A lot of Dutch live in this area. It’s popular to live here. Not like the Algarve, this is popular among people with style, and maybe money, too. We went to a second hand market somewhere
in the hills. A lot of Dutch expats, yes they called themselves expats, were around, and a very tall Brit. Two meter six he was, that Brit. He sold flowers I guess. For basketball he was too short, he told me. You have to be seven feet tall for basketball. We went to have some coffee and I was
introduced to the inner circle of the Dutch enclave. A graphic artist, a woman who adored traveling the world with huge beads around her neck, a former director of a company I won’t
mention here. All were nice, friendly, interested. We went to have dinner at a private place. A trained cook served guests at his mansion, so saving the cost of a waitress. It was great. We had a quiche, white meat, spinach, puree. There was a little discussion about a Dutch expat who had behaved badly in some ways. The guy had sinned against the moral code. He must be talked about. The food was so great I could cry.
That night I saw a James Bond movie with my friend, who is actually quite famous and a bit of an idol of mine in my adolescent days. That felt great, a bit unreal too. But inspiring for that is all the most important. We saw something about oil pipelines, too. The biggest problem for the early oil industry was the transportation of the black gold. I tried to look up some old poetry on my computer but couldn’t find it. The pipelines have to be connected very carefully. Modern day
measurement techniques help to make them absolutely safe. The old poetry might be in my storage room in Berlin. I’ll look for it there. Except for earthquakes, they can always distroy
the vulnarable pipelines.
February 1. In the Dutch enclave.
