,
Map-less, clue-less and direction-less, lost in a maze of
incomprehensible alpha and beta signage, Miss Niece was in quite the conundrum,
to say the least. Miles away from her
Athens hotel, she was in quite the pickle, a forlorn foreigner traipsing around
unfamiliar rues and avenues. Tongue-tied
and rendered virtually illiterate by her inability to understand the local
lingo, she had inadvertently strayed far from the beaten path, and was fast on
the road to nowhere.
It was ALL her wacky ol’ Auntie Nora’s fault, as if it
weren’t for her delusional shopaholic relative, the satchel and shiny trinket
hoarding old Bag, she would be out gallivanting with her gaggle of girlfriends,
instead of being in this most unfortunate of predicaments. She had foolishly promised to check out the “handbag emporium of all time”, located a
hop, skip and jump away from the Metro station, just up the street and around
the corner. Yeah right. Miss Kid had
been meandering for quite some time, the late afternoon heat prickling her now
sun-burnt Canadian skin, her hot pink-manicured tootsies oozing newly sprouted
blisters, their bloody rawness a painful reminder of one too many ill begotten
steps.
A parade of shops littered the pathways, beckoning one to
amble on in, stay awhile and trade colourful bills for handcrafted souvenirs,
an economically beneficial exchange of cash for goods. The only drawback being that most of the
shopkeepers in this neck of the woods, far away from the city center, spoke but
a spattering of English, their vocabularies limited to “that beautiful whatever thing-a-ma-jig costs such and such” and “it’s an unique one of a kind authentic made in Greece, you’ll never find it elsewhere exclusive
item”. Auntie Nora would have had a
field day, excitedly bantering back and forth about the price of handbags and
shipping costs to Canada, able to hold her own and converse as if native
born. Who knew that her wacky ol’
Auntie’s insistence to memorize all words related to the subject of shopping
and acquisition would prove to be ever so useful, immediately forging an
immediate bond between both seller and shopaholic?
Miss Kid, on the other hand, had not such an advantage,
prone to neither frenzied bargain addictions nor those types of exorbitant indulgences,
focusing instead on appreciating the cultural landscape and snapping digital
memories of the vacation inclined kind.
But, a Kid’s gotta do what a Kid’s gotta do in order to escape this maze
of laneways and perplexing alpha betas, if she were to high tail it back to her
hotel by nightfall. Mustering up all of
her courage, Miss Lioness took a deep breath, swung open the door and stepped inside
a crowded little shop that was literally over-flowing with a cornucopia of
knick-knacks and ceramic treasures, all of which would stop her ol’ Auntie cold
in her tracks. Treading carefully so as
not to jostle the merchandise and risk being labelled the proverbial bull in the china shop reckless foreigner, the clamour of smashed vases and
dinner plates echoing in her head, Le Niece ever so carefully picked up one
such earthenware and headed to the cash – figuring that a prospective purchase
could buy that much needed extra kinship from a kindly old shopkeeper. Or so she thought.
What transpired next is akin to a laugh out loud series of
comic events of the funny now but not then awkwardly frozen moments in
time, of the oh so embarrassingly
uncomfortable kind. For you see, the
kindly old shopkeepers absolutely freaked upon seeing Miss Kid casually stroll
to the cash, delicately cradling a terra cotta stoneware, unaware of the “do not touch” signs placed prominently
on each and every shelf. Signs?
What signs? Ohhhhhhhhhh, those signs! Well, it was all Greek to her, those fancy symbol lettered alpha, betas, epsilons
and zetas, spelling out mysterious directives to those in the know, leaving
clued out foreigners like you know who
grasping for dictionaries in the dark.
You know the ones, those annoyingly irritating globetrotters who hadn’t
even bothered to learn the basics of the local lingo and tuck a couple of handy
dandy useful phrases away, for those unexpected “just in case” inevitable stumbles.
And then, on the opposite side of the spectrum, are those
overly eager beavers, the know it all’s, anxious to impress, spewing out
nouns, verbs and adjectives, as they un-eloquently butcher the local tongue,
succeeding only in leaving not so favourable impressions of the cringe-worthy
kind. But hey, to their credit, at least
they tried.
And the moral of the story is?
The revenge of the Alpha Betas had struck once again,
victorious in Round One, unbeatable in Round Two.
Stay tuned for Round Three – it’s Miss Kid versus the
Epsilons and Zetas - Winner take all.
Oh….did Miss Niece eventually make it back to her
hotel? Well, that’s a tale for another
day, perhaps even for next week’s blog post!!
Stay tuned for more Miss-adventures of the Miss Kid kind!!
Come meander along cobblestoned rues and
avenues in a quest to out-run the Alphas and the Omegas on a map and dictionary
search to end all searches…. come gallivant around the globe with Miss Niece and see what escapades
await next week!!
Photos or lack of - Miss Niece neglected to send her ol' Auntie more photos, so I had no choice but to work with what few I already had - Photos - courtesy of Maradzidra
Pink Sneaker Tidbits of Fascinating Facts
and Interesting Info:
Most people have heard of the Greek
time-honoured custom of smashing plates at weddings and celebrations, but have you any inkling of a clue as to the origins of this custom?
Smashing plates was thought to ward off
evil spirits, bring good luck and usher in good spirits and an abundance of
joy.
Kefi – the overwhelming expression of joy,
passion, emotion, high spirits, happiness and enthusiasm, just to name a few. Not to be mixed up with Kefir.
Another belief as to the origins of
smashing earthenware stems from ancient Greece, where the ritual of “killing”
the ceramic vessels used for the feasts commemorating the deceased was a “controlled”
method of coping with the loss of a loved one.
Over the passage of time, this ritual eventually evolved into a
celebratory tradition.
Yet another belief suggests that this
ritual began when a prosperous family invited a destitute one to dinner,
insisting that they break the plates, so as to cement the bonds of friendship,
as friendship is inherently more valuable than plates.
In ancient times, when lovers parted, they
often broke a plate, each keeping one half, which would then be easily
recognized and matched up, upon meeting the other again many years or even
decades later.
Not surprisingly, the tradition of breaking
plates in bars and restaurants was banned in 1969, as shards of glass and
ceramic made for quite the dangerous practice.
Establishments that chose to continue this tradition were required by
law to obtain a license. The majority of bars and restaurants nowadays have replaced plate throwing with flower tossing instead – a much
less messy and more fragrant option!!
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