What Would Odysseus Have Done With A SatNav?

When walking down the street have you ever noticed just how many people stride purposefully along with their eyes focused almost exclusively on the small screen of their smart phone held in front of them like some sort of medieval talisman warding off evil spirits? Oblivious to their surroundings they plough through crowds, sometimes straight into trees or lamp posts, as they tap furiously on the phone or check street signs to make sure the computer map is indeed sending them to Portobello Road and not Penzance.

Is this what we're coming to?

            It remains a mystery just what demands their constant, immediate attention. Remaining in touch with a friend they haven’t seen for at least 10 minutes? Checking their lottery number, finding the magic cure for Brexit, resolving the Syrian mess? Or perhaps they’re anxiously awaiting news on their Oscar nomination or Nobel prize announcement.

            While not wanting to appear like some old fogey technophobe I do sometimes wonder how the social value of recent ‘triumphs’ like Facebook, Twitter, or Instagram improve our lives compared with the discovery of things like penicillin, polio vaccine, electricity. It’s interesting that in the search for clean energy we’re going back to the very basic wind or geothermal sources. Perhaps one day we’ll even figure out how to harness the tides or develop energy from water.

            One innovation that seems to cause as much confusion as enlightenment is satellite navigation or SatNav. How many stories have you heard about people relying on SatNav only to wind up in a remote refuse pit instead of in their friend’s driveway? Once we made the mistake of using SatNav to find a hotel in Normandy and spent hours creeping around back roads before discovering that the hotel was less than a mile from where the device had told us to turn off into the woods.

            That experience only reinforced my prejudice for proper maps. Now before any journey I spend very pleasant hours in Stanford’s map/travel shop in central London. There you can find beautiful, multi-coloured, accurate road maps, hiking maps,  ordinance survey maps for almost every location in the world – all of which you can study at your leisure without that irritating little voice telling you to turn left in 200 meters, turn right there, and announcing arrogantly that you have arrived at your destination when a glance out the window shows that you are instead far from any known destination. Perhaps SatNav developers should add a phrase like ‘You Can’t Get There From Here.’

            These thoughts were wandering through my head as a recent Greek ferry trip took us past the sometimes-turbulent strait between the islands of Evia and Andros. This strait is the most direct route to Troy on the coast of Asia Minor, and I wondered what Odysseus would have done with a Sat Nav for his famous trip home after the long war.  Having made the trip to Troy 10 years previously he should have known the direct route home to Ithaca. But the gods, mainly Poseidon, decided to make his life difficult. At least that’s what he ultimately told his long-suffering wife Penelope.

Think she'll buy the  faulty SatNav argument?

             In addition to the issues with Poseidon he decided to add to his problems by relying on the first-generation SatNav. Instead of the simple, direct route the SatNav directed him to  zig-zag around the Aegean and Ionian seas for 10 years constantly being told to turn at the next way point or that he had arrived at his destination. I wonder if the system would have warned him about spending several years with Calypso, the risk of the Sirens, the dangers of Polyphemus, or the problems of a reckless crew that opened the bag of winds. After many distractions and useless side trips the little, by now almost completely torn, checkered flag finally appeared at Ithaca. History does not record what the frustrated Odysseus did with the malfunctioning SatNav. But he probably did what most of us often think of doing – grind it underfoot before confronting the wife and son with an already tall tale.

            Perhaps now we can blame the trials of early travellers on a faulty SatNav. One can only speculate how travellers like  Columbus, Magellan, the Vikings and others would have reacted when their SatNav said it was ‘recalculating’ or that they had ‘arrived at their destination’. They would probably still be floating around the high seas wishing they had relied on tried and tested celestial navigation. At least the stars move in predictable patterns without constantly 'recalculating.'

Finally Some Good News For Greece?

After more than eight years of being confined to the European Union’s intensive care ward with systemic, near-death, and highly contagious economic and political maladies is Greece finally ready to hobble out of bed? Although the team of EU fiscal doctors, aided by consultants from the International Monetary Fund, is not completely convinced there has been a noticeable positive shift in the tone of comments from friends and family.

