Starbucks

Starbucks - its not just about the coffee.

This is my first time at Starbucks in Hania. Apart from Starbucks, the only other international branded food outlet we have is Dominos pizza. Perhaps this is the reason why I never tried Starbucks before: because I am a snob. I'm into my small and local and I shy away from the large and international. Besides, I've heard and read all the bad stories about Starbucks on the news and social media: they serve standard coffee, it is expensive, the company doesnt pay taxes, etc. I decided to try it out for myself today.

Starbucks Hania

I choose the cappuccino. Safe choice. That caramel brownie also looks tempting. And so does the last outdoor free table. I sit al fresco under a dull grey sky that looks like it's going to rain (the weather forecast was only joking - we haven't seen real rain since March), and a stagnant humid feeling - summer may be over, but the warm weather is still with us. 

Starbucks cappuccino and caramel brownie  

The Venetian port is crawling with young Americans. LA long vowels, NY nasals, Southern drawls. Baseball caps and capri shorts, crew cuts and shaved faces, very white faces and very black faces. Both males and females. And for the males, icky-looking socks pulled up to the mid-shin height, with trainers. It was kind of difficult to find any news on the web about what these Americans were doing here. The USS WASP LHD-1 (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/USS_Wasp_(LHD-1) is in town (http://www.haniotika-nea.gr/episkepsi-tou-elikopteroforou-uss-wasp-sta-chania/), for no less than nine days, taking a break from its 'six-month tour of the Middle East' (as Wikipedia claims), purely for the pleasure of the crew, and presumably on the President's orders. Hania is nice for breaks. That's probably why the rain is holding out - to make the 1000+ crew members' holiday as pleasurable as possible. 

"We promise the perfect drink. If your drink is not like you want it, we'll make it again."

I'm about to take a sip of my coffee when I overhear the American man sitting behind me all alone talking to what sounds like his family: 

"How are you all?... I can't wait to come home... I know, I know, I miss you too, honey... Love you..."

It sounded just like an American movie. But it wasn't a movie, it was being played out right behind me. My heart broke at that point. he hadn't seen his family since... June, if I'm correct. 

https://www.marinecorpstimes.com/story/military/2016/06/24/navys-sending-aging-amphib-take-isis-heres-how-sailors-and-marines-got-ready-fight/86289876 

Still no rain: apparently, priests in the Orthodox Church of Greece have begun chanting incantations. 

If only the President - both present and future - could hear that man. I wish him a safe journey home to his loved ones, and hopefully soon.

 

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Explanations (Εξηγήσεις)

Here's a lovely make-you-feel-good story about the continuous mysteriousness of Greece, which foreigners often find that they cannot discover until they talk with a real Greek. 

They didn't care which cafe they went to. It was obvious by the way they looked around them, checking which seats were not taken. They cared more for the position of the chair they would be sitting in. It was only 11.30 in the morning, and most of the good seats had already been taken. In fact, most of the cafes were doing well already, some more than others. They picked the first table they found that bordered the footpath, which in turn bordered the coastline.

They settled their shopping bags on the empty chairs next to them. These chairs would remain empty as long as all the tables had been taken. Each παρέα takes up one table, and one παρέα does not sit with another. Communal seating - it's for other places, not the cafes of Greece. Every now and then, they became the spectators of a wave splashing onto the breakwater, sprinkling its spray over their heads. The women both revelled in delight whenever that happened. They showed no inhibitions, expressing their joy loudly, vividly, as if it were the first time, every time.

Freddo with frothy milk (left), and frappe with no milk (right).

More sexy coffee photos on my facebook link.

For the kafeneio clutch bag, check out The Greek Collection. 

The waitress came and took their orders. In the meantime, they chatted animatedly. They seemed to have a lot to say to each other. They spoke Greek. Then they spoke English. Then Greek again. Their colonial English accents were that of a native speaker's. But their dark hair and olive skin attested to their Greek heritage. They were gliding effortlessly in and out of their two worlds.

*** *** ***

David and Susan had been in Crete for three months. Their initials thoughts were to pass through the island during their round-the-world trip while David was on sabbatical. They had 'done' Asia, spending a little longer in Thailand than they had planned, due to the relaxed lifestyle that they had experienced there, but the language problems made them decide to move on. When they had first arrived in Hania at Easter, they thought they would be passing through this town, as they had passed through so many picturesque places along their journey. In other words, they would whiff in the atmosphere before moving on for another atmospheric experience. But something in Hania made them decide to stay on. And this time, there was no language barrier - everyone seemed to understand and speak English, even in rudimentary form.

At first, the Venetian harbour seemed so alluring, with its promenade and strollers, and the beautiful sunset with the lighthouse as a backdrop. But an exploration of the area over time led them to the much quieter Koum Kapi, with its fewer tourists and vast number of locals. Koum Kapi exuded the authentic taste of the area. Here, they were not confronted by gaudy tourists sipping cocktails with sparklies and eating damp-looking pizza by the waterfront. Here, they could watch the locals eating and drinking things that looked so very appetising, things that they would like to have tasted themselves, but whose names they did not know, which is what stopped them from ordering them.

David and Susan had each ordered a beer, which came to the table together with two other tall glasses filled with drinks in different shades of chocolate. As the waitress lowered their orders onto their table, their eyes remained transfixed on the other glasses on her tray, the ones with the unknown liquids. The waiter then turned around and placed those glasses on the table next to them, where they two women were sitting.

*** *** ***

"Wonder what they are," Susan whispered, although it wasn't quite necessary to whisper. Despite the close proximity of the tables and the general noise levels of people chattering, street sellers hawking, and seagulls crying, everyone seemed to be able to communicate among their own little group with some level of privacy. The glasses on the two women's table looked icy cold, perfectly pairing with the warmth of the sun. Every now and then, Susan found it necessary to move her chair to avoid the heat.

"They speak English," David said, dropping a hint to Susan. He was hoping that she would do the asking, as he felt that he was intruding in the women's privacy, although this feeling also seemed somewhat incorrect to him - the women's linguistic abilities attested to their knowledge of his own culture.

"Ask them," said Susan, which seemed perfectly logically to her, as David was sitting closer to the women.

David felt obliged to oblige. "Excuse me,..." he said quietly, not wishing to disrupt their peace. The women both turned their faces towards his, and looked at him seriously.

"I was wondering what the name of your drinks are."

The women's faces immediately melted into smiles of surprise, and they began talking together.

"Oh, this is a frappe,... a frappe coffee," said the paler-faced woman with the curly hair.

"And mine is a freddo, it's made with hot espresso that's cooled down with ice cubes," said the woman who was wearing glasses.

"The frappe is the Greek classic summer coffee, most people drink it, everyone knows it well."

David and Susan smiled apologetically. They had indeed seen this coffee appearing almost everywhere in the Greeker part of the town. Since they started coming to Koum Kapi for their monring coffee, they had noticed the difference in what was being served, compared to the Venetian harbour on the western side of the seafront.

"Thank you..., so it's frapay, you said?" David felt confused - both women had used words starting with the same letter. The women then went on to explain the different kinds of iced coffees to them (frappe, freddo, freddoccino), pronouncing each name clearly for them to hear it and to comprehend it well. They told them about how to ask for the correct amount of sugar, and if milk is to be added. The many different iced coffee choices in Greece gave all those iced glasses floating around them a different chocolate-coloured hue. Without these explanations offered by the women, they could not have worked out the difference.

But it was more than just the coffee that mesmerised Susan and David. These women were clearly Greek. Yet, their accents were clearly not Greek. As they wondered about the origins of these women and how they came to be sitting next to them, the woman wearing the glasses offered another explanation, as if she could detect their confusion.

"We're from New Zealand, our parents emigrated there, and we eventually returned to Greece. That's why we have a Kiwi accent. I suppose you're here on holiday." David explained the situation with his sabbatical, and how they had been in Hania for three months.

"And you didn't know what frappe was?" asked the woman with the curly hair looking slightly bemused. "I didn't realise frappe in Greece could still be such a secret!" David felt that tinge of embarrassment when a person shows their ignorance of a basic fact.

"I'm glad you asked us about it," said the other woman. "You'd have never found out if you hadn't asked us! Imagine being here for so long and not indulging in one of these!"

And that's what everyone visiting another country should do if they want the full authentic experience: just ask. Greeks don't charge for explanations, and they are some of the most forgiving people in the world. 

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Pressed for time

What's the moral of the story? Scroll below if you want to skip the details.

