Festive follies – a crazy Christmas in Greece

Posted on November 23, 2025 by Marjory

WHEN Jim and I moved to the Mani region of southern Greece for our mid-life adventure during the country’s economic crisis, we set out to live as Greek a life as possible. We went to church services in the hillside village where we first lived, and also to the vibrant saints’ day feasts, held outdoors with lashings of barbecued goat and village wine.

We tried everything, with various degrees of success – and sometimes mild disgrace – when, for example, we didn’t understand some of the Byzantine rituals of the Greek Orthodox Church and made a few gaffes. We tried olive harvesting (back-breaking!), got in a lather with traditional soap making, and even tried the peculiar delicacy tsikles (small pickled birds) to please a neighbour (never again!).

The point of our Greek odyssey was to do (often crazy) things we’d never done before, and try a new way of life, without most of the cultural norms and cliches of Britain. Christmas had been a welcome revelation in the first year. More low-key and reflective with less of the Christmas hysteria of the UK: the manic shopping, the house fronts decked out like the Blackpool illuminations. Not that we’re knocking a British Christmas, but we’ve never been that into ‘festive-to-the-max’, unlike some British expats we met in Greece early on who were, and who complained bitterly that the Greeks “just can’t get Christmas right!”.

Whenever I heard that I used to do a mental high-five, looking forward to our first taste of seasonal serenity in our hillside village, where most locals were hard-working olive and goat farmers. So it would have been risky chopping down a ‘Christmas’ tree. And there was no need to tinselate our small Greek house into a rural glitter ball. As if! But villagers were there on the day, chapping on our door like the ‘wise men’, bringing us seasonal cheer, offering sweet biscuits, cans of oil and other treats.

**Jim, Marjory and Wallace the terrier at their village house**

**View across the Messinian Bay from the couple’s second house**

In the lead-up to our second Christmas in this region, we were renting a different house, not far away, close to the Messinian Bay, a traditional Greek home with folky sofas and paintings. Our landlords, a convivial Greek couple, Andreas and Marina, called around to see us regularly and usually with ‘deliveries’ – food and household offerings in eccentric pairings I’d come to enjoy: broccoli and floor cleaner, cabbages and firelighters!?

One November afternoon the couple were on the doorstep, Marina with several bulging plastic bags and a basket with a red pointy hat sticking out. That should have alarmed us straight off! Marina rushed, bag-laden, past us into the house with her usual Greek proprietorial charm, while Andreas hung back at the door, chatting. The imminent olive harvest was very much on his mind because in rural areas the whirring sound of harvesting equipment trumps sleigh bells every time.

**Winter in Greece means olive harvesting which we tried with our friend Foteini, pictured on her wobbly blue ladder**

While we chatted, we forgot about Marina for a while until we became aware of furious scurrying and hammering going on behind us.

“What’s happening inside, Andreas?” I asked him, almost too scared to look.

He rolled his eyes and offered an Olympian shoulder shrug. “Marina has just decorated the house for Christmas.”

“What!?”

Jim and I spun around and walked into the open plan sitting room/dining room. Whereas it once looked atmospheric and Greek, which is how we liked it, the place now resembled Santas’s Grotto at a John Lewis store. A big red Santa was lording it over the dining table and tinsel was strung over paintings and across the top of the open fireplace. No health and safety in Greece. On every available surface: flashing Christmas lights, more santas in pointy hats, reindeer trundling across the coffee table and so forth. We gawped, feeling mildly ill. Even Wallace, our feisty Jack Russell terrier, trying to doze in his dog bed, had been fixed up with clip-on red ribbons and other festive embellishments.

**Wallace the Jack Russell terrier wondering if the festive stuff was chewable**

“Here,” said Marina, thrusting two fluffy festive socks towards me. “For Christmas Day.”

“But Marina, it’s barely November. Too early for Christmas decorations, surely,” I pleaded.

Andreas shook his head. “I agree Marjory, but Marina LOVES Christmas, you have no idea!”

Oh yes I did! The living room – lit up and pulsating, lacking only a sound system for Christmas carols – told me so. Silent Fright came to mind!

“This old place looks better now, don’t you think?” she said, hands on hips like the presenter of a TV home makeover show. Except we felt like the teary owners you often see, pretending to be overjoyed with an unexpected vision of home-hell. In Marina’s mind, the theme park she’d whipped up was what she thought we craved, miles from home at this time of year. Ah, bless! She meant well, in that extreme kind of Greek way.

Jim and I laughed over it later and slowly began to dismantle some of her offerings, leaving a bit of tat in place and hiding the rest in the apothiki (storeroom), haggling over santas and sleighs, wondering which things Marina would be more likely to miss on her next visit.

