The national garden in Athens is a place I remember mom and dad used to take us to when we were kids. But I hadn’t been for many years. The other day a friend suggested we go have a coffee there and walk around a bit… a small oasis of cool in a hot Athens.
The old cafe there is quaint but so expensive… a double greek coffee was 4.60e or something. I can’t remember exactly, but it blew me away.
Still, it was cool and restful.
A nice little break from the headache that is my life at the moment.
So. what have I achieved in the days I’ve been in Athens? Well, I got a new credit/cash card to replace the new one I never received in the mail. I could have done that on Paros, but the deadline was approaching so I needed to get it done. That took 2 trips to the bank, but I was lucky. It was a quiet day so there was no waiting in queues.
I found a pet shop that sells BARF (raw) dog food for Vincent in the area so I didn’t have to go all over Athens to get it.
I got the paperwork together to apply for a new water meter for the unrenovated upstairs apartment – that entailed a trip to the local water authority office, then being told I needed to go to the main offices in another area get that underway. The application cost 63 euros. I now need to wait for about a month for the inspectors to come check out the position for the new water meter and will receive a bill for over 600 euros to get water connected. I need to go in in person to sign and pay.
Of course.
This is Greece.
I’m hoping I can give someone power of attorney to go in and sign for me and I can do an online transfer to pay. There is no way I want to pay another 100 euros minimum for a trip to Athens just to sign a piece of paper…
I have not managed to fix the issue with the water leak and damp… After trying 4 different plumbers (from before leaving Paros) who I’d speak to once and then never ever reach again, my uncle brought a guy over this evening who I gave the job to. I guess you could say I did succeed in organising it, but I’m told it will take AT LEAST two weeks to fix, given that they’re all busy and if a job more urgent than mine comes up, I’ll be dumped like a hot potato.
I found new tenants for my aunt’s house, but when they can actually move in depends on when the leak and damp issues are fixed. Which means they’re waiting and need to move asap and my aunt isn’t earning rent – which pays for the nursing home, so meanwhile we’ll have to cover any shortfall…
I really am over this whole thing. Old houses. Tenants. Being responsible for people other than myself.
There’s more. There’s always more. But I won’t bore you. Let’s just say my life right now is a mess.
How much can I take before I lose it totally? I think I’ll soon either be totally white haired or bald at this rate.
Why you may ask?
Well, I’ve had a sick mother all summer. And I’m lucky. I actually have one of those rare nice mothers who aren’t so annoying (or as infuriating) as so many others. And she’s getting better, again, fingers crossed.
But she’s been insisting that she return to Athens, to her own home, NOW, cause she’s sick of being isolated in my place on Paros, being a burden on me, etc etc. So, I began to organise her trip, someone to take her to a seat on the ferry by wheelchair. Someone to pick up her suitcases and put them on the ferry. Someone to meet her on the other end and take her home and carry her bags in and help her settle in…
But then the guy I’d organised for the other side get sick and ended up in hospital.
So here I am, on the ferry with mom, taking her to Athens myself, carrying bags, lending an elbow, trying to keep track of our luggage, carrying Vincent.
I couldn’t let her go alone.
A few days in Athens won’t kill me.
But they just might.
Cause its not just mom… its aunt #1s house too. The old tenants finally vacated 2 weeks after they were meant to. And I have spoken to two plumbers so far about locating and fixing a leak which has been causing trouble on both sides of the wall between my aunt’s house and where mom lives. Mould and all kinds of lovely things.
The previous tenant was an old lady with dementia with her carer, and her son would not let us in there to locate and fix the problem while she was there, cause he didn’t want to cause her confusion… so we now have a small window (getting smaller every day) to get someone in to fix the problem.
Cause of course, all this time (about 3 years now) I’ve been insisting that the issue is in THAT wall, but no one believes me. We’ve had pipes fixed on the outside of our wall. Someone else went into the light well to fix the issue in there… but the problem is not fixed. Cause I’ve been right along. We need to fix it on my AUNT’s side of the wall. And I need to do it ASAP before the next tenants go in.
And of course NO ONE returns my calls, or messages or anything.
Oh, and I have to see what the previous tenants left in the house. I told them to leave only the bookcase and wardrobe which belonged to my aunt and have stayed with the house till now, but now I’m learning that apparently they’ve left 3 beds which I ‘can do what I want with’… Which means they are now my problem…
I am so over this crap.
