Easter 2020

This Holy week will be different from many perspectives.

Corona pandemic has changed so many aspects of our lives already. But as our spiritual father said, it is now the perfect time to really connect with Christ and seek deep inside of us to find the prayer we’ve lost. We are so used to going to church every Sunday, there are people who show up to the church only for the Holy week, there we are casually forgetting the meaning behind these days.
Let’s make this Holy week different. Let’s get ready to follow Christ in his Crucifixion in order to be with Him in Resurrection!

Apricot’s hidden treasure

Do you have things that you postpone again and again, even for years, till you end up with a huge to-try list? After surviving meningitis this year I catch myself daring more things and trying things I’ve always wanted to do but never had the time, energy or money to. Of course, withing my healing process limits.

One of those things I wanted to try is making my own apricot stone liqueur. I’ve always loved baking, making jam and preserving fruit. It is in my culture, I guess, and in our family too. My mom would make and still makes all kinds of jams, marmalades, spoon sweets (glyko tou koutaliou). Filling pots with apricot jam, sweet vyssino (sour cherry), sweet neratzi (bitter orange) and anything you can imagine. Every year when she comes to visit us here in the Netherlands, small or big colourful jars pop up from her suitcase to bring us all the wonderful flavours from Greece. Of course, nostalgia hit my soft spot and I remember all the moments, stories, smells and tastes.

 

Every summer I remember my grandmother having somewhere in the garden (in front of the big bedroom window to be precise) a glass container with apricot pits that seemed to disappear somewhere around August. I remember my father saying how his grandmother would smash those little pits and make liqueur out of it and how amazing the smell of the little kernels inside was. I believe it is still one of his favourite smells. We had broken some pits together and I remember the unbelievable smell and the really bitter taste of those smooth little white kernels.

I never tried this liqueur since I was only a child and I never really experiences this ritual of breaking the pits to reveal all those little noyax- as this is their name. But, every time I eat a fresh apricot I always find it such a pity to through away this little «box» with the hidden treasure inside.

So this year I decided to give it a try and make my own noyax liqueur. In honour of my grandmother and great grandmother (and theia Mina of course).

But first I need to collect enough, around 60 which shouldn’t be too difficult as we love them..

 

What does your to-try list look like? Mine has many more things on it, but I guess one has to start somewhere.

Wish me luck!

Panagiota

 

Shower

Today I sobbed under the shower. It is a lovely Thursday morning, my 4 year old son is at school and my 8 month baby daughter is at the daycare. We got them ready in the morning, my husband brought them and continued to his work. I had an antibiotics pill, then a silent breakfast and could rest a bit more. It was a good day and then it got me.. the memory of one of our last happy days before meningitis. I write it now and tears are difficult to hold back. I even have a photo of me with the two of them, my baby nursing and my son hugging both of us. A lovely moment. I knew I had to take a photo of us cause it was such a precious moment. I’m so thankful I did.

When I returned home, after two weeks in the hospital, I did try to breastfeed my baby girl again but it was too much, too difficult for both of us. She was confused and hurt and I was confused and broken.

Breastfeeding has been so important for me and my son and the first six months of my daughter’s life. And yet I convince myself that it is ok now, she is happy with the formula milk and we still get to hug and sing, she still sleeps in my arms and most importantly she still has a mother. I am alive. It’s just that sometimes the pain of this sudden separation becomes more clear, more sharp and among the other things I went through these last months, this is also hurting me.

I am happy and thankful that I am alive. I am happy and thankful to God that he brought me back to my husband and children. I am happy and thankful that I can walk again, talk again, breath and smile. I am thankful that I can now shower unassisted. But still the burden of this excruciating illness is here. The hearing loss is always here-thankfully only from the one ear. The weakness is here. The different looks on other people’s faces are here.

Lord, Jesus Christ, Son of God, have mercy on me, a sinner.

lovely wishes at my hospital room

I cried today in the shower. And my soul needed it. A cleansing from inside. Water and tears. I can go on, I know I can.

