Zambolis apartments

Zambolis apartments
For your holidays in Chania

Saturday 9 November 2013

Silent beauty (Αμίλιτη ομορφιά)

Last weekend was a busy one for us, as we had to clear the summer garden of the old crops which were now not producing in good form since the arrival of the colder weather and shorter days. By Sunday afternoon, most of this work had finished. To get away from the house, we suggested to the kids to take a drive out to our village fields... which they politely turned down. Now that they are getting older, not only do they not want to do things with their parents, but they don't even want to accompany them! Worse still, they are now using the NO word as a response to politely-stated imperatives!! To top it all off, they even said: "Aren't you tired of taking us everywhere? Don't you want to do something on your own for once?"!!!
They're getting bigger...
So we left them at home watching at least one of the many screens we have in it (tv, computer, tablet), and husband and I climbed into the car (together with our dog) and went on a peaceful drive out to the fields all by ourselves, as the kids suggested (the silence was deafening), to see what life looked like away from our creature comforts.

The first sight we came across was a potato patch:

... and a field full of winter greens (lettuce, onions, celery, parsley, broad beans, etc):

Look at how fresh everything looked: these fields have never been planted before, so the earth is very pure.

Another part of the field has been sown with spinach, which is just coming up.

The photovoltaics in the background are not part of our own fields, but it's a growing movement as part of the concept of green energy from Renewable Energy Sources. I am not really convinced - most of these panels went up during a period when certain licences were being handed out to certain individuals who were subsidised: it's always the same people being subsidised for various projects, so it's not as though many people are profiting (it ends up being the same ones for different projects).

All these vegetables have been planted by a laiki (street market) stall holder using our field. So for the first time, vegetables grown on our fields will now be available for sale to the townies. We are hoping that the farmer will remember our contribution during the harvest period; he is a cousin, after all! If that fails, I could just take a little trip every Saturday to the street market and pick up my weekly needs...

The children need not have come to see these sights with us; after all, the trip had a very functional purpose. But I wonder if they would have been equally fascinated as I was when I saw the fresh new pine trees growing on one of the empty spaces where seeds were dropping onto it from a pine tree overlooking our field which is located on a higher point.

And if I pointed out the different hues of the mountains in this light, I wonder if they would have looked up and said "Oh, now that is beautiful, they all look a different shade of blue", or whether they would have said: "We see the mountains from home too, big deal."

They also missed the sunset that we saw from this spot, which is a shame as they generally don't see many sunsets during the school year, because our house is located in such a way that we have a good view of sunrise and not sunset. But maybe they'll say that the sun rises and sets every day, so they will eventually see it another time. Yes, they will, I remind myself, but probably not from this place.

This coming weekend looks like it's going to be another calm one, before it starts to rain again (as the weatherman predicts). They may be lucky to catch sight of this sunset if they decide to follow us on our trip.

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