England and the Bolitho Homeland

Our time in England has flown by!  It seems it was just yesterday we were nervously dodging traffic from London to Oxford trying to drive on the right side of the car on the left side of road.  It’s harder than either of us remembered.  I think that’s because the last time we did this we were young and invincible and didn’t quite realize how easy it would be to die while attempting to drive in England.  At this point, however, we are managing quite nicely and have almost conquered the art of navigating

the British traffic circle (called a round about) of which there are many!  We have not, however, and will never get used to the Cornish lanes which are barely wide enough for one car with tall hedges growing up either side of the car.  The tricky part is these single lane roads are two way!  That’s right.  Traffic comes both ways on these roads.  So as you round the corner and come up over the hill, it’s possible you will meet another car coming the opposite direction.  After you both come to a quick stop, you have to negotiate who gets to drive forward and who must back up to the last drive way or slightly wider curve in the road in order for your cars to pass.  This could require a long back up!  But enough of driving.





Our time in England has been divided into two segments.  We began in Oxford.  We went to visit our

niece, Julie, whom we haven’t seen since her father’s (my brother's) funeral 8 years ago.  It was wonderful to see Julie and to meet her husband, Vikram, and Vikram’s mother who was visiting from India.  The three of them had us out to their home twice for a meal and long visit.  On the second night we went for a long “country walk” to the local pub in the next village over.  The British people love to walk in the country or along the coast and Julie has picked up the custom.

The second segment of our journey took us down to Cornwall where my Grandfather grew up. We stopped off at my cousin Marion’s house in Crediton near Exeter and again made our way to the local pub for dinner.  We met Marion 30 years ago when we visited England the first time.  She has since been to America twice to visit with us.  She remembers with some fondness our celebration of Halloween and watching our boys tunnel in the snow in Sturgis.

From Marion’s home we drove down to our rented apartment in the village of Newlyn which is just south of the town of Penzance - you know... where the pirates come from.  Actually these days there are apparently drug smugglers in Newlyn! http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-5974811/Police-bomb-squad-close-harbour-storm-yacht-arrest-two-men.html  Newlyn is usually a small quiet fishing village of about 6000.  The harbor is

filled with fishing trawlers and the homes crawl up the hills that surround the harbor.  There is a butcher, bakery, small grocery store, pharmacy, a couple of galleries and some nice seafood restaurants.  Our apartment in situated uphill - seriously uphill.  We have a switchback driveway with no turn around space at the switch.  So we  back up the hill about 50 feet and then put it in drive to go the next 50 feet up to our place.  We reverse the process on the way down.  Apart from the scary driveway, the apartment is lovely and our hosts welcomed us with English cream tea and a plethora of Cornish goodies!

Our location in Newlyn has put us in a wonderful location to see the rest of my cousins.  We went to

church in Truro with Roger and Cynthia.  We met them again, along with Keith and Margaret at the Stithians Show the next day.  Stithians is the little village where my cousins parents and my grandfather were raised.  It has a country fair once a year that is similar to our County fair that we have in La Porte each summer.  It was fun to be at an event in my grandfather’s hometown.  A few days later Margaret and Keith had us to their home for dinner and today we gathered with Marion and Roger and Cynthia and some of their family in their home in Truro for homemade Cornish pasties.  Tomorrow we are gathering the whole clan back in Stithians for a final luncheon out.  It has been so great to renew my relationships with my cousins.

In the in between time, we have done a little exploring of the countryside.  One of the most interesting jaunts was a trip to St. Michael’s Mount.  We took a ferry over to the Island where there is a beautiful castle that was an addition to the 11th century church and monastery original to the Island.  The church still stands.  The really cool moment for me, however, was walking back on the causeway that connects the Island to the mainland.  The causeway only appears at low tide!

We also took a “country walk” to the next little harbor village called Mousehole (pronouced Mowzel.). We drove over to the beach town of St. Ives that has five beautiful sand beaches!  We visited a little church in Gulval once called the Bolitho church which has my family name plastered under stain glass windows and on monuments and over tombstones in the graveyard.  There were also apparently some Bolithos from Newlyn as the name is attached to several civic places here as well.  We also made our way to Lands End which is rather commercial these days, but still beautiful!  My cousin, Marion, always reminds me that when you stand at Land’s End and look out to the west, that the next stop is America.  That’s what I did yesterday.  I looked west toward home.

