Portugal {Catarina Lima}

[port]

(((My Reflection)))

Nation: República Portuguesa

Name: Catarina Sonia Santos Lima

Gender: Female

Appearance Age: Early-Mid Twenties

Hair Color: Dark Brown

Eye Color: Cornflower Blue

Height: 5'8" (171.5 cm)

Weight: 144 lbs (65.3 kg)

Appearance:

Catarina appears to be a young woman of a more-than-average height, her body long in the legs with a high waist. Overall, she seems to be rather well-proportioned, with just a bit of soft fat covering hard, lean muscles from centuries of fighting. Her body is all carefully generous curves and slight dips- it would be impossible for her to masquerade as a man, even with binding and good make-up.

She was blessed with features that are symmetrical and proportioned well enough to be considered attractive throughout most of history, weight and height notwithstanding. Her lips are full, though not overly so, the lower slightly more so than the top, and her nose is long and thin, the tip rounded rather than pointy. Her cheekbones are high, leaving her cheeks slightly gaunt, and her soft blue eyes are framed with long, dark lashes. Her hair parts directly in the middle of her hairline, swept to either side to keep the long brown strands out of her eyes, and falls down her back in soft waves, neatly reaching mid-back.

She tends to wear clothes reminiscent of her pirating days, with full, feathered hats and elaborate jackets with detailed stitching, though the leggings she formerly wore have been changed to simple, tight jeans, cutting off either just below the ankle so that they cover her tall heels, or at mid-calf, showing the tail-end of a simple tattoo, all dark twining lines reminiscent of a celtic design. Underneath the jackets, she likes to wear simple tank tops or shirts, depending on the weather, always in mild colors like mint or lavender.

(((Know Thyself )))

Personality:

When it comes down to it, Catarina is not a very complicated woman. Oh, to be sure, she's as complex as any human with half a personality, but past that, she's really very simple.

Generally, Catarina is very calm, even in high-stress situations. She's learned over the years that it's best to just sit back and let whatever is going to happen happen, and then do her best to salvage the situation from whatever calamity has befallen. She's a good-natured person, pleasant to be around and to talk to, though sometimes she will say things that just sound a little... off, as if she's not entirely seated in her own mind. She's always quietly amused about one thing or another, whether it's entirely appropriate or not.

She loves to kick back and have a good time, and though her idea of fun is often less rambunctious than that of her neighbor and his friends, that doesn't mean that she doesn't like to pull pranks or cause trouble on occasion. In fact, nothing is more entertaining to her than a good fight with someone who knows what they're doing and who won't pull their punches just because she's a woman.

When it's time to get serious, Catarina generally gets down to business pretty quickly, and can be fierce, though she's rarely loud about it. She tends to dance around confrontations, though, to save herself and others a lot of trouble. Still, if it obviously can't be avoided, then she will be right on the front lines of the fight... as long as it happens to be any of her business.

If she knew someone as a child, then she tends to be a bit protective of them, as well as very affectionate, though she will also be harsher on them if she raised them and knows that they know how to behave better than they are behaving. She tends to act a bit like a mother towards younger nations, though she kindly leaves off the lectures and leans more towards the comforting and enabling trends.

And of course, as a former pirate and a former Empire, Catarina loves nothing in the world more than a lovely bit of warm, shining gold.

Likes:

★ Tomatoes
★ Antonio
★ Dancing
★ Arthur
★ Rain
★ Gold
★ Pirating
★ Angels
★ The Church
★ Crosses
★ The Ocean
★ Colonies
★ Children
★ Fighting


Dislikes:

✖ Boredom
✖ Peacetime
✖ The Ottoman Empire
✖ The Navy
✖ Agnosticism
✖ Humidity
✖ Layers
✖ Loud Noises
✖ Swimming
✖ Silver
✖ Small Animals
✖ Fake Leather
✖ Pudding
✖ Idiots



Fears:

☣ Being left completely alone- she had a large empire, and when you're an empire, well, you don't really remember what being alone is like.
☣ Earthquakes. After Lisbon, whenever she feels a tremor she tends to have a miniature panic attack.
☣ Fire, again due to Lisbon and because burning is painful and she quite simply does not like it.
☣ Losing her treaty with England- though it's been off and on, it has managed to last 600 years. She would be devastated if she lost that alliance, or that friendship.
☣ Losing Spain- despite conflicts and differences, he is still her a close neighbor, and just because she doesn't want to be part of his nation doesn't mean she doesn't want him around anyways.


