This is where I was heading yesterday when I distracted myself with an attempt to be humorous or satirical, or whatever it is I try to be here. On Wednesday, my attention was drawn to a headline in the Guardian, stating that an Italian village imposes fines on inappropriately dressed tourists. We have heard about some cities charging, for example, cruise ship passengers to sully the walks and waterways of Venice in their thousands, and as long as the income goes to local infrastructure, all well and good. Symi and other islands were/are considering doing the same, I believe. Now, when it comes to the cladding of those visitors, the sensible and catholic Italians have seen the light. Well, they’ve also seen too much bare flesh, wobbly cellulite, misshapen bulges, and chests of all modern genders, passing by Nona’s house on a quiet Sunday afternoon. The villages of Varenna have had enough.

They are not alone.

In the matter of visitor coverage, I’ve noticed a few changes over the years. For one; that the average tourist-cladding has become scanter to the point of scarcity. For a second; that the number of day-trippers making it to the village (usually, sorry to say, the worst offenders) has remained roughly the same; therefore, the number of incidents per wandering population appears to have increased. I have also noticed the timeworn ritual of the Greek male when a scanty-clad passes by, in that conversation, until then about farms, football and family, ceases for the duration of the spectacle as time passes in awed silence. It then resumes on the subjects of females and fornication, and the world is set to rights.

Meanwhile, the high collar and pearls generation can hardly conceal their disapprobation, and clutching their Woolworth’s tightly, fill the air with tutting and ‘Well I never.’ The dedicated beer drinker takes little notice, others laugh behind the bare backs of the scanty-clad, and some take to blank pages such as this to laugh at life without, hopefully, actually insulting anyone.

The kind of spectacle I am talking about is this: Imagine, if you dare, a lady of any years between the ages of teen an ‘think I’m still a teen’ appearing at the entrance to the village sporting nothing but a pair of cocktail party sandals and a bikini, what Vogue calls, ‘an elevated swim essential’, including two-tone triangle tops, supportive underwire bikinis and sleek one-pieces.

Supporting what? A variety of rear hangings, as far as I have observed. In some cases, one catches a glimpse of the lower glutes hanging beneath a top covering, which is just short enough to get the Greek men betting on whether she’s wearing anything beneath. In other cases, we have the full-on arse reveal, the ‘couldn’t care less’ approach, or the ‘I’ve got it, so I’ll flaunt it’ attitude, even among the misguided who haven’t been capable of a good flaunt for many a moon. Also witnessed — and I am not alone in this — is the Thong.

The Thong is not the villain in a Japanese Kabuki (as it might sound, and indeed be), but is a style of swimwear. The Thong, according to people who are not me, comes in a variety of styles, though how anyone can make a style out of a piece of baling twine and half a pocket square is beyond me, as is how they can then charge upwards of €100 for the lack of material. Ladies can decide between the high-wasted Thong, the ‘Shorty’, the small, medium or full coverage Thong. (No-one dares say ‘large’ when it comes to Thong fashion, but everyone knows it means fat). Full coverage is a misnomer, because it doesn’t mean full body, it more or less means full frontal non-cover, but you get the picture: Ursula Andress or Bridget Bardot glistening as she leaves the sea and walks into soft focus, the ladies of the audience cooing in admiration, the men placing their box of Maltesers in their laps.

And so, passes by a free anatomy lesson, often with complete ass cheek and cleavage demonstration on show. The talk next door returns to football and philosophy, and the lads take no notice of what comes next.

Teh passes by a middle-aged man who made a pact with Lucifer and exchanged his dignity for a pair of Speedos. No offence to the brand, it is highly successful, and where would our fantasies be without Australian lifeguards and their budgie smugglers? However, when worn by a portly gentleman whose budgie hasn’t seen the light of day since 1989 because of the shadow from the serious overhang above, the Speedo becomes almost a Thong, and we know we don’t like to see those in the village. You can’t actually tell he is wearing anything until he passes by, or rather, until he arses by. As when catching a glimpse of a Thong, the effect on the digestion is similar.

