Hoppa!

I love Greek music. I do not know what it is in those old songs I specially like, because I still do not understand all the words. But Greek songs go straight to my heart. In Holland they would be called tear-jerkers but I assure you that the sound of a bouzoukia (Greek guitar-like instrument) goes deeper than the best Dutch tear-jerker song ever.

My evening is good whenever there is dancing besides the music. In Greece weddings, parties and dinners can all turn spontaneously into a big dancing party. It is more than often that the music is played so loud that there is nothing else to do than to listen to the music and to watch the dancers. I do not mind, but sometimes there are parties when it is pretty irritating that the sound is so loud that it is hard to chat with your neighbour and even impossible to talk to the person opposite you. The Greeks never seem to mind. They sing and clap enthusiastically with the music, they carefully spot all people in the party and they love to show how good they dance.

In my earlier years I was crazy with the bouzoukia. That is not only a musical instrument but it is also the name of a nightclub where Greek singers perform until early in the morning. Sometimes the people there go that wild that plates will fly over your head.

Not because there was a fight. In earlier times when you were happy because your friend danced well, or the singer was beautiful or she brought you to tears with her song, you could order a pile of plates and smash them into pieces on the dance floor. Nowadays they do it with flowers, which is less spectacular. And I miss the crackling sound of the broken pieces under the shoes.

Now I am a little older and I do not know anymore the art of getting the magic of those long and late nights at the bouzoukia. How the Greeks do it, I do not know, but for sure at one o'clock I mostly go in the direction of my bed and not to the bouzoukia. Also there is no bouzoukia place near Molyvos. The local music bar in the Harbour Street is kind of small, although a band with singers as well as a public do get in easily. They will not see their beds before four o'clock in the morning.

I did visit the music bar once and since then I intended to go there more, but until now I have not been back there. That does not matter because I have enough parties where there is music and dancing. Sometimes it even happens during dinner in a small restaurant that people start dancing in between the tables, like happened in Stipsi where we ate last week.

Some parties have a disc jockey who alternates English music and Greek music. Then plenty of people will enter the dance floor and the now so popular simultaneous dancing is nothing compared to this. The handkerchief is flying through the air and it will rain flowers on the dancers. Sometimes somebody does a breathtaking solo dance, like the groom at the last wedding we visited. He danced alone and happy around a glass of ouzo, as a last farewell to his life as a bachelor. There are times that it is the grandparents who will make the show. When they enter the dance floor it is as if they totally forgot their age and their stiff bones.

Greek dances come form the heart and not from the legs. That is why they often can be pretty touching. And sometimes they are hilarious. On the island of Samos I used to know a Yannis who with his mouth tilted a little table in the air and danced around with it. Last week we were on a Dimitri dinner party (It was Dimitris Day) and there was a man who first tried to put a glass on his head, then he stood up with a bottle on his head and finally he put a vase with flowers on his head, walked slowly to the dance floor and did a pretty amazing dance act.

I will not easily learn Greek dancing and I am sure that I will never dance with a vase of flowers on my head. For the people who do like to try this at home I have one tip: you need a bald patch on your head and before you place an object there be sure that you wet the surface of your head and the surface of the object with some spittle. I am sure you will be successful!

For the ones who like to try to dance with a table in their mouth I have no advice. I could barely believe my eyes when I saw it happen. I will not compensate for new dentures nor will I compensate for a new vase with or without flowers!

Copyright © Smitaki 2005

Strange Greeks!

Sometimes you think that Greek people have odd customs. The difference between the Greeks and other European people is not that big but there are days when you think: what strange people they are.

For example: I think it is odd that some Greeks do not immediately give a name to a newborn child. Until they are baptized all those babies have to respond to the name 'baby'!. There is already enough confusion with names in Greece because so many people have the same name. Last week we had dinner with 4 Yannis! But also to give identical names like baby to all babies, that's a little pathetic. Then, after the birth they have plenty of time to come up with an original name, but all that happens is that they fight over whose mum or dad may give their name to the new child.

Another strange habit in Greece is the soup as a dessert. This so- called Patza is a probable way of not getting a hangover. But to eat a fat soup right after a delicious meal, I never managed to do that. I prefer drinking glasses of water in between all alcohol in order to have a minimum chance of a hangover.