**Marina (with Jim) trying to find new ways to spin Christmas**

Whenever she came inside after that, her quizzical eyes strafed the room, doing a kind of mental inventory, but to her credit she never remarked on the adjustments. Meanwhile, with a developing artistic flair, she set about making countless Christmas wreaths wound through with fruit, veg and other Magpie finds, decorating everything from cat flaps to clapped-out welly boots, as pictured, top.

But it’s exactly what we came to Greece for. Wasn’t it!?

The story of our Greek Christmas first appeared in a slightly different form in my second memoir, Homer’s Where The Heart Is, which continues the funny, candid story of us attempting to live in Greece like locals, starting with the Amazon best-selling first memoir, Things Can Only Get Feta.

https://mybook.to/HomersWhereTheHeartIS

New novel

If you enjoyed reading my four Greek memoirs and my first two novels, A Saint For The Summer and How Greek Is Your Love?), set also in the Mani peninsula, Greece, you will love my latest novel, The Greek Proposal. This time I chose the wild Messinian peninsula nearby for this story of romance, mingled with mystery and family war secrets. It has a feisty heroine, Isla, two gorgeous suitors, plus a lovable sausage dog, Lou – small in stature, big on character! It also has a stunning location, near Koroni, inspired by the year we later spent living there.

The Greek Proposal: “A masterful piece of storytelling” “Terrific characters”. Five-star Amazon reviews.

For more information about Marjory’s Greek memoirs and two novels set in Greece, please click on the Greek Books tab on her website https://www.bigfatgreekodyssey.com

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Have a Merry Christmas when it comes, and thank you for reading Marjory’s blogs and books and for your ongoing support. The author always loves to hear from readers on her website and reviews of her books are also kindly appreciated.

Thanks for stopping by.

© All rights reserved. All text and photographs copyright of the author 2010-2025. No content/text or photographs may be copied from the blog without the prior written permission of the author. This applies to all posts on the blog.

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Secrets of life in a Greek village

Posted on May 6, 2019 by Marjory

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Part of the lovely plateia in Makrinitsa village, Pelion

NOT all Greek villages are created equally. Two villages can be several miles apart, with roughly the same background and geographical aspect, yet one will be thriving, with a plateia rimmed by busy cafes and tavernas, while the other is on the slide. Sometimes there’s no explanation apart from something that’s now lost in the natural twists of history.

When I was in the mainland region of Pelion last year I was strongly reminded of this fact and also how fiercely loyal and competitive Greeks are about their own village, no matter what shape it’s in. Jim and I had rented a villa in the south of the Pelion peninsula for a month. It was on the edge of a small village, which was quiet, with not many inhabitants apparently, but with gorgeous views down to the Pagasitikos gulf and well placed to access both this side of the peninsula and the other, on the Aegean. As people who don’t like touristy locations in Greece, we thought we’d done pretty well to find a comfortable house in this location.

View from the village of Metochi towards the gulf

Yet, while browsing in an old-fashioned souvenir shop in the coastal village of Milina, the black-clad owner of a venerable age asked us where we were staying. I told her Metochi, in the foothills behind. She pulled a great lemony face. “Metochi! Why would you want to stay there? There’s nothing there. Nothing but old houses. Pah! Here is better,” she said, waving towards the vista of crowded tavernas and sun loungers along the beachfront.

I laughed at her put-down of Metochi for being the poor relation to the buzzy, thriving Milina. In her mind Metochi fell into the second category of villages dwindling into oblivion. There are a number of run-down and abandoned houses in the centre of Metochi, that’s true, and it wasn’t hoaching with people, in September anyway. On the surface it was just a village on the way to somewhere else as it’s on the ‘main’ road from the popular town of Argalasti to the bigger village of Lafkos and then to the south of the peninsula. Lafkos is elegant with a large church and wide plateia (square) with classical houses and busy tavernas and cafes.

The elegant plateia in Lafkos village

Makrinitsa in the Pelion mountains is one of the most picturesque in Greece

The plateia is usually the hub of a Greek village and always a good indication as to whether the place is thriving or not, and it’s worth flagging this up when you’re in the market to buy a house in Greece. Some of the more remarkable villages in the Pelion mountains further north have sumptuous plateias, like Makrinitsa, set under huge plane trees and with a view down to the city of Volos. But Makrinitsa is well established with a stronger foothold in the region’s history. It has old churches with frescos and an impressive museum. This village has been the haunt of artists, writers and revolutionaries. Milies and Tsagarada are smaller mountain villages yet they too have obvious treasures. Milies has a public library with one of the largest collections of Greek and foreign books in Greece, with some of them dating to the 14^th century. Its church of the Taxiarchon is also world famous for its acoustics. Tsagarada has a 1,000 year old plane tree in its beautiful plateia.

