Letter from Espargal: 26 June 2015

On Satuday Slavic rolled up with three fellow workers to continue the concrete underpinning of the fence - part of our mission to stop the orphans escaping and irritating the neighbours. This is a big job as we have some 400 metres of fencing around the house and the park. Building merchants had dumped a pile of sand and 10 bags of cement at the bottom of the driveway, as requested.

I ferried loads of sand up to the cement mixer while the team divided themselves up into mixers, carriers and cementers.

EXOTIC FLOWER

It was hot. Even so we got lots done. At the end of the day, the boys were grateful to sit around the patio table and down a few beers. So was I.

On Sundays I irrigate my fruit trees, a dozen of them on the adjacent field. Most of the fruit has been grafted on to almond trunks over the past few years. The trees are just starting to bear.

Jones has long been a picker of fruit from the many trees that line the roads. The road surface is often yellow or pink with fallen fruit.

Sunday evening we joined the locals at the Hamburgo. Our numbers were swollen by the arrival of some of Fintan and Pauline's (extensive) family from Dublin.

Also there were Neil and Francesca, the son/girlfriend of other Irish neighbours, Tony and Annette. The latter had been mightily surprised when the pair, who'd spent a year travelling down the Americas on a motorbike, turned up at the door. They were thought to be still in Argentina.

BELOW: NEIL AND FRANCESCA FACING

One way and another it was quite a riot. Manuel and his new assistant, Marisa, had their hands full. Apart from ourselves and other customers inside the restaurant, they had to service the patio tables - hugely popular in summer - which call for much running back and forth.
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That night I dreamed that I had been sent to prison for five days, I think for being cheeky to the judge. I met a man who said he was in for 30 days, I'm not sure what for. It was quite a nice, orderly prison and the warder, who was Afrikaans, was very polite to me after he discovered that I could speak Portuguese.

Lots of prisoners lined up for various duties. From the roof of the prison we could see people exercising on the roof of a building below. I was quite surprised, when I woke up, to find that I was not imprisoned after all. It was such a realistic dream.

Monday morning we went first to May in order to open her front door for Christine, a woman who is joining the team of May supporters. Having let her in, we went on to Loule to get new keys to her front door for the support team. Previously May used to let occasional visitors in herself. Now, unless they have keys, they stay outside - as one or two have had to do.

That evening we joined neighbours, Sarah and David, to watch the longest day sun go down from the telef that looms above our hill. The ladies had prepared snacks that we washed down as appropriate. Bobby, who had somehow got out of the garden, joined us. From the telef one gets to see some of the world's finest sunsets. Jonesy always looks out for a green ray.

Monday night I dreamed that I had died - not the first time that I've had such a dream. What I discovered is that when you are dead, you are still aware of other people but they are not aware of you. It's a bit disconcerting.

On Tuesday Luis the electrician rolled up early with his assistant as requested. Jones had heard an ominous crackling coming from a socket in the kitchen when she plugged a device into a neighbouring socket. It wasn't the sort of problem that I wanted to leave her with while I'm away in South Africa next week.

Luis replaced the socket, pointing to the black marks on the old unit where it had been sparking out. Fifteen minutes after his arrival, he was on his way. If only all our problems could be so quickly resolved. Next job is to install a new thermostat to regulate the water temperature. Taking a shower is a challenging experience. For weeks I've been chasing Paulo the plumber.

To our great pleasure, we see that both our bird table and bird bath are now in demand - having been deserted for the best part of a week, presumably while the avian population kept them under scrutiny.

I've been putting out a bird food mixture obtained from the local supermarket.

The pigeons arrived at the table first - no surprises there - followed by a host of sparrows and then an azure-winged magpie. That was special; the magpies are ever so shy. Talking of birds, we had to brake sharply the other night for a nightjar that was sitting in the road - not for the first time.

The bird bath was claimed by the tits which splashed joyfully around. It's lovely to have birds so close by. Portuguese birds tend to be rather shy, which is sensible given the hunting instincts of the locals.

On Tuesday I awoke from my siesta to realise that I'd forgotten about my weekly physio session with Jodi. This was very embarrassing. Most of my appointments I diarise on my phone, which beeps an alert in good time. The local hospitals, aware of patient foibles, either ring or message them in advance of appointments, asking them kindly to say if they're unable to attend.

I apologised to Jodi and booked an appointment on Wednesday morning instead. Jones said she'd come along as she needed a few odds and ends. But her watch had stopped and she was still drying her hair when it was time to go.

"Go without me!" she cried. I knew this wouldn't be a good idea. Instead I suggested that she allow the summer airs to dry her hair naturally. (Temps in the high 30s forecast this weekend.)