The children are growing up now, and I am finding that I can do grown-up things with them, things that I never wanted to do with them before, because they felt more like little pains in the butts when they were around me, rather than fun companions. One of those things that I like to do with them now is to have a sit-down snack when we are running errands in town. This usually happens on Saturday mornings (not afternoons, because that's the eve of never never on a Sunday for Greek commercial centres).

We had almost an hour to kill before my daughter finished from basketball, so I sat down with my son (after we had both had a hair cut - another crisis-related experience that I may remind myself to write about another time) at one of my favorite people-watching places in the town, located on a pedestrian zone behind the touristy area just off Stivanadika (the leather street). I hadn't been there for close to two years, so I was delighted to see this particular place still going, looking pretty much the same as I remembered it from past times. It was a really busy moment for the cafe because on that day, a lot of people were in town. It wasn't just the lovely calm weather but the 100 years celebrations of the Agora that bought a lot of us into town. There were only two tables free, a big one and a small one. We took the small one naturally, and waited for the customary menu to arrive.

The waitresses never seemed to stop running in and out of the cafe, bringing menus, orders, bills, receipts, and clearing tables. But that menu card didn't arrive, so we picked one up off another table. Menu cards are fun to browse, even though you know what you want to order; I didn't need to check if the cafe had cappuccino on the list, but my son had more difficulty finding what he wanted. The 'toasted sandwich' came in an array of tastes at cafes and he found it difficult to choose from the list of toasts that he found in the menu. Mindful I suppose of the many crisis discussions that take place in our home, he chose the cheapest one. I told him not to do that - there's always a time to splurge! He then chose the one called 'French toast' (there were no accompanying photos). I wondered whether that would be a sweet toast with cinnamon  or one of those things the French call 'croque monsieur', but I decided not to worry him (he needs to find out for himself how to handle disappointments when they come).

All that was now missing was the waitress to come along to take our order. Every time she came past our table, we were hoping she would stop... but this didn't seem to happen. I raised my hand at one point to grab her attention (I really hate doing that), and she did eventually notice, but my problem now was not that she would come to take our order, but that time was running out and we had to be somewhere else very soon...

Eventually she came. My son ordered his French toast, and I asked for a cappuccino in a large cup. I'm a fussy cafe coffee drinker, being rarely happy with the coffee served in Hania's cafes: usually, cappuccino in Hania is served in a small cup, and usually, it's tepid. But today's outing was not a quest for good coffee; it was just a mother and son moment that I wanted to enjoy, and we were both in need of a pick-me-up.

The waitress didn't understand my extra request (the big cup). I realised she was not Greek from her accent, but I didn't expect not to be understood. I had to repeat the order a couple of times; as an English teacher, I know how she was probably feeling at that moment, and I didn't really want to make her any more uncomfortable. The place was really busy now - there were hardly any spare tables (and Greeks still don't sit communally, as is common elsewhere).

I was still worried about the time, and I hoped things would hurry along now that the order had been taken... but that didn't happen. Even my son was now getting fidgety. It looked like there was only a 25-minute timeframe for the order to be prepared, come to our table and for us to finish it. Not very relaxing if the point of your visit to the cafe was to relax... I tried to stop the waitresses, but I was out of luck. They were both zipping in and out of the cafe at lightning speed. They were rushed off their feet. I went into the cafe kitchen and asked if the order would be getting ready soon, because otherwise, I told them, I'm sorry, but I would have to leave.

The assistant looked at her order list. "Yours is being made up now," she told me. I thanked her and went back to my table. A few more minutes later, and the order finally came (coffee first). The  cappuccino was not the best I'd ever had (the froth was a bit lacking), but at least it was hot. I always keep in mind that I am a fussy coffee drinker, so I easily forgive anyone who can't make a coffee good enough for my tastes. My son's toast was, in his opinion, the best he'd ever had. (Why it was called French is beyond me - the baguette had something to do with it no doubt, but it looked more like a good sandwich-type roll to me than anything else.) I gulped down my coffee, trying not to let my son know how annoyed I was that I could not savour it more slowly. Thankfully the sandwich was cut in two pieces, so I knew he would eventually have to carry one piece with him as we made our way to the other side of the town to pick up his sister...

I didn't really have time to wait till the bill came, so I hurried that one along too. Time was now of the essence. The waitress came round, looked at the empty plates and cups (the other half of the sandwich was now in my son's hand), and said: "A nescafe and a toast, is that right?" No, it wasn't, and I suppose I could have just said "Yes" and the cafe would have lost money on my order, but I didn't, so I had to wait a bit more for her to correct the bill, which still didn't sound right when it came back (I think they under-charged me), but I really didn't have time to get it corrected for a second time. Still, it was polite service with a smile all the way, and I was happy to see the staff doing whatever they could do to please me, even if it didn't really make a difference. Some things cannot be undone.

The moral of the story is:
- don't sit at cafes which are full if you are in a hurry,
- don't expect to be given priority if it is not your turn,
- don't pretend you are trying to relax when you are looking at the clock all the time,
- the customer is not always right: you chose to be where you are, whereas the staff didn't choose to attend to your needs - they simply have to
and above all,
- just because you think you understand the ideology of a concept well doesn't mean that thing will work out the way you want or expect them to:

Capitalism is not real; it is an idea. America is not real; it is an idea that someone had ages ago. Britain, Christianity, Islam, karate, Wednesdays are all just ideas that we choose to believe in and very nice ideas they are, too, when they serve a purpose. These concepts, though, cannot be served to the detriment of actual reality. http://www.newstatesman.com/politics/2013/10/russell-brand-on-revolution

We can enjoy daily life more if we put it into perspective.

If you like cool places away from the crowds, you might like to try the Red Bicycle cafe - but don't order medium-rare beef steak, like this German customer did: 'rare' meat is never served in Crete, so it's only to be expected that it wouldn't be cooked according to your expectations (ie your own concept) of a rare meat dish (we don't generally eat pink meat - we still think of that as 'raw'). As for beggars and illegally-copied CD/DVD sellers, that's not the cafe's problem - it's a European issue. 

©All Rights Reserved/Organically cooked. No part of this blog may be reproduced and/or copied by any means without prior consent from Maria Verivaki.

Reading between the lines (Διαβάζοντας ανάμεσα στις γραμμές)

My children know I write a blog and that I have a facebook page, but they rarely follow what I do on the computer. They aren't yet at the stage of surfing the web to discover the world - they are at the stage where they want to download new music, play games and chat with friends. One day, I know they will google their parents' names; I wonder what they will discover. In my case, it will probably be information overload, which tends to make people switch off because they are bamboozled with too much data. For this reason, I do not get them to read what I write at this stage, even though I know that I am writing this blog for the purpose of keeping a record of what we are doing together.

The other day, my son watched me typing on the blogger platform, which came as rather a shock. You know people read you, but you don't think it's your own family. I felt 'discovered', so I thought that this would be the right time to ask him if he would like to read something I wrote on the blog. (Actually, he knew I had just been interviewed by the BBC4 Food Programme on the topic of frugal food, so I suppose he was taking an interest in why others were interested in me.) I wanted to see how much he understood of what I was writing: I don't send my kids to private language schools to learn English, and we don't do formal lessons together (even though I am an English teacher), so their knowledge of English is based on the exposure I give them to the language, and more importantly, the opportunities they get to use the language. 

The post I gave him to read contained a lot of what a teacher would call 'unknown words' (or phrases) in the passage, as his Greek school teachers would call them too: come of age, clientele, contribution, on her behalf, etc. So I was curious to see what he might make out of what he was about to read.

The first thing he asked me about was the person I was writing about. "Did you work with her?" That's what it sounded like in the text. But Thalia is an imaginary person, something I didn't want to reveal at this stage. (Most people think I write about a particular person, but that is not the case at all - my characters are an amalgamation of different people I have met; they don't actually exist in real life.) "Does she have a broken arm?" he asked me. I told him to check the tense of the verb that contained this information (it was in the past perfect, not the present tense). "Oh, she HAD a broken arm, but NOW it's NOT broken," he said. (Good, I thought.)

But I was in for a surprise: "Frappe and cigarettes - everyone wastes their money on this, except us, right?" He was reading between the lines. On the one hand, I was pleased to see this happening because it will have a great bearing in his future studies; on the other, I wondered how much I had influenced my kids, and in what way. By swaying them to think of smoking as a waste of money, I could actually be creating a prejudice in them towards smokers. This is something that I believe can't be helped in parenting: we have no control over the place where we were born, and the people who raised us. We can change the rest, but not those two things.

