What’s the difference between a soft and a hard life? A lot of it seems to be where you’re born.
The contrast between Israel and Patmos stand in such contrast that it’s hard to ignore. In Israel, there’s work and hustle and bustle and religion and all the stuff of modern life with an extra kick of national security and preservation mixed in there.
Here it Patmos, we wonder regularly what exactly do people do? We know they eat. Many seem to sit. A few stand. Some like boats. Most smoke. They talk – especially in Greek. But how the electricity is generated and the trash picked up is beyond us.
Restaurants are often out of things. They don’t sweat it. Just choose something they do have. Eventually the next shipment of whatever it is will come. When? Next week maybe.
And why would you stress here? It’s warm year-round. You probably have a family home that is passed down between generations. And best of all – the customers come to you. Just sit in your shop or restaurant or boat and people come to you, wanting things. It’s great.
We noticed that there are tons of hotels and studio hotels which don’t have websites or presence in books like the Lonely Planet. Some are featured in local publications. Others are featured only on their signs. It’s fine. Boats arrive and people come. Maybe people from last year come again. Maybe they tell their friends. Maybe you have a friend in Athens who tells people to go to your hotel. Or not. It’s all good.
People on this little island appear to be very fortunate. And unless there’s something we’re missing, it’s not through ingenuity or cleverness. They were fortunate to find themselves where they are.
Not more than two hours away by boat, their Turkish friends work much harder. With the same climate, similarly beautiful coasts and also a strong tourism industry, Turkish tourist boat captains practically haul you onto their day-tour boats. Restaurant owners stand outside and recruit you (we actually refer to them as recruiters). Banks are busy with efficient, competent tellers and managers. And the pace of life is much faster – and also harder.
In India, people’s beds are harder than the way of life on Patmos. In China, a smart businessman would eat a Patmosian for breakfast and laugh about it over lunch with a client.
We really are so much a product of the blessings of place and time. Where we’re born, to whom and under what circumstances dictate so much of our lives. Bad childhoods, poor family, tough job, learning disability – we sometimes lose track of the fact that our struggles – however real and serious – are nothing compared to so much of the world.
Here on Patmos, it’s hard not to see the blessings bedecking the island and its inhabitants.
These people who invented triangles, parts of triangles, congruent parts of congruent triangles are congruent, medical terminology, hypothesis, theses, theories, myths, epics, democracy, philosophy and wildly popular yogurt are now making waffles with nutella for tourists and then sitting down to have a smoke and watch their beautiful coasts.
However you cut it, it’s a soft life here. They don’t have to work. They are – even the poorest of them – incredibly rich. Perhaps in the top ten percent of the world.
And while our lives are harder than the good people of Patmos, most of us are so blessed for the wealth of advantages in our lives. More than we like to think on a shitty Monday or a long-day of working, running around, handling the kids and a marriage and all the bills…. there are people with hard lives who would pay far more than the cost of a nutella covered waffle to trade places with any of us.
Sent from my iPad
