Temenos: Getting to Know You

Just another rose sunset

Getting to Know You

One of the great pleasures of living in southern Messinia (Peloponnese)—in addition to the great food, the cobalt Mediterranean, and the fantastic vistas in every direction—is getting to know people.

Finikounda morning

I first came to the Finikounda area in 2007, to visit my American friends and scout out a place to bring my family for a sabbatical year in 2009. Like so many others, I fell in love with the place. And right from the beginning, I made friends, with both local Greeks and with the many foreigners for whom this has become a second home: English, German, Austrian, Swiss, Italian, Australian, the list goes on. All of us “outsiders” who live or visit this area share a similar awe and respect for a place that is so welcoming, diverse, and in most ways remains “traditional.”

Behind the touristic bling, the old Greece that I remember from the 1970s lives on: in folkways/foodways, knowledge of the natural world, agricultural acumen, and the all consuming φιλοξενία / filoxenia (hospitality—or literally, “friend of foreigners”).

Landscape below the house

The Beach, the village, and the valley

Because the heat is building each day, I try to run in the early morning. Somewhere in mid-run, I head down to Finikounda’s big sandy beach for a swim: a delicious immersion in the still cool Ionian Sea.

The beach emcompasses nearly one mile of white sand. It is called Mavrovouni on the west end, Anemomilos in the middle and east end. After my run, and following a few hours of house projects, gardening, and freelance copyediting, I head back to “my spot” in the middle beach, with my umbrella, towel, SP 50, notebook, and current book: the essential equipment.

This week’s book, by the acclaimed naturalist Sy Montgomery, is called The Soul of an Octopus: A Surprising Exploration into the Wonders of Consciousness. Clearly, after reading three-quarters of this fascinating study, I will never ever eat octopus again.

And, by the way, the plural of octopus is not octopai, because the word is not derived from Latin. “Octopus” (octopodi… “eight legs”) is an ancient Greek word, so the plural is formed in the usual manner: “octopuses.” Inquiring minds want to know!

Looking down to Finikounda from home

Back to the beach. People are very kind on the middle beach. You won’t be scorned or booted if you choose to wear clothes. It is very civilized in that way.

Our red tile roof--to the right of cypress

This morning, as I was swimming, I saw a small pod of dolphins that were breaching about 100 meters offshore. Initially the dorsal fins got my attention, but not in a good way. I reminded myself that I have never heard of sharks in these waters (and there is neither undertow, current, nor tides to speak of—a weak swimmer’s paradise). Besides, the presence of dolphins have been a sign of good fortune from antiquity until the present day. It is another of those continuities between antiquity and the present that fascinate me.

***************************

Morning run, daily baptism

My runs usually start in the village then head out into the Maniatiko Valley, a protected area—part of the European Union’s “Natura 2000” initiative—where there is an abundance of wildlife: the Mediterranean eagle, several species of hawks, migratory birds, a multitude of insects, wild jackals, and boar.

Yesterday's run was a long one--just over 22 kilometers (13 miles). I wore a hydration vest with a salty drink, but after the first 15 kilometers (with over 1,500 feet of elevation gain) I began to suffer. But what's life without some suffering? The great Buddhist teacher Thich Nhat Hahn says, "Suffering is not enough." Oh, really?

Here are some views of the hinterland, which took me through seven villages: Akritohori, Yameia, Kaplani, Zizani, Grizokambos, Loutsa, and one settlement whose name I forgot owing to dehyration.

Olive trees in impossible terrain

Approaching Zizani

In the distance, Lykodymos: "wolf town"

And, of course, snakes. Many snakes. Very big snakes (some over two meters long, that are not poisonous), small snakes (the Horned Viper, a little guy that doesn’t move out of your way, and is quite aggressive and poisonous), and at least twelve species of “medium-sized” snakes, said to be “harmless.”

I take no chances with any of them.

Marathi beach

On the return loop, which requires two water crossings—I plunge through a steam of cold mountain water with reckless, childlike abandon—I pass a little chapel called Αγιος Ιωαννης Ρίγανης / Aghios Yiannis Riganis…St. John of the Oregano. Yes, there is an Orthodox patron saint for everything and everyone under the sun.