And all this time I’ve been trying to organise the plumber(s) and organise someone with keys to let him in, all over the phone, chasing things up 2nd and 3rd hand.
You’d think it could be done, but no. It can’t. I have to BE there. Like as if, if I’m there, I’ll be able to grab some random plumber by the collar and drag him to the house to fix the problem.
sigh.
But that’s not all, either.
I finally have some kind of paperwork I’d been waiting months for, for the upstairs apartment which we split into 2 apartments, renovated one and rented it out, leaving one to be renovated… In order to get power and water to the 2nd half I needed this paper. Now, I have to take it to some place in Athens (in person, cause if I try to do it online it might never get done!), and run around various agencies to apply for new connections yada yada yada.
Only then can I begin to renovate the 2nd apartment (with money I will miraculously conjur up)…
Between the paperwork necessary for everything, chasing up people who never call back, jobs that don’t get done, struggling to pay bills, borrowing from Peter to pay Paul, etc, I’m kinda over this whole thing. I just wanna hide in my house and never come out.
Of course, I really really want my studio. My space. Space around me.
This was 2 weeks ago at our building site:
And this is now – the framework for the columns is still up, to be removed soon, but the roof is ready.
Sometimes I wish I’d never started anything. That I was content to live in a small one bedroom apartment with my small dog, and knit while watching TV and not have any desire to remake furniture, play with power tools, work on large canvases or paint on any surface I can think of, or play with any other forms of art.
In fact, living in Tasmania, without any family nearby, was really nice…
This has been a difficult summer so far, and there’s no end in sight yet.
Mom has been sick since she arrived on Paros on June 1 and ended up in hospital for 2 weeks with COVID and pneumonia. Then, returning to Paros she was on oxygen for a month.
And she’s been staying with me cause she needs assistance and care.
While she was getting better life got a little easier. She began cooking again so I’d come home to a cooked meal instead of having to cook for both of us (I don’t like having to cook! I only cook when I want to!)
Now mom’s been unwell for a week again. Needing more care again. And me being busier than ever with dog grooming.
It’s not been an easy summer… yet she’s my mother. I have to look after her, and I want to do it too. And I did return to Greece to be with mom – to enjoy her company while she was well but to assist when she wasn’t. So I’m not complaining…
But I miss being alone and having my space to myself. I really really miss having my tiny place to myself.
Mom plans to return to Athens in 5 weeks. Let’s hope she’s better by then or I will have to go with her…
I’d been reading a book a while ago and really can’t remember the title or author. But inside there was something about vampires – the energy sucking type, not the bloody sucking type.
It prompted me to write about it at the time but I never got further than sourcing this photo (thank you AI).
However, today I feel I have reached a peak of anger, frustration, and general stress that I cannot hold it in anymore.
I am putting way too much of my own energy into the problems I see around me all the time.
The destruction of this and other Greek islands in the name of tourism. I get involved where I can, but we can’t achieve anything real against the greed which abounds around us. And I get angry.
The news is horrible every single day. I try to avoid it, but living with someone who watches TV all day every day, I am now accidentally seeing the news on a much more regular basis. I lived so happily for so many years never watching TV, not reading papers, and only hearing about things that affected me locally.
Ignorance is bliss.
Now I constantly upset. Animal abuse. Horrific things, bad enough that they are not just put on Facebook, but on the national news! Disease among the ruminants in Greece today, first time ever, meaning that thousands of animals will most likely need to be destroyed. Fires, everywhere, all the time. And so many idiots leaving their pets behind!
I’ve had it.
I’m not sure what I’ll do, but I’m considering taking a break from the internet for my mental health. And maybe wear ear phones with music so I can’t hear the news.
I don’t know.
I’m just so upset so often. It can’t be good for me.
As I already shared, we went to Naxos for the carnival. It was great, totally different to anything I’ve ever done before. A real adventure, so much fun! Of course, little Vincent had to sit out the actual Lampathofori (Parade of Torches) as it was too loud and too crowded. He stayed in the air bnb while Zefi and I joined the crowd as they chanted to the beat of the drums.
On the balcony, waiting for the Parade of Torches. A long wait.
We were lucky (or unlucky) in our choice of air bnbs ’cause we were right over the main square where everything happened on Saturday night. It was ideal for watching thing unfold from our own balcony, but not ideal for the early morning wake up on Sunday as they sound tested the equipment for the float parade later that day.
