Olive Grove Lessons ~Life, Love, Loss

 A stiff breeze rustling the branches of the olive trees and making the terrace grasses sway, was enough to pause our stroll in the grove. Sometimes, it was the raucous cry of birds swooping to nests high atop nearby cedar trees that stopped us mid-step. 

Each new noise or movement, they taught me, was a wonderment. We had to pause, listen and watch.  Every time . . .because it might just signify something new and exciting.  

In the grove at The Stone House on the Hill

In the spring, the grove beckoned for a game of hide and seek at the rosemary bush. Sometimes on hot summer afternoons, it was where we watched ants at labor marching across the soil cracked by the intense Mediterranean sun. In the fall, it was games of chase using olive twigs cut during olive harvest that filled our time in the grove. 

Olive grove games

For several years now, I have spent a portion of nearly every day in our olive grove, simply for the purpose of enjoying it. 

It wasn't easy to do that at first. I thought I needed to be pulling weeds, trimming, doing something. That is, until my two feline mentors, Princess and Maggie Mae, decided it was time that I understood the concept best defined by Italians as, dolce far niente, the sweetness of doing nothing. 

Dolce far niente in the olive grove

One can't help but notice the proliferation of self-help tips that fill social media these days. There are mantras, memes, and meditations, all offering ways to improve one's life/outlook/happiness by slowing down, simply calming oneself. Indulging in sweet nothingness. I guess the teachings of my fur girls were much in the same vein - they just taught by example. Peace and happiness could be had just by watching a bug crawl past or a butterfly flutter above.  

The key, I learned from them, is taking time to notice, then allowing oneself the time to enjoy it. 

My grove getaway at the Stone House on the Hill

I honestly can't recall when our trips to the grove became a daily ritual.  I was doing it 'for the cats' in an effort to keep them interested in something far away from the road that passes by the other side of our home, I reasoned.  

Princess, left, and Maggie, right, explore the grove.

In truth, I was getting as much out of those grove hours as were the two felines who accompanied me there.  

Life and Love in Greece

The two - Princess and Maggie Mae -- as we named them after they each had made clear upon arrival -- one year apart and nearly a decade ago -- that they would be making their home with us. While not related to each other, after their initial skepticism at sharing our attention, they were to become inseparable sidekicks.  

Dolce far niente at the Stone House on the Hill

The lessons in the grove took on new intensity back in January as the spread of Maggie's skin cancer was clearly bringing her to the end of her life. During these last three months, our trips to the grove increased and each time we lost ourselves in the sweetness of doing nothing . . .together. 

Savoring those last days. Maggie continued to find wonder in sniffing the air to catch its scents as she sat, watched and listened.  

Maggie Mae Smith

We buried Maggie 10 days ago next to the rosemary where she had spent so many hours enjoying life. Princess and I haven't resumed our trips to the grove. We are both adjusting to Maggie's absence, but we continue to indulge in dolce far niente. 

Maggie was not a fan of our travels!

I've taken a break from the blog in recent weeks to experience that sweetness of doing nothing with my fur girls.  As Maggie's health deteriorated, The Scout and I cancelled all travel we'd planned for the first months of this year. (cat people do those things) With Maggie's recent passing, we have a small window of opportunity to travel in Schengen countries before our residency permits expire the end of April and we are no longer allowed to travel (pending the new permits).  We are ready for some travel adventures again. And he's scouted out a good one - I'll tell you about it in the next post.

Maggie 

Thanks for being with us today - and our wishes for safe travels to you and yours. 

And a big welcome to our new subscribers!!

Let's Go Fly a Kite!

Just like that, our hibernating village awakened to spring! Eateries are reopening, fishing boats are being painted and readied for the season. And celebrations are underway.  

Our village, Agios Nikolaos, awakens to spring.

I write today during a three-day holiday weekend in Greece. We end three weeks of Carnival celebrations on Saturday and Sunday, then on Monday kicked off Lent with meat-free feasting and flying kites and outdoor gatherings of families and friends.

