OldMedMan;1366261 said:Hi All !
I was writing a story in the first part of this grow. If your interested in catching up with the story here is a recap of the story so far.
For all of you that didn?t read ?The Story? that started in the first part of this Journal here it is.:
OK.....here is a seemingly unimportant story. It's part one of a long story that I will post in parts. This story impacted the rest of my life later on although it just seems pretty meaningless.
When in Greece our headquarters was on a Greek Air Base at the other side of Athens. Very few of our troops lived there. On the weekends it was desolate. I worked in a comm center and it was a high security site. We had 8 Nuclear Missile sites to support. I had a Cosmic Top Secret clearance, if you can believe that. I'd never heard of it before.
My duty shifts where 24 hours long. More on that latter on. On the weekends it was usually me and the Officer of the day. Sometime a few guys would be at the little theater/snack bar next door watching porno movies or NFL reruns. It sold booze too. That is where the trouble began.
One Sunday about noon the Base Commander called and wanted to talk to the Officer of the day. The OD that day was a Chief Petty Officer. I went out to look for him, he was supposed to right there by the phone. I couldn't find that sucker! I told the CO he was out doing his rounds and I would have him call when he got back. I looked all over for that dude!
At around 3 pm the CO called back. I told him he had just missed the OD and that he was making his rounds again. The CO said if OD didn't call him within the hour he was coming out there.
I'm thinking "Holy Crap! Where is this guy?"
I found him on the floor of the snack bar, behind the counter. He was plastered. I thew cold water on him and drug him back to Headquarters. I slapped him, made him walk and finally got him awake barely. I dialed the number for him and handed him the phone......He said all the right things some how and the Co was happy. Whoooow!
I had saved this guys butt. He never forgot it either.
Thats, part one of a long story.
This where the story actually starts.
In 1973-4 I was living in a junk yard apartment and going to college on the GI bill. The apartment was great. $125 dollars a month including utilities...and I could change furniture when ever I wanted. So what if there were little green frogs in the toilet. When ever I could afford it I sold a little weed. I worked in the college library putting away books as they came in. I would usually get the first three or four books put away and then one would catch my eye and I would stand there and read it. Always stoned ya know. In fact one of my friends had the first hydro grow I had ever seen. Really basic stuff back then.
I also did part time jobs. One of the those jobs was walking a picket line in downtown Napa. A perfect stoner job. I met a young lady there who was a trip.
She always walked bent over and wore a wool jacket with a hood. She looked like she was hiding all the time. Let's call her RS. She was so negative it was funny. She was permanently pissed off. At any and everything.
As we walked I got her to talk her and found out a bit about her. Her parents were older and her father was a teacher. Even my boys had heard about him being one person that you never wanted to take a class from. A mean SOB.
I found out that when she was born, all her mother's hair fell off....everywhere...no hair. She blamed RS for it. Not good. One summer her father and mother took her on a historical drive across the US. Before they left her father got all the homework assignments for her next year in school.
So as they drove, she studied. When they got to Virginia she popped a cork and went nuts. They put her in Napa State Hospital, a mental Hospital. She was in there for 6 months.
So finally she was out, but the father made her work at any job she could find, that's why she was on the picket line with me. A month of walking with her was a trip. She was 21 by then and she was brilliant, just confused. We would eat lunch together and I liked her, she was so funny without meaning to be.
After couple of months I asked her to have dinner with her. She got really pissed and started bitching during dinner. I just looked at her and said I didn't ask you to dinner to fight and she calmed down. We went to the junk yard and a had few glasses of wine. Once we kissed..we headed to the bedroom.
She was hopping up and down and making birds sounds?? Nervous as could be. She shed the frumpy cloths while hopping up and down and guess what?
She was the most beautiful woman I had ever seen! I was stunned.
From that point on we were inseparable. This crazy girl had stolen my heart.....to be continued.
The story continues.......
By now you've figured out I am a dirty old man. RS was 21 and I was 33. A big difference in age. I knew better, but I couldn't think of life without her. We had been together for 4 months and were happy. Then of all things her father forbid her to see me any more. Say What? Oh! No you don't!
