On May 17 2014, Portugal abandoned the recovery program solicited to Troika (European Commission, Central European Bank and International Monetary Fund). After a 3-year recession and a fiscal consolidation based on an austerity program, the European legacy of equality, human rights and solidarity was discarded and the problems got worse. A report from the United Nations confirms that foreign aid has had an adverse impact on social, economic and cultural rights, and warned that the country is in a path of underdevelopment: The risk of social exclusion has increased, there are more poor children and who is poor is further away from ceasing to be. Austerity has come to stay. Portugal, from January to August 2014. BSC

By decision of the Bishop of Porto, Albino Reis was sworn in on 9 November as pastor of Canelas, but a large group of citizens always challenged the substitution of Father Roberto, his predecessor. The movement “The community reacts!” was formed in his support and most of the parishioners stopped attending the Sunday Masses. They assemble now at the church door with black flags and chant slogans such as “Father is just a Roberto and no other” or “The church went to court, they only come out with police escort.” A scenario of protest, and challenge to the new parish priest, that repeats every Sunday. Canelas, Vila Nova de Gaia, November 2014. AG

A combination of long and powerful legs, deep chest, flexible spine and athletic bearing, allows greyhounds to reach running speeds of over 65 kilometers per hour. In Portugal, the races began more than half a century ago, the most controversial being the Release of the Hares, who are chased by greyhounds in open field. Often to death.Between 2007 and 2011, these competitions were suspended but the Court of Appeal of Porto eventually decided that greyhound sports racing with live hares does not infringe the law relative to hunting. Of the two that took place in 2014, one was held in Parada, in Vila do Conde county. North of Portugal, 2014. RDS

After years of study, he seeks a job, a temporary occupation. Reduced to statistics, to a curriculum vitae and defeated by permanent feelings of inadequacy, he now closes himself in his room smoking drugs or drinking beer during PlayStation marathons. The country does not allow for him to be an adult, but he no longer knows how to be a child. Bundled with a shawl, the grandmother takes care of household chores and maintains unwavering faith in a better future as they both share the same space degraded by the erosion of years. This is the picture of a country of austerity, poverty and of growing discouragement. Of the different generations that meet, live with and support each other, facing the drama of youth unemployment and pensions below the national minimum wage. Braga, 2013–2014. JMGS

After a unique summer, tourism in the city of Porto continues high and in 2014 broke all records. Regardless of the time of year, Porto is increasingly seen as a tourist destination, as evidenced by the "Best European Destination" in 2012 and 2014 by "European Consumers Choice". A scenario that has a world scale, with almost 5 million overnight stays registered in 2014, and which fills people from all corners of the world. An "invasion" which, even then, does not make it impossible to find the peace, silence and solitude of other times in the streets of the area classified by Unesco as a World Heritage Site. Porto, 2014. RDS

About 500 thousand Portuguese need food aid to combat hunger. They resort to Private Institutions of Social Solidarity, the Food Bank, vans that distribute food to the homeless through the country’s streets, or still to social canteens that everyday offer hundreds of meals. And at a time when aid applications far outweigh the ability to support the associations, the times are not rare in which hunger and despair lead people to rummage in other people’s garbage looking for something that can fool the stomach. Porto, December 2014. RMO

At first, the posters were mere information for the photographer. Looked at the amalgam of some glued to each other to choose the concert or play that he did not want to miss. Afterwards, they became artistic images, which could no longer be seen in the same way. Somebody had torn them. There is a missing eye, a screaming mouth, a piece of wall that was already there. Suddenly the thoughtless act creates a new and fantastic universe. A new reality that, framed by the photographer’s eye, seems to gain an intention that perhaps never existed. To tear is here, more than ever, to give new life to what already existed. Porto, Lisbon, 2012–2014. PP

