FINDING HISTORY

Previous tenants in my cottage have left books, some treasures some not so. War and Preace, Animal Farm, Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince, John Pilger\s Hidden Agendas and a shelf full of airport thrillers, Dan Brown,Stephen King and others too awful to mention. Almost hidden were two real treasures. Vasili, Lion of Crete by Murray Elliott ISBN 960 226 348 2 published by EFSTATHIADIS 1987 is about Dudley Perkins who was killed in action after volunteering to return to Crete and help the resistance.
On the Run, Anzac escape and is evasion in Enemy-occupies Crete by Sean Damer & Ian Frazer ISBN 978 0 14 300722 7 is published by Penguin in 2006.

They are both rivettingand full of details passed over in official war histories. On the run has also alphabetical lists of known evaders and escapers, and the men involved in major escapes from Crete. I found a few familiar names, boys from Hastings High School who in September 1939 had only one worry - that the war would end before they were old enough to go to it.

But the rivetting thing in On the Run is the incredible heroism of the Cretan women who took food and clothes to soldiers hiding in caves,looked after sick and wounded soldiers and guided them along mountain trails risking their lives, and the lives of their families. There should be a special medal struck for these women, and their stories need to be collected. It's too late for first hand stories, but their some of their daughters might still be around to record their mothers'stories.

I knew about the retreat from Hora Sfakion and the trek through Imbros Gorge, but according to On The Run there were New Zealanders guarding the port at Kissamos Kastelli who escaped into the mountains. The villages they escapes to are still there, and if I can find an English speaking driver willing to take me I intend to go looking for Sifirinia,Topolie, Polirinia, Kalithenes.

Watch this space:

WHAT IS YELLOW PAGES IN GREEK?

Last night when I took off my glasses the right wing came off in my hand. It was not just a loose screw,(all my screws are tightly set than you) the whole thing had snapped. Without my glasses I cannot see the print on my computer screen, or read the title on a book cover, How to find someone to fix them? Of course, let my fingers do the walking. Except of course the yellow pages here are in Greek.
So holding my glasses carefully to my nose I set out for town. I knew I had seen an opticians somewhere, it was a matter of finding it. I did, it is one of the tiny shops opposite the new town square on the way to the beach. A bank with an ATM iis on the corner, then a pastry cook selling Danish Pastry, then the optician next door to the apothecary who sells Voltaren without prescription, but don't try to buy codeine in Greece, it's banned.
The optometrist and his assistant clucked and commiserated. The wing was broken, could not be repaired. Could they fir my lenses into a new frame? more clucks. Not possible, something about the lenses, But bless their hearts after five minutes he returned the spectacles to me with the wing mended (I shall have to be extrta careful until I get home,) and he refused to charge me.
I continued down towards the old town square and sat under a huge umbrella surrounded by middle aged and elderly Greek men. Two very beautiful waitresses organised my breakfast for me, practising their English as they did so; Greek yoghurt with Cretan honey and wallnuts. Cretan honey is the best I have ever tasted, and that includes the manuka honey I used to buy from roadside stalls in the Coromandel. One of my Loutro friends told me it is because the bees are allowed to roam the countryside and feast on herbs. Anyway just this morning's breakfast was worth the trip!

IT IS ALL SO ANCIENT!

Next door to my cottage with its white painted walls and blue shutters and doors is what I think was originally the farm house, It is bigger than my place but it has been empty for fifty years. There is no paint anywhere, and the windows were boarded up so long ago the timber had rotted. My landlord tells me the building will eventually become a museum.
Next to that is the ruined Roman Baths, an empty section full of broken stone columns and what looks like the roman equivalent of the whaling pots that are scattered around the New Zealand coast. I have no idea what they are. They look truly ancient.

I KNEW THERE WAS SOMETHING!

Yes, it's a pretty town, except that the public squares are full of chairs and tables with waiters of both genders dashing about serving coffee to Greeks who scream at each other fortissimo. Greek is not only a rapid language, it is loud. I would like to sit under a tree down on the beach, but the tamarisks have all been cut down, developers are flat out building tourist hotels and the only places one can sit out of the sun is in yet another cafe on the purpose built promenade. Of course there are a few old fashioned family restaurants, like Papadakis on the beach with chairs and tables at the waters edge but so far I have found nowhere to sit and watch people coming and going, to strike up conversations so people will tell me their stories.There are no car parks outside the supermarkets, and their aisles are so narrow there is no way two shoppers can stop and discuss the merits of what is on display. Houses are built flush with the road and they have high walls enclosing them. I can't compliment a gardener on her dahlias, or chrysanthemums as I pass.
I have yet to find a public library, not that it would be of use to me if I did, but in New Zealand and Australia the Library is one of the main places a stranger can make contacts in a new town. Someone there always knows where the writers'groups are.
And how I miss the Women's Institute! There might be an equivalent here, but without Greek I am forever excluded. My phrase book does not have'Çan you direct me to the Women's Institute please?' Glenavy W.I. I miss you all!
In Oamaru, when people go into town they can stroll around on wide footpaths and stop to talk to friends, Here the footpaths are about 30 centimetres wide, and the town is a warren of tiny streets full os tiny shops, apart from the Agora Supermarket, which is about the size of a corner dairy. Men sit outside the shops, and in the sidewalk cafes and shout at each other. If there is a wider piece of footpath somebody will have parked his car on it.

FROM KAIK ROAD TO KISSAMOS

This machine has loaded the pictures the wrong way round, so I suggest you, my readers, both of you that is, look at them from the bottom up. They begin at my crib at the Waitaki River mouth, then go to the Wordstorm Festival in Darwin and a picnic with some friends at Fogge Dam bird sanctuary and finally the foreshore in Kissamos.
Problems with the ageing population? Instead of giving all our money to Rest Homes we are out, active and having fun.

ESPERISTO BOLIKALA

I have no photographs to-day because I spent the morning in the Kissamos archaeology museum and photos are not allowed. The ground floor has a collection of artifacts excavated mostly in the 20th century. The greek text explaining the exhibits has an English translation under it. There are maps showing Crete's place in the ancient world and major trade routes of the Roman empire;a collection of amphorae, and diagrams showing how they were stacked in the holds of trading ships. Upstairs was the almost complete mosaic floor of an ancient villa, it showed hunting scenes, a hunter his chariot oulled by two tigers so lifelike they almost jumped off the floor at us. Also fascinating were the marble statues, portraits of children, young people and military personnel. One of a young girl showed the pleats in the draperies of her dress but it was her feet that caught my attention, Very faintly as though burned into her skin by the sun was the shadow of her footwear. She was wearing the 1st century equivalent of jandals! There was just no mistaking it.

Over the road from the museum I ate lunch, a tasty cheese omelet with a huge Greek salad and iced coffee, all for 10euros.

IN MY CRETAN COURTYARD.

This is the entrance to my villa taken from the front door. Beside it is the grape vine and the courtyard that used to be the goat shed, it is now an arbour. The bricks in the walls date from Toman times and some of them I suspect are even earlier they have a primitive hand made look about them.
I like to take my lunch out into the courtyard and spend a lot of time writing there.