[B-Greek] Patmos in October

Randall Buth randallbuth at gmail.com
Mon Oct 24 07:42:49 EDT 2005


Patmos in October

Everyone speaks Greek, delightful place to get away from English speakers.

Beaches are empty, you can have the whole beach to yourself if willing to
brave 19-20C/66-68F clear blue water. (doable but cold, Tel Aviv is
currently 27C/80F.) Adviso: most beaches are more pebbled than sandy so
water-footwear is nice.

 To enjoy Patmos or most Greek islands one should enjoy:

communicating basic needs in modern Greek,

Greek coffee, ELLHNIKO'

Lamb and fish ARNI' KAI PsA'RIA

Feta cheese FE'TA (TYRI')

Onions and garlic KREMMU'DI KAI SKO'RDO

(retsina and ouzo and optional)

 For those who follow the news, yes, there were TREIS SEISMOI' (SEISMO'S), all
6.0 Richter, north of SAMOS. DYO Monday morning and EIS Friday morning,
noticiable in PATMOS.

 School is in session, which means a chance to hear kids learning to read
OMHROS KAI ARISTOFANHS at the GYMNA'SION (the metaphor GYMNASIA 'going
naked' for simply "training [in general]" was already fixed/dead in
classical antiquity].

 Patmos is a special island for Greeks. Quiet, somewhat off the beaten path.
There are no direct plane flights. One takes a boat from AQHNAI, KWS, H
SAMOS (I am using nominative forms for more instant recognition in English).
Tourism is a major industry, but the island is rather small, afterall. There
is one internet café (or you might not be seeing this), and one petrol
station. Big enough to be interesting, small enough to see most of it in a
week. It should not be a breach of list-netiquette to state that a cultural
change took place in Greece with the turning of the eras. In fact there was
more than one voice at that time that wanted something more than QUSIAI KAI
LOGIA KAI QEOI KAI AGWNES KAI SYMPOSIA. Patmos symbolizes that new era.

 What does one do on deserted beaches? Well, they are nice for family
picnics and reading H APOKALYPSIS and anything else for light reading. I
enjoyed reading "H DIHGHSIS: ADAM KAI EUAS" yesterday. Short, easy
Semitizing narrative. One interesting part about a place like Patmos is that
a waitress will not only recognize what one is reading but will probably
have read APOKALYPSIS in the original.

 Recommendations: LOUKAS has wonderful lamb on a SOU'BLA (spit rotisserie).

 ERRWSQE

Randall Buth

--
Randall Buth
www.biblicalulpan.org <http://www.biblicalulpan.org>
ybitan at mscc.huji.ac.il
randallbuth at gmail.com



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