Crocodile Dun-Dimitri

In the original Crocodile Dundee movie, there was a scene I particularly liked where Croc Dundee himself was walking in the New York streets after dark with his soon-to-be lover and a couple of young street kids appear in front of them and demand Dundee's wallet. "Give it to him" says the Linda Koslowski character. "Why?" says Dundee. "He's got a knife," she replies. After the very briefest of pauses, Hogan (Dundee) replies, "That's not a knife...[pulls a dirty great big thing with a blade about a foot long from somewhere in the back of his trousers, makes ribbons of the leading boy's jacket, then continues...] that's a knife!" Whereupon the street kids beat it. Then he turns to the girl and says, "just kids having fun."

Well, earlier today, ..well, I ought to say yesterday as it's now well past midnight, I was at the Butterfly Valley, having just safely seen my guests off to go and explore, when I was intending to put my clipboard back in the coach before going for a frappé. Suddenly I felt a sensation like a miniature red hot poker in the side of my right forearm and, lifting my clipboard I found a wasp there (the nasty British black and yellow type) which I'd evidently trapped between the clipboard and the flesh of my forearm and so he'd resorted to his only line of defense - his sting.

I suppose I ought to understand the little mite really. I mean, we none of us like these guys and yet they sting in self defense really don't they? Anyway, having swotted it away, too late since it had done the deed, I howled and then began studying the area of my arm for evidence of the sting. There were in the near vicinity my two fellow escorts, Karla and Heidi, plus a couple of our coach drivers, all of whom immediately adopted expressions of concern and began enquiring as to what had happened. All I could do was say, "He stung me. The little devil got me, look!"

Within seconds those around me were expressing their concern and someone, can't rightly remember who it was now, told me: "You know the best thing for a sting?" I apparently replied with a puzzled expression, so they continued, "metal" in the kind of voice that indicated that this was their final word on the matter.

"Metal." I replied, "what kind of metal? What do you do with it?" Before they could suggest anything that may shed light on my enquiry, one of the drivers who I don't know all that well said, "Gianni, come with me." Since I had nothing to lose by complying, I complied. He led me to the door of his coach, told me to wait there and climbed inside. Within seconds he was back at the door with a knife the like of which I'd never actually seen in the flesh (or in the steel, eh?) as it were, and in fact had only really seen before in the above-mentioned scene in the movie Crocodile Dundee. It could well have been the actual knife, I wouldn't have known either way.

So, at this juncture there I was with a burly Greek coach driver, who'd taken fast hold of my right forearm and with his other hand was fast bringing this humungous blade across to meet it, saying to myself "Goodbye forearm, you've served me well", fully expecting him to plunge the blade into my flesh at any moment. I admit to actually having mental pictures of all kinds of ways in which he could soon be causing large quantities of my blood to part company with the rest of me. Yet what he did was to lay the blade across the area where the insect had struck and, looking at me, said, "Yes Gianni, the best thing for a sting is cold metal." After he'd lain both sides of the blade across my forearm for a minute or so, he then angled it in such a way as to convince me yet again that the next move would be to cut deep into my flesh, but what he actually did was to run the blade across my skin much after the manner in which a barber would use a cut-throat razor to shave his customer.

"You feel any relief, Gianni? Does it hurt now?" What could I say? Was there a hint of the panacea about this? Nah, not really. But, since he still held my arm and I was still staring nervously at this huge weapon, glinting in the morning sunlight, I decided to reply with something like, "I do believe it's better. It's not hurting now."

"There, told you," he replied, "the best thing [at this point I joined him in a two-part harmony] for a sting - is metal." After which I continued solo, saying "even though we haven't the faintest idea as to how it's meant to work."

A little later, whilst I was applying a soothing rub of Lane's Tea Tree and Witch Hazel cream to the affected area, which had begun its day-long process of swelling up and reddening to the size of an egg, I reflected on what would have happened to that driver had he been working in the UK and someone had spotted a knife like that on board. Talk about lethal weapon, he'd probably go down for it. I never thought to ask him why he was carrying it, but he certainly was. 

Maybe he had plans for later in the evening to go for an urban walk with his girlfriend.

On a Lighter Note

Went back to work yesterday, doing the Butterfly Valley/Halki excursion. So I took a few shots, which I'll share with you here...

The Butterfly Train arrives at the top of the valley, near the tiny monastery...

The view as one approaches the entrance to the monastery at the top of the valley. Yesterday there was a lot of haze, making Turkey & Symi quite unclear, although still visible are the mountains over there. There is a link, by the way, to the website of the Butterfly Train in the post "In Training".