Secrets:

♦ She was planning on granting independence to all of her colonies even in the beginning, but she went a little power-crazy. She did love them like her own children, however.
♦ She still wears a pirate hat and pirate clothes not because she particularly likes how they look on her (though, really, that's a plus), but because she misses her pirating days. And the gold.
♦ She may have a tiny little crush on a certain Brit, but it's never really going to go anywhere, and she knows it. Still. He's very cute.
♦ She abhors drama. But if you give her a drama-less fight, well, she's all for that.


Strengths:

✓ Practicality of a rather ruthless sort.
✓ Patience with children.
✓ Flirting, because let's face it, she grew up with Spain and France, and she's good at it.
✓ Settling for less than what she wants when it is needed.
✓ Hiding hurt feelings, or just not getting her feelings hurt at all.
✓ Fighting.

Weaknesses:

✘ Stubbornness, especially when it comes to petty fights with Spain or Brazil.
✘ Pride, as one does not escape being an Empire without massive amounts of it.
✘ Gold. Just... gold. Flash it, and she is yours.
✘ Fire and the smell of things burning. It makes her nauseated.
✘ Brazil. Brazil was always her favorite, and, well... she has a soft spot for the brat.

(((The Pages of History )))

History:

~ 219 BC: The first Roman invasion of the Iberian peninsula occurs. Over the next 200 years, almost all of the peninsula belongs to Rome. {Rome finds what is now Portugal as a small little proto-nation and names her Lusitania.}

~ 584 AD: The Visigoths conquer Lusitania after it has, for some time, been occupied by the Suevi, another Germanic tribe. {Germania, as he does, decides to steal Rome's children and toss them around from tribe to tribe.}

~ 711 AD: The Islamic Moors from North Africa invade the Iberian peninsula, utterly driving out the Visigoth Kingdom. {Lusitania changes hands yet again, and she's starting to get rather tired of it.}

~ 722 AD: The Arian Christian Reconquista begins. {More fighting, and Lusitania is less than interested.}

~ 868 AD: Count Vimara Peres reconquers part of Lusitania and renames it Portucale, or in other words, Portugal. {Lusitania changes hands yet again and gains a new name, Portucale, and while she thinks it's rather silly, it's also nice not to have another, larger nation breathing down her neck all the time.}

~ 1065 AD: Portucale becomes part of the Kingdom of Galicia and Portugal under the rule of Garcia II. This is the first time it is an independent nation by law. {Portugal and Galicia agree that being owned sucks, and team up to become a nation of their own.}

~ 1072 AD: The Kingdom of Galicia and Portugal rejoins the larger Kingdom of Leon due to feudal power struggles. {Portugal and Galicia can't hack it and return to Leon. Portugal is still a little feisty, though, from having been able to govern herself.}

~ 1095 AD: Due to a political marriage, Portugal separates almost completely from Galicia, though is still in the Kingdom of Leon. {Portugal takes one more step towards what seems like the freedom she's never really going to have.}

~ 1122 AD: Afonso Henriques, the young Count of Portugal, raises up an army to take back Portugal from his own mother, who had exiled him.

~ 1128 AD: Afonso Henriques overcomes the troops under his mother's lover and ally Count Fernando Peres de Trava of Galicia at the Battle of São Mamede. He declares himself Prince of Portugal. {Portugal is rather saddened by the fighting of her people, much less ones who are related to each other.}

~ 1139 AD: Afonso manages a huge victory against the Moors in the Battle of Ourique. His soldiers declare him King of Portugal, and Portugal becomes a Kingdom now in its own right. {Suddenly, Portugal is a Nation, rather than a vassal county of a larger Kingdom. Words cannot describe her happiness- or, really, her smugness when she sees Galicia next.}

~ 1143 AD: After years of bitter fighting and struggles, the Kingdom of Leon finally acknowledges the independence of Portugal. {Portugal is recognized as independent by the rest of the Iberian Peninsula and pledges her loyalty to the Pope.}

~ 1250 AD: The last of Portugal is finally reclaimed from the Moors, ending the Portuguese Reconquista 250 years before the Spanish Reconquista is ended. {Portugal loves her neighbor like a brother, truly, but she can't help but be satisfied that she got all of her land back before he did his.}

~ 1386 AD: The Treaty of Windsor is signed, allying Portugal and England. {Most people nowadays call it a marriage, but Portugal was a little too young for that back then- all she knows is that England was, and is, her closest friend and ally.}

~ 1415 AD: The Portuguese Empire begins with the Portuguese Armada goes to North Africa and conquers the city 'Cueta' on the coast directly across from Gibraltar. {Honestly, Portugal gets a little power-hungry, and, well, conquering is in her blood.}

~ 1420 AD: Madeira Island is claimed and colonized by Portugal.

