"Home Is the Sailor..." Part Six
After the bleeding, after the dehydration, Diana and I slept in late on Sunday morning. With all the cuts, abrasions, and general gore, Diana had to help me take a shower. I think that day got muzzy in my memory, because in asking Diana what we did (she took notes) I discovered that I have made some mistakes in my narration.
Looking back again, and reaccessing my Random Access Memory, I discover that the day I thought we had devoted to Mykenae was actually a day when we got there late, and spent time instead going through the chachki shops.
So...
On the Sunday we got up late and rather creakily and got on the road around noon. We had leftovers from the box feast at Nemea, went to Mykeknae, toured the museum, climbed the akropolis, and came down too late to see the tholos tomb, otherwise known as the Treasury of Atreus, etc..
We got to Nemea too late to get into the temple site or the museum, so instead I drove us over the mountain to show her the Temple of Herakles, and as much of the long race route as was practical. On the way back out the dirt road we encountered a farmer's truck off the road, and I got out to see if anyone was injured. There was nobody in the truck and I called out, and the driver appeared from the other side of the road. Though he had no English, he indicated that we might pull it back on the road.
It was a small Japanese truck, and we tried, but my long-term groin problem (the doctors tell me it is not a hernia, but an 'end of season football injury') prevented me from being any use. The driver made clear that he had called for help on his cell phone, and we headed out, just as someone bigger and stronger arrived.
Dr. Stephen Miller had asked us to come up to his house for coffee, and we followed his instructions through Nemea and up the hill.
I had heard about the house from a mutual friend, but it was still a surprise. Greeks usually build upward, vertically. Dr. Miller and his wife Effie have build vertically and horizontally, up and out, so that the top floor is more like a California ranch house, with wings. It is easy to spot from anywhere in the town, and is quite beautiful. The entry is on the top floor, with parking space up there (outside) as well, and when you enter you are struck immediately by the view. You look across the living space and through a window, and there you see framed the Temple of Zeus, now with eight columns rather than the three standing from antiquity. It is the centerpiece of the Valley of Nemea, and it manages to be both spectacular and subtle at the same time, residing amid the gentle green of the vineyards and homes that surround it. Residing, rather than dominating: a wonderful distinction.
The Millers led us into the library, where they have a large and long table with chairs, somewhere between a formal dining table and a executive meeting table.
Diana asked about a good book on the flora and fauna on Ancient Greece, and soon she was ensconced with the recommended tomes, while other guests arrived.
I am sure I have sung Dr. Miller's praises as an archeologist many times. He has the rare gift of doing important work and making it explicable to those beyond his field, without condescension or becoming a popularist. It might be well to note that both the Millers are consumately graceful persons as well, a thing not easy for people in the complex and difficult world of academia. It seems singularly appropriate that in retirement (which means spending the rest of his life cataloguing and writing books about the many years of work he has done at the site) they have the privilege of looking out each day on the results of a life well spent and the beauty that life has wrought (though not, as I am sure Dr. Miller would append, without a huge amount of help from many, many others).
Mrs. Miller brought in a large tray of chocolate-covered baklava and coffee, and then announced that it was a surprise party: for us, the guests, because although Dr. Miller knew it was his birthday, the rest of us did not.
Of course we sang the song (not the Berkeley version) and the conversation ranged hither and yon, and then it was time to leave. We were invited, the next night, to a performance at the home of one of the guests, which invitation we happily accepted. It was to be a Monday, and all the museums were likely to be closed. (Well, they are usually closed, but sometimes they are not..)
As the area of Argos is posted in all the tourist books as a place NOT to drive, and as everyone expected to have trouble finding it, Dr. Miller was to meet us all and lead us in caravan.
From the home of the Millers we made our way back down to the stadion, where a 'cultural event' was to take place.
This turned out to be a large pageant about Nemea, with many Goddesses and personified ideas and places communicating with the Goddess Nemea. It had amplified music, which was very good, and featured rhymed verse, something apparently unusual in Greek. We thoroughly enjoyed it, even without being able to understand the text. It is a mark of good pageantry that people be able to understand what is going on, even if they can't hear the words, and this criterium is especially important when many members of the audience may not have the language of the piece. As I believe most of the people in the audience may have been local, this excellence of the presentation was really good for us.
