Portugal – Page 3 – Never Give Up PT

Life After Fortnite

Having already experienced two popped tyres and a mechanical breakdown with our cars in central Portugal, it occurred to me how heavily I relied on the AA in the UK. Sure, there’s breakdown services where I live but in the mountainous countryside of the interior of Portugal it is something that you could be waiting a while for. It isn’t a ‘fourth emergency service’ here.

Seemingly, cars are older than in the uk and in part this is because they are looked after rather well due to just about everyone knowing car maintenance. Everyone is a mechanic, everyone is a farmer, everyone is a builder and everyone can drive a tractor.

So, I need to change. I need to know these things too. And not only for me, but I need to teach my kids.

There’s a reason why the people in our community can do these things and it’s because they have to. They need to know how to fix their cars because of the time and money involved in them not knowing. The nearest garage is miles away and there’s a price to pay if you need a car towed and fixed by someone else. Same with building work and farming. From being youngsters the people in my community have acquired this knowledge through having to do it for themselves.

I learnt to drive at a fairly older age. I was around 30. That’s because a bus would drive along my road every ten minutes to practically anywhere in Leeds that I wanted. Why did I need the cost of a car? A weekly bus pass was about £10 back then! I was also conscious of the amount of cars already on the road. But then I kept moving to more remote areas of the UK. I had to drive.

I began a Building and Construction NVQ when I was 18 in the government’s attempt to get young people gaining practical skills, experience and qualifications in work places. I passed the course but I hated it. Not so much the work, I liked working outdoors, but I didn’t like who I had to work with. I didn’t fit in with the wolf whistling men who would talk mostly about the pictures in The Daily Sport.

And, on a side note, it’s interesting how many men get offended by a rainbow in Pride month and say ‘why do they have to shout about their sexuality?!’ when men have literally been able to intimidate women on the street for decades in their attempts to show how much of a manly heterosexual they are.

Anyway, back to the point!

Since leaving the building trade I haven’t laid a brick. To say that I’m a little rusty would be an understatement! However, just like the locals, I’m now in a situation where I have to wind back the years (25 years to be exact) and do things for myself.

We employed builders to renovate our AL rental accommodation, but we’ve blown the budget on a number of unforeseen expenditures with drainage and a bore hole being the biggest expense. So now it’s down to us!

Lou has a good understanding of building work. From the preparation, materials needed and the technique, she has obviously watched and listened to her dad, who is an expert. So, together we are continuing our project. Learning new things and doing it as a team.

But we won’t miss the opportunity to show our kids how to do it. At 18 I want them to be driving and starting building projects around the property even younger. It’s one of the reasons for the move. So that the kids could learn more about life and the skills required to survive. They’re already learning the Portuguese language at school, so having a second language is a tick in the box. Forest cleaning is another one, something that they will get very used to in order to stay safe from wild fires.

We are still in the early stages, but I think Lou and I are managing to show them that there’s life after Fortnite after all.

Preparing to repair the old wall of the property

Repairing the area that will, for the time being, be my outdoor PT area

Me with the smallest paint roller in the world. (The bigger roller didn’t cover some of the dimples!)

Rat Park

Despite an easier VISA process to live in Portugal from the UK there were many factors why Portugal began to be a very attractive country to live in.

There were hours and hours of research done by my wife and I to discover the cost of living, how good the education system was, we wanted to know more about the crime rates, the policing, the government structure and the tax system. We especially wanted to know what the quality of life could be expected for our young children. What is Portugal like to grow up in and to become young adults?

And yes, Rishi, we wanted to know if National Service existed in Portugal. It doesn’t. That was important to us. You see, my idea of a country expecting their young citizens to serve mandatory time in the armed forces strikes me as a country with a social problem often brought about by a lack of funding to those who need it the most and, crucially, who the wider society depends on. The youth. They are, after all, the ones who will be taking that particular country forward. Therefore we need to create well rounded young people with opportunities to develop.

Yes, the armed forces can get a great opportunity to learn many skills, but only if that person wishes to enrol in the first place.

So, after our conclusion that Portugal, albeit not perfect (which country is?!) gave us good vibes, we decided to move there.

One thing that caught my attention during my research was Portugal’s drug laws. Since 2001, drugs have been decriminalised. This includes cocaine and heroin. It was the first to do so in the EU. So although it is an offence to carry drugs it is not punishable by imprisonment, it does not result in a criminal record or lead to associated stigmas which may affect the ability to find work.

