My visit to the archeological museum yesterday took me to an area east of the city called Halepa, which sits on a lovely bit of coastline, pictured above. It was once considered the aristocrats’ part of town, which you can tell from its many fine-looking buildings. It’s run down in places but still has a fair few beautiful town houses and mansions. In lovely walled gardens bougainvillea and palm trees sway in the breeze.

Walking back through Halepa after visiting the museum, although I couldn’t quite work out from where, I could hear music I recognised and did a bit of a detour to see where it was coming from.

Before Pip and I met in 1990 we’d both spent time in Greece. She’d picked fruit for a while and lived with her then boyfriend, Vangelis, working later as an English teacher in Nafplio, a coastal city in the Peloponnese. We went back there together once. It’s a beautiful city.

Apart from fond memories, as far as I’m aware, unless she got it back in England, one of the few things she bought back with her was an album, which I still have in amongst all the vinyl LPs that we’d both held on to. It’s called Πιο Καλή Η Μοναξιά (Loneliness is better), a 1984 album by Giannis Parios. The song I could hear was the title track, which features Parios and his son Haris singing a rather sad but beautiful song. Neither of us had listened to it for a while but we were both fond of it.

My detour took to me to what appeared to be the source and I jumped up to peep over a high garden wall. In the fraction of a second that I was airborne I caught a glimpse of open shutters and an elderly woman sweeping a terrace. Our eyes met briefly and, back down on the pavement, I wondered what to do next. Then her head appeared over the wall and, eyeing me up, she said hello and asked me what I wanted, although in a friendly way.

Slightly embarrassed I blurted out that I liked the song and knew it. She smiled and said she did too. We chatted, probably for less than a minute, and she told me something neither Pip or I knew, which was that Parios had sold more records than any other artist in Greece.

I’d then admired the house, asking if it was hers, and she’d said that she was the cleaner. After a slightly awkward moment, me peering up at her and her down at me, I thanked her for the info, we said our goodbyes and I walked back across town.

It was another one of those odd coincidences, and probably what prompted me to add Pip’s portrait to yesterday’s post. Coincidence though it seemed I suppose it’s not unusual to hear a song from an artist who’s sold more records than anyone else in Greece when you’re walking down a Greek Street.

I later found this YouTube clip of son and father singing the song I’d heard. I think it may even be of the moment they recorded the version that’s on the LP I have back home because it sounds exactly the same. Even if the music’s not your thing it’s a treat to see Parios’s son’s smile.

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