flying,finaly!!!

Hello everybody!   Long time no see...
Thanks to maria,this blog gets forwards,I'm a slow writer(but I'm working on it)and she is just so fast...
Even if I didn't liked the idea of staying in portugal for longer than had been planed originaly(stone-mind is my name),i have to say that it had a influence on all of us: maria was glad to see her family for more than just the usual busy week ,glad also-as I was-to (re)discover this part of Portugal around Tomar,as well as Nazarè.It was nice also to stay in this family house,to arrange it,to decorate it,to make some repairs,to meet people around.
That last part has been important to me:by talking with various people,I understood that,even if the economic situation in Portugal is even worse than in France,there will always be work for a person with my experience.It might sound strange,but this late understanding helped me to relax about a point that has always been a big question since we sold the camping:will I be able to find a job again,how will I feed my family after this trip ?knowing that there can be a chance here-even if it's not necessarily here where we might stay-was good.Ican fly to Buenos aires with a quiet mind.
The girls had fun with the neighbour's dogs in Murtal,we went to swim in lakes made by barrages,catched and ate some craw-fishes,repaired an electric pump to be able to fill up a tank that they had cleaned before(the pump broke down again before it was full...)

The part they didn't liked too much was school!

In Lisbon,we finaly got all the school material for the 2 girls,big bunches of books(+-20),plenty papers to fill up,home works,etc. The working sheduld is no joke,it's a regular school program:5 hours/day for anaïs,7 hours/day for barbara !It's been a kind of a shock for all of us:is this supposed to be holidays??
   To make things worse,it was allready the 19Th when we got the books,and the first evaluations had to be sended on the 23Rd...
   So,we all had to get inside the "material" very fast,and the girls started to work full speed (so did we!)Intensiv learning,and that's for the "teachers"also,sometimes 3 or 4 hours in a row,the same in the afternoon.maria even asked if we should go on with it,but we agreed that it would mean to lose 2 years for the girls,and it's too much.
   So,here we are,trying to learn as fast as our girls,everybody wishing the school to hell but doing its best to catch up with the time table.
   We found out that there was a full list of other books that had to be bought at a regular bookshop:no problem! you might think,but they are french books,and where are we?...the french college in Lisbon couldn't help either...so we had to order them in france and put our trip for later again...

Every time something like that happened,I went angry with one more delay.
   Now,I recognise that we have been lucky because we never had to cancel a plane ticket,those"delays"allways arrived in time to save us this trouble,like if we were not suposed to book up a flight before everything was settled down and we were ready to leave...This is my apologise to Maria and the girls for all those bad moods I went trough with each "delay"...

So,now,it seems that it's for good:tomorrow I'll buy some extra bags for all those books,at night I'll cook a last time for the whole family,and we'll catch the night train for Madrid.

Thanks to Paula (Maria's eldest sister)and her computer,today we had time enough to find an hotel in Buenos Aires for a few days ; hard job: the week-end of the 11Th and 12Th october is a special Holly day,and most hotels are full,had to it that most hotels-even if not full-don't accept dogs,and the ones that accept them are out of price,and you can imagine the time it took...But now,we got it.A "hostel" that seems nice: "vi luz e entre" is the name,it means: "I saw light and went in"....
From Madrid,we'll leave at night for Argentina,so we even have a full day in the spanish capital.
   I'm geting more and more impatient now,so is Maria. Barbara and Anaïs seem to "wait and see",they got more pragmatic than us...They probably got enough of all those false hopes with all those "delays".
   Daisy seems to be just happy to be with us,even if she doesn't like too much to change "home" so often.She doesn't seem to like chicken anymore and I told her that it's going to be a problem for her in south america :chicken is often eaten there.She looked at me and seemed to say that she was waiting for argentina's famous Tbone' bones...Dogs!
   We all miss Tartaruga,his welcoming space (we've been moving around with a little Peugeot 205...),his reinsuring height,our stuff,our beds,and the freedom of choosing where we sleep.
   Some more news later,probably from Argentina. It can take a while before we get organised again,until we get used to this land's habits and rules,and find a new rythm.By then,we might have a lot to tell again.
   Bye bye,hasta la vista in Argentina !!!