And then the Greeks think their priests are really saints. These papas do whatever they like, which has been proved this last year. The scandal around the papas from Petra who was not only a pimp, but also stole icons from the church and was always drunk, is just a tiny incident at the end of a long row of scandals that hit the Greek Church last year. In Greece the church and the state are still not separated and whenever a minister wants to speak about changing this, the church shamelessly makes threats to the state of Greece.

Quite a lot of Greek people do not want to eat what they do not know. Last week I gave a full bag of boletus to a friend who wanted to surprise her Greek boyfriend with a mushroom ragout. He refused to eat it and even called his parents about it. His mother yelled down the telephone that he must not eat it and even when he explained to his father which mushrooms it was, he was answered by: "they are edible, but we do not eat those mushrooms." So this guy who like a lot of Greek boys still lives with his parents, although he is in his mid forties, obeyed his parents and refused to eat the mushroom ragout.

The last time we went to the chestnut forest above Agiasos we were surprised when we thought we were being followed by a black BMW with a license plate from off the island. It is not easy to pursue someone on the quiet roads of Lesvos. There is no other traffic to hide behind and it is difficult to stay unobserved behind a car whose passengers stop in order to say hi to some turtles, who stop in order to photograph the flowering moor, who go for an hour shopping in Agiasos. So when we finally were back on the road going into the woods above the picturesque mountain village this black BMW passed us for at least the tenth time that day and then we became suspicious. Happily we managed to turn unnoticed onto one of the sandy roads leading into the forest. But even if he did want to follow our Sunny Nissan, he for sure would have destroyed his car's spoiler.

We knew for sure that we were being followed when we came back from a two hours walk and saw the black BMW waiting for us down at the main road. I even panicked a little and we decided not to gather chestnuts and skip the picnic we planned to have under the brightly coloured giant trees. It was the first time I was not so happy about the fact that we were in a wood that was deserted. Who knows what crazy person was in that car! Again we were lucky because we've started to know the roads around Agiasos and we could sneak unnoticed again onto another sandy road. But then we did not stop and drove over Olympos straight home. Our day was spoiled.

Coming home we talked about our adventure with some friends. They thought it might be secret police from Athens. At the moment there seem to be hidden weed gardens somewhere around Agiasos and so some secret agents are sent to the island to follow people at random and discover where the secret fields are. Any sane people knowing the vast network of sandy roads should know that when you really want to go everywhere on this island, you do not drive a BMW! You just have to watch a James Bond movie in order to know that a car in pursuit should be prepared for everything. And this in the time of those huge 4-wheeldrives! Well, we did not spot any black BMW in Eftalou. The only suspicious thing is a pretty big ship floating in the sea, not going anywhere. But that one cannot follow us because it seems that he got stuck on a big rock in the middle of the sea. We were also not followed going to the supermarket. And I hope that we will never be followed again. But still: what strange Greeks there are!

Copyright © Smitaki 2005

See, the pelicans are falling

The most clear sign of autumn here on Lesvos is not the falling leaves, but the nets which are spread under the olive trees. Of course you do have falling leaves on the island, but a lot less than in the more northern countries. This island has a lot of evergreen trees. The olive trees, the orange and lemon trees, the fir trees, they all stay green. It is only the earth underneath which gets black from the nets.

When you count all the olives in the trees it looks like it is going to be a good olive year. The olives already start colouring from green to purple to black. The strong northeastern wind which tried for a week to cool off the island makes that many olives fall into the nets.

But that is not all that is falling on the island. Pelicans also fall. Well, they do not just tumble out of the sky, although some of them literary fall down in the meaning that they do not survive their journey.

Last weekend we enjoyed a marvellous meal at the beach of Avlaki. On the deep blue sea some small fishing boats floated up and down, as well as a young brown pelican who was admiring the island and later on set out for the beach to have a little nap.

I was a little surprised because there are only two pelicans known on the island. One in Skala Kaloni and the big Maki who shuttles between Perama and Skala Loutra. The one in Skala Kaloni is a widower, his partner died in an accident some years ago. Stupid, because how can you drive into such a big bird... (*)

Two birds can make small ones, that I do know. With one of the parents in Skala Kaloni and the other in Perama, what does the youngster do in Avlaki... I was not thinking clearly enough, because birds can fly and pelicans can even swim. And autumn means as well: the migration of the birds.

