We had our first grapple with Cretan bureaucracy today and yesterday as we walked along to OTE to try and sort out a telephone line. We had heard that this was not as straightforward as we might think and were prepared for some insistence on our part. We had our passports, photocopies of our passports, tax number and money, a utility bill – so what more could they ask of us? More apparently! We need to know the full name and address and telephone number of another resident in the village who has an OTE telephone line because they would not be able to trace it unless they had this. They apparently did not have directories, listings or records of these things themselves and we would have to pay them a lot of money to do all the leg work ourselves. Hhhhmmm! Kimon expected this but I was annoyed. Today I had to go to another grey marble building with flags outside to get my tax number. There was a whole roomful of people queuing and of course just as we thought that we would have our turn a young man pushed in front of us because he believed that he was the most important person on earth! Actually all we needed was a form. I had my passport and a photocopy of my passport but in the end someone in the queue gave us a piece of paper and we couldn’t be bothered to waste any more time and decided to get some help to make sure that we could translate the questions in Greek properly. No doubt when we return, they will require information about my maternal great-grandmother’s shoe size and a copy of Kimon’s junior school 100 yard swimming certificate but we will get there in the end.
Yesterday was fun. We drove past a garden centre on the way to Art School and organised to get a bamboo canopy made and fitted for the area over the front porch area. It is a bit pricey, but it will be made to last and we found some plants and pots at the same time. Demitri, the garden centre owner saw us coming and thought that his Christmas and Birthday had all come at once. He asked us to let all our English friends know about his business … I am trying not to wonder too hard why he was so keen on we Eenglish!!
As for Art School, the subject matter was a bit demanding. We were shown some paintings by Matisse and noted his use of colour and involvement with the patterns and designs within his subjects. We then had a complicated line of objects to try to pin down through a large stamp sized view finder and were asked to do two small pictures – one in portrait and one in landscape before tackling a larger piece. The trouble was that it was all a riot of colour and we had to use black and white – either carbon pencil or charcoal which was a bit frustrating. I was out of practice and not pleased with my final effort, but there were some lovely drawings from the group. (Note to self: must do some practice)
We had been invited to Zoe’s house in the evening – although it belonged to a charming couple called Peter and Janet now – and they had transformed it since we had last seen the house 5 or 6 years ago by swapping the downstairs and upstairs rooms and renovating all the outhouses to be stand-alone en suite guest rooms. Our friendly builder (who lives in the same village) had landscaped the garden and it looked wonderful. We had a wonderfully convivial evening with lots of good conversation and laughs with a lovely meal of home grown goodies. As it was late when the party broke up, we stayed overnight at Anna’s and returned home later in the morning after we had completed our list of things to do in Rethymnon in the morning i.e. bank, tax number, odds and ends needed from the 1 euro shop etc etc.
And the weather was HOT today – warm enough to take off my body warmer and enjoy some sunshine! When we got back to the house, we planted up a few pots for the garden and terrace. Kimon has protected them from local cats with souvlaki sticks!
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