Winter shopping

I’ve had a few people over the summer ask me the traditional questions, ‘What’s Symi like in the winter?’ ‘Are the shops open?’ and so on, so today I turned my mind temporarily to winter shopping on Symi. By ‘winter shopping’ I mean day-to-day rather than souvenirs and the like. The simple answer to ‘Are the shops open?’ (apart from replying, No, we starve), is, Yes, the ones you need are, at any rate. Supermarkets, pharmacies, household gods building supplies, shoe shops, clothes, butchers, bakers, just as you would expect.

Up in Horio, only a couple of tavernas/cafes close for the winter, everything else is open, thus we have three supermarkets, two bakers, two cake/sweets shops, a kiosk, the corner shop with its iconic sign, ‘Cigarettes, Beers, Painkillers’, butcher, herbs, flowers/garden, building supplies, clothes shops x 2, hairdressers and household goods – and anything else I’ve forgotten. If there’s anything else you need, like boat tickets, post office, bank, pharmacy, etc., then it’s a trip ‘down town’ by foot or bus. But overall, we’re well covered.

You do have to watch out for fresh supplies during times of bad weather when the supply boats may not get here, but generally, you can find most of what you need. That is, as long as you’re not on an ackee, rambutan and mangosteen diet or anything equally as pretentious. As for the cost of living, well, I’m the world’s worst shopper as I’ll go into the supermarket psyched up to spend muchly on what I need for the week and come out with what I can get away with for that day. I do sometimes shop in advance, usually when the husband is supervising me. For example, the other day, we went to the butchers and bought eight large chicken breasts and a kilo of beef mince, and that came to €20.00. Half a kilo of mince has done us four meals so far, with the inclusion of a few veg, the other half will do four more, and the chicken will do at least another eight (12 if made in a casserole/stew). So, around 14 to 16 meals for €20.00, plus the minimal cost of the veg and additions. So, yes, you can shop, and it doesn’t have to cost you a lot.

Obviously, some things are expensive, and more so here than in other parts of the world, which is probably true for anywhere that imports goods from abroad. So, you cant buy Tesco’s own brand baked beans for tuppence a can (yippee!), but you can buy the Greek-company version for much less than the Heinz. You end up eating more fresh food and preparing it thanks to a lack of ready-meals and processed rubbish, though the pot noodles are an occasional treat and much appreciated by workers on building sites and in the hills during the winter. Another thing you can’t easily do during winter is plan dinner parties. ‘Sandra! Do come for duck and asparagus terrine with lashings of d’espinola sauce, and we will have a Vienetta with our ’76 Cognac reserve before the Serbian Pule…’ Yeah, well, forget that, even if there was such a thing as d’espinola sauce. You say, ‘Come for dinner, and we’ll have whatever we can find on the day.’ At least, that’s how we do it.

Anyway, I should get on and let you get on too. Btw, the photos today have nothing to do with the subject matter, it’s all I could find.

Footnotes:

A Vienetta as a 70s/80s blast, “The original Viennetta was an Italian product comprising layers of vanilla ice cream with sprayed-on layers of compound chocolate. The layers of ice cream were extruded, one after another, onto trays sitting on a moving belt.” Sounds delightful.

Pule is the world’s most expensive cheese. Hailing from Serbia, it costs roughly $575 per pound. It’s made from donkey’s milk.

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Symi Saturday Photos

A few random shots for the weekend. If you were wondering what the Panagia Skiadeni image is all about, yesterday was its last trip of the summer season so as it left it turned a circle in the harbour with its horn sounding before setting off to Rhodes. I think it will be serving Panormitis for a while over the festival time. Have a good weekend.

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Early start

Up at three again today and watching the lightning over turkey. The thunderstorm started yesterday evening and may have been going on all night, I’m not sure, I was in bed by nine. It’s a way off at the moment, at least ten miles if you go by that thing of counting between flash and rumble, but it could well be heading back our way. Some of the flashes are severe, so I may have to go and unplug everything again just in case, leaving me, potentially, with a morning of writing by hand rather than on the PC.

We are in the habit of unplugging where there’s a storm overhead or even threatened because it’s not worth the risk. In the past, lightning has struck something on the island, and the surge in electricity has caused people’s modems, routers and even computers or TVs to blow, even if the strike wasn’t close by. So, we unplug the phone and line, the router and the TV. Better safe than sorry.

