Delirium

I often feel absolutely delirious when I am in Greece.  Several factors usually contribute to this altered state.  I have learned just to roll with it, letting the delirium wash over you is easier than trying to fight it.

1. The ten hour time difference between Los Angeles and Athens.  It is really hard to shake your jet lag and reset your internal clock.  Day is night and night is day.

2. You sweat so much due to the sweltering heat that you become dehydrated unless you drink copious amounts of water. Dehydration is the fastest route to delirium.

3. You expended all of your energy walking up one side of the mountain and down the other just to get to an ATM machine.  And you sweat so much in the process that you are dehydrated again.

4. You spent all afternoon in the sun sorting soil over a fine garden sieve, and now you can't remember what day it is.

5. Now you are back out in the sun hanging out the laundry that you just washed by hand.

In this photo there are two Greek dictionaries.  The first one is Spanish to Greek and the second is English to Greek.  

I my delirious state last year I bought the Spanish to Greek dictionary and did not realize it was not English to Greek until about a week into my trip.  I laughed and laughed at my error. Luckily both Andrea and I are pretty good Spanish speakers, so we got by OK.  This year we've corrected our mistake and have an English to Greek dictionary.  Hurray!

My Greek is improving, I know just enough to be dangerous.  Locals keep on attempting to teach me, but my retention rate is low.  Must be the heat, or the wind or the jet lag.

More soon.