I Had Ankles When We Came Here

I just need to rant about a couple of things and then I’ll get back to our regularly scheduled programming. What makes someone think that taking two 3 year olds to an evening classical music performance is a good idea? Any why would you think that flashing your camera in the face of a classical musician trying to read sheet music wouldn’t be distracting? And what’s with disruptive behavior in a historic setting when people are trying to listen to a concert? Huh? And what the hell happened to my ankles? I had some a week ago.

We had the great fortune to be able to return to Ephesus last night for a classical music performance. The Odeon was beautifully lit; they’d decorated the space with candles and lavender lighting. The staff and guides dressed in period costume. There were even two gladiators guarding the entrance. This is an event that is very expensive to provide, as the site is managed by the Turkish government, and doesn’t happen very often. I felt like it was an experience we’d not have again. There was a cocktail hour before the performance, and the show was about an hour long. Classical favorites were played, all so recognizable that I leaned over and said to Steve, “Bugs Bunny.” My parents didn’t listen to classical music when I was a child. My early education was through Looney Tunes, specifically Bugs Bunny. I can’t hear The Barber of Seville to this day without seeing Bugs massaging Elmer Fudd’s head and getting daisies to grow instead of hair. But I digress. The musicians were not the best I’d heard, but we couldn’t be sure if it wasn’t because people were being rude with their cameras. Most of it was still lovely, but could have been lovelier without the toddlers (yes, the same ones in the cocktail lounge the first night), people talking and “dancing” in their seats. To classical? Sit still, shut up and listen.  Someone behind us was even humming along. So a few made it less that it could have been for many, and I felt as though the cruise line was afraid to insult a customer and did nothing to correct the situation. Someone did take the kids out of the amphitheater, but walked them up and down the walkway near the building, so they were still distracting to the folks sitting on the edges. I detailed all of this in our comment card.

While I am indeed walking more that I would normally at home, and certainly staying hydrated, I am perplexed by my missing ankles. My ankles don’t swell. Yes, I eat salt. More here than usual? Nope. So I’m spending a lot of time après excursion in the dead bug yoga pose, calling the fluid back down my legs. And before you go off on my salt consumption, my BP is 118 over 60, so settle down.

I have ranted, I feel better.

I must relay that on the way to Ephesus last evening I spotted something I had not yet seen; a blue jay. My throat still catches when I see one unexpectedly and it always makes me smile just to think of my dad, if even for a moment.
Today we are in Kos, the birthplace of Hippocrates. And of course no Greek island’s ruins are complete without a myth to accompany them. The main archeological site on Kos is Asklepieion, one of the great healing centers of antiquity which was discovered after an earthquake unearthed some of its Doric columns. Supposedly Asklepios was the half human son of Apollo, and he was a great healer who helped humans along with his daughters Panacea and Hygiena. Hippocrates began teaching the art of healing here in the 5th century BC. The town square boasts a plane tree that is 500 years old and probably sprouted from a seed of the plane tree Hippocrates taught under at that same spot. Asklepieion is up the mountain from Koz Town, in a pine forest that had beautiful energy and was very serene. The scenery atop the mountain was fantastic; the port, the abandoned salt works near Kos Town, and the coast of Turkey were all in perfect view. There was an impressive spring basin in the ruins, with water still flowing and greenery happily growing up the wall. The artist’s rendering of what the site probably looked like is beyond what I could have imagined from the current excavation.

After Asklepieion we went to a traditional Greek house, made of what looked to be fieldstone. It had only two rooms; a formal sitting room and a bedroom with a kitchen alcove.  It had an outdoor toilet and shower, an outdoor room with an oven and a stall for the animals. It was simple, beautiful and efficient. And crowded. I particularly liked seeing their cooking instruments, baking proof box, and cheese making tools. There was a traditional windmill across the street. I didn’t see any modern windmills for energy production but interestingly most modern houses in Kos have solar water heaters on the roof.

The roads here are incredibly narrow, like one car width narrow, with big luxury motor coaches trying to pass each other in the middle of nowhere. Lots of backing up happens. And waiting in villages for somebody to move their car. There was chaos in Zia, a charming mountain village where we ate and shopped: three busses, cars, mopeds, bicycles and even a donkey. By the time we finished lunch all was quiet.

Lunch was great. Café Olympus served us wine, more breaky bread, Greek salad, zucchini fritters, dolmades (really fresh stuffed grape leaves; the best I’ve ever had), tzatziki, and pork souvlaki with rice and fries. When I mentioned rice and fries were staples of the Portuguese restaurants of New Bedford the woman across from me said she was from Stoneham, just outside of Boston. The man mentioned a trip his wife had taken and I was wondering who she was if not his wife. We later found out he is a widower and she a widow and they’d known each other since high school. Whew, that’s better. Didn’t want to have to testify in a messy divorce lawsuit… “Yes, your honor, I saw them together in Zia…”

It was a long but enjoyable day on the beautiful island of Kos.