Homesick

Hereby I offer my excuses to my hosts at whose table I had marvellous dinners around the Christmas days. They awfully spoiled me and my friends. So I do not want to seem ungrateful, but sometimes I do miss some things.

I sometimes do miss a five courses dinner which takes a whole evening. To start with a festive salad draped with nuts, paté or fish or caviar or mushrooms. This starter will be followed by a creamy soup or a hot apple soup, cooled off with a spoom (fruity ice with champagne). As a main dish I would love game with mashed potatoes, green peas and cranberries. For dessert a chocolate mousse, followed by some French cheese. And at last a tangerine. This all accompanied by white or red wine, some champagne for the dessert and a glass of ruby red port going with the cheeses. Well, those good old Christmas dinners... The Greeks can cook pretty well, although they are everything except culinary adventurers.

Lesvos is pretty different during Christmas from the Netherlands. Outside they get the more and more lighted Rudolphs, Father Christmases and snowmen and Christmas balls, on the inside, besides a few fake Christmas trees (the real nice smelling fir tree does not exist on the island) it is quiet another Christmas. They do not know the excellent Christmas chocolate candy, the chocolate balls for on the tree, or a 'büche de Noël'. Of course they do bake cookies and cakes for the event, and although they are very tasty, they do not differ from any other festivity cookie.

In the Orthodox Church the midnight mass is for Easter and is not celebrated with Christmas. Yes, there starts a mass at 5 o'clock in the morning, a time that all Christmas lovers will surely be sleeping already. Baby Jesus is probably not born here in Greece, so they do not know the afternoon mass for rocking the baby Jesus and especially they do not know the nightly Christmas breakfast.

On Christmas Eve you will find pretty strange Christmas shows on television with a lot of music, frivolous hostesses and a plate throwing public. I am sure that during that holy night most people on the island do not move one inch from their telly screens.

Instead of Christmas breakfast with sausage-rolls and Christmas bread with almond paste, the Greek after 12 AM all go straight to the Christmas dinner, which will be lunch. Fasting will be soon, so they all eat mountains of meat. No 3, 4 or 5 courses, they will just serve their ordinary dinners with a lot of meat as the only exception.

The typical Christmas dish is pork with celery. A fair and healthy dish which is not spoiled by any cream or alcohol. In most families they serve this together with turkey and beef. The meat is accompanied by the usual side dishes like tarama salad, marouli salad, hot cheese, pasta or potatoes and so on.

The Greeks never are good with desserts, no exception for Christmas. You will seldom see a good pudding, a chocolate mousse, a fruit crème or ice as an after dish. Here they serve cookies, cake or fruit. That is to say, without cream, of course.

So for a real Christmas dinner do not come to Greece, even if the cook is giving everything to serve all food as best as he can. And although you do not hear me complaining about Greek food, the thing that is missing in the Greek kitchen is some variation. Even with weddings and other big festivities, the food will always remain very traditional.

The New Year traditions are also pretty boring on this island. They do not know oil-dumplings and apple turnovers like in Holland, no oysters like in France, nor a smashing firework at midnight. The only tradition is the famous Twelfthnight cake (vasilopita) with the piece of money in it for the lucky finder, which they eat after the meal.

When we had dinner some weeks ago with some friends who were ready to leave for Berlin, I got a little homesick. I could see the busy and bright lighted Berlin streets, I remembered the fantastic shop windows in New York where I spent some Christmases, I could smell the Christmas trees which are sold on every street corner of Paris until late on Christmas Eve, I imagined masses of people crossing the canals of Amsterdam rushing to the shops in order to get everything in time for their Christmas dinner. To be honest, I really got a Christmas dip.

I again became homesick when most of Europe got covered by a nice blanket of snow. I already was so happy with the few white spots on the Lepetimnos (highest mountain of Lesvos). Layers of snow on the canals of Amsterdam are however much more special. With pain in the heart I watched the fairy tale like images on the television. People cleaning their doorsteps with lots of snow, children sledding, traditional snowmen, they all made me nearly weep. Around Christmas on Lesvos it was icy cold and as grey as a mouse.

