Greetings

A couple of days ago – last Thursday to be precise – the Agnanti restaurant closed.

The Agnanti is the oldest, most famous and most upmarket of our Glossa restaurants and every year in early or mid-October, it winds up for the season.

It is something of a tradition here to support the first and last days of any of the seasonal businesses. Indeed, some hold an open house on the first day of their trading summer, where everyone can wish them ‘kalo kalokairi’ – 'good summer' and have a free drink or two to help the sentiment along.

On Thursday the wishes were for a good winter – ‘kalo himonas’ and there was a good deal of helping the sentiment along.

Greek people are very good at good wishes of many kinds. We, who are used to a restricted diet of ‘Good Morning’ and ‘Goodnight’, find ourselves showered with time-specific blessings. In addition to ‘kalimera’ – ‘good morning’ or literally ‘good day’ we are wished ‘kalo misimeri’ – which can only be translated, rather inadequately, as ‘good midday’.

Then there is afternoon, not to be confused here with after noon. Early afternoon might mean ‘soon after twelve’ to a northern European, but on Skopelos it is more likely to mean six or so. You see, here it is morning until the end of the morning work session at 2 p.m. Work resumes in the afternoon – after 5 p.m. usually. 

In between is a special time set aside for lunch, a siesta in hot weather, or for the family to get together and talk. It is strictly not done to call on someone or even to telephone them between 2 and 5 p.m. If our phone rings at this time, we know it is not a Greek at the other end.

This time has its own good wish – ‘kalo apoyevma’ a sort of ‘good afternoon’. Then, at sometime after 6, the saying is ‘kalispera’ – ‘good evening’. Context is important too. If our neighbours see us on our way to dinner, they are just as likely to say ‘kali orexi’ – literally good appetite, instead of ‘kalispera’.

Similarly, an elderly villager heading off home for the night at 7 p.m. will be wished ‘kalinichta’ – 'goodnight'. Whereas, if you see some friends at 11 p.m. and you know they are on their way out and not home, you would wish them ‘kalo vradi’ – another sort of good evening.

On the first of the month you will wish your friends and colleagues ‘kalo mina’ and on their saints’ days, ‘chronia polla’ – literally ‘many years’.

In Greece, people celebrate their name day – the feast day of the saint with whom they share their name – rather than their actual birthday (although the celebration of birthdays is becoming increasingly common for children).

The naming of children is quite structured on the island – generally, they are named after grandparents and then aunts and uncles. The result is that 90% of the population of Glossa share perhaps a couple of dozen names and on the feast of Georgos, Iannis, Maria or Eleni, the streets will be continuously ringing with cries of ‘chronia polla’. 

Perhaps all these friendly greetings, accompanied by a willing smile, can give the impression that this easy-going island paradise runs along entirely without effort.

It is fashionable at the moment for the press to give Greek people a good verbal kicking and brand them as lazy and workshy. I would like to invite some of those journalists to try our local working hours. In the summer work starts as early as six to exploit the cool of the day. By 2 p.m. a full eight hours work has been done and then there may be the chance to top up some sleep for an hour or two. Work resumes at 5 p.m. and may continue until one or two the following morning.

In each 24 hours a full 16 hours of work is done. And this frequently goes on for seven days a week and for 16 weeks in the summer season. A single working week of 112 days without a break.

This is the equivalent of 51 weeks of work for those who have a 35 hour week.

So, when summer comes to an end, it is good to all pile into the Agnanti – or whoever is having a last night and wish each other ‘kalo himonas’.

Let’s talk.

Swallows

The swallows have arrived!

Which is a little confusing.

A week or so ago, I became aware that I had not seen any swallows for a few days and realised that they had left for their long trip to sub-Saharan Africa. Mentally, I wished them ‘kalo taxidi’ and looked forward to seeing them next year when a pair or two might actually nest on the little shelves we have provided.

And then, yesterday, a flock of swallows came swooping around the house.

