Tales Of Crete -- Watermelon Man - 12

Tales of Crete© Watermelon Man 12 By Jack Schimmelman

With my one-way ticket to Greece a memory, and drachmas becoming rare, one morning sun awoke me with an urgent need to find employment. Paradise would be suspended while I solved my present economic crisis. Talk about the “real economy.” I walked next door to Jorge’s cave and awaited the usual parade of sated, smiling women to leave his stone domicile. When he appeared at the entrance with his usual grin, I immediately asked him if he knew of any way I could earn money. Following the sway of the female walking ahead of us, he mused that he might, indeed, know of my ideal job. I couldn’t wait. We had our usual breakfast after my customary, ice cold shower when Jorge, Carlos and Margot got down to the business of advising me about a new career. “There is something you can do, Joaquin,” volunteered Jorge. “Meet me here at 3 pm.” There were few choices of occupations on Crete. There was agriculture, agriculture, and did I tell you? There was agriculture. Jorge had found another way. He was a jeweler and everyday he would walk various beaches searching for the unique shells that he could put together to form trinkets, bracelet, necklace, earrings and the like. There was something of an underground on Crete, which created a rumor mill of where the best beaches were, untouched and unseen by foreigners where the most beautiful shells could be found. Jorge had it down to a science. With each wave of new tourists that passed through Damnoni, he would show his newly made seashell ornaments to various women of whom he had no problem attracting. He had a simple ceremony. He would take a blue velvet cloth, lay it out on a table in a café and spread his assorted charms (and charm) on the cloth. Drachmas would fly into his pouch, for he always had a small leather pouch, which he claims he had brought from Buenos Aires and which had been handed down to him by his ancestors. My guess is that he bought it at a McDonald’s in Florence. But that was my guess. When business got slow, he devised another way of displaying his goods. He cut bamboo that was growing wild along the frontiers of Damnoni’s beaches and made a miniature bamboo tree from which he hung his goods. In this way, the shells

would catch the abundant gold light, which soaked us each day. Jorge did not have a problem making money. I, on the other hand, did not have a clue. Three p.m. came as the sun reclined into its late afternoon stance. I walked from our beach over the hilly rocks to find Jorge standing on the café’s terrace. He wasn’t one for volume and merely pointed the way to which I follow. We came to a field where there were dozens of huge watermelons lying on the ground and a big covered diesel lorry standing by. It was watermelon season! Jorge, who spoke passing Greek, conversed with a short, shirtless, hirsute fire-plug of a man who turned to me and smiled with what can only be described as a toothless grin. Ok. I exaggerate for the purpose of drama. He probably had three teeth. I counted. Jorge told me that all of the men would form a line to pass the watermelon into the truck. I would be at the end of the line by the truck and it would be my job to catch the watermelon thrown to me like a pigskin and gently put it into the truck. He warned me that if I dropped any, it would be taken out of my pay, such as it was. I asked how much I would be paid and he said not to worry. I would be paid. Apparently, there were no watermelon catcher unions in this field. So I agreed. I should add that these were not small, round melons that fit neatly into one’s mitts, but rather they were huge ovals that must have weighed a minimum of 20 pounds each. I think they told me they all weighed in the neighborhood of 10 kilograms. Being on the receiving end, I was impressed by the neighborhood. Jorge, as I have related, came from native-American stock in Argentina’s pampas. He was in his element. I, on the other hand, was this chubby, curly headed Jewish boy from the Bronx who literally thought for the first 15 years of his life that produce grew in neat plastic produce bins in the supermarket. Needless to say, I dropped my first green and red bomb about 10 minutes into this futile exercise, which prompted the toothless, hairy guy to make a run at me, head down, nostrils flaring. Not being the matador, I quickly made my exit while Jorge shouted at his friend to give me a break and let me live. That made the second time my life was threatened in Damnoni. Paradise’s allure was dissolving before my poverty stricken eyes. I was not the Watermelon man. I was not paid. My wage was to allow me to keep breathing. The next day, while we were walking along a jagged mountain path Jorge told me that he had another idea for me. I hesitated to ask, but query I did. He said that I should show up the next morning at dawn at the café and he would show me what it was I could do. Without guile, I was at the appointed place at the agreed upon hour. The sky was awakening, disrobing its purple mist allowing a golden disc to take its place in the scheme of things. It is impossible to describe the Cretan

2

sky at any time day or night. But to experience day and night’s synchronized palette is to bathe in one’s eternal breath. “Hey, Joaquin!” Jorge was on point. It was time to go to work. I went to the same field, but now there were different men, less squat, more teeth and friendly. Everyone had tea awaiting. There were machines manned by experts who proceeded to cut the grass. After the grass was thoroughly dismantled from the ground, Jorge handed me a rake. We raked the grass into big boxes, which were turned upside down to make bales. We worked like this the entire morning. At about 10 am I turned to Jorge and asked why this was being done. He said that it was for the sheep. Ah! My choir of sheep! It seems that they were fed these bales of grass each midnight hour. The grass would turn into hay in the dry, heated atmosphere. I thought about this and being the chubby, curly headed, Bronx boy that I had always been, I asked Jorge why didn’t they just bring the sheep to the field to eat the grass. Before the last “s” in grass had flown from my mouth, he was on the ground doubled up with laughter. “You can’t do that, you idiot!” Idiot? Moi? “Why?” asked the idiot. “Because the sheep will eat everything right down to the roots. They would destroy the grass so it would never grow again. That is why you cut it, bale it and deliver it. Get it?” Room service. Jorge apparently told the others what I had said and a good time was had by all. I remembered at that moment the enchanted singing that I did with the sheep each night I would pass their pen walking on the path back to Damnoni from Plakias. I was the idiot! They weren’t “baaaing” with me, not harmonizing. They were “baaaing” at me, expecting me to feed them. I didn’t destroy any grass as I had the watermelon, so I was paid. I think I might have been paid as much for being the entertainment as for baling the grass. I was allotted the grand sum of 72 drachmas for my morning work. Two dollars. I limped to the café, had lunch and plotted my next move. I needed to explore my horizons; to uncover other parts of Crete; to leave my beloved Damnoni and my treasured cave to find my fortune, such as it was. That night, I arranged my few belongings along the walls of my seaside grotto, determined to earn my way in Crete’s unforgiving landscape. I fell asleep, flew across the sea, circling the Island, searching for a safe landing.

3