20090629
Chris Update
It sounds like it wasn't a dislocation (probably a sub-luxation), but there's a hairline fracture, so my years of expertise will be brought into play anyway. Chris is okay, but seriously handicapped. The good news is he'll be over the worst before having to face the long-haul flight back.
Staircases to Hell
Chris is now banned from using staircases in Europe.
It must be the whole being upside-down thing, but he fell down stairs at Annika's in London last time we came, and this morning he's done it again in Malaoi. Last time he earned himself a huge haematoma on his thigh, and this time he's dislocated a shoulder, an injury I'm intimate with, and do not envy him.
I had a lovely morning, tidying up our room, then wandering the two or so kilometres down to Paralia for a few hours on the beach. I walked back up the hill with a bottle of frozen water (in case of any hot-headedness), and had lunch, wondering why T&M&C weren't back from town yet, and then I just had a call from the hospital.
Crazy!
Yesterday I didn't go to the beach, because of the previous day's sun-stroke, but had a good day nonetheless. We had a quiet night.
The funny thing is I had a bad feeling about today. I had awful thoughts of another fire on the road to Malaoi or a car crash, but didn't say anything, because it always seems so melodramatic to mention these feelings. I wish I had now. Maybe Chris would have seen the water on the steps if I'd 'done a Cassandra' before they left.
It must be the whole being upside-down thing, but he fell down stairs at Annika's in London last time we came, and this morning he's done it again in Malaoi. Last time he earned himself a huge haematoma on his thigh, and this time he's dislocated a shoulder, an injury I'm intimate with, and do not envy him.
I had a lovely morning, tidying up our room, then wandering the two or so kilometres down to Paralia for a few hours on the beach. I walked back up the hill with a bottle of frozen water (in case of any hot-headedness), and had lunch, wondering why T&M&C weren't back from town yet, and then I just had a call from the hospital.
Crazy!
Yesterday I didn't go to the beach, because of the previous day's sun-stroke, but had a good day nonetheless. We had a quiet night.
The funny thing is I had a bad feeling about today. I had awful thoughts of another fire on the road to Malaoi or a car crash, but didn't say anything, because it always seems so melodramatic to mention these feelings. I wish I had now. Maybe Chris would have seen the water on the steps if I'd 'done a Cassandra' before they left.
20090627
Too Much Sun
Yesterday I spent the morning watching the men level the section, in preparation for laying the pavers down next week, and didn't wear a hat. I got mild sun-stroke, and had a pounding headache for most of the day. As a result I didn't write anything down about the previous days, so this is going to be a patchy post as I plumb my memories.
We have swum the last few mornings, we've had lovely propera, salad, hot cheese*, and the usual beer at lunch, and we've taken it easy during the afternoons. One night Chris made us goges for dinner, which was wonderful, and last night we had dinner with cousins (and met another cousin - inevitable) at the cafenion, which is famous for its spitted chickens (we of course ate one). Chris has been working a lot, but has managed to swim several kilometres this week, and I've had a lovely time too.
Barry and Jane left for Georgia, where Barry's educational psychology has been put to good use 13 years running.
We met Jacqui's son, and hope to see more of his family before we go, and I think apart from Chris and Takis going to Malaoi tomorrow we have no concrete plans for a while. Chris has some pictures of the progression of the landscaping he will post at some stage.
* Hot cheese is a chilli cheese spread from Northern Greece - very yummy!
We have swum the last few mornings, we've had lovely propera, salad, hot cheese*, and the usual beer at lunch, and we've taken it easy during the afternoons. One night Chris made us goges for dinner, which was wonderful, and last night we had dinner with cousins (and met another cousin - inevitable) at the cafenion, which is famous for its spitted chickens (we of course ate one). Chris has been working a lot, but has managed to swim several kilometres this week, and I've had a lovely time too.
Barry and Jane left for Georgia, where Barry's educational psychology has been put to good use 13 years running.
We met Jacqui's son, and hope to see more of his family before we go, and I think apart from Chris and Takis going to Malaoi tomorrow we have no concrete plans for a while. Chris has some pictures of the progression of the landscaping he will post at some stage.
* Hot cheese is a chilli cheese spread from Northern Greece - very yummy!
20090626
20090625
Out of Water
We haven't swum since the day before yesterday, which is unusual. Yesterday we all stayed home for the day, and we ate at home too. Chris made a lovely risotto, which we also had for lunch today. We just took it easy for the last 24 hours.
Today the bulk of the concrete pouring was completed by the men. It's all looking much smarter and much easier to look after.
We got our mains water supply hooked up finally, yesterday, and today we had a planned power cut. This meant Chris, whose meeting was not yesterday morning, was then able to plan for the outage, and borrowed a good USB 3G modem from a neighbour. He was on Skype all morning with NZ, while the rest of us hung around and got a few things done.
