Sales Slips and Taxes

         Taxes (φ ό ρ ο υ ς ) is probably the most feared word in the Greek language. Greeks historically have had an aversion to paying any kind of tax, for what ever purpose, and have gone to great lengths in avoiding them. With the economic depression still going on (as this is 2012), the current Greek government in it’s ongoing efforts to raise revenues, not only tightened  tax laws, but also introduced a plethora of new taxes to be imposed on the population. This has led the Greeks to believe that the last several elected governments have been nothing more than a kleptocracy rather than a democracy, each one more corrupt than the last, bolstered by years of cronyism.

With the introduction of the new income tax came new challenges for the Greek taxpayer in trying to circumvent this hated legislation. According to the new tax a deduction would be given based on the kinds and amount of sales receipts one has accumulated during the year. Consequently, taxes are reduced correspondingly based on the tax bracket one finds himself in. So, throughout the year everyone is squirreling away sales receipts from a few Euro cents to mega Euro purchases. This has led to intriguing phenomena in which people are trading sales slips, as I remember trading baseball cards as a kid. “I’ll give you two of my apparel receipts for one of your gas receipts.” Or if a relative hasn't reached his or her maximum deductions, other family members may pitch in and donate some of their sales slips. What you can find in every household is a large shoe box brimming full of sales receipts that have to be kept for a year. If one has an accountant, then he has to safely store these receipts for all his clients.

During the summer of 2012, as we started a huge kitchen renovation project, I too started to accumulate large quantities of sales slips that I consciously hoarded in a size 44 shoe box. Then it

occurred to me, since sales receipts were such a valuable commodity and in high demand, maybe I could make some extra money and auction them to the highest bidder. It was a fleeting thought, because I knew deep inside I would just give them away. Sure enough, by the end of the summer my niece wound up with my size 44 shoe box packed full of sales receipts, everything from a bag of pistachios to a new kitchen sink. So, maybe this just proves what the arch conservative, Barry Goldwater once said about income taxes, “The income tax created more criminals than any other single act of government.”

OTE

                                      

OTE are the three letters that represented the omnipresent Greek telephone company even on our little island of Ikaria. A neighbor of ours happened to be walking past our house cradling a phone in his arms one early morning looking rather confused and in a state of mild agitation. Noting his disposition, as a neighbor who normally is a happy go lucky kind of a guy, I immediately asked, “Why such a sullen face on such a beautiful morning?”

 “Well,” he said, “You know I have had my name on the list to get a land line from OTE for years. Finally, about a year ago they notified me that I was next on the list, and within a month they came and installed  my  phone. Since then I have had nothing but trouble and annoyance with OTE. Everything from poor phone reception, to no reception, to billing problems, but what took the cake was my ordeal with them yesterday. Once again I called OTE to complain about the spotty phone service I was receiving. I told them I would be on the phone talking, and without warning my call would be cut off. Sometimes if I stayed on the line for two or three minutes service would resume, only to be disconnected again a few minutes later. ‘Apparently’, said the OTE technician while checking my line, ‘your phone seems to be working fine now, what I suggest you do in the future is to call us back when your phone is not working’. I couldn’t believe what I was hearing, so I just hung up on him. That’s why I’m on my way to Agios to dump this junky OTE phone and get myself into the 21^st century with a reliable cell phone.”

         This fleeting incident reminded me of the T.V. comedy “Laugh-In,” back in the 60’s, you might recall Lily Tomlin’s character, Ernestine, as a dismissive and condescending phone operator. Her celebrated parting words at the end of each sketches was, “We don’t care, we don’t have to, we’re the phone company.”

What Garbage??