 

Your hands

Your Hands
by Pablo Neruda

When your hands
leap towards mine, love,
what do they bring me in flight?
Why did they stop at my lips,
so suddenly,
why do I know them,
as if once before,
I have touched them,
as if, before being,
they travelled
my forehead, my waist?

Their smoothness
came winging through time,
over the sea and the smoke,
over the Spring,
and when you laid
your hands on my chest
I knew those wings
of gold dove,
I knew that clay,
and that colour of grain.

The years of my life
have been roadways of searching,
climbing of stairs,
crossing of reefs.
Trains hurled me onwards
waters recalled me,
on the surface of grapes
it seemed that I touched you.
Wood, of a sudden,
brought me the contact with you,
the almond-tree summoned
your hidden smoothness,
until both your hands
closed on my chest,
like a pair of wings
ending their flight.

 

 

let’s spread the .. thread!!

I share a lot of things with my sister Marietta,
one of which is our love for crafts.!!
We love to crochet, knit, sew, embroider and more!!

We are a team, we are called Double Crochets.
We crochet at the strangest places around Athens,
and we have a crochet-knitting club,
our goal is to spread the word or let’s better say
«spread the thread».

I proudly present to you our blog:
Double Crochets 

we both love the internet, but marietta loves it more

we both love yarn, but panagiota loves it more

we will spin a yarn through our blog…
follow us!

..but I always get up

 translated from icelandic

 

 

Hoppípolla/Jumpin’ Puddles

«Smiling 
Spinning ’round and ’round 
Holding hands 
The whole world a blur 
But you are standing 

Soaked 
Completely drenched 
No rubber boots 
Running in us 
Want to erupt from a shell 

Wind in 
Aand outdoor smell of your hair 
I hit as fast as I could 
With my nose 

Hopping into puddles 
Completely drenched 
Soaked 
With no boots on 

And I get nosebleed 
But I always get up «

Sigur Rós

είναι αλήθεια
ένα παιδί όσες φορές κι αν πέσει,
σηκώνεται ξανά
θα κλάψει
θα πονάει
πολύ
ή
και λιγότερο
αλλά θα σταθεί όρθιο
θα σφίξει τις μικρές παλάμες του
με πείσμα
ένα χαμόγελο
θα εμφανιστεί στο πρόσωπό του
και θα συνεχίσει
το παιχνίδι

και τι είναι η ζωή
παρά ένα αδιάκοπό
λίγο πιο σοβαρό
παιχνίδι

σήκω
ξανά
μπορείς!

la foule

τι ρόλο αλήθεια έχει να παίξει το πλήθος;

τι είναι όλοι εκείνοι στις πλατείες και στα πάρκα;
άλλοι μιλούν για χαβαλέ και άλλοι για αντίσταση,
άλλοι πάλι φοβούνται για προπαγάνδα και άλλη για καθοδηγούμενη εκτόνωση,

κι εγω ;

εγω δεν εχω κατεβει στο σύνταγμα καθόλου, δεν άκουσα, δεν είδα, δεν ένιωσα, δε ξέρω

όπως και τόσοι άλλοι,

μόνο ένα θα πω

«Neither a man nor a crowd nor a nation can be trusted to act humanely or to think sanely under the influence of a great fear»

Bertrand Russell

 

 

watch your butterfly fly

so it’s been a while
since you rescued my world,
all the trees were then green,
now the leaves fall..
aw it’s been a while
since you loved my smile,
now the chrysalis’s empty
watch your butterfly fly..

what a life to live..

«Baibaba Bimba

One warm flash lights by flocking together appear and wink

with good smell

Starting of departure has been stimulated and rhythmed up by breathing

The sea who waits our navigation is becoming big or small

with good-bye and hello.»

what a story to tell,
what a music to play,
what a song to sing,
what a life to live..

with all our thoughts close to japan

beautiful mornings