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These days are just so beautiful! Every morning I am greated by a blue sky and warm sunshine (ok, ok, it DID rain the other night and there were some clouds the day after, but nevertheless...) and I would like so much to get out to enjoy it. But I don't have time, since I had to accept a big translation project to even out the cutbacks in my budget lately. Which means that I am chained to my chair in front of the PC from 8 am to 8 pm with just a short escape for an hour or so around lunchtime.
And while things are like this, I enjoy going up to Kouses for my lunch break. It's a tiny village on the heights over Petrokefali, some 8 kms from Mires, with the most fantastic view over the whole valley of Messara. There is only one very small taverna open in this period, maybe it's the only one in Kouses even during summer, but Yorgos makes well-tasting and healthy food. And you get to enjoy it while sitting on the glass-shielded veranda, so your eyes can explore everything from the beach of Kalamaki to the windmills halfway to Heraklion. The top of Mount Ida is totally covered with snow, all the other mountain tops try to live up to her standards, but they don't have the necessary hight to dress as beautifully as her, just some unevenly scattered snow among the green. The olive fields beneath the mountains are a mix of green and yellow, and you can see people working like busy little ants, tractors dragging the branches cut off the olive trees, people lighting a small fire for the lunch break. I enjoy my well-deserved break together with them untill it's time to go back for some more work.
But there is a big and important difference in this situation compared to my former working life. While I lived in Denmark winter would last some 6 months, no need to look out of the window to check upon the weather, it would almost always be dark, wet, and cold. During spring and summer the nice weather, if any, would start on Monday at 9.00 and finish exactly on Friday at 17.00 hrs. Knowing that for at fact would depress you in the most terrible way, having a full-time job would leave you so little time to enjoy a nice day whenever that happened, and while being cooped up all day in the office the only joy for your eyes would be to look at it through the windows. When I moved to Italy that didn't change much. The winter in Northern Italy is not so much different from the Danish, but the summer in comparison would be like living in an oven. Made you fear the end of working hours when you had to leave the airconditioned environment to go out into some 35 degrees celcius and a 60 degrees celcius car.
Crete is SO different! The heat is never unbearable because of the delightful wind blowing, and I hardly ever got to know the winter before it was over and done with. You don't have to fear that the nice weather will be gone whenever you finish your job, so despite having to stay inside to meet my deadline I don't really mind. I am CERTAIN that the sun will be waiting for me the moment I have the time to enjoy it.
And while things are like this, I enjoy going up to Kouses for my lunch break. It's a tiny village on the heights over Petrokefali, some 8 kms from Mires, with the most fantastic view over the whole valley of Messara. There is only one very small taverna open in this period, maybe it's the only one in Kouses even during summer, but Yorgos makes well-tasting and healthy food. And you get to enjoy it while sitting on the glass-shielded veranda, so your eyes can explore everything from the beach of Kalamaki to the windmills halfway to Heraklion. The top of Mount Ida is totally covered with snow, all the other mountain tops try to live up to her standards, but they don't have the necessary hight to dress as beautifully as her, just some unevenly scattered snow among the green. The olive fields beneath the mountains are a mix of green and yellow, and you can see people working like busy little ants, tractors dragging the branches cut off the olive trees, people lighting a small fire for the lunch break. I enjoy my well-deserved break together with them untill it's time to go back for some more work.
But there is a big and important difference in this situation compared to my former working life. While I lived in Denmark winter would last some 6 months, no need to look out of the window to check upon the weather, it would almost always be dark, wet, and cold. During spring and summer the nice weather, if any, would start on Monday at 9.00 and finish exactly on Friday at 17.00 hrs. Knowing that for at fact would depress you in the most terrible way, having a full-time job would leave you so little time to enjoy a nice day whenever that happened, and while being cooped up all day in the office the only joy for your eyes would be to look at it through the windows. When I moved to Italy that didn't change much. The winter in Northern Italy is not so much different from the Danish, but the summer in comparison would be like living in an oven. Made you fear the end of working hours when you had to leave the airconditioned environment to go out into some 35 degrees celcius and a 60 degrees celcius car.
Crete is SO different! The heat is never unbearable because of the delightful wind blowing, and I hardly ever got to know the winter before it was over and done with. You don't have to fear that the nice weather will be gone whenever you finish your job, so despite having to stay inside to meet my deadline I don't really mind. I am CERTAIN that the sun will be waiting for me the moment I have the time to enjoy it.
I still have my memories of Kalyves in December to cling to during these grotty winter days..whilst I long for the coming summer in Crete (only a fortnight tho') and maybe another visit in December 2006. I think I had better start buying Lottery tickets!!
Dave
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