As so often happens among Aegean islands, small squabbles, usually concerning fishing,

politics or who has the best dancers, emerge, are highlighted for a while, and then dissipate over the Aegean Sea. Occasionally though, an unusual crises crops up and takes center stage as it did on Ikaria in 2012.With Ikaria entering the disposable material age years ago, one could no longer burn tidy little bags of garbage in ones back yard, and with the increase of tourist every summer, the amount of garbage exceeded the local capacity to handle the overflow. The Ikarian officials invested in new Mercedes Benz garbage trucks, put out a variety of bins to collect recyclables, and opened up a dump in the middle of the island to deal with the abundance of discarded rubbish. Slowly though, the dump filled up and could no longer handle the constant arrival and dumping of the garbage trucks, and was forced to close. This presented a dilemma for the local officials as the bins brimmed over, and the garbage started to pile up in the streets.

Sometime during the discussions of what to do with this aggregate of trash, a decision was reached by the local authorities to pile the garbage onto a barge and take it somewhere, but where? The approved suggestion was to secretly, in the dark of night, float this barge to the neighboring islands of Fourni. Since the islands are sparsely populated, there would be ample room to accommodate the ever increasing collection of trash from Ikaria. The garbage was quickly gathered and loaded onto an enormous barge and deployed for its’ two hour trip to Fourni.

The secrecy of this mission unfortunately was compromised when the locals on Fourni, hearing from an inside source, of the covert Ikarian operation, mounted their own stealth counterattack. There to meet the phantom barge, in the dead of night, was a delegation of Fournotes, who adamantly forced the unwanted and malodorous barge to turn around and make a hasty retreat back to Ikaria.

Stuck with this smelly barge, authorities once again met to decide the outcome of this traveling garbage pile. In the meantime, Ikarians were becoming irritated with the

slow progress of the garbage issue, and public resentment resonated across the island. Finally, after weeks and much consternation, negotiations by the local authorities were completed for the acceptance of the barge by another neighboring island. This island, seeing the profitable silver lining in the Ikarian trash, demanded payment up front in order to take in the garbage for the rest of the year. So, if by chance you are island hopping around the Aegean Sea be sure to keep a lookout for the floating garbage pile, but then again you probably will smell it before you see it.

Travels with Dad Part III

Neighbors quickly recognized the quirkiness of my father’s behaviors and as village gossip spread like locust in August about the peculiar habits of my father, a clever prank was hatched by our amicable neighbor, Christos. He was a rather provocative catalyst, a speculator in a way, always looking for a semi-shady financial deal to make him rich. His personality was effervescent and disarming, just the right mix that attracted my dad to him. Christos and my father immediately became comrades in arms, and provided additional fodder for the villagers as the two companions seemed to terrorize half of Ikaria with their exuberant wisecracks and antics.

The closed ranks of the brick army were being diminished swiftly by the bricklayers, as the

bedroom progressed.  Eventually a pile numbering about two hundred remained intact for the final push and completion of the bedroom. By now, my father’s sleeping pattern had once again changed. Helping out the workers during the day by hauling bricks, mixing cement and running errands exhausted him physically and by 10:00 p.m. he was in his bed sound asleep.  

Throughout this tumultuous building process our inquisitive neighbor Christos made daily reconnaissance to observe and record the progress of the bricklayers, all the while quaffing a glass or two of ouzo with my dad and joking about his natural affinity with the bricks. The aggregate of these scouting visits was the formation of a deviously ingenious joke, at the expense of my father. It was a short time later during a hot and windy night that Christos stealthily made his way to the last remaining battalion of bricks, still precariously occupying a corner of our yard. Within two hours he had singlehandedly transported my dad’s precious stash to his side yard, a mere twenty meters from our house, and covered it with a large green tarp. Christos’ fiendish klepto plan was basically to enjoy my father’s baffled and confused look in finding his famously proprietary bricks had somehow mysteriously vanished in thin air. He moved his rickety table and chair to the edge of his porch so as to embrace the best view of my father’s emergence from the house and the bewilderment to follow. The morning sun had already cleared the horizon as my father stepped out of the house to inspect the previous day’s work, when he stopped in his tracks. Perplexed by the sight of the missing bricks, he promptly assumed the actions of a possessed man. Words flew out of his mouth like machine gun fire.

