Shiny Happy People!

If Greece is a place marred with concern - both economic and social - then Sweden has to be the land of careless days and short nights (at least at this time of the year). It is no wonder that the summer days are so long there... there is just so much to be happy about! No, we're not talking about the fact that we got to visit with Aleko and Anna and Vince and Sammy and their respective wonderful girlfriends (Anna and Erika). No, we're not talking about the fact that the weather was almost perfect (between 15 and 20 degrees and largely clear skies). No, we're not talking about the chance to visit Askersund, the new home of Walter (away from Greece, that is) and Monica (well, not so new for her) and enjoy the stunning setting along the lake Vattern.

What we're talking about is all the rest of it: The sheer amount of green spaces and places along the length of this admittedly long country; The amount of beautifully kept streets and sidewalks; the number of new cars; the remarkable roads; The near perfect combination of old architecture and modern amenities; The abundance of good food and shopping; The number of people who are just content with life. In every way, Sweden was impressive.

Irini and Amalia were happiest playing with everything and everyone that moved. In Malmo, visitng the "Scan Clan" they spent hours on end rumbling on the kitchen, living room, hallway or terrace floor with the dogs. Amalia would wave both her hands in sheer joy and Irini would seek them out to say goodnight. The only thing that could compete with the dogs - in energy and cuteness - was the younger generation of Myers (and said girlfriends). Vincent, Anna, Sammy and Erika were amazingly caring, sharing and entertaining. They loved being there. There were moments when Natalia and Laurence would look up and just simply smile. The light was shining in the eyes of all of them. The connection was obvious. The love for each other and for the moment was as special as it can get.

In there somewhere was also an unexpected twist: Olga. She is a law student from Russia who is spending her university life outside of school with the gang, taking care of the dogs (and Goiman the parrot). In the short time that we got to know her we had nothing less than an opportunity for Irini to have her finger and toe ("tony") nails painted, a violin recital and a Russian geography lesson. She asked that we consider leaving our children with her while we visited Walter and Monica, and we had to decline but we were happy to reconnect with her upon our return. How delightful to have another person, with a whole different outlook on life, right there to talk to and share with.

And then there were Aleko and Anna, of course! They pampered us beyond recognition and asked for nothing in return, though they were seen trying to peel Amalia out of the arms of her parents and cousins on more than one occasion. They were the superest of super hosts and made sure that all our needs were met, right down to an incredible BBQ to meet the in-laws of their boys. They wanted to make sure that everyone had met everyone. The food was awesome. The house interior make-over wowing and their sense of humor, as always, always present.

Between our arrival and our departure, largely based in and around Malmo, we had the chance to drive to Askersund, the home away from home of Walter. Well, now just home. He has now spent a good portion of his year there, and the foreseeable future seems to indicate much the same trend so we will just call it home. As it should be. The drive from Malmo to Askersund takes close to five hours. Unless, that is, one has younger children who might, theoretically speaking, want to do something other than be strapped into a seat all day long. In that theoretical situation a parent might decide, for example, to stop somewhere along the way and offer a chance for said child to run amok for a while - in a rest stop or in a park - until the child recognizes the value of sedentary lifestyles. If that's the case, the trip might take closer to 6 and a half hours. All of them wonderfully surrounded by green: Green grass, green trees, green parks, green fields, green, green, green.

Until one gets to Askersund. Oh, yes, there is Green in Askersund. But there is also the banks of Lake Vattern. Right there, just behind the rock and the tree and the grassy lawn that face it, there is a house. One of those little red wooden houses with white trim and a veranda. There is a swing here. A table there. A hammock further other. A beautiful fluffy cat walks in and out as if it is the real owner. But we know the truth. Fairy tales are, after all, based on truth.

And in this fairy tale, Walter has been given a late arriving - but albeit major - part. The wedding celebration and benediction were an impressive combination of many friends in a small place. The resulting day - Saturday, June 11th - was as emotional as positive can be. Somewhere between listening to eulogies and vows, and little children's church tantrums, just beyond the long tables with fine cuisine in unpretentious local establishments, intertwined in the conversations and meetings and stories one shares at dinner tables, nestled between the speeches (many speeches) and the singing and dancing, love stole the show. It is a love that is different than what we are accustomed to. As Walter said in his (arguably award-winning) speech, it's about the here and now. There was little talk of "growing old together" as Laurence and Natalia often say. There was talk about making the most of it. There was talk of love being an active ingredient. It was about a life without regrets.