View from the courtyard of the monastery, where you can avail yourself of some light refreshment from the friendly woman who tends the small room which serves as a café.

Same spot as the above, only a different angle. The cafe is to the right, where you see those patio chairs, that's the wall.

After a frappé at the top, Heidi, my fellow rep, and I walked back down through the valley itself. At this time of the year the butterflies are everywhere, making the whole place seem magical, were it not for the succession of tourists parading up and down. You never know in what language to say "please, come through", or "thanks" when someone lets you pass, because there are just too many languages assaulting your eardrums!

Having finished work at the Lindos Princess, near Lardos, at around 7.00pm, I walked a while whilst waiting for my beloved to come and fetch me in the car. This is a study of an early evening olive grove in August, as the shadow of the hill opposite slowly chases the sunlight away.

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The next two photos should interest anyone who likes Greek culture and history. There's a man from Lardos, Panayiotis by name, who has embarked, rather commendably, on a one-man crusade to preserve the history and culture of his village. His own rather modest little village house has long been home to all kinds of artefacts and objects from Lardos' past, but during the past couple of years he's been labouring on his project, his dream, of opening a museum about the folklore of the area. He's been drumming up funds from wherever he can and this has included a few self-published books he's written about the history of his beloved home village. 

Panayiotis can often be seem hawking his books around in the area, anywhere where he can find tourists who may want to shell out a few Euros to learn a little more about the place they're visiting. Having read one of the books, I can't vouch for the quality of the English in them, but that seems only to add to their charm. They are full of old photos which Panayiotis has either always had, or has acquired, and it must be said that if to purchase one helps him finalise the museum so that he can open it to the public sooner rather than later, that's a good thing.

The photos below show the place as it looks now, after a couple of years of Panayiotis' blood, sweat and tears have already gone into it. He hopes to open by next season and we hope he does too. I must say he's done an excellent job of the exterior and even the signs are well designed and easy to read. 

If you'd like to know where it is, it's on the left hand side of the Lothiarika Road from Lardos to Pefkos, almost directly opposite the Mini-Golf on the junction with the Kiotari/Gennadi/Katavia Road.

I shall certainly keep a watchful eye on the place and as soon as it's open will do a report on it here on the blog.

The Crow That Knows

Well, we're back home and sweating. Leaving the UK, where it felt like the air-conditioning was on outdoors all the time, with the temperature around 18ºC when we boarded the plane, then exiting the plane at Rhodes to a smidgin under 30ºC at 9.00pm, it was a case of, well ...get re-acclimatised!

There was nothing for it but to take a brief detour to Haraki waterfront on the way home (our good neighbours Mac and Jane, see chapt. 12 of Moussaka to My Ears, collected us from the airport) for a well needed drink. A cool Fix poured into a frosted glass slid down rather well, while Mac had a draught Mythos and the women ...whatever, I didn't notice theirs!! Sitting above the horseshoe-shaped small strand of beach, surrounded by a hubbub of chatter from the people sat around us in their droves on this balmy, inky-black Greek evening was like balsam to the soul.

You'll forgive me if I just reflect a while on the three weeks we spent in the UK dealing with the aftermath of my mother's death, but I haven't had a great deal of Rhodean life to talk about recently. It was just last Tuesday morning, as we sat in my mother's conservatory gazing out at her pretty little secluded garden whilst eating breakfast, that we saw her friend the crow. And it was then that I finally had time to reflect and become a little watery-eyed. Prior to that, I'd been so engulfed in paperwork and house-clearing; in handshaking, hugging and e-mailing; in telephoning and visiting office after office (the local Council, the Bank, the funeral director, the estate agent, solicitor...) that I'd not allowed myself time to think.

Last April, as we'd witnessed my mum's routine, we saw that every morning she'd rise at something like 6.30am and make her first cup of tea. Then she'd settle down in her favourite armchair to watch the re-runs of Heartbeat before starting to prepare her breakfast. Every morning it would be the same, a bacon and tomato sandwich. Of course, she'd always microwave the bacon, after first having cut off the rind and some of the fat. This was her concession to healthy eating! The beneficiary of this habit though, was a huge crow, who'd arrive every morning on the wall beside the garden, owing to the fact that mum would place the chopped bacon rind in the same location every day. On the top of the brick-built barbecue, that my dad had built many years earlier, there would be the fatty feast awaiting the crow. Mum would make a clicking sound with her mouth, convinced that she was talking to her jet-black shiny-feathered visitor. Nothing you could say would convince her that he didn't answer her as well. Ah, well, no harm done.

