A true path follows no plan…

Yep! I can tell I’m back in the North East of England! It is Autumn, almost winter, but it is still looking pretty depressing outside. I’m sat here trying to find the motivation to complete the study I missed while travelling, wearing my Uggs and thinking I should just give in and put my Mam’s central heating on!

I’ve had a nice few days since I arrived back on Sunday night, after a three hour delay sat on the Tarmac in Athens because of the UK weather in Heathrow, but made it back in one piece. I caught up with Mam as she collected me from the train station, had dinner with Granda and her, we babysat on Monday, I saw Dad for lunch and a natter on Tuesday and spent most of Wednesday feeling hungover as me and my mate of 20 years GK went out and got accidentally drunk on Tuesday evening!

He lives opposite my Grandparents old house, so when we decided to go for breakfast on Wednesday morning I looked over to the house and realised they were ripping out windows and completing what looked like a pretty big refurb. Me being me wandered over and asked. The guys were lovely and invited me in to have a look around. Ohhhh, so, so many memories. And such sadness that I don’t have my Grandma and Granda anymore. There was a lot of work went in to that house when they had it. My Dad and his dad fitted kitchens and bathrooms and converted the basement. And it’s all going. Baths are out, kitchen is out, walls are stripped back to plaster. I was glad to see they were keeping the beautiful fireplaces, but not it seems, after enquiring, the original Victorian front door. It’s rather grand looking with beautiful stained glass and an original funny looking, by today’s standards, door bell! I am a very sentimental, emotional softy and even asked the builders what would happen to the door. They have said they’ll keep it for me if Dad could use it. He can’t, which I knew before I even asked, but it was a nice thought to try and re-use it. I guess we all just have to accept that things change and we must let go of a lot of things, even pretty front doors!

Ok, on with the study…..

I’m flying out of Athens tomorrow, to Heathrow, then the train up to Durham. The job interview in Spain never materialised, the lady has been pretty vague with her responses and info and this time just hasn’t bothered to confirm when the interview would be….hey ho! I have booked the next flight back home which suited me.

I have thoroughly enjoyed my time away. It as been a bit quiet and slightly lonely at some points, and the weather was hit and miss towards the end, but it is Autumn / beginning of Winter so it’s to be expected. I feel relaxed and happy, and a little closer to knowing where I’d like to be headed and what I’d like to be doing, although not 100% sure, but are we ever?!

If I could have a little, white washed Mediterranean style house, with the warm sunshine and beautiful beaches, somewhere very close to my Aussie friends and UK friends and family, that would be perfect. With the food, and siesta time, and 3 hour long lunches, 10pm dinners, lazy ways and music playing everywhere…….hmmmmmm.

Athens has been very cold, and very windy. I went from Pireus in to Athens town today, jumped on the tour bus, after getting completely lost with the reception girls directions, and headed off. It was an easy and cheap way to get around. I stopped at the Acropolis, but didn’t even venture up to the top as it was blowing a gale and was freezing! I went down to the National Gardens and Zappio to walk around the ruins there. It was lovely, and slightly bizarre to be standing in the middle of a pretty large, internationally known city with ruins thousands of years old just dotted around in the middle of everything!

I walked down to Syndagma from here and found the retail area…well I had to take shelter from the cold! I was very good and only bought a jumper in the sale! I grabbed a sandwich from the chain Everest and as I was sat munching away I noticed a very frail, timid, slow walking lady hovering. I could tell by her clothes and her too skinny frame she was either homeless or homeless and an addict maybe….she had that hungry look in her eye and a drawn, tired, giving up look about her. I noticed her before she’d noticed me, but it wasn’t long til she looked my way and I atomatically smiled, that’s just me most of the time, and it’s sometimes taken in several wrongs way! Sure enough she came over. It was hard to say how old she was,but she was painfully thin, she looked freezing and a bit grubby. She asked, first in Greek, then in English, quite good English, and very politely if I could spare some change or possibly buy her a hot drink. Aha! Not just cash……I have met a lot of homeless people who turn out to be well known to the community and are not actually homeless, but are addicts, hard stuff, drugs, crack and smack, and when you dare to offer them a hot cup of coffee or tea or a pie they insult you with some nonsensical verbal crap and insist on money. This lady was different. I asked how she came to be on the street. She said she had no family and lost her job and couldn’t afford to live on in her home….who knows if it was true, but it was cold and she looked like she needed a hot cuppa. I got up and bought her a large coffee, the lady next to me in the queue got chatting to me and she offered to buy her a cake as I was getting the coffee,and I also went and picked up a €1.20 sausage roll. Something else warm to fill her up, and not breaking the bank. The homeless lady, who’s name I didn’t quite understand when I asked her what is was, was so grateful, and she gave me this broad,thankful smile from her gaunt, sad face. My good deed for the day. I just hope she stays safe and warm and dry over winter.

So I wandered back to the tour bus stop, found my way back to Pireus, got off at my stop and got lost, again! Eventually making my way back to the hotel, dinner and a wine and now bed, ready for the 5am wake up call.