 “My bricks, my bricks, someone stole my bricks, they’re gone the bricks, the bricks!” He ran from the yard to the church below desperately seeking some kind of divine intervention on his behalf, while filling the sky with stinging blasphemies.  His agonizing pursuit continued onto the main street, still in a frenzy yelling “my bricks, my bricks, my bricks,” dashing wildly throughout the neighborhood and once again waking up the confused and groggy villagers.

All the while our rascally neighbor was watching him from his porch chuckling at the amusing antics of my father’s painful search for his bricks. Finally, when Christos could no longer contain himself with all this merriment, he called to my father to check out the suspiciously tarp covered pile. My father swiftly raced the twenty meters to Christos’ side yard, pulled back the green tarp to expose his precious collection of sienna colored bricks. A combination of relief, anger and amusement enveloped my father, luckily the amused part won out, as he shook his head slowly and a smile crossed his face, he realized the joke was on him. As morning coffee was shared by the two companiable neighbors the account of the missing bricks escapade was repeated numerous times, and laughter filled the quiet morning air.  

Eventually the additional bedroom was completed, but that did not end the saga of my father and the neighborhood jokester. The summer passed quickly for me and I had to return to the States, but my father remained an additional three weeks to tie up loose ends with the workers and the bureaucratic Greek building codes. It was on the last day of my dad’s extended stay on Ikaria that Christos came by to say good-bye and to wish my hurried father a safe journey back to Chicago. He presented my dad a package the size of a carton of cigarettes, nicely wrapped with a colorful ribbon and bow.

The package was meant for a mutual friend, Anna, who was going to meet my father at O’Hare airport. The contents of the package Christos declared were prescription drugs for this friend, drugs that were much cheaper in Greece, thanks to socialized medicine, than in the States. Not to be derelict towards a friend in need, my father unabashedly agreered to transport this needed medication. Since my father had already packed his antiquated suitcase to the gills, he was forced to re-pack leaving several small gifts behind, to accommodate this hefty medical parcel.

The return trip for my father was a slow and gruesome one, most appropriate for travelers to and from Greece at that time. The ferry from Ikaria to Piraeus was six hours late, his stay in Athens had to be extended by two days, and his Sabena flight back to Chicago arrived hours behind schedule. Throughout all these delays and constrains he carefully and meticulously guarded his luggage with the medicine safely secured, tucked in the inside compartment of his suitcase.

Finally, arriving at O’Hare and uncommonly breezing through customs, he was met by the anxious Anna. Immediately my father opened his venerable suitcase and judiciously pulled out her brightly wrapped gift.

 Perplexed by this magnanimous gesture on the part of my father, she asked “What is it?”

 “It’s the medicine you asked Christos to send you from Greece” he replied. 

“I never asked him to send me any meds’ she countered, somewhat confused ‘but let’s see what it is.” Deftly she removed the bright ribbon and tore into the wrapping paper. Their world, in the middle of O’Hare airport, seemed to stand still as they tried to focus their eyes on the heavy object gently resting in Anna’s trembling hand. What my father had so painstakingly and vigilantly escorted for days, across two continents and over five thousand miles, was one of his brick soldiers, regulation size sienna colored brick, compliments of good neighbor Christos.            

The trip was put in proper perspective a few years later after my father passed away, the excursion we took together was the last one he took to his beloved Ikaria. It was only then that I was able to appreciate those periods of daily mayhem that included arguments and squabbles with the locals, as with the cantankerous old priest, overdue or inebriated workers, and annoying but amusing neighbors. In the end we both survived, returned home with various bumps and bruises and plenty of emotional scars that are the transitional outcomes of such father and son expeditions. Chronicling this story I’m left with the visionary words of the poet Anne Sexton, ‘It doesn’t matter who my father was, it matters who I remember he was.”

Travels with Dad Part II

Most Greeks when faced with a major construction project, will use whatever money they have available, proceed to purchase what materials they can afford, and start the lengthy building process. When the money runs out construction comes to a complete halt. Workers are dismissed and what piles of materials, stone, sand, bricks, etc. remain are just left there waiting for the next injection of money. This prolonged period of time could last weeks, months or even years before construction can once again resume.