We spent several months in Greece last year, and the mood was unremittingly gloomy all the time. Almost every conversation began and ended with a litany of the country’s problems: the idiocy of the government, the evil of the creditors, the collapse of the financial system, and on, and on, and on. The newly elected Syriza government, together with its tragi-comic finance minister Yiannis Varoufakis, was trying desperately to implement its version of the almost universally unsuccessful leftist economic and administrative ideology. All it succeeded in doing was to demonstrate its own incompetence and find new and unique ways to infuriate the people who were trying to keep Greece afloat. At one point, people on various islands were seriously investigating ways to secede from mainland Greece and create their own little versions of paradise.

While the underlying economic reality may not have changed very much, the election of a young, very smart, and dynamic leader as head of the main opposition New Democracy party has injected a whiff of change, the possibility of something better. Kyriakos Mitsotakis is the scion of one of Greece’s leading political families, but people should be careful of thinking of him merely as new wine in an old bottle. In addition to showing himself to be politically astute, he brings an impressive educational and professional resume to the job.

           

Kyriakos Mitsotakis -- the new leader of New Democracy

He graduated summa cum laude from Harvard and has graduate degrees from Stanford and the Harvard Business School. In addition to idiomatic English, he speaks French and German. He spent time in London working for the McKinsey consulting company. He also served as Minister of Administrative Reform in the government of Antonis Samaras from 2013 – 2015.  I met Mitsotakis several years ago when he was managing director of the venture capital arm of the National Bank of Greece. We worked on a cross-border investment project involving Greece and Turkey, and I found him smart, pragmatic, and focused on solving problems rather than advancing any particular theoretical approach.

Greece’s European partners will breathe a sigh of relief at the prospect of dealing with someone in Athens who literally, and figuratively, speaks their language. They would be making a serious mistake, however, to think that Mitsotakis will roll over and accept anything that comes out of Brussels. What they may well find is that instead of facing the profoundly unserious bombast of Syriza, they will be facing deeply analytical, thorough, and logical counterproposals to defend and advance Greece’s position. If Mitsotakis ever gets elected prime minister his counterparts in Brussels better be prepared to send the A Team to meetings with Greece.

Many of the people I spoke with on the island of Andros and in Athens greeted his victory in the race to lead New Democracy as a sign of very, very cautious hope.

“We hope, we wish,” said one shop owner. But with an expressive shrug of her shoulders she added, “But we really don’t trust any government anymore.” She, like thousands of other small businesses, is caught in the uncomfortable position of facing mounting taxes long before there is a hint of the economic recovery that could provide the money to pay the taxes.

A financial analyst in Thessaloniki said that Mitsotakis’ election has “re-energized the middle class. He is the flip-side of Syriza.” Others say Mitsotakis represents an important change in perception.

“Look, nothing fundamental has suddenly changed in Greece. Unemployment is still about 20%, the banks are fragile, and it looks like the capital controls will have to stay in place for the rest of 2016. But, in our politics, perception is very important. And right now, Kyriakos is benefitting from the perception that he may be the one to lead us out of this quagmire. The same dynamics of anger at the existing government and hope for change that brought Syriza to power in the first place could now benefit Kyriakos.”

Mitsotakis is certain to face the charge that he is nothing more than the latest manifestation of the dynastic politics that have plagued Greece for generations by focusing on punishing perceived enemies and rewarding clients rather than solving national problems. Another senior executive laughed and said ‘clients’ are nothing new in Greek affairs.

“Go back and re-read the Iliad. Homer gave the gods plenty of ‘clients’. Hera and Athena, for example, worked hard for the Achaeans while Aphrodite supported the Trojans. Kyriakos will undoubtedly face pressure from some so-called ‘clients’ but I think he is clever enough build bridges rather than simply settle old political scores.”

Under his very new leadership New Democracy has already received a bounce in the polls that puts them a few points ahead of Syriza.  It remains to be seen if Mitsotakis can ride this momentum to victory in a general election, but at this point not very many people would bet against that possibility.

