awkward.

as arina so kindly reminded me just now, i forgot to mention a very interesting comical momentous  uncomfortable memorable  awkward moment of the trip.  after arina had texted marcos mele (of the italian family who gave us a ride up and around the meteora rocks) twice, TWICE, to say that we didn't sleep well, we were tired and weren't able to make the touristy journey with them that day, he had apparently called three times but arina did not answer because once we were on the bus and she had met another dutch person (a married, unhappy woman with children who was back-packing around greece for three weeks and wanted to have internet affairs and...we could give you her life story if you like...) and that would have been rude to answer his calls, right..? so, once we got to igoumenitsa, on our own time and worry free, we thought once we checked in 2 hours before our ferry we'd be out of the town area and not run into the mele family who's boat was 3 hours after ours. bad timing, or call it what you will, i went wandering around the shops in the terminal in search of a new back pack as my bag handle had broken. and who did i run into...mr and son marco mele.
"ooooh. ciao...."
"uh ciao"
 "did you get arina's messages?"
 "uh no."
 "really? she sent you two."
 (showing me his phone with no messages from arina)
"that's so weird, she sent it twice."
"uh no"
(holding up two fingers) "really? two messages, really."
"no.."
"oh, sorry, we were really tired and then arina ran into a friend from holland and um how were the monasteries?"
 "good, we saw three of them"
 "nice!"
 (silence)
"well it was really nice to meet you guys, and thank you so much for taking us around yesterday and sorry we couldn't meet up today."
 "mmmhmm."

i don't think arina believed me that i ran into them. but really. i did. and then they drove by the parking lot where we were sitting on the steps and pointed as the mother looked out the car window. no joke. no laughing. it happened, arina.