It was Fanarakia last night. The festival of little lanterns is celebrated every year on March 24th, the eve of the Annunciation of the Virgin Mary. Today is an important day in the Greek calendar, being both the Anunciation and Independence Day. There will be a parade later, special church services and so on, and a bank holiday for shops and services that take such holidays. I’ve seen some great short videos of last night on Symi TV, and on their Facebook page. As always, they are well worth a look.

As for us? We were at home watching the National Theatre at Home, and the production of Inter Alia with Rosamund Pike. I wasn’t sure what to expect, but it’s one of those performances that leaves the jaw dropped. Well worth the subscription fee on its own, and we’ve got The Importance of Being Ernest tomorrow night. I also started on Macbeth, but had to go to bed before the murders started… Oh no. Tell a lie. I think Ralph Fiennes had just gone running to Indira Varma with blood all over him after doing in Duncan. Then I had to go to bed as it was gone ten.

We ‘did’ Macbeth for O Level English back in 1978/79 along with Arthur Miller’s The Crucible, and Dickens’ Great Expectations.* I have to say, I was fine with the plays, and I used to enjoy reading them aloud in class. I was particularly fond of my John Proctor, such as it was at 16, “Because it is my name! Because I cannot have another in my life!” I hope I wasn’t too over the top. I don’t think I was, and my classmate, Madeline, was just as dramatic with her Elizabeth. In fact, at one point, our English teacher suggested we put on a play ourselves (the school had a large stage and a certain amount of theatre stuff; not exactly ‘Glee’ but good enough). We put our heads together and thought of what would be a good vehicle for a few friends and us – nothing too big, because the head of music put on a musical once a year, using as many kids as he could scrape off the playground benches, usually girls. He once did The Wizard of Oz with over 300 children in it. Blimey. Anyway, his wife, the head of English, suggested we find something and do a basic staged version of it. Anything we thought might be suitable… perhaps something safe like Billy Liar (too big a cast), or the 39 Steps for all the slapstick and adventure. Hmm… We thought about it and came back with ‘Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf,’ because Madelaine wanted to walk on stage, stare at the headmaster in the audience and say, ‘Jesus…What a dump.’ I was quite keen to deliver some of Richard Burton’s lines, particularly the nasty ones and the one where he talks about Martha’s great t*ts. Not because I was interested in them or anything, I just wanted to smoke and swear on stage. We never did it. Not allowed. So we wrote and put on a review instead, and that was so satirical, we made a short paragraph in the Sun. (Another story. Another day.)

How on earth I got to that from where I started today, I have no idea. What that has to do with the photos, I also have no idea. It’s just what comes out of my head first thing in the morning.

* I think I read a couple of chapters of this doorstopper of a novel, but luckily, the 1946 David Lean film version with John Mills was on TV the night before, so I watched that, and got an A in the exam.

SymiTV Facebook page here.

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Actually, we had a good time, and plan to walk everywhere when in Rhodes anyway, unless the weather is terrible, in which case we’ll splash out on a cab. There were no cabs yesterday (strike), the weather was fine, the people at the clinic were friendly and helpful, and we were in and out before you could say ‘annual checkup.’ After that, we wandered over to the other side of the Old Town for another visit, and while Neil was doing that, I sat in the sun and ‘chillaxed’. As we’d splashed out on a hotel, we’d not had to get up at 03.30 to get the 050.00 boat, but we’d not had breakfast (not allowed before tests), and didn’t eat until later, but when we did, we stopped at the Yacht Club place in Mandraki, and treated ourselves to a cheeseburger (my first in I don’t know how many years). And then, back to the boat, back to home, and the grand finale, the walk up from the harbour to the village.

So, a quiet day. We had to pick up some other bits and pieces which, unlike the medical checkups, cost money, but… has to be done. Meanwhile, there had/have been all kinds of doctors on Symi for three days giving free consultations. (The last I heard on Sunday, they were on their way, but I don’t know if they got here. I hope so.)

Now, we’re back from our day trip, Neil has a new hat (very natty), and my mind is back on the day-to-day for now, but we’ll be off on another of these thrilling day-out adventures soon, and the next time, it will be the full cardio checkup. Yahoo!

While I get my head back into gear, he’s a photo of the sea yesterday in Mandraki, to contrast with the picture above.

