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I found this old photo taken in the Bahia bar. My silly way of lightening the Chernobyl crisis. At the time fallout was threatening to radiate all of Eastern Europe. I remember there was run on NoyNoy tinned milk (there was no fresh milk to be had on the island bac ...
Chernobyl Special
Chernobyl Special
Donkeys Uber Alles Donkeys Uber Alles
Happy to be back in Greece after my first trip to the States since 2016. On Thanksgiving my sister in-law asked me what made the biggest impression of change in the ‘real’ world since my last visit … post-Covid etc. ! Quite shocking I can say: see ...
Donkeys Uber Alles
Donkeys Uber Alles
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Credit due, quite literally! When the world is facing an unprecedented energy crisis as 2022 draws to a close, our beloved Rock is now getting renewable energy. Hugely beneficial to the island in so many ways. Bravo, and thank you to those who made it possible! &nb ...
Hydra finishes the season on a high note!
Hydra finishes the season on a high note!
Inkaminicado! Inkaminicado!
Roger Green came up with a classic to describe the Rock’s permanent inmates when the summer swarms drive local denizens into hiding. Now into its third decade, the resident bard’s traditional Pirofani opening poem was spot on. We shall be blissfully Inka ...
Inkaminicado!
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A Lovely Tribute to Kamini’s Tassia A Lovely Tribute to Kamini’s Tassia
Share this:Click to share on Facebook (Opens in new window)Click to share on Twitter (Opens in new window)Click to share on Reddit (Opens in new window)Click to print (Opens in new window)Click to email a link to a friend (Opens in new window) { "@con ...
A Lovely Tribute to Kamini's Tassia
A Lovely Tribute to Kamini’s Tassia
Kamini April Fool? Kamini April Fool?
Who wants to go for a walk? Unanimous yes. Quandary in the port: left to Vichos, right to Hydra town, or a dip in the harbor. Happy Spring all. Share this:Click to share on Facebook (Opens in new window)Click to share on Twitter (Opens in ne ...
Kamini April Fool?
Kamini April Fool?
Romantic August Kamini Sunset Romantic August Kamini Sunset
  But the flip side of our photographic flags a fluttering in the breeze is that with temperatures in the mid 30,s  hot wind can cause deadly wildfires. (As poor Greece has already experienced recently)Please be extra vigilant and always carry water on walks, ...
Romantic August Kamini Sunset
Romantic August Kamini Sunset
Hydra Revisited Hydra Revisited
Honoured to be included. Latest Hydra Book Share this:Click to share on Facebook (Opens in new window)Click to share on Twitter (Opens in new window)Click to share on Reddit (Opens in new window)Click to print (Opens in new window)Click to email a link to a friend ( ...
Hydra Revisited
Hydra Revisited
Okay who’s next ??? Okay who’s next ???
Easy livin’ August was fun, y’all come back soon y’hear. So that is August in Kamini is almost done and dusted, who’s up for September? We are going to win this season, albeit on marginal points. Happy Fall y’All, still standing KC staf ...
Okay who's next ???
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Not Kamini’s Baby Beach Not Kamini’s Baby Beach
We have heard rumblings about August “Baby Beach” being a tad crowded. Try China for fun bathing then. Surfs Up Share this:Click to share on Facebook (Opens in new window)Click to share on Twitter (Opens in new window)Click to share on Reddit (Opens in n ...
Not Kamini's Baby Beach
Not Kamini’s Baby Beach

Extreme snail mail

It must be a record somewhere—nearly three years for a small package to reach our post office on the port. In the age of instant coms, it’s hard to believe that an envelope could literally take years to arrive at its destination (though the main thing is that it eventually did!).

Not so long ago an expatriate received a dog-eared, moth-eaten parcel that had somehow managed to travel half way around the world, twice, before landing on the Rock. No one knows for sure how this happened, but it evoked some speculation because the aforementioned mail had been franked in places as far away as Moscow and Montreal.

There was nothing obviously untoward about the address upon initial inspection; nor were the contents of the parcel extraordinary, just a couple of paperbacks, but it had also visited the United States a couple of times, as well as France and Italy.

It was addressed to

Mademoiselle “Jane Doe”
Poste Restante
Hydra
18040
Ελλαδα

So how did the package go on such an extended walk-about? Someone suggested that it went to both France and Quebec because the sender had quirkily titled the recipient “mademoiselle.” Another pointed out that the package may have been returned to the States, where it appeared to have come from originally, because the zip code for Hydra, 18040, is also the zip code for Easton, Pennsylvania.

It was then astutely decided that it had gone to a Russian post office because some bright spark had noticed that “Greece” had been written in an alphabet resembling Russian. Nobody could quite figure out why it had vacationed in Italy, except that Poste Restante sounded like an Italian pasta or something.

According to the stamp marks, in most cases the parcel had sat in an unknown/pending pile for a few weeks before some clerk had decided to pass the buck onto the next “logical” country.

When asked for our snail-mail address abroad, most folks don’t believe that what we tell them is sufficient. The lack of street name, house number, suburb, city, and state lines diverges suspiciously from what is regarded as the norm.

Keeping it simple works best. A sorting clerk in any post office anywhere initially looks at the address’s bottom line and puts the piece of mail in the relevant bin or pigeonhole. So, if it says Greece, it will go into an overseas box, then a European box, where it is then stuck in a mailbag destined for Athens. Once in Athens, it is then subsorted into suburbs, regions, or islands; so, something marked Hydra comes here. Once here, well, they know who we are:

Snail mail to Hydra, Greece

Whilst we do not advocate everyone keeping it this simple, that is, not even using a surname, snail-mail will find its way home … as we found out recently.

Jennifer
Jennifer first arrived on the Rock at the age of 10, after her father, Michael, bought a house above Hydra’s port. While she lived in Virginia year-round with her mother, Jeanne, and stepfather, Steve, she visited Hydra with her father every summer for a month, in her younger years tripping along the port chasing kitties, then later tripping home from Cavos to make her curfew (father had threatened to call the “police” if she was even a minute late).

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