Instead, drug abusers are treated as patients instead of criminals. Those who remain clean from drug use are given incentives to reconnect with society. The government set up job creation schemes and loans for small businesses, directly intended for an individual to focus on getting their lives back on track and away from drug use.

Portugal had one of the highest number of drug related HIV cases in Europe prior to 2000. It has seen a reduction in new HIV cases by 17%.

Portugal’s drug related death toll is 3 people per million compared to the EU average of almost 18 per million people.

The street value of these illicit drugs massively decreased. Courts and prisons became less crowded. The number of adolescents using drugs declined. All because the government at the time decided to invest in tackling the problem.

A series of experiments were conducted in the early 20th century where they would put a rat in a cage with two water bottles. One was water and the other was water laced with heroin. Almost every rat would keep going back to the water laced with heroin where it would eventually overdose and die.

Then came along a professor in psychology, Bruce Alexander who noticed that, if the rat had nothing to do other than choose from these two bottles then maybe it is an unfair experiment. So he set up a Rat Park. As well as the two bottles, he introduced several rats into a cage so that they could play together, have sex and interact. He placed tunnels into the cages, food and climbing frames.

Professor Alexander noticed that the rats hardly ever went to the drugged water. It didn’t interest them. It went from 100% overdose when they were isolated and 0% when they had happy and connected lives.

What if addiction isn’t about our chemical hooks but instead about our cage?

If we can surround ourselves with a supportive network of people, be excited by a safe and happy future, eat well, exercise, laugh, love and play, then surely our cage is worth staying around for. And the need for turning to the drugged water is less attractive.

And I can say with some experience that it is only when I found a purpose to my life did I stop routinely taking cocaine, ecstasy and steroids.

Much like the rats in the Rat Park I found friendship, pathways, exercise and reasons to live. I also found Blair’s New Deal which got me off of my arse to learn a trade. I gained NVQ level 2 qualifications in bricklaying and construction for £50 a week. Not bad at the time.

Maybe if we change our cage, we can all find happiness. And with upcoming elections in the UK looming, its citizens have an opportunity to vote for who will help them find their cage.

Plonker

The filming for A New Life In The Sun has ended for this week. It’s a relief. The intensity of managing the final stages of phase one of the project (the AL house) and the forest cleaning in 35° heat while being filmed becomes a little too much.

And there’s only so many ways I can say ‘Wow! This looks great!’ when the camera person asks me what I think of the taps as I turn them on and off or what I think of the lid for the septic tank.

Sometimes, I go for the ‘just walked into the room to see the work of the DIY SOS team’ look. This means waving at my eyes to dry the tears as I tell the camera how thrilled I am with the splashback tiles.

The occasional Nicolas Cage from Face/Off look comes out when I have to describe how pleased I am with the skylight while paying the 500euros to the man who delivered it.

And then there are days where I forget to ‘be myself’ in front of the camera as I go around the property like Del Boy, trying to raise a laugh or be the clown. “What do you think of the grouting, Shay?” The camera person asks. “Luvvly Jubbly!” I reply. “Mange Tout, mange tout!”

As I reflect on my day, sometimes I just think to myself ”What a bleedin’ plonker I am”.

Pão

The bread in Portugal is unbelievably good. Since arriving it has been something that, despite trying to stick within calorie goals, I have eaten almost every day.

Chorizo bread, salted bread, sweet bread, cheesy bread, crusty bread, soft bread, it is all delicious.

And I thought that I had mastered how to order it in cafés too! Pão com queijo (cheesy bread) is a particular favourite of mine. But here’s the problem.

The other day as I was in conversation with our Brazilian builders I happened to mention ‘pão’. The builders looked at each other and laughed. Puzzled, I asked them what they were all laughing at. Their answer made me consider all of those times I’d ordered ‘pão’ in the cafes, many of which have Brazilian servers, and made me blush.

Pão, when said without the squiggly accent which makes it a nasal sound, becomes pau (like pow). Pau is Brazilian slang for a penis, or more accurately, a c*ck.

This, I thought, made my orders of cheesy, long and crusty, sweet or spicy much more amusing to the staff serving me!

The last couple of days has meant that Lou is constantly hearing me working on my nasally Portuguese sounds so that I can safely order my bread in the cafés.

But at the moment my confidence in the language has been lost, so today I ordered ice cream instead. There are no squiggly lines to pronounce with gelado.