With all these positive occasions - reunifications and unifications - we were hard pressed to find someone who was not, as the title of this blog post states, shiny and happy. Oh, wait! There was one. It was that Avis employee in the parking lot who helped us with the car seats. "Avis has a racist issue", he said. Did you know that Avis employs just two locals while the rest are all Polish and/or Moroccan? We weren't sure this information was accurate, but showed as much appreciation to his plight as we could given the circumstances. No, shiny and happy he was not. But then again, he wasn't Swedish either. He was Danish.

Chapter 1: Greece

Wednesday morning. Natalia is online. Laurence opens one eye to check on the "light factor". It's morning. The girls are already up, but strangely quiet playing out on the balcony. Laurence picks himself up off the bed and moseys over to Natalia who is intently staring at the computer screen. From her vantage point she can look out to the balcony and the girls, and beyond into the park. It's another slow moving morning. But something's "up". Natalia announced that she is reading Rebecca's email to us and that, Rebecca, has mentioned that her daughter Lizzie checks this very blog every day! The pressure is on for more complete and up-to-date updates. Laurence measures his response. That's great. But really such passing statements puts one on a different plane. How can we fill so much information onto a blog without making it boring? Would we even want to? Balance. So, with that, here it is...another note of our daily doings with a few pictures to add some spice to things.

Truthfully the first few days have gone better than expected. It is amazing what a difference there has been between this trip and our last one here. By now, last December Laurence would have been to probably four different government offices and such doing bureaucratic this-and-thats'. This time it's more real. The general mood in Greece is an overriding mood of pessimism and concern. Shops line the streets with empty windows. Vasil informs us that, downtown there are areas where one in two shops has closed down. Daily strikes infuse an element of immediate impact on daily lives. News broadcasts are filled with conversations of whether Greece will default on its loans, whether it should or not, how Greece perceives the outside world, and the world Greece. On many levels it is a sad story.

But at the personal level it's often overcome with a smile, albeit sometimes forced. The woman at the bakery gives Irini a little loukanikopita (like a hot dog) because she's so cute. She jokes to Laurence that when he goes back to Malaysia, he should take her with him. He smiles and wishes her well. She smiles back and thanks him for coming to see her. They return home where Laurence gets into another conversation with Dina, the woman downstairs and over one balcony. Outside, with the sunny day facing them, they chat about the family, the growing girls, how long we will be in Malaysia. She asks when we're coming back "this way". Laurence doesn't have an answer, but he would love to. At the photo shop he has pictures taken for an international drivers license. After the trip to the bakery to fill the time and bring back some tiropita and bougatsa (yummy stuff!), he returns to another sales person cutting up the pictures to the right size. The woman asks, "Are these your pictures"? "I'm not completely sure" says Laurence. The woman, without hesitating, answers "I think the eyes gave you away". It's a playful conversation with a stranger, on the edge of rational and yet just beyond it, completely Greek. Laurence walks away wishing them a good day. The woman wishes him the same in return. Irini munches on her bougatsa as we walk down the pedestrian streets of Marousi. Some shops have good bargains.

Yesterday was a day "out" in the park. The intention was to stay much longer, but this year has been a little strange for Greece. It appears that there has been more rain than normal, so what is left is a feeling of spring (maybe more like April or early May). Laurence loves it! It means the flowers are still often in bloom, that the bushes and brushes are still standing high (and all over) and that the fields are full of color, insects and "stuff" to discover. It's in that "stuff" that we decided to venture as Irini insisted on looking at everything from the almonds on the trees to the purple flowers and dead grasses. She wanted to look at every insect in sight, and often hold it. Laurence had to oblige as Natalia snapped the pictures. The only problem with high grasses... the more chances you'll get some prickly thing stuck in your socks. Overcome by itchiness and discomfort we had to retreat to change our socks and give lessons on how some plants work. :-)

In the afternoon, they saw their friends Stelio and Maria and their daughter Mikaela. They went to a local play ground where, as the evening slowly moves toward night, more and more people show up. In there, somewhere, Natalia takes a moment to teach Amalia how to be, quite literally, a tree hugger. Parenting skills vary from supportive to uncontrolled, from trusting parents to some chasing after their children, from those who are laughing with their kids to those yelling endlessly at them giving them ultimatums they will never follow through on. One boy pushes over his cousin and she falls crying. Another boy gets dizzy on the merry-go-round and gets off, takes one step and falls sideways to the ground. With a crash His mother rushes over to pick him up and sooth him, obviously under-rested and looking haggard. Other parents are all too busy watching their own children or conversing with other parents about their children to concern themselves too much. The place is happening (in toddler terms)! For one hour in a neighborhood play ground the world's opposites come together to entertain their children and given the parents respite, and then have pizza. As we did. As we chomped away, Amalia managed to do some rounds around the tables, saying hello to a group of smoking mothers (watching their children from afar), watching a group of teenagers playing cards and hugging a pine tree now and then. She is, by all accounts, totally and completely adorable.

