Mainly photos today and fewer words; I’ve had a bit of a busy day and am running out of time while suffering from word blindness. Early morning walk for an hour, 4,000 words typing, emails to send and respond to, an interview for a blog site typed up (another 2,000 words), two chapters of a book to read and make notes on, an hour playing the piano and a blog post all by 5 pm. A bit brain addled. So much so that I just wrote ‘typoed up’ rather than typed up, but that was probably far more appropriate, and I should have left it in. Anyway, off to cook a salad now… I mean chop up a salad… I doesn’t know what I mean. Don’t know… I give up.
NosAll nationalities visit The Olive Tree and leave commentsI had a jeep just like this back in 198-somethingIn a boat yard
The Symi Festival moved up to the village square on Monday night for a concert. We saw some and heard the rest, but I didn’t have my camera with me as we’d been out for drinks at a friend’s house. Meanwhile, there were services and fireworks to celebrate the start of the Assumption events, as yesterday was the feast day of the Assumption, an important Orthodox day in the Greek calendar. The island is busy with visitors coming for the festival and the music and cultural festival as well, and it’s good to see.
A working harbour
Because of our slightly late night (for us) on Monday, I didn’t get out for a walk on Tuesday but did manage to get to work early as I do. So, today will be a collection of images taken the other day around the village and harbour. Neil took these, and that’s a good way to mention his next year’s Symi calendar. You can find the link over on the right, in the column there with book links and other things of interest. When you’re ready to order one (and I will leave the link up all through the rest of the year), simply click across to Lulu. You can change the currency and online shop to one local to you. That will make it cheaper for postage. You’re able to browse the calendar online before you order. You may need to set up an account, which doesn’t take long, and once you have, you can then check the status of your order.
Symi Greece
I know some people have bought one already and have commented to Neil on how impressed they are; always good to hear. It might be a bit early for thinking about next year, but if you’re planning on presents for Christmas, for example, then my advice is to shop early, so you don’t have a last minute panic.
Holiday essential?
Anyway, that’s just a thought on the calendar. I’m off now to get on with something else, and I will see you tomorrow.
As you know, we try and get out of the house early for a walk before and during sunrise; that’s because, after sunrise, things start to heat up. Even so, I usually return home looking like a drowned rat, strip off my soaked t-shirt and hang it up to drip-dry in the courtyard. Yesterday we headed off up the road to beyond the bridge. Although today’s photos are from another walk, this is what you can expect to encounter on an early morning walk from the village square to the bridge. You will also find out what I mean about ‘bridge.’
Ag Triada at dawn
The first person we usually see is Lefteris at his kafenion. He arrives early to set things up and gives us a cheery morning wave as we pass. The Jean And Tonic bar is sometimes still lit up or has its courtyard doors open as the staff tidy up after another all-nighter. Occasionally you might find a moped passing you on the lane to Taverna Zoi where we turn left to stroll down to the main road. From then on it’s uphill all the way. Further along, we usually encounter two ladies in black walking up to the cemetery at Agia Marina where they tend the graves of lost and loved ones. Another ‘good morning’ is exchanged. Often, we get a toot from Sotiris in his white van as we walk up through Leoni, following the twists and turns in the road as we climb higher and pass Lavinia Studios.
Sunrise over Turkey
I stayed there when I first came to Symi in 1996, and this part of the journey always reminds me of that day I set out to walk to Panormitis. (See Carry On UP The Kali Strata for that adventure). In those days, the road stopped half way across the island, at least the smooth tarmac did; after that, it became a rubble road. Now it’s fully surfaced all the way. After a couple more bends we are above Ag Triatha and, depending on the time of year, the sky over Turkey is now streaked with orange as the sun approaches. Yesterday there was mist in the valleys over there, a ‘grey-hang’ as they say in my made-up world of Saddling. (My loyal readers will read about that when we get to the next instalment of the Saddling Quartet, in time.)
