A country that remembers the sea

#EuropeanTravel

#Portugal
#Lisbon
#MaritimeMuseum

A Country That Remembers the Sea

I visited the Maritime Museum next to the Jerónimo Monastery. The early morning air was unusually calm. White clouds drifted slowly over the cathedral spire, and below them, I walked along the old stone walls into the Maritime Museum.

As the bells of the monastery faded, my heart gradually turned toward the sea. There, the memories of a country that once set sail for the world slumbered.

Inside the exhibition hall lay a small compass, an old sailing log, and a worn ocean current chart.

These were not mere objects. They were fragments of the human will to venture into the unknown, fragments of the heart, a mixture of fear and excitement.
Standing before it, I suddenly realized that Portugal was not simply a land nation, but a nation that believed in the sea...

The sails of the model sailboat were covered with the dust of time instead of wind, but even within that, the breath of the waves still lived.

In this small exhibition hall, the sea of centuries past, the life of thousands of young people, was alive. The navigators seemed to still be lingering,
with their dreams.

The footsteps of those who set out for the sea were brilliant, but the path was always one of danger and longing.

Nevertheless, they pressed on.
With the sole belief that the world was round, they sailed toward an unknown continent. That belief was a sail of spirit broader than a map and stronger than a ship.

As I left the last room of the museum, a phrase on the wall caught my eye. "The sea gave us everything, and it took everything away." For a moment, those words echoed like waves in my mind.

When I stepped outside, the Lisbon sky was once again azure, and the Tagus River sparkled in the sunlight in the distance.

The wind still blew over those waves, and that wind whispered to me.
The waves do not forget. The sea always remembers, and a single dot on the compass can change the direction of the world. Today, I am wandering through the pages of Portuguese history, reflecting on the long time I loved waves.
(2025.10.26)