader, one of the main locomotives of the field of child protection as it relates to forensic sciences in Portugal. It is a delight to work with such a soul mate in terms of what our aspirations are.
Jose and his girlfriend Diena are also home, sweet, the entire family is meeting me this time. Jose has grown quite a bit since I last saw him, more manly now. Diena is very sweet, too. Of course since she is younger than Isabel there is an adolescently innocent air to her. Teresa calls her "Lady D". Thinking of Isabel's royal beauty I chime in "well, it looks like you are gathering royal girls under your wings". Isabel jumps in and says "There is Queen Isabel, too." We all laugh, I can tell how proud Teresa is with the girlfriend choices her boys have made. What I am looking at indeed is a perfect family picture.
The greatest surprise is to see Patricia with her 3 week-old daughter Maria Carolina walking in 15 minutes after my arrival. Patricia is a junior faculty at the Institute of Legal Medicine, the head of which is Teresa. I had hosted Patricia at my house when she did a mini-fellowship at my program at the University of Iowa over a 3 week period, two years ago. We became two sisters and enjoyed each other's company greatly during that time and she has a special place in my heart. It was so sweet to meet Maria Carolina and have our pictures taken with her. As we are finishing our red Porto wine, Patricia decides to go back home to have dinner with her partner Diego and keep her daughter's schedule uninterrupted. Warm hugs and good byes. I will have to give my gift for Maria to Teresa's secretary Maria to be delivered to Patricia when she can.
We have a delicious zucchini based soup as the first dish for our dinner along with a lovely bread Jose cooked for us. Portuguese cuisine has so many lovely vegetable based pureed soups, I love it. Main dish is cod fish baked in a creamy sauce and covered with a crunchy, delicious cheese crust. It is delicious along with Teresa's salad. Teresa explains she made the soup and prepared the fish the night before only to warm up one and bake the other after her meeting at the TV station. This is her efficiency, which is quite familiar. We exchange our gifts, which has become our routine. I brought a Turkish hand made ornamental plate for her, and she gave me a pair of ear rings, that look quite royal as well. I will wear them to the conference for sure to bring a smile to Teresa's face. In a little bit, their cat climbs up on the table where Teresa placed the plate I brought. It is sniffing the plate, Antonio explains: "She has to familiarize herself with anything new that comes into this house." How perceptive of him, and another evidence every pet has a personality of their own.
We chat about economy in Portugal. It looks like they still are not out of the woods. Income tax rate has been increased to 50%, a lot of benefits for state employees are being eliminated. I learn that Portuguese health system is one of the best covering all expenses even for transplant surgery. Another surprising piece of information I obtain is that for decades in Portugal, state employees had received 14 salaries for working for 12 months a year. One of the two extra salary bonuses was for vacation expenses and the other for education. What a humane state structure. But no more, all of these are disappearing. They are now moving toward introducing co-payments into the health care system. Unfortunately, they are also looking into reducing the costs of the educational system as well. And they are back to 13 salaries instead of 14 this year, most likely to go down to 12 in the near future. As a result of unemployment reaching 20-30% for first-time employees that is for young people, a lot of professionals are moving out of Portugal to countries like England, Switzerland, Belgium, and Germany. Finally around 11 pm, we decide to end this lovely reunion and Tiago and Isabel drop me off at my hotel to rest in order to be ready for the big day tomorrow.
Third national Child Abuse Conference organized by the Portuguese Society for Prevention of Child Abuse & Neglect led by Propfessor Magalhaes
The conference goes very well. The audience is impressive. There are two high rank administrators from the National Children's Services, two high rank prosecutors who are employed by the Ministry of Justice, physicians, lawyers, psychologists, social workers, etc. I am glad especially the high rank administrators hear my comments on how corporal punishment lead the way to physical and emotional abuse but more so my comments on multidisciplinary, interagency approach to address child abuse. I can't believe how the key individuals in the audience share my comments on multidisciplinary approach almost verbatim. Another wonderful news is that apparently the Portuguese government has signed into law the European Parliament's directive on how European countries should address sexual exploitation of children, which also focuses on multidisciplinary management and Portugal reportedly has to implement this multidisciplinary approach until the end of 2013. I am very hopeful for Portugal in terms of improving their response to child sexual abuse to start with. Teresa is delighted with the presentations and discussions. So am I. Another aspect I am very happy about is that the little Spanish I have turns out to be so helpful. I can follow about 95% of what is on the slides and I am gradually understanding more and more of the spoken language, too. Here is my resolution, I will get back to my Spanish studies as soon as I get over my jet lag when I go home.
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