Quick update: It is with much satisfaction and no little sense of relief that I announce that I have now received, in my credit card account, a full refund of our original payment for car rental. The final chapter has now been written in the entyre, tyring, tyre story.

When we bought the house in Portugal, Bernice and I originally had plans to convert the third bedroom into a bathroom, and reduce the downstairs bathroom to a toilet and washbasin. I even sketched out a plan to steal the rest of the fairly long, narrow bathroom to make a dining alcove extension to the kitchen. We actually contacted the firm of contractors we had called in to survey the house before we bought it and asked them to offer an estimate for this work.

Once we had bought, and the kids had moved in, we decided that we would not rush to carry out any major conversions, but would, instead, give them, and us, a chance to live with the house as-is and then make a decision. It is true that living, for a month, with five people sharing one bathroom that includes the toilet occasionally presents its challenges, we have found that it is doable. I now view going up and down the stairs to the toilet three times a night as valuable cardio-vascular exercise, rather than a right pain. (Truth to tell, I view it as both.)

More important than all this is that, over the two years (Two years! Where did they go? Oh yes, I remember: they were, for the most part, flushed down the toilet by Covid) over the two years, as I say, that the kids have been living in the house, they have colonised the third bedroom, turning it into an office/recording studio/storage room. When we first arrived for this trip, I could not negotiate all the accumulated ‘stuff’ in this room to get to the wine rack (disaster!) and the printer (less critical, but still awkward) that were against the far wall of the room.

A few days after we arrived, Tslil took command. She asked us to amuse Tao (she didn’t have to ask twice, of course) while she and Micha’el disappeared into the ‘stuff’, paying out a ball of string behind them so that they would be able to find their way out. A mere hour or so later, they invited us up to admire their industry. We opened the door onto a room that was a vision of order. Musical instruments now hung neatly on the walls. The computer desk was absolutely ready for business. The floorspace could have accommodated a ballroom dancing exhibition. We were amazed and delighted and, of course, this finally persuaded us that the dream of an upstairs bathroom was unrealistic, and would be very unfair to the kids.

What this meant, of course, was that we now needed to consider renovating the downstairs bathroom. This featured a toilet that more than occasionally leaked; a cracked, but working, bidet in a garish purply-chestnut-brown and white; a bath that leaked, with a plug that failed to keep the water in and water pressure that found climbing to the top of the shower head an all-but-insurmountable challenge; and a sink where the water pressure was so poor that it failed to trigger the gas water heater, so that you could only wash in cold water. All of this was set off by shocking pink wall tiles that, for some reason, Bernice found unattractive, ornate, dull bronze towel rails and a free-standing toilet-roll and toilet-brush holder that had seen many, many better days.

A friend of the kids was able to provide the name of a pair of professionals – a plumber and a tiler – who worked together. She had not actually used them herself, but she knew several people who had, and who recommended their work. So we asked them to come round, assess the job, and give an estimate.

I’m not sure what we were expecting, but what we got was a couple of chirpy Cockneys: Mark, dapper, spruce, diminutive, and Eric, rather more rotund and balding. They took a quick look at the bathroom, as we explained that we wanted a fairly low-budget job, replacing all the fixtures and fittings, replacing the wall tiles, adding a glass shower door, repainting the walls, but not touching the floor tiles, which, as they are throughout the house, are a warm terracotta in fairly good condition.

We have our more high-end bathroom in Israel, and we weren’t looking to rival that. As far as Bernice was concerned, white, leak-free fittings and everything clean and bright was the name of the game. As for me, I also wanted to know that they could resolve the water pressure issue. That was, of course, something they couldn’t guarantee, but they seemed fairly optimistic.

Eric measured up to price tiles. I was a little unimpressed that he asked to borrow a tape measure (he had left his in the car and it was raining heavily), but, other than that, they certainly seemed to be able to talk the talk. They quoted a price for bath, toilet and bidet that seemed ludicrously low. (One of the advantages of living in Israel is that so many goods and services seem very reasonable in Portugal.) Then, pausing only to pocket the tape measure, they left.

They contacted us a couple of days later with a total quote for the job that we were quite ready to accept. We agreed that they would buy all of the white goods and taps, while we would look for towel rails, toilet roll holders and so on. However, a few days later, they called to suggest that we meet them to buy all of the goods. This actually suited us, and we arranged to meet them a couple of days later, outside a large DIY store 40 minutes’ drive away.

In the course of an hour or so, we bought everything we needed. Their estimate for materials had not been far off the mark. Going round the store, we learnt something of their back stories. They had met in Portugal through a common friend, and teamed up. They both have homes in England, and are in the process of buying, and building homes on, quintas (estates) near Penamacor. They both plan to shift their centre of activity from the UK to Portugal, although I am sure they will both continue to return to the UK for short-term lucrative one-off contracts.