On Monday Chris and Takis will go to Malaoi to finish the business begun the other day, and on Saturday we're going down to the Cafenion for chicken, but apart from that it's a matter of whim and preference for a while. I think we'll go swimming tomorrow. I'll post again when there's something fun going on.
Today the bulk of the concrete pouring was completed by the men. It's all looking much smarter and much easier to look after.
We got our mains water supply hooked up finally, yesterday, and today we had a planned power cut. This meant Chris, whose meeting was not yesterday morning, was then able to plan for the outage, and borrowed a good USB 3G modem from a neighbour. He was on Skype all morning with NZ, while the rest of us hung around and got a few things done.
On Monday Chris and Takis will go to Malaoi to finish the business begun the other day, and on Saturday we're going down to the Cafenion for chicken, but apart from that it's a matter of whim and preference for a while. I think we'll go swimming tomorrow. I'll post again when there's something fun going on.
20090623
Casualties of Wall
Dinner was great. Marjory and Adrian, the couple who we went to have dinner with, both looked great, and it was lovely to see them again. Typical that Marjory, who I adore, was just off back to England as we've barely begun our holiday, but it was so nice to see them before they went. Jane and Barry were there too, and we had a nice dinner.
I had my first Goges of this trip. Goges is a local speciality pasta dish, which essentially consists of hand-rolled pasta covered in a local cheese that is similar to Parmesan, and olive oil. It's very light for pasta, and though rich is a favourite of mine. I noticed the new supermarket sells them, so Chris is going to put his own spin on them one night this week.
Yesterday morning we went to the beach, had a lovely lunch, courtesy of Chris (basil, tomato, Mozzarella, and propera, my favourite Greek bread), and wondered at the amazing progress the men have made on the boundary wall. I'll post pictures at some point.
The contractor is wonderful. He's a cousin, and is the most lovely man. He turns up each morning looking very spruce. He works in nice shirts and jeans, and gets progressively dirtier throughout his really strenuous working day, but still doesn't look like a builder at the end. He built the house, and is incredibly methodical and conscientious, so he's a bit special in a country that has a most slap-dash building industry.
His wife is a very warm, pretty woman, who comes up every day with food and drinks for the men, and strongly resembles Rachel, though isn't as beautiful. She's very nice though, and I can't help feeling an affection for her, because of her Rachel-ness!
Unfortunately we have had a casualty of the landscaping. A wild fig tree, which was a very pretty and useful (when the sun is setting) screen, lost too many roots in the preparation for the wall to go up, and blew over the afternoon before last. It's sad, as we all liked it, but now it's gone we get a stunning view of one of the huge limestone peaks that surround the village. Once a pull-down sun screen is fitted to the north-westerly side of the terrace the tree's screening function won't be needed anyway, so the glass is most definitely half full.
Poor old Chris spent ages on the phone to Greg last night, as they sorted out the fall-out from a power-cut at home. Some of the systems we're running out of our server room are not tolerant of interruption to power, and Chris says that the cut we had was too long for a UPS (emergency power unit) to have prevented this, but I'm thinking we should get one anyway. Greg obviously did the trick and everything seems to be running smoothly now.
This morning the green grocer's truck comes, so we'll go down to the beach a bit later. Chris has an online appointment at 9 AM, so his sleep-in won't be as long as I'd like, but at least he can have a siesta this afternoon.
I had my first Goges of this trip. Goges is a local speciality pasta dish, which essentially consists of hand-rolled pasta covered in a local cheese that is similar to Parmesan, and olive oil. It's very light for pasta, and though rich is a favourite of mine. I noticed the new supermarket sells them, so Chris is going to put his own spin on them one night this week.
Yesterday morning we went to the beach, had a lovely lunch, courtesy of Chris (basil, tomato, Mozzarella, and propera, my favourite Greek bread), and wondered at the amazing progress the men have made on the boundary wall. I'll post pictures at some point.
The contractor is wonderful. He's a cousin, and is the most lovely man. He turns up each morning looking very spruce. He works in nice shirts and jeans, and gets progressively dirtier throughout his really strenuous working day, but still doesn't look like a builder at the end. He built the house, and is incredibly methodical and conscientious, so he's a bit special in a country that has a most slap-dash building industry.
His wife is a very warm, pretty woman, who comes up every day with food and drinks for the men, and strongly resembles Rachel, though isn't as beautiful. She's very nice though, and I can't help feeling an affection for her, because of her Rachel-ness!
Unfortunately we have had a casualty of the landscaping. A wild fig tree, which was a very pretty and useful (when the sun is setting) screen, lost too many roots in the preparation for the wall to go up, and blew over the afternoon before last. It's sad, as we all liked it, but now it's gone we get a stunning view of one of the huge limestone peaks that surround the village. Once a pull-down sun screen is fitted to the north-westerly side of the terrace the tree's screening function won't be needed anyway, so the glass is most definitely half full.
