It's been a pleasant Christmas though. A bit of belt tightening has inevitably had to go on as prices continue to rise (we're up to 23% VAT in Greece now), so our celebrations have been a little low key, but that's been good as we've concentrated more on family and less on the size of our gifts. The sight of Tony and Niamh working together on a 500 piece 'Hannah Montana' jigsaw puzzle is something I won't forget in a hurry! Entertaining that Tony was so engrossed in the project, and heartening to see father and daughter collaborating - something that doesn't often happen.
We did have some very pleasant surprises during the run up to the big day. Jack's school report was excellent, and his teacher told me that his Greek dictation was best in class - high praise indeed for a lad who didn't speak Greek (let alone write in the language) 4 years ago.
Niamh, having said she wasn't involved in the school Christmas play this year suddenly announced, 24 hours before the event, that she was actually singing in it after all. I admit, in true bar-humbug fashion, I was just a little disappointed as it meant I'd have to go along. School plays in Greece are pleasant enough, but tend to be very, very late in starting, very, very long winded and very, very noisy... for some reason the only time the audience tend to be quiet is when their own offspring are on stage, the remainder of the time they chat away regardless!
Ah well, not to worry. We arrived at 6pm as requested, for the 6.30pm start - that stretched to 7pm. The performance itself though was surprisingly good. A fun, well rehearsed play and songs and carols that I recognised, albeit that the lyrics were different. I had to smile at 'Santa Claus is... coming, to Town', the first few words of which in Greek were 'O Agios Vasillis einai...' replacing the 4 syllables of English with 9 of Greek - it's a bit of a mouthful!
At the end of the show the Papas (priest) was invited to draw a raffle ticket. I hadn't seen any tickets for sale and so didn't take a great deal of notice of what was going on, until I thought I heard my daughter's name being called. At the same moment Maria, sitting next to me, nudged me and said, "Niamh's won, she must go and get the prize." Odd, I thought, slightly confused as to how she'd been entered in the draw, and presumed she'd get a box of chocolates or something.
A Greek speaking English friend leaned over to me... "You don't really understand do you Bill? Niamh has won a desk". The look on my face must have been a picture! It transpired that the local Sconto supermarket had donated a computer desk to the school to be given to one lucky pupil whose name would be drawn at random.
Niamh is now the proud owner of a very smart desk that we've just about been able to squeeze into her bedroom. She's announced that she's going to do all her homework at it - and I sincerely hope it will be the catalyst to encourage her to study a little harder!
Meanwhile, one of our cockerels, earmarked for Christmas lunch, had an unexpected reprieve. He was spied by a local who asked Tony if he would sell him. Tony had a quick think and I admitted that it was about 34 years since I'd drawn a bird (plucking is no problem, but I'm not too sure about the inside bits!!), so he decided to sell the cockerel and use the money to buy a pre-prepared chicken 'roloff' from the butchers. The roloff made a delicious Christmas day lunch, but the chap who had ordered the cockerel failed to turn up to get him.
Guess what's on the menu in our house for New Years Eve... ELENI!!! HELP!!!
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