The grapevines were the first signs of life to re-emerge, João Duarte remembers. The green leaves appeared after months of living in a black landscape, burned by the inferno that killed two of Duarte’s family. Next to return were the ferns, followed by the cork trees. Then came the eucalyptus, in greater numbers than before.
“I am a little afraid of the eucalyptus. I am not against them. People need money,” says Duarte, a 57-year-old painter who is the gardener at the Pedrógão Grande town hall gardens in central Portugal. “I live in a place surrounded by a green desert of eucalyptus. If another fire comes, it could be worse.”
