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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Well, that’s ironic. I’m about to spend a small fortune each on Dodec Seaways tickets to Rhodes next Sunday, and a hotel for the night, so we can avoid getting up at 03.00 on Monday to get the 05.00 boat and hanging around Rhodes until 09.00 when we have our first MOT appointment, all without eating or drinking anything but water since the night before, and what do I notice yesterday? A barge of free doctors is visiting Symi over the weekend. I didn’t see the full list, it might have been someone’s Facebook memory, and the clinic wouldn’t have been able to run the full set of blood tests, and we like to see the same doctors year on year (I have my urologist on What’sApp), but still… That’s that, and this is a photo of Jack and the Beanstalk’s house in Upper Horio.

In more local news… There’s nothing to report, except we are starting to put dates on the calendar. Who’s arriving when, kind of dates, and that reminds me… I must thank Collette for the birthday card, which I opened early without thinking, and I’m glad I did. I was just about to open my box of ‘Sensations’ tea, and my mind, therefore, was on the incredibly bland experience I was about to have with a cup of hot water with a splash of milk, when Neil returned from foraging in Yialos and brought with him an envelope. He also brought news that there was no tea other than Lipton’s to be found in the harbour, not even for cash. Horror. I was trying not to be triggered by this blow when, distracted, I opened the card and lo! There was a message from the wild north of a far-flung land, which, among other things, said, ‘Have a drink on me,’ and attached was a single, proper teabag. It’s still going, even after ten reuses… No, it’s not, but it was a perfect gift at the perfect time. My sights are now set on the far left aisle of Pappou supermarket in Kanadas Street, where I can usually manage to find a box of Tetley. Meanwhile, while the foraging continues, we’ve found that if you put two bags of ‘Sensations’ together for one mug, you get slightly more flavour than the taste of desalinated water. Two sugars and a healthy snifter of whisky also helps.

Joking about that, but not about this. I have given myself a tight deadline for the latest MS to be ready for proofing, and as that’s Sunday morning, I need to knuckle down. Here’s the harbour as seen the other day.

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We almost weren’t, but now, we are.

I did that ‘pressing the button’ thing over the weekend, expecting all kinds of nasty when I did so, and I transferred my websites to a new host. That part of the process went suspiciously smoothly and took a couple of hours. Then came something to do with domain name servers, and having to find this ‘DNS’ and replace it with that DNS, which can take up to 48 hours, but seems to have happened overnight. Yay! Success, I thought, until I switched on this morning and couldn’t find the admin area to the blog, and then, couldn’t even find the website.

I had to use the hosts’ chatbot, a string of inputted numbers and symbols called ‘Codee.’ Right, so I am conversing with a headache tablet, as we are forced to do more and more these days because humans have become a fad of the past. I told it my issue. I have to say, it not only found the problem within a minute, but with my permission, it then went and solved the problem, and here I am!

And here’s a photo so you can say, what’s that?

It’s last night’s sky, and it looked a lot better on a small screen in the dark. There was another one of those maintenance power cuts yesterday, but not in our area. I assume that at the end of the working day, someone forgot to switch on the lights, because the streetlights were all out along our lane, and it was glorious! Orion was looming above us in the south, striding warrior-like over the Vigla, and Cassiopea was up there advertising McDonald’s to Australia (we used to call it the Big W), I could see Ursa Minor, and there, my knowledge of the stars runs out. Anyway, the night sky is spectacular in winter when someone forgets to turn on the lights. If you’re here and want to see for yourself, then either drive out into the forest or somewhere else remote, and have a look. You can get a good idea by walking up to or down from the Constantinos View kantina that overlooks the village. If you do that and stop in one of the folds of the road where the trees block the light from Pedi, and you’re in shadow, you can stand and gawp until you get run down by Manolis on his 50cc. Here’s one of the moon which also turned up in my folder. The photo, not the moon. This wasn’t last night, but another time. And I’ll be back with you another time too, like tomorrow, all being well.

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