The thing is, this crow did arrive every day, having become quite bold, and would swoop into the garden from atop the wall and snatch a few pieces of dead pig in his beak, before swishing up to the garage roof to pick away at it. He may not have talked to mum, but he certainly knew the sound she made and it registered with him as "time for breakfast".

Now, when you lose your mother, who in our case in fact was the last of our four parents to leave us, you know that it's going to be a difficult time emotionally. To be honest, we were so busy whilst staying at her house this past few weeks that we didn't have much time to grieve, as mentioned above. But finally, two mornings before we were due to depart for our flight home to Rhodes, we found ourselves eating our muesli, covered as usual with yogurt and chopped fresh fruit, staring out at mum's garden, where, right on time, appeared the crow. I know, we often use expression "bird-brain" don't we, to describe someone who's not the brightest sparkler in the box. But birds aren't so stupid really. As we studied the crow, he very definitely hopped or strutted along the wall, then across the shed roof, all the time cocking his head to stare at the spots where my mum used to leave his bacon rind. This was now well over two weeks after she'd died, yet here was the crow, the crow that knows where his breakfast was to be found, apparently expressing his dismay that his benefactor was no more. Having found nothing he'd flit up to the roof of the garage and sit there a while, before once again repeating his little dance along the wall and on to the shed, evidently hoping that he'd not seen right the last time and that somehow his nice little morsel would have by this time appeared.

This was all it needed to set me off. Then began my thoughts of how my parents had moved into this home almost exactly thirty years before and both my sister and I had visited innumerable times, seeing this modest little bungalow as our focal point, the place where we'd come for that feeling of security that only your parents can give you. Then came my reflections of having watched my mum just months before, as she stood at the conservatory door and made that "click-click" sound with her lips, calling her crow to come and dine, which he always would. 

We both sat and became watery-eyed, not needing to talk, since we both knew what the other was thinking about. In just 48 hours we'd be locking up and leaving this place for the last time. Every plant in that garden had been put there by my father's hand, each brick in that barbecue cemented in place by him. How many times had my mum carried a tray of drinks out to the patio near the pond, the pond that Dad had set in place years before in order to realise the dream he'd had for a long time of keeping a few koi carp. That pond, which was now choked with water lily foliage and thousands of baby frogs. Not that the water lilies, which were just coming into flower, weren't delightful, but the way they'd taken over bore silent witness to the fact that my father had long ceased to be around to keep the pond looking just right.

Then it was that we began to talk about what we'd been reading in the papers and watching on the TV news during our stay this past few weeks. Did we still recognise the world outside the little Rhodean cocoon that we call home? It seems to us that the world is full of "fracking" and "trolling", of enough health and safety regulations to tie one up in knots, of all kinds of other stuff that seemed entirely new to us. Yes, you're going to tell me that "fracking" isn't something confined to UK shores, as is also the case I don't doubt with "trolling". It's just that such things don't seem to touch us out here up our dusty track in Rhodes and perhaps that's why we love it so much. We can almost put the world's changes on hold, or into slow-mo, while we nip down to the beach, as we did this very evening, for a swim in the luxuriously warm August waters of the Med. 

Driving up our track just metres from the main road last night, after we'd taken our interlude at Haraki, all four of us were surprised and delighted to catch in the headlights of Mac's car a pair of mature deer, just feet from the front bumper. As we'd come up around the bend from the road, they'd been grazing by the lane's border, been spooked by the lights and stared at us for a few precious milliseconds, before bounding away into the dark unlit surrounds of a Rhodean rural night. He was a handsome antlered stag and she was probably his mate, a mature doe.

Yes, losing loved ones is hard. But I know that millions have been there before me. None of us is special, none of us is immune. But the world, despite all the fracking and trolling going on somewhere or other, is still a place full of wonders. 

And back there in Midsomer Norton, there's probably a crow that knows.

Thanks

We've had a great many messages of condolence regarding the recent death of my mum, some of them by direct e-mail and others through the Facebook page for "The View From Kleoboulos" and a few as comments on my previous post. I'm afraid that it wouldn't be possible to respond to every individual message, so I just wanted to use this brief post to express our deep thanks to everyone who's been in touch with messages of support and commiseration.

We hope to be back home and I hope to be writing more ramblings before too much longer.

Sincere thanks to everyone.

