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Election Fever

Only CG would take the roof off the barn and then, having boasted that he did it without breaking a single tile, ask me what I thought he should do next!

He has excelled himself this time, we need that barn, it is not only our main storage area and workshop but also home to the washing machine, tumble drier and huge freezer – none of which I wish to live without.

I am quietly fuming but saying nothing for now as I know he had only the best of intentions and the roof was in a rather poor state, but I’m sure a few repairs would have been sufficient, and more practical seeing as we have no money to buy the materials for a new one.

Rain is forecast for tomorrow………..

Everything else here on the farm is going well, although I was right to think that Roly pig is not pregnant. I had a very confusing conversation with Miguel the farmer last week explaining, in my best Portuguese, that I didn’t think the insemination had worked and by the time he was able to come round and have a look it was way too late to try again.

So, we will have to wait yet another three weeks for the next opportunity.

Jake the dog is well, (no more poison scares) and has quickly adapted to his more domesticated lifestyle. He stays quite contentedly on his lead all day and comes into the house with us at night. It does seem ridiculous however, to have all this space and keep a dog tied up, so we have started to take him for walks and let him off the lead for a good run every day. The beach is the best place for him but we haven’t always got the time to put him in the car and drive there so, having an idea that the poison came from one of our near neighbours we walk him as far away as possible and then let him run. So far so good.

Election fever is currently gripping Portugal, and as an outsider it is curiously fascinating. My lack of Portuguese means that most of what the politicians are saying means nothing at all to me so I rely on their faces to decide who, if I had a vote, I would vote for.

It was a similar affair when we first arrived in Portugal in 2005, posters were everywhere and as we were new to these shores and had even less of a grasp of the language we made up our own stories about each candidate.

We lived near Obidos then and our favourite was one of the candidates for local mayor, his smiling face beamed down at us from giant posters proclaiming ‘AINDA MELHOR’.  As we passed this image every time we left our village we started to devise a story of our own about this mystery person. We both agreed that should he have been English his name would have been Andy Mellor and he would probably have a West Country accent, (you’ll have to forgive us, but we had little in the way of entertainment).

CG and I invented all sorts of stories about ‘Andy’ and turned him into quite the local hero, even devising a chant – to be recited with feeling, in a West Country accent of course –

‘Andy Mellor, he’s our fella, if he can’t fix it no bugger can. Go Andy!’

During this time we took it upon ourselves to host regular Sunday lunch parties (in those days we could afford a joint of beef) and it was on one of these occasions, feeling rather jolly after some good wine and surrounded by a group of ex-pat English and Portuguese friends, that we mentioned our silly game - even reciting the chant.

Well, the room erupted into laughter, it seemed that our friends found our story even funnier than we did! It was some minutes before we could get a coherent word out of anyone, only to be told that ‘ainda melhor’ actually means ‘even better’ and was, in fact, the campaign slogan.

Boy did we feel stupid!

So, once again I would like to wish Telmo Faria, current mayor of Obidos, the best of luck in the election.

GO ANDY!

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