SWEPT UNDER THE CARPET

The dusty heat of Summer has passed and the last few weeks have been wonderful. Clear, bright skies and a cool breeze to lull us into activity as the tourist activity of Summer closes and Autumn opens its doors to us. Leaves are dropping from the mulberry tree outside the porch and the grape vine along the fence. This involves a lot of sweeping day by day. There have been just a couple of light showers to fool the garden plants into thinking that it is Spring again and for new green leaves to shoot up here and there.

Driving back from town, we are halted every now and then by herds of goats and sheep being led to winter pastures across the national road and the coolness helps us to welcome the pauses and to stop and have a good look around us. The local authorities have also taken the opportunity to paint white lines along the road and there seem to be far more double white lines than before. Hopefully, people will be persuaded to overtake only when safe to do so. Rumour has it that the Police catching motorists ignoring the road markings have their number plates ripped off the car and face enormous fines. So, just … not … worth … it. Until last week, the roads were still full of hire cars and tourist coaches and it is the first year I have experienced rush hour traffic in Crete. There was absolutely no point in overtaking, since the roads were full of lines of traffic all the way to Rethymno.

This week things are quieter and we can get into the car parks. Aqua aerobics has finished for the year as the hotel swimming pool has closed up and other forms of exercise are in the planning stage. Outside the shops, the summer fair of inflatable beach toys, sun hats and flip flops have been taken in and the shops are getting out their winter stocks of hats, scarves, leather coats and boots! The hardware shops which displayed hoses, garden pots, watering cans and green netting now have hauled out tree loppers, rakes, olive and fruit pickers, roof paint and gum boots. Yes, the seasons move on again. Somehow, each new season in Crete brings welcome change to look forward to. The hotels and cafes will close so that people can harvest their olive trees.

I have had many a pause in the garden or the roof to sweep up falling leaves and ponder on the misty views across the Geropotamos valley and at Mount Psiloritis. My meanderings, however, have been less on the magic of nature and more on the poor quality of sweeping implements! My favourite broom went missing after the roof painting weekend and I was ridiculously miffed because it had taken many forays to far-flung emporia to find it. I was left with a feeble excuse for a broom as a swap, which was barely fit for purpose and I now need to start the whole frustrating broom search all over again. I don't want to labour the point, but brooms, buckets, dustpans and all such articles here for which any Greek housewife will need on a daily basis are pretty useless. Poor design, plastic which degrades in the heat, broom handles which rust away within months and packaged sets of brooms which do not fit together with their 'matching' dustpans. If anyone wanted to start a new business redesigning all these articles to keep the dirt and dust at bay and making them of decent quality, they could “clean up” ha ha ha. Just saying! And don't get me on to the subject of mop buckets. Three stand in a sad line, all broken or imperfect in one way or another! I just shudder about all that plastic used to make things that don't do the job properly and then remain somewhere, taking up space for evermore. If only we could melt them all down and make house-ware that is more functional and fit for purpose! Well I had to have a whinge about something!

Our miniature olive tree on the roof terrace has a tiny crop of fruit beginning to turn purple, the roof has been re-coated with waterproof paint and the pallets are down in the porch, ready for our first delivery of fire wood. Today, I unfurled the winter rugs (which are cleaned, moth proofed and rolled up during the summer along with heavy blankets) so that the floors can be swept and cleaned free of sandy dust which blows through the house in summer. I've defied personal tradition, which has escaped me so far in retirement, by making and jarring up Christmas mincemeat to get nice and mature by the time Christmas gets here! Preliminary tasting tells me that it needs a little more brandy, but that can wait until later.

As Mr C was embroiled in the Rugby World Cup, a quick visit to drink a hot chocolate at Vinzi's overlooking the harbour in Panormo today was a lovely outing. Just warm enough not to need a cardy, but cool enough to be comfortable and watch the fishing boats reflected in the still water and the last remnants of tourists sunbathing and swimming. We will all enjoy these last magical days before the winter storms begin in earnest!