~ 1445 AD: The Azorean islands are colonized by Portugal. The Canary Islands are also discovered, but the Portuguese refrain from colonizing them.

~ 1448 AD: Portugal builds a small castle on an island off the coast of Mauritania, and uses it as a trading post for commerce with inland Africa. {Portugal discovers African gold and, quite frankly, falls in love with the stuff.}

~ 1484 AD: Portugal rejects Christopher Columbus' idea of reaching India from the west. {Really, it's silly- clearly, to reach India quicker, you should go East. At least, that was Portugal's reasoning.}

~ 1489 AD: The King of Bemobi gives his realms to the Portuguese King and becomes Christian.

~ 1494 AD: Portugal signs the Treaty of Tordesillas with Spain in 1494. The treaty divides the entire world equally between the Spanish and the Portuguese, with all lands east of the line they make belonging to Portugal, and all lands west belong to Spain. {They're a little ambitious, but Portugal thinks she would love to rule the world with her neighbor.}

~ 1495 AD: Pêro de Barcelos and João Fernandes Lavrador finish their exploration of North America, while Pêro da Covilhã manages to reach Ethiopoia by land.

~ 1500 AD: Pedro Álvares Cabral and his entourage of ships land on what will later become Brazil, claiming the land for Portugal. {Portugal thinks she sees a little girl, but puts it out of her mind for the moment; she's got other things to worry about, like conquering the world.}

~ 1510 AD: Afonso de Albuquerque, after attempting and failing to capture and occupy Calicut militarily, conquers Goa on the west coast of India instead, and Portugal becomes the first civilization to practice what we now consider 'Globalization'.

~ 1530 AD: São Vicente, the first permanent Portuguese settlement, is established. {Portugal finally meets the little girl, and is suitably charmed by the cute thing, but doesn't press the issue when the girl wishes to stay in the forests- eventually, she thinks, the little girl will come to her.}

~ 1549 AD: Salvador da Bahia is founded as the first colonial capital of Brazil, and Brazil is made formally into a single colony. {Portugal takes the girl- Brazil- into her home and tries to teach the wild child her ways. Admittedly, she doesn't enforce them very well, since she can't be there all the time.}

~ 1580 AD: Spain invades Portugal after a confusion determining who is the next king in line, and the Spanish and Portuguese Empires come under a single rule. {Portugal is extremely displeased with her neighbor and disowns him for a short period of time, as she struggles against Spanish rule.}

~ 1580 - 1640 AD: Portugal's wealth declines, and the relationship between Portugal and England starts to deteriorate due to Spain's ongoing war with England and Portugal having no choice but to fight alongside the nation that claims it. {Portugal, as a nation, begins to sink- Portugal as a woman fights, frustrated and unwilling to lose her empire.}

~ 1590 AD: {Portugal comes across an island while she's sailing and affectionately nicknames it 'Ilha Formosa' - beautiful Island.}

~ 1624 AD: The Dutch conquer the capital of Brazil, and a few years later, Pernambuco, though the latter is returned through a treaty nearly three decades later. {The Netherlands makes himself a distinct enemy, for a short period of time.}

~ 1640 AD: The Iberian Union is dissipated, and Portugal launches a war to become its own nation once more. {Portugal decides that Spain is being ridiculous and finally starts to fight seriously.}

~ 1668 AD: Spain finally recognizes Portugal's independence.

~ 1762 AD: France and Spain attempt to force Portugal to join the Bourbon Family Compact. Later that year, they invade Portugal from the north, but the arrival of British Troops drives them back. {If anything, this only strengthens her friendship with England, and when Spain returns Almeida to her a year later, she barely speaks to him.}

~ 1775 AD: After years of relative peace in terms of politics, the capital of Portugal, Lisbon, is hit by an earthquake (estimated now to be a magnitude 9 on the Richter scale), which is followed by a tsunami and persistent fires that burn the city to the ground.

