Kindness in action: Paros, Greece
I promised I would tell you about our Paros festival! But first, it would be rude of me not to introduce you to some of the people who made our time in Paros what it was.
Stratos: the empire building, charming, if sometimes slightly too enthusiastic in his good morning kisses, owner of Stratos Apartments, Car Rentals and probably several other businesses we don’t know about. Age unknown… 70 if I’m being kind…
Lia and Lisa: the engine room that keep the Empire running. These women worked their butts off and managed to do it all with grace and humour. Funny, warm, fun women I would love to get to know better one day.
Alexandros: cheeky and proud. A fisherman in his heart I think, who now works at Stratos ferrying tourists around and doing all manner of work. Alex spoke to us about how hard it is in Greece behind the veil of the tourist gaze. 73% taxes and owning land is now a curse – the kids don’t want the land the parents are ready to pass on because of the crippling taxes that flow.
Yannis: the calm, quiet presence at Stratos. Seemingly unflappable, kind and with a smile that lit up his face.
Dimitrios: the Captain. An incorrigible flirt. He’s not a Paros local, he comes in summer with his yacht to take tourists around to Anti-Paros. We spent some hours with him when our first attempt at sailing failed because of high winds – ˝it’s not a problem for me, the boat, it has a keel, but the port police say we probably shouldn’t go and we keep them happy˝. He was at pains to tell us he’s ok for money, but just wants to make the people happy. I think this was at least 80% true.
George: a young man who worked at the beach bar we spent a few days at, but who we saw every day as we walked past. His face would break into a grin with a ˝hello girls, when are you coming back?¨. Almost old enough to be his mother, total sweetie!
These people anchored us to Paros. The more I reflect on that wonderful island, the more I know it was the warmth, generosity and kindness of them all that ensured I felt so at home there.
As we left Stratos Apartments at the end of our stay, Alex gave us his email and phone number and told us if we wanted to return to Paros for the festival on Assumption Day (for the religious, the Greeks seem to use Assumption and Ascension interchangeably…or maybe we just spoke to heathens!), 15 August he would arrange everything. We booked our ferry tickets the next day. A stereotypically Greek exchange followed, with us making several attempts to contact Alex, him acknowledging us with an ‘ok’, no detail beyond that and us just accepting that it would all be ok and going with the flow!
Luck was clearly on our side this day. We arrived, with absolutely zero knowledge of this in advance, just as the Feast of Ascension procession was making its way from the main church, along the streets to the port where some prayers were said – even the ferries delayed their departures to witness the crowds. It continued on its path, us following along. It’s clearly a very important day for Paros and the wider religious community in Greece. There were hundreds of families, all dressed up in their Sunday best, who walked the procession in the heat and then had coffee or lunch together. The town was heaving, but by 5pm when we walked from the beach back to Stratos, it was a ghost town. Everyone had gone home to escape the wind and rest for the evening ahead.
We arrived at Stratos Apartments to much surprise from Lisa and Lia, Alex had kept our return a secret. It was so lovely to be welcomed back so warmly. Alex had sorted us out with an apartment nearby and told us to get settled and return at 9pm because he had arranged for us to go out on a boat for the fireworks. After a quick dinner, we were back at 8.45pm only to be told that the boat had left early! Clearly our faces fell because next thing we knew, Nic was on the back of Alex’s motorbike being sped to the boat. We had become those people we had spent 2 weeks exclaiming over – sitting on the back of a motorbike, no helmet, summer dresses, zooming down the middle of the road past traffic – sometimes you just have to trust the universe has your back and hang on!
It was a nervous 10 minutes for Nic on the fishing boat as she waited for Alex to arrive with me, with the fishermen getting more and more anxious to depart. But they waited as I traversed one boat onto ours, sat down on some fishing nets and said Kali Spera to about 5 fishermen in their 50s and a couple of their wives (presumably). We motored out into the bay, joining other traditional fishing boats. Then, on some unseen signal, we all started racing back to the sea wall. As we got closer all the boats started letting off multiple flares. It was, in Paros style, windy as hell, so there was a fair amount of sorting out which side of the boat should be used to hold the flares with varying degrees of success! There were a few moments we were all reasonably convinced we were going to be set alight by the sparks – the two former health and safety lawyers, one about to go into a Director of Health & Safety role, were pretty sure adequate risk assessments had not been carried out by the captain, his crew or ourselves!
But as we did a few loops past the crowds lining the sea walls watching the official fireworks and the fishermen’s flares being released, it was clear we were part of this festival in a unique way. A perspective only a few would be lucky enough to have. This was pointed out by one of the women on the boat, an English teacher and girlfriend of one of the fishermen, ˝I’m Greek and this is only the second time I’ve done this. You are lucky.˝ We agreed.
As we waved our goodbyes, we ran into Dimitrios and spoke to him a while. We met Alex at Sativa Bar, our favourite people watching spot, for a drink when he finished work to say thank you. As we wandered home around 2am, we saw George at Kialoa Bar. It took him a solid 5 seconds to place us and then his face broke into his huge smile, ˝Girls! What are you doing here? You left the island!˝ Two rounds of shots in quick succession to celebrate our reunion and then we left him to the busiest night of the year.
I shared a link on Facebook some time ago to Sarah Wilson’s writing on philotimo. I won’t try and replicate what she has already written about so beautifully. But I will say that we had conversations with no less than 3 people about this concept. Of exercising kindness with no expectation of anything in return. We didn’t raise it. We simply made comment, in naturally occurring conversations, about how kind people had been and this is what they talked about to explain it.
In this world right now, that somehow feels poised ever so precariously on the edge of a tipping point, when you wonder what you can do to help or change things, this is one thing. Small, pedestrian acts of kindness. For no reason, but because you can.
For me, Paros was that – kindness. Not only that, there was also delicious food and crystal clear water and pretty streets and cold beer and sunsets and sunrises and wine in karafes…but it is the kindness that will mean I will return here again and again.
Ps. For those not on social media, there was an incident with my laptop and water bottle. Grrr. Laptop is officially dead so blogs will be a bit light on until I get a replacement in the next few weeks. A big thanks to Lucija, my Airbnb host in Kotor, Montenegro who loaned me her laptop to type up an assignment I had due. Managed to get this done too!
Pps. The ˝we˝ in this story is my dear friend Nicole who joined me for the Greek part of my travels. It was such a joy to share it with her. Thank you for saying yes Nic – Wifey xx