I put on my best jeans, put my hair up in a pony tail and told RS to meet me at her fathers place. I was outraged. To make long story short, when it was all over, RS moved in with me in the junk yard. Her father visited us, but never came in. RS and I loved our life style. You may remember me saying that this was what I, now we, wanted for the future, to live the same way forever. Months passed by. We had a small out door wedding, just a few close friends and family. RS danced for me on our wedding night, which I will never forget.
So I went back into the service...the Army this time. The plan was I would go through a 2 weeks training course at Fort Leonard Wood Missouri (better know as Fort Lost in the Woods). In was a special course for prior service people. Can you say dopers? It was a fun two weeks. RS and I met in St. Louis and flew down to Fort Gordon Ga. By the time we got there she was sick. The medics gave her two aspirins and said come back in the morning.
In the morning she was sick as hell and couldn't walk, I literally carried her to the doctors. Her fever was going through roof and she was swollen at every joint. They finally came out and told me they didn't know what it was and that they were going to give her a million ccs of penicillin or she would die from the fever. It worked and the fever came down. In the end they found she had a form of spiral meningitis and she would probably never walk again. I didn't tell her that. In a month and a half we were jogging to gather.
From there on we lived pretty happily. We were stationed in Virgina for couple of years and loved it. Having been in the service before, I started calling and asking to be assigned to Europe some where. I called them everyday and finally they gave in and gave me an assignment to Greece. We were able to fly over together...there was plenty of local housing there.
When we landed RS said to me,,,?we just came home?. Boy was she right!
To be continued......
More of the story
A little about Greece as I saw it. Even though there's only about 9 million Greeks. They are very proud of their country and it's history..with the exception
of Alexander the Great ...who they think was a savage person....He destroyed everything in his path including the great library at Alexandria. The world lost valuable histories in that fire.
Athens did not have even one freeway until they hosted the Summer Olympics a few years ago.....the Olympics bankrupted the county and they are in deep trouble now. Such a shame.
The very first day RS and I took a bus into Athens to look around. We were waiting for the bus and when it pulled in everyone just pushed their way in and we were left standing there. The Greeks do not believe in lines...it's every person for themselves. We got on the next bus ...lesson learned.
Going to a movie is a trip.....I was taller than most of them and we got right in.
They have 19 political parties and 19 news papers. Communist...whatever...it's a free country.
They like us are individuals, but not as a country. Twice we've had a hand in overthrowing their government. However back then we paid them 450 million a year to have our bases there...mostly missile sites.
I am sure there are still places that have no electricity. When we first got there we had an old VW bug. Noisy bugger too. We would go riding through the country side and as we came to small villages, every person would come out to wave and watch us go by.
Having a girl is a time of aghast to families there. Almost a time to cry. They still believe in putting to gather a small fortune to make the girl worthy.
The wealthy Greeks would go to the villages and more or less buy young girls
as servants. The would promise to give the girls a good education and would make sure they married well. A win win for everyone.
The Greeks have no industries. Wool, fur, and vegetables are all they have.
In other words everything is taxed 100 or 200 % that is imported. Autos are incredibly expensive.
We found out when we got there.....don't expect to eat in the middle of the day.....everything is closed from noon to 4. The whole country takes a nap.
If you went to a restaurant or Taverna to eat they will pretty much ignore you. All we knew to order was Bonn Fillet. (steak). After a while watching Greek customers, we learned to walk right into the kitchen and ask the cooks was good that day. After that we were waited on with much love and respect.
Eating in a restaurant or Taverna was great. They would never ever bring you the check unless you asked for it. Not like America where they can't wait to get you out so they could seat someone else.
There are over 2000 islands there and almost everyone is different. Some with trees, some with nothing but rock, some have cars or buses and some do not any vehicles at all . They are all very different and beautiful.
The Greeks do not like dogs at all, when Germans occupied Greece during WWII they would stack bodies on the streets and dogs would eat them, Cats on the other hand are all over the place.
A bit more of the story......
Like I said before, when we landed in Athens....RS said "We just came home"".
During the taxi ride to our hotel...it looked like the place had been bombed. We saw very few homes that were finished....they all looked unfinished. Later we found out that if you are still working on your house, you paid no property tax.
People would add a few bricks every year and pay no taxes.
