Sunset, Scooters & Starbucks
Trip Start
Apr 30, 2008
1
22
31
Trip End
May 31, 2008
Chania,
Greece
Saturday, May 24, 2008
My room is roughly three stories above the gift shop overlooking what becomes a busy alley of shoppers pawing the usual along a cobbled street. The shop across from my window offers African masks, slingshots and carved wooden penises. Talk about one-stop shopping.
But, Chania is a refreshing change from Santorini. Yes, there are crowds of out of towners like me, but at least they aren't served up in gouts via a cable car system and I have seen no organized tours. An e-mail from Vidya's friend Heather reveals they've left Chania for Mykonos, so we've missed that connection.
At 9 near the Venetian fort, I see a ceremony commemorating the Battle of Crete, which happened this month in 1941. It was the first assault via paratroop as the Germans descended on this island. It was also the first time Enigma decryptions allowed an Allied response. Near the Greek Navy and Army honor guard, a row of octogenarians and nonagenarians in Allied uniforms were on hand for handshakes from officials and the flags of Britain, Australia and New Zealand were raised over the fort.
Judging by the conversations I hear in the streets, the Germans are still landing.
I spend the day wandering through the Venetian maze of the old harbor, out along the outer harbor and the length of the breakwater out to the lighthouse, stopping frequently for iced coffees and the occasional beer and finishing a third of Maugham's "Cakes and Ale."
It's refreshing to spend the day at sea level.
Interesting to see the differences between Dubrovnik, Hvar, Split and Chania -- all Venetian ports, but each a unique variation. Foot-polished marble streets, peaked arsenals and fortifications similar, yet each adapted to their sites in different ways. Venice may have been its century's answer to the Dutch East India Company (or the Mafia), but they were no Starbucks when it came to architecture.
The street along the wharf is unfortunately wide enough to accommodate the ubiquitous parade of horse & buggy rides (because tourists need to ride in carriages in every city in the world and will do so someday on the moon) and here, in the interests of hygiene and aesthetics, they hang a sling beneath the horse's ass and the carriage to separate the street value from the GNP.
Only service vehicles ply the streets here in the old quarter, but scooters are as ubiquitous as street urchins playing "Never on Sunday" on their squeeze boxes.
I find a table in an upmarket eatery called Safran, around the corner from the 17th c. Mosque of the Janissaries, a welcome break from taverna fare. Chicken with morels in cognac sauce and medallions of pork stuffed with a creamed cheese and sun dried tomatoes with a good Cretan syrah. I watch the sun drop behind the White Mountains, still flecked with snow, and the inner harbor, while scooters weave around and between the townspeople and tourists sharing a warm May evening in a town that's been settled since the Neolithic era, and where the spires of cathedrals share the skyline with minarets.My waiter pours me a glass of the island's rakia (grappa, by any other name) flavored with honey, the perfect ending to the best meal I've had in sometime.
Comments
glad you're back in the good world
Chania will always inspire the joy of not being in Santorini. Maybe you you should make it your mantra. KT