Life in Góis Nov 2008
Life in Góis October 2008
Life in Góis Sept 2008
Life in Góis August 2008
Life in Góis July 2008
Life in Góis June 2008
Life in Góis May 2008

June 29th
Richard’s blog:
One of the things we are trying to do is publicise events in the region of Góis, and where it is possible, I attend the event with my trusty Nikon camera. Today Patricia is busy revising for the Real Estate exam, which is only one week away, so I was packed off with the kids to go and photograph the Folkloric Dancing event in the square at Vila Nova do Ceira. Groups of dancers come from around Portugal, and this year, a group from Spain also performed at the event. It is a fantastic place for the occasion, with the audience seated under the shade of large lime trees, their blossom scenting the air. The stage however, is in full sun, and the dancers perform wearing traditional costume, each dance telling a story of a custom or mode of work. Rather than writing about it, here are the pictures!

June 24th
Yesterday was the feast of São João, the Christian celebration of the birth of John the Baptist that was long ago superimposed on to the old pagan fertility festival of midsummer. In some parts of  Europe (and Brazil) this is one of the most important festivals of the year, and in Portugal it is widely celebrated. The city of Porto itself, whose patron saint is Sao João, holds a two-day party over 23rd-24th June, with much merriment and music in the streets, that apparently involves hitting members of the opposite sex over the head with plastic hammers (or more traditionally, pieces of wild garlic)! The whole city virtually closes down and gives itself over to Bacchanalia for a couple of days. For some reason that I have yet to discover, the herb marjoram is also associated with this festival, and in Porto everyone carries home a little pot of it at this time of the year. Big colourful paper lanterns are the decoration associated with the festival, and I think these too may have some significance, but I’m waiting to find out what it is.
Here in Góis I was not aware of any midsummer bonfires being lit (sadly, summer bonfires are not really appropriate in this area of high fire-risk), but we did celebrate with a traditional ‘Arraial de São João’ (open-air party) down at the river-bar, organized by the Scout group of Góis. The area was decorated by the Scouts with fairy lights and paper lanterns, and the food was delicious ‘Caldo Verde’ (cabbage and potato soup) and grilled sardines with ‘broa’ (corn bread). We enjoyed live music and the sangria was flowing as the sun went down. Walking back through the streets of Góis we stumbled across another little party taking place in the Largo de Pombal – a lively band of musicians were playing traditional music as people danced and ate together. I believe this was the ‘Jantar dos Joões’, or ‘Dinner for people whose name is João’ – not as you may think, only applicable to men, since many women also have the name João as a second Christian name, (as many men have the name Maria).

Perhaps the association of this time of year with weddings and fertility is still alive after all – I came across a ‘Quadra de São João’ in the newspaper that translates thus:

“It was on your night, São João, that I went to the dance,
I went there empty-handed and came back with a husband.
Twenty-eight years have passed, and our story continues –
I only have to say to you, São João, that it is all your fault!”
Graça Rafael T.

June 22nd
Summer is here and we are heading for the river! Now that the temperature is climbing and the heat is on, everyone’s thoughts turn to that cool clear water tumbling down from the mountains, so invitingly…The only problem is choosing which spot – there are so many. We could join the others down by the river-bar, where we would certainly be tempted by cold drinks and ice-creams, or  we could drive out into the hills to find a secluded waterfall – but in the end we decide to go to a little river beach just a short way out of the town, where we can sunbathe under the trees. The little wooden bridges have not been erected yet, so we take off our shoes and wade through the river to the beach on the other side. The water is surprisingly warm. There are a few young people just arriving – otherwise we have the place to ourselves. Slipping into the flow, all stresses are washed away. This is how the Ceira first seduced me – this is the irresistible lure – to be bathed in these pure waters and feel connected to the natural world is deeply healing. The girls are not so mystical about it – they just enjoy the freedom to swim like the otters, and know that they have three long months of summer holidays to come to the river again, and again, and again…