This start and stop construction cycle with its’ various mounds of materials scattered all over the Greek countryside was a particular annoyance to my father’s convoluted sense of organization and order. When we finally arrived on Ikaria, after our arduous beginnings, some of the building materials we ordered, primarily the bricks, were already delivered. These pavers were brought by a dilapidated dump truck that casually and not too carefully unloaded them in our front yard establishing an enormous sienna colored pile of bricks, instantly creating condos for countless families of scorpions and lizards. Immediately my father seeing this vast and seemingly endless pile of bricks began a verbal assault on the Greek truck drivers for their inconsiderate and lackadaisical care given to his precious and cherished building materials.

My dad and I tired from our long and exhausting trip, turned in early that first night hoping to get some much needed sleep. Sometime during the night or early morning hours, a strange and mysterious sound coming from the darken yard kept reverberating in my ears. A sound vaguely similar to a young child knocking together his play toys in a consistent and rhymic pattern. Knowing that no child would be up at this ungodly time of night, I crawled out of bed and made my way to the window. There, as dawn was breaking over the eastern tip of Ikaria, was my father in his scruffy work clothes carefully arranging the scattered bricks in neat and orderly rows, like soldiers in formation waiting for their marching orders.

“What are you doing?” I yelled in a dry and parched voice. “You know it’s barely five o clock in the morning, people are trying to sleep!” My bellowing had no noticeable effect on my zombie like dad. He just kept on methodically arranging his brick army in readiness for their battle with the bricklayers later on that day. In desperation I quickly slipped on my sandals ran out of the house towards my father, just in time to see him place the last brick, like a royal coronation, on top of the last row. Grabbing him by the arm as one grabs a mischievous child, I shouted at him. “You can’t be doing this in the middle of the night, everyone and everything neighbors, dogs, mules, goats are trying to sleep and you should too.”  Grumpy and exhausted, but tepid from his nocturnal employment, I led him back to the house,  as he explained to me that bricks have to be properly and systematically arranged in order for the bricklayers to work under optimal conditions. Finally, as the first rooster was heard across the hollow and the eastern sky turned crimson red my father went to sleep.

With typical haphazard of starts and stops the building of the additional bedroom began in earnest. Among the many and inconvenient distractions to the process was surprisingly, the elderly village priest, who presided over not one but three churches in our small village. One of the churches, affectionally known as number two, was situated right below and adjacent to our property. Given the location and the general direction of the summer winds, the church yard, as well as the church itself, was often encrusted in layers of blowing sand, dust, and cement powder from our ever expanding construction site. The rakish priest, a late septuagenarian, was a contemporary of my father, both

having grown up on the island and having a long history of personal skirmishes and disputes. None the less, every day he climbed the fourteen stairs from the church yard up to our house, enjoyed the customary glass of ouzo, and shared with my father the latest village gossip. This daily routine lasted about an hour, an hour that my father felt was useless and wasted on the priest, because it took precious time away from his work and the overseeing of the workers. He made his views known in a hushed voice everyday when the priest was descending the fourteen stairs to the church yard below.

As construction continued and the meltimi winds picked up, the priest in his daily visits would complain to my father of the debris and mess created around the church. In response my father in his most diplomatic voice, would deflect the priest’s complaints, and state that he had no personal command over Mother Nature and  her relentless winds. Ultimately, these too frequent bouts of grievances came to a head one bright gusty morning. 

 The priest was once again sweeping the construction sand and dust out of the church entrance, when in a fit of total exasperation stopped sweeping and called up to my father, “Come see what mayhem your workers and the wind have created inside this house of God.”  On this day my father must have had on his cranky pants and was in no mood to take verbal abuse from this man of God. As the barrage of words escalated between the two septuagenarians, the workers hearing the torrent of threats and retribution sensed that something inconceivable might happen.  