The Greek Crisis Has Some Dreaming Of Independence -- From Athens

The only funny thing about the sad situation in which Greece finds itself is reading essays about what the Greek people ‘must’ or ‘must not’ do from renowned economists and leading academics writing comfortably from their offices thousands of miles from the turmoil. They are not the ones lurching from crisis to crisis worrying about when the money runs out, when the pharmaceuticals run out, when their pensions run out, or even if the food runs out.

Even Nobel Prize-winning economists like Paul Krugman urge the Greek people to rejectthe latest proposal from the creditors and risk leaving the Euro and returningto the drachma. Surely, he opines, this would be better than submitting to the even greater ‘austerity’ required by the creditors. Greece would be free of the creditors’ shackles and resume growth quickly. Nothing demonstrates the dangers of long-range analysis better than this.

In a perfect world Krugman might be right. If, and it is an enormous ‘if’ Greece had a smoothly functioning bureaucracy, a government determined to institute sweeping reforms, a political class not wedded to corruption and cronyism, and no deeply entrenched groups from  protected business interests to pampered public service employees with a strong interest in preserving the dysfunctional status quo such a recipe might work. But, alas, we are dealing with the reality of modern Greece and not some theoretical classroom exercise. And that sad reality is that without those sweeping reforms what remains of the Greek economy, regardless of the currency in use, will most certainly contract further.

Syriza could have been an agent of change. It could have instituted long-overdue reforms and, in the process, generated the revenue to improve the welfare of the people. Instead, it has proven to be nothing more than an extension, a particularly incompetent extension, of the failed political system that has decimated Greece over the last several decades. And the sad thing is if it had committed to these reforms it could have minimized the hated ‘austerity’. And the really sad thing is that the price of this intransigence is being borne by the very people Syriza said it wanted to help – the poorest sectors of the Greek population.

It chose instead to implement its school-boy theories, which by the way have not worked anywhere in the world, and substitute revolutionary rhetoric for real achievement. In the process their hypocrisy and deceit have succeeded only in alienating just about everyone who was in position to help. It would have been interesting to see, for example, if the creditors would have taken a softer tone if the government had moved aggressively on revenue producing reforms like privatization or breaking the stranglehold of protected businesses. But all we heard were thunderous pronouncements against such steps. One could almost hear the Euro Group, the IMF and the IMF pleading with Syriza to ‘give us something to work with.’ But the only thing that emerged were half-baked demands for debt reduction. Fine, but in return for what – precisely? I can imagine Christine Lagarde, managing director of the IMF, asking the Greek government what it would do to help itself.

One can argue that the European institutions made a serious error a few years ago by bailing out the private banks that had recklessly loaned massive amounts to Greece. How often should tax payers be required to rescue private banks that should have known better? When do they these banks have to pay the price for their mistakes? Wouldn’t it have been much better to force those foolish banks to take the necessary hair-cut to reduce Greek debt to manageable levels? The problem was only compounded when public institutions assumed that debt. All this may be true. But, as The FinancialTimes Martin Wolf puts it, those are now ‘sunk costs’ and it is time to move on.

Meanwhile the drama is played out on the streets of Greece as most economic activity grinds to a halt pending the outcome of Sunday’s so-called referendum called by Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras. The 72-word question is a ridiculous summation of complicated financial discussions that very few people can possibly understand. The legal grounds for the referendum are not even clear, because currently there is NO deal on the table. What, exactly are people voting on? Whatever the stated question may be, most people seem to understand that the real issue in this referendum is Greece’s position not only in the Eurozone but in the European Union itself.

A friend on the island of Andros had an interesting solution to his anger at the government and the uncertainty of the current situation – independence. “We should immediately declare independence from the oppressive, idiotic regime in Athens! We could build a real economy here based on out maritime history, but including other centers of excellence such as financial and health care.” All it needs now is a Declaration of Independence. We are, after all, close to July 4^th.

The Rewards Of Leaving The Beaten Path

One of the pleasant surprises of visiting the Greek island of Andros in May this year was seeing the number of foreign tourists taking advantage of the island’s unique system of ancient foot paths that wind around the steep hills and down into the deep, heavily forested ravines cut by rushing streams.