Our next stop is America.  We leave for home in three days time and I’m ready!  This has been such a great adventure, with many interesting insights and impressions that will last a lifetime.  It has been filled with delightful people in many countries of many different cultures.  And it has reminded me that I am glad to be an American and proud of my Protestant heritage.  We look forward to planting our feet on American soil again and in a few weeks time to begin again with the Presbyterians in La Porte and Sturgis.

Good bye to Greece (part two)

So here’s what happened in Athens!  I ate some bad food and came down with a fine case of traveler’s revenge.  😒  This turn of events, however, resulted in the added adventure of visiting a Greek hospital ER when we couldn’t get the fever under control.  I share this with you because I found the hospital visit pretty interesting.  Greek medical practices are actually quite modern though they don’t have all of the equipment and staff that we have in the states.  They are short on nurses, so I ended up mostly dealing with the doctor which was a plus in many ways.  When they gave me IV fluids to bring down my fever they hung the bag on a pole without feeding it through that little machine that inevitably ends up beeping every few minutes until the nurse comes to fix it. No beeper box was fine with me. There was a decidedly small amount of paperwork.  I had to ask for a diagnosis sheet so we could apply for reimbursement from our insurance when we get home.  The doctor wrote out the diagnostic procedure and treatment plan by hand.  Mostly, I was blown away by the costs.  We had to pay for services up front and file for reimbursement later.  It cost 58 Euros to see the doctor and 95 Euros for the blood work and IV fluids.  Wow!!! Net result:  They put me on Greek antibiotics to deal with the infection, and I’m much better now.

Unfortunately, this temporary illness meant that we missed most of our Athens plans.  We did get to walk around the city a bit and visit some of the shops.  We made it to the Acropolis Museum where I enjoyed seeing the original Caryatids and we took most of the Peloponnese photo tour for Mike.





I especially enjoyed seeing the Corinthian Canal.

 The canal was begun in the time of Nero (roughly 60 AD) but was never finished.  Construction began again in 1881 and was completed in 1893.  Remember, this would have been accomplished with hand tools.  The canal cuts through a narrow isthmus that separated the Aegean Sea from the Ionian Sea.  The canal is only 4 miles longs but it allowed ships to avoid the potentially dangerous trip around the Peloponnese which could be treacherous with rocks and Islands.  In Paul's day, they used to bring the ships up on land and roll them on logs the four miles rather than risk the trip around the Peloponnese.



Unfortunately, I did not get to see the Acropolis, the Parthenon or Mars Hill, but I sent Mike out on our last day in Athens.  So I’ll let him describe it for you:  

Mike: Similar to the saying, "When in Rome, do as the Romans do."  We can say, "When in Athens, visit the Acropolis."  You can get to the base of it quite easily.  Ascending to its heights is quite another matter.  First you wind your way up through the streets of the Placa - a part of town below the entrance which is filled with shops and restaurants.  On occasion you see a sign - usually hand written and not very official looking which points up the hill or around a corner to go to the Acropolis.  You honestly don't know if you can trust it or not.  I went early in the morning to try and avoid the heat of the day.  It was still plenty warm and there is precious little shade on the top.    The nice young lady behind the ticket counter offered me a Senior admittance ticket for half price which I politely refused.  I must have looked worse than I thought after climbing all those steps.  The hardest part about getting up the hill is the other people;  tons of them.  Particularly obstructive are tours whose leaders don't pull them to the side to speak with them.  Ascending to the main entrance you see the temple to Athena Nike.  This temple was built to honor Athena for giving the Athenians victory in a battle with the Persians that proved decisive.  They also put it up hoping she would help them defeat the Spartans in the Peloponessian war - which they did not.  Did you know the name of your tennis shoes means "victory?"  In an odd twist, the statue of Athena Nike had wings on it.  In an effort to make sure she gave Athens victory and no one else they clipped the wings of the goddess in her temple.  I haven't been able to get my head around that.

The Parthenon is the largest building on top of the Acropolis and they have been working on it for over twenty years.  They are not so much restoring it as trying to stop the deterioration.  You will recognize the picture of the towering white pillars.  Today we know the original builders loved color - brilliant color and decoration were part of the building enhancing its carvings and statues.  All the buildings on the hill were designed by the same architect and tie in well with one another.  Their message was simple.  "We are a powerful people - don't mess with us."  There have been many people over the centuries who have tried to co-opt the symbols of power on that hill over Athens.  Rulers have sought to bask in its grandeur.  Enemies have sought to destroy it.  Walking near its towering height and descending to Mars hill - where Paul proclaimed that God does something new in Jesus - it is no surprise that most Athenians hearing him preferred to imagine that the lives we build and the power we claim are a much better guarantee of life than a prophet who was killed by his enemies.  As if to underscore this point and the scandal of God's ways - Mars hill isn't much today.  It is a slippery and treacherous bit of rock used by most people as a way to get a good view of the city or the Acropolis and its pretensions of power.  This is one of the most enduring historical assertions of human power - a power whose frailty is made plain with the passage of time.