RS and I attended a "Welcome to Greece" class. A few survival words,.like Hello and how much is that? All kinds of stuff, including handing out Ration Cards that told us how much booze, beer and cigarettes we could buy each month. Then they gave us list of things that were controlled...such as sheets and pillow cases and a few other items. I sat there and thought to my self......you mean anything that's not that list we can sell? Well what do you know? I think I might do a little business here. Hehehe!
Now to find someone to sell to......
I did a booming business in Coat Hangers In Thailand. I have no idea what they wanted them for?
To be continued......
The story continues.....
In all the time before moving to Greece. RS and I never had any real arguments.
Once we moved from the hotel to our first Greek apartment....we had quite a conflict. I mentioned that I wanted to bring my two sons over to live with us, there was a DOD school for them and I wanted to let them have the experience of living in a foreign country.
From RS....I don't want any f**king kids here! Never. In fact if I had one, I would probably kill it!......note to self...time to get that vasectomy.
Her behavior was changing......
We met a Greek Harley rider down on the beach, he had an all white one,
with Iron crosses all over it. He had ear rings and wild hair and a big beard. We became good friend with him and his Egyptian girl friend. He would lead the way and we would putt along behind in our VW. Man had some great hash too. We had traveled along the sea shore for a while and he turned across the hywy and stopped. Off jumped his girl friend who was a knockout, she turn towards the traffic and took off her top and waved at everyone. I turned around and there was RS sprawled across the VW hood tits flying, An other new behavior....which I loved..this is getting to be fun.
The story continues.....
In all the time before moving to Greece. RS and I never had any real arguments.
Once we moved from the hotel to our first Greek apartment....we had quite a conflict. I mentioned that I wanted to bring my two sons over to live with us, there was a DOD school for them and I wanted to let them have the experience of living in a foreign country.
From RS....I don't want any f**king kids here! Never. In fact if I had one, I would probably kill it!......note to self...time to get that vasectomy.
Her behavior was changing......
We met a Greek Harley rider down on the beach, he had an all white one,
with Iron crosses all over it. He had ear rings and wild hair and a big beard. We became good friends with him and his Egyptian girl friend. He would lead the way and we would putt along behind in our VW. Man had some great hash too. One day we had traveled along the sea shore for a while and he turned across the hywy and stopped. Off jumped his girl friend who was a knockout, she turned towards the traffic and took off her top and waved at everyone. I turned around and there was RS sprawled across the VW hood tits flying, An other new behavior....which I loved..this is getting to be fun.
Unfortunately they had to go back to Egypt. Bummer.
The base I was assigned to was on the other side of Athens. The place we lived in was a seaside town named Glyfada. It was a suburb east of Athens.
It was know as little America. It was populated by Navy, Air force, and the Army families...all renting. It was pretty cool.
Since we lived there, there was a bus to take us to work and back each day. I if you wanted to take your own car, that was fine too. The Bus was a big old deluxe Mercedes. It took a long route and went though one of the Communist districts. Every day they would throw stuff at us and raise hell...we just waved and smiled. If you drove your own car it was a great ride, you would go by the Acropolis each way. Just beautiful.
Believe me I will tell you about my job in detail later...big part of the story.
To get to the point, I rode the Bus over to the base one day, but I got off early and grabbed a ride with young black guy. He drove a gold Mercedes.
As we drove along, this guy said to me "God gave me this Mercedes".
What's when I asked how's that? The Lord introduced me to Vula. Vula and I do business. She tells me what to buy and she pays me very well for it.
OH! Yeah! Can I meet Vula? Sure, he said.
Remember...I had been wondering who to sell to.
Now I had a who. To be continued......
The story continues....
My Job.
When I checked in on the Greek Airbase to my job I was in for a surprise.
I was promoted in route....so they pinned some new stripes on me. I was now a Buck Sargent. A little more money in my pocket. The big surprise was yet to come.
I was assigned to the comm center. It was a very secure place...push button keys to get in. Typical. It had a beep button on the message window, so we could have folks sign for any messages that they got...all the way up to top secret. More on that later.
As I saluted the Comm Center Officer......he said "Everything that happens in the comm center, stays in the Comm center". I thought. well duh!
