Before and After

 Spring clean-up. 

We've got visitors soon from the land down under.  We must  polish the brass and clean the silver. The fatted pig is ready for slaughter. 

Our front wall needed a good whitewash

The railings were well past their paint-by date and getting rusty

The eagle holding the bell over the front gate.

K have him a paint job.

I've just noticed the bell. That's one piece of brass that hasn't been polished, yet. 

The walls were whitewashed and the railings sanded down and painted. We thought the railings were painted white till the wall was finished. The railings are actually off-white. Never mind, they're look a damn sight better. 

A bit of pruning on our neighbours land.

These bushes are called 'pounari' and they're a damn nuisance. They are trimmed right down to the roots every year and regenerate even stronger, and they spread. To remove them the roots have to be bulldozed out. 

To continue....  they were growing too close for comfort to our BBQ and are a fire hazard. We are going to bbq a pig there soon so our friend cut a wide corridor with his handy little chainsaw. 

Shade cloth in place. It's got a few holes but will do the job for another summer. 

Now we need the council to get it's act together and fix up the road. The edges were dug up for new water pipes. After a 2 year wait. 

6 months ago they assured us the road would be tar sealed before Christmas. When the new Mayor was elected he assured us the road would be concreted before Easter. 

Now he says they'll come, sometime, and concrete the entrance way to everyone's house. There are only 5 houses in the road. 

So we wait. And hope. 

It's all part of the Poros experience. 

Ouzo, octopus and rustic 'charm'.

Early Morning Coffee

 Yesterday we had to go down, not into town, but as far as the bridge which separates the two islands which make up Poros. The bridge goes over a small canal, about 3 metres wide. Most visitors hardly realise they are driving from one island to another. Blink and you've missed the connection. 

So, to continue, it was only 9am and we had a 2 hour wait so we walked along to a coffee shop right on the water. 

Looking out towards the hills of the mainland and the quiet harbour in front of the Naval School where fishing boats tie up.

The new recruits were being quick marched along the quay. We could hear the officer yelling out orders. Then I heard church bells from the cathedral in  town ringing out a slow death knell. Both sounds used to be familiar when we lived in town in earshot of naval and church activities. 

The neo classical building that houses the headquarters of the Naval School. The base is a training school for navy conscripts

A line of majestic palm trees along the coast road

Sunflowers and bougainvillia

Fisherman, cousin Tasos, coming in with the morning catch

 

Seasons

 

My garden

13th March

The greenery are nasturtiums and some sort of clover. I don't think it's oxalis. It looks like the pictures of wood sorrel found on Google. Clover-like leaves with yellow flowers. It grows like mad in winter, as do the nasturtiums, and dries up and completely disappears in summer.

As you can see below.

14th May

And this how it will stay till October/November depending when the first rains come.

If I'm lucky a few pumpkins may provide a bit of green ground cover . A few have sprouted in the enclosed plot on the right, so there's a chance we may have something to harvest at the end of summer.

Sotirakis

 So much has been going on  these last 2 weeks I haven't had time to post about our latest Poros Bazaar.  This one was in aid of another dog

Little Sotirakis

He has problems with his eyes and needs a slew of tests and an appointment with a specialist in Athens

                                                                 

Our 2 tireless Organisers. Waiting for the first customers on a warm Poros day.

Jan from England and Cecile from Belgium.  Both are very long time residents.   Local-aliens like me

Rudi

The boy who benefitted from the first bazaar.  He needed special medecine which the bazaar helped provide.  He has put on weight and become a happy healthy dog.  He lapped up lots of attention

Happy browsers

Jan sorting out the donated clothes.  Most were donated by another English resident.  Beautifully tailored, in excellent condition

My daughter Danae has an eye for a bargain and sorted out something for all of us. She found a dress for me which fitted perfectly. Only trouble is that I haven't worn a dress in years and although it looks great I feel oddly bare. I'm used to having my knees and legs covered by trousers or leggings. 

A friend of ours doing a clean out donated half a dozen paintings

K wanted this one.  We have no free wall space.  Thank goodness someone else snapped it up

Refreshments

Coffee

Sangria and mint water 

And the main items

Books. English and a few greek and dutch

It wouldn't be a bazaar without a raffle.  And the perfect prize/s. Free haircuts and nail care.  

