Friday morning and we’re waiting for the boat to Rhodes. At least, Neil is, so I’m keeping an eye on Marine Traffic to see where the Diagoras is (currently about one hour behind schedule and still on Tilos) while also updating my Mailwasher programme and writing the blog.

There are more decorations up on houses on Symi now as we prepare for Christmas week. When we first arrived here, thirteen years ago, we would hardly see any Christmas lights on houses and I remember the first season here as being rather dark and dull because of that. It was a change after the madness of Great Britain where neighbours compete to be the most American in their Christmas gaudiness. But over the years more and more lights have appeared, and some now even stay up for the whole year. Our neighbour here has a big star on the house and it’s very close to ours so we can pretended we have one on our house too. Inside the house it’s a simple tree (with half its lights not working), that will do for now.

I expect Rhodes and certain shops in particular are going to be busy today. Reports from Jumbo last week were that it was manic and mad enough so now, with only one week to go before Christmas, I suspect it will be busier than a one-armed violinist with fleas. Not that I have ever knowingly met one. But still, the trip must be made, the tickets are bought (€8.00 each way on the Blue Star, in case you were wondering) and the appointments made – not at Jumbo of course, you don’t need an appointment there.

And as for me, well, today I shall be mainly at the desk typing and catching up on some work and maybe some writing. I may get back to ‘Shocking the Donkeys’ as a book of some sort. The Greek government are soon to vote on allowing civil partnerships for same sex couples, or not, and that would make ‘Donkeys’ timely, though it’s never going to get made as a film, so a book that people can buy to read the story might do instead. But for that to happen I have to convert the script into some kind of readable book format. And I reckon I should try and do that while ‘Straight Swap’ is in edit and pre-publishing mode, as it now is. Anyway, that’s what I plan for the day and I really ought to go and make a start. But I’ll just check the boat position first… Ah, it’s left Tilos now and should be about another hour and a half. No rush.

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Wednesday’s desk view gave me some clouds to look at, the Blue Star coming in (a little late) and the fishing boats going about their business, as a cold, quiet day settled in over Symi.

That was in mild contrast to Tuesday when we found the harbour warm in the sun and calm with clear skies. There was a round of bank visits to be taken care of, the last of the previous year’s tax payments to make, yippee! No more bills… Oh hang on, the health insurance bill arrived, and then the rent became due, and the phone bill was just paid, and there should be a water bill coming in any day now, possibly an electricity one, and then we have Christmas to think about and… Oh to hell with it, let’s go to Pacho’s and consider a gyros for lunch.

Talking of money, I’m going to share this image with you (below). Some of you may have already seen it doing the rounds on Facebook but for those who don’t use that site, here’s an outline of taxes and things you need to pay if you have a freelance business in Greece. I didn’t put this together so I can’t say if it is accurate or not, and I don’t understand all of it, but it does show you how hard it is to get everything paid before you earn enough to live off. In order to have €700 per month for home life you would have to earn €30,500 – roughly speaking, or if you are in the UK, an income of £21,000 per year would net you £500 per month for rent/mortgage, bills, food etc., a third (roughly) of what you would have if you were living and working in the UK and earning the same amount. (And shopping prices are not any cheaper in Greece than the UK.)

And on that sorry note, I am going to go and hang the washing out, see to His Majesty’s dirt tray (and I mean Jack Cat’s of course), feed the strays, celebrate that the council or someone has finally filled in the death-trap hole outside our gate, remind Neil to water his plants and then go into the other part of the house, try and warm up and read a book. But first, a couple of village winter photos:

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As promised, some very quick snaps taken from the desk (and elsewhere) as yesterday was a day at home catching up on some work and not going out anywhere. As you can see, it’s clear out there and when you’re in the sun it’s actually very warm; you could probably sunbathe. But as soon as you go into the shade, then it feels cold, though it says it’s around 12 degrees out in the courtyard.