~ 1776 AD: Lisbon is rebuilt with some of what may have been the first earthquake-resistant buildings. {Every time the earth trembles, Portugal fears the earthquake has returned.}

~ 1801 AD: France and Spain give Portugal an ultimatum involving breaking off the treaty with England. A negotiator is sent to Madrid, but Spain and 15000 French soldiers invade anyways. A Prussian General is contracted, but it doesn't make much of a difference. Portugal is forced to concede and break off the treaty with England. {This, to Portugal, is a great personal loss, but she refuses to halt all interactions with England on a personal level.}

~ 1806 AD: Portugal tentatively caves in to commands from France that war be declared on England. However, less than a year later, France and Spain sign a treaty that will partition Portugal and start to invade. With British aid, the entire royal family escapes to Brazil, and establishes the capital of the Portuguese Empire in Rio de Janeiro. {Portugal is grateful to England for getting her out of that mess, but she's also determined to get her lands back- she can't stay in Brazil's house indefinitely, after all.}

~ 1811 AD: Napoleon Bonaparte's troops are successfully driven off of Portuguese soil by a mixture of British and Portuguese troops.

~ 1814 AD: Portugal captures French Guiana and Uruguay, but due to the recent declarations of independence from Spanish colonies in North America, the situation in Brazil is tense. {Portugal begins to suspect that Brazil wants her freedom, but is reluctant to give it, in the state the world is in.}

~ 1821 AD: Though politically the Portuguese Empire has become the Brazilian Empire due to the moving of the capital, the capital was moved back to Lisbon in hopes of preventing a revolution by the dissatisfied people.

~ 1822 AD: Prince Peter of Brazil declares that he will make Brazil free. He becomes the emperor of Brazil.

~ 1825 AD: The King of Portugal restores Prince Peter's rights to the Portuguese Throne and recognizes the independence of Brazil just before he dies, leaving, well, a right political mess, as the now Emperor of Brazil is also the next in line for the Portuguese Throne. Peter gives the Portuguese Throne to his daughter to avoid conflict. {Personally, Portugal thinks with diplomacy like that, Peter would have been a wonderful king, but she's quite glad they avoided a giant revolution.}

~ 1867 AD: "A Propreiedade: Filosofia do Direto" written by judge António Luís de Seabra is adopted as the new Portuguese civil code.

~ 1910 AD: The last of the Monarchy falls, leaving Portugal a Republic, while the royal family flees to England for refuge. All convents, monasteries, and religious orders are suppressed. All of the religious are expelled, their goods confiscated. Anti-Catholic laws are established and Jesuits are forced to forfeit their Portuguese citizenship. {Portugal, religious until this point, is torn quite in two, between her people and her government. A period ensues where she's not entirely sure of herself, and her personality swings quite viciously from day to day.}

~ 1918 AD: Sidónio Pais’, who had previously been trying to restore public order and make the republic more acceptable to monarchists and Catholics, is murdered, leading to a brief civil war. Monarchists and the Portuguese Republican Party alternate control over the nation.

~ 1961 AD: Portugal loses its colonies in India after a humiliating defeat against an Indian invasion in Goa. {She starts to realize her empire has crumbled around her feet, and loses her mind for a short period of time, though when she comes back to herself she seems alright with it.}

~ 1975 AD: Portugal grants independence to its overseas Provinces in Africa. Indonesia annexes the Portuguese province of East Timor in Asia before independence can be granted.

~ 1999 AD: Portugal applies pressure to secure East Timor's independence, as it was still technically a Portuguese Dependency, as recognized by the UN. East Timor voted for independence, and three years later, Portugal recognized it.

~ 2002 AD: The Portuguese Empire officially comes to an end. {Portugal will miss it, but is glad for the end of all the fighting.

