Athens: A lot of really old stuff, pretty busy streets, and bars with “crisis menus” out front, offering cheap food.

The ATMs worked, the buses ran on time, the flights came and went. As a female, I felt safe, but I was usually with Justin, so clearly “spoken for”. Some other female travellers (take this with a grain of salt, said women were 18 year olds) said men were calling after them at the nightclub. Vendors were constantly calling after us as well, so I’m not sure how that factors in.

Lots to see, lots to do. Pretty neat place! Excellent ferry connections to other places, but online schedules and bookings were wrong, unreliable, and plain missing. It was better by far to go to the office and book there. The prices were far better, as well.

Language: Greek is tough. The alphabet is different, for one, so hard to sound out the words. Some sounds are also novel for the english tongue, and frequently used in greek. Fortunately, english translations are almost always below the greek word. But you still won’t pronounce them properly, the emphasis is completely different than we would expect, and it will be hard to make yourself understood. Write down the name, in both languages if possible.

The Acropolis is amazing, and worth the entrance fee a couple times over!

Wandering Dubrovnik, walking around the old city, surrounded by other tourists. This is supposed to be low season, not like the madness of August and September, but it is still madly busy here. Walking tour guides hold flags with numbers above their heads, so their charges can follow the right guide. The guides give details in every major language that travels, and the people look obediently up, eft, down. Here is where artillery shells scarred the stone walls from the Yugoslavic aggressions from 1991-1992. Here is the building of priceless art burned from within, incendiary shells smashing through the roof and igniting the contents of the house. The stone walls remained. The interior was rebuilt here, in tourist central. The roof rehung, the terracotta tiles relaid on the roof. The art however, is gone. Here is where the walls were expanded when the Turks became a mounting threat. Here is the harbour they stood off the sea siege sometime in the 600’s.

Here is a city older than a person can easily imagine.

Feral cats roam the streets. Life is hard for them, and sometimes sweet. I spotted a plate of cat kibble left out beside a dish of water. Though the cats do crap wherever they please, they do keep the mice at bay, and give the pigeons something to worry about.

A broad sweep of steps ends in a courtyard that most likely saw gatherings and markets from time out of mind. Now it is given over to outdoor patios for the nearby restaraunts. They put out the tables and huge square sun umbrellas. The people come flocking when hungry.

One part of the square remains the same. Small stands are set up, little more than cardtables, and usually women hawk their wares from the tables. Spices, candles, glasswork, and of course, lavander. It grows prolifically here and so they sell little sachets of the sweet smelling herb. I have been looking for one to remember Croatia by. And also my clothes could use a little help. There are very few dryers here, most people  doing their washing and then hanging their clothes to dry. It uses  less electricity, doesn’t heat up the house, and of course, things are so space-tight here that most people don’t have room for a dryer. They have tiny washing machines that have little drain hoses you have to stick into the toilet while the machine is in use. So, we have been doing the wash in the sinks of our hostels. With exactly three pairs of foootie socks, two pairs of hiking socks, and the luxury of four pairs of underwear, I don’t have to do laundry that often, but when I do, I really have to get it done! Washing the pants isn’t really high on my prioority list, and shirts only slightly more. So, a lavander sachet would be most welcome.

After searching around for a while, I found the perfect sized sachet. The price listed on the woman’s cart read 15 kuna, or 5 Euro. Well, 15 kuna is actually a little less than 2 eur, so this is like tourist tax for those too lazy to carry the predominent currency. I see this a few times, like candles in the church available for 2 kuna, or 3 euro. So, either 50 cents canadian, or $4 canadian, depending on what currency you can be bothered to carry!

note: the ‘ is actually supposed to be over the c in ´cevapi, but it appear my keyboard is thwarting my efforts at connect accentation

I saw it on the menu over and over again: ´cevapi. Usually near the bottom, usually reasonably priced, and I heard a few people ask after it. I didn’t know what it was. I didn’t know how it was pronounced.

After learning a few rules of the Croatian language, I thought it was pronounced chevAPI. So, now I may be able to order it, but no idea what it was, Some sort of meat dish.

One night, we were walking back to our hostel in Split, Croatia. Have I mentioned wine is quite cheap in Croatia? You can buy it in any grocery store, and an expensive bottle works out to $20 CAD. We discovered that $5 CAD was the bottom limit; wines cheaper than that were not worth drinking. You can also buy single beers and ciders in little convenience stands all over the place. They cost about 10 kuna, or $2 CAD, each. You can drink anywhere except beaches. Glass bottles are frowned upon, but still available.

