Letter from Espargal: 46 of 2006

I received two suspicious emails at the start of the week, one with an attachment, from a man whose name meant nothing to me. After wondering whether to zap them, I took a back- door peep and discovered that the author and his wife had been fellow diners with Barbara and Maureen on the Mediterranean cruise. What’s more, they’d been kind enough to attach two pictures of their group, which you may find on my blog. (I’ve stopped attaching pictures to my letters for the moment because some correspondents are restricted to dial-up internet connections and don’t appreciate large files.)

Jones, I’m glad to say, has had a much better week. Once again, I’ll let her text messages speak for her.

(Sat) “Just coming into Mombasa at 0500 and hoping for a signal after such ages. Still dark. Big clouds. Going on a morning tour.

Sorry for silence but could not leave cabin for 3 days. Doctor’s orders. Neither could M for 2. Also am flustered by net centre although guy very helpful. Very expensive. 15 dollars each to send two (very brief) emails.

Mombasa mainly chaotic but old part interesting. Portuguese fort well preserved.

Everyone up on deck using wifi. Long 8 days for all.

(Sun) 0003 GMT. We about to leave for game park. Back late evening. All is going well.

(Mon) Tsavo excellent. Check internet for Voi Lodge. Must go there. Stunning panorama. Mombasa road worst ever. An experience. Good animal viewing. Sunrise as we enter Zanzibar harbour. Calm and warm. Tour due through old town. Feel fine.

(Thur) Seem to have signal. Trying for 2 days. Miss you and can sense the sights of home. Batteries down on camera. Missing 2 days of shots. Mayotte beautiful but tatty. Today Nosy Be with lemurs. Probably out of touch 3 days until Durban.

(Later Thur) Amazing day in Lekobe Forest.

My (Terry’s) week has managed to embrace nearly all my good deeds for the year. The first was to offer old Zeferino a bucket of fertilizer as he made his way up the steep track beside the house to tend his carob saplings in a plot at the top of the hill. (It took us some time to get to grips with his name, which comes from the Roman Zephyrinus, itself derived from the Greek Zephyros. This is a country whose copper and gold deposits were mined by the Carthaginians and then the Romans hundreds of years before the Arabs came ashore here.)

Zeferino was glad to accept my offer. He stopped for a quick chat. Did I know, he asked me, that X, another villager, had gone mad. I told him that I was aware of X’s problem. It’s a very sad story. The man concerned has gradually developed a dementia that recently resulted in an attack on his wife. They are both in their sixties; maybe early seventies. The police were called but declined to take any action, presumably because she didn’t press charges. So was an ambulance but since X refused to get in, it too went away. X has been prescribed pills that he takes reluctantly if at all. Nobody knows what to do about the situation.

As Monday was a lovely sunny day and I had long since promised a friend that I’d take my chainsaw around to trim some branches, I kept my promise. The tree concerned was a huge old pine that could easily shade a dozen cars. It must have been there long before I was born. The lower branches were drooping uncomfortably close to the ground. I spent half an hour clearing them to a height of some two metres. It’s hard work holding a chain saw at arm’s length or above one’s head. I reckoned that this good deed should safely see the year out.

On the way home I passed the odd couple pushing their ancient wheelbarrow along the road to the village. The barrow, which is pre the pneumatic age and should have been retired 50 years ago, was loaded with twigs, obviously intended for the fire. Getting the barrow up Espargal hill was a challenge that I couldn’t see them meeting. I started the tractor which, as it happened, had a load of firewood stacked in the link box and drove down the road to meet them. Together we heaved their barrow on board and I drove back up the hill to their cottage where I left the load. The only drawback of such kindness is that it always meets equal kindness from the other side, generally delivered in the shape of half a goat or worse – in the same ancient barrow.

Finally, at the request of another neighbour, I attached the extension ladder to the tractor, took the chainsaw, and went to the far end of the village to trim a large carob tree. The tree in question, like the pine, had obviously been around for a very long time and offered a welcome area of shade at the bottom of the garden. Its problem was a collapsed bough that dangled dangerously a couple of metres above the ground. This, after a bit of high altitude chain-sawing, I managed to bring down, much to the gratitude of the owners of the property.

