The truly wonderful “nomodel series” by Niccolò Natali continues with mesmerizing Sûrya.
“Sorry guys, is this tram going close to Tapada da Ajuda?”.
Strong french accent. It was by answering this question that I first crashed into Surya’s beauty. We didn’t know each other, but we were randomly going to the same daylight party. Nevertheless, she decided to sit a few meters from where we were. The whole journey to the venue I was wondering why none of us, neither I, nor her, talked to each other. We could have leveraged on the party mood and became, at least, single-serving friend. Fortunately, when she was about to leave the party, I casually met her, we had a long chat and agreed to do something together, before I leave Lisbon.
Twelve hours before my flight flew back to Italy, I met her downtown, she was sitting on some stairs in Lisbon’s main square. We had no chat, we did not talk to each other after that moment at the party, but nonetheless she agreed to spend a few of these last hours with me. After packing all my bags, around 5 a.m., I passed by her hostel to pick her up, and we went to Miradouro Senhora do Monte, the highest and most beautiful viewpoint of the city to shoot some pictures. “I’m not good in posing, everytime somebody tries to take some pictures of me it was a disaster!” That is why I decided to make her a video too, because I do wanted to fix her beauty, never mind the mean. From there, we went down to the oldest neighbourhood of Lisbon, passing by Feira da Ladra, literally, “The thief market”.
The more the sun was going up, the more I was hypnotised by her. We got into each other’s life with that freedom that just a scheduled departure (and no-sleep) can create. But our time was soon coming to an end.
These are my memories of that morning.