The Alarm Cat has been looked after while we were away and has been very clingy since we’ve been back. He shouts as lustily as ever around sunrise and when he wants something, but is very pleased to be able to come back into the house during the day and sleep on the sofa, back of the sofa, arm of the sofa, bed, under the bed, other unusual places. He’s also been out sunbathing, which will do nothing for the skin cancer he gets on his ears and nose, but there’s nothing we can do about that and it’s not yet very far advanced.

We have started feeding the strays again, our ‘post’ this winter being the bins that we visit every day when throwing out our rubbish. There’s a group of about 10 or so, some better looking than others. Symi Animal Welfare have provided the food and all we need to do is drop some off every day when we go that way. We are also putting down water for them when we can. So far the weather has been mild so they all seem reasonably well off.

Some of the local farmers are worried about this mild weather, apparently. When you think about it, we’ve not really had any rain since around May. We have had two big storms, and maybe a couple of days with rain too, but not the regular amounts we might expect at this time of year. This is not such good news for crops and olive trees, or for topping up sternas and filling up water tanks. No one really likes it when it’s dark and wet and cold, but the wet is necessary. Doing a quick long-range forecast check on a weather station online I see that temperatures are set to be mid-teens with sun, with a little rain from 29^th onwards but not much, and no storms or heavy rain until mid-January. We’ll keep an eye on that while, hopefully, getting in some winter walks in the dry.

That’s it for today. There’s a noisy cat at my feet wanting something and so I must go and see what it is, then empty his litter tray and then see to the strays up the road. Beginning to feel my life is being ruled by cats.

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And here we are back to normal blogging and the old routine. Many thanks to everyone who contributed to the guest blog idea and I hope that everyone enjoyed reading other people’s thoughts about Symi.

As today is Monday this post was written on Sunday and I can tell you it’s sunny out there and very pleasant in the sun, but cold in the house. Just back from central Europe we’re used to low temperatures, around two degrees on most days of our holiday, but here on Symi without central heating and carpets, the houses stay cold and slightly damp through the winter. Even with heating going for the evening, by the morning the walls are wet with condensation, the bedcover is damp and you need to open windows to dry things out and fight chilly mornings in order to air the house and keep the damp mould down.

Anyway, here are a few shots of Rhodes, the first stop on our trip. While we were there we visited the Helping Hands refugee aid workers who have a base near Akandia Harbour. They have some support from the local council and lots from the local community. When we were there they were preparing to send some excess clothing and supplied down to Kastelorizo who were (and still are) receiving a lot of refuges. Symi Solidarity also recently sent some supplies down there as we have seen few refuges over the last few weeks. Cold weather means people are more likely to stay in camps for the winter, I guess.

Also, while in Rhodes, we decided to go to some places we’d not been before. It’s easy to get caught in the usual-place rut, but it’s also good to try new. So, we stayed at a place called the ‘3 Charities’ in the Old Town. This is a small, private run set of apartments that are in an old building but renovated. Ours had a sitting room with TV and satellite, a fitted kitchen area with two rings and microwave etc. a good bathroom and a small bedroom, and everything in the flat that you could need. It was handy for the Old Town and not too far to walk to the New Town, and it was only €25.00 a night, so a bit of a bargain. I found it through Booking.com.

There was a taverna around the corner that we’d never even seen before let alone used and that was a good place to eat out when you didn’t want to walk too far. We also used Saffron, the Indian restaurant, the Swedish Bakery and a few other places that we’d not visited, plus some old favourites. While sitting at the Symi café in the old market one day some fishermen arrived at the closed shop next door, set up a barbeque and started grilling some of the catch. We were sent over a complimentary plate of fresh fish, which was very kind of them.

I’m not going to bore you too much with travel tales, though there may be the odd one thrown in as we approach Christmas, but it’s good to be back and back to work. I’ve opened my shutters so the light falls on the desk and no doubt there will be some views of the calm sea on the blog over time, and the rough sea when the weather changes. So far this winter, it seems, we’ve been very lucky. More weather reports and blogs to come.

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