After our lunch we decided to take a better look of the pelican. But the bird was gone. We could not find him anymore. The only thing we did find on the beach was another young pelican, but that one was as dead as a door-nail. His beak was gone and for sure he died a long time ago.

When we came home I phoned the Wildlife Hospital in Agia Paraskevi in order to inform them what we saw and to ask if they knew more. Joris was a little panicky because he just heard that in Turkey there was a probable outbreak of the bird flu. 250 km southwest from Istanbul, which is pretty close to our island. Earlier this week Joris picked up a pelican from Anaxos beach. The bird was really ill and did not survive many days. Did the pelican have the bird flu? And would Joris be contaminated?

Joris probably paid for it with a sleeplessness night. The next morning he phoned all his colleague veterinarians and finally there was only one conclusion: the young pelican which died in Agia Paraskevi did not die from the bird flu.

We all got a little scared. Especially Joris. Besides the risk of a deadly flu for humans it must be horrible that so many birds must get killed just for prevention. And how can you protect a bird island like Lesvos? The migration in the autumn is not that famous, but the migration in the spring means that thousands of birdwatchers come to the island. Is it possible to shoot all those flying and migrating birds?

Today Joris was called out again to pick up a pelican. This time it was found in Skala Sykaminia. It had big holes, which looked like there was somebody who did not like him. I presume that when Joris makes his monthly report for his site on the internet, he will describe it with his usual strong words.(*)

In these precarious times there is only one thing left: keep your fingers crossed or pray and burn a candle in one of the many chapels in order to please the Greek gods. The bird flu on Lesvos could become a real danger because of all the migrating birds coming from Turkey and Russia. We should keep our eyes open. That is why again I give here the website of the Wildlife Hospital. When you notice anything unusual, please contact them or a local veterinary surgeon.

(*) News about the pelicans from Joris (Wildlife Hospital): The Pelican in Skala Kalonis is a young bird (female) which we delivered THIS year ourselves, after she recovered from shot-wounds and now misses one wing. So this is NOT the last bird (who was found dead last year) and who was AS WELL a female (who got a male name, well, we are on Lesvos here!!) Concerning the pelican from Skala Sykaminia: the holes in the bird will not say that those are due to human practice. We are also known with crashes into trees what can cause the same injuries. And by the way, there was a whole 'bunch' of pelicans seen nearby Skala Polichnitos. It was a Dutch man reporting this from Lisvori.

Copyright © Smitaki 2005

Tzeli Katzidimitriou

Last week I met Tzeli Katzidimitriou, a writer and photographer from Lesvos. It was an exceptional meeting because this Greek woman was so open minded that in ten minutes I had the feeling I was talking to a friend I already knew for years. Tzeli was very busy because she had to travel from one part of the island to the other part, from Eftalou, Petra to Eresos to meet people for her work. She is working on a book on Lesvos and that does not progress as quickly as she wants because at many points she has to make choices about what she will write about and what not. When you know the island as well as Tzeli does, it is difficult to know what is interesting for people who do not know the island.

It will not be the first book Tzeli gets published about Lesvos, although it will be her first written book about the island. Two books already published by her might be known by visitors to Lesvos: '39 Coffee Houses and a Barber's shop' and 'Sacred Water, The Mineral Springs of Lesvos', which are two tasteful photo books about kafenions and a barbershop on Lesvos and about the hot springs of Lesvos.

The photographs are taken with a strong feeling for colour, composition and especially with warm feelings. Tzeli presents a piece of the timeless life of the island. Who does not know the small coffee houses on the island? There is no village without a kafenion and for a lot of Greeks there is no life without a kafenion. For many old men these coffee houses are like a living room. They love to sit whole days long on the front step in order to see the village life passing by, commenting on it and feeling their life fading into eternity.

Kafenions are coffee houses and no place to booze, although that may pass once in a while because of course you can get ouzo there. A kafenion is a common living room where you can dwell for hours with one drink, where commentating on the television programs is a national sport, where you can take all your time to spell out the papers, where politics are discussed with the other villagers but where first of all you can get all the hot gossip about the village.

Tzeli did not photograph the usual clients, but she immortalized the interiors of many old kafenion. Maybe at first sight these drinking quarters all look the same from the outside, on the inside you will see that all of them have their own characters.