The surviving kafeneio in Metochi has rustic charm and doubles as a shop

A slightly forlorn sign on the plane tree in Metochi says: “Our village square.”

Metochi’s plateia was a ghost plateia during the day at least. It was large enough and well situated, high above the road under plane trees with incredible gulf views, and perfect to catch a cool afternoon breeze in summer. It must have been lovely once, with a traditional kafeneio on the far side, now closed, and a smaller one beside it, still operating for limited hours and serving also as a general store. The only time we saw people in the plateia was at night, men mostly, drinking beer and playing the board game, tavli.

At the top of the steps was a sign fixed to a plane tree saying: “Our village plateia”, which was a touching and yet forlorn message. Such as it was, many people obviously still took great pride in their plateia. But its semi-abandonment speaks of a village having lost its way somewhat, apart from some modern, yet discreet, holiday villas at its outskirts, surrounded by olive groves, where we were staying.

The deserted grill house in the village that is a quiet reminder of more convivial days in Metochi

The village had obviously had a different life once. At one end of it there’s a natural spring, spouting cool sweet water, where people still stop to fill up bottles. Across the road from the spring, there’s an abandoned psistaria (grill house) with its huge barbecue still visible at the front, for spit-roasting meat. The broad terrace here would once have been packed, especially on important feast days, but is now just an empty space where fallen leaves twirl in the wind and people park to fill up their bottles across the way.

This is a reflection of what’s happening everywhere in rural Greece, in hillside locations. In the Mani we found many villages that were beautifully sited with once-lovely stone houses that now seemed dead. In one village we found an abandoned kafeneio, its door hanging open and a collection of old junk and furniture piled up inside and old bottles and dusty glasses still on the wooden counter. It was as if the owners had hurriedly disappeared and left everything as it was. In another village we found a group of old people sitting around the front door of a crumbling stone house. There were five of them, most of the current full-time population, they told us rather mournfully.

The village of Metochi is not in such bad shape, not as long as an essential road cuts through it. It wasn’t vibrant and yet we liked its wound-down appeal, its solitude, the view, and no-one bothered us at all, apart from one village gossip. She regularly passed by on the road and one day stopped to ask a slew of personal questions, as Greeks often do, including how much we were renting the villa for because her daughter also had one to rent nearby if we were interested. Cheeky!

Greek rural villages at least are a world apart, whether they buzz or not. When you plan to live in one for any length of time you have to navigated them thoughtfully and choose wisely. Too quiet, too noisy, too parochial, or too steeped in difficult history, and you might be in peril.

A view of Megali Mantineia under the northern slopes of the Taygetos mountains in the Mani

The small sign on the main road to Megali Mantineia. It’s all you get. Blink and you’ll miss it!

When we settled in the Mani, southern Peloponnese, in 2010, for our long Greek odyssey, we picked a hillside village that felt remote, with the Taygetos mountains as its backdrop, but in fact was only a 15-minute drive to the outskirts of Kalamata at the head of the Gulf of Messinia. As it turned out, Megali Mantineia was perfect for us and our crazy Jack Russell Wallace, a type of dog that none of the villagers had seen before and thought resembled a small goat – and he often acted like one!

Megali Mantineia is a successful working village where locals still cultivate their vast olive groves and herd goats. We decided the best way to live there was to befriend Greek villagers rather than cultivate the British expats because we didn’t want to live an expat life. Not that trying to fit into any village as a foreigner is easy. It’s not. Had I not spoken reasonable Greek from a long association with the country and endless Greek language classes, I would have found it more difficult, as few of the villagers spoke much English. I quickly learnt the secret of fitting in was simple: go well beyond your comfort zone and leave all your preconceptions about life, up to a point, behind you.

Foteini, thrilled to have a copy of my first memoir which features her, and donkey Riko, on the cover

Riko grazing outside Foteini’s farm compound

When we first met the goat farmer Foteini – who features in my three Greek memoirs – she was riding into the village on her donkey. Conversing was a challenge as she spoke a heavy mountain dialect and things could easily have gone nowhere. But there was something so unique about her that Jim and I instantly took to her and when she invited us back to her farm compound (a place of rural junk and manic disorder) we never thought twice about it really. And so a strange and unusual friendship flourished, particularly between myself and Foteini. She certainly trounced all my personal preconceptions and, in her way, became a very unlikely muse. Our regular, generally very funny, interactions sparked my journalistic curiosity and inspired me to write the memoirs. How could I not? Fate had cast her on my path, on the very first day in the village.

