Winter garden

It's not all doom and gloom: our garden is looking rather prosperous.
We harvested our first broccoli last Sunday, and now the cauliflower is also ready.
But the cabbages still need some more growing time.

Post-weekend story: The wild west

The image of Athens that springs to mind in most people's heads is that of a tightly packed sprawling treeless city full of apartment blocks that bear a resemblance to the notion of inhabitable accommodation, with the pride and centrepiece being the Acropolis. The image is generally correct, but this did not resemble my first introduction to the city that the Scottish like to think compares to their very own Edinburgh (and why a sun-starved city like Edinburgh should, only the Scots can tell us - it's all Greek to me). As a Greek born abroad, I had very little idea what there was in Athens beyond the Parthenon. The leafy northern suburbs (like Kifissia) and the southern coastal suburbs (like Palio Faliro) were and still are unknown to me, despite having lived in Athens for nearly four years. I went to the wild west, into an area that remains relatively unknown to most of the tourists and locals alike; you don't go west of Athens unless you need to.

When I first arrived in Greece, my very first introduction to Athens was spent in an area that was very far removed from the images of the Athens that I thought I was coming to, a mental image acquired from the tourist brochures at the travel agencies, the travel books in the Wellington public library, and the postcards we were occasionally sent from our relatives. Everyone there lived in single story dwellings, there were quite a few parks and many open spaces surrounding the houses, and the Acropolis was regarded as one of the most useless rocky hills on a prime spot of land in central Athens. The area was close to the sea, hence the name given to the region: Παραλία Ασπροπύργου (Paralia Aspropirgou: the Aspropirgos coast).

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Aspropirgos is located 17 kilometres west of the centre of Athens. Many members of my mother's family moved to this area from the village of Κάμποι (Kambi) in the 1960s, in search of work and better opportunities; generally speaking, they were aiming for a chance to improve their lives. In the poverty of the post-war era, with the demise of village and rural life, everyone was leaving the agricultural regions and moving into the urban environment. But in Paralia Aspropirgou, urbanisation never seemed to catch on at the rate that it had in the centre of Athens. The area only recently acquired footpaths and tarmac on the road, while the main form of grocery shopping is still the neighbourhood παντοπολείο (pantopolio). Everyone knows each other; they are often related to one another in some form, be it as a sibling, best man, godparent or the same village origins. Many people from Crete settled in this area, creating enclaves of Cretan communities, in the same way that immigrants to the New World did in America and Australasia.

My aunt was one of those 'migrants' who settled in Aspropirgos with her young family after her husband was 'excused' from his duties as a policeman (due to the curse of the bottle). There were many job opportunities available in the area, all within walking distance of the first dwellings in the area: makeshift roughshod container style houses, onto which rooms were added one by one, until they were big enough top house all the occupants. They usually contain two bedrooms, and resemble brick and mortar shacks. The area was classified as residential only recently; since then, pavements and tarmac were laid on the roads, which were also given street names. Eventually, Thia bought her own home, very similar to the one she rented when she first came out to the area. It still remains a simple house, although it has been modernised to the point where she has air conditioning in the summer and radiators in the winter. Her tiny garden contains an olive, a lemon and a walnut tree, all of which she planted herself.

(the footpath, tarmac and street names are relatively recent additions to Paralia Aspropirgou)

"When we moved up with Leonidas-God-rest-his-soul, I realised that we would never move back down to Crete. Because of the jobs. Because we had no work there. It was very tiring travelling to Crete and back during the olive season, so I sold the olive grove I had been given as part of my dowry. What use was it to us? We had jobs here, and our lives were based here. I bought my own home with the money from the sale, and helped my daughters into theirs."

So what kind of jobs did everyone do around here? Factories. Hundreds of factories. Light industry, heavy industry, shipbuilding yards, gas works, electricity plants, metal works, oil refineries, cement works. The different suburbs of Paralia Aspropirgou weren't named after a church, in the classical Greek manner; they were all named after the works close to it.