Sally:  Mike and I were very sad to say goodbye to Greece.  We have very much enjoyed the beauty of the natural landscape, the amazing story of its churches, and the hospitality of its people.  We are not so sad to leave the heat behind.  We are on to Britain where it is much, much cooler!  More about merry ole’ England soon!

Good bye to Greece (Part One)

I am behind in my blog mostly due to illness.  (More on that later.)  On the way to Athens we made two important stops.  The first was to the cliffs of Meteora and the “Hanging Monasteries.”  Greece has a strong monastic tradition that I believe stems from the influence of the great number of Christian martyrs from the Greek speaking world in the early days of the church.  This tradition of suffering for one’s faith led many to seek out an austere life of prayer, reading of scripture and the church fathers and little else.  This monastic life

began in earnest on Mt. Athos in the 7th century after the Arabs conquered Egypt, Syria and Palestine which were centers of monastic life.  By the 9th century some of the monks of Mt. Athos moved to the Meteora region and began living in these single cell dwellings cut into the cliffs.  Wanting to be isolated they were accessible only by rope ladders.



Later a couple of Monks decided the cliff hermits might do better living in community and the first Great Meteora Monastery was built in the mid 14th century atop of one of the rock formations shooting into the sky.  It sits 615 meters above sea level.  Again, anyone wishing to visit this or any of the similarly constructed monasteries was either invited up a rope ladder or could choose to sit in a rope basket and be hauled up by a couple of monks.

Today the monasteries are accessed by steps that have been cut into the cliffs - lots of steps!  We visited two monasteries and it took us about half an hour to reach each one by these steps.  You have to first climb down many steps into the valley beneath the monastery before you begin the ascent up.  Both monasteries we visited had over 300 steps each.  Three things impressed me about these monasteries.  First of all, the remote beauty is extraordinary.  You cannot help being overwhelmed by the majesty of the Creator in such a place.  Secondly, I was stunned by the artwork in the sanctuaries.  The walls are covered in ancient frescoes, which graphically depicted the death of the martyrs.  Monasticism seems to draw energy from the faithfulness of the men and women of old, but I would find it challenging to worship with any joy in such a setting.  Lastly, I was surprised by the low  numbers of monks left in Meteora.  There are only 14 monks left among the five monasteries remaining.  Our guide said they have fled the visitors who flock to the area to see their beautiful monasteries and have returned to Mt. Athos.  In contrast, the two nunneries are thriving with almost 50 nuns between them.  They do not have the option of fleeing to Mt. Athos as women are not allowed on that holy mountain.

The second stop on our journey to Athens was to Delphi.  Delphi is a religious site of the ancient Greeks that was established probably as early as 1400 BC during the time of the Mycenaeans. The

ancients believed Delphi was the center of the world determined by Zeus himself.  Over time the god Apollo was worshiped there and a prophetess known as the Oracle of Delphi was said to speak for him.  People of all statures came to seek out advice from the Oracle who was said to deliver her words in a trance like state.  Alexander the Great sought her advice as did many of the Roman Emperors including Constantine.  The Christians finally shut it down in 394.


What remains in Delphi is one of the most magnificent examples of Ancient Greek ruins.  The temple grounds are impressive just on their own.  What surprised me was the amphitheater which was part of

the complex that provided poetry, theater and especially music to the community.  Further up the mountain into which this impressive ruins is built (with many many steps) is a stadium for competitive games similar to the Olympic Games in Olympus!  I was surprised to find such vibrant religious expression.  I remember learning about the Greek gods years ago back in school.  The religion was presented in such a way as to suggest that no one really believed these myths or worshiped these Gods.  Clearly, that was either a mistaken impression on my part or a  misunderstanding of the religion on my teacher’s part.  The ancient Greeks took their Gods seriously and when Paul addressed them on Mars Hill in Athens with a new teaching about a single God who had chosen to reveal himself in Jesus of Nazareth... well, Paul had his work cut out for him!