One Summer in Santorini

by Sandy Barker

  And it was a lot of what made hanging out with Josh so enjoyable – that he teased me and I teased him back. We jousted. Conversing with Josh felt like I was gliding the sharp edge of my mind along a verbal whetstone.

  When we arrived at Miaouli Square, it took my breath away. After a week of travelling to islands peppered with whitewashed buildings and pops of blue – which were gorgeous and I’d never tire of seeing, by the way – the square was more reminiscent of the South of France than anywhere I’d seen in other parts of Greece.

  Although the waterfront of Ermoupoli, where we were docked, was atypical of the other towns we’d been to on other islands, the square was an even stronger reminder that we were in Europe. There may have been distinct lines on maps between countries, but Southern Europe clearly had common threads that surpassed borders.

  ‘This is so beautiful,’ I remarked.

  ‘It really is – not like anything we’ve seen so far,’ Josh replied.

  ‘I was just thinking the same thing.’

  An imposing but handsome neoclassical building in a pale apricot colour dominated the square. I guessed it was probably the town hall or some other official government structure. Ubiquitous pigeons dotted the square, which was, surprisingly, bordered by fat palm trees.

  ‘Unlikely that those are native, huh?’ I mentioned, pointing to the palm trees standing guard in front of the town hall.

  ‘Mmm. I’m going to say no. We haven’t seen any others during our trip.’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Did you know that the North Africans ruled in Greece for hundreds of years until about six hundred years ago?’ he asked.

  ‘Uh, no, I didn’t know that. I knew they were in Spain for a long time.’

  ‘Yeah, they ruled most of what we call the Mediterranean – they could have brought the palm trees with them then. Maybe they grow on the island now.’

  ‘Maybe.’ I figured it was more likely the Islanders had bought them especially for the square, but Josh’s historical knowledge impressed me nonetheless.

  ‘Your knowledge of history is a little more credible than Duncan’s,’ I said.

  ‘Pigeon houses?’ he asked.

  ‘Precisely. Did you know that the Greeks thought pigeons were nice, so they made houses for them?’

  ‘I did not know that until I met Duncan and he told us.’ Josh led us towards a statue in the middle of the square.

  ‘Well, did you know that it was the Moors who brought citrus to Europe?’ I asked.

  ‘Really?’

  ‘I think so,’ I admitted. ‘It’s one of the hundreds of factoids we were trained to spout off when I was touring. It sounds like it’s true, but who knows? We told our tour groups a lot of stuff that wasn’t true – and on purpose.’

  ‘You mean, you lied?’ he asked, pretending to be aghast.

  ‘Pretty much. Like the time I convinced a whole tour group that the Swiss are such incredible conservationists, they turn off their waterfalls at night to save water.’

  ‘You did not.’

  ‘I did. I had a whole spiel about the Swiss enlisting the Dutch engineers who had saved Venice by engineering failsafe flooding technology – and how they’d designed a way to redirect and harness the waterfalls to save water and generate energy at the same time. It was compelling stuff, my lies.’

  ‘But how do you know they bought it?’

  I stopped walking to tell the rest of the story. ‘Because we were staying in Lauterbrunnen that night – it’s in this unbelievable valley – sheer cliff faces each side of these gorgeous rolling green hills – anyway, there are all these waterfalls that fall from the top of these super high cliffs to the valley floor, throwing up mist-rainbows everywhere – and it’s awesome. I mean, it’s probably the most beautiful place I’ve ever been to. On the planet,’ I added for emphasis.

  His eyes widened, indicating he was duly impressed.

  ‘So, I told the tour group that the waterfalls shut off at sunset – around eight o’clock – and that it was a sight to behold. So, there they all are at ten to eight, cameras and phones at the ready, watching the top of the nearest waterfall, waiting for it to stop flowing down the side of the cliff, and I was playing along – I had my camera ready too.

  ‘And at eight o’clock, when someone called out the time, someone else said, “I can see it! Look! It’s stopping!” And there’s this moment of frenzy and they are all convinced something’s happening, and they’re taking photos and video footage. And I ran out in front of them and turned and took a snap of all of them looking through their lenses at the top of the waterfall.

