November Postcards from Symi

A splash of colour outside the carpenter's shop at the bottom of the Kali Strata.  Just in case you are wondering about the fast food signs - the premises were a gyros bar many many years ago, long before I came to Symi and I have been here for 20 years.

This house in Chorio was completed and blessed in 1914 - a momentous date if you think about all the things that happened that year and in the century that followed.

Not all bougainvilleas are magenta or purple - this one on the Kali Strata is a splendid opulent crimson.

Oranges slowly ripening in a walled garden on the Kali Strata.  Symi oranges are very bitter so not much good for breakfast juice but they make excellent marmalade and the locals also candy the peels in sugar syrup.

Friday morning rush hour.  Note the heavy dew on the cars in the foreground.

Hello!  Where's everyone going?  A foal watches the train go by.

A cardiologist is offering free basic checkups at the Cultural Centre this weekend and Symi's seniors are taking advantage of the opportunity. The alternative is a day trip to Rhodes plus at least 50 euros to see the cardiologist.  Pensioners in Greece don't get travel discounts, bus passes, pensioners' discounts or free medicines like they do in many other countries and at the same time pensions have been cut repeatedly, making life very difficult for the elderly here.