The more promising of these came from a client in Ivory Coast who wanted to take a cottage for several weeks. By email, this intending visitor agreed a price and arranged to wire over the full sum in advance. Before this money could be sent however, a “peace dividend “ tax on it had to be paid – as X learned from the bank concerned. This bank appeared to be, I should add, the main branch in Abidjan of a prominent West African institution. X paid the “tax”, as he later confided to us, showing us the various bank documents he’d received.
I should have smelled a rat instantly. Had it been Nigeria instead of Ivory Coast, I should have. But I knew how the war had ravaged the country and a “peace dividend” tax made sense to me. Jones was less credulous. At her suggestion X brought over the documents for closer examination and I looked at the exchange of emails with the client. The give-away on the bank documents was a mis-spelling in the street address and different contact numbers from those given on the internet. For the rest the papers were very impressive. As a variation on the 419 “advance fee” scam, it was slick, especially considering that it was targeted at someone offering a rural Portuguese destination.
(For an illustration of more of the same, see: http://www.ifind2.com/ivorycoastfraud/fullstory.html
http://www.ifind2.com/ivorycoastfraud/ivorycoastfraud1.html
Somewhat disillusioned, X asked whether a problem could arise with American Express travellers’ cheques, which a second foreign client wished to pay in advance for another extended booking. Not if the cheques were genuine, said I, but this time the rat stank. I took a look at a second exchange of emails. This client used a “yahoo.com” email address and wrote in pidgin English. He would be deeply obliged – he explained in the course of several emails - if he could send X a lot of money in Amex traveller’s cheques, half for the rent and the other half to be wired back to the client to pay for air tickets to Portugal. Fat chance, as they say! I googled warnings on forged travellers’ cheques and showed them to X, who regretfully drew a line through a second extended holiday booking.
The holiday ads appeared only in the local media – English and Portuguese. That means that the scammers are scrutinising the press here, and then either posing as clients themselves or passing on the info to such posers abroad. Isn’t it sick that two out of three responses to an advert should come from rogues?
To other matters: from our upper patio the Portuguese flag flutters in the Sunday breeze, as it does from many of the houses in the village, including those of other expats. We’re all hoping that the Portuguese football team will go all the way to the final of the European championships, now taking place in Austria and Switzerland. It would mean so much to the Portuguese, who are football besotted. So far, the team has done well, and is sure to make the quarter-finals.Football news takes pride of place in the media, as every kick, goal, foul and tactic is analysed over and again. The matches crowded out even the truckers’ blockade that caused a mid-week run on petrol stations and supermarkets throughout the country. The situation was quite serious. There were long queues for fuel at all service stations – and many supermarket shelves were bare. It was our first taste of panic buying.
The truckers were up in arms over the fuel price increases. These are making life very difficult for them. Here, as in the UK, fuel is heavily taxed, and more expensive than in some other EU states. Happily, after reaching a deal with the government the truckers called off the blockade. In neighbouring Spain, a similar dispute continues.
If football and strikes have had an impact on our lives, it is as nothing compared to the arrival on the scene of Raymond (aka Raimundo, aka Puppy).
Raymond, as you may recall, is one of two pups to which our neighbour, Idalecio’s bitch, Serpa, gave birth at the end of February. His birth, and that of his smaller brother, Bobby, followed Serpa’s courtship with a big Belgian shepherd, Bizou, who broke down Idalecio’s fence to declare his passion.
Raymond is going to be at least as big as his dad. He is already bigger than his mother. He has boundless energy and a ravenous appetite. Unless he’s restrained, after downing his own food he piles into some other beast’s. He has taken to twice-daily walks with a will, lurching left and right on his huge puppy paws. He’s a handful. Don’t misunderstand me; Raymond is lovely and we hold him dear. If we have any complaint, it’s just that he is a bit of a nipper and endlessly time-consuming.
His appearance has not been universally welcomed, as the arrival of competitive siblings seldom is. Ono, the king of the heap, has been watching the newcomer with green eyes, and reminding him every so often of the established order of precedence – however short-lived that may prove. To keep the peace, we have declared Raymond an outside dog, smartening up his kennel and giving him a thick rug to lie on. The other two spend most of their time inside the house and out of his way.We took Ono and Prickles (fondly known as Pricks – or Grand Pricks) to the vet one afternoon for their annual jabs. What a to-do! Those guys just hate going to the vet. They had to be dragged into the consulting room and put up a miserable performance in front of the new young vet, Helena, who attended them. Still, we were managing until she tried to take Prickles’ temperature. That was more than Prickles could bear. He’s an old-fashioned dog and he just can’t see the justification for having thermometers thrust up his rear. You’d have thought his last hour had come. After three attempts, Helena gave up the struggle.
Next we have to take Raymond and Bobby back for their third puppy vaccination, to be followed by their rabies shot in due course. It’s getting expensive.
We have been fortunate in having the assistance – as well as the company -
all week of my sister, Cathy, from Germany.(You would have been amazed to see her cheering on the German football team the other night, waving, yelling and even leaping up and down. Not that it helped very much. The highly-tipped Germans were beaten by the lowly Croats. Woe was she.) 
Cathy has taken over garden-watering duties each evening, saving us at least an hour of labour. She has accompanied us to the shops, art-galleries, restaurants, neighbours’ houses (we have been regally entertained) and a film – Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull. To behold Harrison Ford capering around like that, and still seeing off villains at age 66, gave me new heart. I thought he did a great job. And Kate Blanchett was a charming villainess. I’m an admirer. Anyhow, as you may glean, it’s been a very full week, which is why my letter is late.
CANADIAN TRACTOR SIGNI have, come to think of it, also put in hours on the tractor cleaning up my fields and those of two neighbours (getting rid of the waist-high weeds and stubble before the fire season sets in). One of the latter fields belongs to Leonhilde, whose husband is ill and no longer capable of tractoring; the other to an old fellow who lives at the bottom of the village. We call it the “running field” as we often take the dogs there for a run-around. More importantly, it has several fine fruit trees that were being overtaken by briars and weeds.
One field I haven’t been asked to clean up this year belongs to Chico and Dina, the strange couple, with whom I had a difference of opinion some months ago over the treatment of an animal. Instead, Chico called on the village digger driver, Mario, to bring up his machine and rip out the winter growth.
Puzzlingly, before the event, Chico gave his Irish neighbour, Fintan, 50 euros, which he later took back again. What this signified wasn’t clear to Fintan, who asked me if I could get any sense out of the old man. That’s easier said than done. Even the Portuguese struggle to understand what Chico is on about. But between us – Fintan, me, Mario and Chico - we managed to solve the riddle. What is amounted to was that Chico had only 50 euros, which was not enough to pay Mario, whose digger costs 30 euros an hour. So Chico wanted Fintan to pay the balance to Mario, on the understanding that he (Chico) would reimburse Fintan when he was in the black again.I’m sorry if that sounds a bit complicated. Village life sometimes is.
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