It was the summer of 1998 when I left my home city for the bright lights of London. I'd go into more detail about it, but it appears further up my Top Ten, so you'll just have to wait.
I was working and living in a bar in central London and had been seeing a beautiful girl from New Zealand called Dionne. She, along with three other friends, had decided that since it was summertime, they were going to carry on their travels and see a bit more of Europe. They'd headed off to Turkey and were then going to Greece afterwards.
I was gutted at having met such an amazing girl, only to have her disappear on me, but I understood why. I contented myself with tearing it up with the rest of the guys that were still at The Cittie of Yorke. That was the summer I was taught how to do the Haka. At 2am. In the middle of the legal district. Drunk. Stark naked, except for my trainers. What can I say? Boys will be boys and a dare's a dare.
So it's safe to say that I was still having fun and getting on with life without Dionne. It didn't stop me thinking about her, but what good did it do to just mope around? I had resigned myself to her departure pretty well, when early one saturday morning, out of the blue, I got a shout from upstairs in the office from the manager, Stuart. He said that Dionne was on line 1 for me. More than a little surprised, but excited, I picked up. The line wasn't great, but I could still hear her. She told me that they'd had a great time in Turkey, but now that they'd come to Greece and had gotten jobs and accommodation, that something was missing - me.
I was quite taken aback. I knew I had been missing her, but I had figured that this was more me than her. She didn't waste any time and blurted out that she wanted me to join her. The impulsive side of me jumped straight in and I agreed instantly. We spoke until her phone card ran out and then I headed up to the office with a massive grin slapped all over my face.
As soon as I walked into the office, Stuart looked up at me with a hacked-off expression of resignation and said: "Are you here to hand in your notice then?" I looked back at him, thinking 'I should probably try and look like I'm sad to be doing this to him', but I just couldn't manage it. "Yeah. I'm afraid so," I said, "sorry." He just looked at me and said: "Don't worry about it - this isn't the first time it's happened." When I thought about it later, the bar was staffed almost entirely by Aussies and Kiwis who were on working-holiday visas, so I would imagine that it had happened to him every year.
The following week, I had my flight booked for Athens, I had packed up my gear and said my goodbyes to everybody at the bar and headed to Luton Airport. The train journey was expensive and my leaving party had wiped out a lot of the money I'd had left. I hadn't saved any, because I didn't know I was going travelling. My calculations had told me that I had just enough to cover my trip out to the island and in my last phone call to Dionne, she had told me that I would be starting work in the same place as her a day or two after I arrived - provided that the restaurant owner liked me, obviously.
I got on the easyJet plane and tried to settle in to my overnight flight, despite my growing excitement. We landed at Athens Airport around 5.30am and I patiently waited to get my luggage. While I was hanging around the baggage carousel, I began to wonder if there was anywhere open yet to change Sterling into Drachmas. I had figured there probably wasn't, but as luck would have it, even at 6am, there was one bureau de change that had been open all night long. It was around then that my new-found luck deserted me completely. When I went to search for my wallet, it was nowhere to be found. I checked every pocket. Then I checked every bag. Then I checked the whole lot again, twice. I still couldn't find it. My heart had sank. Here I was in a foreign country, with no money, no travel insurance, no i.d. except my passport and I didn't speak the language.
I went outside and lit up a cigarette. While I was stood there, I realised that, since I had been limited by the funds I'd had at such short notice and had only been able to afford a one-way ticket, that I had better shoulder my bergan (very large army-style rucksack) and get my arse to the ferry port. I didn't even know what the port was called or where it was.
The port of Piraeus is 12 km from the airport and I was pointed in the right direction by a friendly policeman who spoke very good English. I noticed straight away that he had actually pointed me towards the bus stop, but found a map there that helped me quite a lot, although being a bus stop map, it gave no clear indication of the distances involved. There was nothing else for it, but to saddle up and start marching.
It was a little after 6am when I began and the sky was getting light, but the sun was yet to make an appearance. The few cars on the main road still had their headlights on. As I stomped along, my mood began to improve considerably as I thought about where I was and what I was doing. Every time I passed a bus stop, I would stop and check on the basic map there (if it still had one) and then carry on.