I was determined to complete a blog without the Br*%!t word and have just about achieved it. In this respect, I've resorted to prayer now!

Keep warm and dry wherever you are!

RUNNING OUT OF TIME

Outside the house a furious gale force buffeting of wind is throwing things about and the power is dipping on and off as electricity wires are momentarily touching and cutting off the supply. I have been in and out tying things down, retrieving umbrellas, removing sun blinds and closing shutters to keep most of the furious onslaught of hot winds from the south at bay. However, inside the house everything that is not fixed down is swaying about and the noise is a bit scary! We will await going out and about for an hour or two, to see if things calm down a bit. I wonder if this is one of the tails of the hurricanes which have been in the news.

Mr C and Mrs C are enjoying some down time after a bit of a squash. A crisis situation in the UK brought a brother to stay for a couple of weeks to bridge the gap between looking for somewhere to live and pension arriving in the bank. Housing in the UK has become so prohibitive lately. We all spent a couple of days scouring internet sites with him looking for affordable places to rent which were few and far between.

This does not bode well for many pensioners here. The most recent posting from Gov.UK  (via the British Embassy) informed us definitively that S1 health funding would only be available for 6 months after Brexit. The rush of people returning to the UK for life-saving medication and health care will be an extra crisis for the local authorities to handle with little or no funding from central government. After the kindness we have received from the Greek system in spite of their financial difficulties, the attitude of the British Government has been chilling and I feel ashamed of what is happening. This is not the Britain I grew up in post WWII, these are not the values I hold dear, how can all this be? Everyone seems to be so frightened of mob rule that they are adopting a regime to encompass the line of least resistance, so that the country is to be run by tax evading mobsters instead of some statesmen holding firm with any sort of moral compass. I can barely believe it. I have now turned off and blocked all news from Gov.UK, because it has become a list of threats and no help to us.

While my brother was with us, we discussed Philotimo. A wonderful Greek concept of help, love, support for others without any expectation of reward. Entrenched within the Greek national tradition in their quiet and noble way, the Greek people we know demonstrate this trait and show their welcome and hospitality as naturally as breathing. We do hope some of it rubs off on us in the time we are here among them. We intend to stay put as long as we possibly can!

We have been trying to ignore Facebook and the Six O'Clock News, but things are now closing in on us. The folk who tried to live in a warmer climate and eke out a modest pension in their senior years are being denied what they paid into for all their working lives unless they return to the UK. The drop in the pound has made the cost of living higher here, even though Greek costs have stayed the same, our doctors and access to medication will cease and many of us will be forced to leave our homes here because of Brexit. If those at home are having a bad time already and think “Huh, serves them right!”, just remember that a new mass influx of elderly, homeless and poorly will make things worse for everybody in the UK. The housing crisis will not improve. Hospitals will still be under stress without access to medical professionals from Europe who have gone home in droves. None of this will be an improvement for the man in the street. The only people to win from this will be rich and super rich people who trade on the foreign exchange markets or who keep their mega bucks in off shore accounts and don't pay taxes. If they had been forced to pay tax (as the EU had recommended) it would have helped to cover the costs of schools, roads, hospitals and infrastructure. Avoiding paying tax by all the giants of industry, commerce and the media is what all this push for Brexit has really been about.

Don't be fooled, we have all been ripped off and so much damage done to our country in the process but there is always hope. My hope is that Britain resists threats from the mob, stands firm in the tradition of free speech in parliament and overcomes, confuses and confounds any malign forces that would try to destroy all that is truthful, responsible and right. 

In spite of all this pontificating, the wind is still gusting outside, the power twitching and the router needs rebooting for the third time today! Keep safe!

