Kindle books in portuguese / Livros Gratuitos Kindle em Português

Livros Kindle em Português já disponíveis na Amazon:

O Outro Mundo - Contos (PT Version) (Portuguese Edition) by David Sobral

Antologia de contos premiados para amantes de ficção e ficção científica/fantástica, sobre o nosso e muitos outros mundos.Inclui: O Homem que decidiu ser Deus, A mulher que não corria riscos, O sabor amargo das vitórias, O Diário de VX-4010-dh (I), Rumo a SD-GS2056: a Era dos Descobrimentos Espaciais e GR - Gerador de Realidades, entre muitos outros.

Visões de um Outro Mundo (Visions of a Parallel World - PT Version) (Portuguese Edition) by David Sobral
Há um Universo paralelo mesmo aqui ao lado, e está prestes a colidir com o nosso... quanto tempo falta para um novo Big Bang?Rui William é um brilhante estudante de engenharia física, com uma vida sem excessos, até que uma caneta amarela lhe desperta o interesse, na montra de uma papelaria, e faz com que a compre. Ainda que com reservas, não consegue resistir à aparente vontade do objecto, aventurando-se assim no mundo da literatura, em busca de algo que o rigor matemático não lhe consegue dar. Com isso cria uma personagem, Johanne Ribeiro, mas essa rapidamente se começa a confundir com a realidade. As coisas tornam-se ainda mais estranhas quando recebe um telefonema de uma Johanne, tal e qual a sua personagem, que afirma ser de um outro mundo. Será o universo mais excêntrico do que Rui alguma vez imaginou, ou estará apenas a enlouquecer? Terá a caneta algo a ver com tudo isto?Rui pediu aventura na sua vida, mas nunca esperou que lhe dessem algo assim…

Guinsberg (Crónicas dos Gravitões Rebeldes - PT Version) (Portuguese Edition) David Sobral

Afonso, um jovem hacker português, nunca pensou que a sua incursão pelos computadores da NASA conseguisse ter sucesso… Mas ao fazer o download de um diário, escrito por uma habitante da cidade de Guinsberg (Natasha), Afonso toma contacto com uma civilização verdadeiramente avançada. Uma sociedade que está prestes a dar um importante salto evolutivo: a criação de uma mente global, que implicará o fim da individualidade em prol do bem comum. Uma sociedade futurista e utópica, onde a nanotecnologia, as redes informáticas e os sistemas bioinformáticos levaram os habitantes a um grau de progresso inimaginável. Neste cenário, o passo seguinte, pelo qual a maioria dos cidadãos anseia, depende apenas da derrota de um grupo de rebeldes que se bate pelo individualismo. Todavia, quando o grupo de cidadãos apontados pelo computador central para derrotar os rebeldes – liderado por Natasha – está prestes a vencê-los, algo de inesperado sucede, e a autora do diário é transportada para junto de Afonso, de uma forma que o deixa à beira da loucura.Natasha, a habitante de Guinsberg, habituada a um controlo total por parte de milhares de nanorobôs, e a uma ordem perfeita no que a rodeia, ver-se-á forçada a lidar com uma sociedade em que os estímulos e os impulsos incontroláveis abundam – num mundo caótico, onde há fome, pobreza e ódio – sem no entanto desistir do seu grande objectivo: procurar uma forma de regressar a Guinsberg e integrar a mente global, que ela espera ser já uma realidade, com a derrota dos rebeldes. Mas será também no seio deste mundo ocidental do início do século XXI que ela descobrirá tudo aquilo que a sua sociedade nunca lhe permitiu ver ou sentir, e que reflectirá profundamente sobre tudo aquilo em que sempre acreditou.A vida de Afonso nunca mais será a mesma, sobretudo porque a detecção dos seus actos, por parte dos sistemas de segurança da NASA, e a necessidade de proteger Natasha, fará com que se veja obrigado a revelar um enorme segredo que ele esconde do mundo, desde sempre…

Whispers of a Lost Dream (Pedaços de coisa nenhuma - PT Version) (Portuguese Edition) by David Sobral