"What's drachma, Mum?" My son was born during the last year of the drachma being in use. He has no concept of the drachma except as something old and no longer in use, hence he could not immediately see that drachma was a Greek word transliterated into English. Despite this hiccup, he rarely asked me to explain other words in the passage, even the ones that I thought would be unknown to him, which possibly shows that he was comprehending unknown concepts by trying to fit the unknown ideas into the known ones and working out their meaning in this way. We all do this during times of information overload in the internet age.

But what impressed me most about his relationship to the drachma is that he has no memories of it. He sees drachma as something you read about in books or see in a coin collection. Drachma is not something real or useful in his life. It represents historical stories for him, ones that his parents tell him about from time to time. Drachma for him is like cassette recorders, vinyl records and dial telephones. In the future, he will be able to say he knows what those things are because his parents still have things like that stuck somewhere in the basement, or he may look them up on the internet, but he will not have any direct experience of them himself because they are not a part of his life. They are to do with the past - and that part is over and done with. 

"Is Thalia really going to go to New Zealand?" he then asked me. "Where you write 'Δεν ξέρει που πάνε τα τέσσερα,' you mean that she doesn't understand what life is like there, don't you?" My comment here is very subjective; again, his reading between the lines shows that he is using his experiences to understand what he is reading about. His experiences are based on what he hears being said at home. The theme of immigration often comes up in our discussions, but it is not a theme that my own children have lived through: they know that we aren't interested in emigrating, and now that I think about it, they have not lost any school friends to emigration. This fleeing-abroad business is a figment of the media's imagination to a certain extent - some Greek problems do not concern all Greek citizens; they simply concern the media, both in Greece and abroad, when news is sensationalised.

"Why do you think she wants to go to New Zealand?" I asked him. He didn't take long to think about his answer:

"She's got everything she needs here, but she wants more than that, and it's difficult to have everything in life when you're starting from the beginning, but she isn't thinking about that now, is she?" I dislike it when I realise I have influenced my kids in such a way, because, like most parents, we believe that we have allowed our children to make their own choices. But the truth is that at this age, they are making choices based on their parents' choices. That's part of parenthood; it can't be helped.

I was also surprised by what he understood when he read this sentence: 

If I bought styrofoam coffee on a daily basis, then I wouldn't be able to tell my kids that they should make their own chocolate milk instead of buying it ready shaken.

"But you don't buy us any chocolate milk, Mum, not even powder!" I was tempted to reply that I don't drink styrofoam coffee either, but I decided that I was probably being a bit harsh. So I bought a box of chocolate milk powder for them. And even I have begun drinking a styrofoam coffee here and there, in the form of a 'freddo, metrio me afrogala' when we go to the beach.

I notice that the packet of chocolate powder is still quite full. Perhaps this is because the kids have already understood that we can have all things in moderation, as a famous Greek once said; and on that matter, know thyself. That also helps.

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Koum Kapi

Koum Kapi stands like a sparkling jewel amidst the crumbling ruins of the old tightly packed houses of Minoos St and the newly-built box-style apartment blocks that have sprouted up beside the decay. The sea has been left in its original state, as it remains unable to be built on. The cafes lining the street are some of the most popular in summer, due to the breezy atmosphere created by the sea mist. Foreign tourists rarely venture to this part of town, as it's partly obscured by the commercial centre. A walk towards the east will take you to another side of Hania that doesn't include the view of the lighthouse from the Venetian harbour.

If you want the right atmosphere to observe the locals, Koum Kapi is the place to be, not the old harbour. Swimmers, drinkers, bar staff, dog walkers, strollers, fishermen, tourists, locals and immigrants, of all age groups can be seen in the area, enjoying pretty much the same things.



Koum Kapi was once regarded as the seediest part of town. It was home to the poorest and the most down and out of Hania. Brawls were common, and so was crime. About 25 years ago, Koum Kapi was cleaned up of a good deal of its slum/ghetto appearance, making way for outdoor cafes of all classes. It is now the coolest place to be seen, not just status-wise, but also because of the shady afternoon atmosphere.



But you can still see the poverty of its origins - it remains in full view, often sharing space side by side with the plush cafes; despite Koum Kapi being located close to Hania's red light district (the infamous Minoos St), its mix of locals, immigrants and (well-informed) tourists is a sort of proof that different people can live together harmoniously. Immigrants wash ther underwear on the street hwere they hand their laundry to dry, as tourists stroll through the narrow lanes behind the seafront where the locals are sipping their frappe.

One thing that surprises people about Koum Kapi's beach is that it is very clean. While flotsam and jetsam were commonly seen bobbing up and down in the water, Koum Kapi's waters are now considered some of the cleanest in Hania, due partly to the biological treatment facilities further east, as well as Greeks' greater grasp of social responsibility. As you look out onto the horizon, you catch a glimpse of Zorba's hill in Stavros, which looks so close you can swim out to it.

Koum Kapi is the best place to enjoy an afternoon drink outdoors, as it also tends to be quieter than the Venetia harbour, but beware of the evenings - each cafe is equipped with outdoor loudspeakers, which means that you will be surrounded by a variety of different musical tastes all at once, making it difficult to comprehend what is being said around you. This is nothing new to Koum Kapi, where Hania's African community used to live in the 1800s, economic migrants from a different era. They were named the Halikoutes by the locals precisely because they didn't know what they were talking about when they spoke among each other - all they could hear was 'ha', 'li', 'kou' and 'ti'.

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Coffee, beach and work

After a blotchy start, with rain, clouds and high winds, it feels like summer has finally set in.

IGUANA BEACH, Ayious Apostolous, my local beach, located near forested area, which is still free for all to use.

Frappe, beach and a good book to read. Today, I took along my work-related material. As I have mentioned on many occassions on my blog, much of my work is based on reading material that contains interesting information, which I often share with readers. 

Today's reading was very pertinent to my surroundings: PES (payments for environmental services). What is PES? It's basically a way to make money to protect forests and natural environment. What we take for granted is often spoiled by overuse or misuse. What may have been freely accessed in our grandparents' times when there were less than 3 billion people in the world now needs protection in the era of 7 billion people, where these places are used not just for self-sufficiency and survival, but also for recreation and entertainment, accepting visitors not just from the locality, but from all over the world.

A friend asked me if I could concentrate well enough to read a non-fiction book at the noisy busy beach on a Sunday afternoon. You can egotistically switch off at a Greek beach, because everyone who is there is doing their own thing. You may feel hunched up together with strangers vying for space, and there may seem to be a lack of privacy in Greece in general, but eventually, you realise that the personal space you create around you in a public space - be it a cafe, a beach, a taverna - is where you can be yourself, and in this day and age, as long as you are not bothering anyone or breaking rules, no one will object.

If you can multi-task effectively (I guess I am good at this, as reasearch suggests that most women are), you can do your own thing, while making sure that you don't miss out on anything extraordinary. This afternoon, the only thing that casued a great commotion was a bride in a cabrio which was beeping loudly and incessantly until it took her to the church on the little hill where the wedding was taking place. But if you know this Greek tradition, you will only look up momentarily to catch sight of the spectacle, before you get back to your own little world. 

My local and highly popular little beach is still free for all to enjoy - but for how long, I don't know. For now, it sounds luxuriousto have the freedom to combine coffee, beach and work: maybe it is a luxury...

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Styrofoam coffee (Καραβίσιος καφές)

Although my whole blog is written especially for my kids, this post is written specifically for them, as they slowly come of age. 

During my trip to Iraklio last weekend, I met a young Greek woman who has been a teacher of English for the last decade, without any qualifications apart from a certificate of proficiency in English. This is a typical way to teach languages in Greece - a certificate stating your level of proficiency is usually regarded as adequate; no teaching methodology skills are needed when you do private lessons (on a one-to-one basis in people's homes), or teach at a private institute (the classic Greek frontistirio set-up). It took Thalia a while to build up her clientele, and initially she didn't want to work in a frontistirio, because it paid less per hour than the private lessons, but when she broke her arm a few years ago, she eventually realised that the state health insurance contribution her employer paid on her behalf had some value; thanks to this contribution, she has also been able to pick up unemployment benefit during the three summer months (although this is about to change, according to the new measures created by the financial crisis).

