Page 107 - SpontaneousSuccessMatos

And so, that evening, I found myself in the company
of Cousin Bernard, who turns out to be the senior
menswear buyer for Eaton's, a century-old Canadian
department chain with more than 200 stores across the
country.
Back in Portugal, it took a while to complete all the
medical exams and paperwork, but, at 1:30 pm on
Friday, August 15th, 1975, I boarded Canadian Pacific
Flight 223 from Lisbon to Toronto with one thousand
and sixty US dollars, the maximum allowed by the
currency restrictions imposed by the new government,
and one third of a ton of excess baggage. I was twenty-
nine.
In Portugal, I'd made a handsome income as a
fashion and advertising photographer. That morning,
though, I bid farewell to my four-bedroom apartment by
the ocean. Twelve hours later, I was washing my socks in
the sink of a one-room unit in a Toronto rooming house.
I made a list of my resources. Hasselblad cameras,
flash meters, a portfolio, a healthy body, a goal, a
payphone in the corridor—first and last month paid up,
six hundred dollars left—and one hot contact. Cousin
Bernard.
At 9:30 am on a bright Toronto morning, I went to
the payphone and called Cousin Bernard.
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