4th of August 2017
Every morning, the car who sells the bread comes to Podents, where I spent my first months in the rented snake house.
I had seen him coming and one day I decided to go out and buy some bread in the morning.
The man was nice and he brought fresh bread, all kinds of breads and even cakes. Not expensive and when he arrived he blew the horn and gave the people some time to get out and become a bread customer. Sometimes the same customers and sometimes different ones.
One Saturday morning I was going for a walk. Every time I left the house I opened the door just a fraction, to see if the snakes were there or not. Most of the time they were not but sometimes they had taken a sunbath in the morning and had a nap afterwards, just outside my door. Those days I did not leave. This morning no snakes but I noticed that on my gate there was a bag.
Since it looked safe to go out I looked inside the bag. 2 small breads smiled at me.
How nice, the bread man had left them for me, without me asking. This was something new! The Portuguese were welcoming the strange foreigner who came all the way from China.
I waited for the bread man to knock on my door and ask for payment, but he never came.
The next time I bought my bread he did not mention it so I thought it was just a gift and said thank you very much. Those days my Portuguese was limited, very limited, but I knew how to say thank you!
These pictures are taken outside my condominium yesterday morning. I went downstairs early, just to take the photo to show you. My neighbours do buy bread every morning and sometimes, when I leave for my morning walk, the men are in their boxers, tiptoeing downstairs to get it before they leave for work. They do need breakfast and this is their first task, I think, in the morning. At least they are not dressed. My next door neighbour looks quite nice and has lost a lot of weight, perhaps working out!
When my landlord, the one who rented me the house in Podentes, and totally ripped me off, came to the snake house one Sunday morning and knocked on my door, he had a bag in his hand.
A small bag with breads in it!
Right! I realized what I had done when I took the bag from the gate. I had stolen the bread from my landlord!
I never mentioned it to him. I never told him who ate his bread. I never told him why he was hungry one Sunday morning, not long after I moved in. This is the first time, ever, I mention this. I hope he does not read my blogs. He is probably not a blogger!
Hulda Björnsdóttir
ps. If you get confused when you read my blog telling you about my life in China and then suddenly I go to my life in Portugal and then something else, I want you to keep this in mind. I am a Gemini, a typical one, and jump from one story to the next. You will get used to it and I might even manage to figure out some system, but for now please bear with me. I do realise it is difficult for normal people but I promise you. It is possible.
Hulda
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