We have few words between us, but in the gift shop Alexi calls me. He points to
a t-shirt on the wall alongside Pokemon, and smiles: "Mickey Pontiki".
It is late at night, and while everyone else is
engaged in conversation in Greek—saying their last goodbyes—Alexi and I watch
Quentin Tarantino’s True Romance with Patricia Arquette and Christian Slater.
I wonder if the motherfuckers and cocksuckers have been tamed in the Greek
subtitles. I’m slightly shocked that his parents are allowing him to watch
this movie, but I wonder also if the American violence is no more than mythology
to him. No more real than Mickey Mouse or Pokemon.
Later, as Sophia and I sit on the veranda of her
father’s house drinking our last Bicardi Breezer, I hear wafting out towards
me across the bay from Lazareto, now illuminated by spotlights:
Those who have died have never never left
The dead have a pact with the living
They are with us in the home, they are with us in the crowd
Tis the ancestors’ breath in the voice of the waters2 Q
1 The Southern-most tip of Africa
2 Sweet Honey in the Rock, Breaths
Photos:
Bottle, Starfinder,
Greek Harbor, Sophia Condaris
Greek Column, M. Feinstein
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