Don’t Forget The Backstreets

A few more photos from Sunday’s walk today. Passing through the town square in Yialos, we came across what I call an ‘Art Car.’ It reminded me of half a Smart Car, but had been used for artistic purposes, to make a bench opposite the new bakery.

This new bakery is on the town square, on the left-hand side as you look at the stage. In fact, from the restaurant on the corner, where the train station is (the table with ‘little train’ written on it), you pass a lovely craft and clothes shop, Michaelis and Katerina’s household goods shop and then the bakery. There’s also another restaurant at the back there and, around the square, all manner of shops and cafes. You’ve got Panormitis’ paint and DIY store, a small shop for handmade tin and souvenir items, the Town Hall (not a shop, but handy to know the location) clothes shops and cafes all the way back to the bridge, Kanterimi, the Dolphin pizza and so on.

So, the message there is, when in Yialos, don’t just stick to the harbour front, there’s so much more going on behind it. There’s the backstreets with To Steno and Taxas which, btw, is pronounced more like Tahas, not ‘Tax-ass’ as someone said the other day. A Tax-ass is something completely different and unthinkable. (It’s like when people pronounce the name ‘Yianni’ (accusative case) as Yarny, you know, like he was made of yarn or something. It’s a short ‘a’, not a British long a, so it’s Yianni as in canny, not Yarny as in Arnie.)

You also find more restaurants in the backstreet, the church, the stationers, wine shops, hairdressers and much more. Even if you’re here for only a day (which is only there hours in the end) then it’s worth exploring behind the main seafront route to see what you’d otherwise be missing.

Symi Dream Calendar 2019

Here are a few news updates for you. To start with, Neil’s Symi Dream calendar for 2019 is now ready and for sale. It is only available online so don’t ask if we can keep you a copy because we don’t have any. I have to say that because I say it every year and people still ask if they can buy it on the island. No. It’s exclusive to this link: Symi Dream Calendar 2019. It’s the same price as all previous years, though postage may vary, and it can be bought in any currency. The proceeds go towards helping us look after the bin cats in our lane in the winter. You’re able to look through an online preview when you get to that page.

Last Friday, the Blue Star Patmos came into the south side of the harbour at the new landing stage – you may need to know this if you are planning to use it. I’m on it on Friday night going to Athens (no blog for a few days next week), so will watch in the morning to make sure I know what side it’s on. I assume it will dock on the new southside jetty from now on, but you’d better ask, rather than take my word for it.

The next piece of info comes from the Symi International Film Festival and reads: “Symi International Film Festival news. The Earlybird deadline has passed with 137 submissions from 37 countries. Total run time so far is 55 hours, so the selection committee has a lot of work to do. The Standard Deadline is 30 June with submission fees ranging from $4.00 to $15.00 (US). and the late deadline is 15 July.”

The next isn’t news, but just a local story. We were at Georgio’s on Friday night, having a light supper… Well, it was light until the free wine started to appear from the kitchen. I was on my way down to use the facilities out the back and reached the bottom of the steps in the back courtyard when something moved a few inches to my right. Usually, when something rustles like that, I assume snake, spider, rat, mouse, cat and not always in that order. It wasn’t any of those things, it was a little owl playing with a dustpan. I looked at him, he looked at me as if to say, ‘What’s it got to do with you, pal?’ I was politer and said, ‘Hello, what are you doing here?’ and he flew off silently. I’ve never been that close to one of them before; they’re really cute, but clearly aren’t masters of conversation.

And finally, in other non-news events, the local authority has started work on clearing the weeds from in front of the house.

Symi Saturday Photos – Yialos

Here are ten photos taken in May down in Yialos. Have a great weekend.

Girl Gone Greek Cyprus

Thursday. A little cloudy, a few drops of rain forecast, cloud for another day and then sun for a week, with perhaps a few clouds here and there, but as we know, all this forecasting can change, especially here on Symi where there is no weather station (that I know of). This means we get our weather reports from Rhodes, but I tend to use Windfinder.com for mine as there’s a forecast from Datca, which is closer. Anyway, just updating you on the weather again, a sure sign that I’ve very little else to talk about.

So let’s go to Cyprus. It was almost a year ago that I popped over there to attend part of the Cyprus International Film Festival (CIFF) and ended up writing a short film overnight and then being part of the production team that filmed it in a garden centre in Paphos the next day. Hard work, but fun. This year, the script I wrote for Rebecca Hall, based on her book, ‘Girl Gone Greek’ was entered into the CIFF 2018 and has made it through to the semi-final round of their screenplay competition, which is good news. As part of the festival, they are doing some scene readings from some of the entries, ‘Girl Gone Greek‘ included, and this is going to be filmed, I am told. I can’t go to Cyprus this year (I am already heading to Athens next weekend and later to England in July), but Rebecca is going. So, instead of going there, here are a few photos I took when I was there last year.

End of May

Having chatted yesterday about eating with friends, we did exactly that on Tuesday evening, down at Meraklis in Yialos. It had been a warm day and rain was forecast. We ended up with a thunderstorm passing over the island, but not a major one. This meant, of course, that we were ‘trapped’ in the taverna, under the awning, moving tables out of the drips but carrying on regardless like the dinner party in ‘Carry On Up The Khyber.’ Needless to say, dinner was fabulous and a very reasonable price. We were also in time for the bus which is now running until ten pm.

Tuesday was a damp evening, you could even say wet, but Wednesday dawned fresher for the storm, and the plants were watered. I know it sounds odd, but it doesn’t feel like the end of May. It still feels to me as if we should be at the end of June, not because of the weather but because, I reckon, Easter was early, and it feels like the season has been going on for some time. I am sure business owners wouldn’t agree with me, and they are still waiting for larger numbers of visitors to arrive, it’s just a ‘me’ thing.

As I am running out of things to say, I’m going to go back to my old photos folder and see what’s hanging around in there, to add a few more pics at random, just to fill the pages. (Taken in February.) Enjoy the end of May (oh, if only I was refereeing to a certain out-of-her-depth politician and her cronies), and I will see you in June. Oh, that’s tomorrow. So, I’ll see you tomorrow.