Why it takes four days to buy some pipe!
Now that the road has been improved, although in reality the two short half widths of concrete may be considered a pathetic attempt to pacify us, we need to ensure that the winter rains do not wash away the little that has been done. The main problem was at the lower end of the track where a local farmer had filled in the gully in order to get to his fields. Rather than go to the trouble of putting in some pipe to carry the water and create a bridge for him to cross over, he merely blocked up the gully so that he could drive onto his field.
We decided that just three concrete pipes would do the job. We have seen what we want, in a field with other building material, just a few hundred metres past the out of town supermarket. So, on Friday we decided to find out whose field it was and whether they would sell three pipes to us. Neither of the local builders merchants appeared to have the products. So we went to the plumbing supplies shop, two fields away from our desired pipes. We got the woman in the office to come outside and look to the field. She informed us that she didn't know who owned the pipes, but told us who owned the field.
Luckily we knew the man as he runs a delivery service for large goods and Waldo has used the chaotic service a few times. We drove to his office. The man himself was not there, but one of his staff could tell us who owned the pipes. He wrote the name down and told us that he lived behind the post office in Potamos.
Off we drove to Potamos, we had just come from the post office and collected a bag full of DVDs to watch in the coming weeks. the lady in the post office was outside and shouted to us when we saw the car. The day's post had arrived and there was more for us. I went in to collect more DVDs and some books - how did we manage before Amazon? - and I asked her where Vangelis lived. Surprisingly she didn't know, she didn't even know the name, which is most surprising on this small island. He obviously doesn't get mail!
I walked up the road to a rather nice ladies clothes shop where I take our visitors. The woman who runs it was not there, but her father was shop sitting. He immediately told me he would show us the house. Without even bothering to shut the shop door he bade us follow him as he walked up a side street and through a maze of streets in the hinterland of the village. He then pointed in the distance to the 'aspros spiti' (white house). We thanked him and walked on to the house. The patio, the living area of most Greek houses, showed signs of life. Children's bicycles were parked near the wall, the iron was plugged in and on the ironing board near the house wall, a table with benches and ashtrays was near the door. It was just 1pm and a little early for siesta. We knocked the door and waited, but no response. We rang one of the door bells but no response. We rang another door bell but the house remained silent.
We would have to return another day. Waldo walked back to the car and came through the maze of streets to collect me. We then went exploring to see where the road led us and came back onto the main street down a narrow path that we had always thought was a pavement!
Saturday dawned warm and windy. Waldo was on a mission now to get the pipes before we depart next Wednesday. We set off for the house in Potamos. This time, as we approached we could see that the front door was open. There was some confusion at first as a number of different women came to the door. Eventually Mrs. Vangelis came outside to greet us. Her husband was not there, he was working on the nearby island of Antikythera and would not be back for a week or more. She would telephone him and find out about the pipes. This she did, and we negotiated a price for three. However she wanted to be sure that we were talking about the correct field, with the correct pipes. So the three of us set off in the car, through Potamos village to the field. Yes, it was the correct field, but she wasn't sure whether the pipes belonged to her husband or the field owner. We suggested that we could pay her for them, collect the pipes and she could get the money to her husband or the field owner, whoever was the seller. But she was not prepared to do this and anyway the gate to the field was shut and she didn't have the key. She wanted to see for herself what we were talking about and speak with the owner of the field.
Off we went in the car to the owner of the field's office. Being Saturday it was closed. We drove back to the lady's house, on the way passing the man from the dress shop who waved profusely, recognising that contact had been made thanks to his efforts. The lady insisted on giving us ice cold water and wonderful home made honey biscuits covered with sesame seeds. Eventually we left with the agreement to telephone the field owner and arrange to meet on Monday morning. Then we would telephone her and come to collect her to take her to the field. This meant that we would have to go with the trailer and take it to the field, unhitch it and leave it there for we would not be able to pass through the back streets on Potamos with it in tow. Then with the car only through the narrow streets, fetch Mrs Vangelis and take her to the field. After the transaction we would have to return her to her home and then come back for the filled trailer. Such a potentially simple transaction was now taking on mammoth proportions - not quite like B & Q!
