Old Wounds

Cheek and jowl--the beach is not too packed 

Last night was taverna night in Finikounda. There are over 20 restaurants or tavernas, all vying for the moniker of “best food in the village.” The fierceness of competition yields an amazing array of gastronomic delights, all of which are really affordable (by US standards).

This morning I drove to the big beach at 7 a.m. and parked. I set off for a run through the agricultural valley, fjording the river twice, passing the little chapel of St. John Rigani (St. John of the Oregano), whose panagiri (celebration--with a roast pig, wine, beer, bread, all at 10 a.m.) is next Monday. An event not to be missed, free of charge for the pious and the heretics alike.

Old wounds die hard

I was having coffee a few days ago with my English friends R. and A. They were describing a visit to the Aegean island of Simi, which suffered terribly under the German occupation during World War II. A. recalled a sign posted in German in the town’s main bank.

Some background is in order. First, Greece suffered more civilian casualties that any other European country, per capita, during the war. After the country handily defeated Mussolini's forces in early 1941, the Nazis attacked, and the island of Simi was surrounded by several German battleships and light frigates. The word was sent to the island authorities: surrender or face immediate naval shelling. A largely undefended island, Simi’s small, lightly armed garrison surrendered. It seemed the sensible course given the ultimatum and the terrible odds against the islanders.

After the surrender, the Germans began their bombardment anyway, the superior gunboats all but annihilating the main town. Then the Germans came ashore. They lined up the mayor, the lesser officials, the school teachers, the intellectuals, the artists—and shot them dead in the town square. The executions were unrelenting. Apparently, it included boys as young as twelve, priests, nuns, and the disabled. There were not "fine people" on both sides.

Sixty-plus years later the sign in the local bank, written only in German for tourists, read: “Welcome to our island. We’re still waiting for you to say ‘sorry’.”

My Pylos group

“Sandy Pylos,” made famous in Homer’s Iliad, an epic that describes the gathering of Greek forces before and during the Trojan War, is the home to my fellowship group, a collection of like-minded souls who seek a better life—one of usefulness, decency, and hope. We meet every Wednesday at 6:30 in a small room near the town square. I am so grateful for the support and common purpose—one day at a time.

Church in Pylos

Thank goodness for this simple program for complicated people.

A new neighbor

Until recently, I lived in the solitude of an olive orchard, the nearest resident more than a half mile away. Now Panayioti and his girlfriend are constructing a lovely stone house about 400 meters away, between the vineyard and then olive orchard that separate us.

The Albanian masons arrive at first dawn, before the rising heat, and begin chipping and shaping the rocks that are becoming walls, mixing mortar, and taking lots of cigarette breaks.

The work is masterful, like nothing you’d ever see back home, a structure of hand-hewn stone and mortar and ceramic tile. The result will be both a home and a work of art.

House repairs

Homes the world over require maintenance, upgrades, and continuous repairs. Here in southern Greece homes takes an incredible beating from the extreme heat of summer and the periodic heavy wind-driven rains of winter. (Note that winter begins in January and ends in mid-February, with the advent of spring.) Summer begins by suggesting itself in late March.

Everything in bloom

Aqueduct my friend--those clever Venetians

By late February, any semblance of this Mediterranean version of winter begins to relent—with high temperatures in the mid-60s Fahrenheit and lows of around 50 degrees…on an especially cold night.

As for our house, the problems are small but several. The mortar that holds the ceramic tiles on the roof has separated slightly in a few spots, requiring some pointing to keep the moisture of winter out; discolored interior plaster needs some touching up; and the exterior painted walls (off-yellow and cream) have been bleached nearly white after the intensity of six Greek summers.

Lemons, oranges, pomegranates--a few steps away

Yesterday I introduced myself to the Albanian masons, whose Greek consists of highly accented dialect. We are nevertheless able to communicate effectively. The master mason described what it is that I need to do, gave me a cart-load of sand and cement, offered me a cigarette (which I politely refused), and sent me on my way. I need to find a time in the very earlier morning to complete this work.

A neighbor's water line (I discovered by accident) runs throught the middle of my property, supplying a garden plot and citrus grove down the road. The line is illegal and I could complain but, of course, I won’t. My neighbors all seem to like me, judging by the bags of lemons and oranges, figs and vegetables, that are dropped off on my porch each day—along with bottles of wine and a clear liquor called tsikoudia (made from fermented grape skins/pits) that might as well serve as industrial strength floor cleaner. P. and I got soaked reattaching the broken line, severed by “my” tractor man Yioryio, who seemed unconcerned. I reattached it last year but it has been dripping ever since. Wasting water in Greece is an enormous ethical transgression.

The urethaned upright porch posts have seen the worst of the sun damage. They need to be sanded down to bare wood and either stained or painted. I was warned off of urethane at the outset (it can’t handle the heat/sun) but they do look really “woody” when just refinished. The problem is that they need to be refinished every year.