Dionysia was a Panhellenic festival in honor of Dionysus. One of the most important centers of these festivals was Naxos. The celebration included wine drinking, cheerfulness, unbridled enthusiasm, cymbals, drums, troupes, processions, dithyrambs (choral chants) and phallophoria.
Here is my own video of the night:
The lambathofori parade on Naxos.
The next day, we went to a couple of villages where we saw the Koudounati.
Men strapped with bells and carrying Dionysian phallic symbols known locally as somba, stir up a racket while parading through the village alleys in a procession held to welcome the spring season and exorcise evil spirits.
Turns out, this would have been a better day to leave little Vinnie at home. It was way louder and way more crowded. Poor little man cowered in his bag. Especially in Apeiranthos, the town most famous for the Koudounati where if you fell you’d never hit the ground.
However, we managed to catch them in another town as well, where this lovely man was happy to take a photo with us.
Here is my short video of the event:
Koudounati, bell strapped men, at the Naxos Carnival.
Now, if you’re wondering at the lack of actual MEN in those parades, let me take some time to rant a little about the organizational skills of the Greeks and their total inability to stick to any kind of schedule. Ever.
The Naxos municipality puts out a timetable of events around the island, and like most gullible people who have lived in countries where a schedule is a schedule, we made our plans. I’m not saying we didn’t expect some delays… its normal to have some delays… especially in Greece where the national tag line is ‘siga siga’ (literally ‘slowly slowly’ or ‘it’ll get done eventually‘).
However, let me warn everyone who will visit Greece – times/schedules etc are not a program based on any kind of reality but of fantasy. As Captain Barbarossa said in Pirates of the Carribean, its more like ‘guidelines’….
Seriously. The program said that the Lambadifori would start at 6pm at the square were people would get dressed to start the parade. I didn’t expect to see them till about 8pm, cause it needs to be dark, right? They didn’t show till almost midnight. sigh. Good thing we didn’t turn up to get painted and dressed at 6pm or we’d have been dead on our feet before the parade began!
And it was the same with the Koudounati. We got to Apeiranthos around 2.30pm, they were meant to gather at 2pm. We left there at 5pm when someone told us that the men still hadn’t gathered, it would be at least another hour before they made their entrance. Only the young boys were happy to run around town with the bells and clubs – so, no wild mustachioed men for us… We weren’t going to waste more time being squished while we waited.
We also hoped to see the Kordelati but missed them due to the lateness of everything. We ran into these two Foustanelatoi just as they finished their dancing…
On Clean Monday the custom of ribbons and foustanelata (foustanelades) is observed, which, like the other customs of the Carnival, is a memory of the ancient Dionysian festivals and coincides with the ancient Anthestiria.
According to scholars of folk tradition, kordelatoi and foustanelatoi (foustanelades), during the Venetian occupation, were a way for the Orthodox to communicate with each other, while it is said that during the revolution of ’21, they sewed triangular handkerchiefs they had on their chest and hid gunpowder there to transport it to the Peloponnese and elsewhere.
The custom is that the young people of the village, wearing colored ribbons or foustanelles respectively, form groups, the bairakia, led by the bairachtar, that is, the one who holds the bairaki of the group, which is a thick reed with a colored scarf at the end, and to honor with their visit the women of the neighboring villages, dancing with them in the central square accompanied by violins and lutes. In turn, the women of each village treat the men with food, sweets and wine to please them.
In the past, this custom was also a way for young people from different villages to get to know each other and so many weddings occurred. Today the inhabitants of the island zealously maintain the custom and pass it on from generation to generation.
Amongst all the things happening around us, we visited a few villages, had some great meals at tavernas, caught up with family and friends and made some new ones.
Vincent made a new friend.
Walking up to the Portara on Sunday morning, Vincent made a new friend. Here she is, peering at us over the wild flowers.
The Portara
Naxos’ Temple of Apollo – Portara, a huge marble gate and the single remaining part of an unfinished temple of Apollo of 530 BC, is the island’s emblem and main landmark.
Standing on the islet of Palatia, at the entrance to Naxos harbor, it comprises four marble parts weighing about 20 tons each.
The view back to town from the Portara.
Here are some pics I took along the way.
We visited Lionas, a tiny place you wouldn’t even call a village, on the furthest end of Naxos. There was a cute little taverna there and a small beach with the most beautiful black sand, black stones and the best white rocks I’ve ever seen.
