If there was a place in the world i dreamed to grow old in, living on a wood house with a white beard and a green smile on my heart, was on the southern slope of the Peneda mountain in the National Natural Park of Gerês. It’s a hauntingly beautiful place still with presence of the European original Flora, small creeks everywhere, a place that filled me inside – body and spirit…
Like the rest of the country in this strange August, this slope is on fire… 100 persons were evacuated…
The local population reports that the fire started after midnight…
This is just another example of how Portugal fits itself into the anarchy of capitalism… seven years after, the country is in flames again, the government estimates 90% of the fires have a criminal origin but nothing is really done to stop it year after year… in the aftermath the wood is sold cheaply to lumber companies, oaks are replaced by fast growing eucalyptus, new houses are built… so, some fill up their bank accounts, while others…
In the village of my grandparents, in the Douro region, the employee of the last cattle raiser was caught yesterday setting the forest on fire, 300m away from an isolated house!
It’s for sure that when the media announces some hot day coming soon (Hey! it’s August!) dozens of fires will be prepared.
The guy on the picture has written on his t-shirt “proud to be portuguese”.
My tears spell a different feeling today, they were the closing words for the sadness of the sentence that builds up the meaning of Portugal in my mind.
(top photo by RAFAEL MARCHANTE/REUTERS)
Folk & Wild 