Greek Cats are Harder than Scottish Cats but Scottish Youth Would Tank Greek Youth

Greek cats would murder Scottish cats. Fat and soft, Scots pussies want for nothing as they snore by the fireplace.

Meanwhile, life is raw for their Greek counterparts. Only a spoilt minority are family pets; the rest are hard-as-nails feral street-beasts who fight for food and die in forgotten alleyways. The guy above is having a good day - he's stumbled across a random deposit of sardines near the wharf, but he'll need to eat it quick.


This one is more typical: he looks like he's been in a fight and maybe he hasn't eaten much more than the stinking remains of an abandoned souvlaki for the last few days.

Oddly enough - the story with teenagers is the exact opposite.


The kids round here are breast-fed to the age of 30. Their only worry is what time their next pizza is to be delivered, while Greek parents work themselves into the ground to pay for it.

Glasgow's wiry young teams would tear them apart, limb from fat limb...

...but their cats would kill ours and so the question remains: which country is best?

East End Scene

This is a drawing of the East Harbour, beyond the fish market, the less popular side of Pothia's harbour where ferries don't dock and old dolphin boats go to rust and die.

Dogs are chained to rocks and people leave their front doors open; if you look in as you walk past you can see old people laid out under blankets on single beds.

From a metre-wide strand of gritty sand, housewives wade into the water, fully clothed, to swim every day for health. Somehow it doesn't stop them being fat.

I like the East Harbour.

A Moment of Peace

Aside from the crime and the riots and the dead animals which are, admittedly, more newsworthy there is a world of peace and beauty on Kalymnos that's worth reminding you about

After a more than a year away from Glasgow it's still remarkable to be living with so much sky and water.

Dawn is the best time of day to appreciate this, the quiet hour after the sun rises up over Kos but before everyone wakes up and starts fighting.

Don't worry - stories of malcontent will return as usual next week...

Crime Scene

So we finally got exposed to the Kalymnos crime scene this week when a little local incident resulted in a trip to the police station to make a report plus visits to the neighbours to ask them to keep an eye out.

It's good for our Greek. We now know the words for "thief", "electric drill" and "together we must protect our houses."

Merry Xrisis!

So, the rioting has been cancelled for a few hours to let Santa Claus through to do his thing.


Don’t get us wrong: we have nothing against law and order, per se, but it's freezing and we find the best way to keep warm at this time of year is to set a car on fire and run away from the cops.


So whether you're an enemy of the state or one of the political mafia, we say: MERRY CHRISTMAS TO YOU!

Another Day in Paradise

The ants have eaten the best part of the fish and now they begin on the head.

The fish herself stopped thinking about anything a while ago.

Never Knowingly Understated

You might have noticed a bit of Athens-based bother on the news lately. There are no riots here in sleepy ol' Kalymnos but I did find this leaflet the other day:

The headline translates (as far as we can make out):

THEY MURDER CHILDREN, THEY STEAL PENSIONS
THIS ISN'T A STATE - IT'S A MAFIA

The headline is followed by a reproduction of Picasso's Guernica for added effect.

We did hear some car-horns and chanting the other morning but by the time we got out to look for the riot, everything had gone back to normal: old men were smoking fags in the cafes and old women were crossing themselves as they walked past churches.

We don't think the Greek state is about to collapse.