  ‘And, then I fell about laughing. And slowly, one by one, they realised I had tricked them. And some of them thought it was cool and even really funny – and others were pissed off with me and stormed away ’cause they felt dumb.

  ‘Anyway, it was all in good fun. I mean, we were camping through Europe for six weeks together. We were like this oddball family on wheels, and we were always playing pranks. I wasn’t the only one, you know.’

  ‘I love that you got them to buy that whole thing.’ Josh gestured towards a road leading away from the square, and I nodded. We started walking again. ‘Was it a bunch of Americans? ’Cause I feel like most Americans – especially if they’re travelling – will believe anything.’

  ‘No – only a couple of Americans. Mostly Aussies and Kiwis – a couple of Canadians and a Korean couple. It did kinda backfire on me though.’

  ‘How’s that?’

  ‘Well, from then on, they didn’t trust anything I said – even the true stuff.’

  ‘Like what?’

  ‘Well, when we got to the Netherlands, I told them that sixty per cent of the country’s land is below sea level and that it’s the Dutch engineering – the windmills and the dykes – keeping the land dry.’

  ‘But, that’s true.’

  ‘I know – that’s what I’m saying. I’d lost all credibility. Apparently, the windmill thing sounded too far-fetched; they thought I was making it up.’

  ‘Did you do it again – the waterfall thing?’

  ‘Nope. Learned my lesson. Besides, I’d already pulled it off successfully. I had my story to dine out on.’

  ‘Or walk around on.’

  ‘Exactly.’

  ‘You enjoyed it then, running tours?’

  ‘I did, mostly. But I think if I was ever going to do it again, it would have to be more like this. A handful of people, a few destinations. Not fifty people and ten countries in fifteen days. That kind of travelling gets old, really fast.’

  ‘I’m loving the pace of this trip,’ he added.

  ‘Me too. For one thing, I get to wake up when my body says it’s time.’

  ‘Yes – no alarm clock. I can’t remember a time when I didn’t have to wake up to an alarm clock on a weekday. I was at school, then college, then straight into work. I’ve never even had a real vacation before – a few trips in the US – short ones, but nothing like this – and you know I’ve never left the States before now.’

  ‘You’re setting a high bar for yourself, first international trip and all this.’ I spread my arms wide to indicate our surroundings, which were getting prettier as we walked.

  A friendly bark sounded behind us and we turned around. There was a tan-coloured Labrador, regarding us with his (her?) head cocked to the side. I looked for a collar – no collar.

  ‘Hey there,’ I approached slowly. He (she?) didn’t seem aggressive, but I was careful nonetheless.

  ‘Are you lost?’ I had reached the dog and held out the back of my hand for him (her?) to sniff. The dog obliged and then started licking it.

  ‘Actually, I saw that dog in the square; she was part of a pack. She must have followed us,’ said Josh. He walked over and squatted down beside her, patting her head. The dog nuzzled his hand and panted in what seemed like a happy way. I liked dogs, but I’d never had one and wasn’t too sure how to read them.

  ‘How do you know she’s a
she?’ I asked.

  Josh looked at me with an amused look on his face. ‘No balls.’

  ‘Oh.’

  I was mildly embarrassed because Josh had said, ‘balls’. What was I, in primary school?

  ‘I hope that’s not weird, or anything,’ he added.

  ‘No. Why should it be?’

  ‘I don’t want you to think I spend all my spare time looking at dogs’ genitals or anything – it’s just that I grew up with dogs, and when I saw the pack in the square, I checked them out, sized them up. You know, are they okay? Are they aggressive?’

  ‘You obviously decided they were okay, then.’

  ‘Yeah. I mean, she’s a stray. I’d say they’re all strays, but she seems friendly enough. Aren’t you, girl?’ As if on cue, the dog barked. ‘Hah!’ Josh laughed. ‘That’s awesome. She’s smart too.’

  The dog looked from Josh to me and back again and barked once more. It was starting to play out like a scene from a movie. ‘What’s that, girl? Jimmy’s stuck down a ravine?’ ‘Woof!’

  Josh stood up, and the dog wagged her tail vigorously. He petted her on the head, and she licked at his fingers again before turning a full circle and running ahead of us. She stopped about ten metres away and looked back at us.