No, that wouldn't work. It would be a mess.

Put a hat on then!

No, that wouldn't work either.

AT MATO A VISTA RESTAURANT, WED EVENING

She came along, all the same. Her hair looked fine (because she had stuck a couple of mini-rollers in it, she said.) It seems to me that being a girl is unnecessarily complicated.

Maybe that should just be complicated. Having to look good all the time is against nature. We didn't evolve to preen ourselves - or did we? I don't think I did! Better change the subject!

After Natasha arrived, we took ourselves to lunch at JL's. The brothers make the best toasted tuna sandwiches in town.

PRICKLES - NOT TO BE DISTURBED

Thursday: May's maid has found her lying on the floor. It's the third time this week that she has required the assistance of visitors to get up from the floor. She really needs to go into a nursing home. The rest of Thursday and Friday are going to be busy one way and another.

(Post Script: They were: I spent much of the afternoon and the whole evening getting May belatedly admitted to hospital. She was so weak that she couldn't move a limb of her own accord.)

As I'll be heading south next Tuesday, this is likely to be the last blog for a week or two.

Letter from Espargal: 19 June 2015

This hasn't been a good week. It hasn't exactly been a bad week either. It's really been a messy, half done sort of a week.

The first thing to get half done was sealing the gaps in the fence through which the pups have been entering and leaving the property. Andrei and Slavic set about the task last Saturday morning, mixing cement and laying a stone and concrete base along the wire. They advised me that it was Andrei's birthday and that they would be working only half a day as they wanted to celebrate the other half. They'll be back to continue the task tomorrow.

Sunday we had a most welcome, brief and unseasonal downpour, all of 9mms. We had barely settled down to brunch at the Hamburgo when the rain came rattling off the windows and

streaming down the road. As the garden was as dry as dust, this was the best news of the week, even if we had to wipe down the car seats afterwards. The windows were partly open for our fellow travellers, Ono and Prickles.

On the way home, we came across two small owls in the oak tree avenue that leads back to Espargal. We stopped to watch and listen as the birds amused themselves and us for the best part of ten minutes. That was really special.

Sunday afternoon Jonesy joined her brother and Lucia at the beach before Lucia flew back to London to begin work again the following day. Llewellyn remained behind with the dogs.

He is to motor back home later in the week via Madrid and France's amazing Millau bridge.

Monday Carlos the vet arrived to inoculate our dogs and the strays. He had given us tranquilizing tablets with which to dose the orphans. We went first down to Idalecio's cottages where Llewellyn was waiting with his dogs. They had to be officially dewormed before their return to the UK - in accordance with regulations.

Next came the inoculations. We started out with the orphans but they proved to be anything but tranquilised and were having none of it. We gave up. There was no point in trying to chase them around the pen.

Instead Carlos inoculated our six and Poppy before hurrying back to the surgery in Loule where a badly injured dog was awaiting his attention.

Next on our list of to-dos was May, who has been receiving treatment for severe eczema in her legs, caused by poor circulation. She gets regular visits from a nurse who rubs her legs with creams and binds them with crepe bandages.

The treatment leaves May semi-immobile on her sofa in the living room and disinclined to make the effort to feed herself. Barbara and other kindly neighbours have been ensuring she doesn't lack for food,

bringing in hot meals and tempting her with snacks from her own kitchen.

The nurse asked for new supplies of bandages and wadding, a duty that fell to us. The original materials had been supplied by the doctor. Preliminary inquiries at pharmacies indicated that these items were not widely available from retail outlets. Presumably, they were supplied directly by hospitals and clinics.

Tuesday Llewellyn departed early with the dogs on his long return journey to the UK - made even longer in fact when his technology failed him and he got sidetracked into Paris at evening rush-hour.

MILLAU BRIDGE IN BACKGROUND

We set off mid morning on a search for May's bandages - without luck - followed by a visit to May herself. She wasn't a happy bunny but then neither would I have been with my legs wrapped up like an Egyptian mummy's.

The afternoon brought my regular physio appointment with Jodi in Alte; thence to a combined toenail-clipping and haircut session with Mary in Benafim.

Wednesday, after a brief early walk, I took the car into Honda in Faro for its annual service. I'd booked it in the previous week, making it clear that I would need the car back by lunchtime. No problem said the man taking the booking.

MELLO COOLS OFF

After dropping it off, I took Honda's useful shuttle into the Algarve Forum. At midday when the shuttle dropped me back at Honda, I found the car still parked where I had left it. The receptionist apologised. It had been a busy morning. They hadn't got round to it yet. She suggested that I email her directly in future to avoid the problem.