In Holland we say: the one who has the last laugh has the best. Everything was forgotten thanks to the beautiful day on the 1st of January. A very blue sky and a warm sun announced the spring on Lesvos. Almond blossoms opened their rose-white petals, the anemones, who had try outs far before the New Year, opened as well their flowers to wish the world a happy New year. So, in whatever nice snow jacket Europe may be enveloped, where on New Years Day can you have breakfast in the sun, smell the magic scent of the daffodils and see the lambs jumping in the sunrays? It will quickly make you forget your missed fireworks and your being homesick as well.

My Christmas dip, which only took just a very short time thanks to a friend from Holland who spoiled us not only by being there but also with a huge amount of Christmas candy, disappeared as snow in the sun. As long as we have those beautiful days I do not need to go back to a snowy Holland with all it's 5-course Christmas dinners. For me the New Year started excellent and next Christmas I will do my own cooking.

Copyright © Smitaki 2006

Murder

I'm not that quickly scared, and especially not on this island. It might happen that your pile of wood gets stolen, two years ago at restaurant Anatoli some of those huge red clay urns disappeared, some weeks ago a bicycle was stolen in Petra and last winter in Petra a clothing shop was robbed in the night and the income of a sales weekend disappeared into thin air.

In the summer you have to be more careful because not all tourists come for the same reasons. But in general there is not that much crime here on the island. You never hear about a stolen car and we are always pretty amused at seeing people going on safari, climbing out of their jeep and locking it. First of all there's mostly nobody around to steal the car and secondly where would they hide with a stolen car? No way coming off the island. Also theft from a car is not known here.

All villages on the island are small communities and when something happens, within no time everybody will be informed through the tam tam. Last week again Lesvos was in the news on the national television. Not because we had some fantastic warm days, or another mud stream that overflowed Kaloni, this time it was a woman who went missing. The days that she was not found were kind of creepy.

The 31-years old Anastassia Hadzidiakou had the small gambling shop in Molyvos. There you could place your bets, buy lottery tickets and whatever you wanted to gamble on. There is pretty much compulsive gambling going on on this island. Sunday night, the 11th of December, she had a meeting with a 24-years old customer who owed her 14,000 euro. That is quite some money that you will not earn that fast picking olives. She received the money and was on her way back, she told her fiancée who was waiting for her in Petra. And then nobody heard from her or saw her again. This was the first gossip of the story going all around the island on Monday.

Lots of citizens and police searched around Lepetimnos for her and her car, both seemed to have disappeared from the earth. Planes and helicopters flew on and off, police cars were driving at high speed to and fro along the roads. Wild speculations about what could have happened were running fast. Did the boy who owed her money set her up, did she have a secret lover with whom she went partying, some bad mouths even thought her fiancée had something to do with her disappearance. The North of the island was pretty much in commotion. Whoever you met, first question was always: is there something new about Anastassia.

On Tuesday most people agreed that she probably was not anymore alive. Police from Athens flew over and a big search was set up. They found out something irregular: The boy who was to give Anastassia her money lied. Anastassia was seen driving through Stipsi, so their appointment was not in Vafios. To the fiancee of Anastassia who phoned in order to ask where she was, he said that she forgot her telephone in his car and this was a lie too. He was severely questioned and he admitted to the murder... It took until Wednesday night that they found the body and her car...

They probably had a fight over a bet that he placed on the same day. Because he owed her money Anastassia did not place the bet. A pity because otherwise maybe nothing would have happened because then the boy would have gained a lot of money. He had just a little knife on him and that might be why he stabbed her over 40 times. He threw her in his car, drove to Lepetimnos where he threw her in a small drinking pool for the sheep. It is said that she still lived for another 4 hours... He hid her car under a tree on the way from Clio to Tsonia.