There are (or, at least used to be) a number of American medical professionals who came on aliya, worked year-round in the Health Service here, and went back to America for a month a year to earn enough to enable them to live the rest of the year here in the style they were accustomed to. Clearly, the same can be true for skilled artisans coming from the UK to Portugal.

I’m reminded of the story of a homeowner who calls a plumber for an emergency job. The plumber completes the work in a few minutes and presents a hefty bill. The home-owner says: ‘Good grief! That’s more than I earn, and I’m a brain surgeon”, to which the plumber replies: “It’s more than I used to earn when I was a brain surgeon.”

I think it’s fair to say that Eric and Mark have not yet fully integrated into Portuguese life. From what little I heard, I think my command of the Portuguese language is at least as good as theirs (and I don’t speak or understand at all). Going round the store, I heard them discussing prices and comparing them to UK prices.

I noted that they were quoting prices in sterling: ‘Blimey! That’s only 2 quid a piece!’ I was very impressed to see that they were able to convert effortlessly from euros to pounds. Then I noticed that the item they were referring to cost 2 euros. They weren’t converting; they were simply using the words ‘pound’ (or ‘quid’) instead of ‘euro’. Such is the extent of their lack of integration.

At the end of the shopping expedition, Mark loaded everything onto his van (which was actually his motorised caravan, in which he is currently living on his land), and, later that day, they brought all of the materials round to the house, to be stored until the following week, when they were going to carry out the work. It is fair to say that theirs is a low-overhead business! Unfortunately, Eric forgot to bring back the tape measure.

They started work the Tuesday after we left Portugal, and managed to finish in five days. They also managed to resolve all the problems, and Eric finally remembered to bring back the taper measure. I think it was my telling him that I would deduct it from the final bill that did the trick.

So we now have what is (or at least looks in the photos to be) a much more respectable bathroom.

I suspect that you either immediately recognize the title of this week’s random musings or it means absolutely nothing to you. For the benefit of those of you who belong in the latter group, let me explain that it is the text on the last page of what just might be the greatest of all picture books for young children – Maurice Sendak’s Where the Wild Things Are. Let me sketch the context for this quote. Having been sent to bed without supper as a punishment for his wild behaviour, and having then sailed magically away to the land where the wild things are, Max has a wild rumpusy time but then realises he really wants to be “where someone loved him best of all”, and he returns home to his bedroom, “where he found his supper waiting for him and it was still hot.”

There are several reasons why I love this book. The text is like an early Mozart symphony: vocabulary and syntax are simple and direct, and at the same time lyrical. You feel that changing any one of the words would break the magic spell they weave. The artwork leads the reader almost imperceptibly from the world of everyday to the exotic world of the wild things, and back again. I think what I love most of all is the way in which all of the discord of the early pages, and the rumpus of the middle, melt away to the perfect peace of the ending.

I don’t think it is too fanciful to claim that “he found his supper waiting for him…. and it was still hot” belongs up there with “Reader, I married him”.

It is the happy ending that I want to celebrate this week, by recounting two stories from our latest trip to Portugal. Actually, if you are a regular reader you already know the stories, and I only need to tell you the endings.

Let’s start with the wood stove. You may remember that, during our trip, we bought one for the house, and it was fitted the day we left Portugal. Since then, the weather has turned much cooler there (as, indeed here) and the kids have actually started using the stove. I am very pleased (and not a little relieved) to report that they have given a glowing (forgive me) report of its efficiency, warmth and cosiness. Much less heat is escaping up the chimney, and much more being projected into the room.

Lighting a fire is no longer a mystic art requiring a whole range of skills: the twisting of multiple sheets of cardboard into arcane shapes; their precise placement among artfully stacked twigs and logs; prolonged prostration before the god of the hearth coupled with frantic blowing or waving of sheets of cardboard. Apparently more or less all that is now needed is a slight adjustment of the handle that controls the air-vent ensuring an efficient draw. The prospect of returning to Portugal in mid-January now seems even more attractive than it already did.

It’s fair to say that the success of the wood-stove was not completely unexpected. Plenty of people had assured us that it would make a tremendous difference. Eeyore, of course, wouldn’t believe it until it had been tested in situ, but even he wasn’t really surprised that it works so well.

The second happy ending is a very different kettle of fish. I told you, a couple of weeks ago, about the puncture we suffered on our rental car, and about Europcar’s complete failure to help us resolve the situation. When we returned home, I received a request to answer a survey about our satisfaction with Europcar, and I felt much better after venting my anger.