As you can see, a quiet, calm day. The day boats are lined up along the quay and ready for business, Nimmos Taverna in the Old Town opens very soon, and there was a huge cruise ship in, so the tourist shops are up and running. Apparently, had you been on the ‘Celebrity Infinity’ last night, you could have attended ‘the History of the Blues’ starting at 10 pm in the theatre, so a loud passenger on a nearby table told the table six tables away from us when we were resting at ‘Mike’s in the Old Town. Phew, if I were going to miss any show, it would be a night of blues music, on a ship, in the middle of the night.

Anyway, must catch up with things. Have a good day.

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According to Windfinder.com, it looks like we’re heading into a cloudy and cold weekend, with the temps at 12° to 16°, the wind between two and four Beaufort, and no rain forecast – as yet. The Poseidon weather system has a ‘cloud’ option under its weather reporting, and this shows the position of the Sahara dust clouds when we get them. We’re currently dust free. As the sun comes up, I can see very few clouds at all, dusty ones or otherwise, but it’s still not yet light. I was asleep by ten last night (almost by 19.30, but I managed to stay awake a while longer), and thus, up at 04.00. This could also be a sign that summer is on its way, though I am still wearing at least two layers.

That might have something to do with the rising cost of electricity and how we keep the heaters off as much as possible. Our last bill was another just over €100 for the month (the one before was €250). We have to remember that there’s also the BDS, the boy downstairs, a sturdy young soldier chappie living downstairs who, for all we know, might have a heater running 24/7, but if so, he pays for it, and currently owes almost half of our total bill. He has his own counter, but the account is in my name, and the landlord works out the split by some means of algebra and other cabalistic signs, but the result is always the same; we are paying the same, or less, than we used to pay before the BDS arrived, because the charges are also split. BDS is leaving at the end of the month anyway, and we’ll have another person in below before long. Let’s hope they laugh, talk, sneeze, fart, sing and watch TV no louder than this guy whose phone conversations we have become quite used to sharing. (His ceiling boards are our floorboards. We live and sleep ten feet apart, separated by two inches of wood.)

But you didn’t come in here to hear about our domestic arrangements. Or maybe you did, I don’t know, but I expect you are slavering for an end-of-week gallery and update of news. Well, there’s not a lot I can tell you. In my little world this week, I have finished my MS as well as I can for right now, and it’s going off to the headmistress for proofing on Saturday. I had a letter from HarperCollins about my ‘Bobby’ book. The letter was semi-real in style, but had obvious traces of AI language, example: [your book] offers a vivid and deeply human lens through which to view key moments in twentieth-century British history. Yeah, well, that’s just blurb-recycling, love. Your ability to blend character-driven storytelling with historical authenticity… Is second to none, I know, darling, but either that’s corporate text or AI speak, and I’m not much strapped with either. Yet, the contact was genuine, and even if I am not what they are looking for (I am not, as it turns out), they have offered to suggest agents who might be. Tbh, I’m not sure if I’m that bothered. I like what I’m doing, and I like not being tied down to someone else’s ideas or editing, as you will see if you read any of my books, all of which need some kind of editing by a professional, but which readers like, so there we are. In fact, if I can perform my own trumpet voluntary for a moment, here’s a random message received from a reader only this week. “You are amazing, sir! I love everything that you write. Please keep it up.” It’s not quite Times Literary Supplement style, but it was from a reader, and that’s what counts.

Anyway, I have drifted. I was going to put up a gallery and be done, but I chatted on, and the sun’s now almost up. So, here’s the… Oh! I remembered the news. I won’t be here on Monday. We are spending the last of our savings on a ticket on the Dodecanese thingy so we can have Sunday night in a hotel before the pre-check-up starvation diet begins at midnight. (Annual blood checkups and tests at 09.00 on Monday, and no eating or drinking beforehand.) So, no blog on Monday.

Finally, here’s a gallery of fab-photos Neil has taken recently and some from previous years.

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First: good news. The boy downstairs is back after 2.5 weeks, and has turned off his dripping tap. Yah! Our lovely neighbours saved us from the tea shortage, and more supplies are on their way from sympathetic friends, thank you! And now, before things get rough, here’s one of Neil’s images of spring on Symi.

And onto business.
In today’s round of ‘Things you might not have seen’, we celebrate the annual tradition of “Αυτά τα καταραμένα βήματα!” Or, as we might say via literal translation, “Those pesky steps.”

Established, it is thought, in the twelfth century, the tradition involves carrying several hundredweight of weighted bags to the top of the Kali Strata, and was originally part of a young man’s rite of passage from annoying youth to hard-working contributor to society. There are no rules to this round of life’s game show; the weight of the world can be carried to the village square by any legal means. Legally licensed and driven transport was nigh on impossible to find on Symi until the recent influx of dedicated traffic police, so only manual modes are now available.