Clearly, these were not the birds that had spent the summer here, but had nested further north perhaps in Denmark, Sweden, Belarus or Estonia - where the barn swallow is the national bird, curiously enough.

I wondered what they had seen as they skimmed their way south and what other sights they would encounter on their long journey to South Africa.

Which got me thinking about our other ‘swallows’. In the village of Glossa where we live, there are quite a few houses which are only occupied in the summer. Mostly these belong to people who grew up here but moved to the mainland for work, marriage and to raise a family.

There is still a strong tradition that when a girl from Glossa marries, her parents give her a house. Sometimes it is auntie’s or granny’s old house passed down through the family and renovated for its new owners. Occasionally it is newly built on one of the remaining tiny plots of village land sandwiched between two older houses – land which may have been the subject of years of on-off negotiation.

Every summer, these houses spring back to life. The parents, cousins or grandparents left behind and permanently resident here, start preparing for the annual return of the exiles. First you notice the cleaning and airing going on. It is a time to be nimble as balconies are cleaned with seemingly dozens of buckets of water slooshed down to cascade on the unwary pedestrian below.

Those of us who live here all year round – ‘summer-winter’ – as they say, attract a certain kudos and there is a mutual respect among those who remain in the quietest time of the year. Of course this apparent toughness of the marooned is all a false construct.

Certainly there are storms which sometimes cut off the electricity for a few hours at a time – so we have plenty of gas lamps and stoves and a good stock of firewood. It is true that travel plans can be disrupted if the Flying Dolphin finds the sea too rough to handle – but modern weather forecasting allows us to leave earlier or later for our shopping trip to Volos or concert trip to Thessaloniki. And if that load of bricks and cement is delayed, there is always ‘avrio’ – tomorrow.

‘Avrio’ is a frequently heard word here and it has some similarity to the Spanish ‘mañana’ although without the burning sense of urgency of its Spanish counterpart.

No, we summer-winter Glossa residents enjoy a short and mild winter and all the joys of the  blossoms and wild flowers in early spring. We also enjoy catching up with all our friends who were busy in the summer. And it is true that we enjoy being thought of as the tough summer-winter island folk – just don’t tell anyone that we have the best end of the bargain.

So, once the houses are cleaned for the summer visitors, they start to arrive – a few at a time to begin with and then a flood. The streets ring with the sound of “kalos ilthate” – welcome. In Greek this literally means, ‘good that you came’ and the traditional reply is, ‘good that I found you’.

We have nicknamed these annual returners ‘swallows’ like their feathered counterparts and they are anticipated and welcomed in the same way. Now we have been here six years, we recognise individuals and families – and they way they have changed. Of course, it is mainly the children you notice. 

Hair ruffled, cheeks pinched, picked up and passed around they are re-assimilated into the collective consciousness of the village.

The toddlers have become kids (ough, too big to pick up now), the babies have become toddlers (arms aloft to join the ritual) and here and there is a baby starting its first summer in Glossa.

The noisy cat-chasing lad with the skinned knees has become quieter, more watchful and slightly self-conscious of his breaking voice – but handsome and so tall, says grandma! The girl, only so recently proudly showing off her new holiday dolly to the village children, is gaggling and sharing secrets with the other girls – each with a phone in hand – whilst glancing sideways at the boys.

And so the world turns. Like the heights inked on the back of our pantry door when I was a boy myself, this annual tide leaves its mark. Piles of pebbles lovingly gathered from the beach and reluctantly left behind, the lilo that won’t be going home to Larissa and the memory of a summer when your nose just reached the balcony rail. Here and gone.

Back to the mainland to their real lives they go. And I find myself wondering which of these lives are their real one? The summer or the winter? For the swallow of the bird variety, is the real life the summer of laying eggs and raising young or the other summer of building strength for the next big migration? Or is it all part of a perfect whole?

Today the flying swallows have gone again, refuelled and on their way via Syria or Egypt and other places I will never visit, to cross the desert and head home to the lush grassland. Living a life entirely without winter, these summer-summer birds.

Let’s talk.