Greek is a wonderfully rich and expressive language, which makes it one of the harder of the European tongues to learn. The active vocabulary is much bigger than other European languages. The constructions and the different endings are not easy to master, especially if you are an English speaker.

Greek has a formula for every event - weddings, christenings, buying a new dress, having a haircut, talking about children, going away, coming back, leaving a house, leaving a home. Kalo risiko is for a new house. Kalo means good. Risiko means fate, but sounds ominously like danger.

For the first few months I went round in a linguistic fog. Often I only realized what someone had said minutes or even days or weeks afterwards.

In principle I thought highly of the outspokenness of Greeks compared with English hypocrisy. When I was on the receiving end I found it bloody rude.