Poor old Chris spent ages on the phone to Greg last night, as they sorted out the fall-out from a power-cut at home. Some of the systems we're running out of our server room are not tolerant of interruption to power, and Chris says that the cut we had was too long for a UPS (emergency power unit) to have prevented this, but I'm thinking we should get one anyway. Greg obviously did the trick and everything seems to be running smoothly now.
This morning the green grocer's truck comes, so we'll go down to the beach a bit later. Chris has an online appointment at 9 AM, so his sleep-in won't be as long as I'd like, but at least he can have a siesta this afternoon.
20090622
Running out of ideas for titles already...
Yesterday afternoon was lovely. I did very little but write. We went down to Paralia just before nine and met up with our dinner party. One of the girls who was to be there had a very nasty car accident on her way to Kyparissi, and stayed at another nearby village. She was uninjured, but her car rolled and I'm sure she has bruises and had a really awful shock. I haven't heard yet, but hope she's now here, and is feeling okay.
The other new person came soon after us, and I took a real shine to her. She's a Londoner, and is very easy to get along with. We had a lovely evening, eating too much, then swapping chairs to mix it up a bit so we could talk to everyone. By midnight we were all exhausted and excused ourselves. I slept in until 7 AM yesterday morning, which is lovely. All these dawn viewings have become a little tiresome!
I'm very tired. We went to the beach and swam (Chris continuously with fins), and then came home for lunch. Chris and I watched the F1, and Marie and Takis took their usual siesta. We then had a quiet, early night in, which ended up being quite noisy and late.
This morning we went to Malaoi (not sure about that spelling), which is a little crap-hole, but has what we needed, so we stuck with it and got lots done, then came home for a late lunch, and now everyone's asleep or very, very still. The really cool thing is that the builder started work building the new fence today, and made amazing progress. It'll rock when it's finished.
I got some new sandals in the crap-hole. They've lovely, and are my birthday present from T&M.
Another night out tonight, with a British couple who go back to England tomorrow...
The other new person came soon after us, and I took a real shine to her. She's a Londoner, and is very easy to get along with. We had a lovely evening, eating too much, then swapping chairs to mix it up a bit so we could talk to everyone. By midnight we were all exhausted and excused ourselves. I slept in until 7 AM yesterday morning, which is lovely. All these dawn viewings have become a little tiresome!
I'm very tired. We went to the beach and swam (Chris continuously with fins), and then came home for lunch. Chris and I watched the F1, and Marie and Takis took their usual siesta. We then had a quiet, early night in, which ended up being quite noisy and late.
This morning we went to Malaoi (not sure about that spelling), which is a little crap-hole, but has what we needed, so we stuck with it and got lots done, then came home for a late lunch, and now everyone's asleep or very, very still. The really cool thing is that the builder started work building the new fence today, and made amazing progress. It'll rock when it's finished.
I got some new sandals in the crap-hole. They've lovely, and are my birthday present from T&M.
Another night out tonight, with a British couple who go back to England tomorrow...
20090620
And Takis said "Let There Be Water!"
And there was...
The afternoon after I posted last Chris and I went down to the far beach for his first swim, but unfortunately it clouded over, and wasn't as nice as that morning. Chris went for a huge, long swim though, and had fun. After we got home we cleaned ourselves up and went for dinner at the nearest taverna. The sovlakia was wonderful. We went to bed almost immediately though, as we were both pretty knackered.
Yesterday I woke up far too early (4.45 AM), and gave up trying to sleep at 6.15, getting up and making coffee, then going out and watching Greece wake up. The village went from dead silence to a hum within about twenty minutes, after the local bus came into town. Everyone gradually emerged and we had breakfast, realised that there were excavations going on, and then clicked that it was the new water supply being begun. Takis is more effective than we realised!
We went to the beach, and Chris spent the entire time we were there (well over an hour) swimming around the bay.
The afternoon was leisurely and relaxing for some of us and busy for others, and then mid-evening some guests came for pre-dinner drinks. They were a British pair, Pip and Chris, and Barry and Jane (still without luggage), and after a couple of hours of drinks we wandered down to the same taverna we ate at the night before for a meal. We left P&C and B&J to it at about 11.30, and went home to bed. On the way back Chris pointed out to me how the contractors had left the new water supply line on the ground, and just dumped a whole lot of cement on top of it. Very classy.
This morning we were delayed going to the beach, as we had to wait for the green grocer's truck to come. We also found that the contractors working on our water supply had cut a bloody great trench across the only road into and out of the village. You can't beat a resource consent-free nation for half-arsed ideas.