STONE GROUND

The Canal Basin, Stone by Emma Joustra

Back in Crete after two cool and refreshing months in the UK, I kept any Brexit discussions under wraps since where we were staying was so ordinary, so prosperous, so 'carrying on as if nothing has happened', my current state of mind is just regarded as hysterical.  

Anyway, good things happened and we made up our minds to enjoy our surroundings, the lovely woods and farmlands, the canal happenings and lots of nice waterside pubs to have great pub lunches. We tried out North Staffordshire oatcakes, plump sausages, pork pies and all the delectable local fare which is scarcely found in Crete unless someone brings it back in their cases.

The wedding was a wonderful time where friends and family made a plan to be there several months in advance and co-ordinated their time off and holidays around being in England and enjoying the Peak District. Our daughters, their husbands and children all came over from New Zealand, finding holiday cottages and meeting up with old friends in their limited time in England. K had the use of a little mobility scooter which tackled the roads around the local town and gave him a bit of a boost. The wonderful three day wedding celebration was a brilliant time.

I also found our equivalent Makers Group in Stone at The Artisan Boutique where several ladies meet regularly for a knit and natter group on a weekly basis. We admired jumpers, patterns and different makes and I stayed for a Taster Session in felt embroidery work on one extra day. What with that and the local library, a church, nice coffee shops and pubs all within walking distance, we had lots going on. I was there for the Farmers Market, explored all the new shops and building project for the exciting Crown Wharf Theatre.

The news for us back in Crete, as a no deal Brexit looms, is ever more sombre. The British Embassy insensitively sent out a poster about the difficulties awaiting us should we dare to come back to the UK if S1 medical care is no longer available on a reciprocal basis in Europe. It seems that the powers that be have only just worked out a few of the consequences of their terrible decisions. We were told to expect a wait of six months back in the UK to be entitled to normal care under the NHS and the difficulty in finding a GP was spelled out. Also that social and welfare care would not be available to us. A gap of six months in, say diabetes care, cancer treatment or many other problems would be a death sentence to many. Perhaps that is what they hope for… to kill us all off. Investing in a property abroad and having to abandon it (virtually unsaleable in Greece) would still leave us with tax and bills to continue to pay in Greece, while many would be without anywhere to live or even with family links back in the UK. It has to be against all human rights to sweep aside people's life and status (except in a war situation) by those who are in no way qualified to make such a decision. We keep praying and praying for this nightmare to be over and for someone, somewhere to say that our lifetime of NI payments will still be honoured and that we are not being punished for settling in Europe when the UK was happily part of Europe. What would be the compensation for ruining so many families' lives who could no longer travel to be with parents or children, travel to find work or study abroad? Problems as occurred in the aftermath of the Berlin Wall and the troubles lying in wait for us at the Irish border are only a fraction of the difficulties we are storing up for the future. The United Kingdom has never seemed to be so dis-united or on the brink of dismantling.  Quite a price to pay for ... "sovereignty" and what did people actually mean by it?  What precisely had we given away that needed to be taken back?   

But its all been said a hundred times and many people are still oblivious to this Pandora's Box.

In view of this,  I need to write a thank you note to Europe. It was a wonderful hospital in Berlin who offered medical help to my brother for leukaemia treatment when nothing was available in the UK in 1961. The kindest of German families looked after my mother who was accompanying him, while the British Army took my ailing brother out for tank excursions. It was France, Austria, Norway, Portugal and Germany whose students of English came to stay with our family when we were growing up. It was France who (forgivingly) offered me my first ever job after leaving college at the European HQ of IBM. It was European law that took up most of my trade association jobs on returning to England in 1971 while we adjusted to decimalisation, metrication and new marketing rules. These arrangements all took many years to accomplish … so I knew first hand that a successful withdrawal from the EU would take five years minimum to achieve and the scant two year Article 50 withdrawal move would always have been impossible. It was from Greece that my husband's father came to Edinburgh University in the 1930s, London where my father in law settled and bought up his family. In the next generation, my husband's work with shipping companies that took him all over Europe with roll on-roll off ships.   And Crete of course became our home after our retirement.

