Following the Picture

by AnnMary Mailyan (Armenia)

I didn't expect to find Armenia

Once upon a time, in November 2017, more precisely, we started a trip to an unexpected destinations-Portugal. Unexpected it was because of one simple reason: I never thought about going there, it never belonged to my travel list. However, one picture changed everything. Looking through the photos of Portugal I came across something very familiar. A picture of an underground tower, a picture I’ve had in my phone for years as a teenager, without even knowing anything about it. I decided to follow my dream and the trip was on. We went to Lisbon and spent a few days in there. I can surely say that it was a love at first sight. Despite the cloudy weather, it was the lightest and most positive place I’ve ever been, a place where you felt safe and relaxed. Not far from Lisbon there’s a little town called Sintra, which is all surrounded by forests. And if it’s not the definition of mystery, I don’t know what it is. The first thing that caused mystery among people is Pena Palace, a royal palace on the top of a hill, which had the habit of disappearing from sight every now and then. Second thing was the antique house deep in the woods, which was considered to be witches’ house for long years. People still talk of how their ancestors would swear their lives, that they occasionally saw witches fly out of the house through windows and the chimney. The big amount of thunderstorms over the house added more suspicion to people. Nowadays people look more easily on that, but the fear of supernatural still exists among them. And now we’ve finally come to the place. Quinta da Regaleira. An ancient estate, consisting of an antique mansion and a huge park with fountains, chapels and grottoes. Everything is built in Gothic style, which makes the place more mysterious. There are obviously lots of myths and legends about it, partly because the mansion belonged to Masons and later to an alchemist. Nowadays people put on the play “Midsummer Night's Dreams” of Shakespeare in there and you can actually follow along the story-line, wander in beautifully decorated park and see the magic for yourself. As you’ve probably guessed, the underground tower was also in here. I’m not even sure, that I can describe it properly, because it’s one of those places, where words fail to express what you’ve experienced there. It was a dream-come-true moment. Seeing it in real life was one of the happiest days of my life. Apparently, there was a legend about this place too. A ritual to the Masonic enlightenment: if you go down through the tower and then climb all the way up to the top you will become enlightened. Going down was easy, going up though was the opposite. However, the view was rewarding: the whole tower from above covered in moss, which was in such a harmony with the spiral form of the tower. All old and mysterious, a scene straight from a fantasy movie. As I went back to the park I found myself in a whole different place, a different era, I’d say. The day turned to twilight, the fireflies were all around the air. The butterflies were fluttering around the blossomed flowers, which seemed bigger and brighter despite the darkness. All people have disappeared, and you could only hear cawing of crows, the sound of water in fountains and the wind, playing with the branches of trees. The lights of old lamps and the fireflies were reflected on water and it felt like the whole place was covered in magical twinkle lights, both from above and below. Suddenly I realized I was in a play, and not just any play, but in Midsummer Night’s Dream. The fairies were flying in the air, the mansion felt like coming alive, everything was becoming stranger and stranger with every second. I appeared in a fantasy place, a place where everything’s possible, where magic existed and all dreams came true. I never expected that one picture could bring me to such a wonderful and magical place. Even if the half of this happened just in my imagination…