Fantasy Island

My favorite thing about coming to Greece is that it offers a complete escape from my everyday life. . . For a person who is independent to a fault, it’s nice to come to a place where everything is taken care of, down to ordering food. Plus, in terms of communication, it’s very difficult (even in this day and age) to get regular Internet access and the cost of talking on the phone to everyone back home makes it impossible to make calls all the time. So, I am pretty much sheltered from everything, which contributes to my feeing that this is a completely different world.

The only problem is that, since I do not speak Greek, I am also pretty much sheltered from most things here. While most people do speak English, at a basic level, I am not privy to the many little details that happen every day. Make no mistake – Thomas does a very good job of translating and making sure that I am well taken care of and comfortable, so there is nothing to fear in that sense. However, as I come here more often, it becomes almost disrespectful not to know more of the language. So, I have decided that I will not return to Greece until I have a basic knowledge of the language (since I suck at languages, it’s going to be a very basic knowledge).

I think my fear — to the extent that I have one — is that once I become more familiar with the language, I also become more entrenched in this life. It becomes more real and not the fantasy. And, quite honestly, I am not sure how real I want this to get.