I then went online and submitted, through Europcar’s user-friendly site, a detailed account of our adventures, together with a photograph of the ripped tyre and a PDF of the invoice and receipt for the new tyre. I explained that I felt the only reasonable response from them would be to refund us the cost of replacing the tyre.

I received an immediate automatic response, acknowledging receipt, supplying a reference number, and informing me that “we usually respond within 4 hours, however, due to the current situation worldwide, we may not be able to respond within this timeframe.” I decided I was prepared to overlook the sloppy punctuation. I also found myself wondering what they gained by boasting of their impressive response time, since they then went on to say, effectively, that they weren’t going to meet it. Still, an acknowledgement, even an automated, ill-punctuated, under-promising one, was, I grudgingly conceded, better than no bread at all.

Then, three days later, I received a further response, requesting that I attach the receipt. I had, of course, attached the receipt to my original email. However, there was nothing to be gained by arguing, so I dutifully attached the PDF again and sent off my reply.

Six days later, I received an email stating, very undramatically, that “Following your e-mail, we have proceeded with the refund of €124.99 for the tyre you had to replace during this rental.” This was such a matter-of-fact statement that I had to read it twice to confirm that it actually said what I thought it did.

When Bernice and I had finished the bottle of champagne we opened to celebrate, we both agreed that now we would wait and see just how long it took until something actually happened. We both fully expected that the something, if it did in fact happen, would be a voucher redeemable against a future rental.

The following day(!), we received two further emails. Unlike the previous correspondence, which I believe came from Europcar’s centralised customer care section and which had been in English, these were in Portuguese, and came from Europcar Portugal. I was able to see that they both contained invoices, one reversing the original invoice, and the second a revised invoice, including a credit of €124.99.

Having reached this point in the story, I was about to tell you that the reversal and the final charge have not yet appeared on my credit card account online. However (hands up all those who could tell there was a ‘However’ coming), I have just checked again, and I see that the final charge does now appear. Curiously, the refund does not yet appear, even though both invoices were generated on the same date. So, at the time of writing, we have now paid twice for the rental (less the cost of the tyre), and it is with a sinking heart that I realise this particular story has not yet reached its happy ending. Max’s dinner has not yet materialised in his bedroom. You, as we, are going to have to watch this space. I anticipate there may still be some rumpus in this story before we achieve perfect peace.

Meanwhile, it already seems long ago that we spent our last couple of days in Portugal: last visit to the land, including Tao showing us the pomegranate tree planted in March to mark his second birthday; last sunset; last breakfast with Nana.

…and so let’s start with one.
– Why is Portugal like the past?
– Because (tipping my hat to L P Hartley and the opening sentence of The Go-Between) it is a foreign country; they do things differently there.

Well, I did warn you that it was nothing like a good riddle!

Having recently returned from Portugal, I find that many of the events and images from our trip keep bobbing up to the surface of the stagnant pond that passes for my mind these days. It strikes me that most of these are, perhaps unsurprisingly, precisely those that form a strong contrast with life in Israel. So, I thought I would share some of them with you this week.

The first couple fall under the arcane category of: the open road as calendar. In Israel, for example, the school summer holiday runs from around June 20 (high schools) and July 1 (primary schools) to the end of August. Every year, if you commute by road, July 1 is the day you arrive at work 15 minutes early, because you forgot how much emptier the roads would be. The last week of August, on the other hand, is the week when you suddenly rediscover where all the pedestrian crossings are located on your route, because, having faded throughout the year until they are virtually invisible, the markings are then repainted in preparation for the new school year.

In Portugal, however, our drives from Penamacor to nearby towns were marked by reminders that winter is around the corner. In a few places, we were treated to autumnal reds and yellows in the foliage, but most local trees are not that flamboyant. Instead, we encountered, on one road, in the middle of open country, an unexpected temporary speed limit of 50kph; a couple of kilometres along the road, we were brought to a halt by road-workers directing traffic while a digger re-excavated a trench in the grass-covered earth at the side of the road. In a few weeks, water from the heavy rains should be gushing along this trench, rather than flooding the road surface.

We also passed several timber yards where unimaginable amounts of timber were stacked: an area 50 metres by 10 metres would be filled with neat cuboids of straight pine trunks, six metres long, stacked to a height of three metres.

On our journeys, it wasn’t long before we encountered lorries transporting this wood from the timberyards. The first time we drove behind such a lorry (on a 90kph winding country road, one lane in each direction) was a fairly nerve-wracking experience.