That’s all my good deeds. I am going to check Wikipedia and any other sources I can find to determine how to grade good deeds and to establish how many “good deed points” one needs to get to heaven; that’s if Richard Dawkins is wrong and there is one. (I’ve just finished his God Delusion – interesting book!) With luck I should be in credit well into the New Year.

I nearly forgot. There’s one more to report. I went along to a workshop where Vitor the mechanic fixes cars to see what progress he was making with a car belonging to an Irish couple who commute back and forth. They’re away at the moment and their car has to go for its annual inspection by the end of the month. I’d promised them to follow its progress. The car was awaiting a new generator and then its test.

Vitor himself was a bit glum about his dad, who is in hospital with terminal cancer and not expected to survive very long. The old fellow has been a village institution for as long as most people can remember, an Andy Capp figure who, after retiring from the building trade, was most often seen passing on his moped, stompie glued to his lips, as he headed to or from the bar at Alto Fica. I hope there’s a bar in heaven, or wherever Vitor’s dad is likely to be going soon.

On the domestic front I seem to have spent most of my week caring for animals. That’s the two dogs, the two kittens, Tommie fat cat, the two black cats that arrive for food morning and evening and, since Marie and Ollie are away for a week, Nosey and her brood of four remaining kittens over at David and Sarah’s place. The hardest part has been keeping rival pairings away from each other, especially as the kittens have grown restless with the back patio and I’ve tried letting them out for short spells. Braveheart is quite reckless and hastens to meet any other animals, generally with bad results. His sister, Dearheart, is quite the opposite and very nervous. I shall be pleased to hand over kitten duties to Jones in just over a week.

Wednesday evening I joined friends David and Dagmar for a meal and a film. The meal made a welcome change from my standard evening diet of raw veges and tinned fish. Thursday brought the arrival of a “poltrona” (I wonder where that word comes from) the arm chair that I ordered from a specialist firm of chair, bed and mattress makers some weeks ago. It’s one of those chairs whose base kicks out to support the sitter’s legs and which inclines back at an angle. It’s very comfortable. I tried it out in front of the fire and last barely five minutes into a TV programme.

The chair is intended to replace a most uncomfortable “bargain” leather chair and stool that we acquired in London years ago and which we seldom sit in but have been too mean to throw out. I shall try to persuade Jones to donate it to a worthy cause. I hope that you like the new chair Jonesy, which is currently parked in the lounge while it awaits assignment to either the south patio or upstairs to the study. I’m not putting it on the patio yet as it’s very comfortable in the lounge and I fear that the kittens would not treat it kindly.

Thursday also brought the first drops of rain of a storm that is meant to rage over the Iberian Peninsula this weekend. I have loaded the wheelbarrows with firewood and parked them in a dry spot to help see us through. The wood-burning stove is a pearl of great price. I think I shall get this off early lest the power or my internet link should go down.

Letter from Espargal: 45 of 2006

(Siesta time!)

My week has sputtered along, marked (maybe marred) by a couple of late-night films and sleepy days. I’m finding it hard to maintain an easy rhythm in Jones’s absence. For her part, during the week-long voyage to Mombasa, Jones went down with a virus that was touring the ship. According to the online itinerary (http://www.orientlines.com/destinations/africa/33d_passage_africa.htm ) she’s due to arrive in port on Saturday morning early. I have heard little from her, as you may glean.

“As far as I can count this is midpoint of trip so not so long till home.

Passing through strait to Gulf of Aden.

Watching sunset over distant coast of horn of Africa. Four days at sea over. Four to go. A bit boring.

Try to message as we pass close to land. Have been sick with ship virus along with 60 others. M okay.

(by email) Have been in quarantine for the ship bug from Luxor. This (Wed) is first day out, sorry long silence. Am now fine, will sms from mombasa.