He said "We have 3 times the people that we need and you will work one 24 hour day and be off six days." It was all I could do to not start jumping up and down. I had walked into heaven.
We worked our 24 hour shifts with one other person. If you had someone work our shift for us, we could be off 12 days in a row...or taken farther, 18 days.
Our duties were....keeping 6 old beat up Teletype machines going for messages. We answered the green phone..which was a secure phone to the 8 missile sites we had and notify those who rec'd messages so they could come get them and sign for them.
The other duty we had was to change security cards in a big old machine we had. It was the world com security net. We usually changed cards once a day. We did have nights where we changed the cards 6 or 8 times, because some one breached it. This was way before good computers came along.
Since I had checked in on Friday...my first shift...was the following Friday.
I went home to tell RS the good news!
And more of the story.
Vula!
Vula was about 50 and loved veils....she wore a lot of them. You could hardly see her face. She spoke very little English and I didn't speak much Greek, so she brought pictures and samples of what I should get for her. I did business with her for a while, but I found more and better customers later on.
Glad I did, because she got busted later on. By her husband! He was the chief of police in Glyfada. No joke!
It was rough at first, until one of my friends introduced me to Johnny. Big mistake by my friend. Johnny was not happy with him.
Johnny. He was a Greek that had a bar in New Jersey and one day some Italians came in and said "Can we use your bar and back room for our meetings? We will pay you well. 10 grand a month. Obviously Johnny said yes.
They would leave 50 dollar tips for a drink. He was in heaven.
Some years later there was a big soccer game being held in Athens and he flew over. Right after the game Johnny had a heart attack and could never travel again. Johnny faced reality and bought three big buildings on one property and they were full of condos. Johnny lived there in one of them.
But Johnny was bored....he had to be doing something...so he wanted to impress his rich Greek friends and stated to buy and sell. Johnny was well organized and needed some one who was reliable......that person turned out to be me. He gave me big orders and it was my responsibility to fill them.
So my little business turned into a big business.
How did I do it? It was easy....I would just tell couples "Buy what I ask for and I will double your money". In the end I had 23 couples working for me and I would keep everything over double...which was everything! Fat City!
Once every 6 months are so, I would take them all out to dinner at the same time and we had fun.
I remember that first run to Johnnies. RS and I took it over to Johnny's and had a drink with he and his wife. RS and I giggled and yelled all the way home. We were set! That was what I did until I left Greece.
Next up...my other business.
Some more of the story....just a bit.
After I had been there for a year and a half my OIC in the comm center called me to his office, There stood a young PFC. Then he told me the young soldier was going to send his wife back to the sates because he couldn't afford his rent.
The OIC said Sgt OMM would you tell this young man how to pay his rent here?
I thought to myself "Holy Sh*t" he knows what I'm doing!!! And I think he did, but it didn't matter evidently.
So I had another couple for my business. He was recruiting for me!
My greedy story continues............
The other business. In my hippie days I was known to sell a few buds here and there. In Greece the penalties were pretty stiff.
A oz of hash was as at least two years. One Lucy was a life sentience. Gulp!
One did not want to go to a Greek prison.
I didn't know anyone when I got there, so what to do?
Guess I should talk a bit more about we Americans living there. As a nation we were not popular. They blew our commissary twice. They also blew part of our PX up too at the the Air Base in Glyfada. Both times were at night, so they weren't trying to kill us, just bother us.
Here's a crazy thing too.....they blew up our cars.....we had black and white license plates that said "US Forces Greece" on them. We used to joke..why not paint a big target on our cars?
It included Embassy Staff, and the Marines that guarded it, and all US personnel stationed there in Greece.
Now here's the big kicker! Unknown to the Greek population, our two governments had a deal. They would buy a new car for any American cars that were blown up!!!!!
We started making it even more obvious that we were Americans and parked anywhere we thought that our cars had a chance to be blown up.
I kind of hung around the MATS terminal on the Airbase in Glyfada just to get a feel for the place and to see how well they checked incoming US planes, also they blew up any packages or suitcases that were found just sitting around there. That was kind of fun too. I was there one night with RS having a milk shake (only place to get one) that we could find. And the alarms went off, they had found another brief case without an owner. Bomb squad came running and so did most of us to watch. We hid behind concrete pillars and waited. They blew it up as usual....but this one did have bomb in it! Whooa!