I think many of us were guilty of thoughtlessly blaming some new code of practice or regulation change as “another EU regulation” and blinded ourselves to the improvements or peace that most of us were living through. We enjoyed all the good things like easier travel, stable currency, food, educational opportunities, grants for beleaguered communities and belly ached about trivial things such as losing our navy blue passport covers and swallowed all the misinformation regularly disgorged by the media. We did not check our facts, we did not appreciate everything we had in terms of young medical professionals serving us, youngsters making good in our midst or the richness of our life as a vital part of the European project of peace and stability. The dire effects of Austerity throughout the UK were due to the policies of the UK government and no one else. Objections to bendy bananas and maroon passports surely pale into significance to the UK Cabinet callously legislating for a no-deal Brexit knowing that faceless UK or EU subjects could die from lack of medical treatment because of some bureaucratic carve up. How have we really become so hardened and what kind of society are we blindly walking towards?

Since I typed the body of this text, Boris Johnson has pro-rogued the next parliamentary session to reduce the time available for MPs to debate the final Brexit issues in Parliament. Fortunately, there are plenty of people up in arms about such an assault on democracy and it isn't just me!

What next?

Ask not for whom the bell tolls!

Wedding 2

SUMMER CELEBRATIONS

Humble apologies for the delay in blog posts.  Google Mail seem to have created mayhem at the Blogger headquarters and caused all sorts of log in problems for would be bloggers.  After changing all sorts of pages and profiles and getting nowhere, I have approached it from an alternative browser which sorted out the problem immediately.  If the appearance is grossly altered, I will send my sorries in advance.  I am unable to see the whole page of the blog any more so I may just have to post a lot of photos on a separate post.

We are spending the hot summer weeks in the UK.  We are trying not to think about the consequences for us of a no deal Brexit.  We feel amazed by everyone in the UK as everyone here seems completely oblivious to the outcome for our nation, but we have learned not to raise the issue.  I walked past a stand at the Farmers Market emblazoned with pale blue Brexit Party regalia and had to turn my face the other way so that I didn’t start an argument.  They didn’t seem to have any interest in their publicity as people were way too engrossed in pork pies and beeswax candles.

We have been doing much more interesting things in Stone and in the Peak District.  Pa Crozier had to return last week to Crete to catch up with medical scans and stuff but Ma Crozier is enjoying welcome coolth and drizzle with enough sunny intervals to make life interesting.  Mr C so enjoyed a little break sitting beside the Canal at the Star Inn gongoozling the narrow boats as they negotiated the lock and we were enchanted by the metal clanking of the steel cogs which turned the  sluices and worked to make the lock gates open and close.  The sun was strong and the small electric scooter bought for him earlier in the year worked out well for local running about on smooth UK pavements. (It would be hopeless on Cretan tracks!)

Leo and Harri’s wedding in the Peak District was a wonderful weekend which brought together all the family from all over the world.  They had event planned it beautifully with a fish and chip supper on our arrival on Thursday, a groomsmen’s BBQ on Friday with rounders and football matches.  There was a really difficult quiz on a wedding theme later on that night.  The big event on Saturday needed to be held indoors due to cloud and misty rain, but the sun came out after the ceremony so that all the photos could take place in the sunshine.  We had a lovely time.

The cake was made by the mothers of happy couple and a sister from NZ.  It worked well and looked lovely.  The decor had been envisioned by Harri, the bride and with long fronds of ivy, rose petals and long lace runners on the refectory tables looked simple and lovely.  Yours truly made a few hundred metres of bunting, which also looked surprisingly cheery.  It was a real combined effort.  If I can’t put too many photos on this page, I will post another blog after this!

BUSY BEES!