So I returned home, stopping en route at the local mechanic to book it in with him instead - as other expats in the village do. I will leave it with him just before I go to South Africa on the 30th.

He drops the car back again afterwards. That makes life for us both easier and cheaper. Now that the car is out of warranty, there's really no reason to have Honda service it.

LET'S TRY THIS WATER BOWL!

Natasha worked that afternoon. Jones and I went shopping. We seem to go through an enormous amount of dog food.

I helped Jones rescue a small lizard that had trapped itself in the downstairs bathroom. We secured it under a plastic vessel and took it outside. It vanished into the flowerbed, gratefully or otherwise. It was hard to know.

SPARKY - NOT HAPPY AND NOT EATING

Thursday: Sparky was off colour and didn't want her food. Big worry! We couldn't make up our minds what to do next. Eventually we dropped off the dogs' passports at the parish office in Benafim for their new licences and went on to the pharmacy there in search of May's crepe bandages.

I'll keep it short: Benafim pharmacy to Salir pharmacy and Salir to the Loule orthopedic shop. Finally back to May herself.

Lunch - tomato and ham sandwiches accompanied by cold white wine - was served alfresco by Sophia at the cafe at Funchais. She makes the sandwiches with oreganum and olive oil. I can't tell you how good they taste.

The frustrations of the morning dissolved as we sipped the wine. It felt good to be alive.

DAWN

It's hot. The solstice approaches fast. The sun is up 06.15ish. It doesn't slip down behind the western hills again until nearly 21.00. We have to walk early and late. We limit ourselves to a 30 minute circuit. By the time the dogs get back, they are puffed out; so are we. The cool tiles offer some relief from the heat.

Friday:

Sparky is brighter but still off her food.
(Our midnight skirmishes continue, she in full voice, I with almond-powered catapult)
To Loule to conclude some business: (Done!)
To Faro to exchange a new dud mifi (mobile modem) for a functioning one: (Done!)
To Sao Bras to stock up on baggy and olive oil (Done!)
To May to see how things are going (Done)
Home and blog………………

Letter from Espargal: 12 June 2015

The easiest point to start this blog is last Saturday in Loule when Llewellyn lost his phone. He had taken his two dogs, his wife and mine to the beach - a favourite destination. It was afterwards as they repaired to one of the island cafes in the Avenida to enjoy a coffee that Llewellyn became aware that he and his phone had parted company. This was serious - on a par with losing a wife or a car. Llewellyn's phone contains more than his data, it positively bulges with apps and maps.

A frantic search of pockets and of the car proved fruitless. So did several calls to the phone.

Fortunately, Llewellyn, who's high tech, had his laptop with him. He'd set his phone up so that he could find it, disable it or delete his data remotely via the internet, rendering it useless to a thief. What he hadn't done, however, was to tick one or other box that enabled these functions, so no luck there.

Eventually, a Portuguese man answered a call to the phone and agreed to bring it round. He turned up some minutes later, explaining that he had found the phone beside the wheel of the car. The reason he hadn't answered it sooner was that he didn't know how to.

(This figured; one has to go through a whole ritual to answer Jones's new phone.) The finder was a bit of a sad fellow who was pleased to receive the 20-euro reward that Llewellyn offered him. Much relief all round!

While they were out, I got Slavic to help me attach the heavy plough to the tractor and spent several hours clearing my heavily overgrown fields. It's hard to express how much satisfaction I gained from this activity after three tractorless months.

The fields look infinitely better - and I suffered no sciatic woe for my endeavours.

On Sunday Llewellyn and Lucia joined us and the expats at the Hamburgo brunch. His two dogs, which like ours go everywhere, sat just beyond the tables in the shade. Unlike ours they are very well trained and are not accomplished bummers. Maybe it would be fairer to say that they are more discreet bummers (and just as effective). They indicate their needs more with pleading looks than by picking one's pockets.

That evening Llewellyn barbecued for us at home. He could have used the gas bbq but he declined this in favour of the old unit, with charcoal and smoke and all that neanderthal stuff. I should add that Llewellyn is an accomplished cook.

The bbq took some time. The Portuguese charcoal didn't behave exactly like the British product and had to be heated or cooled or something to work properly - a smoke and mirrors job.

Whatever the case, the chicken portions and lamb chops, when they came off it, were done to a treat and went down splendidly with the excellent wine that he had brought along.

One might add a little too splendidly.

The pair of us confessed to having to blink a few times the following morning.