• 

From the back, there was no visible restraint on the logs. Bernice and I both had a vision of one of these tree trunks suddenly working its way free and either shooting straight through our windscreen and out through the rear window, or landing on the roof of our car, continuing straight down and effectively cleaving the car into two enclosed bicycles. Bernice and I each edged closer to our respective side windows, in the hope of leaving such a log a clear path through the car, unimpeded by, not to put too fine a point on it, us. I determined to overtake at the earliest opportunity.

As we reached a straight stretch of the road, where overtaking was allowed, I edged out to check for oncoming traffic. It was at that point that I first noticed that the top of the lorry was pitching and tossing like George Clooney in The Perfect Storm. For a few moments, pulling alongside the lorry in order to overtake it seemed less like a good idea; being speared by a single log was not an attractive prospect, but having an entire lorryful of logs topple over onto us seemed to have no redeeming features whatsoever.

Eventually, we were able to overtake, without event, and continue on our way, until, round the next bend, we confronted another fully-laden lorry. In this case, the driver used an interesting technique to avoid the side-to-side pitch and toss; he evened out every bend by treating both lanes of the road as his domain. This made overtaking even more exciting, but eventually, as is the way, we became inured to this seasonal hazard of the roads. At least, I became inured. Fortunately, the rental car inspector, when we returned the car, failed to notice the fingernail marks cut into the padding of the front passenger seat.

Next up in the ‘How different from the life of our own dear Queen!’ stakes is customer service, and specifically support by phone. In Israel we are very ready to moan about the level of customer service, and it is certainly true to say that most Israeli customer service reps follow the national ethos that “All citizens are equal; it would be unpatriotic of me to treat you as someone special”. However, you can generally get things done efficiently on the phone (once you get through to a human being).

Portugal, by contrast, clearly pines for its imperial past and its hierarchy of royalty and nobility. When our June 2020 trip was cancelled because of Covid, TAP gave us a voucher for the full value of our flights. When I tried, in late August, to book our October flight online, I found that I could not persuade the site to accept my voucher. Eventually, I contacted customer service by phone, and was informed that it was impossible to redeem the voucher online. So, I booked by phone. After completing the booking, we still had over ₤100 credit on the voucher.

Towards the end of our trip this time, I wanted to book our next trip. I went online to see TAP flight times and prices, and then, in order to use this ₤100 credit, I phoned TAP in Lisbon. I reached a rep who spoke fairly good English and who was very ready to help. Unfortunately, the process of booking the flight was tortuous: the rep insisted on taking all of our information, including passport numbers.

At the end of each step (indeed, often each sub-step), she put me on hold and then disappeared into the recesses of TAP’s computer system for minutes on end. Each time she returned, she dutifully repeated the scripted greeting: ‘Thank you, Mr David Brownstein, for your patience in waiting’.

Eventually, after an hour, we reached the bottom line, and she informed me of the total cost. I then pointed out that, online, TAP was offering the flights for a total price that was about ₤100 less. She explained that TAP has an online discount; anyone who wants the convenience of booking through a rep has to pay the full price. I pointed out that far from being convenient, the process of booking through her had taken me about 45 minutes longer than booking online would have taken. In addition, the only reason that I was booking through her was that TAP’s system did not allow me to redeem my voucher. Round about here, I started thinking of Catch-22.

The rep was apologetic, and understanding, and unfailingly polite, as she explained that there was nothing she could do. I explained that I was not criticizing her, but that I wished to speak to someone in authority who could actually help me take advantage of the discount without losing the advantage of the discount.

After another lengthy period on hold (during which I completed the composition of a complete set of eight variations on the TAP theme tune), she returned to thank me, Mr David Brownstein, for my patience in waiting, and to inform me that there was nobody who could help me.

I must admit that, by this stage, my patience was starting to wear a little thin. I explained yet again that the fault lay with TAP’s computer system, and not with me, and it was therefore invidious that I should be punished for it. At this point, the rep said: ‘But of course you can redeem the voucher online.’

She then asked whether I had gone online through the UK portal of TAP. I said that I hadn’t. There was the problem, she said. The original booking had been made through the UK portal, and the voucher was therefore in sterling. In order to redeem it, I had to use the UK portal. I admit I was sceptical, and so I asked the rep to hold my booking for 24 hours, so that, if for any reason I was unable to book online, we would not lose our seats. She explained, extremely politely, that, ‘Unfortunately, Mr David, the computer system does not allow me to hold the booking uncompleted.’ I eventually gave in and instructed her to cancel the booking. I then went online, through the UK portal, and booked without any problem, redeeming the voucher, in about 12 minutes.

It is a measure of the consideration that I have for you, dear reader, that I spare you the story of my trying to obtain a security matrix card for our bank account in Portugal. You will have to take my word for it that it is a story every bit as full of computer system incompetence matched with personal civility as the tale of TAP. However, like the air tickets, the bank matrix issue was resolved, finally, after three or four visits to the bank, and we are now able to conduct a wider range of banking activities online with complete ease.