I was getting hot and sweaty and was already tired from the late departure from London and the lack of sleep, but I was doing fine. That is, until around 7.30am, when the sun decided to make an appearance. It was by then fully light and the first rays of sun were now coming over the tops of the hills and the buildings off to my right. As I walked along, I noticed something
rather strange - most of the buildings seemed to be under construction. Those that weren't fenced off completely still had the odd pile of materials lying around and almost all still had the steel rods sticking out of the corners of the flat-roofed structures. I found out later that summer that this is because the owners don't have to pay tax on their buildings until they are completed, so most of them leave these steel rods there in order to convince government officials that there's still another storey to go on top.By the time I was almost into Piraeus, I felt like I was dying from heat exhaustion - and it was only 9am! The heat from the sun combined with my forced march had drained me completely. I remember thinking to myself: "If this is what it's like at 9 in the morning, what the hell is it going to be like at midday?!" I found a shady spot near the bus terminal there and flopped on my bergan. I had not long moved from Edinburgh and had spent my time in London struggling to acclimatise to their weather.
As I lay there on my bags in the heat, I began to assess the problem. I had no number for Dionne and no money to call her, even if I did. I couldn't call my parents and, I thought, even if I could, they had no way of getting any money to me. I was stuck.
I've never really gotten very stressed in situations like this. I don't see the point. By this point in proceedings, my feet have already left the 'roof of the dentist's' and I'm in mid-air waiting to hit the ground - it's either going to be a good landing or a bad one. Either way, there's no going back.
Wondering what to do next, I started looking around for the ferry offices to get prices for a ticket. I had no choice, but to try and figure out how to get to the island. As I was wandering around, I passed a couple in their late twenties, chatting away to each other in English. I barely thought about it, swallowed my pride and walked straight up to them.
"Hi. Sorry to bother you. I couldn't help overhearing you speaking English and I wondered if I could ask for your help?" I said. The two of them looked at me with barely a fraction of the suspicion that this kind of opening gambit would elicit back in the UK. I explained to them what had happened and what I was doing there and I think they were so touched by my romantic, yet nearly-tragic tale that they took pity on me. That, or I was seriously starting to look rough and was stinking by then. They gave me 20,000 Drachmas and I insisted on taking their address, so that I could return the money once I had reached the island. They said it wasn't necessary, but I wouldn't let it go. I didn't like the idea of scrounging off of anybody, let alone some loved-up couple who could well have been on their honeymoon.
I said as many si
ncere 'thank-you's as I could and left them to their holiday. Now that I had some money, I had to find me a ticket office. I checked all the different lines that went to the island of Paros and, since they all cost about the same, I went for the one that was leaving next.I'd had no idea how much 20,000 Drachmas was worth at the time (turned out it was around £40), but was ecstatic when I got my ferry ticket for only 8,000 of them. When I walked around the shops and restaurants by the quayside, found that I had enough money for some lunch, water and even a packet of cigarettes. This made my day, since I had finished my last one a couple of kilometres from the airport.
I now had all I needed and after eating and drinking, I sat in the shade and watched this busy port bustle about its day, waiting for my ferry to dock. Most of my friends know that I've never been a fan of boats or the sea and I had had a particularly horrible crossing from The Hook of Holland to Harwich back in 1996 and I was now filled with memories of this as I got myself up and into the queue for the ferry. This example of sea-going craft wasn't in half as good nick as the one from back then, so I was getting more and more apprehensive as I boarded the ferry. Once we had made it out of port and into the open sea, I calmed slightly, mainly due to being filled with huge excitement that I was now finally on my way and the sun was shining down hard on me out on the open deck.
