Storm update: Books

Yesterday morning: Just a couple of quick notes today as I am off to help clear up one of the schools, or go wherever I am needed. Neil has already gone down to join in the clean-up operation, and I’m joining him and many others as soon as I can. It’ll be the first time I have been able to get down there, but I won’t be taking the camera. Not only do I not want to risk ruining it, but there are plenty of photos on Facebook and elsewhere, and I don’t want to feel like I am rubbernecking.

Yesterday afternoon: As it turned out, the emergency services and army are doing such a great job in Yialos that the council didn’t need us – though I am sure individual businesses need help (and please contact us if you do) – but the high school in Horio was also flooded and suffered damage. The children can’t return to school just yet. The science lab, for example, was a wreck, and we did what we could. Whatever the headmistress and teachers commanded – it was like being back at school, except we wanted to be there. We ended up sweeping out water, mopping floors, cleaning the gutters, and, apart from other things, having to throw away damaged books. It occurred to me, as I helped dump the sodden and ruined textbooks that I am just about to release my next Symi book. Ah ha! I thought. The answer is obvious.

I have long wanted to do what I can to help the schools, but what can I do? I was hoping to donate the piano to the music school at some point, but there’s no point doing that now as it’s an ex-piano. One of our godsons attends the high school with the children of many of our friends, and our younger godson and his posse will be there in a couple of years too.
Today I had to throw away their much-needed textbooks…
In the next day or so I will be releasing a frivolous book of my own…
Some of that income should go where it is locally needed…

And it will. Below is the cover of my new book about living on Symi, travel tales, blog posts and… well, nonsense. Now then, this was, as you know, planned for release this weekend – maybe sooner – and I am still going to go ahead with that. But, I’m going to donate a certain percent of book sales towards the high school, particularly for books the government don’t supply. From now until Christmas, a percentage of ‘Symi, Stuff & Nonsense’, ‘Symi 85600’, ‘Carry On up the Kali Strata’ and ‘Village View’ will be donated, by me, to the school.

All you have to do is buy a copy which I was hoping my loyal Symi Dreamers would do anyway, it is, after all, dedicated to you, as you will see. If you do, you’ll also be helping Symi’s high school students.

If that doesn’t appeal, but you still want to help the island and donate towards repairing other community buildings and taking care of those who have lost possessions, head over to Solidarity Symi who are raising funds for whichever part of the island needs it first.

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Symi Flood Victims

Solidairy Symi website

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Symi Disaster Area

I’m posting this on Tuesday, now that the power is back on, so it is here today, and I will leave it for Wednesday too. (Photos below the text.)

There was a storm on Monday afternoon/night which has caused a lot of damage to the island, particularly Yialos and the businesses there, but also, at least one house in Horio and several walls and ruins have been badly damaged. Below is what I have put on our Facebook page, but I’ll repeat it here for anyone who doesn’t use Facebook:

Thank you everyone for your messages. As far as I know, there have been no fatalities, but there is a lot of damage to be cleared up. We’ve not been to Yialos, but we did go up to the Stavros area of Horio earlier. As you can see, some of the paths have been washed away, others are deep with mud and silt, trash from the ravine was washed down, including washing machines, and the side of one house was taken off. Luckily the 80-year-old lady who lives there was taken to another property before she lost her sterna and bedroom.

I have also heard that: cars are piled in a heap in Yialos (there’s an image in the press), some were washed into the sea along with some motorbikes, there’s a car in the pizzeria and a train in the bakery, one café’s fridges are in a café 50 yards away, many businesses have suffered hideous damage, mud in the downstairs, knee deep in water in other places, the town square outer road is a pile of rocks from the mountain (it’s at the foot of another ravine), some of the main water-feed pipes are severed in Horio, trees down in Pedi and the Power Station was under water.

The power (and internet) was out from 17:30 yesterday until, in our part of Horio, around 10.00 this morning. It’s amazing they got it fixed at all – can’t sing their praises enough. Ditto the coastguards, police, authorities, army, the council and whoever is dealing with getting the island back up and running within such a short space of time.

It was a pretty big storm, to understate completely, that lasted from early Monday afternoon through until the evening, and then came back overnight. It was gone by 5.30 Tuesday.

Keep an eye on the local (Greek) news and the blogs, Symi Dream and Adriana’s, to see how the clean-up goes.