Yes, everyday life in Portugal often seems like a game of what some of you call Chutes and Ladders (which is probably about as clunky a segue as I have ever devised).

Blogger’s Note: Last Friday marked the second anniversary of my first post on this blog. Since then, some 150,000 words have flowed under the Penamacorrespondent bridge. If you’ve been reading since November 2019, then I applaud your perseverance. If, at the other extreme, this is the first post you’ve read, then managing to get all the way down here without giving up means that congratulations are still in order. Here’s to Year 3!

Well, ‘left’, actually, but that doesn’t scan. Unlike John Denver, we do know when we’ll back again (or at least, we have a notification from the airline that we’re booked on a plane – plague, war, global warming, fossil fuel supply and Portuguese electoral turmoil permitting).

Yes, folks, today’s post comes to you from the edge of the Judean Desert, rather than just southwest of the edge of the Serra de Malcata foothills. Bernice and I flew back, fairly uneventfully, last Thursday, and, thanks to the kindness of good friends and neighbours, on which we have always depended, we returned to a welcome home greeting placard and a delicious cake, and invitations for both shabbat meals. (Reminder to self: I must celebrate more often the precious gift of being part of a community.)

This was just as well, since we had left in Maale Adumim a fridge that looked like that moment two days before Pesach when it has just been cleaned and has not yet been stocked. Homemade rolls were duly defrosted in the microwave, but the frozen cheese had to wait until the next morning. I was reduced to jam made from loquats from our own tree. (I suppose that’s a first-world problem, on reflection.) Bernice made do with the last-but-one of our magnificent Portuguese apples, and we both finished off our nuts (and in my case raisins) for the journey. And so to bed, after thirteen-and-a-half hours on the road.

In fairness, the trip home was pretty easy. The drive to Lisbon airport from Penamacor takes, on a good day, two-and-a-half hours. However, for all but 50 minutes of that, you are cruising at 120kph on a two- or three-lane motorway, with 95% of the other traffic on the road also cruising at 120kph.

The only problem with this is that you occasionally creep up behind a car whose speedometer is set slightly differently, so that its cruise control is maintaining a speed just 1kph slower than yours. Assuming you pull out to overtake when you are 20 metres behind the car, and pull in again when you are 20 metres in front, overtaking can take you between two and three minutes (or you can live dangerously and exceed the speed limit for a few seconds).  

Mind you, since we only saw about 40 other vehicles during that entire motorway stretch, I was able to handle the overtaking required. The other bonus is that the airport is located only 1km off a three-lane road with an 80kph speed limit, so the end of the journey is also stress-free.

Check-in at Lisbon was very smooth. Multiple self-service terminals issue boarding passes. Baggage check-in is also self-service. At passport control only passports are checked. In this way, any hold-up over incorrect or incomplete PCR test papers occurs at the departure gate, where it inconveniences only passengers on the same flight, and where sorting out any problem does not involve risking missing your flight.

The Covid test at Ben Gurion was also a swift and smooth operation. Boaz (our friend who always gets use of our car in return for ferrying us to and from the airport) was, as always, waiting for us when we arrived. We even received our negative test results within seven hours, so that I was able to get to shul on Friday morning, and then buy fruit and milk for breakfast.

This was all in contrast to the PCR test in Portugal, which we scheduled for last Tuesday. Micha’el had told us that the nearest testing site was at the Red Cross in Castelo Branco. When I phoned them on the previous Friday to book, they explained that the testing is actually done by a private lab, which travels round from district to district, and uses a room in the Red Cross. I phoned the lab, and was told that they would be in Castelo Branco from 9:30 to 11:00 on Tuesday morning. Since we didn’t want to rush unnecessarily in the morning, we made an appointment for 10:30.

I then received an email with a questionnaire, delightfully translated into English, asking for the usual details, and some unexpected ones – desired harvest station (in other words, test location), nationality, profession (why?), postcode in Portugal, passport number, internal diameter of nostril (I jest). Once I had retrieved all of this information from my phone and sent it back, I then simply had to transfer the fee (100 euros each – that’s a total of 720 shekels, 171 pounds, 231 dollars) and provide proof of payment.

This caused me a minor panic: I transferred the money online, through my Portuguese bank app; however, since it was Friday, the bank notified me that the transaction would not be completed until the following Monday. I decided that I would try to offer a screenshot of the ‘booked’ transaction as proof of payment, and, thankfully, the lab accepted it.

