SPITTING ON BLUSHING PINKS AND LILAC BLUES…

We had our garden dug and prepared for the new planting season since the beginning of April. Normally, we would start planting before Easter. But this year the Greek Easter ambled in leisurely and coupled with the lockdown, we somehow couldn’t find the drive to plant early. Last Saturday, however, the eve of the Greek Easter, we stood outside and surveyed our garden. New leaves were unfurling on the trees and plants, the rose bushes were thickening out with buds of yellows, pinks and reds, just waiting to burst open and the daisy shrubs were crowned with flowers. But amidst all this growth and radiance, some plants stood in stark contrast Most of our beautiful tubs of hydrangeas had withered. For years their broad green leaves and their clusters of flowers in pinks and whites adorned the back terrace and the yard behind the kitchen. The same thing befell our gardenias, their once shiny dark green leaves and white flowers, which suffused the air with their exotic perfume as dusk crept in, stood wilting and sulking in corners. Last winter, two of our climber roses dried up and so did our ancient lemon tree which Yiannis’ grandmother had planted after the war.

I suppose plants like everything else in nature have their days numbered. They blossom, bloom, fruit, thrive…then dry up because they grow old or suffer some sudden blight. But Jimmy, who helps us in our garden doesn’t share my belief. He hails from Albania and came to Greece as a refugee more than thirty years ago, risking life and limb… wading through icy swift flowing rivers, crossing the rugged Pindus mountains and clambering up trees to escape packs of wolves and wild bears, hiding in the dense forests…all the while… cloaked in a heavy mantle of superstitions that kept him wary of the unseen sinister forces. He has, however, found good company here in Greece as most Greeks are equally steeped in superstitions. So when Jimmy saw me walking around, shrugging my shoulders with my very ` c’est la vie ‘ attitude, he laughed. But in his eyes I could see that he regarded me a heathen, a non- believer, a person of less than sturdy convictions… Why?…Because I wasn’t attentive to the forces at play around me…particularly the evil eye. Standing alongside us, gazing at our dried out plants, I could sense the innuendoes hidden in the laugh lines around his eyes…it was that menacing eye that had visited pestilence on our plants

Whenever the neighbours sitting on their balcony, comment on our vegetables or passers-by stop to admire our tomatoes, sweetening under the summer sun, our courgettes and cucumbers growing crunchy and green or our chillies sticking out like red tongues of flames… Jimmy gives Yiannis and me side glances and I know what is to follow, and before it can follow, I slip away quickly into the kitchen and get the deed done. In a few minutes, I hear Yiannis’ heavy footsteps crunching in. He clears his throat and tries to sound casual…` Do we have any garlic? ‘… I point to the basket where I keep the onions and garlic. He rummages through it and finds a single whole white bulb. He clears his throat once more…` Don’t we have any more? ‘ he asks, cupping his palm to denote many heads of garlic. I shake my head with a straight face, not betraying a trace of emotion. A couple of years ago, they hung four round white healthy heads of garlic under the tangerine and orange trees to ward off the evil eye, cast by random people passing by and admiring our garden. What a waste! It could have gone into my spaghetti sauces. Now that I can sniff out their moves, I hide the garlic and allow Yiannis to find only one knob. Lately, he’s started buying his own garlic and hiding it in the garden shed. I’m surprised they haven’t hung a couple of ` dordolec[s] ’ or scarecrows for added protection, as they do in Albania.

I had a cleaning lady not too long ago, who was adept at unhinging and routing out the evil eye… even over the phone. Whenever she caught me yawning…once, twice… during lazy summers, when the air was sultry and my eyelids were heavy…she’d nod her head knowingly and mutter that I was  `mathiasmeni ‘… I was evil-eyed. She’d offer to rattle off a quick chant and rid me of it…` No thank you! ‘ I wasn’t going down that slippery slope… there would be no redemption for me after that, as every little mishap or twitch would be attributed to that sinister eye, prowling in the shadows. Friends and relatives would call her on the phone while she was mopping the floor or cleaning the windows or hosing down the terrace… she’d squeeze the phone between her shoulder and her ear while still working and go into this drowsy incantation, disarming the evil eye and booting it out of them. When she stopped working for us I was relieved, especially after what Jimmy had said in his usual humorous way… `Anyone who can cast it out… can just as well cast it in. ‘ Was this what happened to Miu a couple of summers ago when she was sitting quietly on the terrace and licking herself? We heard her shriek and afterwards… she walked around with a distinct limp. Was that ominous eye… cast into her? It would have made a good story…but no…no eye was a match for the cleaning lady. The problem with Miu is that she tends to sit in people’s way…and the woman, with her bristling energy and mighty tread, I fear, had trod upon the hapless creature and thundered away unawares.  

Coming back to our dead plants… standing around and talking about them was not going to resurrect them. So we decided to do the next sensible thing…go to the garden shop and get new plants. We got two thorny climber roses, a pink and a yellow one…heavily scented, we were assured, as the owner had sent his son off to sniff out the roses and he returned with those two specimens. We also bought four bushy hydrangeas with blooms as big as bowls and three geraniums with plump buds. We also threw in the usual colourful petunias for our clay pots on the low stone wall and others to hang under trees and flutter in the breeze like pretty butterflies.

 Yiannis drew up the pickup by the back garden gate and as we were unloading the plants, our neighbour sitting on his balcony and watching us, shouted across…` Bravo! Bravo! Poli oraia![ Very beautiful ]’ … We then waited for him to spit…but he didn’t. He should have. It would have saved us the garlic. In Greece, it’s customary to make spitting sounds…` Ftou! Ftou! Ftou! ‘ when you want to say how remarkably beautiful something is. It is a very considerate thing to do because even if your compliments are trembling with envy…which is the root of all evil eyes…spitting can put a damper on it…snuff it out before it can whizz towards its target and shrivel it down. From the corner of my eye, I caught Jimmy spitting into his clothes silently…another effective way to halt the evil eye in its tracks and send the volley back.

Now that the weather is warming up, I can hardly wait to bring out the garden furniture and have our meals on the terrace…among our tubs of scented gardenias and new hydrangeas, blushing pinks, bridal whites and lilac blues, under a clear summer sky. And…FTOU! FTOU! FTOU! to them.