So we were walking back to our hostel. There may have been some beers and ciders consumed. We passed a “fast food” stand (which is anything that is not a sit down restaraunt) on the flat part of two main roads meeting, near a small clump of tiny dumpsters. It smelled a bitt like piss over in the corner, and there were lots of pigeons, and feral cats hanging around earlier that day. Once again, I saw the ubiquitous ´cevapi listed. Well let’s have a street meat adventure! In another language! 10 pieces for 28 kuna ($6 cad)? Sounds like a deal.

I managed to order the ´cevapi without embarrassing myself, and tho most people in Croatia, especially those who interact with tourists at all, speak very good english, this vendor was not such a one. I managed to make myself understood, asking for 10 pieces by holding up my fingers, and he let me know it would be 5 minutes. Sounds good! Whatever I am getting takes 5 min to prepare!

The vendor then pulls out what looks like short thick skinless sausages from the fridge, and throws them on the grill. Aww yeah, we have street meat in the making!

After  a suitable amount of time had passed, the vendor got his younger, more fluent helper to ask us if we would like the red sauce. Umm, sure? His manner was that of the red sauce being the thing most people got, so I assented.

A warm mound of dense bread, cut into a pocket, a bunch of skinless sausages, a smear of red sauce, and we were holding ´cevapi! We took it back to the hostel, and were assured by the guy running the desk, who lived in the area, that this was the best food, and indeed, everyone ate it. We dug in, and it was delicious! The bread was springy, the meat perfectly seasoned, and the mystery red sauce the perfect mild accompaniment to the meat. We enjoyed every bit!

The next day, we went for a walk around Split, and stopped for a ´cevapi at a small stand. They were out! However, a Croatian resident with excellent english heard our plight, and recommended a great place for ´cevapi, by the name of something Pauline’s. It was on a corner in Old Town, we should go there! So we took off, and asking several people for the best ´cevapi, and confirming Pauline’s, we finally found it. For 22kuna, we had fresh grilled meat, soft mild cheese, and superior buns. The red sauce was fresh and delecious, the cheese a perfect accompaniment.

Croatia, I salute your cuisine! From peka (white wine, potatoes, carrots and lamb/beef/octopus) cooked in a cast iron iron closed pot surrounded by coals) to calamari (actually  whole small squid caught fresh and grilled with butter to perfection) to sladoled (cheap gelato-like ice cream available on every other corner) to ´cevapi, things are delicious here.

The old tow of Dubrovnik, the historic city center, is awash with tourists. The entire walled city is given over to the spending masses, with a handful of actual citizens still living in the shelter of the awe-inspiring walls. This city withstood a 15 month siege once. And then another siege. And another. And the Yugoslavic bombing and siege of ’91-’92. Standing on the top of the walls, staring down at the sea far below, it isn’t hard to imagine.

There are people everywhere. There are shiny stones on all the streets.

The wine is really cheap here.

after a while, the creak of the sailboat rigging becomes simply the sound one expects to hear. The gentle sway of the boat is with you every sleeping momeent, and then every waking moment, whether you are on land or not. I have nearly gotten used to the way grocery stores sway around me as I buy fresh fruit.

I have perrhaps never tasted a nectarine before. And perhaps never a pear. The taste of the fruit here, piicked out of their backyards and brought to market. I cannot describe it, save for imagine a pear with twice the flavour you were expecting, and not a trace of the just-about-to-rot you may have gotten used to at the Albertan grocery stores. Fruit is picked when ready here, and consumed shortly thereafter. We have yet to see a mega market in Croatia. There are Konzum stores, small one room affairs with a small selection of house type wares, fruit and yogurt. Bread is fresh every morning, and croissants usually have apples, jam, or best of all: chocolate baked right inside.

