Mykonos Rocks

Santorini

Just zipped up my orange suitcase ready to head for Santorini. “Expensive and
sophisticated” we are told and so I guess no donkeys. How I remember fifty years
ago camping on the huge stairway from the port to the village with donkeys trotting
by – longing for love and life’s unfolding. Ah how time flies!

But I want to say a bit about this fairly simple but somehow inviting hotel. The
garden has been created with a tenderness and care that is special. A tall furry
cactus grows in a corner of the patio that leads into the white stoned garden. I ask
what will happen when it hits the ceiling. “We will cut a hole” Olympia, our landlady
laughs and gestures. Other massive cacti are loaded with buds and tiny plums hang
from a little tree. There’s a covered well and one of the ubiquitous amphora lying on
its side, If Jacob were here he’d be in there in a trice. It is a generous garden not
designed so much to impress as to enrich. I feel good for having been here.

The garden with amphora

Cacti

We talk a bit to Olympia and she says we are lucky to be here now before the season is in
full swing with tourists packing the place. “We are thankful of course but sometimes
I think the island will sink!” I ask what it is that makes Mykonos so popular. Is it the
party culture? Yes she agrees. It is a free place. People feel they can do what they
like. They can feel safe. Greeks are broad minded and do not judge. A shadow
passes over her face. “But the future is not good”. I am puzzled. “I own a house that
belonged to my mother. It is run down. I would like to keep it but the taxes
are…”She gestures a huge size. “All I can do is sell it and to who – Germans who run
the EU. They want to defeat us.” Grant fans the flames a bit mischievously. “They
didn’t manage it in the second world war and now they are trying another way”
“Your husband is a wise man” Olympia pats me on the shoulder.

Olympia

I begin to wonder about Brexit and the unease that seems to be engulfing the
European Union at the moment. I am sort of glad Australia isn’t in it even if we still
have to have the English queen.