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September 28, 2009

A rare act of kindness in Rhodes

I'm sorry, but our Group Rep is entirely useless at all things - apart from ordering a Frappe coffee for herself at the pool side bar.

She can't conceive that anyone has come here to Rhodes for any other purpose than a sun tan 'to make everyone one at home jealous. Yeh, I know, I know!!'

Only she doesn't know - she really doesn't. She doesn't know herself, us or indeed anything about the ancient island on which we sit.

Her only real interest in our opening and only meeting is in telling us to fill in the feedback form favourably when we go 'as we reps all have a little competition amongst ourselves!'

In a rare act of kindness, I don't fill in the assessment form. I must be going soft.

Posted by Mr Bojangles at 12:16 PM | Comments (0)

September 24, 2009

Stormy times in Rhodes

We were told the Greek storms were briliiant.

'Just you wait for the Greek storm!' said the Englishman on the nearby table in the restaurant. 'Well worth it!'

To be honest, I felt I could wait quite a long time for the Greek storm. Nothing personal, but I was pretty happy with the blue sky and withering sun.

But it was worth it. When it came, it was worth it, as the man from Brighton said. It came from the south, slow but sure, a wierd and distant light show. The sky was splintered with forked flash and whole-canvass explosions of cream and yellow flame. It was a rumbling, random light show, coming towards us from the south.

And when it arrived, torrential lashing rain, thrashing down on the parched landscape. Illuminated sky and sheets of water. A Greek storm, and wonderful to behold.

And then next morning, I'm running in the mountains. There are rocks on the road, ripped from their homes by the water and the wind; but still now, and clear blue sky above. And after the rain, the smell of incense is srong in the air; its like running through a church, only I'm not closed in. The world is my temple.

The church has borrowed the scent; but really, it's only on loan, for it belongs in the world, where sometimes its blue, and sometimes it's a Greek storm.

And well worth the wait.

Posted by Mr Bojangles at 04:34 AM | Comments (0)

September 22, 2009

Death in Rhodes

On my return from Rhodes, I did a piece for the Daily Mail on the treatment of animals on the island.

It arose from a conversation with my distraught waitress as I ate stuffed tomatoes, and drank mythos beer.

She told some quiet horror stories about what happens when the tourists leave, and what became clear is that you don't want to be a cat or a dog there, after the end of October.

Though its not great before the end of October either. That week, seven dogs in her village had been poisoned, with people putting the poison in the owners gardens - so there was no safe place. A friend of hers had looked over his fence to see a dog hanging from a tree.

The e mail response to my Mail piece - and online comments on the Mail site - reveals this is just the tip of a very nasty iceberg. There may be alot of candles and icons and shrines in Rhodes. But the light and hope doesn't extend to the animals, apparently.

All they can pray for is a quick death.

Posted by Mr Bojangles at 03:59 PM | Comments (0)

September 19, 2009

I want to speak with the manager

Still on the subject of music, I did have to make a stand one night.

The restaurant down the road had a live saxophonist playing, with a backing track. More of the same rock classics; only I was trying to sleep, and it sounded like him and his instrument were perched on my pillow.

So I get dressed, and walk hundred yards to the restaurant. I aim for the man who looks like the manager and politely ask what the fuck's going on? I say the music is very loud. He says he'll speak to the manager about it. I say that I will speak to the the manager about it.

It then transpires that he is the manager, and he says he will sort it. I say that I am glad that he'll sort it, but that I won't be leaving until he has done. He then seeks the moral high ground by telling me that it's a wedding celebration. I say that it may be a wedding celebration here, but it isn't one in my bedroom; it's just a nightmare.

He goes across to speak with the saxophonist, who's musicanship on other occasions, I'd admire. It's just that I like a choice about whether I listen or not. It seems he can only do 'Loud'. It's loud or nothing, so we agree that he'll play one more, and then nothing.

Music is very invasive; and one of the terrors of the consumerland. 'If I have the technology, I must have the right to use it.' I reflect that if I stood in someone's bedroom shouting my favourite passages from 'The Gospel of Thomas', I would rightly be removed by the police, deemed aggresssive, a trespasser, and probably insane. Different rules for music, apparently. Challenge this terrorist, and you're a kill joy.

Sartre said that hell is other people. I presume he incuded their music in that. But you want to know what heaven is? I can tell you. Heaven is when other people's music stops. I walked back to my bed listening to the still small voice of the murmering breeze, on this beautiful clear-skied Rhodean night.

Posted by Mr Bojangles at 12:09 PM | Comments (0)

September 18, 2009

Rhodes - the musical

OK, so the blog autumn starts here.

As for myself, I'm just back from the Greek island of Rhodes, and will be sharing my compelling Rhodes diary here, and I start with the music.

Every road side cafe and swimming pool bar has its own music playing; a compilation of pop and rock classics. So walk via the pool up the street to buy some tomatoes, and you are held in an aural net of merging song. George Michael's 'Careless whisper' becomes Blondie's 'Heart of glass' becomes Bill Withers' 'Lovely day' becomes Queen's 'We are the Champions' - and you haven't even got half way. Pllenty more classics await you on your way back.

In fact, unless you're very high in the mountains, you'll always hear a classic on the wind; possibly two or three, if you are equi-distant between bars. They do all merge after a while.

Our tour guide tells us that when the tourist season is over, all the western music stops, and they go back to Greek music for the winter; til the chartered flights start again in May. Though after six months of Greek music, it's quite possible they're glad to get back to Bonnie Tyler's 'Total eclipse of the heart' becoming Rihanna's 'Under my umbrella' becoming...

Posted by Mr Bojangles at 10:42 AM | Comments (0)