Lesvos, Day 1

We arrived on the island yesterday. I've chosen to give up calling it Lesbos in favor of the Greek version because I came here with a woman (Julie) and once you've felt the gravity of the situation here, all jokes are off. We flew in from Athens into a rather rinky dink airport. Our rental car is rather rinky dink as well. We needed the help of a strapping young German to get our behemoth suitcases to fit in the backseat. They are so large not because we a couple of clotheshorses, but, wishful thinking, we brought toys, books, mylar blankets, etc. for refugees in need. Arriving at the airport, one is struck by two things immediately - the water is choppy and Turkey appears so close. The temptation would be there to cross if the swells were not so high. The people we spoke to said people weren't crossing today in these condidtions, yet driving from the airport to our hotel, the site of piles of used lifejackets is striking. There are also bits of shiny broken mylar blankets being taken by the wind. Our hotel, a converted home, is pleasant enough, but far removed from town. We drove into town to get a sense of it. I was struck by the beautiful old style architecture. Driving is a bit of a bear, as natives appear to have little patience for slow pokes who don't know their was around. When they are not behind the wheel, the Greeks are a patient, warm people as far as I can tell. As an ESL teacher, I sometimes take for granted the lingua franca of my native tongue which is not always the case, but I'm also quick to recognize someone who only has a few words in English. I now know how my ESL students feel. I need to point and nod and otherwise let my body do the talking. Thankfully, many people do speak English. As we drove along the beautiful harbor, we drove past an enormous luxury liner cruise ship. I can't help but be struck by the irony. Here is a big boat, capable of transporting (very) large numbers of people safely and comfortably, but no, that would be to obvious?! Instead, let's have them too many to a small, rubber boat in the cold risking their lives to pass this "channel." By not bringing them over, we are forcing them to risk their lives. Which they will do. Who are they? Refugees fleeing countries torn apart by war, war that the west is in large part responsible for. They want a better life for themselves and their families. Wouldn't you? Here in Europe, you actually see a lot of coverage of the Refugee Crisis. Other than Germany, the EU does not appear to be bending over backwards to help. Greece's coastguard and other officials are helping as the small boats make it to shore. Greece is the EU ticket to other destinations in Europe, most often Germany (This is my understanding). Speaking of Germany and Germans, last night while driving, we came upon a row of tents along the side of the road and a group of young people working out of the back of a truck. Weilding large knives, they were cutting up carrots, onions, cauliflower, tomatoes, etc. and tossing them into crates which then were put in a barrel-sized pot and stirred. Julie was bursting to help and asked what she could do and was directed to the woman in charge. Meanwhile, I spoke to some of the group who were mostly women. The ones I spoke to said they were from Poland and Germany. One of the Polish women said she had been volunteering in the Balkans until they stopped accepting refugees. Now this seemed to be the place she felt she could be of use. Their English was all perfect (I say this only because I'm an ESL teacher and have become cued to look for English levels). The one German woman I spoke at any length with seemed to have some humor about her which was welcome to me, still I got a bit choked up (with pride) when talking about how Germany has really stepped up in this situation. Julie returned with the apparent leader/supervisor of the group known as No Border Kitchen whose primary concern about us was whether or not we were religious fanatics and to be sure we were in support of feminism. We easily balked at any fanaticism. I even said something like, "I've left Christmas in the U.S." I didn't know quite how to respond to the feminism inquiry without throwing out a joke like, "When in Lesbos..." Don't worry, I didn't. I so wanted to get a photo of them chopping up huge piles of veggies with their huge knives and stirring their huge caldron. Maybe mistakenly, I asked if I could. The one German woman who had appeared so easy going, asked, "For whom would the picture be?" I replied ambitiously, "The world." She scoffed and pointed to that woman in charge and said I had better ask her. I didn't and didn't take the picture. Julie and I parted from the place and she told me that they were having a meeting the next morning to discuss things and that we could come, but the woman said we might be bored and we might rather come at noon to help. I could see how for this group everything has to go through committee where a sort of democracy is portrayed. As much as I'd like to be a part of democracy in the birthplace of democracy, with our days here feeling like they are leaving us already, I am eager to be told to get to work by a dictator type, feminist or not.