Page 19 - SpontaneousSuccessMatos

Chapter 3
One Door Closes
It was a moment that would change everything.
June 14th, 1967. I was just three months shy of my
twenty-first birthday, and I'd just walked away from a
lucrative job in advertising. London was behind me, and
the open road was calling. I was bound for the Algarve
coast of Portugal, where the sun dipped into the Atlantic
and the villages were frozen in time.
My mission, shared with three friends, was to open a
discotheque in the idyllic fishing village of Praia de
Lavanda. But fate had other plans. The local builder, a
grizzled man with a face like worn leather and a
mouthful of missing teeth, raised his price, and our
dream was shattered. My friends chose to return to
London, but I stayed, driven by a restless curiosity and
the belief that when one door closes, another one opens.
I found a cozy room in a fisherman's cottage
overlooking a tiny beach. Every morning, I awoke to the
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