Some of the villagers and priests from Megali Mantineia on a special feast day. Jim standing in back row, right

Since my first memoir, Things Can Only Get Feta, was published in 2013, readers have contacted me to confess they want their own Greek odyssey, which is lovely, and have asked for advice. I don’t have much really except for this: learn some Greek, talk to everyone. Go beyond what’s comfortable and take part in all the village celebrations (there are many during the year), and church services too because this is the best way to see Greeks as they really are. It’s a window into their society and shows villagers that you respect this, and their culture, and you’re not in the village just to have a remote, parallel life to them.

Before we finally returned to Britain, for personal reasons, we invited many of the villagers from Megali Mantineia to a farewell meal at one of the local tavernas. It was a bitter/sweet night and very sad to say goodbye at last. Everyone lined up to kiss us farewell, some bringing small gifts. One of the women, Voula, whom I’d also become fond of, hugged me and announced: “You’re one of us now Margarita (the name Foteini had given me). You’re a Maniatissa.” Maniatissa is the Greek word for a woman of the Mani. It was humbling to get the title; far better than a Queen’s honour.

Navigating the cultural terrain of a Greek village isn’t easy. It requires more of you than you sometimes want to give. But in the end, it offers you life experiences and insights you will struggle to find elsewhere.

Greek book offer

If you want to read more about life, drama and romance in Greek villages, my first novel A Saint For The Summer is currently on an Amazon ebook promo, 99p/99c (UK/US) from August 16 to 23. It’s a tale or heroism, faith and love with a narrative thread back to WW2 and set in the wild Mani region of Greece. One reviewer described it as: “An excellent read. I was hooked from the first page.” Another said: “The story made me laugh, made me think and made me cry a little.”

Link: https://bookgoodies.com/a/B07B4K34TV

If you have read any of my books and liked them, please think of leaving a small review on Amazon. It will be gratefully received. Thanks.

For more information about all the books please visit the books page on our website www.bigfatgreekodyssey.com

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© All rights reserved. All text and photographs copyright of the authors 2010-2019. No content/text or photographs may be copied from the blog without the prior written permission of the authors. This applies to all posts on the blog.

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Messinia: the secret and the spooky . . .

Posted on October 24, 2016 by Marjory

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Bell-ringer Marjory at the Byzantine church of Ayioi Theodoroi

FOR our second long odyssey in Greece, my partner Jim and I spent 14 months in Koroni, Messinia, which became the basis for my third travel memoir, A Scorpion In The Lemon Tree. While the Mani had been our first choice, we ended up in Messinia, the left-hand peninsula in the southern Peloponnese. If you want to know how that happened, you’ll have to read the book. But this remote peninsula didn’t disappoint. It’s a laid-back corner of the country, with a great climate and some fascinating, often hard-to-find, corners, where we encountered some spooky sites and hidden places, most of which were mentioned in the book.

The strange ‘Hand of God Tree’ at the Homatero monastery, near Koroni

The Hand of God Tree.

This is one of the most curious things I’ve ever seen. It was Wallace, our dear Jack Russell, with his typical questing nature, who really discovered this strange tree, dragging us over to see it in the grounds of the small, deserted monastery of Ayioi Theodoroi, near the village of Homatero, west of Koroni. We had searched out the papas that day, who oversees the monastery, and were given the key to the church and instructions on how to find this fascinating place tucked into the side of a wooded ravine. Dating from the 12th century, much of its outer buildings lie in ruins but the Byzantine church, with its pantiled roof, is in good condition.

It was the tree, however, in the back garden that first captured our imagination with what appeared to be the shape of a huge closed hand on a large section of the trunk. From a distance, it looked man-made, sculpted, and yet on closer inspection we weren’t quite so sure because there was a large amount of bark left over the ‘knuckle’ of the hand.

Marjory beside the strange shape on the carob tree

Or was it something else entirely? As I wrote in Chapter 16 of the book:

“(The hand) was over a foot high and two feet wide and too smooth for a human carving, but with all the signs of being something natural, fashioned by the wind and the rain perhaps over many decades. We called it the Hand of God Tree, given its surroundings and found it curiously appealing.”

Later on, when we met up with Papa Theodoros at his village house and showed him our photos of the tree, he smiled at the title we’d given it and I asked him what the story was behind it. He told me the tree was very old, a carob tree, but if you what to know what his explanation was, and what he thought about many other fascinating subjects you can read about them in A Scorpion In The Lemon Tree. You can also read about the history of this monastery in past centuries, which was brutal at times, and probably accounts for the slightly chilly and forlorn atmosphere we encountered there.

If you’ve read Scorpion, let me know your opinion of the strange Hand of God Tree.

Old pantiles on the roof of the Byzantine church

Two of the frescos inside the church

The rest of the monastery did not disappoint and inside the old church was a fascinating collection of frescos dating back to the 16th century, including some typically bizarre frescos depicting the fate of non-believers. If you look carefully at the example above you’ll see a bizarre half owl/fish creature on the mast of the boat.