We enjoyed a pleasant evening out on Saturday. Andromache is a wonderful cook, equally capable of turning out a traditional Sunday roast, a local Kytherian dish or all manner of tasty Greek food. She has a brilliant strategy for pleasing people; she always prepares at least one dish that she knows one of her guests really enjoy. So for Waldo she prepared taramasalata (cods roe mixed with dry bread, yoghurt, lemon juice and black pepper) and wonderfully light cheese pies made with puff pastry, for me she cooked sliced courgettes in batter, for Rika she prepared a very strong tzatziki (cucumber, garlic and yoghurt), for Dick a wonderful salad in mustard mayonnaise dressing. To this she added pitta bread, a very tasty lasagna and an amazing strawberry cheesecake.
It was about 1am when we drove back through the village. A few people were still in tavernas, particularly the one which had had a tango evening where a group of 4 tango teachers and their partners put on a display and then encouraged everyone to have a try. This week has been the last of the summer festivities and it has been hectic on the island. There has been a wonderful exhibition of water colours by the artist Katherine Kay who manages to capture so much of Greek life with a few seemingly simple strokes of the brush which belie the skill and experience of a life-time of observation and art. On Monday there was a fold dance of local traditional dances in a village beyond Logothetianika. On Tuesday, St Maria's Day, and a national holiday, the island's main icon of Madonna and Child (both faceless), is paraded around. It starts at the Monastery of St Myrtidda where the icon is kept. Bus loads of people turn up for the early morning service and orchestral performance by the island's band. During the day the icon is carried from village to village, by car these days, with everyone assembling just to walk through the village and giving local people a chance to take the blessing and kiss the icon. This culminates in another choral service, followed by dancing till the early hours of the morning in Potamos square. On Wednesday Aghia Pelagia hosted the traditional puppet theatre. In days past the puppeteers would travel from village to village presenting their shows, but they are becoming less and less as the skills are not passed down through the generations as they used to be. Thankfully on the island a young man has revived the tradition where rough outline puppets are mounted on sticks and then displayed behind a large white sheet so that they are viewed in silhouette. The stories are traditional and each provides part of the moral compass to be passed to the young generation. On Thursday a group of Cretans came over and sang their traditional songs and performed their local dances in the square in Karavas, a village at the north of the island. Friday night saw our weekly music by our local group at a taverna in Aghia Pelagia.
On Sunday we decided to have a leisurely time, recovering from the night before, preparing for the continuing adventure of the pipes on Monday and celebrating my birthday as day early. We were to meet friends at 1pm and all travel together to a small hamlet on the north of the island where Minas' taverna is located on a small promontory right at the sea's edge. Minas' is the only taverna that only provides freshly caught fish and most of the salad vegetables are organically grown in his son's garden. It is a delight to go there for Sunday lunch when we take pot luck of whatever has been caught that morning, served simply with a salad and chips for those who want them. We were almost on time. Waldo shouted to me 'Ready?' and I agreed, walked upstairs to the front door. I thought he had gone ahead of me and so I shut the door and locked it. To avoid the baking sun I got into the car for Waldo had already switched the engine on and the air conditioning was doing it's bit to provide a cool environment. I turned on the CD player to listen to some Tina Turner and waited. I thought Waldo had been doing something in the garage but he was nowhere to be seen. I waited. As I looked around I noticed that the roller doors to the garage were shut. Perhaps he had gone down the stone steps to collect rubbish to bin on our way down the mountain. I waited. Then something caught my eye. I could see a hand on the other side of a glass panel of the front door. After shouting 'Ready', Waldo had decided to go to the toilet, he had not gone outside the house and then found himself locked in. Since the first day here some 6 weeks ago he lost his own front door keys and has not been able to find them! Hence he was unable to unlock the door, unable to make me hear his shouts above Tina Turner and unable to attract my attention. We were only a few minutes late - our friends were walking along the beach when we eventually caught up with them.
