Sunday morning on Symi: The liturgy being broadcast from the church (listen to short video below), the cat asleep on his outdoor bench, washing out to dry, Neil up in his loft seeing to his messages, something in the slow cooker for later in the day, house tidy and it’s only 09.15.
We’re up early because we’re aiming to go for a walk up the hillside, but the skies look a bit dark, though the forecast says it’s not going to rain until tonight. We’re not planning to go too far though and I’ll put some waterproofs in the rucksack just in case. All being well there will be some more ‘walking on Symi’ photos during the week.
We went for a short walk on Saturday, just down to Pedi and back, by which time I was drenched; not rain, not the sea, but it was very humid. I took some snaps of the Pedi landmarks which I can share with you: the wartime shell, the fishing nets, the 101 uses of a dead motorbike, the strange man in red, the shopping trolley and other internationally renowned sights will be along on the blog today and later.
This Sunday morning (as it is as I write this) is also an exciting time as the illuminations are due to be switched on tonight. I don’t mean the municipal Christmas trees around the harbour, or the lights on the street lamps, the festive neon of the village square or anything as simple as that. Tonight is the Spalding Festival of Light which we should be able to see from the other side of the island. The boys and Co. are setting up their Christmas lights and decorations today, so I hope to be there covering that story later, and, as long as I can bag an exclusive, I’ll get a photo for the blog. Can’t wait.
We’re not putting our decorations up until after 11th December; two weeks seems adequate time. Before then I have to find decent wrapping paper and pay copious visits to the post office to see if things arrive in time. Not sure when the last posting day from UK to Greece is, but that doesn’t really matter around here anyway. Things can leave warehouses and homes in plenty of time, and wiz across land or sea to Athens, to Rhodes or wherever, but they can then still get held up by bad weather, a cancelled boat or even, and this has been known, get stuck in a delivery person’s yard for several days, outside, in the rain; though that happens rarely I should add.
We did once, when first opening the shop, order a blow-up from Kodak (USA, as it turned out) to see what their service was like – we were sourcing enlargement services from all over the place. The photo didn’t arrive so after about six weeks we ordered another one. That arrived in about three weeks, though the quality wasn’t great so we never used them. About a year after ordering the first print, this tattered, battered old piece of cardboard tube turned up at the post office, stamped all over with labels from places it had toured while en route, like Alan Wicker’s passport; ‘Dusseldorf’, Antwerp’ and the back end of ‘Anus’ (which is actually a town in France, honest, look it up). And the photo was just as bad as the other one. Hey ho!
Anyway, here’s hoping you’ve posted and done, and everything is falling into place for Christmas (if you celebrate it) and here’s hoping it doesn’t pour down just as we get to the top of the mountain later this morning. And here’s that video:
