The Mars Venus and You Blog

It's all Greek to me....

And I love that it is as this week my blog comes to you from Skopelos – a beautiful Greek island best known for its role as a gorgeous backdrop for the film Mamma Mia! And oh, mamma mia, what a gorgeous backdrop it is. I’m seriously considering how I could reposition myself – and of course Mars Venus & You – long-term here... or at least for the season. It actually wouldn’t be *that* hard. But that’s another story for when I’ve pondered it all a little more...
In the meantime, glorious Greek greetings to you! The picture above is one of the many picturesque café’s on the twisting and turning whitewashed backstreets - which make me feel like Alice in Wonderland as I explore my way through them, never knowing what I’m going to find next. The delightfully decadent thing about coming at this time of year is that we’re *just* out of season – which means that it feels as though we’ve hired the whole island for ourselves. Bliss.

Whilst I’ve been out here, naturally, I find myself people watching and contemplating all things Martian and Venutian – and I wonder; if they were to measure stress levels here, how would they fare against the UK’s counterparts? You see the way of life – and indeed pace of life – is SO different here. Don’t misunderstand me – I don’t intend to overly romanticise the lifestyle here and I’m very sure that if asked, the locals would have their own list of dissatisfactions with life – after all we all become accustomed to our surroundings – no matter how ‘perfect’ they are or appear to be...  a reminder of this presented itself to me this morning on my walk down through the winding streets, glistening crystal blue sea against the deep green of the forests providing me with a beautiful horizon, when I overheard (aka couldn’t miss cos it was so bloomin’ obvious) a very loud conversation between mother and son that I’m fairly certain was not of the ‘I love you, have a good day’ kind...

But still – despite life’s natural niggles, I can’t help but feel the way of life must be so much more conducive to the Oxytocin and Testosterone building stuff that we’re missing at home in the UK... here women connect easily and at length with other women – be that over the neighbours fence, or chatting in the shops at a very leisurely pace. Even for women who work, there’s no sense of urgency about the work that they do... everything will get done, but all in good, Greek paced time... and the men have an equally laid back approach.

What I notice most is that both sexes spend a lot of time with their own clan. A lot of the day. Every day. This will presumably mean that the women got lots of opportunity to talk through life, the universe and everything with other women whilst the men get a lot of time to – well, just hang out and be man like together.

All this got me rethinking about an article I read in Marie Claire on the plane over, entitled; What’s Become of Girl Power? In it, Bryony Gordon contemplates  how in the late 90’s, the promising proposition of ‘Girl Power’ symbolised the ability to be ‘whoever you damned well wanted to be’... and, if I understood her correctly – how we eventually then realised that the option of having it all was possibly not all that we hoped it would be. That perhaps the grass did just *look* greener on the other side; when we actually stood on it we realised we now had to furiously try to tread water on quicksand. I know, as a women in my early 20’s and living in London, I certainly felt the pressure to have it all; to be it all. The result was a very dissatisfied young lady, who never quite felt good enough because there was always something she could be doing better at. Part of this could be put down to finding my way or coming of age, but I’ve no doubt that part of it was because I was continuously presented with the idea that now I could have it all, it would be terribly remiss of me not to take advantage of every opportunity; to show that I was embracing every last bit. Come my thirties it suddenly thumped me in the head that this was perhaps not the best route to happiness...

And increasingly since then, in an attempt to prove our capability and to prove our equality, I do sometimes wonder if we women have collectively shot ourselves in the foot. Now I know this isn’t a statement that will suit all out there, but I also know that I repeatedly see women around me continuously trying to prove their SuperWomen type worth. As a collective we seem to have adopted the idea that we have to be amazingly successful at work, amazingly beautiful, amazingly perfect parents, amazingly creative in the kitchen... and all of the above in the bedroom to boot.

(as a complete digression to this, I was also reading another article that caught my attention about why British women are perceived as great mothers whilst French women are perceived as great wives – also very interesting... but another story for another blog)

(also note: I didn’t type amazingly good friends... because even though I know we, as women, are amazing friends – indeed I can vouch I have many fabulously amazing friends – I think this has somehow slipped off our list as a priority; and certainly increasingly so if we’re coupled up in any way. And of course, this is the very essence of what is different here in Greece; to them it goes without saying that women spend time with other women ~ but for us it’s another thing on our to-do list that often gets displaced because there’s so many other things we feel we have to do...)

But back to the point - here’s the thing: I think we’re amazingly Super Women WITHOUT all that.
Us women folk are pretty amazing creatures in our own right; we are amazing at being women.

Which, to be clear, is a pretty huge amazingness; not least of all our capability – if we so choose – to create another human being from our own bodies. We rarely see men collectively turning themselves inside out trying to prove their equality by proving their bodies can grow new life – so why on earth do we feel the need to equate ourselves to men – who yes, also have their own unique amazingness - to prove our own capabilities?

Greek women are proud, and I think this proudness comes from an inherent knowledge of their collective amazingness as women. The same proudness can be seen in so many other cultures too – but the UK is, with sadness, not one that springs to mind. Happily I do believe pockets of women are starting to celebrate our differences and with that comes a celebration of our own strengths.

Indeed Bryony concludes her article with the sentence; ‘In the nineties, Girl Power seemed to be about acting like a man... Today we realise that we need only be ourselves. In that respect, Girl Power has finally grown up. In 2010, we have Women Power at last.’... I think the Greeks may applaud to that. I know I do.

And that’s my holiday musings for the week – back to the harbour side sunshine... have a fab weekend – and till next time, over and out - from Nadia, via planet Venus, with love x

Posted: Friday, April 30th, 2010

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