The front of the atmospheric taverna, the Ayia Playia in Falanthi

Icon of Saint Pelagia, taken on her feast day in May

Brigadoon meets rural Messinia

There are many villages on the outskirts of Koroni that are charming, but one of its secret places is the sweet village of Falanthi on a road that leads west to the Homatero monastery and some other smaller villages. Falanthi was once a thriving settlement, with a successful mining operation, but now supports a small rural population, an olive press and several lovely churches, including the small white chapel dedicated to Saint Pelagia which, curiously, has a spring rising up from under its altar and its outlet is in the courtyard of the taverna next door, called the Ayia Playia ( or Agia Plagia). If you happen to find yourself there on the feast day of Saint Pelagia in early May, when the church is open, you might be lucky to see the spring flowing under the altar, as we did.

This was one of our favourite tavernas outside Koroni (which also has many fine establishments some of which I mentioned in my book). Set by the main road and beside a small stream with a stone bridge over it, it has a retro/timewarp magic about it, with a nod to Brigadoon, the mythical Scottish village that was supposed to appear for one day, every 100 years. Except that this fine establishment is open all year, apart from October. What makes this place such a find is not just the quality of the food but the convivial owner Yiorgos (George) Bossinakis, who is a popular local character, and the place attracts a great number of people from Koroni. For more information www.agia-plagia.gr and bookings: tel 27250 41565.

The church of the Eleistria, looking down on Zaga beach, Koroni

The church of visions and miracles

The Eleistria church, dedicated to the Virgin Mary, nestles just below the southern flank of Koroni castle, with a stunning view of Zaga beach. This church was built in the late 19th century after a local woman, Maria Stathakis, saw several visions of the Virgin Mary, claiming there were sacred icons buried in the area where the church now sits. When Stathakis enlisted the help of locals to start excavating the site, sure enough three small icons were found in the fissure of rocks and a church was built. The icons have been incorporated into one large icon, which is on display in this church and is at the centre of an important feast day in Koroni every spring. The church has documented many healings that are claimed to be associated with the icon.

The icon which incorporates the three small icons found after the visions of a local woman

It’s a very atmospheric church, quite apart from its airy setting. The grotto where the icons were discovered has been preserved and forms part of a small chapel underneath the church and is worth a visit.

Tsapi beach

A beach at the end of the road

Tsapi beach is a place we discovered by accident. It isn’t well sign-posted on the road from Finicounda to Koroni and a couple of small signs say ‘Tsapi camping’ and ‘Maria’s taverna’. The road is good but winds down a hillside for 15 minutes to a secluded beach facing the Ionian Sea. On a stretch of coast with plenty of nice beaches, what’s great about this one? Despite the low-key camping site, two small tavernas, and a tiny white chapel overlooking the beach, there’s nothing here and it feels like the kind of place you discover on islands. It is enclosed on either side and has a long sandy beach, and the water quality here is dazzling. It’s a great place to swim safely, quite shallow, and great for snorkelling. It was one of the nicest places we ever found to swim and the tavernas are a real bonus. Laid-back and unfussy, they serve mostly fish dishes and you can sit all day over lunch and not feel any pressure to leave. There are several nearby beaches, which are totally deserted and you can only walk to them or visit by boat, like tiny Marathi.

Imposing battlements of Koroni Castle

What lies within – Koroni Castle

There is little left of Koroni castle now because it has been targeted down the centuries by a great slew of invaders to this southerly outpost, including the Turks, Franks and Venetians. And the Germans occupied much of it during the Second World War. Its walls remain and a scramble of ruined buildings but it has serious spooky cred and atmosphere and is worth rambling over, as it has set the scene for so much of Koroni’s history.

One of the tiny doorways at the monastery

Ayia Sophia beside the remains of an ancient temple

View up the Messinian Gulf to Kalamata, from the monastery

The castle itself is hardly a secret, dominating the whole town, but what is sometimes overlooked is the gorgeous monastery within it, of Timios Prodromos, which hasn’t changed much since the 19th century when it was built near the site of the ancient Temple of Apollo. It is set within some of the castle walls with walkways, turrets, tiny chapels and an orchard full of fruit trees. At harvest time the friendly nuns here will invite you to help yourself to fruit and offer you slices of loukoumi sweets and cool water. This monastery also played its part in protecting the citizens of Koroni during the German occupation, as I described in the book. The nearby ruined Temple of Apollo sits beside a Byzantine church. The temple was plundered in past centuries but the surrounding walls have been decorated with some of its remaining carved marbles slabs. See if you can spot them.