They have sparkling blue, rose or other bright colors. They have walls full of old fading pictures of family or old Greek historical people. Some walls have shelves full of bottles from exotic brands. They have wooden counters which look like Turkish doors or showcases with articles that are not touched for ages. Their tables can have fine embroidery or just have funny plastic cloths. As well as some barbershops which can look like small museums.

Lesvos is known for its' ouzo, not for its' kafenions. Those you will find all over Greece. Lesvos has something else which is not that typically, but certainly very special for the island. They are the hot springs you will find in several places on the island.

Do not think that these are luxurious spa-centers, or big health resorts, because in Greece still nobody got the idea to commercially exploit the hot baths. In the pictures from the photo book 'Sacred Water, The Mineral Springs of Lesvos' by Tzeli you can see how picturesque these springs still are. Some are in decline, some may not look that attractive, but they all are warm and when you have been enjoying their hot mineral water you certainly come out purified and healthy. And that is the idea of a hot bath.

Funnily enough these baths are not too popular with the islanders. Maybe that is due to the old life when going to the springs was part of the Turkish life, a life that most Greeks want to forget. So only a few Greek people take advantage of these hot springs and that is maybe why they are still not only a blessing for your physical health but also a heaven for the mind because it is always quiet and peaceful there.

Tzeli's website has the name 'odoiporikon' what means 'always on the move'. Tzeli is always travelling. She moved from the island to the big city of Athens where she made a living with photographs of modern architecture. She went abroad to Italy where she studied and she travels to countries like India, Egypt and Korea. In between she returns to her island where she gets inspiration from the quietness, the stillness and the places where time seems to have stopped.

Tzeli's photo books reveal a part of the secret life of the island and not many people notice that these are so characteristic for Lesvos. When you open her books you will immediately recognize the atmosphere, even when you do not know the kafenion or the hot spring she captured on her photographs. Tzeli's pictures are as food for the soul. Check it out on her website: http://www.odoiporikon.com

Copyright © Smitaki 2005

Peepshow

Slowly slowly Lesvos glides into the autumn. The thermometer stays below 30°C, sometimes we have rumbling clouds, a pissed off shower or some drizzling rain and for sure in the evenings it is time for a light jacket. Juicy green grass stems appear everywhere, the yellow crocus-like sternbergias come up very hesitatingly, as well as the purple cyclamen. That all means that it is time for walking.

This enchanting island is full of walking paths. We now go where we can find walnuts, blackberries and rose-hips. And that is nearly everywhere. I do not know why but I suddenly really long for the good old rose-hip marmalade. It is not definite that we will manage to produce a pot of it, because the rose-hips on the island are far smaller than they are in Holland. It is probably going to take a long time to pick them and cut them and prepare them for a marmalade.

Our latest walks go straight through the old village of Chalika (old Leptimnos), among heavy fig trees, we pass fat blue berries and still wonder about the gorgeous bunches of grapes floating high in the trees. We climb towards a country road that seems to go all the way to Vigla, the highest peak of Lepetimnos as well as the highest point of the island. A stiff climb that we still did not manage to bring to an end because the road is climbing and turning and climbing and turning and then we have to go back. I love to do walks but my condition is not that good that I will survive walks of more than two hours of just climbing up and up. On the way back my knees and calves are crying and I wish I were a hedgehog who can roll itself up into a ball and just roll down the mountain. So making these kinds of walks is hell for me. But we are just at the beginning of the walking season. Who knows, maybe one day I will reach the top of Lepetimnos...

The scenery on this walk however is one big party of stately views over the blue sea and Turkey, besides unbelievable thick and old plane trees which are bent over starting waterfalls, elegant chestnut trees full of light green prickling fruit, rampant ferns, music trees (flowering ivy that climb into the trees and give place to thousands of humming bees) and some trees we still have to identify. Like the one which is losing its rose red fruit at the moment. The fruit is smaller than prunes, bigger than cherries and nowhere in our modest collection of botanic books to be find.

The 'Chrysanthemum' tree, which I called it when I first saw one, we finally defined what it is. It is an oak tree which has soft yellow chrysanthemum-like flowers. Which actually is its' fruit bed from where an enormous acorn will emerge. That is the holly oak. I never knew that there were that many species of oaks.