Then, in what appeared to be a split second the wind stopped, the cicadas became silent, the workers dropped their tools, and in unison watched this geriatric smack down unfold. My father in the heat of the moment, promptly picked up a near by shovel, and lacing the morning air with a slew of obscenities raced down the stairs. He ceased only momentarily to graphically describe how he was going to grab and pull the scraggily beard of the priest,  twist  and squeeze  it like a pretzel  around his scrawny neck, so he no longer would have to listen to the daily bitching of the holy man. The priest, alarmed at the sudden appearance of his half-crazed neighbor, stood defiantly in the church entrance, head held high, clutching and holding out the gold Orthodox cross hanging from his neck.  My father, still seeing red, instinctively swung his improvised weapon wildly in a dervisly manner high above his head.                                                                                                

 Suddenly, with a thundering clamor, he brought it belligerently down at the feet of the startled priest, still embracing his protective cross, and scattering the accumulated piles of sand and debris. The two combatants now sweating and exhausted by their morning joust, stood silently, glaring eye to eye and heaving  laboriously, as two depleted heavyweights.   

Swiftly, I flew down the stairs and placed myself between the two warriors trying to interject an air of tranquility, but I was irrelevant for the remainder of the event. As the level of adrenaline slowly decreased in the two bellicose neighbors, a shred of calm appeared in their behaviors. They had taken their positions to the limit, and finally acknowledged the futility of their actions. Only with the last batch of cement mixed and the last brick laid in place, would this daily skirmish cease. This realization was understood by both of them, and with a grandiose gesture my father assured the priest, that when construction was finally completed, he himself would come down and personally clean the church and the church yard. This confrontation was the talk of the village for months, and each time the story was told it embellished and elevated the personas of the two combatants, casting them as the clash of the two septuagenarian titans.

Travels with Dad Part I

It’s not often a son gets a chance to travel exclusively with his father to some far flung exotic destination. Usually family, time and economic restraints limit such rare partnerships. During the summer of 1989, I had the opportunity to take such an excursion with my father to a remote and distant Greek island called Ikaria. The island where my father was born and raised, and where I also spent my first five years of life. The purpose of this father and son journey was the building of a family summer home. Naively, I thought this four week stay on Ikaria would be a combination of work and play. Laboring arduously in the mornings with the builders and then spending the hot afternoons lying on the pebble beaches under the sea pines with the warm Aegean breezes blowing over my body. Such were my idealistic and visionary vacation dreams.

Wanderlust was an inheritant part of my father’s personality. He had traveled extensively during World War II, and continued somewhat after the war. He was always ready and able at the drop of a hat to grab his passport and head to his Aegean island home. He was a man slight in stature, full head of grey hair, bi-spectacled with a thin 1940’s style mustache, and always full of energy and on the move. My father had the distinction, or maybe I should say a “devil’s mark” when it came to traveling. He always seemed to bring about some unpredictable, chaotic and challenging misadventure, which usually required others to come to his rescue and bail him out of his predicament at the last moment. It’s not that he went looking for such misadventures, they just naturally happen to occurred around him. This would include any ordinary, mundane exposure to the outside world, whether a trip to the local grocery store, or a trip half way around the world.

My journey started innocently enough when I kissed and said farewell to my wife, my seven year old son and my six month old daughter. Jokingly I mentioned to my wife, it would be a highly successful trip if both my father and I returned unscathed and alive from Greece. My curt comment referred to the fact, as it was widely known by all, that my father’s magnetism for misadventure grated and infuriated me to no end. I figured occupying my father’s time with full days of work on the house should keep him out of harms way, and away from any embarrassing mischief.

Our trek started peacefully enough on a Sabena flight out of Chicago to Athens, with a stop in Brussels. Events quickly took a dark and ominous turn as we left Brussels, when almost immediately we hit a thunderstorm of massive proportions over Belgium. A storm so immense we couldn’t fly over it or around it. Then when the pilot came on the intercom in a stern Gaelic voice and announced that dinner would not be served because of the turbulence, and for the stewardess to strap in, we knew instinctively we would be in for quite a ride. During the next two and a half hours every disposable sick bag and container on board was put to good use as the plane lurched violently from side to side, sometimes seemly dropping several hundred feet at a time in elevation. The plane fuselage was filled with the sporadic screams of mothers, the moans of grown men and the crying of young babies, along with the varied and countless prayers offered to the Gods by the nervous and apprehensive passengers. Even my father being a relative stoic figure, mumbled and swore under his breath using words that I had never heard before. Finally, as we approached Athens the storm eased, and we all took reconnaissance of our sore and aching bodies, passing the bags and containers down to the stewardess who profusely apologized for the lack of our in flight meal.