Minas has a big fish, we think it was sword fish and with his band saw he cut us a one inch oval slice about 20cm by 35 cm: more than ample for the four of us. As with most local tavernas, no matter how we order and state what we want to start and what we want as main courses, the first dish to appear is the chips. This was closely followed by the beers, white wine, ouzo and Sprite and Soda water for us all. Then came the salad and shortly after that two plates piled high with pieces of squid cooked in batter with a whole fresh lemon to squeeze over. Time does not really matter and we ate the chips whilst they were hot, then leisurely worked our way grazing the other dishes. About an hour later, after drinks had been replenished, came a large platter with the massive portion of fish served with a delicious creamy sauce made of lemon juice and olive oil whipped together.
In line with Greek tradition, by about 4pm we moved on. Waldo drove us back to Aghia Pelagia where we visited a cafe-bar which services the most delicious ice-creams and sorbets on the island. We relaxed, overlooking the tiny harbour where the boats were bobbing up and down. Vanilla ice-cream smothered in cream and strawberry sauce, pistachio ice=cream, plain vanilla ice-cream and a lemon sorbet soon arrived. We spent about 20 minutes watching a beautiful petrol blue backed kingfisher move from boat to boat, take a dive and eat a fish, then move on. What a treat. It was early evening by the time we said our goodbyes.
I was fast asleep at 7.30am when Waldo shook me awake. It was my birthday. I could catch up on sleep later. It was collecting the cement pipes day. No time to laze in bed. I put on my old working trousers and top; both already spattered with paint, tiny holes from fire embers and unmovable stains from gardening. It had been a very windy night and Freddy's 'raft' was waterlogged and submerged; it had been half submerged for a few days and Freddy had been forced to just cling on to one side rather than climb aboard. We had decided that this must be tiring and uncomfortable for our little companion. Thus, immediately after breakfast Waldo and I took up the 'raft' and I put it in the sun to dry out. Waldo had already cut two more pieces of wood and threaded them. One he fitted in the opposite corner of the pool which never catches the sun. The other he used to replace the water logged raft. It took our Fred just half an hour to climb aboard his new raft. We must wait and see how long it takes him to discover the one in the shade.
We hitched up our trailer. It still has 'The Muir Train. Kythera' printed in big letters down one side of it. This was erected when my 'Muir' cousins came to stay last year. Waldo had already filled the trailer with all manner of boxes, bags of rubbish, some electrical equipment that was now defunct and the old bed which we replaced last week. This we took to the tip on our way to Potamos.
When we arrived at the transport office of the field owner it was still closed up. There was no need to be open for the truck taking goods to the ferry had already left and the inward goods from the ferry would not be delivered until around mid-day. We decided to just take the three pipes and go and pay Mrs Vangelis. If we waited to get her and the field owner together it could be a few more days of telephoning, visiting and chasing. Waldo managed to open the gate and backed the car and trailer up to the pipes. When we went to lift the cement pipes they were heavier than we had first thought. One metre long and about 20 inches in diameter they each weighed about 2.5cwt (280 lbs). We had one pair of gloves between us to protect our hands from the rough concrete. After much puffing and blowing, rolling, lifting, wedging with hands and knees to steady the pipes we packed the three neatly in a row on the trailer; there was but half an inch to spare! And I didn't break a single finger nail!
Pleased with our efforts we headed for Potamos. As usual the traffic was chaos. Because the whole village in one-way people seem to think that they can park anywhere but assume that everyone else has a tiny car. All day long delivery vans, lorries, tractors and trailers inch forward and backwards with barely a coat of paint to spare. Waldo decided that wherever the car went, the trailer would follow and so we would take it to Mrs Vangelis' house to show her that we had just taken three pipes, that they were the smaller size and that we had no more. I had some DVDs to post and Waldo patiently waited in a side-street whilst I went into the post office. Then, after hair raising twists and turns we arrived at the house. The lady was sitting on her patio, mobile telephone at the ready, waiting for our call. She looked pleased to see us, but surprised that we already had the pipes in tow.
