As it happens with many animals, sometimes Man needs to show off. Sometimes he does it in a positive way, that is, he decides on demanding objectives for himself, he tries hard to achieve them and naturally becomes famous for his actions. Some other times he does this in a negative way, underestimating the qualities of those around him, looking down upon them, ridicule them, so that he can puff himself more easily.
 
It’s funny that in a small country like Portugal the residents of Lisbon emphasize the events of the capital city, and treat as secondary everything that takes place in the rest of the country, which they call the province.
 
On the other hand, the men from the north, specially from Oporto and the coastland from Aveiro upward, try to enhance the quality of their work, their entrepreneurial dynamic, and confer upon the people of the capital a mere political role.
 
Besides this, the people from Braga look down on the ones from Guimarães, and vice-versa. The people from Lever and Crestuma are rivals. The people from Funchal underestimate the ones who live in Porto Santo and vice versa. The people from Cascais seem to feel superior to those of Lisbon, and these call them snobs. And some thousand, or even millions, of Portuguese tell jokes about the people from Alentejo.
 
People who live in certain regions obviously assume different characteristics. But in a country with the dimensions of ours, these differences can’t be that big. And, whatever their dimensions may be, we will naturally be more constructive if we get together in the things we have in common and stay away from the differences.
 
The people from Alentejo, for example, because of their Arabic ancestry, the characteristics of the climate of their region, the kind of communities they have created, and many others, don’t look like the people from Trás-os-Montes, Beira, the Azores and the rest of Portugal. Of course.
 
But it is extremely unfair to condemn the men from that region, all of them, as idle or mentally retarded. In Alentejo, as well as in other regions, there are hardworking men and very intelligent people, capable of establishing ambitious aims for themselves and working hard to reach them. They are able to contribute, as a group,  to the establishment of ambitious aims for the Portuguese, and to work hard, as a group, to reach them.
 
In a time in which we search for equality among Europeans, praise the open spirit of the countries from the east, admire the fight against racial segregation in South Africa, at home we disagree with and stay away from each other and ridicule others with jokes. In other words, we segregate each other.
 
One might say: "Well, well, they're just small unimportant jokes." Are they? Does anybody like being ridiculed? Are jokes small and funny for those who tell them or for those who are ridiculed?
And if we want union and peace among populations, regions and people, why don't we start contributing ourselves to that union and to that peace? To stop telling jokes about the people from Alentejo might be a small symbolic action, even very easy to perform, but it's something very constructive.
 
And then? Can't we think together about the problems of the people from Alentejo (as well as from the other regions) and try to find appropriate solutions and develop the actions required for its economic, agricultural, social and cultural development?
 
Let's just think: if we rented Alentejo to the Israelites for a period of ten or twenty years, what they could do there! The men who created the biggest orange gardens of the world in the desert, in a region that was devastated by war of fratricide, what could they do among us?
 
In "our" Alentejo there is neither desert, nor war. Will the people there be able to reach a capacity of achievement similar to the Israelites in Neguev? And how can we, the rest of the Portuguese, support them? 
 

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