After a few minutes, I spotted a shopfront across the road with what looked like a Star of David on the window. Closer inspection revealed that this was, in fact, a museum: The House of Memory of Jewish Presence in Castelo Branco. For an admission fee of only 1.50 euro each (or a mere 1.5% of the cost of a PCR test), we were able to spend 30 minutes or so in this very new and well-appointed modest museum, which tells the story of the Jewish presence in Castelo Branco. We could have spent another 30 minutes, if we had had the time, but even this brief visit was interesting.

The ground floor of the museum displays ritual objects, including a sefer torah, which are not originally from Castelo, but are designed to give brief insight into Jewish religious life. Alongside this display is an account, and several maps and a model, of the medieval town, showing the Moslem, Jewish and Christian quarters at various stages. By the end of the 14^th Century, there was already a Jewish community and a synagogue there, and, after the decree of expulsion in 1496/7, the city was a centre of anusim (secret Jews) and New Christians.

Over the following three centuries, the Portuguese Inquisition instigated some 400 ‘processes’ against Albicastrenses (as Castelo Brancans were known). including 21 in which the victims died. In the museum, the path to the staircase passes through a small darkened passageway, with illuminated windows showing contemporary illustrations of instruments of torture being used.

The staircase leads to a floor dedicated to six prominent Jewish Albicastrenses. One of these is Amato Lusitano, a name adopted by Joao Rodrigues.

Born in 1511, Lusitano was a descendant of a family of anusim called Chabib. (Amato is the Latin equivalent of the Hebrew Chabib – beloved. Lusitania is the classical name for the area now occupied by Portugal.) Brought up as a Jew, he graduated with honours as an M.D. from the University of Salamanca in Spain, but was then unable to return to Portugal, where his family were known, for fear of the Inquisition. Prefiguring the ideal of a European Union, like so many of his contemporary academics, he then spent time in Antwerp, the Netherlands and France, before settling in Italy.

His reputation as a physician was such that, while in Venice, he treated the Pope’s niece. During six years in Ferrara, he lectured in anatomy, on one occasion famously dissecting twelve cadavers (a cutting-edge technique), and also discovered, and demonstrated, the nature of venous valves.

At the time, it was believed that both veins and arteries carried blood from the heart: the fact that the network of blood vessels grew thinner as they got further from the heart seemed to support this; in addition, the network of capillaries that connect the veins to the arteries was too small to be detected by the naked eye, and its discovery had to wait for the invention of the microscope. Unaware of that connection, anatomists could only conclude that blood was fed to the arteries from the heart, as well as to the veins.

In his demonstration in Ferrara, Lusitano blew air into the lower part of the azygos vein, and showed that the vena cava would not be inflated. If the air was not able to pass into the vena cava, then it was all the more certain that blood, much thicker than air, could not flow through.

I was also encouraged to see, at the museum, a poster advertising a book launch and talk organized by the Castelo Branco municipality, to be given by a prominent historian who has devoted the last decade or more to researching the story of Jewish life in Castelo Branco.

After this unexpected break, we returned to the Red Cross. Eventually, and totally unapologetically, the test administrator arrived at 11:20. (I wonder: How much do you have to pay to qualify for an apology?) We spent a frustrating 15 minutes while she wrestled with a computer terminal, rather unconvincingly entering all of the information we had already given by email. She then swept us upstairs to a room where she administered the test.

Editor’s Note: Readers of a sensitive nature may wish to look away for the following paragraph.

By the time we flew on Thursday, we had both recovered full use of our noses, and so we were able to enjoy the smooth flight.

Oh, by the way! I know many of you are anxious to know what happened with the wood-burning stove I wrote about last week. Paolo (he of the leather homburg) phoned on Wednesday to say that he could not, after all, install it that day, but would come on Thursday.

We look forward to feeling the glow in mid-January, when we are due to return to Portugal. Mind you, there’s a certain smile that’s guaranteed to generate as much warmth as an 11.4 kilowatt stove.

“And after ‘salmagundi’, we have ‘salamander’”. (With apologies to those for whom that evocation of Twenty Questions means nothing.)

Looking back over the hundred or so posts that I have published over the last two years, I note with astonishment that I have made absolutely no mention of amphibians. The time has come, I feel, to rectify this appalling omission.

Aristotle mentioned in his writings the folk belief that the salamander can extinguish a fire through the frigidity of its body, but appeared not to accept it. Pliny (possibly after experimenting by throwing a salamander into a fire) was explicitly sceptical. Nevertheless, the folk belief persisted and, in the Renaissance period, when cloth made from asbestos was brought back from China, it was claimed that the yarn was spun from the salamander’s fur that was impervious to fire.

For the alchemists, the salamander was the creature associated with the element of fire, and was even born from fire, like the phoenix.