Palaiokastro near Pylos

Stunning Voidokoilia beach with Wallace in the left foreground

Snake Castle

Palaiokastro is an imposing castle on a high bluff overlooking Navarino Bay, on the west coast of the Peloponnese near the town of Pylos. It also overlooks the much- photographed, horseshoe-shaped Voidokoilia beach. Despite its sturdy walls, the 13th century castle, built by the Franks and later added to by the Venetians, is mostly in ruins and has a slightly creepy appeal to it, not to mention a degree of danger. Signs on the outer walls warn the structure inside is unstable but a friend in Kalamata warned us it has become a breeding ground inside for snakes, which will add to the appeal perhaps for some visitors … but we wouldn’t recommend walking inside.

Wallace at Palaiokastro

The castle was thought to be impregnable and had a strategic position on this part of the coast but was bombarded by cannon fire by interlopers, including the Turks and Venetians, which explains why it is now a ruin. The best part of visiting this castle is the walk up to its main entrance of sorts, along a narrow track from a small lower car park (beyond the bird-watching sanctuaries) near a sandy beach.

The path winds up over the sea cliffs of the Sykia Pass, and is a wild and exhilarating part of this coastline looking out towards the Ionian Sea. And when you reach the outer walls of the castle finally, they look rather appealing in this remote setting.

Another great find in this area is the nearby village of Gialova, on the edge of Navarino Bay, with a row of beachside tavernas and a nice laid-back vibe. Or if you want to push the boat out, there’s the nearby chic Costa Navarino golfing and spa resort.

Wherever you go in Messinia, there’s a sense that this region is not well-trodden and there are still many other hidden corners waiting for you to discover.

Our recent odyssey in Messinian, which was the inspiration for my third memoir A Scorpion In The Lemon Tree, was featured in a recent article in the Australian Neos Kosmos newspaper. To read click here

For a recent review of the book, see the popular WindyCity Greek site in Chicago.

For more information about this book and the two previous books in the series, charting our adventures in southern Greece during the crisis, go to the books page on the website www.bigfatgreekodyssey.com or the books page on Facebook www.facebook.com/ThingsCanOnlyGetFeta

The new book is on all Amazon sites:

amazon.uk

amazon.com

To buy either of my first two books please click on the Amazon links below:

Things Can Only Get Feta

Homer’s Where The Heart Is

Thanks for calling by. x

© All rights reserved. All text and photographs copyright of the authors 2010 to 2018. No content/text or photographs may be copied from the blog without the prior written permission of the authors. This applies to all posts on the blog.

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Is a dream life in the sun the high road to happiness?

Posted on November 17, 2015 by Marjory

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Caption here for Marjie and Jimmy and Wally

Marjory, Jim and Wallace the Jack Russell terrier in front of Koroni castle, Messinia

BEFORE Jim and I set off on our mid-life adventure to Greece in 2010, a friend commented on our plan with a yearning look in his eyes. “I can only wonder what it must be like to divest yourself of everything and take off into the wild blue yonder.”

As a successful professional with a lovely house and two young children, his comment was motivated mainly by a wish to be free of nine-to-five pressure for a while, nothing more complicated than that.

But many other people said very similar things as we moved closer to our departure date. One professional guy, stuck in a difficult job and with children to support, asked me rather sadly: “Where is our mid-life odyssey? When can we do what you’re doing?”

I felt for his predicament. “You can do it one day if you really want it badly enough” was all I could offer him. But it did become our kind of stock answer to these unexpected comments, because that statement had been true for us.

We had put in a huge amount of planning and time into the proposed odyssey, putting our personal possessions in storage, renting out our house in Scotland, as well as all the nagging issues involved in leaving the UK for a while. Our to-do list before we left was four A4 pages long. But not once did we doubt we were doing the right thing, even though Greece was moving into the first stages of its economic crisis.

Castle Campbell in the spectacular Ochil hills above our former village in Scotland

We wanted it badly enough, but we didn’t seek out the odyssey because we hated our lives, or where we were living, which was in fact a very picturesque village outside Stirling. We just wanted to live for a while under a “wandering star”. And who doesn’t?

Sadly, the subtext to a lot of the comments we heard over and over again were that many other Brits were desperate for an overseas odyssey, or in some cases a permanent move abroad, because they were innately unhappy and they believed life would be happier if only they were some place else.

But is this true? Can your life be happier just because you change location, particularly to a warm sunny country like Greece, for example? I don’t think so. It will be different, for sure, but not necessarily happier, or better.