I've won a free haircut and boy do I need one. I'm like a shaggy sheep dog 😄

Ekmek Kataïfi - A Turkish Delight

 

 

             EKMEK KATAÏFI OR KADAYIFI

INGREDIENTS

Syrup

• 2 cups water
• 2 cups sugar
• 1/2 lemon (juiced)
• 1 cinnamon stick
• 1 tbsp honey

Kataïfi Base

• 350 grams kataïfi pastry
• 250 grams melted butter

Custard

• 4 eggs
• 200 grams sugar
• 100 grams cornflour
• 100 grams plain flour
• 1.5 liters milk
• 1 tsp vanilla essence

Cream

• 600 ml thick cream
• vanilla
• 20 grams icing sugar

Instructions 

SYRUP - In a saucepan, make the syrup by adding the water, sugar, lemon, cinnamon, and honey. Bring to the boil and after 2 minutes, set aside to cool. Preheat the oven to 180Oc

 

PASTRY - Add the kataifi pastry to a deep dish and separate it out evenly. Pull the clumps of pastry apart. Pour over the melted butter. Mix the pastry around till it is all covered in butter. Press down.   Place into the oven until golden brown and crispy,  20-30 mins at 180oC.

While the pastry is hot pour over the cooler syrup. Hot pastry, cool syrup

 

CUSTARD -

Make the custard by putting the eggs and 100g of caster sugar into a bowl, beat until creamy and set aside.

In a saucepan, add the milk, cornflour, plain flour, 100g caster sugar and vanilla essence. Whisk all together until it’s warm (not too hot).

Using a ladle scoop a spoonful of the warm milk mixture and put it into the egg mixture. Mix it together and add the egg mixture to the remaining milk mixture in the saucepan. Mix thoroughly over the heat until the custard thickens. Let it cool. Don't let it boil or the eggs will set.  If this does happen just whisk till combined.

 Pour the custard over the top of the pastry and spread it out.  Place in the fridge for an hour to set.

WHIPPED CREAM - Add the cream, vanilla and icing sugar to a bowl and beat until whipped thickly. Then add to the top of the custard.  When evenly spread, decorate the top with a sprinkle of finely chopped nuts.

My sis in law in NZ, Bev, puts crushed toffee on the top.  That sounds more to my taste! A little bit of chocolate wouldn't be bad either. Who cares if it's not the traditional fistikia, pistachio nuts. 

Bev's ekmek

This is my Greek sister in laws speciality and she makes it for every family fiesta. 

I've never made this so if anyone has a comment, advice, then add it down below. 

After writing and rewriting the damn recipe 3 times, I couldn't save it at first, I've decided it's actually quite easy. I'll try making it for Ks name day towards the end of the month. Yes, there's still another celebration this month. Kosta, Elli, Nels, Dina all share a name day and Poppi and I have ours the day before. 

Easter Saturday, Sunday, Monday and Tuesday

Easter Monday.

 St George's Day in Greece.

Happy Name Day all the celebrants in our family

George, Georgia and Djordje

Midnight fireworks over Poros Naval School

The (ex) king of Greece, the old Queen Mum and all the family were at the Naval Base for the midnight service and fireworks on Saturday. They must have stayed inside the church surrounded by their security guards because no one knew till the next day when photos appeared on the Poros News site.

The Big Day

Easter Sunday

Two of the boys

Patriarch and s in law Yiannis with the lamb just off the spit 

Family and friends gathered to feast on the easter lamb and all the trimmings. Held at our daughter's home this year. Not ours thank goodness 

Boy no3, S in law Kyriako, showing his love for the lambs head before daughter Elli devoured the brains and tongue.  No-one wanted the eyeballs.  Yuk was the general opinion. Even K doesn't touch them

I made a loaf of bread with the traditional red egg in the centre.

There were a few salads, traditional greek and lettuce.  Lots of tzatziki of course.  Danae fried potatoes and we all had a red egg to crack with our fellow feasters.

The boys had fried liver, spleen, heart and kidneys very early in the morning to give them strength to look after the spit.  That had completely disappeared by the time I turned up.