  ‘Uh, I think she wants us to follow her,’ I said. Was this really happening?

  ‘Well, she knows the town better than we do,’ Josh responded.

  And that was how we ended up on a tour of the town, being led by a scrawny stray dog with a smiley face. She stayed about three metres ahead of us the whole time, stopping regularly to check we were still following her. We meandered down streets and walkways, working our way further up the hill until we came upon the enormous church overlooking the town.

  The dog sat down and looked out at the vista; we stood behind her and did the same.

  ‘I’m running out of superlatives,’ I said, a little out of breath from the last – and steepest – part of our walk up the hill.

  ‘It’s amazing, isn’t it?’

  ‘Amazing, incredible, breathtaking, beautiful – just – wow.’

  ‘You seem to have a lot of superlatives.’

  ‘True, but none of them does this justice. And look at that church! It doesn’t look this big when you see it from the marina.’ We walked along the wall of the church, taking it in. Our dog decided to stay where she was, still enjoying the water views.

  The church looked like it was carved from butter by a very sharp knife, and then piped with cream-coloured icing to highlight its angles and arches. A giant blue cupola and two bell towers punctuated the roofline. It looked down on the town of Ermoupoli, a giant confectionary protector.

  ‘This town is so different from where we’ve been,’ I said. ‘I know I keep saying that, but it’s such a hodgepodge of European architecture compared with the typical Greek island structures. It’s making me a little nostalgic for France, actually.’

  ‘Oh yeah?’

  ‘There’s a lot I’m seeing that reminds me of the South of France in particular. Places in Provence, in Nice, Cannes. And some details remind me of Venice – like parts of this church. The dome reminds me of St Marco’s Basilica.’

  ‘You’ve been to a lot of places,’ he said without a trace of envy in his tone.

  ‘I have. I think I might have said this to you before, but if I stand still too long, I feel like I have to go. I get antsy. And going somewhere new – like here, Syros – that will scratch the itch. But, I know I’m lucky to have been to a lot of places.’

  ‘It’s not really luck, though is it? You work hard, you seek out opportunities, and then you make them happen.’

  ‘I suppose. In a way, yes.’

  ‘When you were a tour guide—’

  ‘Tour manager,’ I corrected.

  ‘Sorry, tour manager – did they knock on your door one night and say, “Hey, do you want to tour Europe? We’ll pay you,” or did you see the opportunity and then make the whole thing happen?’

  He was right. It wasn’t some grand reveal or anything. I had worked hard for my successes and to be able to travel as much as I did. But, when he called out the whole ‘I’m so lucky’ thing, I saw myself through his fresh eyes, and I realised I wasn’t lucky as much as I was intrepid.

  ‘That’s a good reminder. Thanks.’ I needed to get off the topic of me. ‘Hey, so is this close to where you were last night?’

  Josh scanned the rounded tops of the hills. He squinted a little and then pointed. ‘It was somewhere up there. If you remember from the photo, I was looking down on the church, and it was to my left.’

  ‘Oh yeah – the blue of the dome was almost inky.’

  He smiled at me. ‘Nicely put.’ He turned back towards the hills and asked, ‘Do you want to head up?’

  I did not. I wanted to sit down, and I wanted a beverage – probably an alcoholic one.

  ‘I take it from your scrunched-up nose that’s a no.’

  ‘You take it right. I may never come back here, and I know I should climb to the highest point on the island, but I can’t be stuffed.’

  He threw back his head and laughed. I joined in. ‘See? All that stuff about me being adventurous and hardworking, and now you learn the truth – sometimes I’m a lazy bugger.’

  ‘So, you’re a bugger too, then?’

  I didn’t know what he meant. ‘Huh?’

  ‘I’m a cheeky bugger, and you’re a lazy bugger – those are your words, not mine!’

  ‘Ohhh, yes. Well, that’s true then. We’re both buggers.’

  Our dog was where we left her, but we’d apparently been gone too long, and she was curled up asleep.

  ‘Hey, girl,’ I called as we approached. Her head snapped up, and the rest of her followed, suddenly a ball of energy again. I was seriously falling for the mutt. ‘Shall we head back to the square and get you a treat?’

