Letter from Espargal: 12 of 2009

Had you been sitting in the study with me now, you might have seen me thrust a hand up a leg of my trousers and scrabble about furiously, before leaping up to rip them off. There’s only so far that one can insert one’s hand up one’s trousers while wearing them and it wasn’t far enough to reach the tick that was sharing them with me. The dogs looked on inquisitively as I danced about, anxious to get rid of the insect before it got hold of me. There is something peculiarly unpleasant about ticks and even unpleasanter about providing a meal for them.

I am feeling rather aggrieved about ticks at the moment, having detached one from my wrist a few days back. The little bug had enjoyed a good suck before I came across him and the scene of his meal has itched fiercely ever since, in spite of the muti I’ve applied to it. I suspect that, like mosquitoes, ticks may inject some protein that desensitises the skin while they feed.

The bottom line is that the tick season is upon us and will remain with us well into autumn. We pull several off our clothes and the dogs each day, especially Prickles with his terrier coat. He's just had his first haircut of the season and is looking very cute. The tick collars, which the dogs now wear all year round, are effective but they don’t prevent ticks from attaching themselves. It’s impossible to avoid the little bloodsuckers as virtually all of our walks involve a measure of negotiating grassy paths and bushy terrain.

During one of our outings this week Jones offered to guide me along a new path up the side of our hill. She had been shown it by Marie and Ollie, who had learned about it in turn from Idalecio. I was a bit surprised as I thought I knew all the hillside paths already. I was wrong.

Jones led me up a rough tractor track that the farmers have worn into the hillside down the years to access their carob trees. After some time, the track ran out. We hunted about but could find no path through the thick bush that surrounded us. Jones confessed to having led me astray. So we scrambled back down, looking for openings and envying the dogs, which were dashing about, having a whale of time searching for rabbits.

AFTER THE WALK

The following day, at our request, Ollie and Marie led us along the correct route. It winds steeply up the side of the hill, edging around boulders and creeping over rocky walls, before joining our regular paths around the koppie. Jones had missed a key, almost invisible turn-off. We marked several such turns by placing small rocks on larger ones. It’s a lovely walk, although somewhat overgrown. I have resolved to take a pair of clippers to it, to fend off the wretched ticks that inhabit the undergrowth.

I note from the pictures of Kevin & Ann’s new house taking shape in Calgary that snow still lies heavy on the ground in that part of the world. Here we are heading steadily into summer, as dry as a bone and praying for a shower of rain - (Miracles! we had a wondrous shower overnight!) not that the dry weather has retarded the weeds.
FIELD OF FLOWERS

I’ve spent hours turning over the fields (ours and neighbours) with the scarifier, and using the strimmer to clean under the trees. Some areas I haven’t had the heart to cut back because we are shortly promised a glorious show of poppies. Jones gave up weeding our beans for the same reason; at least that’s what she said.

Since the hot weather arrived, I’ve been making use of a gift from Llewellyn and Lucia, two extendable plastic grids that are designed to fit over half-open windows in the car’s rear doors. They prevent the dogs from leaping out and people from leaning in, while permitting a flow of air through the car.

A neighbour, Armenio, to whom we give most of our carobs, turned up one night with a box of pumpkins and 5 litres wine, made in his own wine press. He knows that we’re hooked on pumpkin soup. On warmer evenings, Jones adds bits of pumpkin to the large (very) mixed salad that usually makes up our supper.

Armenio showed us a Roman coin that he had found recently, one of three that he and his sons have turned up in the fields. It fascinates me to think of the generations of farmers that have laboured in these parts down the centuries, in whose dim tracks we follow. The Romans were by no means the first; the Arabs were here for hundreds of years after them. Our older Portuguese neighbours can remember when all the hills around us were cultivated (as the crumbling terraces attest), when people lived off the land or, as often, emigrated in search of a better living elsewhere.

In our lifetime the country has changed out of all recognition. In my last English class we were talking about life under the military dictatorship. One woman recounted that her boyfriend had fled to France to avoid conscription to the armies trying to contain the rebellions in the Portuguese colonies. To join him, she applied for a passport. It was not a document that the authorities issued lightly and before she received one, she had to undergo hours of questioning by the police, who wanted to know why any citizen might wish to travel abroad.

Our Portuguese teacher said he remembered times when any conversation between more than two people was outlawed. Three was not only a crowd, it was an illegal crowd, and the Portuguese police that enforced the law had a reputation for brutality. It’s a reputation that has not entirely disappeared. Following numerous complaints, an EU committee has recommended that video cameras should be placed in all Portuguese police stations to record how prisoners are treated.

Returning to my theme - Armenio had a storeroom packed to the rafters with carobs, the fruit of the past two years of production. He’s been hanging on to the crop in the forlorn hope that the price would rise. It’s fallen instead, to around 33 cents a kilo. So he sold the lot. The price of fertilizer, unlike that of carobs, has been rising steadily and he’s had to spend several thousand euros buying stocks to fertilize his trees. If it wasn’t for the fact that he and his family do all the picking, he said, there would be no profit whatsoever.

Tonight we are joining the gang for supper at the Snack Bar Coral, ten minutes up the road in Benafim. We walked the dogs up there early in the week to lunch out on the patio in the sunshine – on fresh bread, strong cheese, local olives, salads and the dish of the day, washed down with the house wine. I cannot pretend to be a gourmet but I thought it as delicious a meal as anyone might hope for.

Beside us, Jose (the tractor salesman from the shop next door) was busy removing a sporty steering wheel from his son’s car and replacing it with a conventional wheel, with airbag. The car was about to go for its annual health check and the authorities would have failed it without the airbag. I need to take the tractor up to him this coming week to have rapid release grips attached to the rear arms, and a revolving yellow light to the safety bar.

The traffic police were pulling cars over just outside Benafim as we drove up one afternoon. I was grateful that they stopped the car ahead of me rather than mine. As ever, the two smaller dogs were riding on the back seat. People have been fined for carrying unsecured dogs – lest they fly forward in the event of an accident. One of these days we’re going to be penalised. In the meanwhile, we drive with great caution and do our best to avoid the police traps.

One morning we visited Almancil to renew our annual travel insurance policies – the last year we can do so before hitting the pay-more 65 limit. We have – touch wood – never had to claim on them. But we know a fellow who was unfortunate enough to suffer a stroke while visiting the US, a misfortune that cost him a fortune as well as his good health.

Another annual ritual is taking out an international driver’s licence – our North American trip is now less than two months away. Again, I’ve never had to present one to the authorities. The AA say they receive numerous requests from travellers who fail to take them out and discover after the event that they’re required.

I’m reading “The Goldilocks Enigma”, by Paul Davies, an attempt to explain why we inhabit a life-friendly universe. (We obviously wouldn’t inhabit an unfriendly one.) I have a number of his books. He’s a fine writer, able to explain obscure cosmological concepts in language that the layman can follow. I feel fairly comfortable with the Big Bang and black holes although I have to confess to struggling with “multiverses”.

Re last week’s letter, Jones tells me that the cute little animal I was thinking about was a meerkat - not a mongoose. She’s right, of course. She often is. But given that both creatures are furry little animals that run around the countryside and begin with the letter “m”, I don’t think the distinction is really worth quibbling about.