It is a real horror story, also because so many people knew her and the places where it all happened. Monday and Tuesday did not feel good on the island. What could have happened and was there a murderer going around? Just like last year when 3 young boys got killed in an accident, this was the talk of the day for the whole week.

We recently asked a friend who is a lawyer on the island what cases he got. No murder cases, he answered, because a murder only happens once in 10 years on the island. However, this was the second murder of this year. Last March a man was arrested because the remains of a friend were found in his fireplace. He blamed his wife for the killing because she was jealous of the girl friend.

Since the temperature dropped this night the Leptimnos towers white above the woodlands as if on its slopes the horrible things never happened. Even this paradise-like island knows it's murders for passion and it's killings for money. It is not a peaceful story about the island I am telling you just before Christmas. However, I do wish you all a very merry Christmas from an ice cold Lesvos.

Copyright © Smitaki 2005

Tulips from Amsterdam

What a strange subject, you will think. Tulips in the midst of December. Well, I was looking that dumbfounded when I was planting tulips in our garden and discovered daffodils on the verge of blossoming. With Christmas we will have Christmas daffodils!

For my birthday I got a large packet of various flower bulbs. In fact I only asked for tulips from Amsterdam. The giver did not realize that crocus, iris, anemones and daffodils all grow in abundance on the island. I was happy to be able to put a lot of merry coloured crocus in the ground. The autumnal crocus just disappeared and for spring here they do not know any crocus.

The bright yellow daffodils from Holland got a place just next to their Greek fellows, the pale yellow daffodils. When they hurry up I will have for months at a row blossoming daffodils. However I hesitated planting the anemones. In a few weeks these flowers will be colouring our landscape, the first anemones last winter were out on the 1st of January. To put cultivated anemones near their wild sisters... The same thoughts were for the iris. In a little bit of time there will be plenty of them all around.

I was pretty happy with the snowdrops. As far as I know they do not exist in the Lesvian nature. Well, that is a pity because these white fragile flower heads bungling from a green tiny stem might be the most prettiest harbinger of spring. I really do hope that they will not get mixed up by our strange weather. A few days it was cold, these last days the sun shone away the chilly northern wind and today it is lovely and warm. However, when those small white beauties like it here and multiply, know that when you will discover them here in some ten years they originally came from Amsterdam.

The flower bulbs coming for sure from this region are the tulips. In the 16th century the famous tulips from Amsterdam were imported from Turkey (Lesvos in that time was under Turkish rule). In the midst of the 17th century there was even a 'Tulpo mania' in Holland: the bulbs were precious merchandise, they were subject of speculation and crazy prices got paid for them. One man once changed 2 loads of grain, 35 litres of beer, 2 loads of rye, 1500 kilo of butter, 4 fat oxes, 500 kilo of cheese, 12 big sheep, 1 silver cup, 5000 litre of wine and one pack of fabric against one tulip bulb! When this craziness was over like with a crash on the stock market many Dutchmen went broke. Now nobody speaks anymore of Turkish tulips. The Dutch took over the commerce and got world famous for it.

Some books say that there are tulips here in the Lesvian nature. For sure they are on the island of Chios. But I did not find them. Where is the tulip hiding on this island?

Lesvos is not famous for its spring flowers nor for it's cyclamen which make the autumnal landscape so pretty. Lesvos is famous for its olives and at this moment you can learn everything about this harvest. Everywhere you hear the sound of the click-clacking of the sticks against the trees, the chatter of the women picking the olives from the ground, the panting of the men carrying the loaded sacks to the cars, the mount of olives growing by day at the Olive Presses.

It is a good year for the olives. Thanks to the bad harvests in Spain and Italy the Greeks get a good price for a kilo of olive oil (In Greece they do not know litres but all is calculated in kilos) and the trees are just loaded with dark blue black olives. So many an olive farmer can bring in workers. And these days even labourers are well paid: 30 euro a day. Which makes everybody happy. Even the weather seems to cooperate. It looks like spring here on the island. And that is what the daffodils thought as well.