Admittedly, there are some male picturesques who pass, and the sight of a bare male chest is not always unpleasant (as long as it’s Hugh Jackman, Zac Effron or, at a push, Henry Cavill), in other words, blokes can sometimes get away with it. But they shouldn’t.

What should happen is this: An inappropriate dresser appears in the village in a string and a pocket square (or a pair of wren-smugglers if male), and immediately, the officer charged with laying a fine appears from a darkened doorway to demand redress (get it?) and a fine of up to €200, as the village of Varenna is wont to do. Problem sorted; no eyes are singed, no offence is given to the orthodox culture, and, sadly, the lads next door have to think of something else to talk about. The visitor, suitably shamed, dresses, and the municipality takes the money before passing it on to a family member. Or, the cladding-warden might simply be someone with a heads-up who has got there before the authorities, and taken it upon himself to make some naughty cash. It doesn’t matter who imposes the fine as long as everyone is suitably dressed to visit an ancient village considered an historical monument and its churches. With the fine paid, only one question remains:

Where do these people keep their money?

Back on Monday.
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Get your cuppa tea on the go, and settle in. This is part one of a two-day special.

“Italian village to impose fines of up to €200 on tourists with bare chests or in swimwear.”

That was a headline in a major newspaper yesterday. It goes on to say: A fishing village by Lake Como has imposed fines of up to €200 for people who wander around with bare chests or in swimwear, in the latest attempt by an Italian holiday destination to crack down on uncouth tourists.

To start us off, we’re talking at the beach. What happens after is set out in tomorrow’s nonsense. For now, I simply wanted to set the scene.

Obviously, if you are going for a swim on a Symi beach, you will find all the necessary amenities available to you. (Now including disabled access in Pedi and Yiala, with a steaming plastic box nearby in which to change, and, I heard tell, possibly a WC.) As well as this modern addition, there are the wheeled bathing huts into which a lady may step and change into her all-in-one Princess Bathing Suit, before the little old man turns the winch and rattles the box on wheels to the water’s edge, so the lady can demurely slip from hut to water without being seen. Not that she will be, as all the men would have turned their backs so as not to risk becoming amorously inflamed a stray ankle. Those men, of course, are already dressed in their full-body, blue-striped Maillot suits, with caleçons beneath for the daring. They have their straw boaters at a jaunty angle, and with handlebar moustaches waxed, and propriety covered, they are ready for a snifter of bracing seawater.

Such bathers take to such waters in whatever attire they might choose, and are free to do so. As for other bathers in Symi waters, they make for a fascinating multiplicity of sights, not only of the bathers themselves, but also of their manner of bathing. Observe:

On one side of the beach, we see the youthful set of young men down from the mountain barracks on a day off from learning how to kill people. There they are, crammed four to a sunbed with two frappes between them, and with much chat and laughter, they study the debutante potential bathing in close proximity. They need not look far, for closer still is the group of wannabe models and influencers from (by way of a non-prejudiced example) Italy. perfectly proportioned in limb, aware of their own beauty and showing every inch of it, apart from the place of most interest to the young servicemen. As ladies of all ages do these days, they keep the upper storey completely exposed to the sun, and to sons of all ages who might stop by for a parley, a point, or a perv. After some penetrating conversation heard by all temporary residents of the strip of shingle, the younger set quieten into slippery masses of coconut-smelling oil, and lie in their own thoughts, enjoying the attentions of the second battalion currently scrapping together enough farthings for one more frappe, as it will buy them more time to carry out their recce and plan their pincer movement.

