True-Life Greek Moment: Don’t Go Near the Lettuce

Some Greeks have a thing about lettuce. Yes, lettuce – marouli (μαρούλι), or salata (σαλάτα), as it’s commonly called. You’ll rarely see it in a Greek salad.

They believe that eating it can cause one to . . . give birth to cats.

No joke: Serious business this.

A Greek engineer, around 30 years old, related this to my Swedish neighbor, Sverker (Sverker, who has lived in Greece for many years as a missionary, is always good for a true-life Greek moment or two).

The reason, you see, is that cats (of which there are plenty in Greece) play in the lettuce in the garden, and they get dirt on the leaves. And if you don’t wash the leaves very carefully and get all the dirt off – well, the consequence is: A woman can give birth to cats.

“How do you know this?” Sverker asked the fellow, a university-educated professional whose origins lay in a rural part of the country.

“Because,” the young engineer grew very serious as he leaned in toward Sverker, his eyes narrowing, his voice dropping to a confessional hush, “Because, my grandmother gave birth to cats.”

True-Life Greek Moment: Paying the Bills

They say the ancient orators would remember the parts of their orations by walking around the city and (ostensibly mumbling to themselves) associating each key point with a different intersection or landmark.

They would start their walk, and their talk, with one point, and then just follow along from there.

Paying one’s utility bills (which come out every other month or, in the case of water bills, every quarter) in Greece demands a similar technique.

If one wants to avoid a time-consuming trek to the in-city offices of the various utility companies, one needs to pay the bills by a certain date and can do so at local establishments, usually pharmacies (“Why not just mail in your bills?” you naively ask).

This pharmacy will take this bill, but not that one. That pharmacy will take that bill, but not this one. And none of the pharmacies will take the water bill – that has to be paid at the Pro-Po gambling parlor down the street.

With months between bills, it’s easy to forget which bill goes where, so I employ the ancient orator’s approach to remembering the drill:

First, I have to remember the starting point, the place where this all began, where this whole system was explained to me lo those several years ago, The Holy Grail of Bill Paying, which is the pharmacy up in town where I take my electric bill.

Okay. Got it.

Next (and not on the same day or even the same month necessarily) come the phone bills. Let’s see. The phone bills. Eureka! That’s the pharmacy on the opposite corner (pharmacies in Greece are like mushrooms in France – they are just everywhere).

The phone bill pharmacy is the one with the cute girl pharmacist from Philadelphia, which gives me the added memory aide of alliteration (PHarmacist – PHrom – PHiladelphia – PHones). Whew.

Now the water bill. Okay. That’s the Pro-Po (Προ–Πο) lotto and wagering place down the street (“Pro-Po, Pro-Po,” sounds kind of like water dripping in a pan of old moussaká [μογζακά]. Doesn’t it?)

True-Life Greek Moment: First a Right, Then a Left (Or Is It . . . )

Ask directions in most countries, and people will cite landmarks they are most familiar with.

It’s really no different in Greece. It’s just that a Greek might relate to something different as a landmark than you or I might.

Tass, a pleasant older Greek gentleman who came to work for me soon after my arrival in Greece, invited my Albanian friend Laura and me to his home for a little Christmastime cheer.

“Just take the Ring Road,” Tass advised, referring to the peripheral highway (Περιφερειακή) that skirts the inland edge of Thessaloniki. “Get off in the direction of Kavala.” He then followed that primary information with several turns marked by churches, cemeteries, and other such local landmarks, ostensibly leading to his house in (he had led me to believe) some small hill village.

Well, we did as told, exited the Ring Road at the large Kavala exit, and proceeded out the main highway toward that city in the Northeast of the country. But after several dark kilometers with no churches, cemeteries, nor any of the other landmarks Tass had cited, we began to grow concerned. A feeling accentuated when The Love Bus suddenly blew out a spark plug (again) and slowed to sputtering half-speed as we fought our way up-hill against a Herculean headwind.

We stopped in a BP station and got Tass on the mobile phone. Good thing, because had we persisted in following his directions (and if The Love Bus had made it that far) I am convinced we would now be selling chapattis in Calcutta.

“You have to come back in toward the city,” Tass counseled. “Look for the military cemetery on the left, and then there is a church, and you turn left just past the church.”

Cemeteries, churches. “Yes, yeeeessss,” Tass intoned, as is his wont. But it was night, and dark, and somehow cemeteries tend to recede into the background and, as for churches, if there’s one thing Greece has in abundance, along with news kiosks and gyros (γύρος) stands, it’s churches.

Never mind. We dutifully came back into the city (the opposite direction from Kavala) – no small village this – and saw a dark area that might have been a military cemetery. Or a park. Or a vacant lot. And then two or three churches. But nothing that looked like the turn Tass described.

Again I got him on the mobile.

“Look, it’s dark out here, and we’re having engine problems, and everything looks alike. Aren’t there any other landmarks we might have an easier time finding?”

