Rhodes (Island) Local Customs

One thing that surprised me about Rhodes was the number of parrots we saw, mostly outside restaurants (perhaps they weren't allowed in...!).

We ended up keeping a daily parrot count for the holiday.

If a Greek invites you out for dinner or a drink, don't EVER try to make him "split the bill in half" as we often do here in Northern Europe. I know some tourists who wanted to be nice to their host for the evening, and they snapped the bill out of his hand and paid it. Never has a friendship been that close to ruin, and the Greek man was more embarrassed than you could ever imagine!

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If you want to see a Greek church or monastery inside, you must be properly dressed. It's considered rude to enter a church if your shoulders and knees aren't covered. This rule goes for both men and women. So if you as a tourist wants to be polite against the country you're visiting, have this in mind.

In Greece you much live with the GMT-time, and in this case GMT is an abbreviation for "Greek Maybe Time". The Greek people have a very different attitude to time. When the bus is scheduled to come 10.30, it will come between 10 and 11, depending on the traffic, how many people the driver had met and felt he should talk with, and many other small things. Or a local might tell you that the bus will arrive AFTER 4 p.m.! Then he hasn't promised too much. The Greek people don't live by the clock. The Greeks also have a different opinion about when it's morning, afternoon and evening. You say Good Morning until 12. If you have agreed to meet in the 'afternoon', the earliest meant by this will be 6.00 p.m.! In Greece, the evening meal begins no earlier than 9.00 p.m. Also no one will think anything of it if you telephone at 10.00 p.m. in the evening. However, 'siesta' time, between 3.00 p.m. and 5 p.m. is held as sacred. During the siesta, though, it is very unpopular to disturb someone

At most beaches you will have to pay for a sun bed and an umbrella. If you think that it is just people trying to get money out of the tourists you're very wrong. It's a job in Greece having a piece of a beach. A man seeks for a particular part of the beach each year, and he pays a sum of money, to be allowed to put up his sun beds and umbrellas. During the season it's now his responsibility, that this part of the beach is kept properly. The price you pay will depend on where the beach is situated, what kind of facilities (taverna, toilets, showers) there are. The tourist police checks that he does his job properly

You see the Greek priest - or pappas, as they are called - everywhere, as you can't miss them in their long, black dress and high hat. They are not obliged to wear their priest clothes all the time, but they do, as it's most practical and they are easier to identify this way. The Greek priests can marry and have children, just like in the Lutheran church. But you will never see a woman priest. This is not allowed by the Greek Orthodox Church.

The miniature churches or shrines next to the roads are memorials for people killed in a car accident, at the same spot where the accident happened. The family of the deceased construct and maintain them . They contain a photo of the deceased, some religious objects and a lit candle.

Churches = ekklisies. The big churches are inside the towns but the numerous small ones are practically everywhere. Usually white-painted, you will find them on a beach, on the mountain peaks, in deep gorges or inside caves. People of Rhodes are deeply religious people and they build churches to express their gratitude to God or to fulfil a "tama", a promise given to God in exchange for a request.