Day 3 on Samet, Part 1: All Hail the Hose!

Another day, another buffet breakfast. As I walk away from the fruit station with my carefully portioned pieces, I pass a table laden down with plates of food. There are only two people sitting at this table but they seem to have gone round the buffet and loaded multiple plates with everything they want, all in one go. Did they think that there might be a sudden rush of guests, like a plague of locusts, swarming over the food and leaving only crumbs in their wake? Or perhaps they felt that it would be too much effort to get up between each course? I like to think that the little bit of exercise I get walking to and from the buffet table might offset some of the calories consumed with each plateful. Plus, I don't look so greedy by having it all spread out before me. Pacing myself means that no-one really knows how much I've gorged. I find it helps in fooling myself too.

During breakfast we were yet again entertained by Le Vimarn Staff (they really should think about going on tour, they'd be a sell-out!), this time by a group attempting to clean one of the paths, or at least one rather small section of path. This task apparently required ten people: four women on their hands and knees diligently scrubbing away at the cracks, five men standing around doing not very much and one man directing them. Well, when I say directing, I mean sitting on a chair and glancing over at them now and again. The women were working incredibly hard and doing a fabulous job, not even pausing for breath. God only knows what the men were doing. Four had long-handled brushes and were half-heartedly sloshing the water around on one paving stone, whilst the other poured water from what appeared to be a child's bucket. This clearly wasn't working. The size of the bucket meant that probably only a cupful of water was poured onto the path at a time and as soon as the four men descended on it with their brushes, the water was gone.

Then came another Eureka moment, not from one of the path cleaners but from the gardener, who had obviously been watching this spectacle from the grass. He walked up to the group carrying his hose and the men watched on in amazement as water gushed forth and soaked the path. From the looks on their faces, we half expected the men to drop down on their knees and bow to the gardener as a God. It was almost as if they had never seen a hose before in their lives. Of course, this momentous event meant that work ceased for several minutes as the men stood gawping in awe so I'm not entirely sure the hose actually helped in the end. The women paid absolutely no attention to the hose or the gardener and carried on with their work. I'm sure there's something to be learnt from that.