Thinking that the worse part of our trip was over, and glad to be on solid ground, we gallantly, still on wobbly legs and queasy stomachs from the jarring plane ride went trooping up to the passport control window only to come face to face with the notoriously ubiquitous Greek bureaucracy. My father in his younger and more idealistic years happened to be a Communist sympathizer and after World War II was briefly detained by the Allies in an army detainee camp in Egypt for expressing his radical views. As we handed our American passports to the passport official he immediately pulled out what seemed to be a rather large size 20 shoe box, full of 5x7 note cards. When he came to the M’s he pulled out a card with my dad’s last name on it, along with a brief dossier. Looking suspiciously at my father then intently studying his card, the official made a comment in regards, that my father, now an American citizen, must have accepted the glories of capitalism and the proper and correct political views, and thus would be allowed to enter Greece. I, on the other hand knew better, and before my father had a chance to open his mouth to express what he really thought were the correct political views, I grabbed him by the arm, thanked the passport official and briskly pushed my dad through the turnstile and proceeded to drag him to the baggage area muttering something about capitalist pigs, or maybe he was channeling Karl Marx.

Having survived the passport ordeal and now firmly planted on Greek soil, like a true Odysseus longing to get home, we moved to the next challenging task of collecting our luggage. Luckily our suitcases were already on the baggage carousel, a feat which I believe was, and possibly still is a world record time for Greek airport baggage handlers. As I lifted my dad’s suitcase off the conveyer I became suspicious of its’ enormous weight.

 I turned and asked him, “Why does your suitcase weigh so much?”

 He swiftly answered, “I just have a few things for the house and my clothes, come on let’s go.”

Our final stop in exiting the airport was customs. Normally, the Greek custom officials don’t want to be bothered with the task of ordering tourists to open their suitcases and having to pilfer through all their soiled clothing and belongings. They usually give you a summary glance and wave you through. As we hastily passed the first group of custom officials one of them, who looked like a heavy from an old black and whiteT.V.western, unexpectedly started to glare at us, as if we were mentally suspect. Stepping around the other officials he approached us and asked if we had anything to declare.

My father in his rush to exit the airport quickly chirped in, “No, no we have nothing to declare, we’re fine, nothing to declare, our suitcases are all right,” words that seemed to resonate off the building walls, and which immediately raised the suspicion of the less than sympathetic custom agent. Commanding his most surly voice and with a cigarette dangling loosely from his lips the official with his head held high ordered us to follow him.

 “There,” he pointed, to a large steel table, “put your luggage there, and open them up. Let’s see what you don’t have to declare” he said in an officious manner.

Now my father, reflecting back on his knowledge of functionaries and people in positions that could possibly be influenced to ignore breaches of rules and guidelines, had packed inside his suitcase, what he considered to be the international symbol of bribery, cigarettes. Not just any cigarettes, but the most revered, coveted and preferred brand in the world, Marlboro Reds. Immediately my father fumbled around, opened his large and heavy suitcase and there on top were two sealed cartons of Marlboro Reds. Glancing at the customs agent, my father cunningly smiled and giving him a wink or two, stood quietly by waiting for the official to confiscate the two prized cartons for his personal enjoyment. Unfortunately, this scene was played out in an open public area with other officials watching this comical scenario closely. The customs official, feeling the glare of a dozen eyes on him promptly ignored the cigarette payola and started his dutiful search of the suitcase. Reaching to the bottom of the suitcase, while giving my father a curious and perplexed look, he pulled out an old beat up framing hammer.  

My father instantly pleaded, “That’s my favorite hammer, and I need it to build my house.”

