PLAY...
We visited Zakynthos, one of the Greek island this last weekend. Getting there was quite a journey, we had to take a ferry across the river to Rio, then a bus to Patras (20 min.), then another bus to Killini (was sold out so we had to wait in Patras for 4 hours), then a ferry to the island of Zakynthos. When we got to the main port on the Island, the buses had all stopped running so we had to catch a cab to our hotel which was about 7 minutes away. It was dark by the time we go there. Much to our surprise, the hotel we had spent much time picking out on the internet before our trip WAS CLOSED FOR THE SEASON!!! We were confused and were just wondering around the hotel grounds knocking on doors and searching for someone. Soon, a nice women came and motioned for us to follow her. She took us to the Petrol station where there was another women who did not speak English. They talked it over for awhile and decided it was best to bring us across the street to the bar where there was a person who spoke both Greek and English. Long story short, they worked it out and were accommodating enough to open up a room for us.
The next morning we woke up eairly and wondered over to one of the many car rental shops. We rented a little Kia for the day which only set us back 20 Euro. We spent the whole day driving around the island, which is not too big. It was relaxing. We were informed by one of the bartenders that in the summer the streets are just filled with people. Now, it is the last week of the season and the streets are empty. Like our hotel, many places had already closed down.
The Next day was spent pretty much like the first day but backwards. We had much trouble finding the bus back to Rio though, who know one town could have so many #6 buses?!
WORK...
We started the olive harvest today! It is a lot of hard work but good. We use a method the involves beating the tree with a stick, kinda theraputic actually. Dimitris, our host, says we will get to see how the olive oil is made and how to pickle the olives. He had 135 trees and today we harvest 6, we have quite a ways to go.
Some exciting news, Dimitris got a kitten! I have posted some photos of it on flickr... so cute. Dimitris has not named him yet. He likes to play, eat sardines and sleep.
We experienced our first earth quake last night. It was short and small but enough to wake us from our slumber. I hope we do not get anymore while here, they are a bit scary and are cracking the house, something we will probable have to fix!
As far as work goes, we have finished with the sanding of 3 window and two doors and have painted 1 window and 2 doors. We are not sure if he will have us sand anymore, we kind of hope not as it is hard work. The olives are not ready for harvesting, it has been too dry here. We may not even get to harvest them before we leave, I hope he has other helpers coming. The bathroom has received little attention as we were waiting for the guy to hook up the water. He finally came yesterday and it only took him like 2 hours to do. Now we can move on with the rest of the bathroom!
In other news, Dimitris is working on making lemon chello, can't wait until that is done so we can try it!
I could get use to this life! People here walk in the street and occasionally step onto the sidewalk to allow a car or motorbike to pass. Strangers buy us iced coffee at the soccer match. The owner of the cafe has taken to us and does not accept money from Ryan and I most of the time. We had a traditional Greek BBQ the other night and ate way too much. We spend lots of time relaxing, reading, walking and contemplating life. We may even finish sanding the windows and doors some time, who knows. Weekends here are dedicated to one thing, soccer. Friday night we attended a match of the local Antirrio team which included a fight in the stands, how exciting. Then we went to our favorite Cafe, Via Mare and watched Atletico de Madrid vs Real Madrid. Today, we went to the neighboring town of Nafpaktos for a match and will go again to the cafe for another game this evening. Dimitris said that we may even be able to play a bit while we are here, Ryan said he would just watch but I am very excited.
Sometimes there are things that I miss that seem so simple but make me realize how stupid I really am. The Greek word for Greece is Hellas. Here we are in this wonderful place and there is so much we do now know about it.
We have been working on sanding and staining the doors and window of the apartment we are staying in. We pray that he does not ask us to sand the shutters that accompany all of the windows. We are doing all of the sanding by hand and it is hard, if I ever figure out who painted them all white I'll...
Dimitris purchased 15 chickens on Monday for 1.70 Euro each. They are small now but will grow quickly. One can't even purchase a 6 piece KFC bucket for this much, what a deal.
I'm a bit concerned that my body will become so accustomed to siesta that I will not be able to live without it when I get home. I may have to try to bring this concept to the USA. Like Dimitris says, when you wake it is like you have a whole new day.
I am reading "Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance" and am currently on a part which discusses "Quality". They talk about how everyone knows quality when they see it but few know how to achieve it. I see this parallel with my own life. I'm not sure the things that I do and create are quality. I'm considering evaluating what it is I really want to do with my life and working towards that. I guess that hard part is figuring out what you want to be when you grow up. For now I think I will just relax and enjoy the wonderful Greek cooking.