           I came across one happy group of about 15 British hikers with what looked like an average age of 55+ resting briefly on an ancient bridge before setting off up a steep cliff walk and then down again to a small seaside town where they were promised a good lunch. I didn't have the heart to tell them that lunch was a good two hours away. At least they had a coach arranged to bring them back.

           

            In previous years I usually had these trails to myself as I struggled to follow poorly marked paths that should be there, only to have to them disappear and then re-appear on the other side of thick thorn bushes. It took a fair amount of perseverance and bush-whacking to make your way along the trails. But the perseverance was always rewarded with glorious views, fields full of brightly coloured wild flowers, beautifully constructed stone bridges, stone walls and stone paths, and poignant reminders of former settlements and water mills.

            Now, thanks largely to a group of volunteers organized into a non-profit project called Andros Routes, many of these trails are being cleared, adequately signposted and maintained. The group recently published an excellent guide called Hiking On Andros that not only describes several of the trails but also discusses the rich and unique ecology of the island.

            The guide notes that Andros, in the Cycladic group of islands in the North Aegean, has had human settlement since the 4^th millennium B.C. Although there has been considerable depopulation since World War II there are still more than 80 inhabited settlements today. Many of the older residents of the islands can recall when the extensive network of trails was the only link between these settlements. You can still find people who remember taking these trails from remote villages to school in one of the main towns.

            Andros has also been well known since antiquity for its water supplies, Histories of the region are filled stories of seafarers, including Odysseus, stopping at the island to replenish their water barrels. The scenery is incredibly varied with high, steep hills, fertile valleys, small forests and numerous beaches – many of them inaccessible by car.

            Although the island now has a fairly extensive network of paved and semi-paved roads, the best way by far to see and appreciate the ecological diversity and the wide variety of rural architecture is to put on a sturdy pair of hiking shoes, long trousers, a hat and take to the trails.

            And there is no better way to explore these paths than with one of the leaders of Andros Routes, Olga Karayiannis. Olga has walked over most of the trails on the islands and has a deep appreciation of the history and biodiversity of Andros. I have had the exhausting pleasure of joining a small group of friends on two walks with Olga who has shown us places unknown even to the locals.

 

View from the beginning of the trail

           Last weekend she led a small group from the remote mountain village of Vourkoti to the lovely beach at Ahla on the east side of the island. We could see the beach from the village and foolishly assumed the walk couldn’t be that difficult. Wrong! Ten kilometres and four tiring, but fascinating, hours later I staggered from a beautiful grove of plane trees along a river bed onto the beach where, mercifully, one of our friends had arranged a boat to take us back to town.

Grove of plane trees near the beach

            The path was steep, mostly unmarked except for small red dots on some rocks, and was fairly difficult in parts. The scenery was stunningly beautiful, unlike anything one normally associates with a Greek island. We passed countless rare plants that Olga identified for us. There were well built terraces and old stone buildings. Ultimately we descended to the bottom of the ravine and came on a large, well-built stone bridge that passed over a stream lined with large flat rocks. No one seemed to know exactly how old the bridge was. It is in the middle of the forest and seems to come from nowhere going to nowhere. The only possible explanation was that it was associated with very old mining activity nearby.

 

The well hidden ancient bridge

         From there we struggled up to the monastery of Agios Nikolaos where we refilled our water bottles and rested for a few minutes before setting off for the beach that didn't seem to be getting any closer.

            As we came closer to the elusive beach Olga led us into a small farm house where a friend of hers had prepared some delicious unsalted goat’s cheese and traditional lemon sweets to give us energy for the last 20 minutes of the walk.

 

The goal of the beach at Ahla

            Many of the islands I have visited on both the Ionian and Aegean sides of Greece have their own charm. Travellers willing to go beyond the crowded beaches with head-splitting techno noise will be well rewarded with a new appreciation for the history, the ecology and diversity of this unique part of the world.

            Hikers interested in more information for treks on Andros can go the website www.androsroutes.gr or send an email to info@androsroutes.gr. The group can also be reached by calling +30-697-733-4334.