Thalia was quite excited to hear that I came from New Zealand, and showed great interest in my previous homeland. She wanted to ask me a lot of things about it, things that struck me as rather odd (eg "Can you go swimming at the beaches there?") possibly because I took them for granted, but also because I realised I was not in a position to answer factually (eg "What is the average salary?"), as I had been away from the country for so long. She has an uncle there, her mother's brother, who she tells me is constantly badgering her to emigrate. She likes the sound of this idea, but can't make up her mind about going. This has nothing to do with the fact that she is obviously ignorant of any of the NZ immigration pre-requisites; it has something to do with the fear of the unknown. Life has never really been perfect in Greece, but most of the problems in the country are of a predictable nature - we know what to expect. And I suspect that Thalia feels very cosy here too; we like to complain, but we know how good it feels to live in a warm climate near the sea in a comfortable clean house, and more importantly, in relative safety. So we don't feel the need to change it too quickly, until someone puts it into our mind (as has been done relatively recently) that we need to re-think our way of life and make changes. The choices appear complicated to people like Thalia because they generally don't know what it means to 'live better' than they do now. In all honesty, Thalia could have made the move away many years ago, but it sounded like her uncle only recently started making everything sound so much better over there. She is curious, but remains sceptical.

Living at home with her parents, Thalia does not pay board or food expenses. With her hourly wages, she is able to afford to go out for a meal and(/or??) drink on a weekly basis, drink styrofoam coffee twice a day, treat herself to a souvlaki every now and then, pay for the petrol she needs to get to her lessons with her car (which her parents had bought her - they still pay the road tax and insurance fees), and buy extra call units for her mobile phone. She also spends quite a bit on cigarettes per day; I counted 7 cigarettes on each day we worked together, during the breaks. With whatever remains, she can pick up a new fashion item, upgrade her cellphone, or go on a mini-break. During the Easter break, she went to Prague for four days with a friend. "It was very cold," she told me. "And the food was rather boring."

Thalia's spending habits remind me of my single days. Instead of mobile phone and mini-break costs, I'd spend money on rent, utilities and bus fares instead, until my dad helped me buy my first car - I was just a couple of years older than Thalia when I bought a very old and over-used Zastava which lasted me two years. I paid something like 150,000 drachma for it, ~ 440 euro in modern terms. Naturally, I was responsible for its maintenance, which turned out to be quite high, but at least I got to learn how to drive with that bomb. Its final resting place was a chicken coop in a nearby village; it is still providing shelter to some hens. (Which reminds me - I must take the kids to see it there one day.) I gave it up when I realised that it was burning fuel at twice the normal rate - it was unsustainable to drive, and a waste of money to fix. The deposit on my second car was my dad's wedding present. I bought it two months before I got married, paying off the installments over three years, by which time I had given birth to both my children. I still take them to school in that car; my son is starting high school next year.

Even while I was living and working on my own, I still prepared and cooked most of my meals. I loved the idea of going out, but I was very careful with my spending habits. Most of my colleagues were members of the 'you only live once' league - they went out for a meal at least three nights a week. That doesn't count going out for a drink, which took place at least twice a week. I just couldn't bring myself to be that nonchalant. It's a personality thing, I think. It's the reason why I was more than happy to take on as much declared work as I could during my single days. Although I hated working at frontistirio (because it involved working daily in the evenings), and I knew it paid less than private lessons, I always thought it made sense to work in an organised school, before setting my self up on my own. Private lessons make you a freelancer, not a business owner, and they offer no security. I was working towards getting away from Athens one day and living differently in the future, whereas they were living life as if it would never change from what it was like at the time.

My first freddo-cappuccino, while working at the English examinations in Iraklio. We were given coupons to exchange for a drink or snack at the tuck shop of the school where the examinations were held. The organisers made it clear that the coupons had to last us for the two days we worked. All meals (plus overnight hotel accommodation) were provided, apart from the Saturday evening meal. But Saturday lunch was so filling (and stodgy) that I didn't finish it. Instead of throwing it away, I packed the remainder and ate it for dinner at the hotel, after finishing work in the late afternoon (7.30pm). Besides, I knew that next day's breakfast would be a huge one with many second helpings. Because we were literally sitting down all day, I took a long walk around the city of Iraklio to help my swollen feet relax, before getting to the hotel. My colleagues all took cabs for that short ten-minute walk from the examination centre to the hotel and then they went out for a meal (we had to be back at the examination centre the next morning at 8am). I was being well-paid for this weekend work; I couldn't stand the thought of spending this money flippantly. Perhaps if I did not have a home to maintain and children to raise, I'd have done the same thing as my colleagues - but maybe not: it's a personality thing.

Lunch on the job - breakfast was much better.

Styrofoam freddo cappucino coffee wasn't quite as hip back in those days. Even though it's like the only coffee most people seem to drink these days, I still have little idea what it tastes like. I can't even express it correctly which is evidence that I do not know how to ask for it! I always make my own coffee in the morning, and so does my husband. I drink mine at home and have another one at work (made in the cafetiere). My husband takes his in a portable cup; he prefers to sip it slowly in the taxi as he waits for the first fare of the day. I also admit to knowing full well the cost difference between home-made coffee and styrofoam. It's huge. If I bought styrofoam coffee on a daily basis, then I wouldn't be able to tell my kids that they should make their own chocolate milk instead of buying it ready shaken.

I was tempted to try styrofoam coffee while in London. I wanted to do the normal city thing, which I later realised would be impossible in my position. For a start, I did not need to run to catch a train, like everyone else was doing. I was on holiday, not going to work. Just before we caught an early morning train, I bought a styrofoam coffee from the tuck shop at Brockley station. I wish I knew how full the train would be at that moment as we made our way to Canada Water. I would never have bought one had I realised what I was in for. 'Packed like sardines' is an understatement: 'human marmalade' is more like it. I don't know if this is the reason why the coffee tasted so bad, or if it was just bad coffee 'de facto'. I learnt my lesson.

People marmalade at Canada Water - not only was it the wrong time to be drinking styrofoam coffee, it was also the wrong place to be touring with kids! This is mainly the domain of the new social classes in the UK: "Technical middle class", "Emergent service workers" and "New affluent workers".

I've heard that suspended coffee is all the rage in places with growing poverty. Not that I can't afford to drink styrofoam; I just know I can't have everything in life. Since I'm not poor, I would probably not feel comfortable going into a store and asking to be the recipient of a suspended coffee. I guess I wouldn't find myself in the stores that offer it, either, since I don't buy styrofoam coffee myself. Now that I have a home to maintain and children to raise, my needs have changed; as my needs change, my spending habits change too. Most of us have seen better days, but that should not be a reason for being unable to cope with the bad ones:

"... coping with poverty is to be flexible about what you really need. If you can't change what you need, if you have to have cigarettes or alcohol, that's when you really will be fighting poverty." 

I wondered what exactly Thalia wants to change in her life that is bringing up the dilemma of emigration in her mind. She's definitely not poor. What's more, her life sounds like a happy one. She has a loving family, she lives in a freehold property, and what's more, she lives in one of the nicest parts of Greece (and Europe, and the world, for that matter), but her life - and more significantly but less consciously, her thoughts - have been affected by the crisis, like everyone else's. Her hourly wage at the frontistirio was lowered, and she had to 'put some water in her own wine' (she lowered her hourly rates for private teaching). And of course, fewer students are enrolling in language courses these days. It's an honest living, but it is very piecemeal and this worries Thalia about her future here. She is right to worry - it isn't just that the locals have less money to spend on language lessons, but she also faces stiff competition from both qualified teachers (unlike herself) and the internet. The classic way to learn something (in the classroom) is no longer the case. The world is changing, at a very fast pace, and forever.

The Iraklio skyline on a late summery afternoon. Iraklio is not the prettiest of cities, but this is due mainly to the fact that it works like a urban centre rather than a quaint town, such as what Hania is. Cities have more facilities than small towns, and people cooperate better than they do in towns. They come from all sorts of places and fall into various social categories. Towns are much more localised.

Thalia's uncle has been living in a small NZ town - she can't remember the name of the place, but she thinks it's in the North Island (I am beginning to doubt that she even knows the difference between the North and South Island) - for over two decades now, where he married a Kiwi lady who he met while she was holidaying in Crete. He eventually moved to her homeland because she couldn't take the isolation she was faced with in the Greek village where they first set up home. Despite getting divorced, her uncle decided to remain in NZ, where he ran his own glazier's business; he was too well settled in his NZ life to return to Greece. Όπου γης και πατρίς, he would often say on the few times he called his family in Greece. That was before the crisis; now he's telling his nephews and nieces to leave Greece and come over to NZ, with promises of good jobs.