From Piraeus to Paros only took a little over six hours and we had made a few stops al
ong the way. I was already in tourist mode, as I watched us pass by beautiful island after beautiful island. Each island port that we stopped was a stunning vision from the top deck of the ship. In between the islands, I was engrossed by the dolphins riding the bow waves and the rich colours of the deep blues of the water. I had only ever seen dark green or grey, angry-looking seas before and was surprised to find myself with the urge to dive right in.We pulled into Parikia, the main town on Paros and its port, around 5pm and I was already well-up in the queue to get off while the ship did an ungainly three-point-turn and docked backwards into the quayside. This had been roughly the time I'd told Dionne that I should be arriving, so I only hoped that she would be waiting.
As I waited for various cars and pick-ups to get themselves off the ferry, I spotted her waiting next to a very old-looking windmill about a hundred yards away. Everyone who didn't look Greek was immediately accosted as they hit dry land by an army of kamakis (those, sometimes sleazy, Greek men who stand around outside restaurants, and the like, chatting up passing women to come and sample their wares, which of course are always 'the best in all of Greece!')These kamakis were touting accommodation and some bars and restaurants that were, of course, perfect for the weary traveller. Once I had repeated several times that I had somewhere booked already, I managed to fight my way through them to Dionne. I dumped the bergan at my feet and we threw ourselves into a tight embrace. I guessed I had been wrong - she had obviously been missing me way more than I had thought. After the hugs and kisses, she told me that she was technically still working, so we had to go. I picked up my gear and we headed off to the left of the big windmill and down the seafront, straight by what I supposed passed for a town square.
The main drag was lined with small boats and little concrete jetties on my left and several Greek-style coffee shops and tourist shops to my right. Parikia itself is a natural bay and the road followed the curve of the bay all the way round to the other side and out of sight. We walked along, chatting excitedly about my new surroundings and I relayed the story of my ferry journey. I was keeping the tale
of my near-disaster until later. After a short while, we arrived at a restaurant which formed one side of a courtyard with a sun-bleached fountain in the centre of it. The restaurant was called The Cactus and was run by a Greek guy called Yannis and his Yorkshire wife, Vanessa.I had to wait around while the people in the restaurant were served and then left and then I was sat down for an informal interview. I got the job without any problem and was told to start the following day. Dionne was just finishing up, so I waited for her and she lead me to our accommodation. We walked up through the main street of Parikia and began to wind upwards through narrow, white-washed streets. The paths between the houses got steeper and narrower the further we went. Eventually we came to a three-storey building and Dionne rang the bell. An old Greek woman came to the door and started spouting off enthusiastically in Greek, before trying out her limited English. We were handed another key for me and she showed us up the stairs by the side of her front door. They lead all the way to the rooftop, where she showed Dionne and I into a double room with a few bits of furniture in it and wooden shutters where the windows should be.
I was happy enough just to be somewhere I could dump the bergan. There was a flat roof outside, about three times the size of the room. It had a couple of washing lines stretched across it, some solar panels in the corner and a little table and chairs. When I looked around the views we could see, I realised that we had gotten ourselves that highest room in the town. The only things higher than we were were a couple of very small, blue-domed churches.
When she left us, I went in and flopped on the bed. Dionne and I were going out for dinner with the girls and Nick (another Aussie friend from London). I got showered and changed and off we went. After a very nice meal and some fairly strong Greek wine, the evening seemed to me to let out a sigh; like someone undoing their belt a notch after a big meal. We drank some more and laughed and joked late into the night. It was one of the nicest, most chilled-out evenings I've ever had.
I was awakened at around 7am by an almighty crashing sound. I sat bolt upright in the bed, wondering what the hell could be making such a loud noise. Dionne sleepily reached over and touched my back. She mumbled into her pillow: "It's okay - it's just the morning ferry dropping anchor. It does that every morning." Now that I was awake, I had to get up, so I left Dionne snoozing and went out onto the rooftop for a cigarette. The sun was only just cresting the small hills that surrounded the town. It was already very warm. As I stood there in my shorts, stretching, I looked around me and started to giggle.
Something had occurred to me that I still couldn't quite believe. Something that would make me giggle every morning for at least another month. I lived here. I had no address in London or anywhere else. It wasn't like I was just on a gap year and would return to my parents' house. This was it. This was my address.
This is just the story of me getting there. The rest of that amazing summer is a whole other story.
