…but the memories linger on. I still have notes for several anecdotes about our latest trip to Portugal, so, in the blog at least, we probably won’t be leaving until a week or so before Pesach.
Let’s start with what may become Bernice’s signature dish, Munchy salmon. Unusually, the selection of fresh kosher fish in the three supermarkets we visited on this trip was rather poor, and consequently we ate considerably less fish this time. This was much to the dog’s disgust, since Lua loves nothing more than fish bones and skin, and she only gets offered these when we visit. I kid myself that this is not the reason that she always remembers us from one trip to the next, and is always delighted to see us, but I suspect it is, indeed, less puppy love and more cupboard love.
Anyway, what was readily available in the super was salmon, which Bernice baked in the microwave, garnished with garlic, and served with wedges of as many lemons as you wanted from the tree. An illustration should explain why I call it Munchy salmon, and why I give it here what is not so much a shout-out as a scream-out:
Speaking of the dog, she and I bonded more closely than ever on one of our walks this time. We were out early in the morning, deep in the forest, when I realized I needed to relieve myself. When I had finished, Lua trotted over, appeared to nod approvingly, squatted down, and matched my contribution. I feel that we are now, if not blood brothers, then at least urine siblings.
A couple of days after we returned from our Lisbon break, Tao resumed gan, after a break of several months, when the kids were visiting Israel and were subsequently without their truck. His return was unfortunately timed, because he was just getting a dreadful cold, and wasn’t entirely sure that he wanted to go to gan. In the end, Bernice went with Micha’el to take him to gan, and I went with Tslil to pick him up at the end of the morning. I didn’t realise what I was signing up for until Tslil asked me whether I had boots! Fortunately, I was able to borrow Micha’el’s wellingtons, and we set off in the truck.
After a fifteen-minute drive along very minor roads, we turned off onto an unpaved track across country. A couple of hundred metres along, we hit a traffic jam where a flock of sheep were crossing the track, then, five minutes later, Tslil pulled up in what looked to me suspiciously like the middle of nowhere. If Tslil were 40 kilo heavier, and 15 centimetres taller, I would have been a little worried that she had brought me out here to sleep with the rabbits.
As it was, we set off down a gentle slope and soon arrived at a stream, which we had to cross using stepping-stones that, at that time of year, even during a very dry winter, were 8 centimetres under water. Leaving a small herd of cows behind, we were greeted on the other side by a very friendly, large, aging, docile, black dog and then by Marta, the ganenet, and her assistant, and the children. Set above the stream was one refurbished building, and one derelict and roofless shell. This was the forest gan.
Tao showed me round the refurbished building, The one large room at ground level was furnished with an efficient wood stove, a cooker, a kitchen cabinet and work-surface and a mobile signal. Up a flight of ‘these would never get Health and Safety approval’ open stairs was a second large room with a large toy cupboard. I was under strict instructions from Bernice to ascertain whether the cupboard was securely attached to the wall, which it was.
Outside was a flat, grassed mini-meadow, where Marta told us the children had practised their yoga that morning, facing, and being watched by, the faintly bemused cows. On a warm and sunny winter’s day, with the sound of the flowing stream and the placid chewing of the cows as background, the scene was near-idyllic. I suspect it loses some of its charm in a howling gale and driving sleet, but then, which of us doesn’t?
Last week, I am pleased to report, Tao went back to gan very willingly, and thoroughly enjoyed himself. The move back seems to have gone as smoothly as everyone hoped, which, considering the length of the break beforehand, is very positive. Not only is it an opportunity for Tao to have extended exposure to Portuguese, but it is also a chance for him to play and mix regularly with his circle of friends. When your nearest friends are a 15-minute drive away, and others are 30 minutes away, play dates are not quite so straightforward, so the gan, on a regular basis, is a tremendous thing. This first year, Marta is running the gan for two days a week, but she may add another day at some point.
Another regular feature in Tao’s routine is his videos – English in the morning and Portuguese in the afternoon. Some of the English videos are puppet shows – some stop-motion animation, others where adult hands are clearly seen moving the figures. In addition, there are thinly veiled promotional videos, principally for Lego. Tao has not yet, I am delighted to say, realized that his role in this set-up is supposed to be to demand to be bought ever-more-elaborate Lego boxed sets. Rather, and much more healthily, he takes ideas from what he sees to build his own models from Lego or magnetiles and to fuel his own imaginative play.
Shabbat sees a curious phenomenon in the house. Micha’el and Tslil are respectful of our beliefs and feelings, but we have always insisted that, while the house may technically be in our name, it is their home, and we are their guests when we stay. So, on Shabbat, out of respect for us, the kids light no fire (we keep the heaters on all shabbat) and turn on and off no lights, in the ‘public’ rooms, but, in the privacy of their bedroom and their office, the kids are free to continue their normal lives. What this means is that, on Shabbat, Tao knows that he must watch his videos not in the salon but in the bedroom. It suddenly struck me one Shabbat that he is, in a sense, marking Shabbat as a special day in a ‘clandestine’ action that is a curious mirror-image of the behaviour of Portugal’s crypto-Jews.
Finally, for this week, here is Tao, enjoying his new sandbox on the land (rather grand, but not yet quite completed – more of that next week), Raphael, enjoying his reunion with Nana on Purim, and Ollie, relieved to have cut his first tooth not long after we returned home.