I explained that the field owner was not in his office, that it was closed. I explained that we thought the easiest was to collect the pipes and asked her to look at them in the trailer. We had agreed a price and I was getting ready to sit down, enjoy some of the fresh figs she offered us and pay our dues. Surprise, surprise, she started to tell me that she had been speaking with her husband on the telephone again this morning and the price had changed. The price had now gone up some 50%. I translated the news to Waldo and, as expected, it was lighting a blue touch paper. He started waving his arms around and shouting. Another woman had come onto the patio, but as neither of them spoke a word of English there was no point in his shouting. But they got the message. Mrs Vangelis kept telling me that it was not her fault, this is what she had been told to say. I thought she was going to cry. Eventually she telephoned her husband. Now speaking Greek face-to-face is one thing as body language, facial expressions and mime all aid the communication and understanding, and writing and drawing can always be an added option. Speaking on the telephone requires a greater language skill. My heart sank as I wondered whether I was up to it.
Before I could think twice Vangelis was on the telephone. Yes, there were two sizes of pipe. We had the smaller sized ones for which we had agreed a price. I told him that they were in the trailer. I would pay his wife the amount agreed yesterday and nothing more. Yesterday he had already added a quick 10 Euros to the price as a delivery charge - seeming to overlook the fact that we were collecting them! In any Greek negotiation the trick is to raise ones voice, appear angry and stay firm. I told him we would pay the agreed amount and nothing more. I wasn't even prepared to negotiate. We would take them back to his field and he would have no money. OK he agreed, but wanted to speak with his wife.
As she was on the telephone I got out the Euro notes and waved them in front of her. I had the exact amount with me. She put down the telephone and took the money. Then she smiled and the face saving part of the negotiations now came to the fore; her husband felt that the bigger pipes would be better for the job, but they were more expensive. He would rather us have them and he would have done a good deal on them because he doesn't want us coming back to him saying the smaller pipes are no good. I thanked her for his consideration, but confirmed that it was the small pipes we wanted. We finished our figs, shook hands and with smiles all round set off back to the house.
Once back on our mountain road, we off loaded the pipes, rolled them into the gully and set off back to the house. When we return in a few weeks Waldo will take the Bobcat down the road, make the gully slightly larger and bed in the pipes. The farmer will have a bridge to his land and hopefully the rain water will flow through the pipes and stay in the gully rather than wreaking havoc on the road. A job well done. And still not a broken finger nail!
We enjoyed a pleasant evening out on Saturday. Andromache is a wonderful cook, equally capable of turning out a traditional Sunday roast, a local Kytherian dish or all manner of tasty Greek food. She has a brilliant strategy for pleasing people; she always prepares at least one dish that she knows one of her guests really enjoy. So for Waldo she prepared taramasalata (cods roe mixed with dry bread, yoghurt, lemon juice and black pepper) and wonderfully light cheese pies made with puff pastry, for me she cooked sliced courgettes in batter, for Rika she prepared a very strong tzatziki (cucumber, garlic and yoghurt), for Dick a wonderful salad in mustard mayonnaise dressing. To this she added pitta bread, a very tasty lasagna and an amazing strawberry cheesecake.
It was about 1am when we drove back through the village. A few people were still in tavernas, particularly the one which had had a tango evening where a group of 4 tango teachers and their partners put on a display and then encouraged everyone to have a try. This week has been the last of the summer festivities and it has been hectic on the island. There has been a wonderful exhibition of water colours by the artist Katherine Kay who manages to capture so much of Greek life with a few seemingly simple strokes of the brush which belie the skill and experience of a life-time of observation and art. On Monday there was a fold dance of local traditional dances in a village beyond Logothetianika. On Tuesday, St Maria's Day, and a national holiday, the island's main icon of Madonna and Child (both faceless), is paraded around. It starts at the Monastery of St Myrtidda where the icon is kept. Bus loads of people turn up for the early morning service and orchestral performance by the island's band. During the day the icon is carried from village to village, by car these days, with everyone assembling just to walk through the village and giving local people a chance to take the blessing and kiss the icon. This culminates in another choral service, followed by dancing till the early hours of the morning in Potamos square. On Wednesday Aghia Pelagia hosted the traditional puppet theatre. In days past the puppeteers would travel from village to village presenting their shows, but they are becoming less and less as the skills are not passed down through the generations as they used to be. Thankfully on the island a young man has revived the tradition where rough outline puppets are mounted on sticks and then displayed behind a large white sheet so that they are viewed in silhouette. The stories are traditional and each provides part of the moral compass to be passed to the young generation. On Thursday a group of Cretans came over and sang their traditional songs and performed their local dances in the square in Karavas, a village at the north of the island. Friday night saw our weekly music by our local group at a taverna in Aghia Pelagia.