Lemon

Seeing as I am writing a post all about a lemon, you could be forgiven for thinking that I would take this opportunity to bring up the ‘when life gives you lemons, make lemonade’ quote.

But you would be wrong.

You might think, seeing as I entitled this blog Lemon, that I will draw similarities with how squeezing a lemon is like squeezing the most out of each day, giving you that zest for life.

And again you would be wrong.

You could, however, be entitled to believe that I am going to give you a string of health benefits from eating this versatile fruit such as helping your body absorb more iron, it is rich in vitamin C and the citric acid can help to prevent the formation of kidney stones.

But, no, your incline would be wrong.

So it is totally feasible for you to think, then, that this article must be about how lemons are also very useful as a natural cleaner, as the citric acid can kill bacteria.

But, guess what? You’d be wrong again.

No. This post is simply dedicated to the biggest, kick ass beast of a lemon that I have ever seen! Thanks to the lemon tree in our garden, we are growing some mahoosive lemons to try to cram into our gin and tonic glasses.

So that’s it! Lemons, eh?!

Thunderstorm

Everyone gets a different feeling when they see and hear thunder and lightning. Some people, like my wife, have a warm fuzzy feeling that reminds her of childhood looking out of her bedroom window on a stormy night.

Some people are scared of the noise and the flashes of light like my eldest son.

Thunder and lightning can bring out all sorts of different kinds of emotions. The practical side of me gets disappointed that I can’t get the stuff done outdoors that I need to get done. The relaxed side of me just wants to find a box set and chill out until the storm passes.

I’ve even heard of people stripping off naked and dancing in it. I’ll stick to Netflix.

Today is a thunderstorm, bringing with it sheet lightning and hail stones. The rumbles of thunder are almost constant. It is majestic. I feel a bit like my wife as I gaze out of the window watching its wonder. But I can’t deny that there’s a little bit of my brain that agrees with my son. What if our house falls down?! The thunderstorm is beautiful, but so is my 100 year old Portuguese house that might not appreciate being shaken.

That’s how it feels as the thunder rumbles on. I can feel the vibration below me. But although the house is old, it comforts me to know that it has survived a 100 years of thunderstorms. It’s a solid structure and will survive another 100 years I’m sure.

‘Yesterday we were in the pool trying to cool down!’ I told our builder. ‘Welcome to Portugal!’ he laughed.

There’s rain, thunderstorms and sunshine in the UK, but here in Portugal the weather is on steroids.

A quote from The Minds Journal says…

Why do you like thunderstorms? Because it shows that even nature needs to scream sometimes.

The science behind a thunderstorm is a little more complex, but I quite like to think that nature is just having a moment, like we all do sometimes.

I once wanted to go on Dragons Den with an invention that allowed busy people (I imagined the city centre of Leeds at the time) to enter a pod so that they could scream, shout and swear without being heard or causing a scene. They could then calmly walk out and continue with their day a bit less stressed. ‘The Screaming Pod’, I announced to Lou one day. ‘I would call it The Screaming Pod!’

I think somewhere in Japan beat me to that invention though. And anyway, Wetherspoons has had a similar concept for decades already.

As I look again out of the window my thoughts turn to the newly sowed grass seed. ‘They need a bit of rain’, I think to myself. And then I realise what just ran through my head and remember that I’m getting old. Between the lawn being a priority these days, groaning every time I stand up and Lou having to point out the food that’s missed my mouth and instead dribbles down my chin, I know that I am getting old.

I jest, of course. 45 isn’t old. But I do think that I have reached an age where I can ‘feel old’ once in a while. I’m entitled to dribble now and again, right?

Ah, there I go again, wittering on about my time in Wetherspoons.

Lou has just reminded me that we still don’t have any doors and windows to the AL rental house, so my next job is to find some plaster board to protect the flooring from the rain. So I’d best sign off for now and get piss wet through in the rain while nature has a scream.

Until next time, my friends.

A Bitoque Break

Not so long ago I would have run a mile from two carby items on my lunch plate. It can make me feel ‘heavy’ for the afternoon, sleepy even. But then I was introduced to rice and chips. Oh, and siestas.

Rice, chips, a slab of meat of either pork, turkey or beef with a fried egg on top and a side salad is called a Bitoque in Portugal. It is insanely nice!