(by email) Don’t know if you saw my line yesterday, but today netcentre guy eldon has helped me. am now fine after the luxor virus, looking forward tho to being on land again. have not had opportunity to read all the emails, hope am not missing abything importnat. is it still ok for llew to meet ship, do you know? will sms him later. Can’t remember all the things was going to say. still bit flakey after 4 days throwing up and runs. o for baggies.”

Cathy flew home at the weekend after a very pleasant and easy stay. The showers that dampened the first half of her visit were replaced by a series of blue-sky days that gave way to another spell of rain midweek. Before it arrived, I managed to sow six more rows of beans that ought to provide us with a handsome crop in due course. The rule is a handful of blue fertilizer granules and half a dozen beans in the furrow every half metre or so. What’s more, I weeded the bean plants that I sowed last month, having seen a previous crop all but overcome by the jungle of weeds that sprang up simultaneously. Our carob trees should also be smiling soon. They’ve enjoyed generous scatterings of ammonia fertilizer around their trunks.

Acquiring the fertilizer meant a trip to Benafim where two of the small family-run supermarkets in the main drag are tied in with building supply businesses directly over the road. Women folk manage the former and men folk the latter. Come to think of it, one of the women concerned was recently widowed when her husband wiped himself out on his motorbike. She employs a men in our village to do deliveries. He wasn’t there when I called so she trotted over the road with me to help me load a 50kg sack of fertilizer.

Running these businesses requires multiple crossings of the road and loading of lorries in the street, hazardous stuff given the number of world speed records that are set in Benafim high street. In a bid to slow the traffic down – there are no traffic cops for miles around – Benafim council is now putting a traffic circle at the main crossroad. Big machines have been grunting around for a couple of weeks. Half the job seems to be trying to persuade the local drinkers to move their cars from their favourite parking spots outside the adjacent café-bar. Habits die hard in this part of the world.

Eddie and Lesley Vanko came around just before Cathy’s departure to assist me with some plumbing

problems. That’s to say, Eddie worked on the plumbing (with a couple of minor useful suggestions on my part) while Lesley passed an hour or two with Cathy and a magazine before we all went to the Adega for lunch.

Although I hesitate to confess it, two of the tasks involved a dripping tap and a loo cistern with an obstinate mechanism. I write as a handyman (of sorts) who has replaced any number of tap washers and fiddled around in the innards of numerous loo cisterns. But I had never dismantled a combined hot-and-cold-water tap before, nor had I worked on a double-flush loo. Both appeared to be seemingly undismantleable. This was because, as Eddie demonstrated, an alan key had to be inserted into a tiny aperture in the tap while in the loo cistern there was an all but invisible retaining screw. In spite of his professional efforts, both the tap and the loo have continued to play up intermittently and I may have to procure new innards for the both of them.

A bigger job was to prepare the mains water supply pipe for the installation of a water meter at some point in the future. To facilitate this, the parish offices supplied free to all householders a section of plastic piping with brass fittings at either end. These fittings had to be connected to the pipes in the water supply box, leaving the short length of pvc to be replaced by the meter in due course. (Sarah and David, I have a fitting waiting for you.)

In the meanwhile, Eddie has connected the mains water supply directly to the house plumbing. The pressure is a huge improvement on the efforts of the cisterna pump. Taking a shower is a real pleasure. On the other hand, the valve on the solar water heaters freaked out. It started leaking so much water down the roof tiles that I felt obliged to disconnect the mains and replug the pump, pending a visit by a technician.

I see that the Al-Jazeera English TV channel has been added to the free stations available on the satellite signal that we receive. I watched bits of its opening night and was quite impressed by the extent of its coverage and its emphasis on third world issues, aims set out by its British editor in radio interviews earlier in the day. I can see it becoming a strong contender against BBC World and CNN. France launches its own international channel shortly, although I’m not clear whether it’s to be only in French. You may be aware that Al-Jazeera’s Arabic channel has not gone down well with the Americans.

Thank you to those correspondents who have brought me up to speed on Connect Cards. All considered, I’ve decided to stick with Telecom’s broadband service at home and to use wifi services when I travel.

Wednesday and Thursday brought the regular language lessons. The dogs came with me as they usually do. I put down a blanket in the corner of the classroom and they plonk themselves down there for the duration of the lesson (more or less). There are no objections.