Burrow into the green tunnel, pushing vines aside gently. Crouch and scuttle along the ground. Stop, kneeling, and there is another cluster of ripe red globes, hanging among the green leaves. These ones are like tigers, faint green stripes marking their dusky red surface. I grasp the tomato and it parts from the vine with a whisper of leaves. A bee drones by above me, and then he leaves the plastic shelter of the greenhouse tunnel. I drop the tomato into the pouch I made at the bottom of my shirt. As long as I stay crouched, the shirt stays pouched. Reaching again, I snag a half seen tomato screened by lush green leaves. This one is so ripe it has split. Well, can’t have that in the pouch, so I bite into it. Juice flows into my mouth, sun warmed and ripe as only fruit on the verge of spoiling just before your hand plucked it can be. Delicious. I can almost feel the sunlight sustaining my flesh, the dirt nurturing my body.

The next plant over is a different variety of tomato. This one glows with a deep red. Hmm, slightly different taste, a subtle difference of texture. Supermarket tomatoes taste all the same; in the garden, every plant has its own character, every variety its own nuances. I might as well never have eaten a tomato before, save to establish a proper frame for appreciating these, sun ripened, picked at the peak of their fruiting, straight into my mouth. There is basil growing nearby, planted along the base of the tomatoes, as complimentary in growing as they are in eating. I pluck a crisp leaf and pop it into my mouth with the next tomato, a little orange globe perfect for one bite eating. Divine.

The city seems very far away right now. What am I supposed to be doing? Oh right, filling the bag my mum is holding, not my belly!

I unload my makeshift shirt-pouch into the bag, and pick some bunches of basil to join them. The tomato plants fairly groan with the weight of the tomatoes growing on their vines bending them earthward again. The fine red soil dusts those hanging lowest. I rub my hands together. My fingertips are sticky with a yellow dust. Pollen? Residue from the vines themselves, as I gripped them to gently remove the fruit without breaking the vine? I don’t know, I don’t know so very much about the food I take for granted will appear in my grocery store, grainy of flesh and bland of flavour.

We are at a coffee house, a small farm, and education centre, a place to learn what food is and how it must live. This place is all these things. Just off the main highway 101 running from the Bay of Fundy across the peninsula of Nova Scotia to the port city of Halifax facing the great Atlantic ocean, this ambitious place exists. Just Us Coffee, serving fair trade coffee, making chocolate, offering a few foods made from local produce, including the bounty of this garden.

We are in the greenhouse of the woman who runs the garden, educates those seeking organic food information, and engages the curious through their taste buds. The Tasting Garden is nearby, orderly rows of plants identified by neat placards. A small wooden sign is pushed into the earth near some small tomatoes, inviting the walkers of the garden to Try Me! in cheerful hand painted letters. It was at this row, as i was dusting off tiny delicious tomatoes that we met Sandy, the woman of the garden. Sandy invited us to pick freely in her greenhouse, as she said she couldn’t possibly get to all the tomatoes that had grown this year. So I found myself tunnelling thru the green rows, plucking the red tomatoes. When we finally emerged, Sandy refused any payment for the bounty, nor any tomatoes picked by us for her own self. No, she was happy to see the delight we took in the tomatoes, and insisted we take all we wanted.

I have found this to be the case in Nova Scotia. The people here are so friendly, so helpful. Sure, they gossip, but what small town doesn’t? And that is really what Novoa Scotia seems to be; a series of small towns along a few major highways, the fresh ocean breeze everywhere. People here reuse their stuff, sometimes to a degree that seems ludicrous to my Albertan ways of consumership. During the garage sale my mother and I had, I was amazed several times by the resourceful people buying the items for sale, and explaining how they would turn what I perceived to be scarcely better than junk into useful items. Reuse was everywhere, and the old stuff was especially prized for its old fashioned standards of workmanship.

This valley where my mother currently has a house is lush. Farms take up most of the landscape, and small farm stands are frequently seen along the roadways. Drive up, and a small stand crouches at the base of the family’s lands, stocked with the latest harvest. More often than not, no one is around, only the food and a small metal container requesting exact change. The prices are marked; choose your food and pay appropriately. The difference in taste is pretty hard to miss, once you get home. Some of the beets are scraped, some of the apples bruised. This is the food that doesn’t make it to the supermarket with it’s expectations of perfection. This is the food for eating, not looking at. What matter if the beet needs a little dirt in a scrape cut out of it before cooking? What matter of an apple grown lopsided due to being pushed up against a nearby tree branch? Or a little dirt on a basil leaf?