At Least The Flag Has Returned

Well, at least the weather is good and the flag on Andros is flying again. A group of private Andros citizens, with no help from any official sources, decided on its own to buy a new flag and hoist it up the flag pole next to the ruins of a Venetian fort guarding the harbour. The rubbish, however, remains in the same sorry state as Greek politics. In rubbish as in national politics and economic matters the people are united in what they don’t want, but completely disunited on exactly how to achieve what they say they do want.

The Flag Is Once Again Flying

 Voters in the general elections completely rejected the two traditional forces of the so-called left and so-called right that had dominated Greek politics since 1974. Many would say that the families and groups dominating those parties have actually ruled Greece for much of the last 100  years. Antonis Samaras, leader of the conservative New Democracy, badly misjudged the mood of Greek electorate when he demanded an early general election before any benefits of the structural reform package filtered down to the people. He had hoped to use the widespread discontent with the Socialist party PASOK to catapult his party into a leadership position. This narrow political calculation backfired badly.  Instead of attaining a leadership position he has plunged Greece into a prolonged period of uncertainty. Both the main parties were severely punished at the polls, and the new Greek parliament will include parties, from the neo-Nazis to the old-line Stalinist communists. It is doubtful that any party will be able to form a government. Therefore, the country will have to go through the entire general election process again sometime this summer. Well done, Mr. Samaras.

Assuming you can even get these diverse parties to sit in the same room, finding something – anything - for them to agree upon will require more skill and statecraft than any Greek politician seems to possess. More than 60% of the votes were cast for parties that rejected the tough structural reform program that has made austerity a four-letter word in Greece. Voters demonstrated that they were shocked, Shocked at the levels of cronyism, corruption and sheer administrative inefficiency that had brought the Greek economy to its knees. Millions of those same voters, however, conveniently ignored the extent to which they had benefitted handsomely from the same pattern of cronyism, corruption and inefficiency that would make any self-respecting banana republic blush.

Poll after poll has shown that Greeks by an overwhelming majority want to retain the Euro and remain anchored in the European Union. So far, so good. But, as yesterday’s election clearly shows, those same voters are unwilling to take the steps required to remain a member of the Euro club. The parties they voted for reject completely the reform package laboriously arranged with the Troika of the International Monetary Fund, the European Commission, and the European Central Bank. They blithely talk about ‘renegotiating’ the program. If the Troika, as expected, rejects any talk of renegotiation then these political parties advocate defaulting on the mountain of Greek debt, leaving the Euro and returning to the drachma. These steps are supposed to bring prosperity back to Greece and enable the hard-pressed voters once again to fill their pockets with freebies from the Generous State. The only problem with this scenario is that the Generous State no longer has any money.

Now, thanks to Mr. Samaras’s insistence on early elections, Greece is at a point where default and return to the drachma are no longer inconceivable. The Greek stock market greeted this election outcome by falling 7% on Monday. Bank stocks were down an incredible 19%. Further time will be wasted while the parties fruitlessly try to form a government with ever more unlikely coalitions. When it becomes clear that it is impossible to find a coalition with enough power actually to run the country the whole process will begin again with another election. In the meantime, nothing will get done. This is a luxury Greece can not afford.

This national indecisiveness is reflected even in local issues like the rubbish on Andros. Everyone wants it to go away. But you ask three people just how this should be accomplished and you get at least five opinions. There’s vague talk of a modern treatment plant. But where to put it? Everyone thinks such a plant is a good idea – as long as it is far away from their land. Greece is by no means the only country to suffer from the NIMBY (Not In My Back Yard) syndrome, but unfortunately Greek institutions are not strong enough to overcome this problem and force a compromise. Elected officials on the island don’t want to offend anyone by taking difficult decisions on issues like treatment plants for rubbish and sewage. One is reminded of Charles Dickens’ character Mr. Micawber who lived on the faith that ‘something would turn up.’ Unless they take those difficult decisions, however, the only things that are going to ‘turn up’ are overflowing rubbish bins and a severely polluted harbour.

Is The Natural Beauty Getting Buried?

It used to be that trips to the islands were a blessed respite from the confusion and mind-numbing negotiations, strikes, and political maneuvering that pass for normal life in Athens these days. After listening to debates about abstruse acronyms such as PSI, CAC, ECB and so forth it was a relief to get on a ferry and head to an island, any island, where life tends to run at a slower speed and reduced decibels.

