Nopigia

The gorgeous weather this week finally prompted me to take the walk from Kastelli/Kissamos to the Rhodopou Peninsula, to revisit a meadow overlooking the sea that I had visited earlier in the year. It was about 4 hours round trip, and I packed a small lunch of bread, meat, cheese and fruit to eat along the way.

On the return trip, I ran into Neil and Lorraine, the folks who take care of things for my landlord, at the taverna Porto Allegra, where I first went with Yannis last summer. They invited me in to have a drink, but I declined knowing that I had a good two hours walking ahead of me.

Before seeing Neil and Lorraine, I had a rather strange conversation with some fishermen. They were out in the water in their boat, I was high up on the rocks. I tried to speak Greek, they tried to speak English. We were yelling at each other to be heard above the wind and the waves. They learned that I was living in Kissamos and had walked here from there (looks of incredulity). They learned (after asking) that I am not married but am here with my two cats. I'm not sure if they really understood the cat part of it, because they then asked if they were brothers or sisters. I learned that the one guy's father lives in New York, and that I should come back the following day at the same time to feast on the days catch. I explained that it was a long way to walk, and I probably would not be back tomorrow, but some other day. I told them I want to go out in their boat with them and help them fish, which was met with looks of confusion between the two of them, and me finally deciding to wave goodbye and tell them I'd see them some other time.

Greek is difficult enough for me, but I have to admit that yelling what little I know across the sea to a couple of strapping, handsome young fishermen was kind of fun.

There is a picture in the collage above with some goats and a chicken. I love this particular yard, because it has not only goats and chickens, but some random bunnies hopping around too. Sometimes when I eat meat I feel bad, but if I'm going to eat it I'd like to think that whatever creature it belonged to was wandering around happily before it met its end, just like these guys.