I left the car at a tyre service outlet on Thursday, after encountering a disconcerting and growing low-speed wobble from a front wheel. The outlet manager heard my description of the problem and immediately said that the tyre concerned was “torto” – twisted or bent (as he later illustrated). I left him to put on two new tyres while I went to lessons. He had to order them in and didn’t have the price which, as it happened, was somewhat high. Nor did he have a book to give me an official receipt (although he promised to have one next time I dropped by) – meaning that he could pocket the VAT. I consoled myself that at least I didn’t have to waste a couple of hours at another outlet.

The sun’s back and the dogs are waiting for their walk.

Letter from Espargal: 44 of 2006

(Cathy and Tommie: It's not a new picture. Jonesy has the camera)

Cathy and I have been practising our 21st century communication skills. She sits downstairs scanning her emails and the internet on her laptop while I’m on the desktop upstairs. The router is happy to accommodate us both. Each time she gets a pertinent email or comes across an interesting item on the web, she emails it to me. I return the favour.

Similarly, anything she needs printing sails up here electronically and sails down again on sheets of paper. We find the system works well. One thinks back to the old days when one actually had to walk up and down stairs to perform such exchanges. In due course, no doubt, if we are not all frizzled up by global warming or laid low by bird flu, we shall find our legs shrivelled up and useless. (I have a picture in my mind of a little green baddie with a big head who used to perch on a hovering cushion in the Dan Dare comics of my youth.)

I was sitting at the computer on Sunday morning, not dressed for company, when I heard a car draw up at the gate and the dogs starting barking. A peep through the window revealed a Portuguese neighbour. I tried to pull on my jeans over long undies and a t-shirt but they stuck fast on my shoes. After a five-minute tussle I managed yank them off and went down to meet the driver. He seemed to think that I was within the limits of estrangeiro eccentricity.

He was clutching a sheaf of documents from his brother in law, who owns a field adjacent to mine, a field that I have long had my eye on. I had bumped into the brother-in-law in the village square a few weeks earlier and asked him whether he would sell it to me. He was interested, at the right price. On this we quickly settled. The plot concerned forms an L around a rectangle that we already own, and I shall be thrilled to acquire it. Other people who own contiguous property have to be consulted first, and given the option to improve on the price. I wait with fingers crossed.

On Monday it poured. While Natasha was cleaning the house, I took Cathy along to Algarve Shopping at Guia. It was her first visit and she liked the place. While she explored I nipped into the electronics store, FNAC, to inquire about the bit of gadgetry that was intended to fit into a slot in the side of my notebook computer. An assistant explained that it took connect-data-cards that permit internet access on the move (for the sum of 100 euros down and 40 euros a month. Don’t worry too much about this paragraph, mother!)

Alternatively, one can buy a card that plugs into a USB port and can be transferred between notebook and desktop computers. The cost is less than I’m paying Portugal Telecom for broadband access. If anybody has experience of such cards, please let me know. Presumably, in areas where one gets poor mobile phone reception there would also be a slow internet connection or none at all.

Tuesday the Portuguese news bulletins were full of the floods that have ravaged parts of the country, cutting roads and rail lines, submerging fields, drowning animals, fouling houses and generally making life miserable. Many of the dams that were reduced to puddles during the recent drought are filled to bursting.

Wednesday the sun reappeared. I reploughed Sarah and David’s field to get rid of the green carpet. My beans, at the top of the field, are already a foot high. The ground was a mite too wet for comfort and a mud trail followed me back home.

Cathy and I play in turns with the kittens, which have grown tired of their patio home and long to explore the world around them. They come bursting through the door the moment we open it. Stoopy ignores them. Ono doesn’t approve. Ono, meanwhile, has suffered a recurrence of his stairs phobia (after twice tumbling down). He now descends very slowly, looking from side to side, until he reaches a point about five stairs from the bottom, and then he tries to leap to the floor. As the stairs are made of wood and are slippery, it’s a bad strategy. I’ve taken to leading him down a stair at a time.

Friday we got Natasha in to clean for the second time this week. As always, she did a great job. But somehow a patio door was left open and when Cathy returned the kittens from her bedroom to the newly-cleaned patio, the kittens went awol. Cathy didn’t notice until the silence from the patio struck her as odd. Then we all went looking. Within a few minutes Braveheart returned. Of Dearheart, there was no sign.

So we were not in good spirits when we set out for supper and a film with our friends, the Davieses. On our return we found the missing kitten back on the patio. What joy and relief. I don’t know what we’ve had said to Jones if the kitten had taken off for good. Cathy returns to Berlin on Sunday.

Jones continues her cruise. She’s on the high seas and I don’t expect to hear from her for a few days until the ship gets back within range of a network antenna. Last contact was from Safaga on the Red Sea coast. I shall let her speak for herself: the brackets are mine:

ATHENS:
“600 passengers got off and a new lot got on today.

On high seas bound for Port Said. Am up on deck. Nobody around yet. New people at table, American retired teacher with pony tail and a Swiss German gentleman.

It is self service in the mornings. Entire housekeeping and catering crews are Filipino. Very informal. Perhaps over friendly with eye on end of trip tip.

Just docked Port Said. 05.00 gmt. Will see if roaming works. (It did)

We are in middle Suez. Dawn just breaking. Takes about 16 hours. Our convoy passes northbound convoy in lake.

10-bus convoy with armed police truck and onboard guard. Roads cleared of traffic as we passed. Pyramids great.

Stationary in canal at moment. Await north convoy pass. Warmer today. Some sun.

Am helping tech-phobe Aussie learn SMS. (You may not appreciate the irony of this statement!) What costs SMS rough price?

Beautiful morning. En route to Aqaba and Petra. Much walking ahead. Not sure how M will cope. Suez was interesting. Were delayed as another ship in convoy grounded.

Have just discovered ship has live web cam. Maybe you can see it. (We can’t.) Very disappointing. Petra trip cancelled because of (Suez) canal delay and high winds.

High winds prevent docking at Aqaba. Passengers mutinying. Like a hive of angry bees. M suspects captain of trying to save port fees.

Windy on board. Hope does not affect docking at Safaga. Great arid jagged mountains on coastline.

Due to overnight in Luxor. Been on board two weeks – a long time.

Luxor incredible. Early to the Valley of the Kings.

Just back after overnight stay Luxor. Great Moevenpick hotel. Temples astonishing. Convoy 15 buses. Military escort. Traffic cleared. Now 8 days sea to Mombassa.

Still in Safaga. Some problem in getting enough water on board for 8 days at sea. Seems this is first such voyage for this ship. Late arrival at Mombassa would affect some passengers’ return flights. Engines just started. Goody.”

So there you have it.

Letter from Espargal: 43 of 2006

It’s wet and sunny in turns. Another low pressure system is working its way across the peninsula. The rain is turning the green carpet around us into a jungle. The bean plants that I sowed in Sarah and David’s field a few weeks ago are already six inches high. One can virtually watch them grow.

This is true also for Braveheart and Dearheart, who have been upgraded from the guest bedroom to the south patio to permit my sister, Cathy, to occupy the bedroom in their place. They have taken to their new quarters with gusto. After an interrupted night midweek I reported to Jones that I felt like Old Mother Hubbard. In spite of several nocturnal trips downstairs, I failed to find the cause of the crashing noises that woke me. All the windward shutters appeared to be firmly secured. When the racket resumed at dawn, I went down yet again to find the kittens playing with a metal bar that was banging against a door.

Just as I was getting back to sleep, Tommie started squalling for his breakfast – and then Stoopy threw up on the upstairs carpet.

Come back Jones, all is forgiven.

Jones and I continue to exchange daily text messages via our mobile phones. It is just over a week since her boat left Venice. It has tended to sail at night and lie up during the day while the passengers, Barbara and Maureen included, go exploring. Her latest messages have come from Athens. I’m sure she will not mind if I give you a flavour of what she has had to say:

………………………………………………………………………………………………………

“Venice. Just back from sunset boat trip. Dinner at Danielli hotel. Glamorous and pricey but great.