Ask a cabbie to go west of Athens beyond Egaleo and watch the reaction on his face.
"Where ya goin' to, kiria mou?" asked the taxi driver.
"Paralia Aspropirgou," I replied. His face scrunched up; Paralia Aspropirgou isn't the most popular destination for cab drivers - there's no guarantee of a return fare. It's like World's End, the point of no return.
"Know ya way round there?" he looked at me suspiciously.
"Sort of, you can drop me off at Halips."

(Halips factory, as seen from the entrance to the suburb of Paralia Aspropirgou)

Halips (ΧΑΛΥΨ) is the now defunct cement works across the road from what looks like a narrow insignificant side street on one of the filthiest motorways in Europe, the very road that one must take to go from central Athens to Corinth. Looking at it from the motorway, it is difficult to imagine that there is sense of home and hearth behind the putrid dust storms that Halips left behind well after it closed down. Not a single house can be seen from the main road, only industrial plants. It looks like Hell, a wasteland of metal, concrete and glass, right next to the coast, a site probably chosen for the ease with which waste could be dumped without anyone needing to find out (toxicity tests started being conducted well after the environmental damage had turned the area into Athens' biggest sewer). Nothing shines here on the main road. If you saw the metal works in the Lord of the Rings films, you can conjure up the right picture in your mind. The windows are permanently covered with a thick film of dust, which doesn't get thicker because it is so dry, nothing can stick onto it any longer. It blows around continuously, entering the houses, settling on the ground, piling up in corners.

(when you don't have a choice, you may indeed decide to go for a dip here; don't worry about the mass of ships ramming into you - this is a ship cemetery, they're not going anywhere)

On my first night there, I woke up in the middle of the night feeling somewhat disoriented, as is common when you stay in an unfamiliar place for the first time. From the window of the kitchen-cum-dining room where I slept, I saw a fire that seemed to be burning on the top of a chimney. I startled my aunt.

"Thia, wake up! Something's burning!" I pointed to the window. She turned to look at me, with a surprised look on her face, then looked back out the window without saying anything.

"What's that fire there?" I realised that she had seen this flame before.

(look closely; you'll see the Olympic flame, too)

"Oh, that's the Olympic flame," she replied, and returned to her bed. "Διυλιστήρια (thilistiria - oil refineries)," she added. "Nothing to worry about."

I received a few more shocks over the next few days of living in Paralia Aspropirgou. One of the most shocking for me was that nobody could direct me as to how to get to Athens. No one knew how to go to the Acropolis. I finally found out from someone who had been living in Paralia Aspropirgou for a long time, and worked in Athens.

(the original Halips bus stop was at the point where the iconostasis is now; don't kid yourself about why the bus stop was moved a few metres away just below the recently built overpass )

"Cross the road and stand outside Halips. All the blue and white buses that pass this road terminate in central Athens (except one which clearly says PIREAS on its ticker tape). Buy your ticket at a kiosk before you board the bus and validate it once you get on. On a Sunday, getting into Athens takes a quarter of an hour from here, since there's less traffic."

It sounded surprisingly easy. "Why couldn't anyone else have given me this information?" I asked her.

"Oh, don't ask anyone anything here. They don't know, really they don't know anything. In any case, they do their shopping in Elefsina, which is only a few kilometres from Aspropirgos. It's much more convenient than entering central Athens. They'll just get lost, believe me, they'll never be able to return home if you let them loose there."

