INLAND This is about a love story between man, nature, and animals. The country’s inland regions have been going through continued de-population for many years now be this due to lack of interest in rural work or to the utopian pull toward large cities and the seemingly prosperous and vibrant lives they offer. The exodus to metropolitan regions has left a track of deserted villages, but also derelict houses and crops and pastures left to the wilderness and at the mercy of wildfires.
Estranged from nature and land, today’s urban lifestyle of mass consumption and technology is not a compelling way to live anymore for many people. For some a better way is found in the quiet inlands where they are picking up the lost traditions of bygone generations and giving it new breath and meanings. Their dream is to live among nature and tend to her. To live in a more sustainable way in that the use of resources closes in a full circle. To make do with whatever the land offers – to eat, to build, to heal, and to meditate.
Across Serra do Açor there are now an estimate 1,000 new inhabitants scattered across the region’s boroughs. Mostly foreigners but also some Portuguese have brought new life to these lands. At Benfeita, 35 new children cheer up the village once and long barren of life and energy.
They are advocates of indigenous forest species and fight against eucalyptus mass plantations and monoculture, they have rebuilt the many homes wrecked by the 2017 fires, and they have lifted whole communities. A great many practise permaculture and some host volunteers keen to learn about it. Eventually, some end up buying plots and settle for a new life. The everyday hinges on time to live – to plant, to work, to rest and, more than anything, to relate.
The newcomers have picked up on the ancient techniques combined with the resources at hand. For instance, using shale stone as in the vernacular building types and resorting to wood stockpiled from the recent wildfires, or adding whatever the land gives. Some have goats and sheep. All the animals have a name.
They have set up a new economy and a currency of their own – the ‘star’ –, two handcraft markets, a project of community learning, an association, and a store of second-hand clothes, among many other things. They come together to share common interests but they live autonomously with each family tending to their own project.
Life is not always easy and the work in the uplands is often hard. But a strong will beats harshness. They unite around the common good and the love for nature. ANA BRÍGIDA March 2020
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