What a blast! No one was hurt, but it scared the crap out of us. Maybe we shouldn't watch next time!
One day I was cruising around and saw an Airman in work fatigues that was pacing back an forth...he looked like he was looking for some one. I walked over to him and started talking to him. He was in fact waiting for some one and he was way late. I just ask if there was anything I could do. He looked me up and down and said "not unless you want buy some hash". Hello there my friend, of course I wanted to!
It quickly became a partnership. I would buy whatever he had. He was an on board aircraft mechanic and before he left Turkey he hid the hash in the engines. When landed he would pull maintenance and recover the hash. Fact was he was standing there with it in his pocket.
We drove down the Glyfada beach and sat down. He had 40 sticks of green colored hash that had been pressed into 4"x1" strips. He wanted 15 bucks for each one. I bought it all. I sold it for $35 a stick. Should have asked more really...it was really good. As we sat there he and I became partners. He made two or three trips a month. He would try to write me before each trip, if he couldn't he would just call me when he landed. Was great for 5 months, then he never came back. Who knows what happened to him.
Actually as we sat on Glyfada beach I noticed that there were other deals being made. Hummmm! To be continued..........
The Story Continues.......Two Crazy Englishmen !
RS and I had been in Greece for a year and we decided to move up town so to speak. We moved all the way up to the top of Glyfada, so far up the sheep herders would drive their sheep right down the street in front of us. It was great! We could see the three closest islands clearly. The sunsets were picture postcard stuff. The landlord was a marble cutter and marble dust designer. All our floors were marble and the designs were incredible.
We found out marble was cold as could be in the mornings. The landlord only turned on the heat 1 hour in the morning and one hour at night. That just wouldn't do for two spoiled Americans. I had a talk with him and he had a 3 ton tank to hold the fuel oil. He said it was too expensive to burn longer than 2 hours a day. I told him to let me take care of it. Service people got a discount and I kept it full from then on. His family loved it and so did we...heat all the time. It had a intercom and a push button door downstairs and we could buzz people in or not. By the way rent was $200 a month.
We had balconies front and back and if we leaned over we could pick lemons right off the tree. Through the years I would stand on the front balcony
and think to myself "Life will never be this good again". I was right!
We has two kittens...Nuts and Buns. Nuts fell into the fuel oil and after much washing..he lost all his hair. RS and everyone else would not touch him...poor pink little thing. I did.
As we were moving a friend came over and said there were two English men down on the Glyfada beach and they had something to sell. Away I went to find them. I did. They had two keys hash oil to sell. Oh! Boy!. We made arrangements for them to come over to our old place the next day. I had to get the money out of the bank.
Sure enough they came over. You could run a toothpick's worth over a cigarette and it would knock you silly. I paid them one dollar a gram for it all!
Remember this was long ago.
I never ever sold on the street.....I was always the middle man. I sold it for 10 dollars a gram. The people I sold it too would double it, if not more. We furnished our new place with the money. A note...fisher men were making $500 a day back then, so folks did have plenty of money.
Talk about something hard to work with it was that oil in plastic bags. So I froze it and cut it off with a knife. Then weighted it.
This was not the last time I would see these guys.
What these guys did was leave England with something to sell. Their first stop was Morocco......Casablanca. There the would sell their goods and buy something else. They traveled all across Northern Africa buying and selling, then through the Holy Land and finally to Turkey, then Greece. I honestly don't know how they got the hash into Greece. The Greek borders were very hard on drugs. Usually nothing came across the boarders. That leads to another story later on.
By the end of their journey, they had something to sell when they got home to England. What a pair these two were. Really good dudes.
Like I said, I would see these guys again.
For you sex nuts.....RS was the same...in public very shy and demure.
At home she was totally different. Our house was typically Greek. It had another floor above us, which was unfinished. the brick at a time for tax reasons. When RS saw it...she wanted to have some pictures taken up there of her in a bikini. Who was I too refuse....we did this many times...each time she would lose her bikini in minutes. I always thought the neighbors with telescopes loved it.
The Story Continues.....Crete
This was at the end of year three in Greece. Not only did I supply Johnny, I had other customers too. There were 4 really nice young Greek Guys that wanted to stock a new bar on the island of Crete. Obviously that was right up my alley.
