Though the name of Portugal hasn't been visible in the world history since Age of Geographical Discovery when its power was at its peak, the relationships between Portugal and Japan were very close one since several Portuguese reached Tanegashima-Island and introduced guns up to the establishment of the trade relationships between the two countries. A museum in the city of Lisbon has a special exhibition room called the room of 'the Island of Rising Sun' , that is of course Japan, where such items introduced through the trade with Japan as folding screens, china ware and so on were exhibited. I was impressed when I imagined the life-risking difficulty of the navigation between the two countries of those ages.

Well, Alvaro Siza whose architectural works are the main purpose of our visit is a world famed architect who won the Pritzker Prize, a novel prize in the field of architecture, which Fumihiko Maki, Tadao Ando also won in the past. The main place for his activities is not in the capital city, Lisbon but in the second largest city of Porte. We quickly moved there. There, besides the architectures of Siza, there is a newly opened concert hall named 'Casa Da Musica' which, we hear, is now a hotly being-talked-about architectural work designed by Rem Koolhaas. My friend, Noriko Takiguchi had advised us to listen to something at 'Casa Da Musica,' there was, however, no concert during our stay unfortunately. We were lucky enough, though, to happen to be able to listen to some rehearsal during the introduction tour of the place. Arriving at 'Casa Da Mujica' around 10 am, first, we went to the caf inside it and happened to see a kind of familiar Japanese faces. The couple were well-known architects my husband has kept friendly terms with. They said they took all the trouble of coming all the way to Porte on a return trip from Paris so as to see this particular architecture. They also said they had already seen almost all the works by Siza. I asked their impressions about them.
You know Iﾕve been always impressed by the passion and the tenacity the people called 'architects' have. The guts that make them go to landﾕs ends and to see every possible good architecture in a short time allowed for them. I heard such stories as 'they were caught by the police when trying to climb over a wall,' 'they spent a night outside after missing the bus that came only once a day,' 'they fell off stairs and got injured, being intoxicated by the beauty of the space,' 'and because of the laughter I've had, listening to the saga like these, I've risked my life for the inability of breathing.' At least, it's obvious the lines of wrinkles on my face have increased in number. At the same time, I envy them for the happiness of their having such an object to which they can dedicate themselves to such extent. My husband, too, seemed to be beside himself with the joy of looking at Casa Da Mujica with his wonderful company who are famous architects.
Me? Of course I could spend a very significant time experiencing the two different spaces created by the two modern world-famed architects of Siza and Koolhaas who are at the opposite ends of architectural designs. If they were in such cities like 'museums for modern architectures' as London, Paris, Tokyo, etc, too much information overload of architectural stimulus would make me have a stomachache because of overeating. Here in Porte, however, thanks to its city-scale, I felt the comfort of eating delicious food to a proper amount.

Oh, sorry for this too long introduction. Please look forward to the details I'm going to present to you at the next issue.