Tass offered to meet us somewhere and lead us to his home, so I suggested we meet at the large Titan Cement plant – one of the largest cement producers in the world and an impossible-to-miss landmark – just outside the Ring Road.

An hour later, sitting directly opposite the main entrance to the Titan plant and learning very well the Greek words “Cronia Polla” (Χρόνια Πολλά) for “Happy New Year” (literally, “Many Years”) from the lights strung above the plant gatehouse, we were beginning to turn blue from the cold.

This time I got Tass’s wife on the phone.

“But he left an hour ago! He must be there!”

“But he’s not here, and we are sitting directly in front of the Titan plant entrance. I’ve even walked all around looking for him.”

Fifteen minutes later, the phone rang. It was Tass, back home from his explorations.

“Where are you? You’re not in front of the Titan Cement plant.”

“Well, then they must be making this up, because it sure says, ‘Titan Cement,’ and ‘Cronia Polla,’ and there’s an entrance gate . . . ”

At this point, Laura, who was finding the Greek Christmas less enchanting by the minute, was seized with practicality, and suggested we meet by a certain prominent traffic light at a well-marked intersection on the main road, where we could see Tass, and he see us, as he came along.

And so, at last, we met up and followed Tass back to his home, directly away from Kavala (though to this day he still insists the proper direction is toward Kavala), and not in some small hill village, but wedged squarely into one of the most densely packed city neighborhoods.

Just before the turn to Tass’s street, past the black hole that turned out to be the military cemetery, somewhere around Church No. 901, there is perhaps the hugest, most brightly lit “PEUGEOT” sign I had ever in my entire life seen, followed a short distance later, on his very corner, by yet another clearly visible and well lit “PEUGEOT” sign.

Signs, apparently, Tass had never noticed in all his years living on that street nor, even if he had, would ever think to offer as landmarks.

And that, exactly, is where we turned into his little street.

True-Life Greek Moment: Dateline: Panorama

I’m a very bad boy, and habitually late filing my U.S. income tax returns. In fact, in any given year you are likely to find me working on the return for some past year.

This year was no different.

After putting the exercise off as long as possible, I finally rustled through all my various boxes and drawers and files and piles of papers, and unearthed every receipt and ticket and bill and record I could muster, covered the dining room and kitchen tables and chairs with masses of paper, and went to work. And work. And work.

Finally, at last, voilà! Several days and nights of pure torture later, I have finished it all, affixed my signature to the forms, stuffed them in envelopes (including my separate request for an extension on this year’s tax filing), and raced off to the post office in the center of Panorama.

I arrived inside the post office at 10 minutes before the 2 p.m. closing time. It was Friday, the 14^th of the month, and the next day, Saturday (when the post office would be closed, of course) the 15^th, would be the absolute deadline for postmarking my forms or risk losing my refund.

There sat my friend, my local friendly postal clerk, all ready for wheels-up and with visions of her weekend in the sun and surf, or at least in the café, dancing before her eyes.

And now here I come, showing her envelopes, speaking in a foreign tongue, gesticulating like a madman, making stamping motions with my fist, pointing to the envelopes and then pointing downward and mouthing the word “T-O-D-A-Y.”

“Nai! Nai! ”(“Yes! Yes!”), she smiled, showing every sign that, at last, she actually comprehended my meaning. A true breakthrough in communication! Declare a national holiday!

She carefully weighed the envelopes, handed over the requisite stamps for each one, tallied-up the charges on her little hand calculator, and held it up for me to see.

I licked and affixed the stamps, passed the envelopes back over to her with my euros, and waited for her to postmark the stamps, again making stamping motions with my hands.

“BLAM-BLAM!” went her date stamp. “BLAM-BLAM!!!”

Just to be sure, she proudly flashed first one, and then the second, envelope before my eyes.

Squinting, since the ink was so faint, I was at last able to make out the date: The 17^th!

“No, no, no!” I cried, as if in pain, seeing all my hard work and effort – not to mention my refund – evaporate before me. “Oxi, oxi, oxi! ”

That all-too-familiar look of bewilderment crossed her face. What could possibly be wrong this time?!?

She pointed to one of her colleagues, one who spoke some English. I explained the importance of having today’s date stamped on my envelopes, not Monday’s date, and he quickly explained this to my friendly clerk in a few well-chosen words.

Oh.

I could tell this was not something she was used to dealing with, nor one that she wanted to become used to dealing with.

She took her little paperclip and unhappily undid her earlier handiwork, sliding back the date in her postmark stamp.

“BLAM-BLAM!” went the stamp. “BLAM-BLAM-BLAM!!!”

“SCRATCH-SCRATCH!” went her pen, obliterating the earlier postmarks. “SMUDGE-SMUDGE!” (oops, she missed). “BLAM-BLAM!! BLAM-BLAM-BLAM!!!”

Again she flashed the hardly visible postmarks, now proliferating in multiples, before my straining eyes. And now they read: The 15^th.

All right, endaxi, close enough for government work . . .