Moving along to the next oasis of plastic, canvas, steel and bamboo, we witness the longevity of the northern races. To wit, the perfectly preserved Scandinavians of the middle age practicing the yoga positions learnt that sunrise atop a mountain, heads to the stones, bottoms to the sky, legs to the shoulder, dignity to the wall, a bottle of Special Edition Evian Pure warming beside them, and healthy (organic) fruit ready for the feasting. Beach dress sense? Mildly practical, but contoured to fit only the fit, and show off hours of hard physical work in the gym and various health classes. The middle-aged-and-beyond middle Europeans and British come next with their charming display of big top canvas barely covering the cheap food diet of many years. The landscapes of their homeland have, over the centuries, become ingrained in their physicality. Thus, we witness the rolling hills and deep folds of the valleys, the craggy peaks of past indulgence, and the green and pleasant land of Blake’s imagination, which has become a bilious and pendulous landslip. This is all laid bare with only a little modesty covered, and only then because of a sound early-life training in Victorian ethics.

We may turn our attention to the activity in the water, and there find the various types of aquatic dwellers a summer island attracts. There is the circle of matrons of many nationalities, taking their exercise with feet firmly planted on the seabed, upper storeys in various states of decline exposed or otherwise, but bobbing just above the waterline, and their bodies benefitting from the highly aerobic actions of finger waving the surface as they chat. They stand in marked contrast to the serious bather who is off to complete his third circuit of the entire bay in his (or her, or [preferred pronoun]) daily ritual of ‘Can do so will do.’

There are many others, of course: The tenacious toddler set free to shatter the peace of strangers and learn for himself (herself, [preferred pronoun-self if old enough]) that investigations can lead to reprisals, and that one’s scream is the greatest weapon against being ignored. There’s the family who have brought plastic lilos, foam tubes and other undegradable excesses all the way from the garden shed via Buzz Airlines, and have set up a temporary market stall of balls, bats, buckets, spades, hampers, tote bags, towels, wet wipes, ‘snax’, bottles, ointments, creams, books, Kindles, newspapers, and loud video games — but very little clothing.

Towards the end of the bay — and this could be any bay anywhere here, there or in our imaginations — we find the one who got it right. The solo (or couple or [preferred pronouns] etc.) who find peace in their own solitude, and who, with respect for their bathing companions, sets himself (herself… ffs, you get the idea) away from the circus in order to find that inner peace so easily offered by an island like Symi, but so easily shattered by the tourist hungry for the same. There, beside the trickle of the sea, an eon-ago-crafted piece of igneous rock provides a free resting place on which to lay a towel. Toes teasing the lapping water’s edge, biodegradable sun lotion simply applied, a large straw hat protecting the head from the sun, and a suitable, nay, respectable attirement of beachwear about the person. Perfect peace, tranquillity, self-absorption, totally content and becoming one with nature, until it is time to leave perfection in search of the rest of the afternoon.

And that’s where the problems started in that village in Italy. That’s where we’re heading with this, and we will head there in tomorrow’s post. From the beach to the catwalk. Don’t be late.

Be cautious, because we are now in wildfire season. I wanted to direct you to some Greek newspaper reports out of interest, and I’d seen them on the Symi Dream Facebook page, but when I went back, they had been replaced by adverts for all manner of things that could not be further removed from the topic of the page.

Every now and then, I cull the adverts and unwanted/irrelevant posts, and that was this morning while I searched for the news item I wanted to share. These ‘you might also like’ things, as far as I can see, are completely pointless and a drag. I spend a good twenty minutes now and then just scrolling through and hitting the X button to get rid of them. After a while of this, we get less naff clutter on the page and more Greek-related things we actually follow. That doesn’t last for long, though, before the desperate influencers and advertisers are back. Here is part of my early morning summary:

Lots of non-related posts from lots of people ‘I might like to follow,’ Pizzas from New Jersey, hideously defined creatures competing in a ‘body shaping’ contest which reminds me of Colin Clive proclaiming, ‘It’s alive!’ in James Whale’s Frankenstein (1931), random posts from small sports organisations such as a bowls club in Warwick. Irish colleges’ reunion photos, and an Australian beach community day out, a beagle rescue centre (cute, but no), various adverts for non-Greece related items from fashion to football, an animal trust, something pointless from California… Only one question about all of this: Why?