Bomp, Bomp ...Bomp

I ought to have known. I should have guessed. It was never going to be that easy. In the post "Counting Down" from October 2012 I referred to some of the brain-numbing bureaucracy involved in legally buying or selling a car privately in Greece. Just to recap...

To buy or sell a car in a manner which satisfies the legal requirements, the buyer and seller for each transaction have to go together to the KEP office (Citizens' Service Centre) where a number of forms are filled out and - bomp, bomp - rubber stamped by the clerk who's sitting behind the desk. Then the purchaser is assured that in a couple of weeks or so the new Registration Document for the car they've just bought will be available, for collection of course, ...none of this "coming through the mail" malarkey. If you're the purchaser, you'll already have gone to the National Bank of Greece, where you'll have told them the make, year and model of the car you're purchasing and they'll have relieved you of over a hundred Euro in cash and given you in exchange a green docket, which you'll bring with you to the KEP office to prove that you've paid the required tax. Once the seller and the purchaser have signed a half a dozen or so pieces of paper they go their weary way safe in the knowledge that they've carried out the transfer of ownership in a way that ensures that they won't get their collar felt some time in the future.

End of story? Nope. As mentioned above, it was October of 2012 when we finally parted with the Suzuki Swift that we'd been running around in ever since moving out here in 2005. We became the proud owners of a splendid Skoda Fabia after I'd made two visits to the KEP office, one with the seller of the car we were buying, the other with the bloke who bought the Swift. On both occasions I'd watched in great bemusement as the pile of papers the clerk was dealing with grew ever larger. Now, here we were in early summer of 2013 and it was time once again to go see our accountant, get him to complete a totally useless tax return and give him around €50 for the privilege, and hopefully forget all about that kind of thing until next year.

After sitting down with the accountant for a few minutes, we were just about to leave his office when I shot a parting comment to him.

"Does it have any relevance the fact that we changed the car?"

I ought to have known. I should have seen it coming, for at this the accountant's facial expression changed as he replied, "Ah, yes, well, you'll need to have filled out this 'Υπευθηνή Δήλωση' [or 'Solemn Statement']." He then bade me hang on whilst he clicked his mouse a couple of times and two sheets of paper spat out of his lazer printer. Snatching them up he thrust them at me, at the same time saying, I couldn't help thinking with a degree of amusement, "One is for you to fill out as the seller of your old car. The other has to be filled out by the person who bought it. They'll both need to be rubber stamped by either the KEP or at a local Police Station."

Right about this moment I could feel a depression coming on. "And what about the car we bought?" I asked, rather unwisely in the circumstances. See, the thing is, the seller of the Fabia had moved back to the UK last Autumn. 

"We'll cross that bridge when we come to it." Was his helpful reply, which, of course, implied that more shenanigans would be sure to follow. I was now faced with the task of seeing if I still had a phone number for a bloke I only met a couple of times some seven months previously, then calling him in the hope that, assuming he still liked me if the Swift was behaving itself, he'd be happy to meet up and once again go visit the KEP office together in order to get these "Solemn Statements" filled out and rubber stamped. Oh joy.

After fingering through my contacts on the old mobile phone I was at least relieved to find that the buyer's name was still in there. I called him. Now, put yourself in my place here. Have you ever sold an eleven year old car and wondered what may be just waiting to go wrong with it just minutes after the new owner had driven off into the sunset? Can you imagine what kind of feeling the person in question may have towards you if they answer their phone and find it's that git who sold them the shed that's cost them a packet on the other end; and not only that, he's asking a favour that's going to cost time and effort from which the only reward forthcoming for that buyer would be the satisfaction of knowing that they'd helped that seller (the swine!) to provide his accountant with some vital piece of paper?

To say I was a little nervous calling this bloke would be the understatement of the century. I dialled his number and awaited his answer. Soon a voice spoke, "Yes? ------ here, who is this please?"

I swallowed hard and said, "It's John. I sold you the Swift last Autumn. How're things going then?"

"Ah, ya sou John. OK thanks," at which point I managed to avoid changing the colour of my trousers. Inside I was yelling 'YES! YES! YES!' while outside I continued, pushing my luck, "And the car? Good yeh?"

"Very good John, my friend. Hey, a pipe burst in the engine bay, ...needed a few Euros spent on fixing that. But hey, it's twelve years old now. I'm not complaining. Anyway, what can I do for you?"

'You mean apart from just having relieved me of an immense amount of mental anguish' I was tempted to reply. I went on to explain how he'd need to meet me so that we could fill out these forms and get them rubber stamped at the KEP office. It wouldn't be easy, as it transpired. After all, he worked full time and I worked a few days each week. To agree a time to meet and drop by the KEP would pose a bit of a challenge.