Whispers of a Lost Dream é a história de um conjunto de personagens que contam na primeira pessoa o mundo angustiante e intolerável em que estão mergulhados, e que vão revelando, palavra após palavra, os sonhos que perderam pelo caminho, e os laços que porventura os uniram no passado. Haverá esperança, mesmo quando nada faz sentido?"A vida é feita de pedaços – de inúmeros pedaços de coisa nenhuma. Pedaços vazios que nos rodeiam e nos prendem, pedaços de nada que nos sufocam no vazio de viver.Só na memória há um pouco de luz, um pouco de ar puro, uma esperança que resiste, ano após ano, década após década, como se no mundo existisse a palavra que só poetas e escritores sabem pronunciar correctamente: a eternidade. Sim, parece que em mim existe algo de eterno, como se um pequeno ponto de luz possuísse uma força inimaginável, capaz de resistir às incontáveis investidas cruéis da parte do mundo, e como se esse pedacinho de mim fosse realmente imortal.O mundo torna-se difícil, mais e mais árduo, a cada segundo, a cada minuto, hora, dia (porque na realidade o tempo é agora apenas uma confusão inultrapassável). É impossível viver. E só de o pensar, só de reflectir na palavra que há tanto deixou de fazer sentido para mim – viver –, sinto de novo as paredes do quarto a descerem sobre a minha mente em fúria. E eu sou as paredes, incertas e brancas. Sou o quarto sem rumo, a casa, a noite. Mas não sou eu, não sou a minha mente pensamento ideias, não sou nada, não sou ninguém não sou não sou não sou!... "

http://www.amazon.co.uk/s/ref=ntt_athr_dp_sr_1?_encoding=UTF8&field-author=David%20Sobral&search-alias=digital-text

Being Alive

Sometimes life is unbearable. Heavy. Sometimes life is hard, if not impossible. But is it, really?

Things are not what they are, but what we think of them. Sure, the World around you doesn't (shouldn't) actually change just because you think of it in a different way, but that is not what matters, is it? What really does change is our perception of the world, life, and ourselves, and that perception, that feeling is all there is for us.

The World and the Universe are what we feel about them.

Food in china - attempt number one to actually write something sort-of-guide-book-like

The food is amazing in China. Not only diverse and pretty much available at any corner - although I wouldn’t recommend having it literally at any corner. They probably have “too” much diversity in fact, particularly as it seems like they really do eat anything they can put their hands on (poor dogs...). Nevertheless, once you find a good place (where cutlery and dishes are very well-packed on the table - meaning that it really should be cleaned), it only really becomes a China experience if you are sharing. And ordering loads of different things. And trying - and mostly failing - to grab the strange “things” with your likely dodgy chopstick skills. Of course, if you get to see a place where cutlery isn’t packed, you’ll probably see the locals making sure it gets clean. How? Step one: pour tea into a cup. Step two: use the hot tea to try to clean it. Step three: convince yourself that you are actually cleaning the stuff (and that it really wasn’t obviously dirty before). Another bulk part of the entire experience is trying to find out which thing is which on the menu - and there you can either go with the nice pictures (and no english translation) - or just go ahead and trust your luck. You’ll probably get laughed at for some options (or for all of them), but, overall, the more the better - you can always not eat the dodger(ish) thing. Ok, not everything is great. Particularly the smell. If you get to experience, you’ll know exactly what I mean. And no, it’s just a “western” thing; it is true that you could argue that maybe it only smells really bad because we are not used to it - but maybe it is wonderful for chinese people. But it isn’t, really, they find it as disgusting as anyone else. They just get used to it.

The East Side

It’s been a while since I have managed to write something. As a previous post mentioned, the absence and lack of radio/virtual emission does not mean that life has been boring and with pretty much nothing to do or report. Not at all!

I am now on my way to China for a conference. It should be a great conference, with plenty of opportunities to interact and hear about the latest on the field. On the other hand, it is the first time that I head East. Stockholm, in Sweden, is pretty much my “eastern” record. So this “breakthrough” represents a huge improvement on my “eastern” trips: Beijing and Guilin, in China. Of course, it is much more about just going East; it’s about actually heading towards a culture which is actually different from what most of Europe.

Inevitable?

There is no such thing as destiny (?). No such thing as what we are meant to do. There is definitely not an activity or profession that fits us. The problem, of course, is the fact that we always tend to believe in the complete opposite. Regardless of the reason why, the reality is that we do tend to think that there is something that we will be quite good at. Something which will be fulfilling and that, because it is what we are "meant to do", will surely lead to quite a success. Why is it a problem then? Well, mostly because assuming that there is some sort of a "destiny" very frequently leads to searching for something that "feels right" - and such searches will almost always end up in a frustrating road. Of course, some people will tell you that this is completely wrong, assuring you that they really do what they were "meant to do" and they will base that on the feeling of fulfillment and success. But .

Clearly no time - or rather no real motivation

I guess this huge time-gap tells a lot about the potential adventures that have been happening meanwhile - although there is a huge degeneracy with the potential (and quite real, frankly) lack of time for actually writing something here!