It seems likely that these beliefs arose because of the salamander’s habit of hiding beneath damp logs. It is conceivable that, when these logs were brought into the house and placed on the fire, the salamander emerged, as if from the fire itself, in an attempt to escape from the heat.

The salamander, despite appearances, is not a lizard, but an amphibian. It lays its eggs in ponds, just as they are about to hatch, and the larvae develop in the water. Curiously, adult salamanders are very poor swimmers.

The fire salamander, with its distinctive yellow and black colouring, is common throughout Europe, including Portugal, preferring a damp forest habitat at fairly high altitude. I suspect it is native to the region around Penamacor.

And what, I hear you ask, has all this to do with us? Well, on our second stay with the kids in Portugal, in midwinter almost two years ago, we initially found the open wood-log fire in the salon rather romantic. However, by the end of our stay, the noxious fumes, the ubiquitous ash, the heat escaping up the chimney, and the constant danger of sparks leaping into the room, meant that much of the romance was gone. We decided that, on our next visit, we would research installing a cleaner, healthier, safer and more efficient wood-burning stove, which, Micha’el assured us, was becoming increasingly popular in houses such as ours.

Of course, by the time of this, our next, visit, the kids had endured (without complaint, I must add) a second winter of open fires. Despite the sunny weather we enjoyed in our first three weeks here this time, we wanted to get a stove installed before we left, so that they would be ready for the imminent colder weather.

And so, last week, the kids obtained, through their network of friends, the name of a reliable local stove installer, and last week we arranged for him to come and take a look at the fireplace. Paolo certainly looked authentic, with his weathered features, gnarled hands and stitched hard-leather homburg. Micha’el was impressively able to negotiate Paolo’s Portuguese, and he gave us the names of three hardware and building supplies stores in Castelo Branco where we could buy the stove and the pipes that carry the smoke up the chimney. Once we had the materials, he would be able to complete the job in one day, included cleaning the chimney, at a labour cost of 80 euros.

In addition to his skills as an installer, he was also able to provide linguistic expertise. The kids had asked him about a forno de madeira (literally, a wood oven), but he informed us that what we were talking about was a salamandra. Knowing about the legend of the fire lizard, I was tickled pink to hear this name. Subsequent research reveals that similar stoves are also called salamanders in the USA (although whether that is more true in Arkansas than Manhattan I hope one of my American readers will be able to tell me).

Over the next day, I conducted some research online. I discovered that, to calculate the required output from the stove, you should divide the cubic capacity of the space to be heated by 14 if your home is well insulated, and by 10 if it is not. The resulting figure is the kilowatt capacity you require.Put like that, it all sounds fairly straightforward. The website even included a line-drawing of a neat rectagular room, showing how to calculate the cubic capacity.

Now, I don’t know about you, but I’ve never lived in a neat rectangular room, and the ‘space to be heated’ in our house in Penamacor is certainly not easily defined. The fireplace, in which the stove will stand, is in the salon, which comprises a rectangular space eaten into by a generous chimney breast, to which is added a small square area of entrance hall. However, wooden glass-panelled double doors, usually open, connnect  the salon to the kitchen, which is much narrower than the salon. Leading off the kitchen is a short passage leading to a utility room on one side and, on the other side, a wash-basin alcove that then leads on to the bathroom.

A little thought and discussion led to the conclusion that we should aim to heat the salon, hall, kitchen and passage. So, four fairly straightforward rectangles. Except for the fact that from the salon an open-plan staircase leads to the first floor with its two bedrooms and office.

In the end, I decided to add to the calculation the cubic capacity of the staircase, even though my C grade in ‘O’-level physics allows me to say with confidence that heat will escape upstairs.

The other imponderable for me was the question of insulation. I suspect that what an English website means by ‘if your home is not well insulated’ is not what a Penamacorean website would mean. I felt that I should perhaps divide by less than 10, but it was impossible for me to estimate by how much less.

A little more research indicated that stoves tend to fall into the following groups: 5-7 kilowatt, 8-10 kilowatt, 11-14 kilowatt, and so on. Calculating on the basis of dividing by a bit less than 10, I thought we should be looking for an 8- or 9-kilowatt model, and I suspected that anything bigger would be overpowering for the very narrow salon and would cost more than we wanted to spend.

We were now armed with everything we needed: an idea of the kilowattage, the right word – salamandre – and Google Maps, and so Bernice and I set off last Thursday on a shopping expedition. In the first store we visited, an assistant with excellent English was able to answer all our questions, and, to our delight, we found that the cheapest model in the store (which the assistant warmly recommended) had both an impressive efficiency rating and an output in kilowatts (11.4) that should be more than enough. It was, in addition, small enough to fit into our fireplace. I noted with interest that the (Portuguese) handbook that came with the stove suggested dividing your cubic capacity not by 14 (well insulated), nor by 10 (poorly insulated) but by 8.5 (Portuguese-insulated).