For example you also have the 'Christmas oak'. This is a jolly fellow with shiny red and yellow balls, but he is pretty dangerous. Those Christmas ball look-alikes are gall apples or nests for the gall wasp. It seems that every oak can become a Christmas Oak because the gall wasp does not care if he is delivering his little ones in a holly oak, a cork oak or an American oak, although he seems to prefer the summer oak.

So, you meet some animals as well on the way (however the little wasps are hidden safe and sound in their Christmas balls). Besides birds the small game you meet on the island consists mainly of light- footed squirrels who hop and skip away when they spot you.

Maybe to compensate for those rare small game animals last week we got a special show from two tortoises. Thanks to the still hot weather they performed in a peepshow. To gather the public the small male with his shield rammed the bigger female and then took his position on her behind. He started miauling and sang his song. That he really gave everything he had you could see as his tongue hung far out of his mouth. And the further it went the more he had to gasp. Anyhow, my ears got red from hearing them. The peep of the show was difficult to see. I suppose that the male has a sting-like member that he has to put under the shield of the female. And what is there to be seen, I'm afraid, will always be kept hidden under the skirts of the mother.

Copyright © Smitaki 2005

Fish and snails with balls

Last week I wrote about the most popular fish you can find here in the restaurants. There is another fish that gets photographed a lot, but you will not find it in a regular restaurant; the rofos which is actually a grouper. This monster from the sea can grow far more than 1 metre and I really do hope you never catch it with a fishing-rod, otherwise you will have nothing left to fish with.

Swimmers who do not like fish do not have to be afraid of a confrontation with this fish because it likes to dwell over a muddy and deep sea floor. It is one of the favorites for game fishers, who dive from a boat into the water in the middle of the sea, armed with a harpoon. When you do some surfing on the internet in order to find out something about this big fellow, you will find triumphant photographs of fishermen posing proudly next to a rofos. Sometimes the fish is as big as the fisherman himself (a small fisherman can be as big as a large rofos).

Last weekend our neighbour Zina from Mytilini came with just such a whopper to Eftalou. It was a pretty one being more than half a metre. Her son Antonis, who is a game fisher, caught it and gave it to Zina to bring it to the lunch what is given each Sunday by Yannis and Marianthis. Normally all neighbours and their guests who are in Eftalou are invited.

Yannis and Marianthis have an old brick kiln here on the land. You light a fire in it, let it burn in order to heat the kiln, then you empty the kiln, put food in it and close it so that the food can cook. A stuffed lamb needs an entire night to cook there, the big grouper was more modest and needed only two hours to get ready. It was prepared with some herbs, tomatoes, a courgette and a smaller fish and I do not lie when I say that it was the best fish I ever tasted.

The Greeks, especially on the islands, eat what is around. Sometimes I miss my supermarket in Amsterdam, but mostly not. The food you get served here is fair and very fresh, and there are things you will never find in my Dutch supermarket. Because of this way of eating, some meals can be pretty surprising. So when there are snails around, a grouper and some sheep balls, they are all served together in one meal.

I know now that a lot of people start to shiver at the thought, but I started my lunch on Sunday with sheep balls, a delicacy for those who like organ meat. Just like a rofos you will not find those vital parts on any menu. When slaughtering a sheep the farmer mostly keeps the balls for himself. Just like the sweetbread. Sheep balls have a soft taste in between sweetbread and chicken meat. In Greece they are a beloved mezès, they have become one of my favorites as well.

Last Thursday night it rained a little and on Friday we got a heavy tropical rainfall what came pretty quick over the sea from Turkey. There were buckets of water emptied, many people were taken by surprise and got totally wet and also many a house did not keep dry. After 10 minutes the sky was as blue as it was before. We had to mop the water and find our way through the mud, otherwise you would have thought that nothing happened.

Rain in September means snails. They come out of hiding (not out of their houses!) where they have tried to survive the dry season. They feast upon the rain, like we in our turn feast upon the snails. The Greek kitchen has a different way from the French of preparing snails: for a few days they are put into flour where they clean themselves and then they are prepared with onions, quinces and some tomatoes. It is a very fine recipe and the French with their garlic snails really should try this way of preparation.

So that was my second dish of that Sunday lunch. Where after came the divine rofos. All these plates are wonderful with a glass of ouzo. I do not know how many I drunk, but I do know that I ate quite a lot. And that after this meal fit for a king I needed at least 2 hours of sleeping in my hammock to recover.

