Thursday 3 January 2019

Crime Wave!

Vaso has been robbed.  She has been very apprehensive these last few months after watching endless news stories of the elderly in Athens being beaten for a few euros and attacked in their own homes,  She puts a padlock on her gate when she's inside the house, not that it would keep out any serious robber.   And she watches very carefully who goes up and down our dead-end road, who they are and whether they check out the house as they whizz by.

We always reassure her that Poros is not Athens and she is safe living up here in the wop-wops all by herself, as she has for the last twenty years.  

But  robbers came in the middle of the night and took away 4 hens, a rooster and a big (female) turkey.  Naturally she was very upset and wanted to tell us all about her troubles, analyse this heinous crime and lay out her suspects for us to chew on.

She's sure there were two them with a big sack. It wasn't a dog  or wild animal because there was no trail of feathers and carnage.






But she came on the wrong day to get all our attention.  We had been 'robbed' too!  K had just been up to check our land and olive trees at the top of the island.  'Someone' had been up there with a truck, fixed up the road, 'pruned' the olive trees and hauled away the wood.  

'Someone' went to a lot of work.  Wood is an expensive commodity at this time of the year.  It wasn't long of course, in this small community, before he found out who was behind it all.

Vaso and K sat there with steam coming out of their ears, voices getting louder and more vehement with each stabbing accusation.

Vaso doesn't know the identity of her chicken thief but she has a few offenders in mind.  She can't prove anything but K hopes he can.  He has confronted the head of the gang, the wood cutter and the truck driver and been to police to file a complaint.  The wood has gone, squirreled away or already sold but he's pushing for them to clean up the land and plant new trees.  The old ones unfortunately have been 'pruned' almost down to the ground and an old spreading carob tree has been left looking like a xmas tree on the day it is chucked in the rubbish,  Such a pity. 

He could sue them for destruction of property and loss of income from the trees but it would probably take five years for the case to come to court.  
Easier for them to compensate by doing some work on the land. 
Except for the 'mastermind',  This smart arse  owned land up there once upon a time.  He sold it 20 years ago but knows that it is an isolated area.  He blames the wood cutter who cut the wrong trees but they are all the 'wrong' trees.  None are his to cut.  They must have made almost a thousand euros out of the wood.  Around here olive wood is considered the best for  firewood.

Vaso is ill and snuggling up in her bed in this freezing weather.  It was her name day on New Years day and we called her but are waiting for her to recover to go up and have a few glasses of raki with her and discuss this terrible business once again.

We are in the grips of storm Raphael.  Snow is covering the hills around Athens and we heard it was snowing on the next island of Aegina.  I keep peeking out the window hoping to see a snowflake here.   It is very early in the year for such bad weather.  Climate change!

Actually I see this is a second storm named Sofia. She'll be hanging around for a few days. We've got enough firewood, olive wood but not our own.  Hope the raki holds out!







14 comments:

  1. So sorry for your troubles, and luckily for Vaso, she has you as neighbors.

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    1. Yes, thank goodness vaso' has someone to go to. BUT she is not so innocent herself. She was very good on the old days at helping herself to other people's things left lying around. As someone suggested...karma!!!!

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  2. A gang!?!?

    Bad stuff, even on a Greek Isle. And to steal from a very old lady, is even worse. -sighhhhh-

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    1. Not really a gang, a crooked business man. He's known for his shady dealings. Rumours are he's about to be pulled in by the police for something else .Hope he gets his come-uppence

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    2. As for the chicken thieves....unfortunately this sort of thing happens. Not likely to get caught unfortunately

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  3. Not the same person. Seems a coincidence on the same night.

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    1. Nicking stuff from farms and others land always happens but it's usually a bag of olives from someone else's tree, not the whole tree

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  4. No matter where you are in the world there are always going to be those people who steal from others and I hope and pray that karma will come calling and hit them hard
    Poor vaso. Let’s hope this doesn’t make her so very frightened that she ends up sick from it
    Stay safe

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    1. Old age is making her very wary but also a bit paranoid . She'll be out in the fields again in a few days...probably putting barb wire along the tops of her fences, by herself!

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  5. At my people's house in Shropshire there was a huge Holly tree down in the orchard, that was always covered in berries. One Christmas I went down to pick a few branches, and the whole tree had gone; sawn off at the base. Gypsies!

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    1. If you can make money from it then take it seems to be the motto of quite a few. We used to get gypsies passing through but seems they are prevented from coming on the island now.

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  6. Sounds like it is was a bit tit for tat island life from your replies to the comments. No big deal really.

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  7. That's disturbing, especially when you are quite sure you know who did it, but can't really get any justice. On a slightly different note, I wouldn't mind if someone stole my roosters! -Jenn

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  8. oh that's not good, it's a feeling of being violated. I hope she and you guys are ok now.

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