June 18th
There is a stretch of Roman road that runs up from Góis for about 3km called ‘Vale Dama’ Despite being used in recent years by trucks collecting the felled eucalyptus trees, it is still wonderfully preserved. Yesterday I walked along it (downhill!) and was amazed at the precision of the construction, and how well it had withstood the passage of time. I have never seen a Roman road like this before, that has not been tarmaced over or interfered with – just left in its original state. This must have been a veritable Roman two –lane motorway, with an unbroken line of stones set along the middle like the white line on our modern-day roads, as well as horizontal demarcations to space out marching troops.
Until the 1920’s it was still the only road linking Góis to Portela de Góis, the ‘gateway’ to the valley. Until relatively recently it was the way used to carry the dead to the cemetery in Góis, and within living memory there were two tavernas on the way, where the coffin bearers would lay down their load and take a fortifying drink. Today the ‘taverna of the oaks’ stands in ruins, although I would say that the atmosphere around it is still alive – so many people, for so many centuries, have passed this way before - and for some it was their final passage of all. I think that this taverna, and its former incarnations, has seen plenty of life, standing at the junction under the oak trees, as well as passing death. What we do with it in the future is now the question.

June 14th
The spirit moved me the other day to go and spend some time in a sweet chestnut grove, not far from Góis. These beautiful trees grow all over the region, and chestnuts in the past played a vital part in the economy and food stores of the mountain villages. Now sweet chestnuts are vastly outnumbered by the eucalyptus and pine trees that have been planted, but they still hold their own, and their glossy green leaves can be picked out on the hillsides, shimmering in the sunshine.
Some of the sweet chestnut trees we saw today were several centuries old – their girths huge and split open, showing where they had been coppiced down the years. The bark of these trees has become gnarled and twisted, so that expressions and faces seem to appear in them – giving each tree its own distinct character.
The trees grow on terraces on the hillside, and goats are still brought to graze the grass short in the little valley. Wild boar root for chestnuts at the base of the trees, turning over the ground, and violets and primroses bloom in the early spring. The atmosphere in the chestnut grove this day was deeply peaceful, with only the murmur of the stream and birdsong to be heard. The trees emanate a graceful presence unique to their stature: ancient, yet living and productive, constant, yet adapting through the seasons. Spending time among them was good for my soul.

June 10th
Tuesday is market day in Góis, and today as usual we were down there soon after 9am. It is not quite a usual day today however, as it is yet another ‘feriado’ (bank holiday) – the fourth in six weeks! But although some shops and businesses are closed, the market traders carry on as they always do – only Christmas and New Year seems to affect their regular schedule. The market was moved about a year ago from the Largo de Pombal – the square in the centre of town – to a larger piece of open land on the edge of the town by the river. It certainly provides more space for the traders, although it does not have quite the same atmosphere as when everybody squeezed into the square, and some of the businesses in the town miss the trade that market day used to bring them. It is still a meeting place for people from the outlying villages, and you can see people stop to greet each other and catch up on the news – the social aspect is probably just as appealing as the shopping! The market has a colour and vibrancy that you can never quite find in shops – the appeal of wandering around market stalls out of doors seems to be universal. Here in Góis the market used to provide an important means of trade for local people, who brought down their home-grown produce to sell, wrapping it in cabbage leaves. Now there are only two or three women who can still be seen regularly with whatever fruit and vegetables are in season, eggs, honey and goats’cheese that they have carried down early in the morning. In the winter months it can be just dried beans and chestnuts, but they still come down. The cabbage leaves, sadly, have been replaced by the ubiquitous plastic bags.
We bought our fruit and vegetables from the ‘professional’ market trader, and then spied one of the village ladies with a huge bowl of cherries for sale, that she had picked herself –“Try one” she offered “they are very good – no chemicals!” It was a ‘cherry experience’ I do not think I have experienced since childhood – the flavour just exploded on my tongue. We bought a kilo and had a cherry-fest. It was heaven!