Lou and I felt that we needed a few hours away from the house this afternoon. Since the builders left on Friday we have been trying to reshuffle our home and our lives back to how we want it. A lovely plant in place of the cement mixer. A thorough clean and mop up of the dust that has gathered. Stuff like that.

But today we were tired. The temperature has rarely gone below 25° until evening, when it hovers around 13°, for the past seven days. This has added to our bouts of lethargy.

With the kids at school we decided to take a stroll along the Ribeira Grande river and visit our favourite cafe, Ponte Romana. Not only do they serve the best Bitoque in town, but the location and the views are amazing. And just the tonic today.

Tomorrow we will feel refreshed and focused to go again. After all, there’s plenty to do. But we mentioned today that we can’t take moments like this for granted. Just a meal together, away from the work, kids and business talk, can make a big difference. And it is important to remember the simple things that keep our spirit up.

Even if it is a bit carb heavy!

A Quick Update On The AL House

Just weeks away until the AL house is ready and the difference is massive since the last update! Along with the house being a place of relaxation and tranquility for our guests stay, we are trying to prepare the surroundings for a sensory lift.

Here’s the first floor entrance back in January…

And now…

The ground floor entrance when we first moved into the property…

Now we await the front doors and Juliet balcony…

Upstairs where the stairs will be…

And from the end of today, still waiting for the stairs but the surrounding areas are finished! We have tried to keep as much of the original character of the building as possible so the walls remain exposed.

The next update should be the very finished article which (hopefully) will be in a couple of weeks. Stay tuned!

I’m Just A Beginner

I will never truly know the forest, but I get the feeling as I walk through it, that it knows me already.

I aim to wander through this dream every morning. I call it a dream because it reminds me of a quote by Turkish novelist Memet Murat Ildan when he stated that “You can walk in a dream while you are awake. Just walk in the misty morning of a forest.”

And also before I have two cups of coffee I am hardly classed as awake, so one could argue that I am still slumbering through my morning walk.

I see something different with every walk. Most of the time I’m not even walking. I stop, listen, look up at the tallest pine trees and breath. The deeper into the forest I go I can lose my mind and find my soul.

But I am mindful that I am entering nature’s home. I bought the land but I am only a guest. I’ve already had snakes slither across my path with no harm to them or me. I’m sure I can come up with a similar understanding with the wild boars. It might seem naive, but I’m learning to become a part of my new environment.

I carry with me a long stick. I was advised by the locals in my Portuguese village that if I walk in the woods I should do so with a long stick. Apparently the wild boars, which come out at dusk and can charge if they feel threatened, make their dens in the forest. I don’t know what to do with the stick if I were to be confronted with a wild boar. Duolingo never taught me how to say “What the fuck do I do with this?” in Portuguese.

My aim is to wake up willing to be a beginner every single morning. Like I say, I will never truly know the forest. But if I enter it with the wide eyed care and attention that it deserves then I can make new discoveries each day.

I’m just a beginner at everything. Even stuff I’m qualified in. I’m a personal trainer but every visit to the gym is another chance to learn. I can’t possibly know it all.

At the moment the forest is my gym. Another day to grow, learn and become a part of something special.

An Evening With Alan Sugar Or A Wild Boar?

If you say ‘wild boars’ often enough you begin to hear it in Simon Le Bon’s voice and finish the sentence with ‘never lose it’.

And that is what I do now everyday. I have Duran Duran’s The Wild Boys song permanently playing in my head thanks to the wild boar population in central Portugal.

Tonight is a fine example, but first I need to explain our house. Typically in rural Portugal, you have to go outdoors to go down the steps to the other indoor living areas. So our bedrooms, kitchen, dining area and bathroom are upstairs whilst the sitting room/lounge is downstairs.

As Lou and I were leaving the indoor area to go downstairs to watch TV, we heard what sounded like a snuffling sound and scarpering hooves. The creature (what we think was a wild boar) will have been startled, but Lou and I were panicked too! We quickly put on the outside light and used our phone as a torch. We couldn’t see anything.

We decided that we wouldn’t take our chances with a 200 kg wild boar in the vicinity so we went back inside. The Apprentice wasn’t going to be a big enough draw for us to chance making It to the sitting room!

And so that means it leaves me writing this little blog and Lou shouting the occasional wild boar fact at me as she researches wild boar on the Google thingy, hence the weight that I gave earlier.

Interestingly, wild boars never chose this way. Wild boars never close your eyes and wild boars always shine. Who knew?!