This food bears the marks of the land it grew in, the marks of the hands that harvested it. This food is real, it is local, and our dollars support our neighbours, not the companies that would make a fertile seed an illegal thing. This food is alive in a way I hardly appreciated a decade ago. In this valley, such food is commonplace, and the natural way to do things. The humid air enables such tremendous growth, the soil sustains such thriving plants. The farmers still live here, you can still meet them. You can still pick your own tomatoes, and for free when your neighbour has too many.

Harvest time in Nova Scotia is a lovely time to be here.

The eggs sizzled promisingly, the only sound in the darkened kitchen.  Well, there were other sounds, but this was the one I was most interested in.  I could hear music from the other room, a song about living simple at the end of a pitted gravel road.  Fitting for my current situation.  The night air came in through the open kitchen window.  Crickets chirped, and I could hear the faint jingle of a dog scratching their collar.  The stars were just visible, past the towering trees.  The wind was playing in the tops, swaying the leafy canopy far above, merely setting the trunks to quivering ever so slightly.  If I listened carefully, I could hear the soft whooshing of the wind, like a river just around the corner.

The smell of the eggs was growing, combining with the sharp cheddar I had grated into the pan, mingling with the spices.  Simple fare, but it would keep me going.  It was also one of my favorite meals that I can make quickly and easily.  That went a long way to endearing it to me as well.  I was looking forward to a quiet meal for this quiet evening.

The sound of shots rang out, loud in the otherwise still evening.  I jumped in my skin, and would’ve dropped anything I was holding.  My host was shooting off rounds into the darkened forest.  In the distance, I could hear a neighbor answer with a few rapid shots of his own.  After a moment, I could hear some more shots even further down the valley.  Just another evening at the end of the gravel road, with people bein’ neighborly.  I unwound my shoulders and finished my cooking.

I headed upstairs to watch a movie and enjoy my dinner.  After another round, the shooting had died down again, and everyone was back to their drinking.  After the movie, after dishes, I headed back outside.  The stars were bright above my head, and the moon was less than half full.  I listened to the soft night sounds.  Dog should be coming up any moment now, sensitive to the sounds of my feet in the front porch.  I stood a moment, looking around.  Where was she?

“Dog?”  I asked, looking about.  Have you ever tried to spot a black dog on a near moonless night under the tall trees?  I highly recommend it.  A wonderful exercise to keep one humble.

When there was no response from my usually attentive dog, I called a bit louder.  I stepped away from the front porch and further into the darkness.  The inky pools under the trees stared back, unrevealing.  Here was the other dog, annoyingly excitable in the face of my attempts to listen for my dog.  I shooed away the other dog, and called again.

There.  The faint jingle of her collar tags.  I listened, but the sound did not repeat.

“Dog?”  I queried the darkness.  A whine answered me, and I turned.

The front porch was about five feet off the ground, and the open face of it had been fenced in with trellis.  Behind the cheerfully crossed pattern of the light wood, I saw the starlight glint off Dog’s eyes.  I could hear her panting gently in distress at being unable to come to me, and I could hear the faint whoosh of her tail wagging with pleasure at my attention.  Her eyes beseeched me, completely confident I would be able to extract her from this predicament.  I sighed.

I went back inside and fetched a light.  Sliding down the slight slope of the earth beside the fenced in porch, I came to a corner.  I reasoned that this inside right angle was probably where she has forced her way thru the trellis to hide from the gunshots.  Sure enough, I found a place where one sheet of trellis could be just pushed in, allowing something frightened and silly to get in.  Once in however, there was no way to force back out.  I sighed, and teetered on a tumble of concrete clumps to push in the trellis.  The other dog figured I was finally coming down to her level, and she immediately wriggled right into my way, attempting to smear my face with her muddy tongue.  I shoved the other dog away with a curse, the only language she seemed to pay heed to.  One more glare was needed to keep the other dog at bay, and then I pushed at the trellis again.  Dog slithered around the corner, claws scrabbling on the debris under the porch.  The slope was awkward, but she did manage to squeeze out.

Dog was ecstatic, pouncing all over the ground before me.  The other dog leaped on her, teeth nipping her and growling in her exuberant adolescent way.  Dog shook her off, and continued to celebrate her freedom and my attention.  I sighed, and scratched her behind the ears, pushing away the other dog again.  I had no doubt Dog would not hesitate to get under the deck again should more shots be fired off.  Of course, then I could rescue her again, and cause such delight.  Some things about a dog’s life are pretty simple.