I am not surprised to hear that Thalia is tempted to take up the offer. But Thalia has never visited NZ and had never thought of going there until now; she is being lured with what I would call false promises. Her uncle insists that because she speaks English, she will find a job easily. I am not going to doubt this as I really don't know the job situation in NZ at the present time; but I do know how easily people with accented English are passed over almost everywhere in the English-speaking world. It's a bit like anywhere, really; foreigners, no matter how readily accepted they are into society, remain foreigners for much longer than they would like to believe, even when they themselves feel that they have adapted well into their new environment.

"Will I be able to teach English in New Zealand?" Thalia asked me. Had it not occurred to her that NZ is an English-speaking, I wondered. Thalia and her uncle are talking at cross-purposes. When a Greek hears about a "good job", they usually think that the job pays a lot of money and the work conditions involve an office environment; it rarely involves getting your hands dirty. But when a Greek-New Zealander talks about a "good job", they probably mean that the job is an honest one with a decent employer - the money part may play some role, but it will be a much smaller role than the work conditions. Landing a job in NZ was never a final destination; it is a dynamic one, changing in nature as a person develops. Not so in Greece, where the destination is reached as soon as you land yourself a 'chair', which you try to hold on to for the rest of your life. Thalia still has a chair in mind when she thinks about employment.

Of course, Thalia has no idea about any of this, and I could see that she was not even at the catching up stage needed to understand this. Δεν ξέρει που πάνε τα τέσσερα, so to speak - the whole question is way way WAY out of her depth. For a start, Thalia doesn't know what it means to look for a job. She never really went through the job search process; she got her present work through contacts. Thus, she has never really been through what is often a gruelling process in the Western world: the job interview. Despite her many years in teaching the English language, she still sounds, thinks - and acts - like a Greek; she has no idea of what it means to be a global citizen, someone who can move about in the world without being ethnically tied, someone who does not have an idiosyncratic nationalistic hangup about how things are done. We like to think that people are the same everywhere, but that isn't true at all. Most people have not grasped the high connectivity that people share in today's world, and Thalia is a typical example of that.

Thalia's ignorance of the ways of the world beyond the borders of her island is weaving a complicated web around her that will contain many snags, but I can't tell her that. She needs to find it out for herself. So I hope Thalia ends up going to New Zealand, even though I firmly believe that she is setting herself up for failure.

I don't think she won't find a job, but I don't really think she will find the kind of job that she was expecting to find. Her new job will probably be something like a frontperson for a small business, say a gym receptionist. She won't find a job working at a supermarket: "I could do that back home," I can imagine her insisting indignantly. At least she will get herself a little holiday in an exotic part of the world; after that, she may return to Greece and recount her tales of New Zealand reality, after spending two (but not more than three) months. Perhaps she can update me.

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Greece in crisis

You will rarely see me in one of those trnedy-looking cafes that we see throughout Greece, where many beautiful people sit, often outdoors, enjoying the generally good/mild weather of our beautiful country. That's because it is generally too expensive to do this.

I can, of course, go out occassionally, without my children, and have a drink/coffee with a freind, but I don't do this much at all. In fact, I'd say that there has to be a very very very special reason for me to do this, and last week, I did in fact do this, and there was indeed a very very special reason for me to do this. And even though the coffee I had cost 66% of the cost of the coffee at this place (€3), I still felt that even that €3 amount felt like too much for my own household income level - it's just too much for a cup of coffee that we all know we can make for a lot (and I mean a heck of a lot) less in our home.

Thanks to Kostas for supplying me with the photo - it is virtually impossible for me to get my hands on such receipts, for the reasons stated above.It makes no difference where this receipt was issued - Athens, Crete, somewhere else; in a Greece of crisis, it mocks the whole show.

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The lucky ones (Οι τυχεροί)

After reading this little story in Greek on the web, I decided to share its potent message with you by translating it.
 

The reastaurant was on our right; the people came here for lunch after us.

"Sorry guys, there's no free table," said the restaurant owner, "except if you don't mind us setting up a table outside."

The lucky ones came late and they got the best table, while we all sat crammed indoors. We tried to enjoy our meal amidst the muzak of chomping jaws, the cries of the urban peasants shouting out every now and then "hey, koumbare, we ordered a beer, you forgot us". Screaming kids: "Aaaaaaaaaaa I want an ice-cream", and then their parents: "You can't have one, it's too cold."

My wife had recommended the restaurant. At one point, I couldn't tolerate the cuffufle any longer and I asked her: "Are you sure you brought me to the place you'd come to?" She asked me why I was asking. "Because I have the impression you've brought me to a madhouse."

When we eat, we Cypriots have some kind of penchant for talking too loudly, as if the person across us is a kilometre away. Sure, we are a lively people, but it doesn't have to come to this. All the while, those lucky ones were sitting outside enjoying the peace and quiet under the pine trees with the sounds of the singing birds, and they were being served as if they were the most prestigious of the elite.

And I ask myself, weren't they lucky?

 I remember a cold wintery afternoon, sitting alone with my family in a cafe by the harbour. Everyone else was sitting outside bundled up in their coats and jackets, talking on their cell phones, talkign to each other, surrounded by clouds of cigarette smoke, while we had the place to ourselves, save the cafe owner's children...

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Etesian winds - Meltemi (Μελτέμι)

Since the beginning of summer, not once did I see a choppy sea or a cloudy sky. This summer has been a very hot one (to a similar extreme as the last winter, which was very cold), with a still air that made you gasp for breath. Last weekend, for the first time in nearly three months, we felt strong winds and saw waves crashing onto the shore, taking everything with them in their wake at a stretch of ten metres.

August is known in Greece for its meltemi winds: "During hot summer days, this is by far the most preferred weather type and is considered a blessing. They are at their strongest in the afternoon and often die down at night, but sometimes meltemi winds last for days without a break" (Wikipedia). The dry meltemi winds have a cooling, soothing, reviving effect on our parched sunburnt skins. On such days, it is pure joy to be outdoors in summer. On days like this, no one stays indoors. This is the first day in the summer that I took a walk by the romantic picturesque old Venetian harbour which sits over my town like a jeweled crown. We took a stroll in the late afternoon, along with what seemed like the whole town, as the area was busy with tourists and visitors promenading along the port, with many taking a seat at one of the eateries for some al fresco dining.

We started off our walk by the old ABEA factory where olive oil soap was produced en masse for the first time in Hania. The chimneys are all that remain of it now as the factory was forced to relocate due to environmental issues - the area where it was situated (known as Nea Hora - the 'New Town') had become a flourishing suburb, the first in Hania to be built outside the western walls that once enclosed the old town. The former ABEA site is now home to a local high school, and there is free parking available here, within a few minutes' walk to the port area.

 The chimneys of the former ABEA factory

Across from the ABEA site, we caught our first glimpse of the sea, crashing over the barricade separating it from the swimming pool that belonged to the former XENIA hotel. XENIA was demolished a few years ago, in order to renovate the old city walls, and exploit the potential of the area as a local heritage site. The hotel, which was built in the 60s, was declared an illegal site, as parts of the old wall had been destroyed in order to build the hotel's restaurant and kitchen areas. The hotel continued to operate for two decades, until it was forced to close down, and later demolished. The renovation works were successfully completed, in conjunction with the archaeology department of Hania, which helped to reconstruct the city walls to their former state. The moat area that surrounds the former fortifications of the city is now used for open-air exhibitions and fairs during the summer, when the weather guarantees no rain or high winds.

 The western moat of the former city walls of Hania in 2009 (left) and three years later (right) 

The fate of the pool is yet to be announced, but from what was visible of the area, everything is slowly being dismantled and cleared, making way for more modern recreation areas. The water foamed furiously, as it drove outwards onto the shore, covering the kiosk where we were standing with water as the sea spray streamed over it. 

The former XENIA swimming pool area (above) and the now bare western wall (below) on which the XENIA hotel sat. The wall continued uninterrupted along this road in former times. Nowadays some parts of it don't exist; over the years, damage and/or demolition carved out roads in its place. 

