10th September 1992

Today is a very special day for me. A celebration day even. That is because 17 years ago, on the 10th of September 1992, me and 11 other Portuguese guys and girls, arrived at Manchester Airport to embark on a new experience and life. In fact it was a day that changed my life, even if I wasn't completely aware of how important that day was at the time.

The first group!

I came full of hopes and dreams, like many do when going to a foreign country. Funnily enough I wasn't scared, well I was a bit apprehensive, but I was more excited than anything else. You see, one of my biggest dreams when I was growing up was to go and study abroad and now I had the chance of doing it so.

As I grew older, I stopped dreaming about going abroad as circumstances changed in my life and my parents lives that I thought I would never be able to do it. But I never stopped focusing on it really. In a way I was using the law of attraction without even knowing that I was or what it was. Then it came the time to start applying for Universities back home.

I had excellent grades and did a good entry exam, the old PGA (Prova Geral de Accesso) which was a exam that all students had to do as part of their application process. Unfortunately for me despite all my results I failed to secure a place in my preferred Universities by 0.01%! I was devastated and really disappointed with myself and with the whole system as well.

So decided to re-do my 12th Grade (equivalent to A levels I suppose) and cracked on with trying to further improve my grades. Was a weird year if I'm honest, as I always felt like this was something I didn't want to do and that something was missing.

Then one day, whilst reading the Public (Portuguese Newspaper), my Mum came across an advert from Bolton Institute, saying that they were looking to interview EU Students with the purpose of offering them places to come to study at the Institute. At the time they were already striving to gain University status and to do that they had to have a certain quota of EU students.

I went to the British Embassy in Lisbon for the interview and ended up being offered a place. Then a couple months later I was in England. It is funny how the "failure" of securing a place in the University in Portugal ended up being a blessing in disguise! That actually proved to me that dreams do come true!!!

(Me and my 1st 3 Housemates - Marco, Luis & João)

And so it is 17 years later, after a lot of things happened in my life, both good and bad, although all beneficial to my development as a person, I am still in England, happy for being here and looking forward to the next 17 years of my life. Will I be living in England in 17 years time? Well I know where I am planning to be in the next 17 years and know that with hard work I will get there but for the time being those plans are, let's say, confidential...

One final thing...

When I was saying goodbye to my parents in Lisbon Airport, after hugging everyone, my Mum came to me, gave me a big hug and whispered in my ear "You are not coming back to Portugal, are you?", to which I said straight away I would come on holidays, "That is not what I mean and you know it" said her...

Well, I am off celebrating my special day...

Have a brilliant day!

Speak soon,

Paulo

What I Learned From My Grandfather

I have been thinking about writing this post for a while now. He was one of my heroes, I loved him to bits and he was one of my best friends in the World. He passed away almost 15 years ago already but I still think of him a lot.

Throughout his life, like all of us, he made mistakes and even said or acted badly or out of turn, but he was always capable of recognising his mistakes and amending them when he could. I admired a lot of things about him, and learned a lot from him. Today I thought I would pay praise to him and share with you some of these learnings.

Do you want respect, then earn that respect...

He always told me that if you want people to respect you for who you are then you first have to earn that respect. How do you do that? By beeing yourself at all times and by making sure you respect who you are. If you don't respect yourself how can you expect others to respect you?

He was of the opinion that no matter what your status in society was, if you wanted his respect you would have to earn it and prove to him that you would be worthy of it. He once told me that just because he was my Grandfather that wasn't an excuse for him not to earn my respect from him. Funny to hear this from someone that I idolised but in more then one occasion he proved that concept to me. He also told me...

Respecting someone doesn't mean you agree with them...

Looking back this teaching was a sour one for both me and my Grandfather. He had told me in the past that disagreeing with another person was natural and if you always kept each others respect then the disagreement would eventually turn out to be positive for the relationship.

A few years before his death me and my Grandfather had a big disagreement that even threathened our relationship. The reason why it didn't was because we respected each other above all others and were able to see the points we were both making and eventually "made up". Our relationship became stronger than ever before from that point onwards.

Always dress to impress... yourself!

From my first memory of him up to the last one, he always looked extremely smart and well dressed. His hair was always impecably taken care off and his nails expertly cleaned and tidy. He never dressed to impressed the World outside, he had no need to do that because he only wanted to impress himself.

Even around the house well after his retirement, his clothes were nicely colour coordinated, pressed and neatly presented. To his last day he combed his hair with "brilhantina" and had his silk scarf on his neck. No point in trying to impress others if you are not impressed with yourself.

Some might call it vanity, I call it pride...

This is a story my Mum told many times and I often tell it too. My Grandfather used to work as a tailor, so he always looked impeccably dressed at all times. On his way to and from work he had to cross a field that often was dirty or even muddy.

So every day without fail, either on way to work or home, my Grandfather proceeded to walk through the field, and on reaching the other side, he would remove his handkerchief and would thoroughly clean his shoes from any dirt and mud ensuring they looked clean and polished and off he went on his way.

Some people might say that it was very vain of him to do that, but for me was pride, pride on his appearance and, most importantly, pride on himself. He was also a role model on how men dressed, on account of his job, so if his attire was not perfect why would anyone buy from him?

Hard work pays up in the end...

I have never believed in easy work for easy pay. A lot of people out there wants you to believe that it is easy to achieve your goals, but it always involves hard work from your part. I also believe that, at least in part, that belief of mine comes from him.

You can achieve anything you set your heart upon but you always have to be prepared to put the effort in. Once you do that it will pay handsomely in the end! You are responsible for your dream! Dream big, act big and reality will be big...

I could go on...

And tell you more of his learnings... Someday I might add a few more, or maybe not. Today I just felt it was time to pay homage to a great man, that I miss dearly and I loved throughout my life and still do, in the hope that some of his "teachings" could of assistance to you as well.

As always comments are appreciated.

Speak soon,

Paulo