Watashi-wa is back in southern Crete. I came down here with FFF, a French female friend. We hiked down one of the gorges to the Libyan sea. There is a small pebble beach at the end. The water is beautifully clear because of the white marble seabed.
I told FFF that when I was last there I had seen a French girl and her boyfriend negotiate a slightly dicey route along the white marble rocks in order to jump from a ledge. The French girl had lost her nerve on the ledge and spent an age up there. Her boyfriend, and various Cretans, shouted encouragement from below. Eventually she jumped, to much applause.
‘It doesn’t look very high. What, 4 metres? I’m going to jump,’ said FFF.
We climbed up to the ledge. The only other person jumping was a young Cretan girl. The marble was dry. Nevertheless, it was still not totally straightforward. The access to the ledge is narrow and there are rocks below. The Cretan girl jumped three times, as if she were stepping into a swimming pool. Then I jumped. But FFF froze.
‘Jump!’
‘I can’t. I’m shaking too much.’
The Cretan girl scampered up once more, to show FFF where to place her feet. Then she leapt off again. FFF remained frozen. No one on the beach showed much interest. I offered encouragement from below. She asked me to leave, I wasn’t helping. A bit of a conundrum, leaving a girl stuck on a rock ledge. I went to get her shoes from the beach. It would be possible to climb back up again, with decent footwear. After a long time, she jumped.
‘I think I will call that place “French Girls’ Rock”,’ I said, after congratulating her.
‘That can be understood two ways,’ she said. ‘Depending on the punctuation.’
FFF is a better grammarian than cliff jumper.
watashi-wa in the snow 