On Sunday we decided to have a leisurely time, recovering from the night before, preparing for the continuing adventure of the pipes on Monday and celebrating my birthday as day early. We were to meet friends at 1pm and all travel together to a small hamlet on the north of the island where Minas' taverna is located on a small promontory right at the sea's edge. Minas' is the only taverna that only provides freshly caught fish and most of the salad vegetables are organically grown in his son's garden. It is a delight to go there for Sunday lunch when we take pot luck of whatever has been caught that morning, served simply with a salad and chips for those who want them. We were almost on time. Waldo shouted to me 'Ready?' and I agreed, walked upstairs to the front door. I thought he had gone ahead of me and so I shut the door and locked it. To avoid the baking sun I got into the car for Waldo had already switched the engine on and the air conditioning was doing it's bit to provide a cool environment. I turned on the CD player to listen to some Tina Turner and waited. I thought Waldo had been doing something in the garage but he was nowhere to be seen. I waited. As I looked around I noticed that the roller doors to the garage were shut. Perhaps he had gone down the stone steps to collect rubbish to bin on our way down the mountain. I waited. Then something caught my eye. I could see a hand on the other side of a glass panel of the front door. After shouting 'Ready', Waldo had decided to go to the toilet, he had not gone outside the house and then found himself locked in. Since the first day here some 6 weeks ago he lost his own front door keys and has not been able to find them! Hence he was unable to unlock the door, unable to make me hear his shouts above Tina Turner and unable to attract my attention. We were only a few minutes late - our friends were walking along the beach when we eventually caught up with them.
Minas has a big fish, we think it was sword fish and with his band saw he cut us a one inch oval slice about 20cm by 35 cm: more than ample for the four of us. As with most local tavernas, no matter how we order and state what we want to start and what we want as main courses, the first dish to appear is the chips. This was closely followed by the beers, white wine, ouzo and Sprite and Soda water for us all. Then came the salad and shortly after that two plates piled high with pieces of squid cooked in batter with a whole fresh lemon to squeeze over. Time does not really matter and we ate the chips whilst they were hot, then leisurely worked our way grazing the other dishes. About an hour later, after drinks had been replenished, came a large platter with the massive portion of fish served with a delicious creamy sauce made of lemon juice and olive oil whipped together.
In line with Greek tradition, by about 4pm we moved on. Waldo drove us back to Aghia Pelagia where we visited a cafe-bar which services the most delicious ice-creams and sorbets on the island. We relaxed, overlooking the tiny harbour where the boats were bobbing up and down. Vanilla ice-cream smothered in cream and strawberry sauce, pistachio ice=cream, plain vanilla ice-cream and a lemon sorbet soon arrived. We spent about 20 minutes watching a beautiful petrol blue backed kingfisher move from boat to boat, take a dive and eat a fish, then move on. What a treat. It was early evening by the time we said our goodbyes.
I was fast asleep at 7.30am when Waldo shook me awake. It was my birthday. I could catch up on sleep later. It was collecting the cement pipes day. No time to laze in bed. I put on my old working trousers and top; both already spattered with paint, tiny holes from fire embers and unmovable stains from gardening. It had been a very windy night and Freddy's 'raft' was waterlogged and submerged; it had been half submerged for a few days and Freddy had been forced to just cling on to one side rather than climb aboard. We had decided that this must be tiring and uncomfortable for our little companion. Thus, immediately after breakfast Waldo and I took up the 'raft' and I put it in the sun to dry out. Waldo had already cut two more pieces of wood and threaded them. One he fitted in the opposite corner of the pool which never catches the sun. The other he used to replace the water logged raft. It took our Fred just half an hour to climb aboard his new raft. We must wait and see how long it takes him to discover the one in the shade.