About 20 posts later, finally a piece from a Greek newspaper in English that I do follow, and then back to the pointless adverts: ‘Create your own music with AI’ (it won’t be your music; get out your quill and manuscript paper), more effing football…

Finally, a piece from Greek City Times reminding us of that night in 2004 when Greece won the Euro Cup. We were in Rainbow with the crowd that night. Previously, Yiannis had been so excited Greece had made the semi-final, he put his icon on the floor, got on his hands and knees to worship it, bowed low and fervently, and just about broke his nose on the tiles in his enthusiasm. We were only talking about the incident the other day. Anyway…

Back to adverts from posh holiday lets on other islands. Got to love these: ‘Experience the real Greece’ type things showing you shimmering infinity pools overlooking the Santorini caldera, impossibly perfect women floating dreamily past in white samite (or Temu man-made, it’s hard to tell), bowls of perfect fruit littering the place in soft focus, the occasional croissant on a table, a hazy horizon over the blue waters of the Caribbean (eh?) and all those other things one finds in ‘authentic’ Greece. (I found a dead cockroach in the kitchen sink on Sunday morning; does that count as authentic?)

And then we’re back to the rubbish: An ‘influencer’ exploring Spain (so what?), a tip for how to clean the runners of your sliding doors, another bimbo ‘influencer’ thinking I’ll be influenced by her trout pout, ‘Naval Nostalgia’, something in Japanese, various video games for your EggBox, or whatever it’s called, more football…

Again, a Greek online newspaper. Yay! A different one this time, but the same story: wildfires breaking out in the north and on some islands (there have been some on Rhodes already) a warning that even if you drop a cigarette and set fire to thousands of Euros worth of something, even if it’s an accident, you will be fined and imprisoned. So, watch yourself if smoking on the balcony, or as you’re walking around town (who does that?), or if you are considering dropping your Coke bottle or anything else without anyone seeing, because anything can cause a spark, which can start a fire which, around here, will be virtually impossible to put out quickly. We have a fire hydrant just up the steps from us, which is reassuring to know. Not so reassuring to know is that the fire truck can’t fit into our lane, so it’s never going to hook up to it, not even in an emergency, but there you go.

Anyway… As usual, I didn’t mean to go off down that route, and the serious message of the day should be about staying safe and not starting a fire, not even by accident.

For Greek news in English, look up: https://www.ekathimerini.com/

Or:

Greece Records 33 Wildfires in One Day, Four Arrested

The other day, I was wandering through some of the social media pages dedicated to Symi, to see if anyone had brought up any interesting thoughts or had a question I might address, and I found one post asking what it would be like to holiday on Symi in December. With some holiday companies now extending their operations into the later months of the year, I thought, ‘Why not December?’ It can be a wonderful time of year here, though it’s doubtful a holiday in the winter would be anywhere near the same as a holiday in, say, June or even October. Not impossible, and rather an adventure, but there are things you’d have to look out for.

Getting here, for example. With charter flights and airlines not available at that time of year, you’d have to get yourself to Rhodes with another airline. We use Aegean (my favourite), because it’s about all we have in the winter. There may be other airlines using Rhodes in December, but I’ve only ever had to get to Athens and then onwards, and you can get to and from Athens around three times a day throughout the winter. There, you change for other countries, but those connections may not be daily. So, a scheduled flight into Rhodes is your first task. Then, you have to get across to Symi.

This, naturally, you do by boat, but in the winter, we have a limited supply of ferries. Gone are the 14 + crossings a day by various summer boats, some of which you can’t use one-way anyway, and we’re down to three Blue Star crossings (usually, Monday, Wednesday, Friday), and maybe one or two with Dodekanisos Seaways (weekends, I seem to remember, but the timetables can change). As the most regular/reliable service is Blue Star, you leave Rhodes in the later afternoon. If your flight arrives before, say, three, on a boat day, you might make the evening ferry, if not, you will have at least one night in Rhodes. There will be plenty of local hotels open; those used for conferences, locals, and general travellers, as opposed to seaside places.