The chapel celebrates its namesake on June 24th, and Ann and I will likely attend the panagiri (“celebration”). The chapel is quite small, so while the priest completes the Liturgy inside, most people are assembled outside: smoking cigarettes, roasting the donated pig, and filling the coolers with beer and local wine. All of which is freely given to those in attendance once the church bell rings.

Saint John of the Oregano

Visitors

We have a nesting sparrow in our roof tiles, now with young chicks who are nearly ready to fledge. They make a terrible racket at 4:30 a.m. but I remain tolerant of their presence—while still remaining hopeful that the χαλιδόνια / halidonia (swallows) will build their mud nests against the eaves. Swallows, in Greek folklore, are said to bring happiness and peace to the home.

Another visitor is Lizzy, a large green lizard that skitters across the stone wall that divides our property from the endless olive grove that rolls down to the sea.

Lizzy the Lizard

At the Koroni Police Station

I became a dual Greek citizen (along with my then minor daughter, Evyenia) in 2017. Like most European countries, citizens are required to carry identity cards. These alone are sufficient (without Greek passports, which we also have) to visit any other Schengen area/EU country. Americans, on the other hand, can only visit Europe for 90 days per year, unless they wish to jump through the veritable burning hoops to obtain a residency permit.

My wife, on the other hand, is eligible for a “spousal residency permit,” which costs just 17 euros but requires days of insufferable bureaucratic hurdles. She better get her Italian citizenship. The Greeks say about the Italians, just what the Italians say about the Greeks: Una fatsa, una ratsa (“one face, one race”).

But like most things in Greece, the interminable bureaucracy decided to change the old 3x5 size identity cards—which don’t fit into any normal wallet—to a more manageable license-size document. It includes your photo, birth information, town of registry, etc.

The mandatory process of changing to the new cards requires multiple steps, in keeping with a medieval (or shall we say, Byzantine?) bureaucracy.

First, go the local tax office and ask the kind ladies to make your “rendezvous” (appointment) with the local police department—in our case, in nearby Koroni, where we were first “registered.” Then you are presented with a παράβολα / paravala (roughly, fee document), which you take to the Pylos post office, which is thirty kilometers in the opposite direction. You pay it, receive a receipt as proof of payment, then wait for your appointment.

Yesteday's 22 km run

Mine was in early June at the Koroni police station. The police lady (like most police around the world) was especially grim. Fortunately, my Greek is good and I have an arsenal of platitudes—which didn’t serve me especially well that day.

She asked (in Greek): “When was your wife born?” I thought, my wife is an American citizen and this is my identity, so what do you need to know that for?

But instead I replied: “1965.” Surely she did not have this information on record. But it gave me license to mention that my citizen daughter would be coming next year to update her own residency permit.

She then asked sternly: “And when was your daughter born?” I answered definitively: “2002.”

She slamed her fist on the desk and shouted “λαδος!” (“wrong”). “You will need to take these documents”—a pile of them that she produced from another desk—“to the mayor’s office to correct this error.”

My response, with a bit of resolute eye flutter: “You know, maybe she was born in 2001?”

“Correct,” she replied, and promptly finger-printed me and took a new photo.

“Don’t smile,” she warned. So I adopted her grim demeanor.

Now I need to return (when they call) to trade in my old ID for the new one.

Yes, nothing is easy in this country.

------------

Later in the evening I shared this vignette with my friend Niko, the English-educated poet. He too slamed his fist on the table (it must be a Greek thing) and shouted, with fists clenched: “Ο κράτος ειναι μπορδέλλο / o kratos einai bordello: The government is a whore house.”

I wondered for just one moment if he was speaking about my government back there in the DC swamp, led by the commander and thief.

The truth the world over

---------------

Big ideas, modest budget

My Albanian friend L. painted our house anew in the past week: total cost (without paint), 230 euros….for three days of work in the searing sun.

New paint, old house

L. is a master stone mason and we are negotiating for another mortared wall that will serve as a break for potential winter flooding…and will also look beautiful. Another place for Lizzy the Lizard to play.

A few days ago I met with an electrician to explore the possibilities of a photovoltaic system, sufficient to run a fridge, a washer, and a couple of outlets. I’m waiting for an estimate. In the meantime, my Ecoflow solar charger keeps the laptop and mobile phones going.

Gardening

Last week I planted another lemon tree (9 euros at the nursery) and an exotic, flowering tree called a Persian Silk tree, which grow to over 20 meters--if it doesn't die in the summer sun.