6 March 2009
Friday

The sky became dark and threatening by 8 o’clock this morning and rain has seemed imminent all morning—but the girls were able to walk to school before any downpour. Lucia learned yesterday that a girl named Yiorgia, age twelve, would be joining the class today. When Yiorgia arrived, she was all smiles, apparently equally excited by the prospect of another girl her age. The boys in her class—Tassos, Christos, Alexandros (whose mother is British), Andreas (Bulgarian, the son of the sweet shop worker), Hassan (Egyptian), Costas, Apostoli, Kharam, and Thanasis—outnumber the girls in all the classes combined: Joanna, Veronica, Rosalita, and Lucia.

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Public Works…Greek Style

The power went out in the entire village at around 9 a.m. Kanoun erya (“they’re doing work”), according to the man at the green grocer. A few minutes later the power crew arrived outside our window—a walking, breathing OSHA violation in the making. (For non-Americans that is “Occupational Safety and Health Administration—they monitor workplace safety, which seems anathema in Greece.) A powerful-looking line worker, with a cigarette dangling from his mouth and a belt laden with tools, began climbing the pole adjacent to our house: with large hooks on this uninsulated boots, a frayed harness belt, no helmet, and a large hammer in one hand. He wore no gloves. As he climbed the first ten feet, he was swinging a large hammer in both directions, cursing politely. Signs detached from the pole and flew in every direction: the discoteque sign (one square meter of solid steel) sailed across the street and glanced off our iron gate; various parts of a street lamp had a similar fate. He made short order of the smaller signs. His coworker from below threw a cutting tool about thirty feet straight up and the man, dangling from the pole by his hooked boots, caught it in one hand. He stuck the tool in his belt and with both hands now free—he seemed to be saying, keita manna, horis heria (“look mom, no hands!”)--he lit another cigarette. He used the flying tool to cut an eight-foot length of wire (while bare-handed) and tossed it through the air into the adjacent lot. He cut the wires leading to our house, which sailed past the window where Jonathan was working on his (judiciously unplugged) laptop. Another coworker unrolled an enormous spool of power line on the ground. Large pieces of metal, ceramic insulators, and assorted nuts and bolts fell to the ground, a veritable shower of parts. The half dozen coworkers on the ground, none of whom wore hard hats, swore back at the man on the pole.

About this time, our landlady appeared. “Hurry up and finish now, I have a cake to bake!” she joked. All of the applicances, including the oven, run on electricity.

Several orange cones were set strategically to block both vehicular traffic and pedestrians. Cars nevertheless skirted the cones and drove under the barrage of falling metal; none of this activity seemed to bother the workers. An elderly man passed under the pole, laden with several large bags of lemons, just harvested. These folks were giving “traffic control” an entirely new meaning.

On the way down, the line worker used his hammer to obliterate what remained of the street lamp, a hint of vengeance written across his face. Another worker, the chainsaw man, took over: no helmet, no chaps, no gloves. He stood on the last wrung of an extension ladder and began cutting the pole at the halfway mark.

Jonathan recalled his training at the Maine State Fire Academy, the repeated warnings of the instructors: “Remember, guys, personal safety always comes first. Never put yourself or your fellow firefighters in a situation that is dangerous. And always remember: leave at least two paths of egress open.”

From his perspective, Jonathan could imagine our fire chief experiencing cardiac arrest—just from witnessing this remarkable undertaking.

The guys controlling the boom truck (they were installing the replacement pole) made the line worker look like a paragon of caution and restraint. The fully extended boom nearly undid the work of their colleague, which temporarily tangled on the now taut replacement wires. A few curses, a minor adjustment by the operator, and the wires were set free.

In the midst of this mayhem our landlady appeared again with a plate of cheese and fruit, a dozen plastic cups, and a kilo carafe of wine—a little refreshment for the workers at 11 a.m. They were grateful for this offering, which put them in better spirits. The foreman (the man who climbed the pole) was very thirsty. A few moments later, he attached the hooks on his boots and was climbing the new pole.

Cars, trucks, and pedestrians negotiated the nearly blocked street, taking a serpantine approach to the piles of electrical detritus. The traffic cones were long ago flattened.

At noon, Keria Irini returned with another half carafe of wine—just for good measure. “Come on guys, let’s finish up. I need to cook Yiorgio’s lunch.”

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With the power out for most of the afternoon and laptop power nearly exhausted, Manny and Jonathan set off for the waterfront. The waves, fueled by a powerful southerly gale, were pounding the waterfront cafes. It is hard to capture the magnitude of the storm with a camera. But here are a few pictures, just the same.

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We are fasting but we are hardly suffering. Today’s lunch consisted of an enormous bowl of thick yogurt, piled high with fresh strawberries, and topped with local wildflower honey. We bought the strawberries from one of the many trucks that pass through the village with megaphones attached to the cab roof: “Strawberries, I’ve got strawberries, and they’re fresh, and I won’t be here all day, so come on out…and get… fresh strawberries.”

A few days ago a gypsy from Kalamata drove by. His megaphone, with a pre-recorded message, issued the following assurance: “I have a variety of used heaters, some in excellent shape, others are antiques, well worth bringing to your home.” His truck was piled high with a rusted tangle of metal, and there was nothing onboard that even distantly resembled a heater.

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