When Lucia and I painted the house in 2014, it looked spectacular. Now I need to make a deal with my children—let’s visit next June with paint brushes!

Necessity is the mother of…vocabulary

Needs and wants are the key to learning another language in situ, a way to expand one’s vocabulary. Yesterday I lost a hubcap somewhere between the house and the lower village. I retraced my steps, by car and by foot, to no avail. Fearing a fleecing for a plastic hubcap by the rental company in Athens, I am determined to find a replacement.

And so I learned the name for hubcap as a first step: Ζάντα (zanta) is the elusive word.

And so my spoken Greek has increased by precisely one word. But still no hubcap.

A drinking culture

People can do as they wish. For some, alcohol is a source of convivialty; for others it is a class 1 neurotoxin.

I choose not to drink and this is entirely problematic (not for, but for them) in a country where drinking is a cultural imperative. Like the gas station attendant who offered me a beer; the police man who let’s an intoxicated driver follow him to the precinct to pay a fine; or the neighbors who are constantly dropping off enormous bottles of their wine—in point of fact, “the best wine in the village.”

In America, for the most part, a simple comment (“Thank you, I’m not drinking”) goes unchallenged. Here the reaction is one of utter astonishment and disbelief.

More blooming oleander, planted in 2014

In the right place at the right time

The cypress we planted as a sapling is half a telephone pole high

Last night Niko the poet and I joined T. and K. for a taverna night. The waiter’s first question—will you be drinking red or white or rose?—was swifly answered by my friends. I ordered a lemonita (carbonated lemonade), but that was not the end of the story. The evening proved to be an Olympic gold medal event of drinking and eating. And more drinking. I may have consumed every lemonita in the establishment.

The taverna owner, before bringing us food, “treated” us to shot glasses of tsikoudia, the aforementioned industrial strength floor cleaner. Niko and T. were the recipients of my largesse.

The problem is that every table in the taverna is ordering carafes of wine (on them) for all of us. A salute and glass clinking is the expected reply. I learned that saying “cheers” with lemonade is off-color at best. But I persisted. After four carafes (one kilo each), the owner matched every ordered carafe with one on the house. The conversation steadily grew with a combination of animation and gesticulation, with periodic combustion. It was the typical four-hour dinner event, on the ocean’s edge, the warm breezes of North Africa licking our sandaled feet.

Dessert included more floor cleaner. The one thing I can say for my dear, dear friends is that their floors are sparkling this morning. Even if their heads might be slightly askew.

A warming sea

A fact of life in June in southern Messenia is that the ocean becomes progressively warmer each day. On Saturday afternoon, when I first arrived, having driven from the mainland to the north (across from the island of Spetses), that initial plunge into the cobalt sea took my breath away. Either I've gotten used to the sea temperature, or it has warmed--perhaps a bit of both.

The deepest place in the entire Mediterranean--said to be 22,000 feet or so--is located about 20 kilometers offshore. There, on the ocean floor, the European scientific research organization CERN has sited a massive telescope that observes neutrinos--microscopic paticles--in deep space's distant cosmos.

Here, back on terre firme, the glow of resurgent summer keeps beachgoers ensconced under their shade during the truly dangerous hours (1:00 to 3:00), slathered in SPA 50.

Enjoy being alive

"To breath and know you are alive is wonderful. Because you are alive, everything is possible. The Sangha, the community of practice, can continue. The church can continue. Please don't waste a single moment. Every moment is an opportunity to breath life into the Buddha, the Dharma, and the Sangha. Every moment is an opportunity to manifest the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit."

                                                                          Thich Nhat Hanh, Living Buddha, Living Christ

No, not everyone

It would a total and complete exaggeration to suggest that everyone is walking around naked on this beach--in fact, most people are usually lying down, under one sun shade or another. Just the Germans, the Scandinavians, the French, the Italians, the Dutch, and the Americans (all three of them), and half the Greeks are cuprits. In all shapes and sizes, ages, and genders.

Nudity, like God Herself, can be very controversial, a source of great discomfort and anxiety for many. Or maybe just for some. But not here.

Does God wear clothes?  I wonder. Or is she perhaps just topless? Then the village beach, G-rated, is the place for her...

It is not a big deal, existing in your birthday suit on a ribbon of white sand and wine-blue sea--unless you make it one, or don't use sufficient sunscreen. My own kids have different opinions on this subject. The eldest might yawn at the thought. The youngest might say "gross!!"

People are largely respectful of one another and of the children and seniors at the far end of the beach. There is no gawking, no pandering, no hooting or hollering.

My totally unscientific research, forty years in the making, tells me that uptightness is a uniquely American quality. The only obscentity that I see is our nation's foreign policy, or the jihadist assistant to the chief and his peristent calls for sharia law.