Sadly, this year a winter trip to Andros served mainly as a reminder of official lethargy and confusion in the face of a long-term and increasing problem. This problem has nothing to do with the much-debated Greek pension plans, strikes, or debt repayments. The problem is quite simply the growing mounds of rubbish that blight all corners of this otherwise lovely island.



An all-too-common sight

This is by no means a new issue for Andros. The previous municipal administration also had no answers, and tried to solve the problem by burying it, literally. Unfortunately, the place they chose to bury it collapsed under heavy rains about a year ago sending tons of Andros rubbish into the sea and, eventually, onto other islands miles away. People on those islands were not amused.

That was more than a year ago. Since then, despite several official promises that ‘things were going to get resolved’ nothing has been done. Consequently, large mounds of rubbish pile up all over the island. From time to time they are collected and even shipped to treatment plants in Athens as a last resort at vast expense. Sometimes they resort to the very clever solution of turning streets leading to the main town into improvised garbage dumps.



One of the main streets turning into a dump



Even the streams are clogged

This year the locals have greeted the advent of the Orthodox Lenten season with more than the usual religious fervor and expectation of miracles.

“Thank God for Clean Monday (the beginning of Orthodox Lent). Before then the rubbish was even worse than you see now. You could barely walk anywhere. Suddenly the officials got busy and started to clean things up about a week ago. I have no idea where they’re taking it, but at least the mountains of rubbish are somewhat reduced. Fortunately we have had a cold winter so the stench was somewhat controlled. We will probably have another break for Easter when I’m sure they will find another place to hide it as the island starts to fill up again. We could do with another miracle. God knows what they will do in summer when it gets really hot and the population of the island more than triples,” said one disgusted local.

It’s not as if they are no solutions. Several have been proposed, but for some mysterious reason none has been acted upon, or even widely discussed. One of the better ones seemed to be the construction of a treatment plant at the southern tip of the island far from any population center. One land owner even said he would make more than enough land available. One attraction of this plan would be that the plant could also handle the rubbish that could be brought from the neighboring island of Tinos, only a few hundred yards away. There may be no Greek government funding available for such a project right now, but officials could at least research the possibility of a European Union grant on environmental and health grounds.

But so far, there is only thundering silence from local officials. Andros is blessed with unparalleled museums, wonderful neo-classical buildings, beautiful hills, ancient pathways, green valleys, rushing streams, and, of course, the Aegean Sea. With these natural resources and rich maritime tradition Andros could be a magnet for up-market, high quality tourism. But sadly, this opportunity seems to be slipping away under ever increasing mounds of rubbish.

While I’m at it . . . I have no idea who is responsible for maintaining historic monuments on Andros, but I really do wish someone would take a look at the remains of the Venetian castle that guards the entrance to the harbor of the main town Chora. This castle used to be graced by a tall flag pole with a large Greek flag  flying proudly above. For more than a year the flag pole has stood barren and rusting with no flag. A flag is a powerful symbol of pride and determination. In these difficult times it would be fitting to see that symbol returned to its rightful place. “We may be in tough shape, but we’re still here.”




Where is the flag?



The Relief Of An Island Easter

The social and religious rituals surrounding Greek Orthodox Easter provide a welcome relief to the constant drumbeat of depressing economic news coming out of Athens. Tempers have been fraught for months as the newspapers and television are filled with reports of yet more strikes, demonstrations, or persistent rumors of Greece about to reschedule or default on its mountain of debt.

Come Easter these fears and tensions turn to more mundane matters like the drama of fitting every living relative, household pet, cars, and piles of luggage onto the ferries out to the islands a few days before Easter. Crew members are busy helping, usually bodily lifting, ancient immobile family members up the stairs and then stuffing them into seats. Children and toys are scattered over the stairs while the hordes of smokers head for the open decks where they can relieve the tension of daily life by going through a pack of Marlboros during the two-hour trip to Andros. All of this is accompanied by furious hand gestures and a high decibel cacophony of opinions on the state of the world, the injustice of their current situation, concern about how to get the grandmother up the steps into the church without too much protesting, worries that the lamb won’t be ready, and fears that the wife forgot the all important red dye without which the Easter eggs will be a failure. This results in emptying bulging sacks of luggage all over the deck until the errant jar of dye is triumphantly found and displayed to the other passengers.