It is funny, we go to this seaside cafe pretty much on a nightly basis. We have iced coffees or beer. Sometimes Dimitris or his cousin go behind the bar and get our drinks, sometimes the bartender does. We have peanuts, chips and sausages. People are talking or arguing, we can't quite tell. When it comes time to pay, sometimes we leave some money, sometimes not. Dimitris says it is the winter and this is how it works. We will go there tonight for the live music.
We have been pretty lucky on our travels to run into very open people who don't seem to hate us because of our country and all that is happening. We met one such person last night. We just tried to sit back and listen to what he had to say, most of it we agreed with and told him that it sucks. He had a lot of anger though, it got a little uncomfortable. He left with his girlfriend before they even finished their drinks. It was intense. I don't even like talking about politics when I am drinking!
We have a bit more time on our hands here and access to a computer so feel free to send us an email, we would love to hear from any of you!
We wake at about 8:30, give or take an hour. We have breakfast of toast with marmalade, coffee, juice, banana and cookies. We then do some type of work until about 2:00. Today, we finished sanding a door that we started working on yesterday. I know just one door, why two days? We did it all by hand as our host hast no electric sander. Lunch is the biggest meal and varies. We usually have a tomato, pepper, onion and olive salad with olive oil for dressing, some feta cheese, bread, some meat or fish and an apple for desert. Then siesta, where we rest, read, do yoga once digested. Then sometimes to the field to water and pick the veggie garden. The olives are not ready yet for harvesting. We eat dinner at about 9:00 and then take a walk to the cafe on the beach for a nightcap. It is a tough life, I'm not sure how much I can take!
i am adding more pictures to the flikr site right now. there are many, as it has been a while. athens was pretty cool... very big town with many buildings that look the same. fairly dirty looking... has smog like LA.
We saw some cool sites like the acropolis, and walked around the old town for a long time. there were many shops selling all kinds of things. the vendors were not as pushy as in turkey, which was nice. we took a 12 hour overnight train to thessoloniki, then a 6 hour bus to athens. that was a long trip. we are now in antirrio, which has a population of like 800. it is very beautiful here though. the house where we stay is about 2 blocks from the sea. it is pretty warm here too. not sure the exact temp, but we wore shorts yesterday and it is equally as nice today. it is very quiet here. it should be a nice relaxing time. we have to do some work while we are here, but that won't be too bad.
we made it to Greece and spent a day in Athens before heading to Antirrio where we will stay for 1 month. We will update later, must eat now!
We have seen and conquered Istanbul. It was a tough couple of days but we have survived. We went to the Grand Bizarre yesterday but did not buy much as it was fairly expensive and the people were hit and miss as far as haggling. We saw a fair amount of monuments and met some cool folks. We went to a Turkish bath house, picking the location based on someones recommendation. It was weird. We went in and changed into a towel that was too short for me. Then we walked across the lobby which was open to the street, partially exposing ourselves to the people on the street. We then proceeded into separate rooms where we pored water onto ourselves in preparation to our bath. Then someone came and got us and literally washed us. When we were done we got tea and that was it. Not all that cool. We are taking a overnight train to Athens tonight, will stay there for a couple of days then we head for the olive farm, wıll post more and add photos soon!
This is by far the most unique place we have visited. The cıty has 15 mıllıon resıdence and on top of that ıs packed wıth tourıst. We took a boat cruıse up the bosphorus to the black sea. We got off at the last stop and spent a few hours wonderıng the streets. We had fısh sandwıches for lunch and hıked up to the castle ruıns. The evenıng we spent our tıme on the asıa sıde of the bosphorus where the locals stroll up and down the maın drag stoppıng for some shoppıng or maybe a bıte to eat. We hoped from place to place, enjoyıng a beer, some lıve musıc and some food. Everythıng on that sıde of the bosphorus was a bıt cheaper then the tourıst sıde where we i. We vısıted the castle but were very agıtated by the number of pushy tourists who really just seemed to want to get to the front of the lıne and dıdn't care much about what they were seeıng. It ıs frustratıng to be ın a place that ıs so beautıful and full of hıstory and seeıng people just toss theır garbage on top of ıt. We hope to see more of the bıg tourıst sıghts but do not know how much more we can handle! We can not upload photos at our hostel but wıll be able to ın Greece...we have a ton more!