The landmark of Hania is its lighthouse, which locals refer to as the faros. It never fails to please, even during a gusty sea when it becomes an even greater spectacle. Before its most recent renovation a couple of years ago, it was last renovated in the early 1800s. It has been presiding over the harbour for almost 600 years, but its present form was built on the base of the previous one, which had a different form. The Venetians who originally built it probably did not envisage that it would look like a minaret six centuries later, which is how it was shaped by the Egyptians, who the English 'gave Crete to' once the Turks left!



The other landmark of the Venetian port is the former mosque at the central square of the harbour. This has been used in many ways since the Turkish Moslem population left the island. At one point, it was a tourist information bureau, now it is mainly an art exhibition centre. A friend of mine was in fact staging her works in it over the weekend while we were there. Across from the lighthouse stands the castle-like fortress used in former times to guard the town - it now houses the naval museum. 



The old port is a magical place to be when the sun starts to set. It's far too hot during the day in the summer to enjoy the atmosphere, as the area offers little shade, unless you choose to sit under the awnings of the eateries lining the quay. The buildings now all have some commercial function: souvenir shops, restaurants, cafes, hotels. In the past, they were mainly private dwellings, until the advent of mass tourism in the town. Since then, they have been built on, renovated, and changed in form, keeping abreast of the changes in society.



The tiles at the outer edge of the harbour were rather slippery from all the water splashing onto them. It felt a little strange to be wading our shoes through so much water at this time of the year; in mid-August the meltemi signals its presence, but temperatures rarely drop below 30 degrees Celsius, as they did last weekend. Cretans look forward to this time of year - it's the best part of summer in our eyes, after the torment of over-heated houses and the still stagnant hot atmosphere. Heatwaves also produce very strong winds, but they come from the south (unlike the meltemi which comes form the north) and they create an exhausting humid heat that debilitates you, sapping away your energy during the day. There are times during those hot windy periods when the sheets of your bed feel like they're on fire - you get no rest in such weather. That's when you wish for the meltemi to come sooner than its time...

We waded our way through the water and the crowds, finally stopping off at the art exhibition, where we took a peek inside before sitting at Aroma Cafe, next to the mosque, for a coffee and ice-cream. Refreshments at the harbour are not cheap, not even during a crisis (it is August after all), but all the businesses have a menu card available outside their business for potential customers to browse through. I set a maximum for spending money on this outing at €10.

Individual servings of ice cream cost about €4-5 in most places; it may sound expensive, but you need to remember that there is no time limit placed on you to eat what you order, you can sit here for as long as you like, you will not be harassed to leave as soon as you finish your order, and you will be able to enjoy your time here in peace and quiet (save the clacking of the backgammon peons).

In order to meet the budget, I convinced the kids to have the waffle with Merenda spread and three balls of ice cream of their choice with chocolate topping and nuts (€7), while I had a cappuccino (€3.20). Our bill was slightly over what I had budgeted, but few Europeans stick to their budget these days, and even though there's always a fear that the surplus will come out of another budget which cannot itself be compensated for, money always seems to be found somewhere to plug the gaps, so I won't worry myself too much about the extra €0.20 I had to fork out (0.02% over, to be exact). I suppose I could have a plain coffee when we go back there another time - but that is going strictly against what I've budgeted, as a second outing isn't on the cards this summer...

 

Bonus photograph: this view always makes ex-pat Haniotes a wee bit teary-eyed; if only they knew how difficult it is for most Haniotes living in the town to catch this view on a regular basis...

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Internet cafe (Ιντερνετ καφέ)

What am I doing on a Sunday afternoon in this dark room, with walls painted grey, the ceiling painted black, and neon lights hanging from drainpipes fixed to it? Why am I staring ahead of me at three TV screens, all playing different football matches, with ads for cars and cellphone companies? Why am I tolerating the illegal thick plumes of other people's smoke, and listening to Greek terms of endearment (ρε μαλάκα) being hurled around the room as often as the ball is being kicked in the matches on the screens? Why am I in a room full of men with ponytails, boys with shaven carvings on their scalps, girls with skinny legs wearing drainpipe jeans and Ugg boots, where everyone dresses in black as a rule, as they sit on black chairs looking at black screens? Why am I writing a blog post while listening to fast loud techno-pop music?

I'm sitting at an internet cafe (even though there are three computers in the house) because I'm a mother, and as mothers, we do things that we don't always want to do. They haven't sene anything I've just described.

The cappuccino was very good, taking taste as the only factor to be considered. But if I also took into consideration capacity, then I'd have to say it was only just enough to keep me awake in the drowsy atmosphere I find myself in, and if I also take temperature into account, it was just hot enough to drink in three large swallows before it became tepid (it was on the verge of doing so when it was brought to me).

It's moments like these when I recall life in New Zealand, a place I now believe I was born in by some lucky accident. No one makes cappuccino as well as Espressoholic. Do they still make them the same way they did two decades ago? Just wondering...

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The Chinaman who found himself in Molaous (Ο Κινέζος που βρέθηκε στους Μολάους)

You may be a budding story teller, but you don't know it. Today's story has been written by Stella Yeung, a friend I made via facebook. Stella and I met up at the island of Kithira just last Easter, and she told me about her little adventure during a previous trip to the island. Here is her story, in her own words.

It all began when our baby grandson gave my husband a kick right under his ribs on his right-hand side in the morning of the first day of our second holiday week on the island of Kythira two years ago. In the beginning it caused him just a little pain. He didn’t seem to pay much attention to it. Later on we went to the village of Potamos to buy some groceries with our daughter. Hubby went back to the car as we continued shopping.

 If I hadn't met Stella through facebook, I would never have visited Kithira, a beautiful Greek island only a few hours away from my own home. This amazing waterfall is just one of the places I visited while I was with Stella on the island.

We thought he got bored because we spent quite some time in the supermarket, but when we came back to the car we found him sitting on the back seat with big drops of sweat on his forhead, and a pale face, looking deathly sick from the pain. We immediately took him to the island’s hospital in Potamos. Thank God they have a hospital on a small island like Kythira, thanks to the Kithirian migrants of Australia. I called Frank, the host from the travel company, who was a great help to us.

Even though I speak Greek very well, I still needed his help because I was feeling totally stressed out in the world of medical terms. My husband was examined by a doctor who hurried to hide her box of cigarettes as soon as we entered her office. She sent us for an echogram, X-rays and blood tests. It was clear to everyone that there was a gall stone causing trouble and a serious gall bladder inflammation, so he had to stay in hospital. They put him on a drip and antibiotics. That was the last time he ate anything for almost a week.

When my husband was brought to the ward, he looked a lot more at peace. The pain had subsided, and so did my fears. I asked the doctor if there was anything that I could do for them before I went back to the apartment. They said there wasn’t, so we returned to our apartment in Agia Pelagia, after leaving my Chinese husband in a hospital on a small Greek island where hardly anyone spoke English and no one spoke Chinese.

It was already quite late in the evening. My daughter ran me a long warm bath, which made me feel very relaxed after all the stress. Only five minutes after I entered the bathtub, Frank called to tell me that the doctor was afraid my husband might have appendicitis, and she didn’t want to take any risks if he needed to be operated on, so she insisted on sending him immediately to a bigger hospital on the mainland, in Sparti. I had to pack some clothes and stuff for a few days, not knowing when or if I’d be coming back to Kythira. In five minutes, I was standing outside the apartment; the boat that would be taking us to Peloponessos was already waiting for us!

From Agia Pelagia in Kithira, you can see Peloponesos quite clearly n the distance

I can’t tell you how it feels to go from being totally relaxed to totally stressed. The owners of the apartment made me panic even more because they showed their anxiety by asking me why I was leaving the island via the old and disused port of Agia Pelagia, which is now only used for pleasure craft and as a marina for local fishermen! They also couldn’t imagine that there was a ferry boat being sent specially to pick up my husband. They began to offer me a ride to Diakofti, the main port of Kythira. But Frank had told me that he would come to pick me up and take me to Ayia Pelagia. Who are you supposed to believe in times of crisis?!

I began to wonder if I was living in a dream, which was quickly turning into a nightmare, and that I didn’t have any part in this chaos, but I knew this wasn’t a dream, because when I pinched myself, it hurt!
I said goodbye to my daughter and her family and hoped to see them again in Kalamata at the airport by the end of the week.

