So I wasn’t sure if I should write about the fires that are destroying the mainland since it is all over the news but a certain someone thinks I should so here goes…
Oh wait… Incase anyone doesn’t know and wonders why I should blog about the fires… I live in Crete…. That’s the Greek island at the bottom of Greece and above Africa. Uhuh good geography lesson there 
So here goes…… Parts of an email sent last night with an update of today below it.
Crete is fine so far… Unless some idiot starts a fire here as well. We don’t have any forests / woods here unlike the mainland so hopefully we will be safe… I have strict instructions if I do see smoke/flames to get the cats (and my laptop!) and get out of the house/village.
I haven’t been bothered to read the news online, have just been watching it on the Greek news which has been running 24hrs since Friday night when it all broke out. Piecing the bits together with my limited Greek. I guess the images transmit the story without me needing to understand the reporter.
At the moment I can’t see how it’s going to end as the fires are all totally out of control and there don’t seem to be enough fire engines / water…… anything. (Every male in Greece has to go in the army so that makes a very big Greek army that could go rescue people or whatever needs doing but so far we haven’t seen the army doing anything at all… It’s the red cross and the villagers and a handful of firemen who are trying to fight the fire)
Half the time i’m sat shouting at the tv telling the people to move, get out of the village (if only they could hear me) as they are just staying there trying to fight the fire but when the flames are 30ft high they have no chance and should just get to safety. The worse part is when they try to beat the fire out with olive branches, (you know like beating a carpet in the olden days to get the dust out) when the flames are 6ft high and above that’s not going to help.
This morning it looked like the fires were pretty much out. Lots of smoke but no flames. The news that was on 24hours wasn’t on this morning (back to normal schedule) so I thought the worse must be over… But it’s now 16.51 and put the tv back on to see the flames are back again and its like yesterday and the day before… I guess the news that was on got bored of reporting and left it to every other channel.
I’m getting quite confusing now though… The news channels keep showing old footage of yesterday and last night and then they’ll show “now” and I get lost on which places are on fire and which happened yesterday… and which village is which and if it’s still on fire or if it’s just “old news”.
So I don’t know… it all seems like a totally unorganised mess that keeps getting worse and where will it end?
If anyone wants the “proper” story then just Google something like “Greek fires news” and it’ll all come up…. I won’t go into the whole “why did people start the fires” part cos that’s politics and I don’t really understand those things…
All I know is people are trapped and have practically no help, the firemen seem pretty useless from what I’m seeing on the news and like everything in Greece “siga siga” meaning “slowly slowly” also seems to apply in the case of fire. That and running up and down the road screaming. (Anyone who has been to Greece and knows the culture will understand what I’m getting at there.)
Please please please let the fires be out by tomorrow.
End of Rant!
Tags: august 2007, emergency, fire, greece
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