Allies:

~ Spain during the Peninsular Wars {1808-1814} and the Dutch-Portuguese War {1602-1661}

~ England during the Peninsular Wars {1808-1814} and the Spanish invasion of Portugal {1762}

Enemies:

~ The Moors during the Portuguese Reconquista {1169-1250}

~ France during the Peninsular Wars {1808-1814}, the Napoleonic Wars {1803-1815}, and the Spanish invasion of Portugal {1762}

~ The Netherlands during the Dutch-Portuguese War {1602-1661}

~ England during the Dutch-Portuguese War {1602-1661}

~ Spain during the Portuguese Restoration War {1640-1668} and the Spanish invasion of Portugal {1762}

~ Germany during WWI {1914-1921}

~ Soviet Union during the Colonial Wars in Africa {1961-1974}

~ Cuba during the Colonial Wars in Africa {1961-1974}

~ United States during the Colonial Wars in Africa {1961-1974}

~ People's Republic of China during the Colonial Wars in Africa {1961-1974}

Sample Post:

He called her Lusitania, and her neighbor simply Hispania. He was tall, and strong, and he told her his name was The Roman Empire, and said that if that was too much for her, she could call him The Empire. He laughed when she asked why, and explained kindly that he was going to expand his territories all over the world, and so he would be the only empire, so calling him The Empire now was perfectly okay. He was kind to her, and taught her many things about how to be, as he said, 'civilized'. He said she was strong and beautiful and that someday she would make a wonderful warrior. She grew from a toddler to a young girl under his careful supervision, and he nurtured her ambitions like he did for all of the children he considered his own.

(She misses him, and his cheerfulness, and how nothing ever seemed to stand in the way of him getting exactly what he wanted, how he told her that she could do anything, be anything- as long as it wasn't an empire, because he was the only one allowed to do that.)

Seven hundred and twenty-two years later, the next one came, just as tall and just as strong, but cold, so terribly cold, and so terribly angry. He didn't have The Roman Empire's careful hands, or his carefree smile, and he looked on with apparent displeasure when she showed him that she could fight, too, just like her neighbor. He called himself Germania, and put her under the care of one of his many tribes. She didn't see him very often at all, except when he came to tell her that another, different tribe was going to live in her lands, but when she did see him, he would, sometimes, give her a tight smile that made her feel so proud of herself.

(He's gone now, gone shortly after The Roman Empire, but when she remembers him she remembers barbaric customs and cold fires and the way the corners of his eyes would tighten when she showed him new things she had discovered. Like he was pleased, but couldn't show it.)

When she first met the Moor, he wasn't nearly as intimidating as she thought he should be, for someone who was trying to take over her lands. He was young, and she laughed at his attempts to puff up, to be scary. She didn't laugh when he drove the Visigoths away, setting up on her lands like it was her own. When Germania did it, well, he was older, stronger. This little... boy, he had no right to do that. But he did, and her rebellions were ignored. In fact, she was ignored- he didn't care about her, just the lands.

(He ignores her, until he no longer has her. Then he wants to be friends, and she laughs in his face. She's not sure if what they have no is a pleasant rivalry or an unpleasant friendship, but she'll never be completely comfortable around him, and she thinks it's probably for the best.)

It didn't take long for the Kingdom of Leon to come to her 'rescue', and he wasn't as big as The Roman Empire, but he was just as kind and was infinitely tolerant of her struggles to become independent. She embraced her new name, Portucale, though she changed it a little (Portugal is much softer, much nicer). He was the last one to rule her fully and truly, and the least memorable.

(But she remembers him the most fondly, because he didn't stop her from gaining her independence, he didn't fight it, and he had the nicest eyes- he wasn't even power hungry like The Roman Empire. It was... nice. Boring, but nice.)

Now, she looks down at the wild child her men have brought her, straight from the forests, everything about her lean and lanky and damp and tangled, and she remembers all of the men that made her what she is today, everything that they did (or didn't) do, and worry clenches in her gut. How can she be sure she's going to do what was right? How will she know, what to mimic and what not to, from the actions of the men who raised her? She does know, however, that the one thing they didn't do is show hesitation, and she kneels, waving the men off and gently reaching out to touch slim fingers to the girl's cheek.

"... Hello," she says in their own language, one humans will never understand, never learn. "I am Portugal, and you're going to come live with me now. I know that you probably have your own name, but I think that we should give you one that I'll be able to pronounce, hmm? What do you think about... Beatriz?"

And maybe being a 'parent' isn't going to be easy, but she thinks that maybe, maybe she can do it.

Did you read the rules and Dark Reflections Canon?
Italian pasta sounds awfully delicious. I should eat. ;~;

Random fun fact about yourself:
I am a Pastafarian.

And, do I have to do the wordhunt in the Rules and Canon, since I've already done it once? Thought I should probably ask~

[Russia]

Your application is...

Everything looks fine here. ~ Love the detail you went into here. Not to mention the fact that it took you so little time to write all this. XD Feel free to post away now with Portugal.