The lovely harbour of Koroni where we spent the last year of our Greek odyssey

A taverna by the water at Limeni Bay, the Mani. The casual Greek lifestyle has a massive pull for foreigners

Our years in Greece brought us in contact with a lot of British, American and other expatriates, who told us they came to live in Greece to ‘escape’ their old, humdrum lives. Many of them obviously thrived in the gorgeous climate with a better lifestyle than they had back home, particularly the Brits, as if they were permanently on holiday, and no-one should blame them for wanting easier lives and sun and sea.

Many confessed to being happier in their new location, and said it was the best move they had ever made. However, those who sought Greece for a particular reason rather than the expectation of being happier, were probably the most successful resettlers, especially those who managed to assimilate well.

The American artist and writer Pamela Jane Rogers, who has written a fascinating memoir Greekscapes: Journeys With An Artist, left America after the break-up of her marriage and ended up settling on Poros island. She has been living there for 26 years. Mostly, she came to Greece for its beauty and as an inspiration for her painting. She has built up a great reputation for her work worldwide and is thriving in Greece. www.pamelajanerogers.com

The Scottish crime writer Paul Johnson has lived in Greece for some years, which has been the inspiration for many of his novels. Many other writers and artists also find that Greece provides a sunny muse and have no intention of leaving, despite the crisis.

Tsapi cove, Messinia. Who can resist the lure of enless sun and sea?

But a move to Greece is not always the answer to everything. Some British expats told us that although their lifestyle was easier, they weren’t as happy as they thought they’d be. The same problems that plagued them back home, plague them in Greece, as well as the fact that in Greece there is no financial safety net, a poorer health system, and their extended families are not around for support.

Many of those who escaped to Greece have ultimately returned home. One British expat I interviewed in 2010 for a freelance story about Greece had gone there with her husband where they built their ‘dream’ home near Kalamata, only it turned out to be anything but. It was planned as a retirement home, but after a heartbreaking series of bungles with builders, bureaucracy and other disasters, they sold up and moved back the UK, and have no further plans to pursue a dream life abroad.

Wallace our Jack Russell enjoying life as a Greek beach bum

Perhaps it shows that you can’t ramp up happiness just by changing location. It’s something deeper, more intrinsic. There’s a line in a poem by famous Greek poet Konstantinos Kavafis which sums it up. It loosely translates as: “You can change your skies but not your soul.”

To a great extent that’s true. The old life will follow you about wherever you go. A broken heart will be a broken heart wherever you are. A failure to relate with others, or to feel fulfilled on many levels, won’t change just because you go to Greece, or another sunny location.

The Greek/American travel writer Matt Barrett, who has an informative and popular Greek travel website www.greecetravel.com also had similar thoughts recently on his blog, written while on the island of Lesvos. In many ways he inspired me to write this piece.

Having lived for many years in Greece, he made this astute comment about those who want to leave their old life and move there: “The truth is that you only think you want to throw it all away and move to Greece because you are not taking the time to appreciate the things you have that you would absolutely miss if you did … If you are happy, with yourself then it does not matter if you are in Greece or Nebraska.”

The search for happiness is only part of it, of course. People are seeking different things when they go to Greece, and sometimes it’s not all that straightforward. It was one of the themes of my second travel memoir, Homer’s Where the Heart Is, after a Greek businessman had posed a question to me at a village celebration in the Mani. Apart from sun and sea, he asked, “what is it you (foreigners) seek to find in our country that you cannot find in your own?”

It’s not an easy question to answer and it is one of the things I thought about a great deal while in Greece, the illusive thing we are seeking there, and I am not sure I’ve really found it yet. Or that it can be found.

We went to the southern Peloponnese for a year and ended up staying for four. Although we never went seeking greater happiness and contentment I think we were unintentionally happier overall, despite the fact that not all our experiences were positive. We didn’t always get things right. We had tough times in the crisis, like everyone. We found it hard adjusting to another culture, and in our case a very traditional rural culture in the hillside village of Megali Mantineia. We found it tough renting abroad, without all the comforts and security we take for granted in Britain.

But in the end, we went without any illusions or expectations and we were constantly surprised and delighted by everything we found, helped in no small part by the wonderful Greeks we met (and occasionally expats, too), who shared their lives and their stories. Because we never sought happiness in a different location, I believe we found it and that may be the only thing I learnt after four years in Greece.

The place really isn’t the thing. It doesn’t set the agenda I believe.

The expat I mentioned earlier who built her dream home near Kalamata later told me that when she returned to the UK she realised perhaps for the first time what positive things the country had to offer her. So her story really did have a happy ending but not in the way she expected.

Of course, I’m not saying, don’t go abroad to search for the dream life, or have a long adventure – especially in warm and welcoming Greece, and even though it is still in crisis. But don’t go expecting it will change your life forever. As Kavafis indicated, it may only change your ‘sky’ and nothing more – unless that’s really all you want.