Copyright © Smitaki 2005

Here come the fishermen

Finally the big mass of tourists has gone. The island is recovering in the still warm weather, but at sea it gets busy. Medium sized fishing boats go back and forth and you ask yourself if there is anything left to fish because there are so many boats. Lesvos itself does not have a very large fishing-fleet. It is again the people from the cities that bring the turmoil: fishermen from Athens and Thessaloniki come here to fill their boats with palamidas which come in big shoals to the waters of Lesvos in this season.

In whichever restaurant you go to near the big fishing harbours like Plomari, Mytilini, Molyvos or Petra, you will find palamidas. In the months of July and August you can be sure to get sardines, of which the most famous are fished out of the Gulf of Kaloni. September seems to become the Month of the Palamida, although you still find some lost sardines, like my favourite dish sardelles pastès (salted sardines which taste a little like the famous Dutch Herring) which is a perfect side dish to eat with a palamida.

In Molyvos and Petra it is difficult to buy fish because there is no fish shop. You need to keep your ears open to hear where the mobile fish shop is and then you have to take a run to it because you never know if he will continue to drive because there are not enough customers. Or you have to keep your eyes open in order to see the fishing boats coming back into the harbours.

In Petra the fishermen stop at the little jetty in the centre where you can buy whatever they've caught. Then for sure there will be a disturbance with wild gesticulating Greeks and pushing women who all shout for the best fish. In Molyvos harbour you will find the same scene, but in the winter there also come big fishing boats at night which bring part of their catch to the very small fish auction where you can shop in a more relaxed way. The other part of their catch is driven to Mytilini at crazy speed to fill up the shops.

It is not easy to know all the names of the fish here. When you want to eat fish and the owner of the restaurant pulls you into his business in order to show you what he's got for that day, the fish will stare at you and seem to say: I've been already so stupid being caught, so it does not matter if you choose me. Most of the times I have no idea what fish they are. The man of the restaurant will help you by saying their names, but that is in Greek so you still do not have a clue.

The sardines (sardelles) do not need any explanation of how they look. The smaller fish are marides, small anchovies which get fried and are eaten with the head and tail. Gavros are other anchovies, but bigger than the sardines. They get a little red when fried. There are some kinds of bream which are silver, flat and of average size, but do not ask me their name, they have several. A popular fish is the barbouni what is a red mullet and that one is easy to recognize because of its red color. Mackerel (skumpri) are regularly found and sometimes you will even find swordfish (xiphios). And then there are palamidas.

It took some time to find out what palamidas are. But I found it: they are bonitos, which are part of the tuna family. They look a little bit like a mackerel, the same size, but they have juicy white flesh and they are a pure sensation, especially after two months of eating sardines.

The research however resulted in another interesting find. Palamides (one letter different from the fish) was a hero from the Trojan War. He was buried on the (nowadays) highest mountain in Lesvos, Lepetimnos. Troy is opposite the north of Lesvos, just around the corner in Turkey and according to the writing of Homer it was Achileas and Aeas who buried this Greek hero. When the beautiful Helena of Sparta, wife of Menaleus, got abducted by Paris of Troy he took her to his hometown and married her. All previous lovers of Helena were summoned to fight against Troy. Amidst them was Palamides, a son of Poseidon. He found out that Odysseus was pretending to be ill because he did not want to go to the war and that is about all the feat of arms I could discover about this Palamides. Except, according to some writings on the internet, that he might be the inventor of letters and numbers.

In the Iliad of Homer there is the extensive story of the Trojan War with all the Greek Gods and big heroes. A lot of people think that this Trojan war is one of the many mythical tales from Greek Antiquity. But recent archeological finds in nowadays Troy prove that in the times of Homer's Iliad there was an extended war going on and that around 1200 BC Troy was that big that it was worth a big war. So scientists now speculate that the Iliad of Homer is not just a fantasy tale but based on historical memory.

While eating a palamida, I can look over the sea and the Turkish coast where once Homers heroes went by. I look at a mountain where once there was a temple dedicated to Apollo, where the observatory of the astrologer Matriketas was and where a real hero got his grave. All ingredients for an even more divine taste to that fish...

Copyright © Smitaki 2005