Today we searched the hot olive treed hills of interior Crete looking for an old old monastery our friend Zaharius owner of the butcher shop and cheese store told us to see. Byooteeful.. he said... one of his few English words. Using his hand and fingers in a very greek way to say beuatiful with his hands.
We arrived and parked in the shade of a tree then climbed the steps of the first small building we saw. Peering through the locked gate like door we could see inside a mausoleum~like small round room. Inside was a glass case with many skulls on the shelves... some with big parts of the skull missing. Leg bones placed behind the skulls.
lWe went in search of the history inside the walls of the monastery. Renovations ocurred many times.... 1800's.... 1700's.. but the original place was buit in the 1300's.
It was a holy place.... centuries of worship and times of violence and honor. 36 monks killed along with the slaughter, referred to as the holocaust here, of many people in the wine storage room during the Turkish invasion of 1866. 36 skulls in the case.
I lit two candles in the extremely old church... Greek Othodox... thin beeswax candles... my prayer for bless..ed journeys for two of my loved ones.... J and M.
More pictures from Dale's phone if I can get them for the rest of the trip back to the apartment we are in. So much packed into each day.
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