Frank picked me up in his car and we followed the ambulance to the port of Agia Pelagia. It was very dark, and a storm had just set in. The wind was 7 on the Beaufort scale, and the sea was rough, waves riding the ocean, and crashing onto the port. I don’t know how long it took to reach Neapolis on the other side. I was told it was an hour's journey from Kithira, but it seemed like ages to me. My husband was lying down inside the boat, while the doctor and I were standing upright inside. There was nowhere to sit. On the deck was the fisherman, the owner of the boat, who was holding the drip bottle high up in the air with one hand, while with his other hand, he held himself upright.

 The boat that took Stella and her sick husband to Peloponesos

Inside the boat it was hot and muggy. The waves became higher and higher and we were thrown from one side to the other, as one wave after another crashed onto the boat. It felt like a game of volleyball; the boat was the ball. I began to feel dizzy, and I got dizzier and dizzier. I seemed to have turned a green colour, which only the doctor noticed, so he told me to lie down in the front part of the boat. I remember thinking that I wouldn’t mind drowning at this very moment, because I felt so sick and the weather was so inclement, and I really couldn’t believe that the boat wasn’t going to sink in the turbulent waters. At this point, my husband was feeling much better than me.

When we finally arrived on the other side, I stood up to disembark, but I felt like vomiting. Unfortunately, I couldn’t get out of the boat quickly enough, because they were helping my husband off first, along with his drip bottle. I noticed a small basin on the boat. It was filled with nets and fishing hooks, which I grabbed and threw out onto the deck, and instantly began throwing up in it. At the same time, I was feeling embarassed and sorry for the fisherman who was going to clean up after me.

When I got out of the boat, there were no steps to get on to the quay. I was told to wait for the next high wave to lift us up and stretch my arms high, then someone would grab me and pull me onto the quay. And so it happened. There was an ambulance waiting for us at the quay with another doctor. I remember I had to sit in reverse at the back of the ambulance and try to keep a squint eye on my husband. We were driving right into the mountains; the bends in the road and the cover of darkness made me feel even more sick.
Finally we arrived at the hospital. It was about 2:30a.m. and I had to tell the whole story again to another doctor there, who was forcefully pressing my hubby’s belly, all the while wearing a huge grin on his face as he asked him:

"Pain here?"

“YEEEEEES!!! Ouuuuch!!!”

“Pain there?”

“YEEEEEEES!!! Ouuuuch!”,

The doctors soon concluded that there was no fear of appendicitis so they put him on a new drip with new antibiotics. Then they began asking questions about his medical history. Again, I felt uncomfortable speaking Greek because I don’t know these words in Greek: my Greek is limited to talking about everyday things. So I said a few things in Latin, which I remembered from the internet, thanks to Google. I was describing my hubby’s condition like a quizmaster, and the doctor was the test-taker.

Thankfully he seemed to be understanding what I was telling him, and once he was assured of all the right answers to his questions, we were brought to a dark room with six beds. Five beds were occupied and the empty one in the corner was for my hubby. There were shadows like phantoms lying on the beds and sitting on the chairs; no one spoke a word, only the nurses who whispered questions. Some of the shadows shuffled in the dark, and one came very near to have a look at us without saying a word. Others were moaning in pain.

When the nurses left, I was so exhausted that I lay down on the same bed with my husband, thinking about the adventure we had just landed in. We didn't even know where on earth we were! When one of the phantoms in one of the beds suddenly started shouting : “πατάτες , ντομάτες, σαλάτες” (= potatoes, tomatoes, salads) in the middle of the night, we felt like we were starring in One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest.

When morning came, the shadows turned into humans with voices and faces, and after the first “Καλημέρα” (= Good morning), they started talking and asking us questions. This may have been the first time they had ever seen a Κινέζο (= Chinaman), and they probably thought we had just landed on earth flying on a UFO when they realized we didn’t know where we were.

“Is this Sparti?” I asked them.

“No,” they answered, “you’re in the hospital in Molaous.” I’d never heard of Molaous before.

 The view from the hospital ward

When the curtains of the room were drawn, we saw an unbelievably beautiful scene: a valley full of olive trees. Later in the morning, kind and helpful Frank called to tell me he had booked a hotel room for me, the only hotel in Molaous. He urged me to go there, to take a shower and a good rest, otherwise I would not be able to help my husband.

 The view from Stella's hotel room

The doctors came to examine him. An orderly came to pick him up in his stretcher bed and I accompanied him to take some more X-ray photos. A nurse drew some blood for tests, and he was told that food and drink was strictly forbidden for the next few days; only the drip was allowed! Eventually the diagnosis came through – an acute case of gall stones. The doctors informed us that they could operate on him straight away, but they imagined that my husband would prefer to have the operation in his own country, so their plan was to stop the inflammation and get him ready to fly back to Holland. We agreed with them; it sounded sensible to go back home and undergo major surgery, where we felt safe and comfortable, where we could talk to the doctors in our own language and be understood.

The road leading from the hospital to the hotel

At siesta time, I went up the little hill close to the hospital to find my hotel. It was quite an exercise because I was exhausted from the stress and I was feeling so very, very tired. The hotel manager and his mother were very friendly people, and since Frank had already told them the whole story, they were waiting for me like a family member who was supposed to come home and bring them good news about my sorry predicament. They did everything to make me feel comfortable. It was so good to have a shower and a clean bed and finally find some peace and silence, but I felt so lonely in that hotel room, wondering how my hubby was doing in a hospital surrounded by Greeks who spoke only just a little bit English.

The days passed with more examinations, tests and X-rays. We had the chance to talk a lot together (mostly about food) with all those lovely strange patients and their family members. They offered us boxes filled with tarts which were brought in by visitors and shared with everyone in the room, except for my hubby who wasn’t allowed to eat or drink anything. But he was feeling much much better as the days passed, apart from feeling more and more hungry. He spent some time on the balcony every day smoking cigarettes, absorbing the wonderful views with the other patients and learning about olives, olive trees and olive oil.

Some of the men in the ward had been sailors at one time in their life, and they had been to Hong Kong and China, so there were plenty of subjects that they could share opinions over. From time to time the waitress of the nearby café brought over frappe, Greek coffee and sandwiches which were ordered by other patients, family members, doctors and nurses. There was a huge tv in the room which was playing until midnight but no one seemed to bother watching it. Everyone was absorbed with their own matters. Every night the volume was turned on to high by an autistic patient. That was the only time we saw him smiling. Otherwise, he never spoke a word all those days that we spent at the hospital.

Every day Γιωργάκι (= little George), a handsome young nurse, came to take blood from the patients and every day he made a big bloody mess of it, because he just couldn’t find people’s veins. The poor autistic patient had to undergo this every day and as soon as he saw Γιωργάκι, he lay down on his bed without moving, without making any sound, just staring at the ceiling and waiting till the job was done.

When the doctors came round, they always asked my husband: “How are you feeling today?”

"Very good! But also very hungry" he would answer.

And the doctors always answered: “NO FOOD YET!!!!”

One of them pointed to his drip bottle once: “Look at this! This is meat, potatoes and salad, accompanied by wine, all in one!” We all started laughing.

The senile old man was allowed to go home while we were there, but he was replaced by another one. This old man had run away from his home and was lost for some days just when it had started raining and getting colder. The whole village had been searching for him. There had even been a missing report about him on TV, and after some days the mayor found him 200 metres from his home under some bushes. He was brought to the hospital and had to stay there for a few days for observation. The problem was that he always wanted to run away. So in the middle of the night he started fighting with the αποκλειστική (= private nurse) who was hired to take care of him.

When I came back to the hospital one morning, one of people there told me that he wanted to escape again last night and he had pulled out all the tubes in his arm. Then they called in a nurse called Nionio (after a famous greek actor) who looked like Popeye (she had only one tooth). She started screaming at him. Everyone became silent and no one dared to say anything anymore, not even the old man. But as soon as the nurse left, they all burst out laughing.

I spent my days running down the hill towards the hospital in the mornings and afternoons and creeping up the hill back to the hotel at midday and in the evening, making phone calls to the insurance company in Holland every day because they wanted an update everyday, translating everything between the doctors and hubby, washing and nursing him and walking around in Molaous, taking pictures of the town and doing some shopping. I found a plant shop and was very happy to find some chicory and amaranth seeds. In a bookshop I browsed through, I found an interesting Greek book, “Το νησί” (The Island) without even knowing what a hit it was! Almost everyday, I had lunch in the cafe next to the hospital where I fell in love with frappe coffee, cheese pie sand chocolate filled croissants. In this place, people got to know each other after only one day. We chatted every day; they asked me how my husband was doing and they made me feel less lonely.

