Letter from Espargal: 45 of 2009

This has been a very jumbled up week and it’s difficult to know where to begin addressing it. First and foremost, I guess, the painters have gone. The parting was amiable. They did a great job. They really are excellent painters – neat, precise and thorough, if somewhat late in starting. As they completed a room, Jones, Natasha and I would get to work on it.

REHANGING PICTURES

It was a huge job - unpacking books and returning them to the shelves, restacking CDs, restoring the furniture to its proper position, dusting the paintings and rehanging them and reconnecting the electrics, along with much vacuuming and mopping.

The house looks great. It would look even better if the floor were not draped with towels to soak up the doggy footprints that testify to the rain that’s been falling, often in terrific gusts. We’ve had over an inch of the stuff, with several more wet days in prospect. We need it so badly that we’re gladly suffering the consequences, mainly for our walks. The dogs are rather less tolerant but that’s life.

As a side show, the lock man returned with the sliding door and the window that he had taken away the previous week to have new glass panels installed. We were mightily pleased to see him, all the more so as temperatures had plummeted to a bitter C2* at night (yes, we know, Canadians). We had the devil of a job trying to close the gaps with plastic sheeting and cushions. It was a case of early to bed.

In celebration of these achievements, I allowed myself my first alcoholic drink in nearly two months, a rum and coke with a generous squeeze of lemon. It was good but I can’t say I’ve missed the stuff. Like many other things, it just gets to be a habit, albeit a habit I’ve much enjoyed down the years.

As I was about to say, we were trying to get everything back in order for the arrival of Llewellyn and Lucia from the UK this (Friday) morning. They didn’t make it. After battling through a blizzard to Luton airport in the early hours, they checked in and hung around, only to hear that their flight was among the dozens that fell victim to the severe weather. Worse, they’d booked their car into the airport parking for the period. So – forgive me for stealing your thunder Llewellyn - they went home by public transport, a long tiring journey after a very early start.

The good news is that we were able to communicate with Llewellyn at the airport and inform him of the seats still available on flights from other airports. He managed to book tickets on a flight that leaves Birmingham early on Saturday morning instead. (He and Lucia have since arrived safely; they carried on by train to Lisbon where they will spend a few nights. Jonesy is joining them for two days.)

My sister, Cathy, and her husband, Rolf, were also dumped as they began a trip from Berlin to Calgary on Friday to spend Christmas with Kevin and family. Like Llewellyn, they had the good fortune to secure a reservation for the Saturday (at a time when flights are either sold out or offering premium seats only!).

STOP PRESS! Just heard that they're camping at a hotel near Heathrow after multiple hassles and dramas, with a reservation to fly out Monday afternoon!

With nowhere to sit and the kitchen draped in plastic, we’ve been eating out. Our outings included a visit to the Snack Bar Coral to celebrate the 6^th birthday of Joey, the son of the owners.

It was a scene to behold. The place was packed. Most of the adults were smoking and the open door did little to relieve the fug. Those who lacked chairs clustered around the snooker table, watching the players. Between raids on the birthday cakes, Joey and his friends rushed around the room, whacking each other with balloons. It was all quite sober, relaxed and noisy. (Public drunkenness is rare in these parts.)

During one dinner we got the low-down from the restaurateur on the Benafim cash machine robbery the previous week. It appears that the thieves first broke into a building materials depot to steal a digger at around 3 a.m. From there it was a short drive to the town. While two of the men stood guard with guns at the ready, the digger driver scooped the cash machine out of the wall and dumped it into a stolen vehicle in which they all made off.

Alerted by citizens who had witnessed the event, the police arrived not very promptly. In fairness, Faro, the nearest centre, is half an hour away. Not far behind the police came a security van that was due to replenish the cash machine. It would seem that the thieves had to content themselves with the dregs. Not that they have been doing badly; according to press reports, six cash machines have been ripped out of local walls in the past three weeks.

Two lorries arrived in Espargal square one morning, one stacked with sacks of white powder and the other bearing large tanks. The white powder was apparently a paint base. As we left the scene, this was being tipped into the tanks. By the time we returned a few hours later, two white edging lines had been painted the 2 kms along the road from Espargal to Alto Fica. In the mist that’s draped itself around us these past few weeks, one is glad to have them.

Also gladly had are the electrically-heated seats in the new car. Both the seat base and back warm up to cocoon driver and passenger in the lap of luxury. One doesn’t need this feature very often in the Algarve but it’s wonderful when one does. Several times during the recent upheaval in the house, the smaller dogs and I have retired to the car for an hour of peace and quiet – not, I should add, in heated seats.

SUCCULENT IN FLOWER

A friend living in Cape Town reports that she was expecting a visit from a family based in Switzerland – a South African woman married to a Swiss man, and their children. The family had booked to fly via Heathrow in order to benefit from a day flight (that was later changed). At Heathrow, the woman was denied entry because she lacked a visa, even though she would have remained in transit. Her husband and children flew on while she was sent back to Switzerland.

She was unaware that the UK had decided to impose visa restrictions on all South African passport holders, (apparently because corrupt SA officials have been enjoying a lucrative side line, flogging false and stolen documents). The new regulations have made headlines in the expat press here as they impact on thousands of South Africans living legally in mainland Europe.

JUST FRIENDS

Jonesy knows just how unpleasant such episodes are, having once (many years ago) been put back on a plane when she tried to enter France from the UK. The French had introduced visas in order to stop a Springbok rugby tour, a fact that had escaped her. It was, she recalls, a very tearful return.