(various views of Iera Odos; heading westwards, once you pass the signpost for the old monastery, the road loses its tree-lined scenery and takes on a deserted ghostly appearance)

Elefsina, 5 kilometres westwards of Aspropirgos, is where the site of the ancient sacred mysteries perfomed in the goddess Demeter's honour are located. The site was highly significant in the ancient world, with members of her sect being sworn to secrecy about the ceremonies held there. The road from Eleusis (as it was then called) to Athens was known as Ιερά Οδός (Iera Odos), the Holy Road. It is still bears that name - Iera Odos offers some of the most pleasurable shopping opportunities in Western Athens - one big long stretch of road with few turns and bends, leading straight to the Parthenon, although this will not be so obvious any longer, what with the reshaping of the city of Athens once the urban sprawl began to spread out of control. There was a time when the Acropolis could be seen right along Iera Odos, although this has changed too, since the construction of tall buildings, obscuring the view of the hill where the Parthenon stands. My father remembers seeing it as he walked to work at the Pitsos appliance factory in Egaleo. It is more visible once you pass the site of the Agricultural University of Athens, which coincidentally is located in the most polluted area of the city, the western suburbs.

*** *** ***

So what did Little Crete have to offer in terms of edibles? I recently overnighted at my aunt's house, before meeting up with a friend who I had never met before in my life.

(typical views in the area of Paralia Aspropirgou)

"So what brings you to Athens, dear?" asked my aunt.
"I'm going to meet up with a friend who I've never met before," I answered.
"Oh.. well.. you know what you're doing, you always did." We left it at that.
"Are you hungry?" she asked me. I had left my own home in Hania at 7pm, and it was now half an hour before midnight.
"No, not really, Thia."
"I've got some leftover rabbit from today's lunch," she tempted me, an offer I couldn't really refuse. "I've cooked it with pasta, and there's just one more serving of it."

Thia comes once or twice a year to Hania and stays with her brothers. When she returns to Athens, she takes whatever she can in terms of fresh produce back with her. Cretan products are not always difficult to source in Elefsina - her main shopping area - but they are not always available when she does her weekly shop. Her brothers give her freshly slaughtered rabbits and chickens, farm fresh eggs, potatoes and whatever is in the garden at the time of her visit. There are also some Cretan supplies stores in Elefsina. A very small laiki street market runs weekly in the area, mainly used by old people and those that do not own a car. Most people drive to the large well-stocked supermarkets in Elefsina to do their shopping.

"I almost forgot, Thia, I bought you some aubergines and peppers." She was most thankful; we discussed different recipes I cook to use up the eggplant surplus in our garden.

It was time to go to bed. Thia doesn't usually stay up so late. She did it for me. As it was a warm night, we left the window open in the bedroom. It was eerily quiet in the neighbourhood, save for a humming sound. This sound did not stop, in the same way that the Olympic flame never blows out in the Aspropirgos refineries. It was the sound of the humming machinery that was working 24/7 in the surrounding area, a slow buzz that did not so much interrupt the silence, as much as pervade the air. Every other sound was like an over-write on the silent humming, like the lyrics to the refrain of muzak playing in a supermarket, an artifical world where nothing seems to change. Paralia Aspropirgos had not changed much at all, despite my first visit to the area being seventeen years ago.

In the morning, Thia insisted that I have breakfast with her. She brought out some φρυγανιές (friganies - dry toast squares), feta cheese made in Hania by a local cheesemaker ("ask your uncles where they buy it from," she informed me), and a bowl of cured olives from the olive tree on her property, served with a cup of hot τούρκικο (tourkiko - Greek coffee, named after its origins).

"Do you like it here, Thia?" What a question; she's been living here over thirty years.

"Of course, I do, dear, it's much better to be living in a little shabby house that I can call my own, rather than the best apartment in central Athens. If I didn't live here, I'd have gone back to Crete. I could never live in a box. And it really isn't that bad here; I know everybody and we all look out for each other. At night, all the lights from the factories sparkle like a Christmas tree. It's really quite beautiful."

If you could just keep your eyes away from the main road, Paralia Aspropirgos doesn't seem such a bad solution to the Greek housing and employment problem.

©All Rights Reserved/Organically cooked. No part of this blog may be reproduced and/or copied by any means without prior consent from Maria Verivaki.

