fire free Lesvos

Last night we invited an Austrian couple – Elizabeth and her son Phillip (12) to have supper with us as it was their last night here. I for one will be sad that they have gone
because I drew inordinant comfort from the sight of them at the pool everyday, Phillip frolicking in the water and their routine soujourns down the stairs to the sea. They were a constant in an unfamiliar place. They were good dinner companions despite Phillips scant English, Joop made up for it by frequently chatting with Phillip in German. Elizabeth and her husband are theatre actors in Vienna and she is excited to return and start directing a play. I found them quite a romantic pair simply because Elizabeth confided in me early on in our trip that she was there because Phillip had Angina pectoris which I took to mean chronic tonsillitis because of her constant stroking of her throat to demonstrate his affliction. Apparently his doctor had decreed that he must have at least 2 trips per year to the sea to keep this at bay. Since she has started on this regime he has not been sick. It must be the vitamin D, I offered helpfully. She shook her head and said the sun yes, but the sea is important also. I am seduced by the absoluteness of her belief and the necessity of taking such instruction. I need someone to decree it to me and follow it so religiously and feel perfectly vindicated doing so.
Our potential engagement with Elizabeth put pressure on the rest of the day. We set out what we thought was early enough to see the Lesbian town 60k away. The road there was filled with such switchbacks that I nearly expired on the way back due to carsickness and having to clutch the handle on the ceiling to stay centred. The landscape changed from the olive groves and small bush covered terrain, to a sort of moonscape with nothing clutching the hills. It was sort of beautiful but somewhat sad when you realized that this was once a densely forested island. Of course it was over 1000 years ago but deforestation that long ago permanently changed the ecosystem. And now of course we have adapted and think that this desert like island with the olive groves, sea and sky is so beautiful and it is but it is also scary to see how we change things even so long ago and then we happily keep going and actually even aspire to such a landscape. I always cling to the faint hope clause that everything will eventually recover, but it doesn’t always.
The purported Lesbian mecca was a small town on the sea. It had a fabulous beach completely lined with tavernas. Lesbians are drawn there from all over the world to pay homage to the birthplace of the poet Sappho. I failed to see any lesbians. Kyr claimed he did and that I couldn’t identify them because they didn’t look like Nelson lesbians.
We ate last night with Phillip and Elizabeth in a taverna recommended in the guidebooks. It was a most beguiling location – up a steeply cobbled street with the tables on the street against a ledge looking out onto the sea. It was very beautiful with the full moon lighting the sea and the occasion was marred only by the craziness of the proprietor. He insisted on coming over to our table every few minutes to rant on and on about his experience the night before. Apparently two women with baby carriages stopped just outside the door to his kitchen to talk. He couldn’t go in and out with the plates and so “politely’ asked them to move down abit. The one woman said “Don’t you know who I am?’ The guy said he didn’t care whereupon her husband showed up on the scene and threatened him. They were from Athens and apparently that explains everything. But let me tell you after the 5th retelling, the story was getting pretty stale as it didn’t seem to go anywhere else. I even tried to console him with tales of mean clients at the clinic – how they loom large but really very few in number. Nothing worked with this guy and we were eager to get out of there so we didn’t have to hear it again. It reminded me of the time in Nelson when Gord at café Kas came to our table and would quit telling us how horrible business was, how ungrateful Nelson was and how he couldn’t go on. Initially you feel compassion and empathy but then as the barrage never ends you start to feel panicked – how are you going to eat and get out of there fast enough. Restaurant proprietors – same the world over.
Kyr seems to have picked up a little cold so we might have to keep our activities more low key – no zooming wildly around the hills. My voracious reader boy has already finished his reading material so I am frantically trying to pawn my books off on him. Hopefully he likes them. P.S. Don't worry Carl - no fires on Lesvos. Miranda I love the food and am enamoured. We have been into Molyvos lots thats the place to set up. Kyr's blog address is http://MyTwoDollars-kitty.blogspot.com/ You would love it Melissa.