I am looking forward to catching up with my family, and seeing friends. I have 2 big birthday celebrations coming up in the family and a friend who I’ve known since my early hospitality days is getting married. I am invited to the evening reception and cant wait to see her and meet her hubby. And then it will be Christmas. Looks like January will be the time to make a move further on….

I have learnt some things along the way of this little journey, the main one is quite simply put in the image below – weirdly enough I saw it last night……it is painted on the wall of the hotel restaurant………the last place I will have visited on my wonderful Greek Island adventure.

I miss Santorini. I could have stayed forever. I have been looking through the last couple of days photos, and know that one day I will return. Maybe around May time as it won’t be rammed with tourists from the cruise ships and other travellers, but it will be warmer. Even though it was a bit cooler I saw loads of places and walked a lot, which would have been a lot harder work in the heat of summer. I also got to watch the National Day celebrations on Wednesday, which was lovely. All the children from the schools dressed in traditional costume and some in their school uniform, carrying flags, marching down the street, a band played, the army stomped past, it was nice to experience.

I am sitting at Mykonos New Port waiting for the ferry to Athens. After jumping ship yesterday, I only had an hour of sun light left after finding accommodation, so I made my away around the old port and town. It was freezing! Windy and cold! I had about 4 hours in Taverna Madoupas drinking wine (to get over my sea sickness of course) had dinner and was organising bits and pieces for my blog. I ran out of battery on my laptop after putting up the last post and I didn’t have the charger with me either, duh!

Mykonos is very quiet at the moment, which is probably a very good thing as the streets are so tiny here I really can’t imagine how you move in the height of summer in peak season. It is well known for the Gay community here and young backpackers partying in the summer, but is currently resembling a ghost town, hence the quick turnaround. One of the things that really stands out here is the feeling of an almost fakery , once you move back from the main harbour area. When you look closely at the pathways leading all around the alleys, and there’s a lot, it’s like a maze, and yes I did get lost-twice! You notice, after a very short time, that the white cobble stone paths are actually painted on. And then you feel like you’ve been cheated! I finished reading a fab book whilst on Leros (I posted it back home as I just couldn’t part with it and didn’t need to carry any extra weight…yes, yes I know I should get a Kindle, but I like picking up an actual book and opening the pages) One section of the book is set in Mykonos. The lady, Nancy (Shooting Stars & Flying Fish – read it!) tells of when her and husband Ted visit Mykonos, during their fabulous round the world sailing trip, and how all the stones are painted on. It all came back to me the instance I walked down the alley following my accommodation lady Maria, who I met at the port. It really does look odd, especially after some of the amazing Islands I have seen that are all naturally beautiful, aged and original.

Anyhow, I had a meander last night and got up early today, walked up to the windmills and took some photos, and made a couple of friends. One I named Blacky, as he was a gorgeous little black cat who took it upon himself to make my lap his bed for half an hour while I was sat idly watching the world go by and drinking my tea. The other was a young guy called Ahmed. This friend didn’t get to sit on my lap! I bumped in to him after watching a local guy play the Greek version of the bagpipes for me, let’s call him Bob because I really couldn’t spell his Greek name if I tried! He went to great efforts to get out the folded instrument, made of sheep leather and horns, and blow it up and play and sing for me. At the cost of a couple of Euro I discovered, afterwards! He offered to play while I took photos, as he’d spotted my camera, and I’m sure he was loving the attention.

As I was walking up to the windmills after saying bye to Bob the Bagpipe player, this young guy approaches me and smiles and says hi. We say a quick hello, he asks what I am doing here, says he has been working here, he’s from Pakistan and would I like to go for a coffee. I fibbed and said I couldn’t, I needed to get back to the hotel and I had a boyfriend anyway…he looked sad and we said goodbye. After walking up and around the windmills I was making my way back down to the waterfront when I met him again. He chatted some more and asked again for a coffee, and this time I got the sense he was lonely and a bit lost, not trying it on or anything like that, and I understood as it is a little bit how I have felt on some days on this journey. What was half an hour out my day? So I said yes and he showed me to the little café by the water. He told me he had left Pakistan 5 years ago, but his family were still there, that they had been trouble, and still is over there, and he missed his family. He has been back to visit though, to meet his Niece and was very proud, you could just tell! I also left Australia where I’d been living, before this journey, to visit “home” to meet my baby Niece. We looked at photos of our siblings children, chatted about how good Skype is (although I very rarely get to see my family on this, everyone is always so busy in England) how Facebook is a good way to keep in contact, and how modern technology is, in general, pretty clever! He has finished work as a cook and kitchen help now, after a very busy, long season, and so he will have a month in Athens of relax time and hopes to visit Pakistan again next year after another summer season. He gave me his Facebook name and we said goodbye, after he insisted on buying the coffees, bless him, and off he went with a nice, big smile on his face.

I made my way to the New Port and am now sat typing away, wondering what Athens will have in store for me, or, more so what the bloody boat ride has in store for me!