This is how Vincent felt after all our travels…
Pretty much how I felt too!
Back home now and trying to catch up on all the things I have on my to-do list. Well, some of them at least!
I admit, I’ve been lazy. Very lazy. But that doesn’t mean I haven’t done anything at all. I’ve done a few things…
Including this very large painting of a shell.
It’s a commission for an air bnb studio apartment, the theme was something island-ey and the main colour had to be grey.
It took a while to do, first I had to find something I liked as a theme, then I worked on layers to achieve the colours and texture I was after.
I think I achieved it.
For now I’ve hung it over my bed in my bedroom as its the only free wall in my place. The new owner will pick it up in a month or so, till then I’m the one enjoying it.
Here are a couple of close ups that show the texture I was aiming for. It’s not nearly as textured as the cat on a chair I did last year because I didn’t cover the canvas with magazine pages first.
I’m pretty pleased with it. I’ve rarely worked on something this size – 120cm x 90cm. But I like it, it was fun. It was done on a recycled canvas so now I’m looking for more large canvases to recycle!
So, you may ask, what other things have kept me busy? Well… Vincent keeps me on my toes for one thing. He’s either sleeping, chewing on things he finds in my toolbox, selecting a toy from his toybox and playing with it, asking for cuddles, wanting to go out and socialize and have coffee with friends… what did I do with myself all those months without a poodle?
Plus I am working through a list of things to get done both online and in real life.
I’m halfway through making a small table to hold my grooming tools while I work, using all sorts of odd and end bits of timber I have lying around.
My dog bath arrived and has been set up. Now I await the plumber.
I’m waiting for the wind to die down so the guys can come out and do more concreting on our building – a slab for the container to sit on, columns and a structure which will house the electricity meters.
Yes. You read that right!
I actually heard from the electric company and it took me two visits to see the guy I needed to see, who just wanted to show me the map he’d made of where they will bring in the power.
I said “That’s fine”.
He said “Get your construction crew to build a spot for the meters.”
I said “Sure” and it was done. Only took getting up at 6.30am two days…
I also got a call from the water authority!
Wonders will never cease.
This was trickier.
I was told that the closest route to get water into our property was through one of the 3 neighbouring houses above our land. So I have to find out who they are and knock on their doors to see if any one of them will give the water company permission to put pipes through their land…
This is Greece.
How likely is it?
I don’t know.
As for the road access… I’m still on that, but I’m told I will most likely need a solicitor to locate the owners of the other properties who would benefit from opening that section of road. No way I can find the owners on my own… and the neighbour who said she will fight the issue with me can’t find her contracts… which would mean I’m requesting a road on my own.
How likely do you think the council is to do this if me and my brother are the only ones asking?
You do know that you can’t create without making a mess, right? So why bother cleaning if you’re going to just make another mess?
At least that’s my philosophy in life.
My house is my art studio, a place to pile stuff, where I groom dogs, where I make stuff or paint stuff and, sometimes, where I actually make art…
This little 50m2 apartment has to fit all that in it.
As a result, I can’t see my kitchen table top for months at a time. When I want to cook I have to clear crafts, paint and occasionally tools off the kitchen bench and stove top.
In summer, since I don’t really have time to do much other than groom, I usually keep the house tidier. Soon as I get busier with grooming, I pack away all the paint tubes, varnish spray cans, the sewing machine, the unfinished works of art, and clean the house. Once almost everything but the daily living stuff is put away, its easy to clean.
I just run a broom or a vacuum cleaner over the floor, mop it, and voila. Its pretty much done.
But its too early in the year for that, so for now I only sweep or mop when it gets embarrassingly bad, or I can no longer quieten the voice my mother implanted in my head as a child which hassles me to do housework.
For the last couple of days I’ve been doing online stuff as well as building a side table for grooming. I’m using all scrap wood I’ve collected over the months, making something not so pretty but functional. It’s where I’ll put my scissors, clippers, blades, and anything I might need to reach for while grooming a dog. When its finished it will have a couple of handy hooks, get painted a pretty colour and have a cover to protect it from the weather.
Till now I’ve been using a metal trolley I found at the rubbish bins a couple of years ago. It’s missing the top but the two lower shelves are intact. I think that while I have power tools out, I’ll make a top shelf for it. So far, I’ve been spreading a clean towel over the existing middle shelf and laying my tools on that. However, now I bought a bath for the dogs, I will move that to the wet area to hold shampoos and other bath accessories. Hence the need for the patched together little bench/side table.