Just made it on board. Now unpacking. Cabin fine if I stay tidy. Still need to explore ship.

Sorry. Long silence. Busy day. Room-service supper.

At breakfast. Many Americans. I am off to tour glass factory.

Just coming into sight of Croatia coast. Very rocky. Light cloud. Joining walk tour of town. Email very pricey, very busy.

Am sitting (on an island) in a quiet spot shaded by pines, looking across Adriatic to mainland Croatia. Water lapping at my feet.

Three thirty and just sailing from Corcula.

Corfu today and all day tour. Captain’s party last night. Wore the dress (a birthday gift from Kevin and Ann). Had photo taken with him and M. Cloudy warm calm sea.

Done Corfu. Coach trip across mountains via small functioning monastery and coves to east coast and lunch on west. Drove around Corfu old town. It’s okay. Many bars.

Didn’t explore. Tomorrow visit ancient Olympic site on Katakalon. Many cats on Corfu.

Already docked in to ancient Olympic site. Now having usual muffin and coffee. Last night saw Willis film, Sixteen Blocks.

Olympic ruins and museum wonderful. Katakalon much more quaint and clean than Corfu. Met two pleasant Americans.

Who won world series baseball please? (This at the behest of the Americans)

Thanks for baseball info. Charlie impressed. Patmos today. Is in bible, Book of Revelation.

Just docked Izmir. Visit Ephesus. Early start. Last night Filipino crew gave song and dance show. Quite moving. Patmos stunning.

Just back from Ephesus. Mind blowing. Pouring rain. Forgot brolly. M shared. She in good spirits but feels officers not paying enough attention to us.

Bad weather due. Now sailing to Istanbul. Had great visit to carpet factory, prices out of my league. Look forward to a day without touring on Thursday.

Driving rain, heavy seas. Not sea sick. Today blue mosque and Topkapi Palace.

Just back from Turkish dinner, belly dancers. Great city and mosques. St Sophias. Just leaving port now. Flood-lit skyline. Rest-day tomorrow.

Six in the morning, watching sun rise over Dardenelles.

Despite glamour here, envy you. On open sea heading for Athens.

Just done ten times round the deck. Now for a shower and a show, then dinner.

Docked in Piraeus for Athens. Vast cruise liner alongside. Busy port. Will have morning tour of acropolis.

Acropolis was amazing but crammed. Athens much cleaned up. Traffic abominable.”

……………………………………………………………………………………………………

My own week has been dull by comparison.

On Monday I went looking for some computing equipment.

On Tuesday, with rain looming, I ploughed our three bits of field. All three had already been covering in a fine green baize since their last ploughing a few weeks ago. I was quite proud of myself for managing to plough the steep Casanova field along a contour route, as advised by a neighbour, instead of from top to bottom as I had done before. The neighbour ploughed the adjoining field in the same manner to show me how it was done. There were times when I chose to stand up on the tractor and to lean against the slope although I’m sure my neighbour would have laughed at me.

Wednesday was a public holiday. That meant that there was no early morning bus from Loulé so I had to fetch Natasha. She cleaned inside while I tidied up outside ahead of Cathy’s arrival. The dogs and I went to fetch Cathy from the airport mid-afternoon and were very pleased to welcome her back to the Algarve. I took her to supper at the Adega. It was as good as always. The owner confessed that he was hoping for a small turnout that evening as he and the staff had been worked off their feet over lunch.

Thursday brought the usual English classes. Cathy helped me walk the dogs from the car to the building and then occupied herself for an hour. The dogs came to classes with me.

Then we drove in the drizzle to Almancil to fetch an elderly friend plus large dog and to take the pair of them to the vet in Loulé. His house floods easily after heavy rain. As usual, the water was lapping around his front door.

And Friday Cathy and I bought the weekly papers and took ourselves to Alte for coffees, toasted sandwiches and a catch up of the news. Jones will sigh when she reads this as it’s one of her favourite activities. And in spite of her exotic and glamorous adventures, she sighs a little for home.

I have assured her that she will be back soon enough.