The Fires Get Closer to Home

On May 31, 2006 we smelled smoke in our house.

There was smoke rising over the houses across the street. There was a fire in the empty lot on the next block in front of us. The Brasilian Lawnmower was at work again.


Here was the start of it all.




It was a grass fire with a great deal of smoke. It blanketed the entire neighbourhood!




The fire had been set on purpose to clear the grasses on the lot. The empty lot is large, walled, and occupies enough space for four or five homes.




It seems odd to me that people put up with this in town. It actually is illegal.



Imagine coming home from work at day's end and finding your house full of smoke. This was the intersection of streets just around the corner from our place.




The smoke was really thick up and down the street.




When the smoke died down this is what the lot looked like.




Incredible as it may seem, the next morning they did it again. This time they were burning scrap lumber from a construction site in the same lot. In our own home we could hardly breathe. So we complained and they stopped burning.

So that was the end of fires . . . . . or so we thought!

Photos by Urso Branco