And there was icecream and ekmek for dessert.  The ekmek is a syrupy middle eastern sweet made in a baking tray.  Underneath is a layer of  straw-like kataifi pastry soaked in honey syrup, custard and cream on top.

This was made by English neighbour Caroline. 

We need something sweet after a meal of lamb, pork and chicken (kontosouvli ) and offal (kokoretsi).

Because May Day, otherwise known as Labour Day,fell during Holy week, today,Tuesday, is another holiday for the workers.

And that is the end of this year's Easter story.

I think.....

The Easter Lamb

 From start to finish

Lucky Danae. She has the lamb, uncooked and bloody, propped up in her sink all night.

I remember when we lived on the island of Salamina and my brother R and sister in law Joan came to share a Greek Easter with us. The boys got the lamb wired onto the spit and it spent the night in the bath tub.

It's stinky. And it drips blood. Seriously stomach upsetting.

Not so stinky once it's cooked

The boys do the cooking at Easter. 

Except for the salads, potatoes, tzatziki.. 

And all the other preparation

To be continued....

Good Friday

 It was Good Friday yesterday in Orthodox Greece. And in Serbia. Tomorrow the Serbian branch of my NZ family will be celebrating in a similar way at the other end of of the world.

Good Friday evening there is a candlelight parade and each of the 4 big churches with their congregation meet in the main square.

The Epitafio of St Nikolas, the church at the Navy Base

Last night it was a parade without candles. It was blowing too hard to keep a candle lit. We went down to join the throng, hordes, invasion, to see Poppi carrying the Epitafio of our local church. This is a heavy wooden structure decorated by the church ladies in swathes of spring flowers. It is presumed to be the bier of Christ. 

Coming down the steps from the church of St George. In the narrow 'stairwell' the wind was blocked and candles stayed lit for a short while

We went down early to get parking but still ended up stuck in between 2 cars and only left with many manoeuvres . There must have been a few thousand people down in the square. I tried to take photos but all I could get were heads with hands holding phones aloft taking videos. We couldn't see Poppi but family sent photos and video. It was a great honour for her. It's rare to see a female holding the epitafio.

Our Poppi

Meanwhile at the big Cathedral in Central Athens grandson George was in the front line guarding the big Epitafio. They showed the whole ceremony, parade, and him, on TV but we missed that. Fortunately there were photos and videos taken of him as well. 

Our hearts swelled with pride. I spit on my grandchildren. Don't want any of them to suffer from an evil eye.

The big church on the waterfront brought their Epitafio along in a kaïki  (fishing boat) . 

On their return to the church the boat did a short trip around the harbour.

It was magical .

And now it's Saturday and we are preparing for Sunday. The offal soup which we eat at midnight is bubbling away. The lamb is waiting to be stuck on a spit. Hotcross buns are wafting their aroma through the house. 

And it's raining. 

We are supposed to be going to the midnight service but we may skip it and watch the Athens service on TV. 

At midnight, Christ Is Risen. Down town all hell let's loose, bells ringing, fireworks going off, ship horns blowing, thousands of people shouting greetings to friends, neighbours, family. I've done that many many times. 

The Holy Light was brought again from Jerusalem without incident.  The light arrives in Athens on the Presidential plane and is sent all through Greece, usually coming to Poros just before midnight. At midnight all the lights in the churches are turned off and the Priest emerges with his candle lit from the Holy Light. 

Everyone holds a candle and the light is passed from hand to hand to be taken home to make a cross over the front door and to be kept alight in a family lamp.

If we do attend the midnight service we will go to the Monastery. There are fewer people and no fireworks. We go on the top road through the hills and avoid the traffic jams elsewhere on the island. 

Till tomorrow... 

The Pig..

 It looks as though K has closed the deal on the suckling pig. We were humming and haa-ing about spit roasting a whole pig for our summer visitors . We need to show them a genuine Greek feast but the smallest pig he could find was around 16 kilos. That would mean quite a few kilos of leftover pork even if everyone took home doggy bags. I can't imagine they'll want to take cold fatty pork back to their hotel rooms to eat for breakfast.  Good coffee and a hot cheese pie whilst sitting  on a balcony overlooking the Aegean sea will be more acceptable the morning after.