From Kentucky to Kolimbari

The dietary habits of an American family of French Huguenot descent living in a village in Hania, Crete

INTRODUCTION:
People's dietary habits differ all over the world, with the result that when they leave their home territory, their dietary choices may not be available in their new place of residence. This invariably results in replacing food items that cannot be sourced in certain parts of the world with a foreign equivalent, or in extreme cases, doing without.

Kentucky Fried Chicken (KFC) is well known all over the world, but not in Hania, Crete. What happens when an American family from Louisville, Kentucky (don't pronounce the 's'), the headquarters of KFC, comes to live in Kolimbari, Chania (don't pronounce the 'C'), where KFC does not (yet) exist?

How will their dietary habits change? What substitutions and replacements will have to be enlisted in order that their daily dietary KFC doses will not suffer adversely? Is it possible for a Kentuckian to survive on the Mediterranean diet?

LITERATURE REVIEW:
The rates of obesity in the USA are constantly under discussion. The situation is being treated as an epidemic by many specialists: unhealthy diet coupled with lack of exercise and an addiction to sedentary activities, notably the internet, have led to a decline in the health of the average Americans.

In The Omnivore's Dilemma (2006), Michael Pollan points out that the average American's diet consists of corn-based food products, most of which are prepared in industrial kitchens (hence the term "industrial eater"), the kind usually served in fast-food outlets and store-bought ready meals, and eaten mainly by sitting on a couch watching television or in a fast moving car. Houses are even designed with a non-functional kitchen and just a microwave oven to heat up ready food (as Joanna Blythman claims in Shopped). Corn is fed to animals used in the consumer food market, such as chicken and beef, staple parts of the American diet. It is also used in other food products in the form of flour, preservatives and other food-related ingredients, even in the pesticides that are used to ensure a healthy bushel of corn. The problems inherent in such an agricultural system are mainly those related to non-sustainability and the cruel nature of growing food for fuel instead of starving people.

This is in stark contrast to the diet practiced by many residents of Crete, in accordance with the food pyramid of the Mediterranean diet (Verivaki, 2007-2008). Although supermarkets in Crete do sell prepared food in cans and plastic containers, it is not available in great quantities, nor is it treated as a staple food source. Fast food outlets do abound on the island, so it is expected that a Kentuckian will be using their facilities as a meal replacement service, given the absence of KFC.

While Americans source their food in supermarkets and the likes of McDonalds and KFC, the Cretans subsist mainly on local food which they have grown and harvested themselves. Although television features in various degrees of priority in both locations, there would be very few homes in Crete which do not own a table large enough for one's family to dine on, despite the fact that this worrying trend has been seen to intrude i various households on the island.

The purpose of this thesis, oops, sorry, I meant post, is to provide a descriptive account of the food lifestyle of the Hanioto-Kentuckians.

MATERIALS AND METHODS:
The data used in the thesis (of course, I meant the post) were gathered through the use of:

• casual interviews with the subjects (n = 2, no males)
  
• a meal prepared by the subjects in their Cretan home
• the contents of the subjects' fridge
  
• foods from the Mediterranean diet range presented to the subjects

RESULTS:
1. What do you do for a living? (Sedentary jobs, no doubt...)
S1 is an occupational therapist, while S2 needed new kneecaps and hips, no doubt partly due to the archaeological digs she has been participating in for the last 25 years. There isn't a moment to sit around...

2. When you are in Crete, what physical exercise do you take? (I'll bet it's the gym...)
S2 has been swimming all her life, even though she doesn't live near the sea. She first crossed a river close to her home in Pennsylvania when she was only four years of age. S1 swam before she could walk because her mother (S2) was worried she might fall into someone's swimming pool and drown herself, so she taught her how to swim form a young age. They are both able to tackle Kolimbari Beach, which is very stony and deep, playing host to a dangerous riptide every now and then. S2 has also been known to hose down neighbours who spray her freshly washed laundry with water mixed with concrete from their newly constructed house. Although the subjects are both very active, they did not partake in the tomato pelting fight which took place between two neighbours; they were very thankful guns were not used instead.