Copyright © Smitaki 2005

The Flood

I already said it last week: the southern wind was coming and that often brings rain. And warmth. Last Monday we had a night of -2°C, this Monday the quicksilver went up to 20°C. Summer! And this warmth we really needed, because this time the rain was a little too much.

Holland, Germany, Belgium and England got a bad surprise with the cold, storm and snow. Greece, and especially Lesvos, was tortured with rain. It rained and it rained, one full day, two full days and the third day the rain did not yet seem to stop. And now I am not talking about some drizzle or light rain, but without end it rained cats and dogs.

Masses of water fell down. The first days it meant that we stayed inside. It was not cold, the animals all had a roof where they could shelter and anyhow rain was good for the plants. The third day however we felt annoyed not to be able to go out without getting thoroughly wet. And then the messages from the outside world started coming in: The road to Petra was flooded, Mytilini full of water, Kaloni flooded...

When we went for lunch in the afternoon to Anatoli, we could see it with our own eyes on the national television where Lesvos, among some other places in Greece was hot news. The quays of Mytilini looked like one wide river estuary, brown water everywhere flowing into the sea. Kaloni was worse. A brown mass of mud entered houses and shops, in some places 1 metre high! Children panicked when the water invaded their school. They had to take refugee on the first floor. A lot of people got surprised by the rising water.

In the afternoon when on the island the state of emergency became a fact, the rain slowed down and we could drive to Petra. Merry waterfalls dropped down from the mountains and several mud streams still used the road to go down. The Bay of Molyvos as well as that of Petra was coloured brown from the mud and had branches, trees and other stuff all floating around. The harbour of Petra looked like a Tsunami had passed, so many things floated on the water. As well as in Mandamados, in Petra several houses got flooded.

You probably know the sight in Lesvos of all those dry rivers in the summer. Sometimes it is hard to imagine that there will be water streaming through. In the winter there always crawls some water. The masses who sought a way through those rivers this last Friday were probably never seen. The wide river after Kaloni in the direction of Mytilini swole that much that it occupied the main road most of the day and no traffic was possible from or to the capital.

I always wondered why Kaloni had this wide high street in the direction of Skala Kaloni. Now I know why it is such a royal road: they built it above a river. This river could not handle all the water and came up. Not only houses and shops but also many pieces of land got flooded.

Molyvos and Eftalou were lucky. Only some land got flooded and the road next to the bus stop at the school was for some hours under water. The lovely small river next to the road to Vafios became a wild roaring river which overflowed the road as well sometimes.

Now the sun is out again, the temperatures have risen like in summer, mushrooms shoot out of the earth and the people are resettling themselves. In Kaloni and Petra complete furniture, clothing and carpets are sunbathing outside. People clean and scrub, they are not in a good mood.

The day after the flood we took a walk to Molywood, the green part of Molyvos under the Donkey Station where it is full of olive groves. There we could see how the water had behaved. From the mud banks we had to wade through, you could see that only a small river came out of its bed at least 1.5 metres higher. Many roads are damaged or destroyed, many crops on land drowned. No, this winter rain we waited so long for did not make anybody happy.

Copyright © Smitaki 2005

The Living Room of the Mayor

Just like in the rest of Europe winter has arrived in Greece. In the north of the country a thick layer of snow fell and the thermometer descended pretty much under 0°C. On Lesvos the Lepetimnos is sprinkled white with snow. You guessed it: very unusual for the time of year.

Before the thermometer reached -2°C this Monday morning we had some days with rain, which was needed badly on the island. Everything was too dry. Although not everybody was happy with the rain. The olive harvest this year started quite early and it had just started a few days when the heavens opened and the rain came down. That meant that most people could stay home, olives are not harvested when it is raining.