One month in Hawaii

There's a funny thing about having too much to talk or write about: we end up writing nothing, and end up realizing that, actually, it's so much easier to write about nothingness than about a full life.

Nine Nights at the Top of the World

Mauna Kea is not just the highest point in the Pacific, found within the most isolated group of islands in the World. It's not just the best astronomical site on Earth, home of some of the best and larger telescopes in the World, allowing us to probe the distant, young Universe and at least hope we can understand a bit more of our origins. However, closer to the stars, above the clouds and most of the atmosphere, Mauna Kea is much above any of the "highest" or "biggest" journalistic description. And yet, within the context of the "economic crisis", instead of being seen like one of the most valuable, impressive and sacred sites in the world, Mauna Kea seems to be starting to be seen as a burden, something that governments and research agencies seem to be willing to get out from just to save a few piles of green paper.

Every day, more than a hundred of people drive all the way up from sea level to Mauna Kea with very different motivations. On the one hand, bus drivers take the excited tourists, eager to see the sunset above the clouds at more than 4 km height (eager enough to pay hundreds of dollars per person for a simple afternoon or morning visit). On the other hand, professional astronomers, telescope operators and students make their way up to provide the quality observational data that we need to understand how the Universe, their galaxies, stars and planets formed and evolved. The differences between the two "groups" are actually quite striking: it's not just the clothes, which clearly help to distinguish both, or the fact that most tourists either come on 4 wheel-drive buses or on (very unsafe) two-wheel drive cars (and dressing like they were ready to go surfing at sea level...). The greatest, most striking difference actually comes from the current "economic climate": while the tourist business is on an unprecedented high, and keeps growing - despite the inflated high prices per person - the astronomy "business" seems to be breathing a much more rarefied air and the most important word, here, seems to be "withdraw". Now the paradox is even clearer when one realizes that actually, at least a large part of the money that tourist companies are making comes directly from the telescopes. Mauna Kea is an impressive site, but the largest, most sophisticated telescopes in the World siting on the top of it make Mauna Kea more than a nice place to visit; it makes the mountain unique and worth paying the 200$/person. So why do these two worlds (of tourists and astronomers) keep living their lives as if they had nothing in common and how long will it take for they to realize that, whilst they depend on each other, only together will they be able to survive and get the best of both worlds?

The Blue Moon and the Full Earth

It was mid-August in the middle of the Pacific, in what is supposed to be the most isolated group of islands in the entire planet. Well, on Earth at least. The third (actually, 30th in total) and last night of the August observing run was coming to an end and the data obtained so far couldn't be better. So with the telescope observing the last target of the night, and with virtually no wind outside (and a scalding 3ºC outside), going for a walk felt like quite a natural thing to do. Of course, in a completely "dark night" (new moon), it's not that easy to know where you are going. Outside the telescopes it's always absolutely dark (well, unless when there are dumb crazy tourists around which clearly can't read...), except for the faint and distant lights coming from Hilo at sea level, which make up for quite a spectacle when the "down-sky" is clear - which was not quite the case for that night. Of course, using the amazing near-infrared view (a sort of army-style thing which makes everything look green) gives you an absolutely different view of the outside. Despite the relatively low temperatures around 0ºC, things are sufficiently warm to make them visible in the near-infrared; not quite the great multi-colour daylight view (as the one in the photo at sunset), but definitely better than walking in pitch black conditions. More than that: it really reveals the breathtaking spectacle of light in the sky, with hundreds of thousands of stars shinning all over the place and with constant shooting stars making the sky look even brighter at times. Soon enough, the proximity of the sunset starts to fill the horizon with light, and that's when your eyes are inevitability drawn to it, only to realize that, actually, there is something there already. Already above the horizon and covered in a faint blue colour, but just bright enough to recognize its "oceans". The moon had risen just minutes before the sunset, and whilst its illuminated side was hidden from the Earth (it was new moon after all), you could see it so clearly. That's when you realise why you can actually see it: whilst there is no sun-light illuminating the moon's visible side, the entire "dark" face is exposed to the entire Earth. It's "full Earth", the moon would say, and being in a place in the middle of an Ocean as large as the Pacific, there's enough light being reflected in the ocean's surface to actually illuminate the moon, making its entire surface visible if you are in a dark enough place. Such as Mauna Kea in Hawaii.

The usually amazing sunrise followed within minutes, as all telescopes closed their domes: once again, the day was simultaneously starting and finishing on Earth. But after seeing my first "blue moon", I couldn't help but thinking how remarkable it would be to see that blue light directly. I mean, the full moon is really great (well, not so great if your "job" depends on observing faint sources in the sky...), but the full Earth, that's on a completely different level.