By the time the groceries had been purchased the trench had had some soil dumped into it, so we were able to drive down to Metropoli for bread, then on to the far beach for our morning of whale impersonations. Once again Chris spent the entire time (aside from a wee hike around to the dock to take a series of photos for a panorama - see above) swimming around the bay, and Takis and Marie and I just chilled out on the beach, with the odd cooling dip.
We've now come home, desalinated, eaten, and while T&M are having a siesta Chris and I have watched the F1 qualifying (strangely good with Greek commentary).
Tonight we're having a large gathering of ex-pats down in Paralia for dinner. I'll post again in a couple of days with that and more.
I hope you're all having a good week.
The afternoon after I posted last Chris and I went down to the far beach for his first swim, but unfortunately it clouded over, and wasn't as nice as that morning. Chris went for a huge, long swim though, and had fun. After we got home we cleaned ourselves up and went for dinner at the nearest taverna. The sovlakia was wonderful. We went to bed almost immediately though, as we were both pretty knackered.
Yesterday I woke up far too early (4.45 AM), and gave up trying to sleep at 6.15, getting up and making coffee, then going out and watching Greece wake up. The village went from dead silence to a hum within about twenty minutes, after the local bus came into town. Everyone gradually emerged and we had breakfast, realised that there were excavations going on, and then clicked that it was the new water supply being begun. Takis is more effective than we realised!
We went to the beach, and Chris spent the entire time we were there (well over an hour) swimming around the bay.
The afternoon was leisurely and relaxing for some of us and busy for others, and then mid-evening some guests came for pre-dinner drinks. They were a British pair, Pip and Chris, and Barry and Jane (still without luggage), and after a couple of hours of drinks we wandered down to the same taverna we ate at the night before for a meal. We left P&C and B&J to it at about 11.30, and went home to bed. On the way back Chris pointed out to me how the contractors had left the new water supply line on the ground, and just dumped a whole lot of cement on top of it. Very classy.
This morning we were delayed going to the beach, as we had to wait for the green grocer's truck to come. We also found that the contractors working on our water supply had cut a bloody great trench across the only road into and out of the village. You can't beat a resource consent-free nation for half-arsed ideas.
By the time the groceries had been purchased the trench had had some soil dumped into it, so we were able to drive down to Metropoli for bread, then on to the far beach for our morning of whale impersonations. Once again Chris spent the entire time (aside from a wee hike around to the dock to take a series of photos for a panorama - see above) swimming around the bay, and Takis and Marie and I just chilled out on the beach, with the odd cooling dip.
We've now come home, desalinated, eaten, and while T&M are having a siesta Chris and I have watched the F1 qualifying (strangely good with Greek commentary).
Tonight we're having a large gathering of ex-pats down in Paralia for dinner. I'll post again in a couple of days with that and more.
I hope you're all having a good week.
20090618
Hello? Anyone Out There?
We arrived without any problems, and our baggage arrived with us (a definite plus). We were met at Athens Airport by Takis and Marie, and drove straight down to the village, much to my pleasure. I love this place. It's a haven of peace and quiet, and very Greek people being very Greek. When we arrived I was a bit stupid, as I slept for most of the drive down, but once we'd had lunch I felt much better. Chris, Takis, and Marie then had a siesta, and I walked down to the nearest beach at Paralia, the lower village. I had vowed before we flew out that the first thing I wanted to do once we arrived was go down for a swim, and I had four swims before walking back up the hill. By the time I got home it was about 6.45 PM, and everyone was awake, apart from Chris.
It took me about half an hour to wake him up, as his jet-lag had kicked in with a vengeance, but I persisted and we went down to Paralia for a lovely dinner at Ravatso's. We bumped into Jacqui, a lovely resident here, who we met when we were here in 2005; James, an English painter who has taken up permanent residence here; and Barry and Jane, who are kiwis, who had arrived that day too, but sans luggage.
We crashed as soon as we got back up to the house, and woke up this morning feeling much more human. Chris is still a bit out of sorts, but is way more himself than he was yesterday.
Takis, Marie, and I went to the far beach this morning, after buying fresh bread in Metropoli, the far village, on the way. Barry and Jane were there, and we swam, chatted, and lay in the sun until it was time to come home. We had a set time to come home, as the mayor had an appointment with Takis to be shouted at about the water supply. She turned up after we'd had lunch, put up a brief struggle against reason and sanity, and then backed down when she realised her legs had fallen off. Silly woman could have saved herself a lot of hassle by just doing her job two years ago.
Anyway, Chris and I are contemplating a leisurely afternoon, which for me will definitely include more swimming, and then an evening at a taverna nearby, eating sovlakia.
I'm feeling very relaxed and entirely at home once again. This place is just so perfect...
20090615
In the Beginning
We're off to Greece at sparrow's fart. If you'd like to get emailed when we post while we're away just become a follower (right side of the page). We'll update as and when we can from the village, hopefully with photos.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
Posts