So it was a good opportunity to go to the bars. Which are only a few to go to, in the winter in Molyvos. One of the best at the moment is the Bar from the Mayor: Paradosiako, also named the Kafenion or the Living Room of the Mayor.

Molyvos has a mayor who needs only a little bit of sleep. That's why he prefers to hang out in the bars until very late. You can say what you want about this, but early in the morning he gets up fresh to do his work. So we cannot say anything about him being a barfly.

Two years ago he used to spend his nights at the Brasserie, which was a nightmare for the owners because when the mayor arrived at one o'clock it meant for them that they could not close before three o'clock even though the mayor was their only customer. Since last year the mayor found a solution for this: he opened his own bar.

With that he handled two problems. In all other villages you fall over all the kafenions - you know, those locals brightly lit by fluorescent lamps. However, in Molyvos there were none although each village should have one. It is the hang out place for the elderly people who pay half price for a drink there.

So the mayor opened a kafenion and got a brand new living room. Paradosiako does not really look like a traditional Greek coffee house, even though it's name means traditional. Instead of white walls and bright lights there is cozy light and the walls are painted light orange and pale yellow. The whole place is furnished in a way that looks like a nice family room.

So each night you can find the mayor in Paradosiako, together with a lot of villagers who look like one big family. Thanks to the cultural artifacts on the wall, the brown wood and the large balcony you can imagine yourself in a Swiss chalet. Except that for the rest everything is really Greek.

I do not know how the Greeks design the interior of their bars, but it seems that they are not that smart in doing it. Like in the brand new restaurant of Babis, the sound installation is posed on a huge refrigerator. So when you want to put on the music you have to take a chair, put it against the refrigerator and climb on the chair in order to put on the music.

When you have demanding clients who every 5 minutes want other music, that means that every 5 minutes you have to take a chair, put it against the refrigerator, climb on the chair, change a CD, climb down and put back the chair. Seeing this happening at least ten times in a row it is like you are watching a slapstick movie.

The restaurant Sykamnia of Vangelis in Skala Sykaminia is not that new but it has it's ice and coffee machine placed somewhere at the other side of the street. This means that Vangelis or his brother are always seen running up and down the street with cups of coffee or bowls with ice.

Also the new Living Room of the mayor is not very smartly designed. The refrigerator with the cool drinks is placed against the wall opposite the bar. Before that refrigerator is a table. Because the Living Room of the mayor is not that big there are always people sitting at that table. In the winter it is even the game table for the card-players. Playing cards is the favourite winter occupation for the people here. So the guests at this table are not able to have a quiet game because every now and then they are summoned to get something out of the fridge. This means that when an exciting game is going on you are even afraid to ask for a new bottle of retsina!

But I must say, it is a way not to drink too much and besides that there is often good live music to distract you. And then the mayor dances, or his wife. So you see, the mayor of Molyvos day and night really takes care of his villagers...

Copyright © Smitaki 2005

Getting lost on Lesvos

Yes, we finally did it! We managed to do a walk described by Brian and Eileen Anderson without getting lost. This English couple has published about 28 walks in the book 'Lesvos, car tours and walks' published by Sunflower Books. The walks are breathtaking, but the directions are pretty badly described, or very badly translated.

When I have to choose a walk from the book I always look at the time they give for a walk. I start to know the Andersons. It is as if they have wings because they fly over the walking paths as a fly smelling food. However we walk, we always need double time.

It is true that in the walking world, people do mend their pace. We do have friends who are alike. They walk like they have to finish a skating marathon. If you do not stop them, they will not look at anything and they pass at high speed all beautiful purple cyclamens, terrific views, nice shaped trees and beautiful landscapes.

You can say it in reverse as well. We cannot walk without stopping at superb views, we have to take a picture of a flower or a tree, we cannot pass a wild apple without looking for more or we have to stop to define a mushroom in order to pick it or not. For us walking is not making kilometres, but to get surprised by the always changing landscapes.

