GREEK LOAF

Our luxury villa has been laid waste, pulverised into little more than a pile of gravel on an arid hillside. Either that or the sat nav got it wrong.

"Ring the number."

"I’ve tried, it doesn’t work. Just goes to beeps."

Despite our best efforts we’re both thinking the unthinkable. That we’ve been taken in by people who dupe people far less intelligent than us. That we might have to go on the telly and sit side by side holding hands to relate our sad and tragic tale for the amusement and edification of people to whom this kind of thing never happens. People like us.

Nearby a goat bleats insensitively as if nothing’s happened.

"What do the directions say?"

"Turn left before the Shell garage." 

But this doesn’t feel like the kind of place you’re going to find one of those. In fact it feels like we're the first motor vehicle ever to pass this way. Other than the one that brought the gravel. 

"We need to ask someone."

It’s a sad fact that you only remember how hard holidays are when you’re actually on one. Back home they always seem like such a good idea. Bit like having children: we do it again because we forget. How the heat hits you like cement poured from a great height. Hot cement poured from a great height. How you seek refuge in the cool of the hire car only to discover you can’t drive it because your gear changing arm is on the wrong side of your body. And all the things that make roads work properly have been suspended for the duration of your stay. Like markings, meaningful signs, driving on one side only, and not turning into a footpath at a moment’s notice. And when you do finally get to where you want to go you actually don’t. Because it doesn’t exist.

The goat bleats again, reminding us that the only other living thing in this wretched place is about as much use to us as Apple Maps. 

I have one of those moments when I’m looking back from an imagined place in the future where everything’s okay again. This is reassuring, because it suggests to me that such a place exists. But, like our villa, I have no clue how we’re going to get there. I’m tempted to sit back and see what happens. But fate is a strange thing; out of our hands while entirely of our doing. I wonder if there are any Greek gods still operating in the area. Probably not.

So ten minutes later I’m staggering blinking and bewildered into a small supermarket, doing the only thing a man in my predicament can do. Asking if anyone speaks English.

"Yes of course", says a radiantly bronzed and bearded fellow who rises up from behind a deep freeze of calamari like hope dawning. 

I hand him the directions and explain, in a tone that makes it clear I hold him partially responsible (being Greek), that neither the phone number or villa exist. He whips out his phone and within seconds is engaged in a lively conversation with the villa owner. Then:

"Come. I show you." 

Shamefaced, I accompany him outside where he kickstarts his motorbike and waits patiently as I summon up the coordination to turn the car round and follow him down the busy waterfront. Turning inland he guns his engine and accelerates hard into the olive groves. I’m wringing every ounce of power from my entry level Hyundai but still he pulls away into the distance.

"Come on Jes, for Christ's sake, keep up!"

Thankfully he slows to commune with a small child at the roadside and we catch up just in time to see him throw up a cloud of vapourised rubber and shoot out of it like that bat you used to hear so much about when sweaty fat men were still allowed to sing on the telly. Then comes the main feature. If there’s anything cooler than riding through an olive grove on a Harley Davidson without so much as a helmet, it’s riding through an olive grove on a Harley Davidson without so much as a helmet - on one wheel. And that’s what happens next, a perfectly executed wheelie that just keeps on wheeling. My passengers erupt into spontaneous squeals of delight.

"Come on Jes, he’s losing us. Go faster!"

But he doesn’t let us fall too far behind - why would he want to lose his audience? - and soon he’s in back in conventional two-wheel mode and guiding us through the tangle of narrow alleyways to our villa. There, we prostrate ourselves and laud him with extreme gratitude. The man who brought us out of the shadows. Who gave us our holiday back. But it’s all in a day’s work, and he’s soon back on his bike and wheeling off to save someone else’s day.

Later that night we’re back in town needing stuff for breakfast. The family wants to go and see Greek Loaf (for that’s what he’s been christened), and we find him fresh-faced, smiling, and still enormously helpful. I brace myself against a sack of aubergines to withstand the full force of his high five, and wonder if our debt to him amounts to more than the price of a loaf of bread, bottle of milk, two bottles of water and a jar of nescafe.

The next night we need more milk. I sit in the car looking over the bay at the two black humps of Ithaca, beloved home of Odysseus, while the family troops back into the supermarket to pay tribute to our own Greek hero. I’m giving it a miss. The tan’s coming along, but in local terms still amounts to little more than a slight pink colouration upon the shoulder, nose and kneecaps.

They return with biscuits and water. 

"Was he there?"

"Yes, he was asking for you."

“Really?" 

Two days later we’re back again, and planning a barbecue. The bike’s outside, I hang back.

"Jes, you need to come in. You’ll need to carry the charcoal."

“Okay."

He welcomes me with open arms and a slap on the back. As though I’ve just come out of a coma. Keen to put the relationship squarely on a business footing, I ask if he has charcoal. Because if he has, I have money. Of course he has but it's in the basement, and he stands on a little platform in the corner which lowers him down, amusingly. He quips there are girls down there and winks. I respond unconvincingly with a laddish grin and small cheering sound. 

A moment later he’s back with a huge dirty sack, way too big but it’s all he's got. My wife intimates that after all he's done we can hardly exercise our consumer rights and insist he sells us what we actually need. So I take it, and carry my filthy burden of indebtedness around the store as the kids pile on the accoutrements.

Approaching the checkout he swoops in with a plastic bag and a damp cloth. Carefully lowering the charcoal into the bag he takes each of my hands - my pale, feeble hands - and wipes them clean.

Outside Ithaca has all but dissolved into the deepening darkness. We weave through the pairs of promenading holidaymakers, venturing into the strangely intoxicating evening like so many fish out of water. It strikes me that there’s nothing less heroic than a tourist. What with their new white pumps, embarrassing pastel clothes and determination to do nothing useful. In a land that overflows with the damn things it’s all too easy to carve out a legend for yourself. It only takes a quick ride to the next village for half a dozen eggs and the next thing you know they’re saying you’ve spent ten years evading cannibals, getting off with witch goddesses and vanquishing monocular giants. 

I go ahead to the car to get the air con going.

Let’s face it, it’s easy to be a hero when you’re surrounded by people having a fortnight's break from trying. Being a hero back home, well that’s a different matter. I’d like to see how Greek Loaf gets on amongst people who are actually doing things. Urgent things. Things with deadlines that can only be done sitting down in a hushed grey place with a computer. I may not be able to do a wheelie, but I could certainly show him a thing or two on a… 

On a what?

Sweating within the blast furnace of the uncooled Hyundai I contemplate the distant lights of Odysseus’ hometown and think about all the ways I could impress Greek Loaf. And decide there aren’t any. The only thing I can do that he can’t is what I’m doing right now. He can pull a wheelie. I can travel two thousand miles to somewhere way too hot to do absolutely nothing except go a bit pink and pour copious amounts of money into his shop on a more or less daily basis.

No wonder he thinks I’m amazing.

For more tales from Kefalonian set course for:

Battle for Beach 8

@jesoverthinksit