Saturday, March 5/2011

After coffee - guess we can call it our café when the owner sees us sit down and says automatically two sketo (unsweetened Cyprus coffees) - we wander through the market. There's a large blue plastic vegetable bin with live snails. Cypriots gather them on the hillsides. J buys a big bag of grapefruit (he counts 21) for €1.70 (£1.45, $2.30 CAD). I stop at Prinos greengrocers on the way back. It`s crazy busy, since Monday will be Clean Monday. This is the day when the Orthodox clean the house and also cleanse the body of meat for the beginning of Lent. It`s not very penitential though, compared with Ash Wednesday in the western Church. Usually marked by countryside picnics featuring vegetables (especially greens - hence the crowding at Prinos) and seafood. Also by kite flying. A major public holiday.