Everyone’s an expert

The above photo is taken on the town beach and it shows a gaggle of grannies. The culture here is great as respects ya-yades (grandmothers). Most mornings they can be seen either treading water in the sea, or sitting in small groups like this one putting the world to rights. Let’s face it, beats the bingo hall doesn’t it ladies? When they go into the water, they seldom swim anywhere, but rather tread water, their hands gently sweeping back and forth across the surface, as they natter away contentedly. Many of them do this daily well into their eighties, and it has to be said, the broadly held opinion here that sea bathing is good for the health does have some merit when you factor these women into the equation, doesn’t it. We’re certainly trying to keep up our regular dips well into winter time, if it’s liable to benefit us like it has these ladies.

I was talking to Taki, my coffee friend, earlier today and it came up that I’d been to see a doctor. Well, actually I’ve been to see two. Here, as I’ve mentioned many times, you can’t move for ‘ologists’ in the back streets around the town. I don’t remember ever seeing private ‘ology’ clinics in every side street back in the UK, correct me if I’m wrong. Back on Rhodes I’d been advised by my chiropractor to go see a neurologist about the slightly suspect reflexes in my right leg, which seem to be connected to my chronic ‘restless leg’ syndrome that I’ve had on and off for a couple of decades now. What with the move between islands and everything, oh and the tiny factor of a lockdown brought about by a worldwide pandemic, I had put it on the back burner until recently. I’d seen the sign outside one neurologist’s surgery quite a few times in the town, so I decided that I ought to fix an appointment and see if she could shed any light on my condition.

I don’t really want to go into all the sordid details here, except to say that my visit was indeed of some benefit and it also resulted in my getting my Greek health insurance sorted out, as it happened, much more easily than I’d expected. Back when I gave up work, I’d always intended to visit the IKA offices (only it’s no longer called ‘IKA’ by the government, even though all the great unwashed still refer to it as such. It’s more correctly known now as EFKA) and see about my health cover with the government scheme, but right about the time when I wanted to get it sorted, a pandemic struck, and the UK concurrently decided in its infinite wisdom to leave the European Union, throwing the proverbial spanner in the works of international cooperation on such matters.

I had actually paid one visit to EFKA just before the first lockdown kicked in, and I’d presented all the necessary papers to get my AMKA number activated to provide me with full health insurance cover, but the person behind the desk back then told me that my S1 form was out of date, even though I’d only just received it from the UK. Plus she said that since the UK had only just ceded from Europe, they didn’t know themselves how to handle people in my situation. I went to see the neurologist this past month and she asked me if I had insurance, to which I had to reply no, I didn’t. We’d taken out a modest private policy in order to get our biometric ID cards a couple of years back, but not renewed it a third time, because it was too expensive. This meant in practical terms that if I needed blood tests, or any type of scan, you name it really, then I’d be paying out some serious money.

If you want to get your blood tested here you have to turn up at the clinic waving a form from your GP or neurologist which confirms that you have insurance and that you only pay what’s called the ‘simetochi,’ which literally translates as ‘participation,’ but in the UK we’d call a ‘standing charge.’ The number of results that my neurologist wanted from my blood test totted up to a mere €300 plus without insurance. Cue another visit to the EFKA office. Back when I’d been told that my S1 was out of date, I’d duly gone back to the UK Department of Health, explained the problem to them over the phone and they’d promised to send me a new one. That ought to have sorted it, then, right?

True to their word, they did send me a new S1 (which is several pages long) and the dates on it were the same as the previous one. I couldn’t quite understand why the woman at EFKA had told me that the thing was out of date anyway, because the only date on the form relates to when I became a pensioner, thus it’s not an expiry date as such. Anyway, trying (but as usual, failing abysmally) to cut a long story short, this time I gathered up all my papers from when I’d worked on Rhodes (all those A4 photocopied forms that had been rubber stamped, you get the picture) along with my second S1, and trotted off to the Ierapetra EFKA office a couple of weeks ago. The lady who now serves the public behind the appropriate counter is now a different one, and she greeted me with a helpful smile. Good start, anyway.