I have to admit that I often also have to stop the gang because I have to recover from a steep climb. For a Dutch woman coming from the Flat Countries the mountainous island sometimes gets me in trouble. Although my condition each year becomes better and better. I am getting used to climb over the mountains. In my first years I got tired just seeing a mountain where the path would pass over. Now I walk as if nothing matters.

Last week we did the winning walk, I mean the walk where we did not get lost, the part we took a wrong direction in Loutrópoli Thermi I will not count. So I can criticize those walks, but I have to admit that each walk surprises us with a new part of the island. Walk number 3 is a walk about Thermi by Panagia. It starts at the beach and then it continues through a residential area, pretty chic. The sandy paths go past big houses and gardens to match. I was most surprised by the Tower Houses, some renovated, some in ruin. These are old country houses where in the past century the rich of Mytilini passed their days in the country. The area is full of olive trees, as well as orange, lemon and mandarine trees. A shadowy land with impressive views of the always blue sea.

Especially these months the coloured leaves of the huge planes which are bent over very old churches form enchanting autumnal pictures. The endless gardens are silent witnesses of a past wealth. It was a nice change to do a walk through surroundings made by humans.

You did not get that impression from walk number 12 that we did today: Agias Anargyri, Asomatos and back again. There you walked over centuries old footpaths, where time seems to have stopped and where thousands of old olive trees are backed up by walls as old as the trees. The whole looked that natural that you forgot that those walls who make half a circle around the tree are built by human hands, as well as the old footpaths which have to be made by somebody.

Now they are fantastic walking paths, the narrow monopathis who give space for only one donkey and the kalderimis which are much broader, say for three donkeys abreast. Once these were the high roads of the island. They say that when you break up an asphalt road for sure you will find an old kalderimi, they are the perfect foundation for the modern roads.

Walk number 12 started at the picnic area of the little church of Agias Anargyri, where it rained leaves from the huge planes, where the autumnal colours and the gurgling of little water streams meant that you immediately fell in love with the spot. But we were there to take a walk and the start already was a problem. In what direction we had to start? The walking guide of the Andersons (in Dutch) is a real puzzle book. And do not make any mistakes because that means trouble.

We did the walk totally wrong (as usual), but this time we were rewarded by the Gods. Everything went smoothly until Asomatos. An incredibly beautiful path wound up to the mountain village close to Agiasos. In the village square we only had to read the instructions ten times before finding the right kalderimi going down. And even at the turning point opposite a B-2 building, we thought we were on the right way.

But we did not encounter a junction where we should keep left, nor did we find a pretty steep climb. The better for us because that climb towards Asomatos was enough for that day. We walked a sheep path going through enchanting olive groves. We walked and we walked and we passed a little church on a magic spot in the middle of nowhere, we saw little streams of water but nothing anymore matched with the description of the walk of the Andersons. The sun disappeared behind the mountains, the clock was ticking time away: what would happen if we really were that lost and we could not come out of those donkey paths before it became dark...

This time we really walked as fast as real walkers do. We chose to follow our feeling of the good direction and not the directions of the Andersons. And suddenly there was the path where we started. Results? Instead of the double time we normally need to do a walk of the Andersons, we only had 1 hour more on this walk of 1.45 minutes. We set a new record! When some time later we closely examined the map we discovered that we did skip a large part of the second part of the walk. Very well with us, otherwise we probably would still be looking around for the right way to Agia Anargyri. And then I could not complain to you about those very bad directions given in the (Dutch) description of those breathtaking walks of the Andersons...

Copyright © Smitaki 2005

Everywhere cats

Yes, the tourists are all gone. Yes, all the hotels are closed. For the visitors in the winter only Hotel Adonis and Hotel Delphinia will stay open. The streets of Molyvos look deserted. Many inhabitants are back to their houses abroad or in Athens, some took off for a holiday. What stays behind is a sad pack of hungry animals. Especially everywhere cats.

