Symi Civil Partnership

It’s Tuesday. The nephew, son and their fiancés are off on a round the island boat trip with Neil, and the house is empty for a few hours. This has given me a little time to look through some of Allan’s photos from the events of last weekend. I have quickly selected a few which I am posting over the next few days. This will take us up to Tuesday next week when I am heading to Rhodes for a night to take mother to the airport before I return on Wednesday. After that (probably Friday) I should be back to normal-normal and you’ll start getting a more regular and varied blog. Meanwhile…

I’ll put the photos up roughly in order although they may not match up with the text. The celebrations started with a drinks party at the Rainbow bar in the village square. After this, we went home to get changed, returning half an hour later to collect mother and Neil’s father and the two best men, Neil’s son Christopher and my nephew George, plus Allan and Julie who were in charge of photos. We walked down the slope to the notary office where the first official piece of paperwork was to be done.

The notary was there ready for us, we had given her our passports in advance and the paperwork had been translated by Rachael and Anna (The Symi Estate Agent) in advance so we knew what we were signing. Rachel was also there to translate again as is required by law as we are not Greek nationals. I had had a go at translating the document myself with the help of on online translator but became confused when I started to read that, should a termination of the agreement come about, there would be a diet involved… It’s one of those words that covers a couple of things, apparently, and we were relieved that no, we would not be required by law to go on a diet should anything go wrong.

The papers were signed, hands shaken, and it was off to the boat to meet the other guests.

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The Old Markets and Meraklis

The rest of this week is going to consist of quick blog posts with any photos I can grab from the hundreds being sent to me. I’ll be back to more or less normal next week; for now, time for blogging is still a bit rare. So, I will do the words in more detail another time -perhaps as a chapter in ‘Symi Stuff & Nonsense’, but I thought you’d like to see a few of my snaps of The Old Markets Hotel, where we stayed for two nights, and Meraklis, where some of us went for dinner. At both places, we were treated beautifully and spoiled rotten.

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There will be more

Morning! Just putting up a few of Allan’s photos from Friday to keep you in the loop. I know that not everyone uses Facebook (where I have taken these from) so for those who don’t, this is for you. There are loads more, but we’ve not had time to see them yet, but I will get back to a more regular blog pattern after today or tomorrow, all being well. There’s so much to tell you and so many people to thank that it’s going to take a while to get through all the messages and reply. For now, I thought you might like to know what a wonderful reception we have had from everyone here, visitors, residents of all nationalities, neighbours in the village, taverna owners in Yialos, the boys who work at Georgio’s, Yiannis and his wife (tears of happiness from Katarina, very moving), random people in the street, people of all ages from 14 to 80 + have given us their congratulations and so many people have told us ‘the whole island is talking about it’ (in a good way). Just goes to show what a truly wonderful place Symi is.

Anyway, more photos and news during the week, plus thanks, but today, in particular, a big thank you to Allan and Julie who took these photos (and many more) and who were working from Thursday at the impromptu stag and stag night, all through Friday’s drinks party at Rainbow, the signing at the notary office and on to the boat.

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A week of Symi Photos 6

It’s Saturday and so here are the rest of my photos from last Saturday. I should be back on Monday but more likely it will be Tuesday. Have a good weekend and I hope you’ve enjoyed the week of images from Kokimides, a small monastery high up on Symi which is well worth a visit, if you have transport or strong legs. Have a good weekend.

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A week of Symi Photos 5

There is a lot happening (for us) today as Neil and I are signing a civil partnership agreement with the notary this evening and then having a party, including a party for Neil’s 50^th birthday today. I am sure there will be more about all that later, next week. I am still posting photos from a name day festival and today we’re looking inside the chapel at Ag Michaelis Kokkimedes.

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