On Monday, while Jones was doing May's shopping, I visited J.L. Simoes, gunsmiths in Loule, to obtain a new catapult. The elastic in the one that had lain in a drawer for years had perished. In the event, I came away with two, one rather more professional than the other.

The aim of these catapults - in a manner of speaking - was to dissuade the orphans, whom Lucia has rechristened the three musketeers, from keeping the neighbourhood awake by howling half the night. We've tried dousing them with water, bribing them with bones, exhausting them on walks - all to no purpose. They have howled on regardless.

For ammunition I first tried some of the small lemons from the glut in our buckets and under our trees. I should interrupt my flow to say that we have squeezed scores of lemons, filling bottles and ice-trays with the juice, as well as making tons of lemon marmalade. But we still had lemons to spare and some of these I nicked from Jones' bucket while she wasn't looking.

The launch pad was the north patio, about 40 metres from the musketeers' stronghold in the adjacent field. The lemons proved to be rather overkill. The smaller ones flew true, whacking explosively and impressively against the heavy fence. I feared they might prove too lethal(?), actually striking an orphan. What I wanted was to shut them up; not to wipe them out.

ON THE PATIO OF IDALECIO'S GUEST COTTAGE

Almond nuts proved to be the perfect ammunition. Our trees are drooping under the weight of this season's crop. So I gathered a hundred or two and waited till the orphans burst in voice around midnight. Then from the upper patio, I launched my fusillade.

It worked surprising well. I could hear the nuts pinging off the fence or the roof of the pen. Whether the orphans were terrified into silence or merely puzzled is impossible to know. But they stayed quiet. It was the same story the next night and the next. Success at last - for the moment, at least.

COBBLED TOGETHER
Tuesday night we tried a new restaurant (to us) Adiafa, on the outskirts of Boliqueime. It was ok, much like the Hamburgo, although not as attractive, with noisy expats packing the exterior patio tables and a few Portuguese and us inside.

Wednesday Jones met up with her relatives in Alte while I had a session with Jodi. My sciatica continues mild although it doesn't like hard, upright chairs, even those with seats covered with layers of cushion, as it made clear to me the previous evening. I have some sympathy for the princess and the pea.

That evening we trooped up to the telef to watch the sunset. It's Jones' favourite evening retreat, the only place that she can escape the demands of her garden, dogs, cats and waifs; maybe I should add husband to that list.

Truly it offers views forever in all directions, across the soft, huggable Algarve hills to the sea.

The others walked up the steep path alongside our fence, with the orphans following. I took myself up on the tractor.

We made ourselves comfortable on the rocky summit to gaze out on the evening; the outlook seemed to improve with each snack and sip of wine.

The orphans were pleased to get a nibble or two although they hesitated to come close.

It's not quite supper at the top of the Eiffel Tower but it's much closer, cheaper and more intimate.

LOOK MA, NO HANDS!

Thursday we called in on the vet to discuss the visit he is due to make here on Monday. He has to give our dogs their annual jabs - a prequisite for the issuing of their licences - and to give Llewellyn's dogs the prescribed deworming tablets that will allow his dogs back into the UK in a few days' time.

The hard part will be inoculating the orphans; they will not permit us to handle them although they frolic around our heels and will take biscuits from our fingers. I have obtained tranquiliser pills that, I hope, will render them sufficiently sleepy for the vet to carry out the task.

Letter from Espargal: 5 June 2015

Monday brought a fine moon and the final English lesson of the academic year - on European birth rates - even though few lessons can be less academic. Mine tend to resemble a typical Portuguese market scene more than serious learning. This used to worry me. No longer. That's just the way it is and the way people seem to like it.

Monday's lesson was even more confused than usual. Canadas was summoned out of the classroom several times by the secretary to countersign urgent cheques while Carlos photocopied the wrong text, causing enormous puzzlement among those pupils who tried to find the correct place. Helena disputed the birthrate figures for Portugal until we ascertained that she was used to counting average children per woman while the scale used in the lesson was per thousand inhabitants.

AN ARCHIVE SHOT OF THE CLASS

However one counts them, they're ominously low - as are Germany's and Italy's. Portugal is interested in attracting suitable immigrants although it's grateful not to have to cope with the boat people washing up on Mediterranean shores.

A friend who's applying for Portuguese citizenship told me after attending the language entry exam that most of the candidates present were from eastern Europe. Before they left the hall, a government official checked that those writing the exam were the genuine applicants and not their more fluent friends.

Anyhow - returning to my theme - I reassured my pupils that confusion was the normal state of mankind (humankind if you insist) and there was nothing to worry about.

