Easter 2019

Monday 29 April

Easter Monday morning and hot. There’s hardly any wind and what little we have is blowing up from the south, laying a patina of ripples across the sea while endowing the air with a thick, steamy consistency that reminds me of lava although I’ve never actually seen any. Earlier I walked up to the shop, arriving in a lather of sweat after almost having stepped on not one but two very large black whip snakes, both creatures dozing on the path in a no doubt comfy tangle of long grass and a profusion of wildflowers including daisies, marigolds, crimson poppies, pale pink mallows, rose-coloured holy orchids and scores of tiny yellow things that I’ve never bothered to identify. On both occasions the snakes panicked as they tend to do in such situations and as they writhed and twisted under my feet I found myself leaping with an undignified yelp into the air in order not to foil their obvious desire to flee. Thank god I wasn’t in Australia, I thought, where a similar encounter would have had a far less sanguine conclusion.

As it’s Easter I wasn’t expecting much from the shop so took the lack of fresh vegetables in my stride. However I did manage to buy tinned sardines, some tomatoes and peppers, a couple of avocados, a dozen fresh eggs from Irene’s chickens, a tin of dog food for Lisa, half a kilo of almonds and a large bottle of olive oil, decanting the latter which comes from Astypalea from a fifty-litre stainless steel drum tucked away between a derelict fridge unit and a large basket containing items such as paint brushes, garden clippers and hammers. Behind the counter I was surprised by the presence of a young man I’d never seen before doing something on a computer. I assumed he was husband of eldest daughter Mary, who is currently visiting from Crete, a guess which strengthened in likelihood when I pressed deeper into the cluttered bowels of the establishment and stumbled upon a long-haired and rather pretty child sitting on the floor playing checkers amid piles of boxes containing staples such as beans and rice and lentils. The child’s grandmother Irene was at the end of the aisle unpacking some of these boxes, and when I asked her how she was she answered with characteristic forthrightness, ‘Eh, you can see for yourself how I am, I’m putting things on the shelves.’ It’s responses like this that make my visits to the shop in Megalo Horio endlessly stimulating.

More people began to arrive as I was paying for my things, so with chaos threatening I was pleased to get out. Back down the path I went, keeping an eye out for snakes, and feasting on the view of the sea at Agios Antonios, my appreciation of which never falters regardless of how many times I see it. Tiny ripples lay over its surface, while in the distance a soft white haze that appeared to be billowing up out of its depths reduced the neighbouring islands of Kos and Nissyros to vague apparitions. Close up, the water owned a limpid clarity that allowed me to see all the way to the bottom where rocks and weeds mingled with smooth white sand and the occasional tiny fish enigmatically darted.

I arrived back at Jennifer’s place to find a large section of the old wire fence missing and Paroke and Marita, generically known as the ‘Swedes’, firing up their cement mixer. The pair offered to help her rebuild the fence a couple of days ago, claiming that they needed a project to get their teeth into. This and the fact that Paroke is a builder, albeit a semi-retired one, was handy for Jennifer who had previously considered doing what nearly everyone else on the island does when they need work manual completed around the house and hiring an Albanian.

I haven’t yet worked out what my role in the scheme of things will be, but I dare say it might come down to lifting heavy things like stones and the odd bag of cement. There’s also trees that need to be cut back and old bits of timber and rusty iron scaffolding that the previous owner deployed to hold up the fence and which now need removing. Meanwhile, in case you’re wondering, the reason Jennifer needs a fence around her house at all is to keep the goats from coming in and eating the garden and prevent her dog Lisa from going out and eating the goats. A solid barrier, in other words, is viewed as a win-win situation all round.

Ecclesiastically I didn’t see a great deal of action this Easter, although we did go up to the church for the service on Good Friday evening. To me this is the most moving of all the ceremonies over what is invariably an action-packed weekend. The highlight is the candlelit procession behind the epitaphios, elaborately bestrewn with flowers, down to the cemetery where Papa Manolis walks from grave to grave saying prayers for the souls of the departed. Soldiers from the army base shouldered the burden of the epitaphios which had obviously benefitted from the vast number of flowers all over the island, the result of better than average winter rainfall. More soldiers lined the approach to the cemetery, standing at attention with their rifles by their sides, while within the battered whitewashed walls candles flickered on the individual graves and the aroma of incense from the priest’s thurible mingled with the sweet smell of the countryside on the fresh night air. Papa Manolis wore his usual glittering robes and was preceded by Leftheris the electrician who carried a big wooden cross while young Antonis from Agios Antonios, his blonde hair cropped, brought up the rear. At each grave a family member passed him a hand-written prayer which made me wonder if he remembered exactly who he was interceding for.

While the prayers were in progress, with families standing around the graves of their deceased waiting with varying degrees of patience for Papa Manolis’ arrival, Jennifer and I gravitated to the end of the cemetery. I wanted to be near my friend Menelaus, whose son Marios was killed in a motor accident on Rhodes earlier this year. Menelaus, dressed all in black, stood by the flower-bedecked grave with other family members including his son Michalis and his older brother Pantelis together with their wives. When we came up Menelaus gave me a dismal look and shrugged his shoulders as if to say, ‘This sucks but it is what it is and there’s no getting round it.’ Since Marios’ death we have passed a number of vigils together, sombre and mostly quietly worded affairs fuelled by strong Cretan raki.

Otherwise Easter was marked by the usual loud explosions erupting with hair-raising frequency all over the island. All the crashing and banging scared Lisa and was one of the reasons I abstained from the Saturday night service, having lost my enthusiasm for heavy-duty ordnance going KABOOM!!! right under my feet. It’s hard to worship god, I find, when you fear you might be joining him at any moment.   

So it goes. Plans are afoot to head off next week to Crete for some walking, but as always I’m finding it hard to tear myself away from the island which is currently heartbreakingly gorgeous. Today was rather like summer though without the people and the fanfare, which is about as good as it gets.