Prose, partly funny, partly profound about our everyday life in Ikaria, the island of centenarians, about the intertwining of relationships, about the happiness, love and the unshakable joy of life of these people. I’ve written a whole series of little island stories. You can find the links below the text.

For a few days I have been watching the huge Holderbush in front of the old stone barn between the two houses just to the left of our village on the main road. It’s huge, higher than the house and the white plate-shaped flowers have started blooming at the top, so I could see them from afar days ago. It will soon be time, I thought, for the holder syrup with fresh lemon wedges from my garden and the sparkling taste of a cool Hugo with fresh mint foamed on my tongue at the mere thought. I know Hugo from my short stays in Switzerland, but we don’t know him here.

Every day when I drive to work in our shop, I see how the flowers are becoming more and more numerous, the whole bush is already covered in white and they are slowly coming within reach. There aren’t enough of them hanging low yet because, as I know from last year, it’s difficult to get to the lower branches because the tree hangs half over a high dry stone wall into a lower terrace. A few more days and then it will be harvest time.

This morning I wanted to deposit some bills at the post office. Anna comes in and as soon as I see her, I see Holder flowers, because she lives on the lower floor right next to the Holderbusch. Her mother-in-law lives on the upper floor, at eye level with the white flowers, Dina, I always asked her if I could collect some and every year she looked with pity, like what these xenoi who have no idea always come up with, Everyone knows that this bush only provides shade and is good for nothing else, but okay, take as many as you want, nobody needs them anyway, chased me out of her kitchen again.

I wanted to visit you in your Avli, I say to Anna. Visit? Why? She never gets visitors, I know that because I’ve never seen a strange car in front of her house. She shakes her long, platinum-blonde hair, which is Greek women’s favorite hair color if you go by Greek television, and looks at me like a UFO with her eyes that are way too heavily made up for the morning at the post office. She is herself a xeni, a stranger, married from Athens. Well, about the holder flowers, after all the bush is right next to her house, I think I can’t just climb through her avli and steal flowers. I actually wanted to ask your mother-in-law, but now I’m asking you. Firstly, this tree is poisonous, everyone knows that, and secondly, my mother-in-law has no authority whatsoever, she rolls her beautiful black eyes at the sky, but absolutely nothing!

Then it occurs to me again that she has had a row with her mother-in-law for years, no one knows why, but everyone knows that they have a row, the mother-in-law is toxic, they don’t speak a word to each other. I’ll be careful.

You have to ask my father-in-law’s cousin, Toulla, she owns the tree, my mother-in-law has absolutely no say in it. I hear that: she thinks she has to have a say always and everywhere anyway, very clearly and I see the impotence of all the past years of silent resistance spread over two floors in her pressed lips.

Okay? Yes, you’re just getting yourself into trouble, she says, I once picked rosemary from the huge stick next to it, well it was a little more, I wanted to sell it, but it grows everywhere anyway, that caused an unparalleled family row, you can do that you believe me. In Ikaria you don’t pick anything without asking, that’s what goes through my head, I know that, everything belongs to someone and that someone planted it and looked after it until it could survive on its own. Anna says: I found a shop in Athens, I sometimes sell them a few sacks of wild herbs, they pay well, after all you have to live on something. My girls are getting bigger, they want shoes, clothes, you know, they have a daughter themselves. My husband and the goats, that’s not enough, she didn’t say that, I just thought that.

But what do you want with this bush anyway, it’s poisonous, it doesn’t eat Gais, you’d better leave it alone! She rolls her beautiful eyes again with way too much blue make-up, she’s good at that!

Now it’s my turn. I want to help her. Then I just ask my uncle, the man from Toulla, I’m good with him, I once translated something from English for him, a washing machine manual, he never forgot it for me. Then I tell him how healthy the Holder is, a farmako, a medicine, healthy tea, dried or syrup, ideal as a base for delicious drinks, I say and I have to think of a sparkling Hugo again. The leaves and stems are really poisonous, but the flowers are really poisonous!

Real? Tea? Hmm, she’s pulling her hair, you give me an idea.

Yes, just have a look, I say. I’m not sure if she has a computer, but back in the day, more than thirty years ago, when I came here and the old woman on the first floor asked me with a superior smile, do you also have Tiwi in Switzerland, please what? Tiiiwiii, she wrinkled her nose and drew a rectangle in the air with her index finger and spoke to me slowly, loudly and clearly, as if I were slow to understand. After all, I was a Xeni and all Xeni always act so stupid, she probably thought: Tiwiiiiiiiiiiii! Back then there was a single television in the village cafeteria, and everyone gathered there in the evenings to watch the news together. What was said on television was 100% true, everyone was sure of that. Well today, gugeln is a synonym for GUARANTEED TO BE RIGHT. Well, if it’s already on the internet!

So then you can really use the flowers! Anna beams at me mischievously and I’m not entirely sure whether she’s thinking about poisonous tea or a delicious drink. With fire in her eyes and flowing mane, she rushes out of the post office. As she passes by, she whispers in my ear: So it’s not the flowers that are poisonous, but some people!

This story, like all my others, is of course a lie and a fabrication. How much I love the art of fiction, interwoven with my ideas and opinions, but as always inspired by the encounters and events with the idiosyncratic, lovable people and the wonderful island that surround me.

My film tip: The German-language culture clash comedy: Highway to Hellas – – Hilarious, lovable, cynical, honest, so funny! Could play in Ikaria! The story takes place on the fictional Greek island of Paladiki against the backdrop of the financial crisis. The island community received a loan from a German bank for its eco-tourism project “Galapagos in Greece” and pledged its non-existent power station, hospital and beach as security… Buy here

My book tip: Language calendar 2018 – The perfect preparation for your vacation, your daily portion of Modern Greek with varied texts, grammar and spelling exercises. The translations and helpful grammar explanations are included on the back of the respective calendar pages. Plus a lot of interesting facts about the country and its people. A varied mix of information, entertainment and exercise. The exercises are also available online as audio files. Buy here