I do not have the name of the composer at hand, but then, being dropped into a dazzling variety of musics by performers famous in Greece, and in the rest of Europe, was both a joy and a despair. The composer was famous, but how was I to absorb it all, short of coming home with hundreds of CDs?
We made our way back to Napflion, and to the wonderful taverna that Mr. Economu had recommended.
Many of the eating establishments we visited on our trip hand the customers, as a matter of course, a little cardboard folder with information about the place you have just eaten: and a map, so you can find it again. This is a wonderful idea. Without the little folder I would not be able to tell you the name of the place.
I may not be able to tell you even so, because the folder is in Modern Greek: but here goes, with my ham-handed translation:
Koütoüki "To Parelthon"
It is located on Profiti Ilia, just off Xar. Trikoüpi, which runs between the main road to Argos and the main road to Epidauros.
I cannot recommend this place, and the wonderful family running it, too highly.
I think it was here that we first had lamb Kleftos (sp?), where the lamb and vegetables are wrapped in paper and slow-baked, but I am not sure. (The dish has great historical significance.) We had several deserts, on different evenings,, none of which were standard and all of which were great. We also had mezes, and Greek Salad, and ouzo. -Not on this night, but over the course.
In fact, the only thing we had that I didn't like was a Greek specialty of what I took to be kidneys roasted in slices on a spit. Unlike Mr. Leopold Bloom, I do not relish the inner organs of various animals. (Too high in iron for a person with my degree of Elf blood.) Diana liked the flavor but found it tough. I think its called Kokoretsi, but we kept leaving the phrase book back at the hotel.
I am sure we had some wonderful mutton at this place as well.
A least one day of our stay in Napflion was spent running around town looking for things like the bank, the tourist office, and a place where we could make our reservations on various ferries and high-speed catamarans, all ocean-going vessels. That would have been the day when we first saw the little fort on an island in the middle of the Bay of Napflion. That might have been the morning when I thought we had toured Mykenae, but hey, it has been a month. And all in all, the narrative drive seems, in the long run, more important than the exact order of the expedition. Such a scramble would not do for Archeology, where the exact order and location of every detail is vitally important, but it may serve for literary communication.
We retired, looking forward to Monday, and the performance, and whatever else we could fit in.
Looking back again, and reaccessing my Random Access Memory, I discover that the day I thought we had devoted to Mykenae was actually a day when we got there late, and spent time instead going through the chachki shops.
So...
On the Sunday we got up late and rather creakily and got on the road around noon. We had leftovers from the box feast at Nemea, went to Mykeknae, toured the museum, climbed the akropolis, and came down too late to see the tholos tomb, otherwise known as the Treasury of Atreus, etc..
We got to Nemea too late to get into the temple site or the museum, so instead I drove us over the mountain to show her the Temple of Herakles, and as much of the long race route as was practical. On the way back out the dirt road we encountered a farmer's truck off the road, and I got out to see if anyone was injured. There was nobody in the truck and I called out, and the driver appeared from the other side of the road. Though he had no English, he indicated that we might pull it back on the road.
It was a small Japanese truck, and we tried, but my long-term groin problem (the doctors tell me it is not a hernia, but an 'end of season football injury') prevented me from being any use. The driver made clear that he had called for help on his cell phone, and we headed out, just as someone bigger and stronger arrived.
Dr. Stephen Miller had asked us to come up to his house for coffee, and we followed his instructions through Nemea and up the hill.
I had heard about the house from a mutual friend, but it was still a surprise. Greeks usually build upward, vertically. Dr. Miller and his wife Effie have build vertically and horizontally, up and out, so that the top floor is more like a California ranch house, with wings. It is easy to spot from anywhere in the town, and is quite beautiful. The entry is on the top floor, with parking space up there (outside) as well, and when you enter you are struck immediately by the view. You look across the living space and through a window, and there you see framed the Temple of Zeus, now with eight columns rather than the three standing from antiquity. It is the centerpiece of the Valley of Nemea, and it manages to be both spectacular and subtle at the same time, residing amid the gentle green of the vineyards and homes that surround it. Residing, rather than dominating: a wonderful distinction.
The Millers led us into the library, where they have a large and long table with chairs, somewhere between a formal dining table and a executive meeting table.
