The shepherd Andreas

Background

    There is a long tradition of travel writing in English. It dates back to the 14^th century with Sir John Mandevill’s travels. This was an extraordinary mixture of fact and fantasy that even described strange creatures and two-headed men. Richard Hakluyt is well-known for his descriptions of the voyages made by English merchants and explorers in the 16^th and early 17^th centuries.

    In the 18^th century, travel literature started to become popular as great novelists described their trips around Europe. In the following century, classic travel literature included descriptions of travels in West Africa, South America and the Amazon.

    Among great travel writers of the 20^th century were: Robert Byron who journeyed across Central Asia, Freya Stark who traveled widely in Arab countries; Bruce Chatwin whose travel books are a mixture of anthropology, philosophy and fiction. Famous contemporary travel writers include V. S Naipaul, Paul Theroux and Bill Bryson.

    Travel writing now is not only more popular than ever but is no longer regarded as an unimportant genre of literature. Good travel literature combines observations with imagination and can explore the depths of the human condition. As the Spanish proverb says, “ He, who would bring home the wealth of the Indies, must carry the wealth of the Indies with him.”

Reading and Listening

 Before you start

l         Read the background notes and answer these questions.

1.       Which of the travel writers mentioned would you most like to read? Why?

2.       Which of the writers listed mixed fact and fiction?

3.       When did travel literature first became popular?

4.       What, as the proverb says, makes a good travel writer?

2    Read and listen to the story. Order there events.

a). The wrier gave he shepherd a cup of tea.

b). The shepherd started to talk louder.

c). The shepherd got a bit angry because the writer couldn’t understand.

d). The writer went outside with her cup of tea.

e). The shepherd tried to show that he wanted a cup of tea.

f). The writer asked the shepherd questions.

g). The shepherd used his cane to dismount from his donkey.

h). The shepherd started laughing a lot.

i). The shepherd and hid donkey came into view.

3  Read the story again and answer these questions.

1.       Why did the writer spill her tea?

2.       Why did the shepherd use the cane to dismount?

3.       What did the writer like most about the islanders?

4.       How did the shepherd finally explain what he wanted?

5.       How does the writer think one learns a language?

6.       Why did the shepherd laugh so much?

4   Match the objects with the writer’s descriptions of them (a-e)

a laugh, the sea, the land, a sound, the sky

a). like wide blue hands

b). bearish

c). lassoing the entire island

d). the curved and plummeting body

e). rumbles

Speaking

Work in pairs. Which of these things would you like to do? Why?

Visit a Greek island, meet some islanders, live abroad for a while a travel book, learn another language (besides English ), know more words in English.

The sleek black donkey is called Marcos, and the old man who rides him is called Andreas. They appear early one morning while I am sitting outside, my back against the wall of the spitaki, a cup of tea cradled in my hands. The gate is on the other side of the house, out of immediate view. I hear hooves knock against the stones that mark the threshold of the gate. To give me warning, the old man shouts some unintelligible greeting that scares me out of my wits. spill tea on my lap.

"Kaleemera," he says gruffly, with a cautious smile. "Kaleemera," I return the greeting and reach for my dictionary He pulls his cane from its resting place in the ropes of the saddle, maneuvers Marcos to a stone, where he aims the cane, then slides off the donkey's back. His lower left leg and foot are deformed; the foot fits into a black boot cut open to accommodate its dimensions. How to describe Barba Andreas, the old shepherd? A yellow piece of cloth is wrapped around his head of white hair. He has a big white moustache, blue eyes, a dandy's flower stuck in the lapel of his green army jacket. Hands. What will I love most here, what will ! dream about years later, to return me to this place? The hands of the islanders. Their thickness, their roughness, their ugliness. Nails broken below the quick. Scars. Missing fingertips and lines of dirt.

      Barba Andreas names the plants for me, pointing with his cane and leaning down to pluck off the chamomile blooms. Sitting on a milk crate, he lifts his bad leg up to rest on a stone. I remain sitting against the house in the shade. We both take in the view before us: slender Marcos, eating my melon rinds and shifting in what is, effectively my front yard: poppies; olive trees; the curved and plummeting body of the land, its shapes of green, sage-green, yellow, almond; rose and purple and gray shadow. The sky opens over everything like wide blue hands. And all around us, lassoing the entire island, the sea.

   A bearish sound comes from Barba Andreas' throat. As though bored with the view -- how familiar it must be to him -- he turns back to me and says something I don't understand. He points in my direction with his cane. Is he pointing to the low table between us? I look at the table.' Is he pointing to my books on the table? I offer him a book, which he wisely refuses to touch. He pantomimes a motion, but I don't understand. Once more, he directly asks for something and pokes his finger against his chest. I don't understand. Finally, smiling but clearly frustrated, he grabs the tea-pot with one large hand, pours tea into the palm of the other, and raises it to his lips. "Ena poteeri!" he cries, and bangs his cane on the ground, demanding a cup.

      Embarrassed, I jump up and go into the little house for another cup. I come out, pour tea, hand it him. He waves away my apologies. He drinks the tea in one go. How many Greek words do I know now? How many? Not enough, never enough. To learn another language one must re-acquire the greedy hunger of a child. ! want, I want, I want. Every desire begins and ends with a word. I want to ask a thousand questions. Where does the path behind the house lead and who lived here before and how do you make cheese and are the sheep in the neighboring field yours and what is this place, truly, and how do I go to the mountains behind the house? Because there is a gate closing off the field that leads to the mountains, and I am afraid to walk through it.

      He understands my last, garbled question. "How do you go to the mountains?" he parrots back to me, almost shouting. It is an international assumption that when people don't hear and understand our language, we think they can't hear at all. "How do you go up to the mountains?" Now a slow laugh rumbles in his throat. "Me ta podia!" he cries. Every line of his face proclaims laughter. He slaps his knees, guffawing.

      How do you go to the mountains?

      Me ta podia. With your feet.

      Open the gate, go through it, close it behind you. And walk to the mountains

spitaki- is the Greek word roomed shepherd's house

Karen Connelly was born in Alberta, Canada. She has published award-winning travel books such as Touch the Dragon: A Thai Journal and One Room in a Castle. She is also the author of two works of poetry.

When she is not travelling, Karen Connelly lives in Greece.