The lesson concluded with the presentation by Canadas to me of a bottle of precious Dona Antonia white port, with card, to thank me for my efforts, never mind that I have been more absent than present this past term.

Thus endeth Monday's lessons - until October or thereabouts.

On Tuesday I sent Canadas a text message complimenting Dona Antonia on her exquisite virtues and regretting that her stay with us would be brief.

Canadas responded that she could not have arrived in better company, however brief her stay.

I have declined to attend the university's annual end-of-year banquet on the grounds that I'm still not sitting down, which is partly true.

A RECENT SHOT OF MAY

May was slower and frailer (?) than usual, needing a lot of support to get in and out of the car and complaining of her pains.

She hurt all over, she said. I knew the feeling I responded.

Her great battle in life, octogenarian frailties apart, is with her television (by internet).

At the best of times this requires nudges and prompts of a kind foreign to May's experience. At the worst of times, it simply offers her a blank screen.

And since her TV is her company, the interruptions cause her a lot of distress. It would be easy to put in a stable, reliable system but not one with channels that interest May.

JONES' LABORIOUSLY WEEDED SHEEPFOLD GARDEN

Tuesday Jones and I light-lunched at the Hamburgo before my physio session with Jodi, leaving the house to Natasha. There were lots of cyclists on the road. I give them a wide berth, still grateful to those London motorists who afforded me the same.

The circuit through Benafim and Alte is popular with the cycling fraternity (sorority?). Now that it's been resurfaced it's additionally attractive - ditto with the motorcyclists who whiz (or thunder - Harley Davidsons) past the Hamburgo.

If I seem more than usually gender sensitive today it's because the BBC has been pounding our ears with gender issues - in short, women's rights. The corporation seems determined to right millennia of gender wrongs without delay. Some are troubled by God's male designation - a language rather than a theological issue - and others by the Catholic church's insistence on male clergy.

No doubt that women have historically got the rough end of the gender pineapple - and still do in many cultures - but my eyes glaze over at the endless bleating about skirts on company boards and in parliament - and suckling infants in public. There is certainly nothing remotely oppressed about the females in my life - whether neighbours, lawyer, notary, physiotherapist, pharmacist or surgeon.

I might add "wife" and certainly dogs.

It's hot. Wednesday we cut short our morning walk as the beasts were pausing in the shade with little enthusiasm for further exercise. The orphans followed us into the park and insisted on their share of the treats that always conclude an outing.

Paleface prefers to hover outside the pen. He still has an uneasy relationship with our male dogs. The girls are part of the gang. We keep an eye on Mello as she's a shoe-thief. We had to bribe her with a chewy to recover a Jones shoe that she (Mello) was making off with (below).

Two of Espargal's oldest residents have left the village. Ever since our arrival we have seen Mrs Casimira and her equally bent husband tending to their duties around their house in the square. In the winter she would find a patch of sunshine to rest relax; in the summer they'd sit in the shade of their front patio.

The couple were both in their 90s. He still tended his garden and drove his equally ancient tractor although only to his plot at the other end of the village. A few weeks ago, they were retired to a home. He died days later. Local people shrug when you ask them what of. Seems he had no further interest in life.

POPPY - SNAKE SLAYER

Thursday morning: Jones, who was walking ahead with Poppy, yelled that I should take the route beside the fence and avoid the path through the park.

I gathered minutes later that Poppy had encountered a snake there. Rather than fleeing the scene our little guest dog had seized the serpent with mongoosian agility and begun flinging it in the air.

Jones shrieked at her with such force that her throat hurt her afterwards, more out of fear for Poppy than the snake.

I hope that word of the incident gets around the slithery community.

Thursday afternoon: Our turn around the park reveals the remains of Poppy's snake. Here Raymond sniffs at it suspiciously before I turf it over the fence.

Jones regretted that the snake had expired.

I reassured her that there are many more where it came from.

We have certainly seen our fair share of them these past few days.

Our neighbour, Idalecio, and his partner, Sonia, invited us around one evening to join them for dinner on the patio of a recently completed guest cottage.

We were most impressed by his efforts. The living room was once their occasional mini-restaurant.

Idalecio had knocked through, both to a new bathroom and patio and also to a basement level below where the bedroom is now located.

The patio offers superb views and total privacy.

LUCIA AND DOGS IN SPAIN

Llewellyn and Lucia (plus dogs) will be staying in one of his cottages when they arrive here late Friday.

They've been motoring down from London with stops in Bordeaux and Madrid.

We've been following their progress - with frequent pictures of them relaxing along the route.

SICK AND TIRED OF DOGS? TELL US ABOUT IT!