So they left Glyfada with enough stock to start a bar. About 6 months later they called me. There was an Egyptian lady there that I should meet. She would go to Amsterdam and bring back goodies. I never asked her how she did it, she would probably not tell me anyway.
So I flew down to Crete. RS didn't want to go, so it was just me. The airport there was on the opposite side of the island from my destination, so I rented a car. The drive across the island was beautiful. I drove by the Palace of Knossos. A very ancient civilization once lived there...all there is now is ruins. They are still trying to figure out what happened to them.
I was headed to Agia Galini. Translated it meant "House of the Sun". Was it ever! As I got closer the mountains got steeper...I was thinking "What the hell?" Then I turned into a small road that looked like it ended in a cliff .
Then the road took a turn and down below was Agia Galini shining brightly by the sea. It was beautiful.
Finding the bar was easy and in I went. After much hugging and slaps on the back, the guys turned around and said here is whom you came to see. Sitting in the corner was one the most beautiful woman I had ever seen. The Egyptian lady. She took me by the hand and we walked to her place. I can't tell you what she had to sell because of 420's rules. The following day I would make a pretty big buy from her.
She wouldn't let me buy anything, because she said it was going to be a big night all around town. As we walked along anyone that passed by she gave something to them. When we got back to the bar it was dark. She gave everyone in the bar a present too. Low and behold she introduced me to a band called "Dire Straits". You old timers have probably heard of them. They weren't playing they were there to party. The whole figgin town was partying.
Some how I ended up with a young blond lady and she took me to a place called "The Singing Rocks". It was amazing. The waves washed in and moved the rocks each time . It was beautiful to listen too. We stripped and jumped in. We played for what seemed like forever. That was close as I ever came to cheating on RS, but I didn't. Well, there was another time, but that's another story.
I woke up the next morning on a table in the bar, my arms around the Egyptian girl. All the tables were full. A couple of guys from Dire Straights was on one too. We had a party!!! The Egyptian lady and I ate and drank some strong coffee, Then we walked back to her place to do business.
I left with allot of what she had. again I can't say what it was because of 420's rules.
I wasn't too worried about flying back to Athens. The Greeks didn't check in country flights. When I got back home RS said "Did you have a good time ?"
All I said was yep...you should have gone with me.
In all my dealings, this was the biggest profit margin of all. I paid 2 bucks each for them and sold them for 1000 Drachmas ......$27 dollars. The folks I sold to would sell them for twice that or 3 times that. Fat City again. Nice two day trip.
The Story Continues...........Tasos Panos
I should have talked about this before. It starts before I ever set foot in Greece.
When I was stationed in Virginia. I was in charge of a Mars station. Mars = Military Amateur Radio Station. I would run nets between the Military and Voluntary Amateur Radio Stations. Was a wonderful job. We ran phone patches to folks stationed in Germany. This was way before digital anything was invented. So it was like a free call to loved ones separated by their assignments.
I had a Armature license so on snowy days I could run the nets from home. My Commander had given me his old rig to use....I was stoked. After my business was over I would start looking for distant armatures to talk to. One day as I was looking around I heard a SV call sign....Greece!
So I called back.....that's how I met Tasos Panos. He was a private detective in Athens. Very friendly guy and insisted that soon we arrived in Greece to come see him.
Well RS and I did. We were still living in a hotel at that time.
His office was top notch. Then he started talking about all the things he did.
He was an official currier for the Greek Government. He traveled with a suitcase hand cuffed to his arm. This where it started to get weird. He had diplomatic immunity where ever he went. He loaded the suitcase with hundreds of thousands of Greek drachmas. As he went from country to country he would exchange the money for the current currency. One can make thousands this way. All totally illegal. RS and I started feeling that we wanted to get out of there fast. Then he started telling us how many M-16s he was selling to other governments. That did it we were out of there!
We went straight to the CID office on the Air Base and told our story. They said they would look into it and to come back in two days.
Well, we did. When we came back the CID investigator took us to a little room with a big smile on his face and looked right at us and said " You can do whatever you want to with Mr. Panos.....He works for us!". Say what?
To be continued...........................
