Summer Journal 2012, August 23

Hang on.  I have quite an elaborate story to tell.   I'll begin by saying we have had a brief email from Paris with the following photo from the Airport in Toronto letting us know they are home:

Kids can sleep anywhere

 

I'm sure they were exhausted, and I hope by the time they read this they are much more rested.

 

On Tuesday night we had dinner at Kolotsi's with Aggelos, his mother, and some of their family friends:

 

 

Today Stellios Foras came to paint the Parent's Temple.  He was singing and happy until he opened the paint.  He felt it was still the wrong color, but once he applied it, I thought it looked great, so I don't see any problem.  It is pretty close to the same color as the house.  So we all had to roll the roller for a photograph:

 

 

The trouble started when another white jeep (Stellios drives a white jeep) pulled into the driveway.  Two men got out and the moment I watched their stride up to the patio, I knew they were trouble.  They were too formal.  One Stell recognized (he's a topographer), the other was a big handsome but rather frightening looking fellow who stiffy shook hands than strolled around the house with Stell and the fellow he knew following and he proceeded to explain to Stell that the property with the Parent's Temple was his and he started shouting out Stellios Foras, "what are you doing on MY PROPERTY".

My Stell proceeded to go inside the house and pull out topographical maps that showed that the property was ours.  The topographer told the big angry dude, that he could do nothing because we indeed had the legal paperwork.  He strutted back to the jeep continuing to wave his hands in the air and shout.  This put Stell and Stellios in a bad mood, which I'm sure will only be cured with ouzo later.  My comment (I had stayed inside) was if this was the angry man's property, where has he been for the past twenty-five years?   His name by the way is Karavasilis, but don't get confused with the family we know.  They are probably distant relatives, and Karavasilis is something like "Smith" in Ierissos.  If Paris had been here he would have exploded, I'm sure. 

 

I finished Ali Wentworth's "Ali in Wonderland".  Very humorous to be sure.  Now I'm starting today "The School House Door:  Segregation's Last Stand at the University of Alabama" by E. Culpepper Clark.  Cully is the Dean of Journalism at UGA, a civil rights historian, and one of my new friends (a great find).  Cole Campbell, whose book I read earlier this summer, was a person he deeply admired, as did I. 

 

We have no great plans for today, but I MUST start on my project work for the folks in Florida.  If there are more "property" fireworks, I'll keep you in the loop in this blog.

 

Stell has located an old stained glass church window for the window in the Parent's Temple.