Clean Monday's kite-flying tradition. Photo credit

Saturday and Sunday were filled with activities to end Carnival, here called Apokries.  Dressing up in costumes and masks - and often referred to as Halloween -- the events were fun and festive community-wide parties.  

Carnival comes to the village.

Carnival really got underway two weeks ago on Smoked or Charred Thursday, Tsiknopempti,  when barbeques appeared outside businesses and homes throughout cities and villages. Souvlaki (usually chunks of pork on a skewer) and other meat was served in generous portions and eaten with gusto.  

A Tsiknopempti celebration makes ready in Kalamata

But like all good things, celebrations must come to an end, and this weekend moved us from Carnival's frivolity to a more somber celebration of Lent, which is heralded in on Clean Monday. In Greek the day is called Kathara Deftera, the day that officially starts, the seven-week period of fasting, and self-moderation before Easter. 

Clean Monday is similar to Ash Wednesday in western religion.

Kathara Deftera is celebrated with non-meat feasting and flying kites. (For those wondering about the kites: It signifies the ascension and purification of the soul; symbolic of the human spirit flying closer to God.  And for kids, it is just plain fun, no matter what the reason.)

Clean Monday's kite-flying tradition. Photo credit

Mother Nature has been a bit fickle this celebration weekend with rain and hailstorms dampening parades and concert plans in the region on Sunday but allowing for outside activities on Saturday and Monday.  

Kite flying at Pantazi Beach on Kathara Deftera

Monday's sunshine and light wind was just enough to bring early morning hopefuls to Pantazi Beach just below our home.

And it worked!

The holiday weekend brought a surge of visitors to our village. The rural villages often draw large numbers of city dwellers on holidays weekends; many are returning to their roots, their family homes, and others are simply seeking a change from the city.  Some 60,000 cars were recorded leaving Athens on Friday on the nation's highway - thankfully not all were headed our direction.  

Section of Agios Nikolaos waterfront road opened!

The weekend was such a big celebration that our village has even managed to completed repairs to a section of our main beach road and open it to traffic.  After a near nine-month closure, let me tell you, that is BIG news! And even more reason to celebrate!!

Close up of roadwork at To Limeni in Agios Nikolaos

And restaurants in the still-under-construction part of the roadwork, didn't let that stop them from opening their doors to the new season.

Seafood pasta a popular Lenten dish

I realize that some of you are all set to celebrate Easter on March 31st, as that is Easter's date in western religions.  Here, the Orthodox church is celebrating Easter on May 5th.  

Another feast: tzatziki, horta, falafel balls and calamari

As long-time readers know, the weeks leading up to Easter are my favorite time to be in Greece. I honestly think that the three Easters we spent in Greece prior to becoming expats here helped to tip the scales in favor of moving here.  There is no other season that highlights the coming together of families, culture, history, religion and traditions as well as do the weeks leading up to Easter.

Stuffed squid one of my favorite non-meat dishes.

Next weekend is another three-day weekend, the first of Greece's two Independence Day celebrations this year. One is in the spring and the other in October.  Both are times of celebration and pride in country and marked with strong displays of patriotism.  

Spring is here!

So, we are welcoming spring and the celebrations that it brings each year.  We hope that wherever this finds you, you are enjoying your surroundings as much as we are ours! 

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A Winter's Walk on the Wild Side

February's departure and March's arrival made it clear that winter's wild side is still with us in our slice of the Greek Peloponnese where we make our expat home.

Windblown lamp post on the way to the village

When we decided to move from the U.S. Pacific Northwest among the factors that helped drive the decision was getting away from ice, snow, cold and the long dreary winter that seemed to stretch from November until April.  

The highest waves we've seen here. This is Agios Dimitrios below us.

We succeeded in leaving the snow and cold behind. But we still have winter.  And while winter storms in our area don't strike often or stay long, they are wild. 