We have to assume the weather hasn’t turned and left you stranded in Rhodes for five days, as happened to us once when coming back from Romania, though this was in April, when the weather is more inclement. Had we known we would have been able to see the island and the boat that was due to take us there, and yet, not been able to get anywhere near either, we’d have stayed in Transylvania, because it was (then) cheaper. But, we got here.

Try and book a Symi taxi in advance, as they will be in short supply at six pm on a winter’s night, and it’s a fair hike from the port to the cab rank (which will be empty) and the bus stop (where there should be one or maybe two bus runs of an evening), or else, it’s a walk, or a pickup from your host, assuming you have found one.

You shouldn’t have any trouble finding somewhere to stay, though you’ll have to hunt around the listings. Every other granny flat and derelict workshop is now an Airbnb, it seems (some friends recently stayed in what used to be the shoe shop on the main road, others in what was once a storeroom), though the larger hotels will be closed.

As for entertainment, you will find some places in the village open all year round, though operating on half a shoelace. The big taverna in Horio stays open, and places like the Secret Garden and the Sunrise remain operating (bar holidays for the owners), Scena, too, is usually open and still serving food, and one year, Niki’s Kitchen was open in the winter, but it wasn’t last winter, so I’m not sure. Down in Yialos, it’s a similar story with only a very few (one or two) tavernas open, some of the bars, and maybe a giros shop or two. Elpida’s is a very popular place all year round, and there are several others. You may, though, be having a drink behind plastic with your feet in water as the rain lashes, and you wonder, ‘What to do now?’

You can go for walks, you could try the sea for a swim, you could check out if there are any festivals taking place, you could sit in a bar all day and drink your pension, or just wander the village and harbour and explore the fishing boats and general ‘Isn’t it cold?’ and ‘Wet again,’ kind of winter vibe the island has.

It will be an adventure, but remember, it will not be easy to get here (all part of the adventure), you may get weather-stranded in Rhodes, or here on the way back, and there’s not much ‘touristy’ going on. But, there are always local things happening (especially around the Christmas and New Year weeks) with a Christmas market, some concerts in the square, church services, fireworks on NYE night and so on.

Oh, and dress warm. It can get down to 5° in the winter, and your accommodation won’t have carpets, central heating and other northern comforts you might be used to. All the same, enjoy! (And bring a good book.) Oh, and did I mention the rain? Bring a sou’wester.

Oh dear. Look, no offence, but if you are going to use AI to create a post, or if you are going to copy and paste someone else’s, please don’t make it one created by a machine that has fed off the writing of thousands of talented people and then, in a very untalented way, put it back into a completely farcical set of words.

I am referring, without prejudice, to a post on a social media group/page that purported to be talking about Symi. It has appeared a few times in various places, and perhaps people share it because they can’t tell that it is AI at work. Let me give you a few examples from the translated text (the original is in Greek); a few things that prove it was regurgitated by a computer and not thoughtfully composed by a creative human. (Ps. This is only for a bit of fun, and not a slight against whoever has used this text and shared it.)

For a start, in one place, when talking about the island generally, the text line says: You don’t read her story, you listen to it. Apart from making me think, ‘What on earth does that mean?’ I note that Symi is female. A little later, she has transitioned. She’s not just beautiful. He has energy. Then we have the rather worrying, … stone courtyards that smell of basil, worn steps that lead you up or inside you.
Worn steps that lead inside you? Carry on Up the Khyber Pass, perhaps?
Holding hands with that rare silence that only companionship has when words are not needed. [Reaches for sick bag.] That’s the kind of drivel you might read in an AI-generated Regency romance novel, all heaving breasts and ripping Empire lines, no plot, no character development, only saccharine words that not even Dame Barbara Cartland would have dictated from her chaise.

… cats that were sleeping like queens on terraces and benches. Ah yes, a reference to that time when Good Queen Bess found herself homeless in Chatham and had to kip in the park.
… discovering corners forgotten by the world, yet so alive. Don’t overdo the hyperbole, love. Forgotten? Not by the thousands of day trippers and cruise passengers, regular visitors, not to mention us 3,000 inhabitants, and if there is a forgotten corner, it will soon have another Airbnb built on it.