Over the past few years the circus has gone from being the “greatest show on Earth” to become a diversion that goes from place to place without the viewers realizing, in most cases, that the artists run real life risks every time they go on stage. Since the beginning of 2014, the photographer followed the lives of 25 circuses, a total of 80 visits made from north to south, including Madeira, to see firsthand the efforts that these men and women make. Some numbers continue to leave the viewers flabbergasted, which makes the circus owners continue to assert that this remains the greatest show on Earth. Portugal – different cities and towns, 2014. FS

Over the past few years the circus has gone from being the “greatest show on Earth” to become a diversion that goes from place to place without the viewers realizing, in most cases, that the artists run real life risks every time they go on stage. Since the beginning of 2014, the photographer followed the lives of 25 circuses, a total of 80 visits made from north to south, including Madeira, to see firsthand the efforts that these men and women make. Some numbers continue to leave the viewers flabbergasted, which makes the circus owners continue to assert that this remains the greatest show on Earth. Portugal – different cities and towns, 2014. FS

The Ceras – Study and Recovery Center of Wild Animals, in Castelo Branco, sometimes receives injured or poisoned animals that eventually die or have to be slaughtered. After the autopsy, the heads of these animals are frozen and used for interns and volunteers to become comfortable with local species in order to later identify the species in various states of development. Castelo Branco, 2014. DR

Imaginarium is a story about the inner world of blind or partially sighted children. They were asked how they imagined and they answered back with remarkable self-portraits. They showed things they were not able to see. This concept of imagination raises the question of what it means to be blind and how to figure it out can go through going beyond the limits of the visible and into the invisible. The photographs were taken in Poland in the center for blind children in Laski, a small town near Warsaw. The “Imaginarium” project is still in development and aims to involve the largest number of blind people from different countries, cultures and ages. Laski, Poland, 2014. NS

Created in 2012 in the US as an event to promote health and happiness, Color Run exists already in more than 30 countries and 170 cities. In Cascais, on May 17, 14 thousand participants painted with colour, joy and enthusiasm the coastal avenue. Starting in groups of approximately a thousand people, everything is allowed: run, walk, crawl or even to compete in a wheelchair. In every kilometer of the route there is a color thrown at all. And as if it were Carnival, nobody takes this the wrong way. Parede, Cascais, May 2014. APS

Controversies and protests against the massive spending on the production of the 2014 FIFA World don’t undermine the Brazilian faith in an equality that is generated by football. When there is a ball involved, there is no age, gender, social status or land that can hinder what arises from those feet. Even away from the stadiums and the spotlight, it is the purity of the game that spreads through mud camps, slums, dilapidated buildings, or on the beach under the eye of Christ the Redeemer. It is the faith of the division of cleats, the patched balls that continues to fill the world’s collective imaginary as the visceral relationship of the Brazilians with soccer. In the name of the Father, the Son and the Holy Ghost of football. Amen. Brazil, March 2014. DR

“A healthy mind in a healthy body” is a maxim that applies to the life experience of Stanislav Nosov, Russian naturalized Portuguese that with the demise of the Soviet Union, starved, stole to survive and immigrated to Portugal, where he found in the “Street Workout” the board of balance and salvation. In the meantime he joined the world of drugs, destroying the professional career in athletics. In Braga, Portugal, he rediscovered himself through the practice of that sort of exercise, which he currently teaches to citizens from all around the world in order to promote a healthy and active lifestyle, free from the same errors that he committed in the past. Braga, 2012–2014. GD

All over the world there is a ship built in the shipyards of Viana do Castelo. From the Faroe Islands to the United States, about 220 boats have the logo of the largest Portuguese shipbuilding company. In business since 1944, the yards are a reference of the shipbuilding industry in such diverse works as “ferry boats”, cruise and fishing ships, container ships and tugboats. In January 2014, the Portuguese government privatized the company by signing a concession agreement with West Sea, a company that has at its service 130 workers, mostly former employees of the shipyards of Viana do Castelo. July, 2007. APS