  She seemed very excited at the prospect. She must have spoken some English as well as Greek because she led us off, just like I’d said. Or, maybe the word ‘treat’ was universal to all dogs.

  ‘I love this dog,’ I said as we followed her.

  ‘Yeah, she’s sweet. And smart too – she seems to understand us.’

  ‘I was just thinking how she must speak English as well as Greek.’

  He laughed. ‘Yeah, she’s definitely bilingual.’

  Then our incredibly smart dog spied a cat on a wall. They both stood stock still and eyed each other off. The cat was fat with orange stripes, and it looked like it had been around the block many, many times. It had a scar over its left eye, and half of its right ear was missing. Our dog started a low growl and the cat responded in kind. The standoff continued with neither of them moving. And then without warning, the cat took off along the wall in the other direction, leapt off, landed deftly and ran around a corner.

  Our dog took off after the cat, and I thought it would be the end of our tour. But no. A few minutes later she rounded the corner at a casual lope with her tongue hanging out of her mouth. She looked like she was smiling. The cat was nowhere to be seen.

  ‘Did you chase away that big, ugly kitty?’ I asked her as she accepted my praising pat on her head.

  ‘Good girl.’ Josh ruffled her ears, which she took as her cue to continue our journey back to the square – at least, that’s where I hoped we were going – she wasn’t taking us on the same route we’d come. I wasn’t too concerned, though. If we headed downhill, we were going in the right direction.

  Not long after the cat episode, we spilt out from a narrow street back into the main square. She looked at us like, ‘See? I knew where I was taking you the whole time.’ And if it’s possible for a dog to express pride, she looked well pleased with herself.

  ‘I think we should get her something,’ I said to Josh, as I walked towards a little snack stall at the edge of the square.

  He followed me, but when I arrived, I was disappointed to see that we were somewhat limited in our choices of treats. I ended
up buying two bottles of water – one for her and one for us – and a packet of chips. I poured water into my cupped hand and she lapped it up greedily. ‘I wonder where she usually drinks from.’

  We both looked around the square. Other strays were lazing about in the sun and the shade, but I didn’t see where they would get water.

  ‘Maybe there’s a fountain or something close by,’ replied Josh. I hoped he was right. I felt proprietary over our dog, and I couldn’t bear the thought of her having to scrounge for water every day, especially in that heat. I saved some of the water for after the chips – I knew they were probably too salty for a dog, but it was either chips or ice cream, and I guessed potatoes would be marginally better for dogs than dairy. She gulped down the chips, and then I let her finish the water. She sat at our feet, grinning at us. What a gorgeous girl she was.

  I didn’t notice until he said, ‘Smile!’ that Josh had his camera out. The dog and I both turned to the camera and obliged him.

  ‘Bye, girl,’ I said petting her head again. She licked my hand. ‘Thank you for being our dog today.’

  And as if she understood it was goodbye, she stood and trotted away without looking back. I felt tears sting my eyes. And then I immediately felt stupid and glad I was wearing sunglasses. She was a stray – she probably did the ‘cute dog’ routine with travellers all the time. I blinked away the tears.

  ‘Water?’ Josh asked, handing me the second bottle. He’d already taken a swig. I was super thirsty after our little adventure, but my hands were a grimy mess. I poured some of the water into my left hand, gave him back the bottle, and did my best to wash my hands. I wiped them on my shorts. They still felt gross, but not a dog-has-licked-these-hands-all-over gross. I signalled for the water again and took a drink.

  ‘Hey, I haven’t charged my phone in a couple of days, and I was thinking of finding an internet café, maybe checking email. Would you be up for that?’ Josh asked.

  ‘Uh, yeah, sure. Did you see one near here?’

  ‘I figure if we head back towards the waterfront and keep an eye out, we’ll find one.’

  ‘Sure.’

  Twenty minutes later we were each sitting in front of an ancient computer. I loaded my Gmail account and started deleting dozens of emails from stores, blogs and services – all soliciting for my time, my money, or both. It felt freeing to delete them without reading them, to ignore the unnecessary minutiae of life I would typically pore over.