Jonathan was invited to his
friends Dimitri and Yioryia’s house for dinner last night, on the road that
leads to the village of Lahanada, with their balcony’s incredible view of
Finikounda and islands beyond.
Dimitri spoke of his recent trip
to Italy, as an emissary from Messinia to the ethnically Greek community that
is located an hour from Naples. In 1532, a group of thirty families escaped the
incredibly oppressive turkokratia,
the Ottoman occupation of Greece, which was contested by the bloodthirsty bey
named Barbarossa—an Egyptian warlord sent by the sultan to control his
Peloponnesian holdings.
These families followed on the
heels—that is, about 1,800 years later—of a much larger group of Messinians
who, escaping the Spartan domination, took residence in the “heel” of Italy and
in Sicily. Even today, both communities speak an Ionic dialect of Greek known
in Italy as Grexica, and self-identify as Greek Italians—although in the case
of the latter group, the pope abolished the ancient Orthodox faith there and
forced conversions to Catholicism.
The latter group was given land in
exchange for feilty to the Italian king, and served as soldiers and warriors, of
which they had ample pedigree—having endured nearly two millenia of constant
combat, first against the Spartans in antiquity and then against the Ottoman
Turks during the late Middle Ages.
In the 1860s these Greeks, who
had lived independently in Italy for more than two hundred years, joined forces
with the nascent Italian liberation movement (under Gharibaldi) and for this
they incurred the wrath of the Vatican, which forbid the practice of Orthodox
Christianity.
Coming full circle, a
schooner-load of these Italian Greeks returned to Messinia, and are settled
today in a village near the site of ancient Messene. It is a fantastic history,
told so well by Jonathan’s friend Dimitri, as a point of pride and another
example of the long arc of Greek history.
----
Common sense did not prevail when
he left his friends’ house at midnight. He ducked into Finikounda and there he
stayed until nearly 3:30, engaged in lively conversation with his friend
G. and a German couple. The subject got “stuck” on the European bailout of
Greece, the stalled negotiations, the steep precipice on which Greece now hangs
by mere fingertips. G. maintained that the Europeans generally—and the
German chancellor, Angela Merkel, in particular—are “fascists.” The term was
thrown around loosely and was calmly refuted by the German couple, nice people
with a gentle bearing and a logical rebuttal. But G. would have none of it.
“They are all fascists, and that is my opinion.” The harsh words
notwithstanding, it was a friendly conversation among people who have known
each another for many years. But it was surely a futile effort at finding that
holy common ground.
----
A run at 8:00 (on just three and
half hours of sleep), some pulling of rocks—an endless task that is making a
world of difference to the little orchard’s character—and then, following a
lead, Jonathan found Vaso and Panayioti—what else could a male be named in this
province, beside “Dimitri”?—who raise bees and sell honey.
A short introduction and J. was
soon on receiving end of the typically copious Messinian hospitality: given
coffee, cold water, a large piece of comb honey—and sent packing with three
one-kilo tins of honey (one orange blossom, one thyme, and one wild flower), a
bottle of wine, and a bag of garden vegetables, including a fantastic white
eggplant shaped like a UFO.
Panayioti keeps his bees in
various locations, including (of great interest to Jonathan) on the slopes of
Mount Taygetos (elevation: 8200 feet), east of the Gulf of Messinia and west of Sparta. The conversation led to his interest in
tackling this peak, which is the plan for next
year.
----
It was 90 degrees by 9 a.m., and
in the high nineties when he arrived at his favorite beach spot, just beyond
the dunes. The sensation of extreme heat followed by the relief of an ocean
immersion is indescribably pleasant.
-----
A Foreign Story
Jonathan’s American friend describes
this area as the “United Nations of Finikounda” and it is an apt description.
Nearly every European nationality is represented in this corner of the
Peloponnese. Some are long-time visitors, often multigenerational, while many
others live here full-time or periodically throughout the year in houses, some
new, some renovated—on the hilltops (Germans and Dutch) or tucked into the
folds of olive groves (most everyone else). Here is the best guess for
represented nationalities, in order of magnitude: Germans, Austrians, Dutch,
English, Swiss, Italian, French, Russian…and a tiny smattering of Americans.
-----
Jonathan took his English friends
P. and D. out to dinner in Vasilitsi, a village about 15 kilometers up the road
from his little spitaki. None of them
had been there before, so it was a shared adventure. It is a large cluster of
houses on a hillside, with a broad view across the Bay of Messinia toward Mount
Taygetos, and an incredible church located on the village heights..
Nikos’s taverna serves
exceptional, traditional food—including delicacies such as zuccini flowers
stuffed with rice, baked Messinian cheese, and an array of main courses that
would satisfy the most discriminating gastrinome.
In an act of self-preservation
and common sense, Jonathan was home before 1 a.m., the earliest night, by far,
in six weeks. A chance to rest up for the final three days of “goodbyes.”
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