 In a calm and collected voice the official replied, “We have hammers in Greece, in fact we’ve had hammers for thousands of years.” Dropping the American made hammer back in the suitcase, he once again reached his hand in the pile of my dad’s clothing and this time emerged with a hack saw and a half dozen replacement blades. By now I was totally speechless and just as mystified as the customs agent. I had no idea my father was carrying such unconventional travel items, I imagined the next tool to be unearthed was going to be a Paul Bunyan type ax. Examining the saw and the blades, the official shaking his head in a bewildered manner, threw them casually back in the suitcase toolbox.

 “Open the rest of your bags” he ordered. Nimbly we proceeded to open the remaining three suitcases, wondering how much longer this inquisition was going to continue. Apparently by now the official was also becoming frustrated, seeing that we really didn’t have any meaningful contraband to speak of just a rag tag collection of old tools.

 He gave our bags a quick once over then abruptly said, “Close them, you can go.” In a flash the suitcases were slammed shut, still containing  the two not so enticing  cartons of Marlboro Reds and with passports hot in hand we briskly walked out of the airport and headed to the taxi stand.

Commandeering the first taxi we could find, we slung our suitcases in the trunk, gave the driver the address of our hotel, and settled in the backseat of the taxi for the half hour car ride. It was at this point I realized I could finally relax after the non-stop events of the past few hours, which had seemed to have lingered for days. Jet lag had caught up with me as the taxi maneuvered cautiously in and out of traffic, and just when my eyes shut for a quick cat nap we arrived at our hotel. Sluggishly we crawled out of the taxi, retrieved our suitcases, and paid the cab driver, who courteously wished us a restful and peaceful vacation.

Approaching the hotel entrance with our luggage in hand, my father looked around and in a soft voice said, “I think I left my jacket in the back seat of the cab.”

 “Don’t worry,” I said, “we’ll buy a new one tomorrow.”

 In an even softer voice he whispered “My passport is in my jacket.” 

             “What?!” I exploded, “Your passport?!” Without a moment’s hesitation I dropped my suitcases, looked around and then down the narrow street I spotted our taxi, two blocks away, stuck in mid-afternoon traffic. I took off running at a speed that still amazes me to this day, hoping that the taxi would remain locked in the everlasting traffic jam. About half a block away I saw the stalled taxi starting to move and pick up momentum as it approached a major intersection. Thinking I had no hope of catching up to the cab, I immediately started  to orchestrate in my mind the dreaded and time consuming trip to the U.S. embassy, and the explanation I would have to give the embassy official. Could my father’s personality suffice as an explanation?

 Suddenly with what seemed like divine intervention, as the cab sped up to cross the busy street, the traffic light turned red. With an unusual squeal of the brakes the cab abruptly stopped at the crosswalk just in time for me to catch up to it. Winded and out of breath, I banged on the taxi window shocking the startled driver, who instinctively thought he was going to be robbed by a hot sweaty, mad man. It took me a minute to catch my breath and through heavy breathing I explained that my dad’s jacket was somewhere in the cab. The driver unaware of the mislaid garment and its’ contents, looked around and on the back floor found the jacket scrunched under the seat. Handing me the wayward jacket, passport still snugly secured in the inside pocket, accompanied by my father’s wallet, with all his money I thanked the stunned cabbie.

 Holding my dad’s jacket, as one holds a holy book, I lethargically walked back to the hotel. The hot afternoon sun, jet lag, an empty stomach, combined with the unexpected jolt of physical activity turned my mind into a congealed glob of mush. I was left with one sobering thought, it had only been a few hours since my father and I started this exhausting journey, what else could possibly happen to us in the next few weeks? I reached the entrance of the hotel to find my father sitting on a stool silently waiting for me. I presented him the jacket and without saying a word we both turned and entered the hotel lobby knowing this father and son odyssey was just commencing.

Maybe Zorba the Greek was right, when he said, “Life is trouble, death is not, to be alive is to undo your belt and look for trouble.” My father not only removed his belt, but his jacket, shoes and socks as well. I realized that the next four weeks, would be not only challenging in trying to keep my father safe and out of trouble, but a trial of my capacity for endurance, patience and civility. All these attributes were going to be inevitably and severely tested in the days to come when we reached Ikaria.  