Through the trees on the road
Sometimes we see goats or sheep on the road, but every day we see some of the military officers heading to the barracks at Roukouniotis. I believe that the ‘ordinary’ soldiers, those on trailing, stay at the barracks (unless they are locals) and the officers are allowed to live off camp if they can afford it. When I say, ‘live off camp’ I mean, live off the base, not earn a living from doing drag, though they may do. Who knows? Our neighbour passes us on his working days, so that’s another cheery wave from a captain or sergeant or whatever rank he is.
Ah, there it is
Chickens make the occasional appearance for no reason, as they did yesterday, but that’s usually it unless a passing farmer or shepherd (‘Looker’ in Romney Marsh language) passes us. The Kantina up there has now moved lower down, but we pass that and the 0.5 Km marker – not sure what that’s 0.5 km to or from – and to the ‘bridge.’ This is where the road crosses the old river bed on arched supports. Just along from there is the bench which marks the 1.5-mile distance from the square. Here we glug down some water, turn and head back downhill. We have been passed here by Tassos and his mules coming down from his smallholding, and depending on the time, more soldiers drive past on their way to the barracks.
Pedi valley hills
The way back is usually just as quiet, but one regular wave comes from the skip-lorry driver who is already out and about collecting the rubbish to take to the dump. He’s probably been at work before most visitors to the late-night bars have gone home. Back in the village, there’s then the smell of fresh bread to contend with as we pass the bakery, and then that’s more or less it until we reach home. There, now you can put your feet up and revel in the knowledge that you’ve just walked three miles before seven in the morning.
Generally: Festival events, preparations for the Assumption Day festivals at various churches on 15th August, busy nights in the village square, a couple of private helicopters coming in and out, many boats, a cruise ship on Saturday, hot weather (34 degrees in the shade in the courtyard), clear skies, live music playing at various venues and lots of happy holiday makers.
The church of Aletheni on the Pedi road
At home: finishing draft two of ‘The Witchling’, the follow-up to ‘The Saddling’, about to start on another major project which has a deadline, cleaning windows, cleaning the floors, washing the sofa cushions, watering and feeding the plants, going out to dinner with friends, long walks for Neil, up to To Vrisi at sunrise, a couple of jogs back, rehearsing a dance routine, checking arrangements for the civil partnership next month, sending emails, doing some blog admin, reading, watching television and doing some shopping.
Sail boats, Yialos
These days, when I am writing, I use a couple of add-ins to my Word programme. Grammarly is one, and I use this one for checking my punctuation and any obvious typos; it doesn’t always catch all of them. The other one I have started using is called ‘Pro Writing Aid’, and you can use both online or have them plugged into your computer; not physically. This one is much more detailed although I find it’s grammar check and punctuation not as good as Grammarly, which is why I use both. It has checks for all kinds of things such as repeated words, clichés, over-used words, as in over-used generally by people, words like all, like, quickly, felt, saw, etc. It also has a full analysis function which I’m now going to run to see what it says about this post so far…
Happy holidays
Average sentence length (28.3) but should be between 11 to 18. That’s because my first two sentences up the top are lists. Sentence variety, ok, no long sentences found (which seems to contradict the average sentence length report, average reading age (10.9), other ‘readility’ indexes fine. (I just noticed that word ‘readility’ I think they’ve abbreviated readability.) No house style issues, thank you, and no ‘sticky’ sentences found, but I do score a glue index of 46.3%, and the target is up to 40%, and I haven’t worked out what they mean by glue index. I know now, I just looked it up. Glue words are the most common words in the English language; in, on, was, that, will, be, think, much, have, with, etc. I use a lot of them in the blog.
Pedi workshop
I have no idea where that bit of writing chat came from, but it has made me realise that I now need to run all the pieces for the forthcoming ‘Symi, Stuff & Nonsense’ through Pro Writer Aid and boy, is it going to have some fun with some of them.
Early at Nos beach
It’s a wonder I get any time to write this blog. Sometimes I don’t, which is why on some days you find only photos, but on other days I have half an hour to ramble on. Example: what’s you’ve just read. The photos today, are from Neil and there are more to come through the week. Have a good one!
Here’s your collection of random photos for the weekend. Mainly Yialos, you can see how the new boat dock is coming along, and there are some shots from the Kali Strata. Have a good weekend.