It has reminded me (again) that we need to clean and paint the bathroom roof to help prevent water leaking through, and I should go and check the gutters and make sure they are cleaned out. If they fill up, the water rises and trickles, or pours, into the building under the eaves. With the duvet back on the bed, and the hangings ready for doors and windows, we’re definitely in winter mode, though there’s still no need to dust and clean the heaters before firing them up again, not yet, not quite – we have the extra layers of clothing stage to go through first.

Also, winter season is here because Neil finished working at the Rainbow bar last night, so now has his whole days free. It will take a couple of them to adjust back to the routine and realise that there’s no need to plan his day around a 3 pm start time for work. And so, after those three random photos and those ransom thoughts, I will make the most of this early start and get some typing done while I can. I’m hoping the weather improves, or it at least doesn’t rain too hard, so I can get out to the shop and stock up the weekly groceries. Luckily, we don’t need to go to town as Neil did that yesterday when he went to the dentist. (€50.00 for treatment and a filling if you were wondering. Well, more like a reconstruction job than a filling, but finally looking brand new and no pain or discomfort involved. Symi dentists are the best!)

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Nearly at November

Looking at the photo taken on Tuesday from ‘Kali Strata Corner’, you might be forgiven for thinking it was taken in June or September. If it was, the one of the Kali Strata taken just after it should have included people labouring slowly up the steps admiring the architecture and keeping in the shade, but as you can see, it’s a little quieter now than in those peak summer months. A little colder too. Socks are making a comeback, as are hoodies and jackets for the evening, the balcony doors don’t stay open as long as they did, but the heaters are still packed away waiting for their annual dusting and checks before they come into service.

The duvet is back on the bed, and the blankets are in readiness for when they are needed to go on top of it, while the quilt-on-a-pole is on hand for when the cold wind blows and we hang it over the doors to stop the drafts. On very cold nights, we take it down and lay it over the blankets over the duvet, but hopefully, that won’t be necessary until further into the winter. The house faces north and is exposed on three sides, hence we feel the cold up here more than the houses facing us on the north side of the harbour which face south and have more sun. The plants are doing well, still in flower thanks to regular feeding, but the vine is starting to go off. This means, hours of regular courtyard sweeping lie ahead as the leaves drop and then, finally, we cut it back and take the debris away.

So, still getting into winter mode with Neil finishing his summer job at the bar today, possibly the weekend, maybe next week, but most likely today, and as it’s Halloween, he’s threatened to be there in costume, including skull mask and top hat. That should ensure either a lot of custom or none at all, not that there is much custom to go round right now.

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Winter draws on

Having one of those frustrating computer things going on again today. Not this time, another Microsoft update, but a data stick failing. It’s the one with my writing on it and 101 other useful things which suddenly won’t work. Not on my machine, not on Neil’s. You plug it in and… nothing. Luckily, my writing folder is also copied up to my Dropbox, so the basic bits are saved – the PDF and Kindle files of published books, on-going manuscripts, but not the last draft Word copy, which means that should I ever need to re-edit or re-write one of them for any reason, I will have to find a way of retrieving the editable text from a PDF, or find a way of retrieving the data from the stick, which after an hour or so of trying, I am still unable to do. I will only know what else was stored on there when I come to need it and realise I no longer have it. Ah well!

Meanwhile, on Symi, we’re still enjoying good weather though colder by degrees. I can still take my tea on the balcony at 4.00 a.m., or whenever, though now in long trousers and slippers, and there’s a chill to the sitting room, but not enough to warrant the heater going on, yet. It’s still very warm in the sun, a couple of the day boats are still bringing people in, many of the tavernas are still open, waiting to decide on closing dates depending on the weather and number of visitors, though some offering a reduced menu.

Were going out tonight for what will probably be our last dinner of the season. We continue to use George & Maria’s during the winter, from time to time, and again, what you eat depends on what Noufris has decided to cook that day, but the taverna takes on a different atmosphere during the winter months. Only the inside is used, where the men play cards most nights around a table of mezethes, and where you have a much more ‘village’ atmosphere. The first football gathering of the winter took place at Rainbow the other night (AEK playing), though we didn’t know it was on and had made other arrangements, but we’ll probably be down there some nights for some of the games, the atmosphere and to make a break from the sofa at home. So, it looks like the winter season is nearly on us which means days and nights at home keeping warm, lots of writing, I hope, and lots of TV under blankets, but probably not much to write about here. We will see.

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