“I was wondering,” I began trepidatiously, “if you could tell me if I’m entitled to health insurance cover, and, if so, what obtaining it may involve.” She asked me for my papers, so I handed the substantial wad over the counter for her to peruse. Her next words were, “Panayia mou!” At first that led me to feel some dismay, but she looked up at me with a smile and said, “Do you have a biometric residency permit?” Did I ‘eck as like? I handed it to her triumphantly, whereupon she asked if I’d mind while she made a phone call or two. I told her I’d all the time in the world if it meant that she could sort something out for me. She picked up the phone and evidently asked for guidance from some superior ranked individual, but since I understood perfectly what she was saying, I got the distinct impression that things were going OK. As she talked, the phone propped under her ear on her shoulder, she responded to instructions by tapping away at her keyboard while studying her computer screen. After around five minutes, during which she’d apologised to me several times for the delay, she put the receiver down, tapped away a few more times and re-examined the S1, which, remember, had the same date on it as the one that her predecessor had rejected two years ago, then looked up at me and said, “Everything seems to be in order Kyrie Manuel. If you could come back the day after tomorrow, I’ll give you a form to sign and you’ll be good to go. I’m sorry it’s the day after tomorrow, but tomorrow I’m off work you see. Is that OK for you?“

Now, what do you think, eh? I honestly couldn’t quite believe my ears. The S1 was valid (she told me she’d be processing it and then it would be returned to the UK to activate my cover) even though I was previously told that it wasn’t. That had cost me around €400 in two years minimum private health cover too. I went back two days later and she was as good as her word. She handed me a form to sign, then told me I was covered, right from that moment. No hassle, no frustration. It’s virtually unheard of in the history of ex-pats getting things done in Greek Government offices! All I needed to do from now on was to go into the office the first week of March every year to sign a statement confirming that I was still resident in Greece, and that was that.

I went to my GP to get the form for my blood test, and she printed out a two-page affair that I then was to present to the people at the clinic where they would be taking the blood sample. It detailed all the various things that the doctor/neurologist wanted to learn from the test, and each item was accompanied by a price. €30 here, €20 there, and the list was long. Like I said, it would have set me back in the region of €300. The actual ‘simetochi‘ payment was just €32. A couple of Greek friends told me that everyone pays that, that’s normal. Next is my MRI scan, since the neurologist wants to have a look and see if there are any mechanical issues in the spine affecting the nerves in my legs. A typical MRI scan without insurance is around €200 too. With my insurance form from the doc, I’ll only have to pay what all the Greek people pay, the ‘standing charge.’

No one wants to have health issues, but now that I’ve got my insurance sorted, I almost wanted to shout, “Bring ’em on, I’m ready.” I did say almost, mind you.

Returning to my chat with Taki, which is what kicked me off on this story, he asked me which neurologist I was seeing, as every Greek will do. They always want to know who your doctor is, what specialist you’re seeing, how much you’re earning, what you paid for your house, it’s the culture and you have to get used to it. The trouble is, as soon as you reply, you hear what I heard from Taki. “Oh I wouldn’t go to that Neurologist Gianni, we have reservations about her. She went to Denmark, you know.” Like going to Denmark was the kiss of death. “Anyway, who’s your GP?” I told him.

“Oh, I don’t think a lot of her. I could have recommended a doctor if you’d asked me.” Now, I love Taki, he’s a very good friend, but you can be certain that if I’d been talking to someone else, they’d have had a different point of view, and so on. The thing is, they’re all right in their own minds. I’d already talked to a female friend who works in Ierapetra hospital, and she gave glowing reports on both my neurologist and my GP. In fact, I decided to look up the neurologist on Google and the recommendations she has on there are all four and five star. You simply have to be strong in such circumstances and make your own decisions.

Diminutive Dimitri from down the lane turned up at the front door yesterday. We hadn’t been given any vegetables for a while and, even though we of course don’t expect anything, it was like he and his mum had read our minds. A few hours earlier we’d been helping his mum Maria sweep a lot of leaves from the steep lane leading up to Kyria Sofia’s house. The locals are nothing if not predictable in such circumstances. Do them a good turn and they’ll inevitably want to reward you, even though we don’t do it for that reason. He handed Yvonne a plastic bag full of produce from their own fields…

Yes, you’re right, there were also some tasty items that Maria had cooked, including a delicious portion of a large hortopita, plus some homemade portokalopita, yum!! Do we feel blessed living here? What do bears do in the forest, eh? More recent photos…