Clean Monday

Clean Monday is the next day on the religious social calendar. Aside from giving everyone a 3 day weekend, what is it about? It is the beginning of Lent for the Greek Orthodox calendar - and the fasting begins. No food from animals that bleed, so no meat, poultry, fish, dairy products. What does that leave? The more expensive sea food like lobster and octopus, lots of vegetables and fruit, and bread. The ouzeri's (which traditionally serve sea food) make a killing in business on this day. While at the grocery stores, they are advertising sales on beef and feta. Ah, the deals a non-faster can get right now!

So what did we do to celebrate? Vasilis found out that our municipality was having a "do" at a theater up on the hill within walking distance of our house (if you don't mind hills). We hiked up there to find many people already gathered, eating the free food that had been supplied. You find that, aside from fruit/veggies, the allowed food is pretty colorless. They were serving a kind of bread that is really only made for Clean Monday (not sure why), halvas (it's made from semolina - there's a sweeter juicier version that is ok, but this I am not a fan of), pickled veggies and olive mix, and taramosalata (a sauce/dip made from fish roe - pretty fattening).

None of the food looked very enticing, which I suppose can be the point when you are fasting. We decided to go to our favorite ouzeri, handily placed on the other side of the hill. But first wee sat around a bit at the theater, waiting for the band to start playing. Unfortunately, they started with some modern music (I wanted to hear Greek folk music) and it didn't start well. So off to the ouzeri we go!

Thank goodness the band wasn't so hot, for the ouzeri was rapidly filling up when we got there. Thirty minutes later and we would have had a hefty wait period. One of our favorite dishes are small uncooked (marinated) filleted sardines, so we didn't quite make the fasting program. It's a bit odd to talk about fasting, knowing how full I was when we stepped away from the table!

After a delicious meal, sipping some ouzo in the sun, we went back down the hill and to possibly buy a kite. For the day or so before Clean Monday you see kites on sale all over the city. It is practically the only day you'll see kites flown here. Not being impressed with the quality, and a little full/tired, we took a pass. We'd like to buy a nice kite in the States next time around - something you can break down and use again.

After enjoying a cup of coffee at our local square, we called it an afternoon.

I know a number of people that escaped to their family village home for the 3 day weekend, but for those that stick around our agenda is what many do. Happily we avoided using the car that day, for those we saw stuck in traffic looked to have all holiday spirit sucked out of them already. We were lucky to have had things to do locally that we would enjoy!