3. How far away is your local 'fastfoodadiko'? (This place sure looks like the wop wops...)
Neither S1 nor S2 have any idea where the local souvlatzidiko is. They must miss KFC a lot.

4. Where do you eat your meals? (Oh, shit, there's a table in here...)
All meals are taken on a Shaker-design table which S2 made herself. In fact, all the furniture in their home is hand-made Shaker-style by S2, including a rug, made on a traditional Cretan weaving frame, called an argalio, and the covers of the living room suite.



5. Where do you source your food when living on the island? (I mustn't lose my focus...)
"We grow our own weeds," they proudly told me. The garden contains lettuce, peppers and glistrida (purslane). Basil decorates the balcony as a pot plant (and I can smell it cooking in the kitchen).



6. What do you keep in your fridge? (I'm curious...)
Apart from a carton of juice and some containers full of cooling water, half the fridge had been invaded by a 15-kilogram watermelon. There were also an incredible number of corked wine bottles in the fridge, all of which have been presented as gifts (but never imbibed) from friends passing by to see them in their Cretan home in Grimbigliana, a hamlet of the coastal village of Kolimbari, west of Hania. The house itself was part of a former Turkish court, of which the fortifications and the stonework of the court, dating back to the 1700s, can still be seen today, against a background of terraced fields where wheat was once grown.



7. How often do you eat meat? (Not a cow or chicken in sight...)
Despite expecting otherwise, no corn-fed cows were to be found in the vicinity of the house. S1 is a vegetarian; she only eats chicken when she goes out for dinner in Crete and their Cretan friends deliberately over-order, as they regard her as under-fed. S2 is tired of cooking after mothering four daughters and would love to eat something cooked by anyone else other than herself. Her youngest daughter, also a vegetarian, has just had the healthiest grandchild S2 has seen so far, over 9lbs. (The answer to this question has obviated the need to ask how long it's been since the subjects had KFC).

8. Can you name these foods? (Worth a try...)
"Oh my God, you bought us some horta! Oh, you didn't bring a boureki, did you? You made courgette patties especially for us?"



9. What are we eating today? (I'm hungry...)
S2 made a tomato and courgette quiche, using a Southern recipe for the crust. It had a sprinkling of basil on it, an unusual herb for Crete. Anne whipped up a green salad with red peppers. There was also anthotiro, a soft white local variety of Cretan cheese, and multi-grain bread from Drandakis bakery in Akrotiri.



10. Why do we need two forks, Mum? (Thanks for the question, Aristotle)
I don't know, son.

11. Hey, what's that gun doing over the fireplace? Do they go hunting? (???)
Oh, go ask Alice, please, Dimitri.

12. How on earth does S1 keep so slim? (If I ask this one, I'll only be drawing attention to myself...)

DISCUSSION:
Tomato quiche with Mama's crust is finger-lickin' good.
I must remember to take back my baking tin.
The framed flag on the wall travelled from England (as a scarf on an RAF soldier's neck) to Greece, to the USA, and back to Greece again; the rudder to the right of the fireplace is from a boat owned by a friend who also owned the gun (it doesn't work).
Is there a Shaker furniture store in Hania?
Who's your daddy?

CONCLUSION:
The Mediterranean cuisine has had no effect in the dietary habits of the Kentuckians surveyed, although this must be verified with a greater sample size. Future research could focus on the availability of Cretan food in Kentucky, as this is what is actually eaten by the subjects where they live most of the time...

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS: I am indebted to Anne Clarke and Allis for inviting me to lunch at their home in Grimbigliana, Kolimbari, Hania, Crete.

©All Rights Reserved/Organically cooked. No part of this blog may be reproduced and/or copied by any means without prior consent from Maria Verivaki.