a couple of weeks back in portugal. the first week was spent in the north, mostly checking in on family and catching up with work.

and then we came south to catch up on friends, vitamin D, the salt pans and their birds, the PO box mail, our favorite restaurants, the neighbors’ spectacular bougainvilleas…

it’s such a beautiful time of the year to be here! the harshness of full-blown summer hasn’t arrived yet, and so the days are just long and bright and (mostly) mild. the city is gearing up for the santos populares next week, and there’s a kind of eager anticipation in the air.

and also, it was my birthday this week! i turned 44, which is not a very lucky number in chinese… but i kind of like the symmetry of it! also, it’s half of 88, and i hope to be so lucky that i get to 88 someday. :)

i got some nice gifts, all bird-themed! they made me happy.

i’m still reading leviathan wakes, but in the meantime i squeezed in a quick read of roald dahl’s charlie and the chocolate factory, in a very battered copy that i picked up from the bakery’s bookshelf. i enjoyed it, and then we watched wonka, which i wasn’t even aware was a musical, but turned out to be the perfect choice for a birthday movie. yay!

just before the week ended, we packed up the car and drove back to aveiro again. we ended up driving quite late in the day, and were pleasantly surprised at how empty the main highway was. if we have to drive, we might do it in the night… but i’m actually hoping we can start taking the train again, using cp’s green rail pass. the only hiccup is that, when you use that pass, you need to wait until the day before to book tickets, which feels a bit risky. but maybe we’ll give it a try, stay flexible, and see how it goes!