One of my husband’s room mates was a kind, but very over-sensitive man. He had a swollen leg which caused him a lot of pain and he often acted like a big baby for his poor wife. She sat on the chair next to him day and night, helping him to drink water, feeding him, cutting his nails while he got angry with her for cutting them too short and making everything even worse and more painful. She looked so tired and I whispered to her that as soon as he fell asleep at night she should lie down in an empty bed in the ward to get some rest too! My husband told me the next morning that indeed she did try to lie down on the bed, but after 15 minutes the big baby woke up and commanded her to come back and sit on her chair again… and so she did.

Day and night he was screaming “αχ, ουχ, οχ!!!!”. One day, when the doctors came round to check the patients, one of them got so angry with him and suddenly started kneading his leg with force while shouting: “Ελληνες άντρες δεν είμαστε ;;;!!! Τέλος επιτέλους με τα αχ και ουχ! Σαν μεγάλο μωρό είσαι ρε!!! Το πόδι σου είναι τόσο καλύτερα τώρα, κοίτα ρε!!! Ετσι είσαι και στο σπίτι σου; Λυπάμαι την κακομοίρα την γυναίκα σου!!!”

His wife silently nodding that indeed at home he was like that too and we all did our best not to start laughing out too loud. But after this, we never heard him make any sound again!

During my daily walks in the town I noticed many interesting things in this rural area. I particularly liked to look at the chimneys which were shaped like birds of prey. The view from my hotel room was not as amazing as my husband’s view but still very beautiful.

 Greek chimney decorations

Greek spring weather isn't always sunny. When there is a lot of rain, there is also a lot of thunder and lightning. On one particular day, it felt like the heavens had opened. The street near the hospital had turned into a river so the hotel manager called me a taxi to take me to the hospital. The taxi driver, Apostolis, was a very nice young guy. I asked him how much it would cost to drive to the airport of Kalamata if my husband would be allowed to fly home as planned, which was the coming Monday. We weren’t sure what was going to happen, because it would depend on the test results and the situation concerning the inflammation of the gallbladder. He told me he would make an estimate of the cost leave a message in the hotel.

 Molaous in the rain

On that rainy day the doctors decided to send my hubby to Sparti for a CT scan just to make sure that he only had a gallbladder problem and that just gall stones were causing the problems, and not anything else.
This news came so early in the morning as soon as I had just arrived at the hospital and I had to rush to the cafe to buy him 2 litres of water which he had to drink in 1 hour. Then we were hurried into the ambulance for a ride through the mountains to Sparti. In the middle of the mountains we had to make a pee-stop because of all that water and I still remember the sight of my husband standing there in the pouring rain adding to the streaming rivers that the skies had created.

We were surprised to see the modern medical centre of Sparti where they make scans of all kinds. Primary school memories came to my mind of the history lessons about ancient Sparta – the old times when sick and weak people were killed to create a healthy and strong Spartan nation; fortunately things have changed immensely and Spartans show great mercy and compassion these days.

When I returned to the hotel that night, I found the taxi driver's note with the hotel owners about the price of the taxi ride to Kalamata. The next morning, I was in for a surprise: the sun had finally come out. That day's walk was like magic, after all that rain. The road was quite slippery but the view of the olive yards was a wondrously beautiful sight!


By the end of the week, my husband had lost several kilos and felt more and more hungry. On Saturday the doctors took pity on his hungry stomach and allowed him to eat two small φρυγανιές (= rusks made of dried bread). He showed great pleasure eating them, as though they were topped with caviar.

Apostoli then called me to ask if we still wanted the taxi ride on Sunday. But I had to tell him we still were not sure whether my husband would be released from the hospital or not. I could call him any time I needed him, as he said he would accept only short rides on Sunday just in case we might need him, so he could be at hand.

Fortunately thanks to the good care of the two surgeons, my husband was allowed to fly back to Holland on Monday. We said goodbye to the doctors and all the people in the room, and when my husband shook hands with the autistic man, the man replied “Goodbye my friend!” It was the first and last thing we heard him say. The big baby invited us for a meal of φασολάδα (= bean soup) made by himself (!) the next time we came to Greece. The doctors asked me to keep in contact with them because they were really interested in my husband's condition and his health.


Then we called Apostolis to come and pick us up. Never have I had such a grand welcome in a taxi before! It was like being a guest in someone’s home! We could even watch films on a small screen, but we thought that might not be a good idea, because we could get nauseous, and I didn’t want to think about getting sick again too quickly. Before we set off for the airport, Apostolis had to pass by his auntie’s house to give her the carnation flower which was lying on the seat next to him. It was so nice to see how happy his aunt was by his gesture and she gave him a big heartfelt hug.

Next he told us that we could choose three routes. Two were roads going through the Taygetos mountains, the two shortest routes, but with very many bends in both roads, so that after a while, you don’t know if you’re going up or down the mountain. He also told us that most of his passengers get sick on these roads. The third option was the route through Mani, along the sea, the touristic route with great panoramic views. It was also Apostolis’ favourite route. It would take one hour more than the mountain roads.

 Mani

After 6 days in hospital we chose the Mani route. We were grateful to Apostolis for recommending this. It was so very, very beautiful! He told us many interesting things about all the places we saw and because we had enough time, he drove off the beaten track at different places to show us some special nature spots and picturesque parts of the little towns we passed by. It was the most pleasant and enjoyable taxi ride we have ever had. Apostolis drove us safely in a relaxed cruisy style, without hurrying or feeling stressed. We chatted about Kythira, Mani, Molaous, Holland and China.

When we arrived in Kalamata we even felt sorry to say goodbye to him. The meter of his taxi showed a much higher price than what he had written down for me some days before. He refused to accept the higher price so we had to force him to take it and gave him an extra tip for his super service. We told him that thanks to his pleasant driving and outlook on life, he made us so enthusiastic about Mani, that we definitely would come back for a holiday here in the future!

The next day we left for the airport. We were so happy to finally meet up with our daughter, son-in-law and grandson once again. Other guests came to greet us too, because my husband’s adventure had become ‘hot news’ on Kythira!

*** *** ***

Back in Holland, another adventure started for us: the fight to get my husband into a hospital, begging doctors and assistants to please, please, please hurry the process a little bit and give my husband priority on the 3-month waiting list because he really had to get the operation done within one month, just as the two Greek surgeons said.

Anger, disappointment, annoyance followed from my side. When I showed them his Greek test results, I was told by the hospital staff that they didn’t want to see them because they hadn’t been done in Holland, and even when they did them all over again, they diagnosed that it wasn't necessary to prioritize his operation to within one month. Such arrogance!!! I was forced to do some “shopping around” at several hospitals to find the shortest waiting list. Even then, it still took me two months before I could finally get my husband into a hospital.

Hospitals and hygiene are at a high level in Holland; there are nurses to take care of the patients and to wash them, but we are like “numbers” on waiting lists and all the times we went to the hospital for X-rays, echograms, tests and checkups, we never saw the same doctors twice. So many doctors, all working part time, which resulted in my telling the same story again and again, and checking up on whether the doctors had written everything down correctly because when so many different people are involved in one case, it often results in mistakes being made somewhere along the line.

In Greece we saw the same surgeons almost every day, several times a day. I had to take care of my own husband, but I found it such a relief to take care of him, knowing that he was alright and I was there for him whenever he needed me. I washed him, talked to him and was generally there for him, supporting him in whatever way I could. The social life in the room with the other people, helping each other whenever necessary, made us feel like human beings instead of numbers.

After all the trouble I had in Holland, my experience of Greek hospitals made everything look so simple. I bought postcards to send to some people in Kythira and Molaous, to thank them for everything they did for us. I apologised to the fisherman for vomiting on his boat, and thanked Apostolis for his special taxi ride. I also wrote to the two surgeons at Molaous, and I told them that ,if, in the future, it were ever to happen again that a Dutch tourist might need an operation performed while on holiday, well, in that case: please just do it and don’t ask questions because you’ll save him from long, long waiting lists in Holland!

Back home my husband started to crave the same bread rusks as the ones he had been given in the hospital, just to keep the memories of his adventure alive! We often talk about this adventure and still laugh about all the things that happened. And what a surpise we got when we heard a year and a half later when we received a card from Apostolis with a beautiful wedding picture and a letter in which he told us that he and his wife were going to China for their honeymoon!!!

Thank you Stella, for being my guest today. Maybe one day, I'll meet up with you in Holland or even Hong Kong!

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