Once on the island thoughts turn to the succession of church services and meals that must be prepared according to dictates of the Orthodox version of fasting during Holy Week. It is the very clever cook indeed that can successfully navigate this narrow channel of what is acceptable and what is not. In theory, all meat, dairy products, fish – except for shell fish and squid, are forbidden during Holy Week. On Good Friday the forbidden list expands to include olive oil – but not olives. Supermarket trolleys are carefully, if somewhat surreptitiously, examined by other shoppers for signs of contraband dairy products or the odd sausage skillfully buried beneath mounds of innocent vegetables.

Those of us not involved in food preparation can take advantage of the sunny and chilly weather to explore the island’s countless ancient paths that crisscross the steep hills and green valleys. Many of these paths have become overgrown with thick gorse bushes and are all but impassable. But others have been cleared and marked by international groups of volunteers dedicated to opening up these ancient pathways. These paths and weathered steps were once the only way to get around the island, and the intricate stone walls carefully delineated ancient property rights. In some places you come across remains of terraces that were once cultivated with fruit trees and vegetables. In other places you see foundations of what were mountain shelters for the shepherds that used to follow their flocks across the craggy hills.

One of my wife’s many cousins joined me in an effort to find an alternate route up to the monastery perched high above the town. We trudged for more than an hour up a semi-cleared path between high stone walls before emerging onto a plateau covered with bright blue anemones, pink and white snapdragons, and other wild flowers that went well beyond our limited knowledge. We also stumbled upon the water source for the village at the bottom of the hill before deciding that the search for the alternate monastery path would have to be completed another day.

These paths are among the island’s hidden treasures. Away from the sparkling blue sea, white houses and tavernas beloved by travel brochures these trails let you discover new parts of the island’s rich heritage and beautiful vistas as you marvel at the effort and craftsmanship that created the stone paths and high stone walls.

Above all else, however, the days leading up to Easter are dominated by a succession of church services culminating in the midnight liturgy on Saturday. The churches and the courtyards are packed as the sounds of chanting and the whiff of incense float out to the waiting crowds. Everyone, from those in push chairs to elderly people using walkers, is holding a candle waiting to light it as the priest comes outside at midnight and pronounces Christos Anesti - Christ is Risen. Alithos – Indeed He is Risen. Bells ring out, firecrackers explode, and the crowd disperses for the next part of the ritual – a full meal celebrating the end of the fast.

This meal, featuring the traditional thick magiritsa soup made with generous helpings of lamb offal, is one of the main parts of the Easter celebrations. Treasured by many, this particular dish remains a taste yet to be acquired by others. However, housewives spend much of Saturday making their magiritsa and good manners dictate that you at least taste it before gently putting it aside. If you’re lucky the person next to you loves the stuff and will gladly finish yours before the hostess notices how quickly you have moved on to the meat dishes.

It’s about 2 am as you slowly make your way back up the agora wondering just how your arteries are going to cope with mainlining all this cholesterol. A couple of Alka Selzers later you fall asleep only to be woken around 9 am by the sounds and smells of people getting ready for the main event – whole lambs that are slowly roasting on a spit. In addition to the lamb many cooks will include a goat and the inevitable kokoretsi¬ – bits of lamb or goat intestines put onto a skewer and slowly roasted. While the uninitiated might run the other way, most consider kokoretsi the highlight of the weekend and will savor it with the same satisfaction as a wine connoisseur tasting a rare bottle of Haut Brion.

The ferry trip back is noticeably quieter as people either sleep off the weekend excesses or worry about what faces them on the mainland. Others, buoyed by the celebrations and enduring message of Easter, recall that Greece has been through very hard times before and has always managed – somehow – to pull through.