Our signature storms bring near gale-force howling wind, thunder so loud it reverberates as if bombs were falling in the grove and lightning strikes that turns the sky into an electrified kaleidoscope.  The sea becomes a boiling cauldron of angry waves. And sometimes we even get a blanket of African dust! 

This is dust - from Africa - heading our way

Even though the storms are often short-lived, they are so ferocious that we understand how ancient ones developed beliefs in mythological gods.  Some days we are certain that Poseidon, god of the sea, and Zeus, commonly thought of as, the god of the sky and weather, are having one grand war between their respective worlds.

Our municipal parking lot flooded from waves and weather

The storm that came with February's end hit with such power and force that it left many of us newcomers shaking our heads in wonder at the destruction left in its wake.  In our village, Agios Nikolaos, waves flooded the municipal parking lot - a lot where fishing boats had been moved to from the harbor to keep them safe from the storm.  One boat was washed from its trailer and still sits on its side in the lot.  

Municipal garbage bins scattered by the storm

Municipal garbage bins that normal line the street like soldiers were tossed about by the wind as if they were leaves. Rocks and downed limbs were strewn about the roadway making it impossible to drive on in places.   

Walkway closed in town due to high waves in the harbor

The walkway at harborside (the one we've been using since road construction closed the road above it) was also closed by waves crashing into it.  

The good news about winter storms is that we have pretty accurate weather warning systems in place these days and we know when a storm is coming and approximately what its strength and duration will be.  Advisories are posted on FB by emergency service and government pages.  

The African dust that covered us recently

We also use a weather app called Poseidon, which shows not only wind and rain but dust storms as well.  Our Peloponnese in the map above is under that red circle. And did we have dust!

Garbage crews had bins uprighted the next day

The other good thing about these winter storms is that local folks know how to deal with them. Cleanup was underway as soon as the waves and the wind gusts lessened.

The morning after. . .

Dimos, as our municipality is called, had bulldozers out clearing roads and parking lots. Business owners were also at the ready to clear up storm debris.  Our Pantazi Beach Bar's outdoor terrace - a favorite place of ours for coffee . . .

A February morning before the storm - Pantazi Beach Bar

. . .was hit hard by the storm as show in the photo below. I took it from nearly the same spot.  But within days debris was cleared, and we are again able to sit on the beachside terrace.

Pantazi Beach Bar terrace the morning after the storm.

Road construction has resumed in the village, and we are again using the harborside walkway as a bypass.

Harborside bypass is open again

Winter storm watching is popular on the Pacific Northwest West Coast (United States and Canada). I can tell you that it is much warmer watching storms here than there!  The tourism folks in Greece are missing a bet by not promoting winter storm watching. Maybe those of you who like to storm watch should take advantage of the off-season lower airfares and hotel rates and head to our part of Greece and do some storm watching here next winter! 

We hope that whatever season you are in while reading this that the weather gods have been good to you!  Thanks so much for being with us on this walk on the wild side of winter in Greece.  

Time for a coffee?

'Time for a coffee any time soon?' texted one of my girlfriends the other day.  Her question was aptly worded as meeting for a coffee is not a hurried affair here - it takes time. 

Going out for a coffee has become one of our favorite pastimes in this chosen expat life of ours, although, doing it 'the Greek way' was initially one of the most difficult behaviors to wrap our heads around.

Morning coffee at seaside in Stoupa village

We came to this new life bringing our American coffee break habits with us: drink it hot and drink it fast, visit quickly and don't get a parking ticket. So, in Greece we carried that rapid consumption mindset with us, drinking - not sipping - our coffee and observing those around us.  'How can they sit so long over a cup of coffee?' we'd ask ourselves.

Coffee and complimentary cake in the village

Here, the sipping is done so slowly that the coffee can actually cool down before it is finished.  Then you tag on a bit of extra time to drink the glasses of water and nibble the complimentary cookies or cake bits brought with it.

