Day 17
One must indulge in cultural things while one is abroad, I suppose. That's why I ended up at the theater tonight.
Well, that's not entirely why. I've been talking over dinner with another of the boarders here, a Miss Diviou. Foreign, you know, and we don't know any of the same people. But the roof constitutes an introduction, eh wot?
At any rate, she wanted to go to a play that's sort of a culmination of the harvest festival, and of course she wouldn't dream of going unescorted, so I said I'd do the proper thing and take her.
The play was an unusual thing. Didn't understand half of it, to be perfectly honest. Something to do with ancient rituals to thank somebody or other for the forest's bounty, and a retelling of what I assume must be an old folk tale that the locals know so well they didn't feel the need to explain it.
The interesting thing was what came after. Miss Diviou and I were on our way back to the boarding-house. Must have been midnight. I was counting my steps and plotting out the turns for the map—Miss Diviou is rather good cover, come to think of it, must remember to use her more often. Then three hooligans stepped out from around a corner.
I naturally assumed they intended an assault on Miss Diviou's honour, and readied myself to defend her. But instead they feigned concern that we must be lost, and insisted on guiding us to the nearest main square. They surrounded us, and we really had no choice, so off we went. They took us this way and that, and eventually we ended up at a square quite near the boarding-house, but by then I'd quite lost track of the route and my step count.