Beauty Of An Island Winter

Cold rain was sheeting down, waves were breaking over the pier and darkness had long since fallen as we pulled up to the ancient ferry that was to take us to Andros, the Aegean island my wife calls home. I looked dubiously at the good ship Penelope as it bounced, creaking and groaning, on the waves even while at anchor. The load master saw my nervous look, laughed and bellowed above the howling wind the Greek equivalent of ‘No problem.’ Thus re-assured we parked the car on the heaving car deck and staggered up to the passenger salon for the two-and-a-half hour ride. A reasonable person might just ask why this trip was necessary.

But as soon as the heavy anchor chain started to clank into the hold and the ferry slowly edged out into the stormy sea everyone’s spirits seemed to lift from the prevalent gloom of mainland Greece. The islands, as always, were offering refuge from the confusion, strikes, and general chaos of the mainland. Even during the dark days of World War II when Greece was under German and Italian occupation people on the islands avoided the worst of the warfare and famine that killed thousands.

After awhile we passed the lights of Karistos on Evia and entered the bumpy Cavo D’oro strait between Evia and Andros where we could see the running lights of ships slogging their way northeastward toward Turkey and the narrow, twisting Dardanelles Straits. A little while later the ferry docked in the port of Gavrio on Andros and we bumped down the ramp onto solid ground once again. The familiar Andros wind was strong as ever, but the rain had eased and a few stars were visible over Mount Petalo. Once on the road to the town of Chora on the eastern side of the island we rolled down the windows and immediately the rich scents of wild thyme, sage and rosemary filled the car.

Most people limit their trips to ancestral islands to the summer months when you can actually sit on the deck of the ferry and enjoy the scenery without freezing to death and getting pelted with a hard, cold rain. But we had ‘chores’ to do – the old house needs constant attention and the garden of fruit trees, grape vines and an overgrown mimosa tree was in serious need of pruning. During the summer when it’s hot and lazy you’re too busy doing absolutely nothing even to dream of getting any real work done. Besides, so I’ve been told, it’s the wrong time of year to prune anything.

But, as we discovered, there are real advantages to visiting the islands during the winter. You get to see the hills covered with what looks like soft green felt, the streams are full and rushing down the steep hills, and the wild flowers are just waiting to burst out at the first stretch of warm weather. You can even see a dusting of snow on top of Mount Oxi on Evia.

Among other benefits you gain immense credibility and move up the acceptance ladder from mere ‘summer people’ to ‘real islanders’. Shopkeepers have time to smile at my broken Greek and suggest that perhaps what I really wanted was a half a kilo of mince meat and not the five kilos of pork intestines that I had mistakenly ordered. A contractor makes time to come out on a cold Saturday night to fix our electricity. The owner of the computer store, who was up half the previous night hosting a 'Back To The 80s' party at his cafe,  makes time on a Sunday morning to fix my internet connection.  Passersby nod with satisfaction when they see lights in a house that is usually dark from September to June. You can just hear them saying, “This is how it used to be. This is how it should be.”

The outdoor tavernas may be closed, but it’s Friday night during the winter - and that’s bouzouki night in one of the restaurants. The man that runs one of the town’s jewelry shops doubles as a bouzouki player. He is accompanied by the owner of the restaurant who plays a mean 12-string guitar and happens to have a pretty good voice. After a few glasses of ouzo the customers add their voices to the renditions of traditional Greek folk songs. During the winter the cinema moves indoors and people are encouraged to make a bit of social occasion out of it by bringing wine and traditional Greek mezzes. Even if you miss the subtle points of an Italian film with Greek subtitles you can sit back and enjoy the wine and food.

The next day was perfect for pruning, bright and clear. Looking at the size of the task I felt like resorting to my favorite pruning tools of napalm and a chain saw when a friend showed up who actually knew what he was doing. He was horrified at my suggestion of wholesale slaughter of innocent plant life, and produced a small pair of pruning shears to tackle the jungle. Bit by agonizing bit some order emerged from tangled mass, and by the end of the day we had a two-meter tall brush pile, slimmed down grape vines, and a denuded, shrunken mimosa that he promises will spring forth in scented glory by Easter.

A few days later, loaded down with our own lemons and mandarins, we reluctantly returned to Athens convinced that island life has as much, if not more, to offer during the winter months than during the sun-soaked days of summer.