I'd wager that indulging in a coffee over the span of an hour or more, is almost a rite of passage into Greek culture and community. 

This Greek coffee culture is serious business as shown by statistics from the World Coffee Portal: Greeks consume 40,000 tons of coffee a year, 40% of which is consumed outside the home. 

Kalamata coffee stop while running errands

The coffee culture is so pervasive that the Athens Coffee Festival, September 28 - 30, this year is expected to attract some 32,000 aficionados, vendors, and coffee professionals. 

We aren't sure when we morphed into sipping coffee in the appropriately slow manner, but we have become believers in its benefits.

Watching the harbor is a popular coffee activity in Ag. Nikolaos

Here going out for a coffee can be done with groups of people or by oneself. Coffee sippers might open a book and read for an hour or more, join in a game of backgammon, watch the village happenings, visit with friends or simply sit and sip. You might find some looking at their mobile devices, but seldom will you see people bent over computers as you do in a Starbucks in the States.

Watching traffic is a favorite activity while sipping coffee.

No, coffee in our village is a time for watching traffic make its way down our only north-south route through town. And it is always fun to speculate on which big truck might not squeeze past the balconies and awnings. Or we might watch the fishing boats come and go in the harbor. Or we might just visit with friends or with tourists seated at nearby tables or walking past.  

Take a book and leave a book at the local coffee shop.

Sometimes we use the coffee time to select books from the 'take a book, leave a book' shelves available at a number of the cafes in town. This is a particularly nice feature of having coffee out, when living in an area where we don't have libraries or bookstores.

Morning coffee at the Kafenio in our village

And going out for coffee could almost be reasoned to be healthy here because often it is paired with a walk.

Getting to the Coffee

A grove on my way to coffee called out for a photo

For most of the year the weather is conducive to walking to the coffee shop, taverna, or the traditional kafenio. We have versions of them all in the two villages that are walking distance from our Stone House on the Hill. So, when we go for a coffee, we generally get in a two-mile walk. Walking is such a normal activity, done by so many, that we often pass friends and neighbors, and we get in a visit or two as well as exercise. 

On my way home from coffee - the seaside route

Our route takes us through olive groves and along the sea - I never tire of photographing scenes along the way.

A 'friend' on the coffee shop route

We've obviously adapted to this coffee culture as we often chuckle at how easily the mornings 'get away from us' these days when all we've done is to go out for a coffee. 

 And we now understand why some jokingly say that drinking coffee is the National Sport of Greece.

Coffee Pantazi Beach February coffee

That's it from Greece where winter is still hanging on, although the wildflowers have sprouted along our 'coffee route' and spring is just around the corner. We can even sit outside for most of our coffees.  We thank you for the time you've spent sipping coffee with us. We send wishes for your continued safe travels.

Got a Bee in my bonnet!

It seemed odd that during the first week of February my garden would be buzzing with a swarm of bees. One or two maybe, this time of year but certainly not a swarm. Actually, there's seldom more than a couple zipping between blooms any time of year.

February blooms at the Stone House on the Hill

But at least a couple dozen of the winged critters were hovering around a water bucket I use in the side garden. I went to the front door and another dozen or so were swarming around another water bucket I keep there. When I picked it up, they swarmed around it AND my hand.

As with all mysteries about life in Greece - the place we live as expats - it took a while, but today the mystery of the bees was solved: 

The new neighbors

They are our new neighbors! And quite a subdivision of them is in the previously vacant lot between six houses in our neighborhood.  Not only have they settled in for a long stay, but it appears more of them are coming! And Google tells me that bees are social little creatures and that thousands could inhabit a hive. Lucky us! The new neighbors are many and sociable!

The bees live above our Stone House on the Hill

We've seen plenty of beehives in our slice of the Peloponnese. We are among the many who brag about some of Greece's best honey being produced right here. 