To try and cut a "War and Peace" down to a "Mills and Boon" here, we eventually met up and tried to get the job done at the KEP office in Arhangelos, where the bloke behind the counter is marginally less helpful than a traffic warden on an off day. We failed. These "Solemn Statements" have a section where you write in all kinds of stuff like your passport number, date of birth, parents' first and second names, including your mother's maiden name, dental records (OK, so that last one is a joke, but only just) etc.. Then a little further down one has to write, in Greek, something like: "I hereby declare that I John Philip Manuel, did sell the car Suzuki Swift, registration number ------, year of manufacturer 2000 for €xxx to Mr..." ...and so it goes on.

We retired to a nearby cafe, where we both filled in all the stuff at the top, as listed above, but since we didn't have any time left as the other guy was already late for work, I promised I'd get the statements written out and then take the forms to the KEP office near me in Gennadi. My buyer had written all the relevant details in and even signed his version. Hopefully I could get them both rubber stamped (bomp, bomp) at the Gennadi Office - job done, Fait accompli as it were. The following day I strode into the Gennadi KEP office, where the young woman (I've dealt with her before) was very helpful. She even told me that it was a waste of time trying to get any help from the bloke in the Arhangelos office, since he never wants to know. Once she'd satisfied herself that the forms were in order, out came the ink pad and rubber stamp and she bomped away on my version of the form and passed it to me saying, "There you are, yours is done."

"And the other one? You couldn't just stamp that for me too?" I gingerly requested.

"Aah, no sorry. The signatory has to be present I'm afraid." Seeing my face drop about a metre or so, she added, "...but you can go with him into the Police Station. They'll do it in minutes. It's all ready, just needs the person to be present."

I did venture the question too, as to why didn't they tell us at the KEP office when we'd done the transfer of the vehicle, that we were going to need these "Solemn Statements" too. The answer, rather unsurprisingly was, "Well, you didn't ask. Anyway, we don't require them, it's the accountants who do."

So, here I was last week, trying once again to get the Swift's buyer to meet me, this time outside the Police station, to get this wretched piece of paper rubber stamped. So far we haven't been able to arrange a time to suit us both. 

Meantime, I've had an email from the Fabia's seller, who's now living back in South Wales, UK. In it, apart from asking us both how we are, she told us, "I've been in touch with my Greek accountant [she still has a house out here] and he tells me that because I sold the Skoda, I need to furnish him with two Solemn Statements..."

Not Having a Blast

Apparently in Indonesia it is still carried on. Here in Greece and nearby Turkey the practice was widespread up until about fifty years ago, when it was finally stopped. What am I talking about? Fishing with explosives.

Seems an absolutely crazy idea, but it was hugely popular until the 1960s and was responsible for a considerable number of deaths (not only at sea either, as this story will illustrate), no to mention having a devastating affect on the ocean's delicate ecology and environment too. It's blamed by many experts in all things oceanological for the fact that fish stocks in Aegean waters are much, much lower than they were fifty years ago and beyond. It's not simply down to over-fishing, it's down to the fact that using explosives destroyed vast areas of marine habitat whilst the practice was still being carried on. In Indonesia it's still popular and none other than Sir Richard Branson has issued a statement on his Virgin Blog about the situation out there.

The explosives used here in Greece were many and varied, some using dynamite, others homemade explosives made from potassium permanganate, easily available as a fertiliser, whilst others used old hand grenades from the Second World War. Some fishermen would literally light the fuse on a stick of dynamite and toss it overboard from a small caique. Needless to say, if the thing wasn't thrown far enough, or went off early...

This practice was brought to my attention just yesterday my my friend Lena, an elderly Greek lady living in a village nearby. She was telling me how she'd bumped into a woman she'd not seen for many decades and asked how she'd been. Needless to say, she was interested in how the woman's family had turned out. For many Greeks it's still a huge feather in your cap if one of your children becomes a doctor or a lawyer, so few old women will hold back from extracting information about their long-lost friends' progeny. Here, they go for the jugular.

Lena was shocked, however, to learn what had happened to this old friend's family. Apparently the poor woman had lost her husband and three children all at the same time in a tragic "accident" decades ago which took place at her house. The woman had left the house in the village to go out to the family's "horafia" [fields] to pick some vegetables for the family's evening meal. This would have involved a trek on foot of several hours, taking the woman into some hills from which the village would not even still be visible. She returned to the village after the best part of a day to see a huge plume of smoke rising from the area where her own house was situated. The dreadful truth soon emerged that it was, in fact, her home that was burning. Fire fighters were on the scene and she was taken aside and made to sit down before she could be told what had occurred.