Diana asked about a good book on the flora and fauna on Ancient Greece, and soon she was ensconced with the recommended tomes, while other guests arrived.
I am sure I have sung Dr. Miller's praises as an archeologist many times. He has the rare gift of doing important work and making it explicable to those beyond his field, without condescension or becoming a popularist. It might be well to note that both the Millers are consumately graceful persons as well, a thing not easy for people in the complex and difficult world of academia. It seems singularly appropriate that in retirement (which means spending the rest of his life cataloguing and writing books about the many years of work he has done at the site) they have the privilege of looking out each day on the results of a life well spent and the beauty that life has wrought (though not, as I am sure Dr. Miller would append, without a huge amount of help from many, many others).
Mrs. Miller brought in a large tray of chocolate-covered baklava and coffee, and then announced that it was a surprise party: for us, the guests, because although Dr. Miller knew it was his birthday, the rest of us did not.
Of course we sang the song (not the Berkeley version) and the conversation ranged hither and yon, and then it was time to leave. We were invited, the next night, to a performance at the home of one of the guests, which invitation we happily accepted. It was to be a Monday, and all the museums were likely to be closed. (Well, they are usually closed, but sometimes they are not..)
As the area of Argos is posted in all the tourist books as a place NOT to drive, and as everyone expected to have trouble finding it, Dr. Miller was to meet us all and lead us in caravan.
From the home of the Millers we made our way back down to the stadion, where a 'cultural event' was to take place.
This turned out to be a large pageant about Nemea, with many Goddesses and personified ideas and places communicating with the Goddess Nemea. It had amplified music, which was very good, and featured rhymed verse, something apparently unusual in Greek. We thoroughly enjoyed it, even without being able to understand the text. It is a mark of good pageantry that people be able to understand what is going on, even if they can't hear the words, and this criterium is especially important when many members of the audience may not have the language of the piece. As I believe most of the people in the audience may have been local, this excellence of the presentation was really good for us.
I do not have the name of the composer at hand, but then, being dropped into a dazzling variety of musics by performers famous in Greece, and in the rest of Europe, was both a joy and a despair. The composer was famous, but how was I to absorb it all, short of coming home with hundreds of CDs?
We made our way back to Napflion, and to the wonderful taverna that Mr. Economu had recommended.
Many of the eating establishments we visited on our trip hand the customers, as a matter of course, a little cardboard folder with information about the place you have just eaten: and a map, so you can find it again. This is a wonderful idea. Without the little folder I would not be able to tell you the name of the place.
I may not be able to tell you even so, because the folder is in Modern Greek: but here goes, with my ham-handed translation:
Koütoüki "To Parelthon"
It is located on Profiti Ilia, just off Xar. Trikoüpi, which runs between the main road to Argos and the main road to Epidauros.
I cannot recommend this place, and the wonderful family running it, too highly.
I think it was here that we first had lamb Kleftos (sp?), where the lamb and vegetables are wrapped in paper and slow-baked, but I am not sure. (The dish has great historical significance.) We had several deserts, on different evenings,, none of which were standard and all of which were great. We also had mezes, and Greek Salad, and ouzo. -Not on this night, but over the course.
In fact, the only thing we had that I didn't like was a Greek specialty of what I took to be kidneys roasted in slices on a spit. Unlike Mr. Leopold Bloom, I do not relish the inner organs of various animals. (Too high in iron for a person with my degree of Elf blood.) Diana liked the flavor but found it tough. I think its called Kokoretsi, but we kept leaving the phrase book back at the hotel.
I am sure we had some wonderful mutton at this place as well.
A least one day of our stay in Napflion was spent running around town looking for things like the bank, the tourist office, and a place where we could make our reservations on various ferries and high-speed catamarans, all ocean-going vessels. That would have been the day when we first saw the little fort on an island in the middle of the Bay of Napflion. That might have been the morning when I thought we had toured Mykenae, but hey, it has been a month. And all in all, the narrative drive seems, in the long run, more important than the exact order of the expedition. Such a scramble would not do for Archeology, where the exact order and location of every detail is vitally important, but it may serve for literary communication.
We retired, looking forward to Monday, and the performance, and whatever else we could fit in.