This summer it was a lot of fun in Hotel Panselinos. Not only for our dogs Rockie and Vrini who went there to play with the hotel dog, brown cocker spaniel Bella and all the guests. Also for Albino, a beige snautzer-like dog, who was an entertaining guest of the hotel the whole summer long. And besides those dogs there were everywhere cats.

Now the gates are nearly closed. Only a last labourer is doing some last jobs and then Eftalou will be almost empty. And Albino, what will happen to him? He followed his friends Rockie and Vrini. So he is often with us. And at our place there are everywhere cats...

A few days ago a merry Whisky followed Rockie to our place. This nice young black & white doggie we already knew from last summer when he was running up and down the Eftalou Boulevard, looking for some attention and an owner. Now he totally unexpectedly found us. So he came amidst everywhere cats.

I had no reason to complain because only 4 cats stayed in Hotel Panselinos at the end of the summer and now came to our house. Molly, a tiny white cat with a black mask, Tiger, a small grey baby tabby tiger and Puk and Muk, two complaining grey and white cats. Integration is not that good because our eleven cats think: everywhere cats.

Amidst all those cats Whisky is trying to find his place as well as Albino who tries to become a member of the family. So we have everywhere cats with thick tails who snap at each other and who snarl at each other because so many newcomers is quiet a change. And all those dogs, 5 in number together with the illegal black dog who got thrown away by his Greek owner, cause quite some commotion. So spitting cats everywhere.

Last year we started the winter with 23 cats, this winter we kept the amount at a lower number: 11. Miss Panselinos and 4 new cats are making it a reasonable 16. But what in heaven are we going to do with 5 dogs! Because the cats are everywhere!

It is also a big difference between feeding 23 cats and 16 cats and 5 dogs. In the morning when you open the door there is a pack of animals who cry that loud that you can hear it in Molyvos. As if they never get food! When you serve them their food there are dogs who do slurp slurppp slurppp and gone is the food. And what do you see? Everywhere cats.

They got disappointed because such a small Molly or a fat Leonardo, both eat at least ten times slower than a hungry dog. How do you feed cats and dogs together? It is after I wake up that I get nightmares. How will I manage to share out the food in a fair way between all those dogs and everywhere cats?

So, I will call upon two Dutch ladies who left Hotel Panselinos in a taxi on the 31st of October. They fell in love with Albino whom they called Flipse. He might like to be exported. I would like that. Because I'd rather have my two dogs and everywhere cats.

Rougette is upset because there are too many dogs, Reu does not sleep anymore in front of the house, GrisGris and Eftalou do not want to know any dog, Tinto does not dare to eat with all those dogs around, Jip lost her place on the couch, Little Tiger cannot get used to the always running dogs and stays in a tree, Yanna simply does not come here anymore and Dikkertje Dap thinks about a smart way to reach the house without being seen by the dogs. Only the smallest one, Molly, is not disturbed by the turmoil of the dogs during dinner and she likes to crawl next to a warm dog, no matter if it is Rockie, Vrini or Whisky. You see, our cats are not happy with dogs everywhere.

And I, I probably soon will not come out of my bed. I can choose between dropping the new dogs so that they have to face famine or I have to face each morning this chaotic animal family. Help! Please give advice what to do. Because when I open my door: everywhere cats. Do I make a step forwards: everywhere dogs. Do I sit in the sun: everywhere cats. Do I stand up: everywhere dogs. Do I serve tea outside: everywhere dogs and everywhere cats. Do I hang the wash outside: everywhere cats. Do we take a walk: everywhere dogs and everywhere cats.

November is quite a bit colder than last year. The winter approaches. This month is the cruelest month of the year: just put on your blinkers in order not to see all those lonely animals. Because there are already so many dogs and everywhere cats...

Copyright © Smitaki 2005