 We are just getting our house back to rights after the painter spent a day scraping and recoating the ceiling and walls. The winter storms caused so much damage in Crete this year that many of our friends are waiting for the builders or decorators to mend and renovate walls, roadways and ceilings. Whenever we get the chance to meet up, we are all exchanging tales of all the work which needs doing, and how hard it is to get everything done! However, I have painted the downstairs bedroom wall (tick) and the patch of peeling paint at the foot of the stairs. (tick, tick) I still have the bathroom roof outside and ceiling inside to paint before July. And our house got off lightly!

We visited a favourite taverna on the edge of the sea yesterday … Bar Eleven. (Not sure of the origin of this name but it has always been a favourite haunt for Ladies Lunches.) The two day cyclone in the winter swept flood waters down the mountains, destroyed road bridges and by the time the torrents reached Bar Eleven on the mouth of the river, the flood waters swept away most of the taverna with it. They have completely rebuilt the seating and outside area and, newly landscaped, it looks wonderful but must have cost a small fortune. We gathered on its first day of opening to celebrate the 1^st June in the beginnings of sunshine. We are still not in Summer weather, even now. The skies are heavy with dust and mist each morning, but we are opening windows, cleaning away layers of grime, putting in the mosquito screens and emerging like timid butterflies from our winter coverings. The UK in the meantime, we hear, is still enjoying our weather!

It is almost easier to ignore any news coming from the UK now. I had a huge argument with the powers that be at our UK borough council and the un-charming (= rude) person on the end of the phone who wanted to erase me from the electoral register and deny me a vote. If ever there was an indication of what an unpleasant time EU nationals are having in Britain these days, this was it. I did not get to vote in EU elections, even though I am entitled to in every way, was frustrated by obstruction and obfuscation at the town hall. Elections took place in Greece too last weekend, but not knowing the language or anything about Greek politics, it seemed better to stick to the election process I am familiar with - thus losing any chance of a vote.  I live and learn!.  

On the plus side, we have been trying a new regime of medication for Pa Crozier because his previous meds were not working. We have to jump through a lot of hoops to get the prescriptions fulfilled, but the local health authorities are being very kind to us as the pills are eye-poppingly expensive. I feel as if I need an armed guard with me when I go to pick them up from the health insurance office. We are juggling with maths, calendars and counting pills to try and work out how to get four weeks off for Pa Crozier in England for Leo and Harri's wedding. We keep looking at our mid-riffs and hoping that all our clothes will fit. Cretan food is certainly very fattening and our enforced incarceration during the winter has made exercise much more difficult.

The tourists are here in large numbers, much increased traffic on the national road, beaches full of sunbathers and swimmers and the towns busy with pedestrians. Our garden came back to life with great panache as the warm weather returned and the hibiscus bush is offering large red blooms new each morning along with the jasmine bush and the bay tree. I can't keep up with the grape vine trying to stop too many new shoots from stealing all the goodness from the grapes which are forming under the canopy of vine leaves. Up on the terrace, I managed to put up the rather faded old umbrella, which had rested for a year or two while we looked for a heavy duty umbrella stand. It now gives us lovely shade and is firmly anchored with five guy lines to keep it from parachuting off the terrace in strong gusts of wind. In the long line of “things to do” is a collection of old tiles which I want to break up to make a mosaic table top. I am in need of the right materials to make the table top permanently sealed before any progress can be made. Visits to the paint shop are quite tricky in Greece because none of the materials do quite the same job or have the constituents we are used to. A paint called Monotiko, (translated as insulating) does not immediately make sense to the unwary.

I am tasked with making a large carrot cake as part of the wedding day preparations. I have been practising this and the resulting cake made for the CIC Fund Raiser at Camping Elizabeth sold out very quickly. Yum! I am just praying that the final effort for the big day works just as well. Converting ingredients for 2 x 9 inch cakes to 3 x 10 inch has exercised a lot of grey matter!   My suitcase will look odd with cooking cup measures, cake lifters, wedding clothes and rose petal confetti (gathered from next door's garden) tucked away in the corners. Thank goodness my hat is already in England. Pa Crozier will be in a suit for the first time in YEARS! Let's hope it all fits!

