Kitchy
Banned
My great grandfather was Manuel Antonio Furtado, a whaling captain from the Azores, in Portugal. [ Faial] My grandfather, at age 13, jumped off the whaling ship in the San Francisco Bay, swam to shore, and made his way to the new world. He ended up in Madeira California, with a large successful dairy farm. He went back to the Azores and brought his bride, Olympia Costa, back to California in 1910 0r so.
There was a very large Portuguese community in Stockton/Madeira area. Very kind, family oriented, hard working stock.
My father had a tin-plate portrait photo of his grandfather, the whaling captain. He had an earring, and I was told he had it pierced as a sign that he crossed the equator.
Very cool family story, KD! "muito romantico" .
Nelly Furtado's family is from the Azores. You are probably distant relatives!
(I thought I posted her "say it right" video in one of those links, but they were both of cristiano, so i must have clipped and grabbed the same one twice)
I have been through Stockton and Madera (Madeira) before when in college or afterwards. I had a few friends from the Centro Valle Stockton/Modesto/Visalia - farmer/orchard/dairy kids of long family history in those areas. Swiss Italians, Portuguese and Swiss. To think of someone from Azores, such beautiful coasts, being stuck in central valley is shocking, but they made well in agriculture and ranching in those areas. (There are a lot of central valley expats here in Northern Nevada).
V - I remember that period of time in Algeria. I think that is what Turkey is battling now - my friend Altan said that they are fighting against Sharia laws, radical Islam.