We hitched up our trailer. It still has 'The Muir Train. Kythera' printed in big letters down one side of it. This was erected when my 'Muir' cousins came to stay last year. Waldo had already filled the trailer with all manner of boxes, bags of rubbish, some electrical equipment that was now defunct and the old bed which we replaced last week. This we took to the tip on our way to Potamos.
When we arrived at the transport office of the field owner it was still closed up. There was no need to be open for the truck taking goods to the ferry had already left and the inward goods from the ferry would not be delivered until around mid-day. We decided to just take the three pipes and go and pay Mrs Vangelis. If we waited to get her and the field owner together it could be a few more days of telephoning, visiting and chasing. Waldo managed to open the gate and backed the car and trailer up to the pipes. When we went to lift the cement pipes they were heavier than we had first thought. One metre long and about 20 inches in diameter they each weighed about 2.5cwt (280 lbs). We had one pair of gloves between us to protect our hands from the rough concrete. After much puffing and blowing, rolling, lifting, wedging with hands and knees to steady the pipes we packed the three neatly in a row on the trailer; there was but half an inch to spare! And I didn't break a single finger nail!
Pleased with our efforts we headed for Potamos. As usual the traffic was chaos. Because the whole village in one-way people seem to think that they can park anywhere but assume that everyone else has a tiny car. All day long delivery vans, lorries, tractors and trailers inch forward and backwards with barely a coat of paint to spare. Waldo decided that wherever the car went, the trailer would follow and so we would take it to Mrs Vangelis' house to show her that we had just taken three pipes, that they were the smaller size and that we had no more. I had some DVDs to post and Waldo patiently waited in a side-street whilst I went into the post office. Then, after hair raising twists and turns we arrived at the house. The lady was sitting on her patio, mobile telephone at the ready, waiting for our call. She looked pleased to see us, but surprised that we already had the pipes in tow.
I explained that the field owner was not in his office, that it was closed. I explained that we thought the easiest was to collect the pipes and asked her to look at them in the trailer. We had agreed a price and I was getting ready to sit down, enjoy some of the fresh figs she offered us and pay our dues. Surprise, surprise, she started to tell me that she had been speaking with her husband on the telephone again this morning and the price had changed. The price had now gone up some 50%. I translated the news to Waldo and, as expected, it was lighting a blue touch paper. He started waving his arms around and shouting. Another woman had come onto the patio, but as neither of them spoke a word of English there was no point in his shouting. But they got the message. Mrs Vangelis kept telling me that it was not her fault, this is what she had been told to say. I thought she was going to cry. Eventually she telephoned her husband. Now speaking Greek face-to-face is one thing as body language, facial expressions and mime all aid the communication and understanding, and writing and drawing can always be an added option. Speaking on the telephone requires a greater language skill. My heart sank as I wondered whether I was up to it.
Before I could think twice Vangelis was on the telephone. Yes, there were two sizes of pipe. We had the smaller sized ones for which we had agreed a price. I told him that they were in the trailer. I would pay his wife the amount agreed yesterday and nothing more. Yesterday he had already added a quick 10 Euros to the price as a delivery charge - seeming to overlook the fact that we were collecting them! In any Greek negotiation the trick is to raise ones voice, appear angry and stay firm. I told him we would pay the agreed amount and nothing more. I wasn't even prepared to negotiate. We would take them back to his field and he would have no money. OK he agreed, but wanted to speak with his wife.
As she was on the telephone I got out the Euro notes and waved them in front of her. I had the exact amount with me. She put down the telephone and took the money. Then she smiled and the face saving part of the negotiations now came to the fore; her husband felt that the bigger pipes would be better for the job, but they were more expensive. He would rather us have them and he would have done a good deal on them because he doesn't want us coming back to him saying the smaller pipes are no good. I thanked her for his consideration, but confirmed that it was the small pipes we wanted. We finished our figs, shook hands and with smiles all round set off back to the house.
Once back on our mountain road, we off loaded the pipes, rolled them into the gully and set off back to the house. When we return in a few weeks Waldo will take the Bobcat down the road, make the gully slightly larger and bed in the pipes. The farmer will have a bridge to his land and hopefully the rain water will flow through the pipes and stay in the gully rather than wreaking havoc on the road. A job well done. And still not a broken finger nail!
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