June 6th
Yesterday it was my turn to go into the mountains with Anna and take photographs of the villages, while she sought out snippets of history and local stories. The places we were visiting are at the edge of the Góis region, and in more ways than one felt to me like habitation at the edge of everyday living.
Let me expand: for a start, we were climbing so high on the roads and tracks that it felt like being on the roof of the world. Small wonder that places are named after the eagles – you could imagine that you were up there with them soaring over the valleys and villages below.

Life up here must have been hard for people in the past, before the roads were built and communication and transport became accessible – in their separate valleys, people had to walk or go by donkey or mule for mile upon mile to grind corn, press their olives, or reach a market. The lucky ones could communicate with each other by shouting across the valley, where acoustics permitted, but in many cases, in these remote villages it was a rare event to socialise with neighbouring villages – only on high days and holidays for many. Some children would walk for 2 hours each way across the hills to get to school – others were unable to attend school at all because it was just too far away. Even in recent memory, we heard of a child that would go to school on his donkey, left happily to graze around the village until it was time to go home again – everybody loved him and wanted a ride!
We heard an interesting theory that it might be possible that some of the first local inhabitants of this area were escaped prisoners of the jail in Castelo Branco, about 500 years ago. In this mountain region they had everything needed to survive - water and chestnuts, and the remoteness offered the protection they sought. It is also possible that some of the original inhabitants were pilgrims on their way to Santiago de Compostela (the track is thought to have passed through Góis, Colmeal, Fajão, and Pampilhosa da Serra).
As is the way in such remote areas, it seems that the veil between the worlds of the everyday and the supernatural has been thin. While coping with the very tangible threat from wolves in the past, that meant keeping livestock well-protected and not straying out after dark (we have recorded some hair-raising wolf tales on our village pages!) people seem also to have been very sensitive to the presence of malign spirits. There are countless tales of folk being pestered by spirits, seeing lights in empty houses etc, and there has traditionally been a very real fear of ghosts and werewolves. This has been so strong that it has actually caused people to abandon isolated quintas, to band together in villages for greater protection. But it is hardly surprising that superstition should flourish, and that an isolated life so close to the land could lead to  a unique interpretation of natural phenomena and occurrences. Having the other night witnessed the eerie moon-lit spectacle of huge owls hunting bats outside our house, I could easily see this as a little ‘spooky’…(owls are traditionally seen as harbingers of death in these parts, as in much of Europe).
Of course, people living so remotely have had to be extremely self-reliant. It was many hours’ trek to reach a doctor, for example, and so it was sometimes the village shoemaker who put stitches in the child’s wounded head! That self-reliance and community kinship must surely have created some strong bonds and independent characters – we heard of a woman who regularly used to walk from Aldeia Velha (the second highest of all the villages in the region) with a basket of apples on her head through Colmeal, Sobral, and Celavisa to Arganil,(more than 20km) where she would sell the apples at the market. When she was old, this woman was placed by her relatives in a home for the elderly in Lisbon. But she missed her old home in Aldeia Velha so much, that she walked out of the old peoples’ home, found a taxi, and got it to take her back to her village! As she had no money the other villagers, it is said, paid the taxi fare. Soon thereafter electricity was installed in her house, and she was able to end her days as she wanted, taking her daily cup of home-made wine with the people of her home.

June 2nd
In many parts of the world June 1st is celebrated as  International Children’s Day. Portugal is one of the European countries that participates in marking this date, and here it is known as ‘O Dia Mundial da Criança’.
Since June 1st was a Sunday this year, the celebrations took place today in Góis. Every child in the Góis region, from pre-school age upwards, gathered at Góis school this morning to take part in a parade through the town. Each child and each teacher wore a t-shirt decorated on the theme of the Rights of the Child, their own handiwork in most cases, displaying some wonderful creativity.
Happily the sun shone down brightly on the colourful parade, as the traffic was brought to a standstill, and people came out of the shops and offices of the town to watch the young folk come past. It seemed that the teachers were enjoying a break from the usual routine just as much as the children were, and there was a real festival feel to the occasion.
After a few words from the President in the main town square the children returned to the school, where they enjoyed a communal outdoor lunch complete with loud music, and equally loud excited chatter!