I spent most of the time this year with The travels of Mendes Pinto trying to identify place names. Those elements of a text that, instead of being searched in a dictionary, you would rather look for in an encyclopedia or an atlas.

Not that easy!

Batampina is just an example: very carefully described, with clear and well-known points of references (city of Nanjing), Mendes Pinto depicts his journey from Nanjing to Beijing through a so-called Batampina river. ...A river?! Not that I could track on a map!

Until I found the biggest network of navigable waterways and the longest canal of the world.

Public works and, as far as Mendes Pinto was concerned, minimum environmental impact.

Due to rainy weather, late season potatoes were planted later than usual. The plants have already sprouted and begin to develop their first leaves over a no bigger than five centimeters stem. This is how much an average size plant has grown to date.

I spent most of the past two months in refractory activities again. Not the best job I have ever had, not the one I like the most. A job. These days you cannot ask too much. Let's see what the future brings.