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Tacit and a Symi Wedding

Sunday turned out to be a day of both good and bad. I sat down to warm up my arpeggios in the morning, about an hour before we were due to move the piano down to Yialos for the private concert… And the piano failed to work. It hissed and cracked and made very unhappy noises, so I turned it off. And on again. And off again. And on… It was turned on and off more times than a shore-leave sailor in a dubious brothel, but nothing would coax it into life. It eventually settled into what musicians call ‘Tacit.’ “A musical term to indicate that an instrument or voice does not sound. In vocal polyphony and in orchestral scores, it usually indicates a long period of time, typically an entire movement.” Well, my piano’s tacit is on a looped repeat, possibly to never sound again.

Steve came to collect it and spend half an hour trying to fix it but in the end, the concert was not to be. And neither is the piano. I’ll have to save for a new one. I’ve only been without a piano for about two years out of the last 50 so it will be a bit of a wrench to throw the old carcass away. (It’s old and would cost more to send for repair than it would to buy a new or second hand one.) Never mind, we still had a wedding to go to…

There will be more photos of the event once Neil has worked on them as he took most of the images. I’ve stolen a couple before he gets to them so you can get a flavour of Sunday afternoon’s happy times. We were guests of the groom whose family house (astute readers will know) is next door. We arrived, were welcomed and given a drink – whisky for the men, Lord knows what in tiny glasses for the ladies – and waited in the courtyard with some other guests. The cast list included Yiannis Rainbow in a suit and Manolis and Alexis in their finest. Everyone was in their finest actually, and my Crombie had an outing too. (It only gets one or two per year; it’s too hot for summer and not warm enough for winter, but yesterday was just right.)

The couple met in the square, and we joined the procession to the church. Previously at weddings, we’ve been working, taking the video and photos, so it was wonderful to be part of the party, walking with neighbours, complimenting them on their children’s outfits and discussing the weather and wedding. We processed through the lanes to the church of St George overlooking the Castro and parts of Yialos, and about 200 people gathered in the courtyard and church.

Afterwards, we sat in the square at Lefteris’ kafenion where passing guests invited us to the follow-on. We’d not been invited there by the father of the groom, only to the house and church, so we politely declined even though we would have been made very welcome. Instead, we hung out with a couple of friends until the need to feed drew us home. As I say, more images to come in the next couple of days.

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Symi coincidence

A very early morning Sunday morning blog today. I am preparing this at half seven before setting out on what looks to be another wonderful day here on Symi, and it’s a day that brings a coincidence. It’s not such a surprising one really, considering we live in a small village.

I’m out later this morning, taking the old piano down to the Well Being Centre for a private party where I am accompanying a birthday-party-celebrating singer who is doing a few numbers for her guests. After that, we’re bringing the piano home (by car, don’t worry) before heading to the wedding of our next-door neighbour’s son. The party, or the groom’s side of it, is meeting at the house beside ours at four, and we have been invited to attend. Let’s hope the piano carrying doesn’t get caught up in the celebrations or procession as that’s the same time as we’re due to bring it home.

The coincidence is, the wedding is between our neighbour’s son and the daughter of our last landlord. Like I said, not such a coincidence as it’s all village-based, and although it’s big, it’s not that big a village. But the house that the newlyweds will be moving into is the house we moved out of three years ago to move into this one, right beside (in fact joined to) the groom’s house. I feel like I am part of the family, and yet have no connection at all apart from the properties.

This reminded me to tell you that there are loads of coincidences like this that crop up on the island. Back in 1998 when we were here on holiday, we were at a bar late one night when I met someone who lived 100 yards away from me in Dalston, London in the early 90s, whose partner used to use the shop in Buckinghamshire that Neil’s parents owned. So it was a double coincidence. There are many other Symi coincidences too, you often hear people meeting up who live in the same village or knew each other from a time before, just happening to meet here on holiday. In fact, another one happened when a friend of ours was staying and found himself sitting at one table at the bar when on the table next to him, he met up with an old college friend he’d not seen for ten years.

And so it goes on. So, that’s me, typing this out quickly and bunging in a few random photos before I go and do a few scales and arpeggios to get my fingers working. Before I go, just to say, ‘Symi, Stuff & Nonsense’ is ready to be published, I am just waiting for the final cover edits which should be back with me this week. Watch out for more news, but it looks like this fourth book about living on Symi (which also about travel tales, funny blog posts and thoughts and other adventures) will be ready to order for Christmas presents. The print and Kindle should both be available in the next week, two at the most.

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