Contradictions

     Contradictions are as numerous on Ikaria as cicadas in August. One of my favorite contradictions involves the judious law enforcement agency i.e. the Ikarian police, and their seemingly arbitrary and somewhat hazy enforcement of Greek motor vehicle laws. During my summers on Ikaria the run-ins I’ve had with the local police consisted mostly of minor motor vehicle violations. These so called violations always seemed to be selective or maybe they were somehow related to the phases of the moon, but nonetheless they happened and they should be duly noted with some kind of a plausible explanation. Those of us, who have bikes, on Ikaria everything from a Vespa to a Harley, are required by Greek law to wear a helmet, or at least have a helmet handy. When the police decide to enforce this law they will set up a road block for an hour or two, usually under the shade of a large tree and see who they can catch sans helmet. My three experiences with these police road blocks are quiet varied and so are the results.

     Experience #1  My first experience happened as I was riding my Vespa to Agios as usual without a helmet and unaware of a road block just outside the city limits. As I approached the police road block I purposely slowed down in anticipation of being stopped by the Ikarian police, but because both officers were busy with their official duties of writing tickets they motioned me to continue without stopping. How fortunate I thought, maybe my Vespa is too cute or too slow to warrant a warning or a ticket. So, my first experience reinforced in me a false sense of motor vehicle security.

    Experience #2 Two years later, once again riding to Agios

on my Vespa without a helmet, I encountered another police road block. Thinking I had free passage I whizzed past the blockade only to have an officer quickly chase me down and pull me over. Asking to see my driver’s license, I searched my back pack only to discover I had left my wallet with all my identification back at the house. Explaining the situation to the perturbed officer he allowed me twenty-four hours to present myself and my drivers’ license, which happened to be a Michigan drivers’ license, to the police station. The next day being a bit fearful and uncertain of my status with the Ikarian police, I asked my good friend, Giovanni to accompany me to the police station in case some unexpected development occurred like being thrown in the Ikarian jail. He could thus relay the news of my imprisonment to my supportive wife. Upon reaching the police station and finding the main desk I explained to the duty officer the reason for my presence. “Fine,” he said, “let’s see your driver’s license.” Reaching into my back pocket I produced my wallet with all my identification cards. Fumbling to find my drivers license, my local Michigan library card happened to fall on the desk. The officer picked it up, examined it closely and asked, “Is this your driver’s license?” Jokingly I replied, “Oh yeah.” “Well, ok”, he said shaking his head as if he didn’t want to be bothered by such mundane civil infractions, “you’re free to go.” This thin piece of plastic had no identifying photograph, had no printed address, had no affiliation to the Michigan driver’s bureau. The card did however have a cute graphic of two books leaning together and a helpful list of nearby branches. That magic combination was evidently all I needed. Hastily I picked up my get out of jail free card, tucked it safely in my wallet, thanked the kind officer and with a dazed and confused Giovanni made a swift exit out of the police station.

    Experience #3 This latest encounter with the inglorious police road block occurred on a return trip to my village. By this time I had acquired a helmet, or what would pass for a motorcycle helmet since it was really nothing more than one of those hard foam bicycle helmets. My son, Alex, was my passenger on the Vespa, and he unfortunately did not have a helmet. Spotting the road block about half a kilometer away, I quickly donned my fraudulent helmet, but then started worrying about my helmetless son. Stopping at the road block, the police officer approached and giving my improvised helmet a cursory glance, asked the usual to see my driver’s license. After a quick glimpse at the license he waved us on. By this time my curiosity was inflamed. “Excuse me,” I asked, “is everyone on a motorcycle supposed to wear a helmet?” “No,” he replied, “just the driver, passengers aren’t required to wear helmets.” As we motored back to our village I couldn’t help but wonder if this was the same panel of Solon lawmakers that also made the no smoking law for the bank customers, but not for the bank employees.