We got lost in hidden chapels and sheltered bays, leaving behind us only our laughter and the sound of exhaust. The. Sound. Of. Exhaust. [Thinks for a moment, and imagines the Honda 125 that screams past the house at 3.00 in the morning, leaving behind the stink of burning engine oil.] Nice.

Along the way, our gaze became a pilgrimage. Now we’re getting into the realms of Oscar Hammerstein II and some of his classic lyrical writing. I cite: [My heart wants…] To sing through the night like a lark who is learning to pray. (The Sound of Music.) A lark who is learning to do what now? Ah! Kneeling at a prie-dieu with a rosary in its wings… Come on, Oscar, you can do better than that.

The AI word vomiter, sadly, cannot.

We reached Archangel Michael the Roukouniotis and got lost in that silence that only stone monasteries near the sea can offer. It’s inland, babe. Were you using Google Maps?

Next comes a different, old, ecstatic pilgrimage that I first read as ‘elastic,’ and a quietness that was not just silence. Er… There’s a difference between quietness and silence, isn’t there? In this case, quietness is clearly made up of silence and something else, therefore rendering it neither quiet nor silent. I’m confused.

… we stood reverently, not out of obligation, but out of a sense of deep inner silence.

We remained silent.

… the prayer of the Aegean sailors could still be heard. (They only had the one prayer between them, but it was apparently loud enough to break this interminably noisy silence from which the island apparently suffers.)

The sea of ​​Symi is crystal clear, a mirror of the sky. Your average Symi sky comes with clouds, chem trails from planes, the occasional helicopter, drones and Sahara dust clouds. On the upside, we do see ravens, hawks, migrating birds, incredible sunrises and sets, turtle doves and so on – but not mirrored in the sea.

The post goes on, endlessly taking us into realms of quiet silence through the treacle of nonsensical embellishment… And on. And on. And runs for so long, only a pedant like me would read it. But as for the remaining highlights:

She wasn’t just clean. O…kay. What else was she then?

… small vessels that seemed to have come out of a Greek black and white, picturesque, as if they had a soul. What? Has Trump now taken over the AI machine?

Every shoreline and a sigh of joy. [Inserts about-to-vomit emoji.]

And the sun is warm, sweet, like a caress as it sears the skin of whiter than white tourists, turning it to the raw red of our childhood skimmed knees and silent moments of Greek joy like we used to know in another person’s life of such tranquillity and reflected sky. (I put that in so when an AI snout comes a-snouting, it won’t know what the hell to make of this.)

And so on and so on… Until we take a very extended excursion, There, in Marathon, among the few pine trees… According to Google Maps, Marathon is a 640 km drive away, but there is a road joining it directly to Symi if you don’t mind driving over water. But, whatever…

This line, on its own, possibly cribbed from Gerard Manley Hopkins or another Jesuit poet: As a souvenir from the times of radio, fishing line and family Sundays.

I’ll leave that conundrum with you because, quite frankly, I’ve had enough of this drivel.

Perhaps, now, you can see why I am so against generative AI. (The thing you use when you want to become a published author overnight, so you type in ‘Write me a successful novel overnight,’ and out pops this kind of crap.) Well, at least it’s novel, I suppose. But the worst thing is, people fall for it. The need to produce content, it seems, is more important than the content of that content, and that can only lead to a dumbing down of human creativity. The more we accept this kind of nonsense, the more immune to it we will become, until, one day, we’ll end up speaking like it.

On that note, I shall be away now. I shall take to the ancient, basil-smelling stone steps of antiquity, while watching the sea reflect the lark-prayed hopes and dreams of the young blacksmith’s daughter, whose passion was as intense as the furnace of her nearly-silent youth, his breasts the bellows at her fire, there to give [preferred pronoun] all passions to the sage-sniff of the poacher’s pouch when he threw her manfully onto the sandy shores of Marathon… Oh, per-lease!