Travel Memoirs

TO read more about living in Greece during the crisis in the southern Peloponnese, read my travel memoirs, Things Can Only Get Feta, Homer’s Where The Heart Is and A Scorpion in the Lemon Tree.

The books are available on all Amazon’s international sites, Barnes and Noble and also on the Book Depository www.bookdepository.com (with free overseas postage). On the website www.bigfatgreekodyssey.com you will also find a books page with other information about the books.

New Book

Marjory has just published a debut novel, set in southern Greece, called A Saint For The Summer. This is a contemporary tale with a narrative thread back to the Second World War, a “tale of heroism, faith and love” described by a recent reviewer as “entertaining, enthralling”. For more information, see the books page link, above.

The book is available on all Amazon sites.

A Saint For The Summer

If you have liked my books please think of adding a small review on Amazon sites which is always very welcome. Thanks for calling by. x

You can also find me on Twitter @fatgreekodyssey

And my books page on Facebook www.facebook.com/ThingsCanOnlyGetFeta

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New book – Homer’s Where The Heart Is

Posted on April 20, 2015 by Marjory

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FOR all blog readers who have read and enjoyed my Greek travel memoir, Things Can Only Get Feta, I am very pleased to announce that the sequel is now available as a Kindle and paperback on Amazon worldwide.

Called Homer’s Where the Heart Is, the story takes up where Feta left off, as we decide to stay longer in the Mani in southern Greece after our first amazing year, despite the economic crisis becoming more severe.

Caption here for the local cove near Paleohora

A quiet cove near Paleohora with Mount Kalathio in the distance.

We rent a house in a slightly different location, but nearby the first village of Megali Mantineia. In Paleohora, we share an olive grove with our Greek landlords and their crazy collection of animals, including a she-wolf with a shady past.

It’s a fabulous new chapter in our odyssey but, typically for Greece, not everything goes to plan, although there’s plenty of entertainment as we deal with Greeks on the edge, gun-toting farmers and Wallace, our much loved Jack Russell dog, is up to a few of his tricks as usual. But he also faces one of his most challenging problems yet.

Caption here for Wallace surfboard riding

Wallace our Jack Russell can’t help getting up to a bit of mischief in the sequel.

I hope readers of the first book will be pleased to find that some of the original Greek characters from the hillside village of Megali Mantineia are very much part of this book, as we keep in close contact with them and take part in more of their village activities. Foteini the goat farmer, who charmed readers in Feta, is still one of the stars of this book, with her endearing and eccentric rural ways and her sense of fun.

We also explore more of the southern Peloponnese, and visit new locations, including ‘Little Australia’, the charming island of Kythera, and the wonderful house of the late Patrick Leigh Fermor in Kardamili, while researching a feature article on the famous travel writer’s home.

The famous stone arcade in the late Patrick Leigh Fermor’s Greek home.

There is also a grittier side to this book as the economic crisis intensifies and Greece edges closer to bankruptcy. Interwoven with the narrative of the book is my own back story from another troubling era in Greece’s history, which provides an interesting parallel to current events.

In the early 1970s, as a young woman fresh from high school, I travelled to Greece and spent a year in Athens during the military dictatorship. This was an edgy and fascinating time that I have never written about before. It will reveal as much about Greece as it does about my own personal journey and my continuing love affair with this country.

I hope you enjoy this book, and in the coming months I will share with blog readers some pictures and stories from behind the scenes that might help you to get a broader idea of what life has been like in Greece during the crisis.

Lastly, I must thank the very talented English artist Tony Hannaford for his absolutely gorgeous illustration for this book. Tony has a great love of Greece and has the ability to capture the vibrancy and beauty of this country to perfection, as he also did with the cover of Things Can Only Get Feta. To see more of his work on Greece and the Mediterranean in general, please visit his website www.anthonyhannaford.co.uk

The editing and formatting for the Kindle was done by ex-journalist Jim Bruce and I can’t praise his work enough. For more information on his service please visit www.ebooklover.co.uk

Please let me know how you like the book, and if you do, please think about leaving a review on Amazon. Writers are always very appreciative of this. And comments to the blog are also very welcome.

As always, I thank you for your ongoing interest in our Greek odyssey and for support of Things Can Only Get Feta and all your very kind messages to the blog.

* To buy the new book Homer’s Where The Heart Is in Kindle or paperback in Britain or the US, please click on one of these links: amazon.co.uk or amazon.com The book is also available on European and most other international sites as well.

For more information about the books and about our time living, firstly in the Mani and currently in Koroni in Messinia, visit our website www.bigfatgreekodyssey.com

© All rights reserved. Text and photographs copyright of the authors 2015. No content/text or photographs may be copied from the blog without the prior written permission of the authors. This applies to all posts on the blog.

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