Tomorrow we head off to Sweden on a "biiiiiiiig eroplane" - as Irini puts it - for chapter two of our summer. Chapter one has been wonderfully slow and sprinkled with just enough to-dos to keep things interesting. From breakfast on the balcony to reconnecting friends, it has been the perfect way to start the summer.

Lizzie, we miss you. :-)

Summer At Last!

It's not quite summer until the plane is landing in Athens. The trip was a long one, filled with little children (ours) crying, running, playing, and laughing. We were fortunate to share the KL to Doha flight with our friends Matt and Cat and their little son Jonathon. He loves Irini and Irini loves him, so the two (and sometimes three) of them spent a good deal of time yelling from one window seat to the other "Jonny!" or "Rini!" across the wide body jet. We were in the same row, but opposite sides. Happily for us, the middle section of four seats only had two people in it, a beautiful and very happy girl (around 10) named Oomia (meaning wish in Sudanese we were told) and her mother who fell in love with Amalia. They were happy to allow the onslaught of toddlers to run back and forth throughout the 7 hour flight and this made all the difference for us.

Once in Doha, we were whisked away from our friends (who had a four hour lay over in wait for the flight to London) by the ground crew and thrust onto our next flight. We were on the ground for probably no more than 25 minutes or so. The second flight was smooth as can be (happily for Laurence) and after lunch we all promptly fell asleep for the final hour and a half of the flight. Laurence woke up, of course, to watch the Greek islands appear below as the plane descended and, just as always happens, watching the Aegean below brought a sudden - and much welcomed - sense of tranquility and 'home' to him.

The arrival was uneventful apart from poor Irini trying to walk up the jetway and into the terminal. For the first time we didn't bring a stroller, meaning that she had to walk but, having been sleeping the last leg of the journey, she found it difficult to do so. She swayed this way and that while other passengers patiently waited behind us. She was, as always, adorable.

After a short taxi ride (the roads were empty and the taxi driver was going 150 km/hr ) we got home just in time to meet the chatter of a Greek apartment building evening. Is seemed like all the families were out on the balcony overlooking the park and Laurence found great sense of belonging instantly. This is the stuff he had been missing. The dry relatively cool (27 degrees) evening was upon them and it was the perfect time for an arrival. As they got to the apartment they found it empty, of course, for the first time ever. Irini asked where "pappou" was and was told that he was in Sweden (our next stop) but yes, this was his apartment. She was later heard explaining this to Amalia who had, apparently, missed it the first time. :-)

An empty apartment, though peaceful, means no food. So off we all went down the back streets of Marousi to find an Evga (a corner store). It was Sunday afternoon. Would it be open? It was! The woman inside was friendly as can be and immediately moved conversation to where her family is from, the content of the products that she sells (and recommends to us since we have children), the concerns about industrially manufactures products, where we were from and how she has a sister-in-law from Bogotá also that loves living in Preveza, where she is from. How wonderful for Laurence to be in this environment! That was probably the longest conversation he has had with a stranger in at least six months, AND in Greek!

The walk from the store to our local little souvlaki shop took only five minutes, but we stopped three times, once to look at the purple flowers (Irini's favorite color), once to smell the pines and once to look at the dogs passing by. It was a delightful evening with a 'nip' in the air that would prompt Irini to ask for her sweater. We are tropical beings these days. The souvlakia were ordered and devoured with a side order of french fries and tzatziki, of course, and the girls took the time to walk around sidewalk and sit with their mother on the steps and chat and look and feel the place out. Laurence sat alone to finish his meal (and the left overs) and took the opportunity to chat with the restaurant owner about the day's events and the Greek economic situation. It seems that the arrival day also marked the largest peaceful demonstration in Greek history since the demonstrations against the junta in 1974. Over 200,000 people were downtown in front of the parliament as Laurence, Natalia, Irini and Amalia flew in and took their walk in the quiet Marousi streets. The souvlaki place owner joked about everyone heading down there just to welcome us with some peace and quiet.

It was the kind of evening that Laurence has so much missed. It was the kind of evening he wants to give his daughters time and time again. It was the kind of experience that makes Greece such a major part of him and - he hopes - of them as well. Home again. Summer has begun.