Somehow, I managed to persuade Bernice (who readily admits that her attention span for shopping rivals that of a goldfish with ADHD) that we really had to visit at least one more store. Fortunately, all three stores Paolo had recommended were within the same industrial zone in the southern end of Castelo, and it only took a few minutes in the car to reach the second store. There, it took us scarcely longer to realise that there was nothing on offer to rival what we had already seen, and so we reurned to Bricomarché.

This time, a different assistant helped us. He had surprisingly little English, but by this stage we felt like near experts in wood-stove Portuguese, and so we were happy to place the order with him. Of course, by the time we added to the cost of the stove the cost of the chimney pipes, and the cost of delivery, we didn’t have quite such a bargain, but we were still within our budget. To be honest, we had no choice over delivery. I had no intention of attempting to load a cast-iron 24-inch suitcase into the car, not with my back.

The assistant assured us that he would deliver the stove the following day, around 10AM. He wantred to know whether anyone at our end would be able to help him carry the stiove in, and we generously volunteered Micha’el. (At this point, we found ourselves wondering what we would do if we were an old couple – which, I suppose, in this case, we are – living alone. However, if we were, we would call a friend in the village to help. Our house is, after all, in a close-knit community.) We then gave the assistant Micha’el’s phone number (remember my experience with the tow-truck driver last week) and were persuaded, at the till, to join the store’s customer club at no charge, having already almost earned 10 euros off our next purchase. The application form required my tax number, passport number and full address with postcode, none of which I know off by heart, but all of which are, theoretically, easily accessed on my phone. So that took just another 15 minutes, after which we left the store with a fine sense of accomplishment.

In due course, 10AM the following morning (Friday) arrived, which is more than can be said for the stove. After a couple of phone calls, it finally arrived just before 3PM, thankfully still a good couple of hours before Shabbat. In a relatively short time, the driver and Micha’el had unloaded the package from the van, brought it in, removed the cardboard wrapping, lifted the stove from its wooden pallet, tilted it and screwed the adjustable footpads onto the base and slid the stove into the alcove where it will sit until Paolo comes to instal it. (Micha’el was quick to ask that the driver leave the pallet, since it represented useful wood.)

At this point, Bernice came in and said: ‘That’s not the right model. The handle is different.’ Indeed, when I checked the spec sheet, I saw that this model had a capacity of 10.5 kilowatts instead of  11.4, and an efficiency rating of C instead of B.. The stove itself had no identifying label, but the driver checked our order against the label on the carton and insisted it was correct. We were equally insistent, and he phoned the store to clarify. After sending a photo of the stove to the store, he very apologetically explained to us that the label on the carton did not match the stove inside.

So, he and Micha’el slid the stove out of the alcove, tilted it and unscrewed the footpads from the base, lifted the stove onto the pallet, wrapped the cardboard around it, carried it outside and loaded it back onto the van. He assured us that he would deliver the correct stove the following day (Shabbat). Micha’el then explained to him that this was inconvenient, and, to our surprise, he said that he would deliver it on Sunday morning, leaving Castelo Branco at 9AM. This meant he should be with us around 10.

Today is Sunday. 10AM arrived, which is more than can be said….However, by 10:45 the driver was here, with the correct stove, which he and Micha’el unloaded…Well, you get the picture. Again full of apologies, he even brought Micha’el a compensatory extra pallet that he presumably had on the van from an earlier delivery.

Later today, Paolo arrived, to inspect the stove. He conducted a long conversation with Micha’el, during which I persuaded myself that we had bought an entirely unsuitable item, and that, in addition, the pipes did not fit the stove. However, when Micha’el eventually translated, it transpired that my fears were completely unfounded. He will come on Wednesday, bringing dust-sheets to trap the dust when he cleans the chimney. He stressed that we should keep Tao well away during the cleaning, although I know that Tao will be fascinated to watch the assembly of the pipes and their disappearance up the chimney. We now also know that Paolo has a 4-year-old grandson and a 2-year-old granddaughter who are the light of his life!

All being well (and although it seldom is around these parts – most jobs seem to take two attempts – I have a good feeling about this), we should have a fitted working stove before we leave on Thursday morning to fly back to Israel.

Which is probably just as well, because we have had fairly persistent rain over the last couple of days: perfect weather for splashing in puddles, then sitting at home well wrapped up, eating buttered toast with Marmite.*

*Personally, I can’t even type the M word without feeling bilious, but Bernice, Esther and now Tao are all Marmite fanatics.