[Interestingly, the shift in culture brought about by someone finally imposing motorbike safety laws on the island has led to a shift in fashion. One sees the most unlikely of folk wearing crash helmets these days, though I have yet to see the mayor with one. This ancient island law is called “Φόρα κράνος, ηλίθιε” which, again in rough translation, is the law of ‘Wear a helmet, you idiot.’ First established for the safety of children who can drive machines at 14, it is still widely flaunted despite the mandatory €350 fine.]

Contestants of the quest, therefore, are not allowed to transport the weight by road vehicle. Aye, for in the 12th century, there was no such thing as a road. In fact, there wasn’t one for much of the 20th. Over the passing of time, various other methods for completing the challenge have been devised. One popular method was “The Yiayia”, and you can read about this in a compilation of travel writings called… (Sorry, I thought the book was over there on my shelves, but it’s found its way back into storage, and as it’s 05.52 and the house is asleep, I am not going rummaging around in the attic). The book is called ‘Traveller’s Tales’ or something, and in it, the author compiles writings by travellers to Greece dating right back to before the tradition of “Αυτά τα καταραμένα βήματα!” In one story from Symi, he recounts how his trunk was brought up from the harbour to the village by a yiayia (a grandmother), who carried it on her back. Thus, appeared one technique.

The second was to use a mule, commonly called a donkey by mistake, and once to be found in abundance. Sadly, now, the mule train is a rare sight for one reason or another. These beasts of burden were once used to transport the traditional weight, and the weight of men, women and other luggage — not that women are luggage, sorry, I don’t edit the clumsy writing on these posts — to the top and elsewhere.

Now, though, foreign labour is brought in even to honour this, the noblest of island traditions, and these foreign contestants are called “Tourists.”

So, this year, when you arrive on Symi again or for the first time, before you set off to your beach with your gold credit card ready to pay for sunbed hire, you will be required to join in the tradition and earn your rite of package-passage by transporting at least one of these weights to the summit.

Just so you know: Each one can be exchanged for an hour’s sunbed hire on a beach of your choice, as long as you carry it there. They are waiting for you, but it’s first-come, first-served.

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I once read a book by Paulo Coelho. Actually, I have read three: The Valkyries, The Alchemist and… No, it was only two (I was thinking of something else). In one of them, the Valkyries, I think, he, or one of his characters, is giving a chat about… Buddhism, was it? Something like that, and I think a desert was involved. It was a while ago, and as you can tell, I don’t remember much else, but anyway… There was this thing about keeping your head up and looking at the horizon when walking. It’ was something philosophical to do with life, I don’t know, but it came back to be when I saw this photo in my collection. *

To see this kind of thing on Symi, you need to look down, and if you do, you will find patterns in the stones all over the place. Some are there by design, and there is a good example of stone engraving in the churchyard floor in the courtyard of the Kastro church (the blue and white one). There are others that are similar, but there are many more put there by bored children or teens, or even older folk, sitting on the steps, whiling away the days. You might call these ones graffiti, because they were not planned, but they are still interesting to see. For example, I remember one drawing that had a date on it from the 1980s. That’s like coming across a moment in time, because the etching in the rock could only have been made by someone sitting in that exact spot, on that date. If you close your eyes (while standing still), you could imagine the scene, and there you are in the same place, only in a different time.

This picture has nothing to do with what I’m talking about (except it’s the church I mentioned).

I guess the point is, to take time while wandering the village and look at the ground. (I’ve not seen so many etchings in Yialos, but I expect they are there.) Well, it’s safer to do that around here anyway. If you followed Mr Coelho’s advice and walked around with your eyes fixed on the horizon so your head is always held high and your spirit open to the teachings of whoever, you’d soon end up, in bandages, treading in animal leftovers, or at the very least, missing a step and hurtling down the Kali Strata at full tilt. So, look out for such details, read such books, and take time when here, to stand and stare as sheep or cows, as WH Davies suggests in his poem. You never know what you might discover.

Of course, if you also look up, you will see other interesting details you might otherwise miss, such as:

* In Buddhist walking meditation, the practice of looking ahead toward the horizon—often described as “gazing at distant mountains” or keeping the eyes open and unfocused—is a technique designed to cultivate awareness and balance. This method helps to maintain a state of relaxed alertness and prevents the mind from falling into a dull, sleepy state.

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