Download Blue Skies and Black Olives: A Survivor's Tale of Housebuilding and Peacock Chasing in Greece AudioBook Free
It was an instant of mad impulse when John Humphrys decided to buy a semi-derelict cottage and a building site on the plot of land overlooking the Aegean. Some minutes' gazing out over the most glorious bay he previously ever before seen was all it took to persuade him. In the end, his kid Christopher - a professional musician fluent in Greek - was already nurturing his family there so he'd help build the beautiful villa that John dreamed of. What could possibly go wrong?Everything. John was to spend much of the next four years regretting his moment in time of madness.Some of it experienced its comic side. He learned to cope with the escaped peacock that took over his lemon grove and even a colony of rats that took over the cottage. A number of the humans demonstrated trickier: the old man challenging repayment for olive trees in the center of John's own land; the unfriendly neighbour who tried to barricade him in and the friendly neighbour who dragged his lovely old fishing boat onto the beach and set open fire to it after a row with his wife. And, of course, the contractors. If you have ever struggled with contractors, read this and become grateful.John learned a whole lot about Greece in a short time. He grew to love and lament the country and its people, but was never for an instant bored stiff by them. And Christopher learned a little more about John. Their shared experience revived eager stories for him of growing up with a daddy for whom persistence was never the strongest virtue...Here daddy and son inform a story by turns entertaining and revealing in regards to a country that intrigues and infuriates in identical measure.
