Stacey Seaside

And so it begins …

Another season.

Another summer.

Sunsets, Ships, Shoppers, Sand, Salt, Sunbathers …

I have been racking up seasons of summer since the early 80s.

Nature initiates the messaging

Nature makes the first moves.

Flora and fauna appear in a riot of colors of purples, pinks, green and of course red.

Poppies with their dramatic crimson capes and black eyes stand on delicate stems absorbing sunlight or cowering at improbable sideways angles with prevailing winds.

Traffic changes too.

Drive times suddenly go from 5 minutes to 10 and then to 15.

There are backups at the traffic circle coming from the harbour 10 and 20 cars deep.

The waterfront cafes seem to have more people in them; more unknown faces.

In town, establishments that are beginning to open have freshly painted doors and windows in crayon colors; building stucco reflects dazzling light.

On the flagstone lined streets of town the grout traces brilliant white. The narrow lanes look almost too clean to walk on; as if staged for a photo shoot.

Beaches I once enjoyed in solitary satisfaction have added more swimmers and sunbathers to their sandy shores.

And if you missed all of the smaller visual details, there is suddenly a floating city (aka cruise ship) in the harbor.

Smells and sounds continue the messaging

The streets smell of fresh paint, fill with folks wearing brand new vacation clothes– always obvious from the sun dresses, tank tops, shorts and the unmarred white rubber on their sneakers as they navigate the labyrinth.

There is an explosion of sound. New building and remodelling the old fills every corner of town as well as the entire island. Jackhammers and drills clip and buzz away. Hammers pound.

The earth shakes as bricks, sand, bags of concrete and vats of lime are offloaded from dump trucks. Construction workers from. Balkan countries shout out at one another on the work site in a mix of broken Greek and their own native tongues.

After the quiet of winter, most have used up income generated from the previous season. Locals are more than ready to welcome visitors back to the island.

The joy of fresh starts

Lovely to discern new faces, fresh explorers and the opportunity to start making money again. It is welcome to end the hibernation of winter to kick off another season.

To welcome new guests

To welcome summer.

To welcome the opportunity to fulfil the next set of dreams through a season of hard work.

Along with the joy comes Negative Nancy

Invariably come the complaints as this shift comes from winter to summer. It is ironic that the biggest complainers are those who actually earn a living from the island’s tourism.

When you work 12 hour days and then some, you have no day off, performing tasks like doing laundry, eating a meal or even trying to just grocery shop are super challenging, it is understandable that you do not welcome “the season.” Most of the island’s residents work seasonally. That means they are locked into a rota of work, sleep, work, sleep and not coming up for air for the better part of 5 months.

No easy task, but when you only have 5 months to make the income that will keep you going to the next season, there is little choice.

So everyone whinges about the traffic, the lack of infrastructure, the challenge of going from a population of 10,000 in the winter to 200,000 at peak in August.

The benefit and anathema of tourism is diametrically opposed. You can’t want to earn an income but rant about too many people coming to the island.

I have often equated tourism in Greece to a dinner party, an analogy I have used in being philosophical about the how and why of lots of life’s situations.

“The Dinner Party”

You organize a dinner party for 12 with a delectable menu and chairs and table settings that are exquisite. But instead of 12, 24 or 36 show up. Now you are scrambling for chairs, plates, glasses– to say nothing of stretching the food meant for 12 to 36. Nobody leaves such a dinner party satisfied or happy.

And this is the case for all the Greek Islands, not just Mykonos. An excellent op-ed in Kathimerini 18 months ago addressed the issue head on, summoning the federal government to support local municipalities by developing better infrastructure as they simultaneously court global investors to put money into Greece.

In Mykonos and across Greece new municipal leadership has been in place since January. On a local level, the newest city council members have already put in an immense amount of time, energy and private funding to change the course of the island so that everyone walks away from the “dinner party” in Mykonos both satisfied and happy.

New municipal leadership offers hope

Hope springs eternal.

As a new season gives us a fresh beginning, leadership should be ready for course correcting the dilemmas that troubled us before- on both a local and national level.

As the flowers embrace the sun’s precious light, may we all realize our best potential in the summer season of 2024.