A really long day; from the beach in Waikiki to George Square in Edinburgh: I

How long can long be? That was something I really wasn't thinking about by the time the longest day in my life was over. Not only because time itself is clearly relative (you would probably agree with this; even if Einstein's relativity is nothing more than a set of odd-chinese symbols which you really don't understand - or even want to), but mostly because after being awake for almost 50 hours (rest-frame!), all you want is to finally collapse in your bed and sleep. This is particularly true if those 50 hours included getting up early (after coming down from a week of telescope fun at 4 km) for a nice run along the beaches of Waikiki followed by an entire day of competitive volleyball and ended with 2 tutorials in Edinburgh.

Apparently, I take the "experimental" approach quite seriously (ok, not as seriously as Newton; at least I don't plan to stick needles into my eyes like he used to!), especially to prove that a lot of things that we take for granted are either wrong or nonsense. Yes, we are sort of "cultural" beings, and apparently mankind is addicted to routines, prescriptions and recipes, but that doesn't mean things are the way they are because they have to; it simply means they are the way they are because we do it like that. Surely things can work as well - or better - if we take a completely different approach. Further developments on these issues will probably be addressed later in 2010, exploring similar topics, from food to the way we live in society (so stay tuned if you want to know how to bake awesome cakes without any fat or eggs - or even without sugar; or if you want to find out how many calories the so-called "light" drinks really have, among many other things). For now, lets get back to the really, really (really) long day; or, rather, what happened just before that.


It was the beginning of March 2009, and my longest observing run had come to an end (9 nights in Mauna Kea). For many people, that would have been the end of a nightmare, but for me (maybe because I like the felling of being different?), it was actually just the end of another great time. Sure it was cold up there - it even rained and I got snowed on there for the first time - and more than half of the nights were lost due to weather (but hey, at least I got to take and "make" the pretty pictures shown here through a really thick cloud layer!); but being up there for 9 nights and feeling great after it was quite a nice thing to take with me. That was probably because of how peaceful and dry (humidifier: off) Mauna Kea is - perfect sleeping conditions I reckon (although the brits would say otherwise), but that is probably just a result of being Portuguese (not genes, environment!).



Of course, by the time I left Mauna Kea the sky was looking great (it didn't the night before when I was trying to get some nice data... but hey, I blame Murphy!), almost perfect blue skies, and impeccable visibility - you could see all the way down to the hawaiian-well-behaved-volcano and the smoke caused by the lava falling into the Pacific ocean and doing its daily-job of making the Big Island of Hawaii larger and larger. It was probably the first time I actually saw some nice sun shinning in Hilo (although, of course, that probably didn't last...), which made the flight to Honolulu a really pleasant journey, at least as far as the amazing views were concerned. That and the fact that I had 3 days planned in Waikiki before coming back to the giant fridge called Edinburgh, of course; and yes, the last of those days was the one that actually lasted for quite a long time, and became the longest day of my life.

(Stay tuned for the next "episode", starting with a nice run along the beach to a full afternoon of non-stop volleyball, an evening flight to New York with an entire afternoon to kill - allowing you to walk around "the city" for more than 5 hours, flying back to Edinburgh, getting your bags home, hit the gym, then go to work, where you mark more than 50 assignments, go on and teach for 2 hours, and only then get home and say "this day is no more"!).

Every story has a beginning

The life of an astronomer (or, rather, of an astronomer-wanna-be) may well be miles away from the excitement, adrenaline and glamour of many other "occupations" in the modern world, but it does not go without a remarkable hint of adventure. Particularly if you are "into" the observational side of things (meaning if you actually care about the "real Universe", instead of studying well-behaved, human-created [fake] universes), your chances of "adventurous episodes" rise significantly, mostly because you might well get the chance to travel to remote places, meet hundreds of different people, and get to know so many different countries, cultures and languages.



So this fresh, newly-created blog is a simple result of a significant piling of out-of-the-ordinary life episodes in the last couple of years; they probably deserve to be written in some form, at least so that I can guarantee that I won't forget the details and come up with a totally different story when I think of them in 10 or 20 years. These episodes will include absolute box-office-hits such as "The sudden Scot move", "The Airfrance-Mercure-Paris-bugs-everywhere adventures", "Emergency landings", "Cooking with whatever there is", "The hawaiian adventures" and "How to go from Portugal to spain with no gas".



Of course, due to the (apparent) rebellious(ish) nature of the "writer", this blog will also include very odd ideas and thoughts about life, science, astronomy and many other areas, including great (or not-so-great) life tips!

So stay tuned (if you ever get tuned!), and let's start this!