But none of the hives we've seen before were sitting among and this close to residential houses.  You better believe we expat neighbors have discussed the newcomers. We've speculated about probable regulations, and the unlikelihood of there being any about bee hives. But who would one even contact at the Municipality to ask, we chuckled. And what if they aren't allowed? Then what? More laughs.

The two police officers who patrol a wide swath of our area would surely get a laugh out of it as well if we were to contact them. 

View from our 'hood to the neighboring village

The bees' sociable ways could be considered 'pestering', but they certainly aren't classified as 'pests', so the private pest control service would get a laugh out of it as well. 

And really, no one wants to hurt them, we'd just like them to move a few miles into the wilderness. Perhaps a relocation service? More laughs.

Home of the bee hives, our home lower right corner

The lot is for sale, asking price is 350,000 euros - thus, buying the lot and moving the bees is not an option. 

So, like with many things that don't quite compute in the expat mind, we will file this away as another one of 'those' experiences that serves to remind us we are living on foreign soil. It simply can't be treated as it would be 'back home'.  

And the bees are a good segue into another topic of expat living we are currently focused upon and that is the quest for the residency permit.

On the Road to Residency Again

Those residency permits - a reason to rejoice!

Long time readers probably just rolled their eyes, and said, "Oh, not that again already!!' But yes, with a permit that requires renewal every two years, one must start gathering documents, dotting 'i's' and crossing 't's' several months in advance of 'expiring' as we call it. We've started the' pre-app' preparation.

The good news is there has been no change in the required amount of income, health insurance or documentation required to make us eligible to continue living here.  We gather it, submit it and wait for it to be reviewed, and that is where the bad news comes in. . .

The traveling life brought us to Greece. . .

Note to new readers: it is during the review process that we are not allowed to leave Greece, other than for trips as might be necessary back to our home country.  The reasons for not being allowed outside we are told, is that our temporary residency paper only signifies we've applied to continue to be residents.  It doesn't guarantee we will be granted a renewal.

With it, we are basically just like non-visa travelers who visit countries in the Schengen Zone. There is a 90-days-in and 90-days-out rule which travelers, and apparently, we, must abide by.  Because we have been living here, we've technically already exceeded those 90 days. So, if we leave Greece, we could be barred from returning because we'd overstayed your 90 days.  

No welcome after 90 days

Staying longer than 90 days in the Schengen Zone is considered a serious offense and could result in fines, penalties, deportation or forced exit and being blacklisted for future travels.

After having the Immigration officer taking our fingerprints in Kalamata two years ago say in a no-nonsense voice, "You cannot travel out of Greece until you have your permit.' (The Scout had asked if a week getaway to Italy was allowed - it clearly wasn't.) we aren't going to travel outside Greece while waiting our permit.

A Lengthy Lockdown Ahead

Greek islands beacon during lock down

Fully prepared to spend a few months 'locked down' in Greece we were lining up destinations to see in the coming months. It took 4.5 months to get that bit of plastic two years ago, so perhaps it would be six months this time, we speculated.

Staycations ahead

Last week we came close to booking a cruise for January 2025. Just before we did, we learned Greek Immigration is understaffed and backlogged. Seriously backlogged. They are currently reviewing applications submitted last April 2023.  A ten-plus-month wait. We may not have our permits by next January! We didn't book the cruise or anything else.

Too Old to Be an Expat?

Petra, Jordan

A few posts back I took a light-hearted look at when one might consider oneself too old to be an expat. This backlog in Immigration has prompted us to think about the question again in a more serious vein.  While the years go quickly here, the years are going quickly, period. We aren't getting any younger and we ask ourselves how many of the years left before us do we want to spend locked down and unable to travel?  It is a question being asked by many expats right now. 

For now, we will continue gathering our documents for Immigration and prepare road trip plans for Greece in 2024! 

As always thanks for being with us and wishes to you for safe travels.  Where are you traveling this year? Let us know in the comments below or by email - we may just be traveling vicariously with you!!