The pig will be slaughtered a few days before they all arrive and Ks friend will keep it in his big fridge. He's assured us this one won't be more than 12 kilos, head, trotters and all.

Now another problem has popped up. They arrive at the beginning of June and the fire ban will be in full swing. Smoke from our BBQ will attract the fire department and we will have a fire engine, siren shrieking, tearing down our cul de sac.

K will now have to negotiate with the fire department. We might need a 16 kilo pig after all so we can have a fire engine on stand-by outside the house and feed the crew.

Or we will get it roasted, in the oven, not on the spit, at the rustic taverna up the road. 

Negotiations continue......

The man who sells the pig also roasts pigs. We could get it delivered ready cooked.

Or, our fire fighter friend says we can bbq as long we have a hose and a fire extinguisher nearby.

At the moment K is deep in Easter lamb deliberations. Will we have traditional kokoretsi (innards covered with intestines) spit roasted alongside the lamb.  And what about those in the family that don't eat lamb or offal? Some prefer goat, others would appreciate a bit of chicken. Every year it's the same and every year it turns into a greek drama. 

Serious business .  The big day is this Sunday . Then he can get back to the pig.

 

Red Eggs

 The girls are back again to dye 32 eggs. K hard boiled them last night so they're all ready to go.

But the girls don't get off that easy. Once I've got them in my grasp they're 'forced' to do chores on my list. I always have a list.

They changed our sheets. I'm not allowed to lift mattress corners yet and K has problems with tendons in his shoulders. One down. 

They stored away all the carpets that were cleaned a couple of weeks ago, emptied the dehydrator in our bedroom. We have a lot of damp in our houses. They both have dehydrators which they say they empty way more often than ours. 

Next on the list was moving our very heavy concrete umbrella stand into position to give us shade at the front of the house. Easy peasy for a rower with strong arms. 

And then onto the eggs.  32 is the least we have ever dyed and it's more than enough. I don't know how K agreed to so few. It's usually double that. 

Of the 32 a dozen go off to family and another dozen to friends along with a small container of Easter biscuits. That leaves 8 for us. 3 or 4 will be cracked by us on Saturday night along with the offal soup so K will be left with 4 or 5 to have as a meze with his nightly glass of wine next week. Perfect.

Getting the red mix ready. 

It stains everything and I only had one pair of gloves. They wore one each and declined the use of aprons. Lucky there weren't any splashes

Once the dying is done and the eggs are dry they are polished with a little olive oil

Every year I keep an egg or two and we write the year on it. Most of them have broken but these ones survived. The yolk after a year or so turns into a hard amber ball. 

Then it's lunch time. No one leaves Papou's house without eating. They're not eating meat, for Holy week, so I fried some potatoes, the girls made a salad and I got a pizza margarita out of the freezer. Just the sort of meal kids love. 

Actually the pizza had 5 pieces of salami on top but I soon got rid of those and renamed it.

After lunch they pushed my quad bike across the road so I could start it. It has been sitting rusting away all winter. And it didn't start of course because the battery was flat.

Not a problem . I'm going to retire it. 

Chores all done they were free to leave ...along with red eggs and more Easter cookies. They've been having private lessons since school finished. They're a necessity here if your children want to go on to higher education. 

All lessons are finished till next week. They're free as birds to go swimming, sit in cafes with friends or promenade in groups, eat icecream, or whatever innocent activities I like to imagine them doing. 

May Day

 1st May

- A day to gather flowers and make wreaths to hang on doors, gates, your car.

I was so busy with Easter I forgot to find flowers and make a wreath. I foraged from neighbour's walls and gathered some rose and red geranium, pink and white oleander and made a bouquet.

My daughter bought this gorgeous wreath from our garden shop!

- A day of news black-out because all the journalists and news crews are on strike.

In fact it's a day of general strikes, marches and riots.  But we won't hear about it all till tomorrow morning.

- This year it lands in the middle of Holy Week and the granddaughters have been busy making easter biscuits, koulourakia.  Tomorrow on Holy Thursday they'll be here again dyeing red eggs.