When it’s finished, I will share a post about it, but trust me… I am no carpenter, so I don’t bother sharing instructions or how to videos. You do not want to do things the way I do them! I just screw this to that, measure then measure again another 2-3 times, and still get it wrong sometimes, cut this or that to add as I progress along a path that is totally unplanned and for sure completely the wrong way to do things.
It works for me. I’m not fussy. I like using recycled materials and making things from scraps. I also don’t care if something looks wonky. It has character!
Well, not exactly. Not yet. I’m still in Athens. But that doesn’t mean issues haven’t already cropped up.
For one thing I realised I can’t get electricity connected to our property till we have an official road. I THINK we can get temporary power in order for construction to continue, but in order to get a regular connection we need a gate/entrance to our property where the electric company will build housing for the electricity meters… Right now all we have is permission to drive through a neighbour’s land to access ours… not a real, legal road.
Sigh.
And that’s the Paros issue I have to deal with soon as I get back.
There’s also an Athens issue.
The tenants in the upstairs apartment I finished renovating last year let me know that their electricity bill says they are being charged for a 140m2 house – which is the size of the entire upstairs, not the smaller apartment I created when I separated it into two. Turns out I had to go through a few more steps which I was unaware of in order for that to happen.
I made some calls… Apparently I need an electrician to give me a certificate for both upstairs apartments (even the one which is currently lying idle cause I have no money to fix it). I thought I’d done that, given you can’t rent a place without a certificate of some kind from an electrician, but it turns out thats a DIFFERENT certificacte. I need 2 OTHER certificates.
Once I have those, I can apply to the power company for a new meter. They will then give me a connection number (before or after they actually install a new meter?) I take that to the municipality with the certificates from the electrician, and get some paperwork from them which I have to give to the electricity provider of my choice in order to amend the size of the apartment and thus the base charge per month…
If that makes sense.
The only good news about this is that when I get the certificates, I can do the application online, and once I get the connection number I can give it to the tenant and they can chase up the rest of it. I (sincerely hope) I dont have to be in Athens to do that myself.
Its been a while since I was in Holland last…. I used to go every year when I lived in Greece, and on every trip to Greece once I moved to Australia. This is only my second trip here since I moved to Paros 5 years ago).
I have always loved Holland. The first time I went there I felt almost like I’d come home. I’ve often thought about living here but there were always reasons not to. I even applied for a job here after I’d finished high school, and planned to go to art school here, but I ended up going back to Australia where I spoke the language and could get AUSTUDY (a government payment which enabled me to support myself while I studied. Sure, I had to get a part time job as well, but it made life so much easier to have a steady fortnightly payment.)
I often wonder how different my life would have been if I’d decided to live in Holland instead, learned dutch, attended art school here, got a job at Greenpeace… The road not taken. If I had my life to live over again, I would definitely take that path.
People sometimes ask if I would do things differently if I had my life to live over. Of course I would. I’ve lived this ilife, made these mistakes. I would want to try different things, make different mistakes.
I’m really quite excited about this trip. I had planned a trip a couple of years ago but postponed it due to COVID, so this time I’m going to do the stuff I planned to do back then: visit Germany and the Christmas markets in Cologne, drink gluwein, hot chocolate and freeze my toes off.
There is nothing like a white Christmas and the markets though there is no snow and only rain, rain, rain (and some hail thrown in for a change since I got here. I doubt I’ll get the white Christmas I’m hoping for, but who knows… I would LOVE to be able to ice skate on a lake or a canal again, but its been years since there’s been enough ice over Christmas to do that I’m told…
Other than that… I was in Athens to see mom for a couple of days, and she’s well. She’ll lbe 91 in January and has had to give up driving which makes her very sad. Still, she’s healthy and her mind is intact so I am thankful every day for that.
Before leaving Paros I’d had a lot of social events to go to, which was fun, and some grooming to do. When I return in January I’ll have a tons to do, no least of which is following up with the container positioning and worrying about whether I’ll get water and power to it by summer. Ain’t looking too promising… Meanwhile the excavations have finished, and they moved on to the concreting this past week.
For now I’m happy to spend the holidays with good friends and just relax in the warmth while it rains outside.
junk4joy 