Busy, busy, busy!

Kalo mina from Crete!

SPRING TONIC

Easter shop window at the Confectioners

It's Sunday morning and the birds are chirruping loudly outside in the sunshine, the swallows have returned to Crete and we can at last begin to believe that this long, hard winter is over. We have had five bouts of fearful cyclonic rain over the course of the winter months, three of which have caused major damage to roads, homes and bridges. The walls of the old stone houses close to us in our village all look washed down, dilapidated and in need of some attention.  Meanwhile, I have been around the house with my notebook listing items which need to be dealt with after a major leak in the kitchen and bathroom roof and around the window frames upstairs which poured down the walls, through the floorboards and across the floor of the living room downstairs. As all the floors at ground level are stone or tiles, leaks were easy to mop up for a few days but the house will need a lot of attention this year – mending outside and decorating inside. Lots of people have also been stricken with a horrible bout of flu too this winter and we all need a tonic to pick us back up and put some good and vital energy into us.

Anyway, we can open the shutters, start sweeping away the debris and watch with anticipation as little green shoots start to appear on what until now has seemed to be old dead wood! Our geraniums look much happier after the deluge and the Easter lily in the corner of the front yard is coming into bloom. There are an awful lot of snails though, which are being picked off our precious plants and being given flying lessons!

At the end of March, I flew to the UK for a funeral and Mother's Day in England, and enjoyed fabulously warm Spring sunshine which we had been missing further south! My feeling is that global warming is interfering with all normal weather patterns and beginning to cause havoc in many parts of the planet. Dealing with this is much more important than dreary old Brexit. As we have no chance of having our opinion heard as Brits in Europe and no control over the outcome of any beleaguered government, we are trying not to lose interest. Our visit by the British Vice Consul was helpful, the talk by the local Mayor and Chief of Police even more so as they made us feel as if all the British settlers would not be hung out to dry on their own but would still be welcome here in Crete, at any rate. Whether the governments involved sort out reciprocity of social care and health provision is not yet settled in full, but the consultation left us feeling much more hopeful. Lord, what a mess, but the Greeks still want to be friends in spite of everything!

Vinzi's Coffee Shop in Panormo opened on Friday although when we went for coffee and shopping on Saturday, there were not many people around. Panormo seems to be going through a building spree with heaps of new villas going up blocking views of the sea. I hope they know when to stop and don't spoil what was always a lovely resort. Overkill would be a great shame and even now I find high season much too busy to be enjoyable. In any event, nowhere should be short of water this summer!

Our lovely Greek classes with helpful Greek post graduates at Achlade came to an end because the ladies had eventually found paid work and couldn't spare the time any more. Sad for us, but great news and we were all happy for them. As a result of this, we have started a “Do it yourself” class at our local village Kafeneon with books from the Hellenic Bookshop (in London), which we can work through at our own pace. It is slow going, but we need to keep revising what we have previously learned because our old, slow brains need constant jogging! The bookshop said that they knew the author of the book and would love to get feedback to pass on to him, so we will be taking a photo of us at work and emailing it to him next Tuesday.

I was so upset that three parcels of knitted goods made for refugees in Lesvos, which we had hoped would be helpful in the winter just past, were returned to me and others in our group had the same experience. I feel that the Post Office may be making its own protest about the situation there which is hard for the refugees and more than costly for the locals whose tourist aspirations are suffering. Makers are having to rethink their strategy also as their Arts Cafe closed this year and we have not found another venue nearly as practical. So much change! Dealing with change seems to be par for the course at this stage of life but let's hope that it is transformative!

Best wishes for a very Happy Easter! Kalo Pasca!

*  A few days delayed in posting as we have had internet problems!