Her husband and all of her children had been inside the house when an explosion had ripped through it, killing two of the children instantly and seriously injuring her husband and the third child. The survivors of the explosion later died in hospital, but not before having helped others to piece together what had happened.

It seems that the woman's husband was a fisherman, one of those who would frequently use explosives to kill schools of fish, usually going out at night. Many such men had lost fingers, hands, arms or even lives when mis-timing their detonations, yet still the practice went on. For this unfortunate family, however, their method of catching their prey led to a tragic end of four lives all at once - and right in their own home.

What had happened? It seems that the seven-year old son had watched his father using a supply of old hand grenades to catch his fish. His father would pull the pin and throw the missile into the water a few yards from his caique. Following the blast, he would row closer to the spot to collect whatever fish had been either killed or stunned and were now floating on the surface. On the day in question, the son had found his father's stash of grenades, pulled the pin and thrown the grenade on to the floor inside the house. Sadly, it was the last prank he would ever play.

The woman explained to my friend Lena that the only silver lining to this tragedy was the fact that it led to a general abandoning of such fishing practices in the area, but what a tragedy it had taken to bring these locals to their senses.

I remember having read about such fishing methods in a book I'd borrowed a few years ago about sponge fishing in Kalymnos. I'd been shocked at the time to learn of such foolhardy men and their ways, who so often sustained terrible injuries in the pursuit of their trade. This tale from my local friend here in Rhodes brought home to me the harsh reality of that bygone life in a most vivid way.

What I was alarmed to learn, having done a little research about the subject, was the fact that in some parts of the earth this fishing method is still employed. Check out that link above to Richard Branson's blog post. There's also a piece of video there too.

I hesitate to use the expression, but this practice is really not about having the kind of blast that we'd all like to experience.

In "Train-ing"

Some time ago I'd have been the first person to pooh-pooh the upsurge in the "little train" phenomenon which is sweeping tourist destinations it seems just about everywhere. But it seems that one has to admit that these vehicles do afford the passenger a rather fun experience, often proving invaluable to families or those with walking difficulties, enabling them to see places which they may otherwise may have had to forgo.

So, I'm rather happy to make known the fact that there is now a "Little Train" running in Butterfly Valley. Called the "Butterfly Train" (do please click the link. They have posted some exquisite photos on their site) it's managed by a very nice chap called Panagiotis and his Scottish wife, the indefatigable Maggie...

Kyr. Panagiotis at his ticket booth

The train runs from the coach park at the South end of the valley all the way up to the Monastery, from where passengers can either ride the train back down, in which case they'll miss the butterflies, or they can enter the valley from the top end and only walk it in a downhill direction (much easier for those not so fleet of foot), arriving back at the lower entrance from where they started out. If you're going up there, Panagiotis and Maggie have a very good colour brochure which you can avail yourself of explaining all about the train in 6 languages.

I particularly took to Maggie and her husband for another most important reason. Anyone who's read my ramblings for a while will know how dedicated my wife and I are to recycling, something which has been a long time getting off the ground here in Rhodes. Well, finally things are moving for the better.

Maggie and Panagiotis were the first to establish a complete recycling centre in the area just off Kanada Street to the South and East of Rhodes Town. I'm going to make a visit there this very week, along with several sacks of plastic bottles, cans, glass and paper/card, for all of which the centre has the machinery installed to crush and process.

Maggie has given me directions about how to get there, so once I've made my first visit I'll post the exact location, using a map, on the News and Stuff page for any Rhodean residents who may be ecologically aware enough to want to make use of the place. They have passed the running of the centre on to a local businessman, after the local authority had shown themselves rather slow to see its potential for profit. 

All in all, some good news, eh?

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Once again, I've been snapping away this past week, so here are some more photos hot from my iPad Mini...

More Halki magic, Ftenagia Bay with Rhodes in the background

The taverna on Ftenagia Beach

Ftenagia, ...again!!

...and again!!

This is Giannis and his fishing boat. Giannis is a Halki native and he used to work on the Nissos Halki boat, which was where I got to know him. I've yet to run into him and not be greeted by a huge smile. He can frequently be seen entering one of the tavernas on the front with a supply of freshly-caught fish.

One end of Halki harbour front, where we reps often go for a dip

As per usual, don't forget to click on any photo to see a larger view.