URSABLOG: A Port In a Storm

Ports are wonderful things. I love hanging around them generally, not just for the ships, but for the noise, the buzz, the action, the sense of transition and movement. I think of them as the interface between the land and sea, a place of safety where the business of shipping coincides with the business of the land, where the relationship between the two is as much about the sea, the coast, and the hinterland, the land behind the port where human activities provide the meaning of the ports’ existence and identity.

The character of London, for example changes from one of almost bucolic charm in Teddington Lock – the tidal limit of the Thames, the furthers reach of influence of the sea – to the hard and harsh transactional Pool of London, and the old docks on both sides on the Eastern side of Tower Bridge. I think I am more comfortable within the fluid inconstant ways of the East End, amongst the old dwellings and battlegrounds of immigrants and exiles, than the moneyed stolidity of the West End. Further east, looking out to sea, I enjoy the feeling of impermanency combined with the hope of promise beyond the horizon, and all those things seen – yet not grasped and held – in the offing.

The offing – that wonderfully ambivalent word that describes both that part of the deep sea seen from the shore and the hope of the near future – implies action about to happen. Whether it’s a ship leaving to somewhere beyond the horizon, or one arriving from there, or just sitting there, waiting in the expectation of voyage orders, or orders to come into berth and load or discharge, there is a latent expectation of action, of movement, of life, of expectation.

Ports have been in mind a great deal in recent weeks, and not just because I have been helping students of the Institute of Chartered Shipbrokers prepare for their examinations. I have just received – after many years of hassle, planning, thinking – the building permit for a house in Piraeus I bought back in 2018.  I have thought many times since then that this purchase was a folly of the highest order, but I am now thankful that I did.

The house is about one hundred years old, and one of the many neo-classical houses that dot the cities of Piraeus and Athens. It has a faded beauty, and I fell in love with it at first sight. It is in need of drastic renovation, needing not only a new roof and internal reconstruction, but also the demolition of some substantial – if misguided – additions added by later owners. It has not been lived in for many years, but letters still arrive for earlier occupants.

At one point – after the devasting end of a previous relationship – I tried selling it but even though it had gone up in value, it was not easy to sell. To obtain a building permit, any buyer would have to start again – in his or her name – and go through the same frustrating procedures I had already undertaken, including investing a great deal of time and money in the process. This was a hardly a selling point.

Many foreign visitors here are surprised by how many of these neo-classical houses are being left to crumble into ruins around the city. But the houses are usually owned by second, third or later generations who have multiplies in the process. Few of them have the power, money or inclination to buy out their siblings’, or uncles’, aunts’, nieces’ or nephews’ (not to mention in-laws and children from other relationships whose shares are bitterly contested) and invest anew. In any case, in this crowded city scape, it is far more cost-effective – and eventually profitable – to wait for the house to collapse of its own accord, and then demolish it completely and build a new apartment block instead, to match those around it that have appeared in the meantime. Families will more likely resolve their differences when there is hope, even if it is the hope of future income from renting apartments that they will own as their share of the property. And the rooms in new apartments are spacious, modern, and filled with light.

I had fallen in love with the house for what it was: high ceilings, tall windows, courtyard and geometrically pleasing – if undersized – room. So why did I want to sell it? This was my property, owned solely by me. I have no children, and nor – at my age – am I likely to have any. I think it was more emotional than financial. The end of that relationship marked the end – in my mind at the time at least – of hope in any relationship. I had envisaged the house as a home, a place where a couple could dwell together, and grow old together. This was despite the fact that my ex-partner didn’t like the house and didn’t see its beauty and romance in the same way I did. She saw it for what it was: a house I had bought without her consultation – which was hardly my fault as we hadn’t yet met when I bought – in a quiet side street in Piraeus over shadowed on three sides by apartment blocks of varying sizes, with no view except the street and the sky above. I could not enthuse her with my vision; on reflection maybe that’s another reason why I didn’t push the permit procedure as much as I could have.

So maybe it was me attempting to draw a line under the relationship – any relationship – and accept that I was alone, and would stay alone, and it was better that I built up my cash reserves to face the inevitable – and lonely – old age ahead, financially secure. Better to rent, and be free, than be tied to old, tired, frustrated, and unrealised dreams.

But life goes on, and the stars continue to realign in different configurations. Progress on the building permit sped up, and as I buzzed around different tax offices in Piraeus and Athens paying money to the various offices that had to be satisfied for reasons that are still not entirely clear to me, I began rethinking the project as something not only inevitable, but fated. I also found that my thoughts about myself and my future had changed too, from ones of slow decline to ones of renewed optimism and growth, from accepting the status quo and just making the best of it to the possibility of growth, evolution and adventure.

The house has three floors: a basement, a ground floor and a first floor. I had envisaged the basement as a self-contained guest apartment for visiting family and friends, with a storage area – including for wine – at the back. The ground floor – with a reception room at the front and a kitchen/dining room facing the small courtyard at the centre of the house – as the public space. The first floor would be my private space: bedroom, bathroom and a very spacious office/library/living area, with walls surrounded by books and sofa and chairs surrounding a large television or projector screen to watch films on. On the roof, a secret terrace garden framed by a pergola draped with vines to keep out the sun and the inquisitive gaze of my neighbours.

I began to think of it as an οἶκος (pronounced eekos), the ancient Greek basic unit of society in most πόλεις. Aristotelis used it in his Politics, and it was sometimes used to refer to everybody living in a given house. So a house where everyone belonging to it – i.e. me – where business, identity, family and meaning resided. The spaces reflected that – a ξενώνας (guest house) in the basement, the public places for business and hospitality on the ground floor directly accessed from the street, and the private spaces above.

But this did not seem to be entirely satisfactory. It seems fine for those whose life and business is only of the city, but this city is Piraeus, and it is a port city. And I am in shipping, and I like ports, and identify with them. The port is only alive if there is business and people passing through it, ideally – despite Mr Trump’s new found philosophies – without restriction and transactional penalties. A freeport if you like, but more than that. Where ships – and people – are welcome to enjoy refuge, do business, learn news, load and discharge, carry out necessary repairs, stock up on victuals and supplies or even just rest a while. This idea seemed to fit in with my idea of a house, a home port, one where you return, even if – as with Cavafy’s Ιθάκη – you find that you have changed during your journey away from home. The wisdom you achieve is the point of the journey, not the return.

Τhe port combined with the οίκος is forming in my head as the right emotional framework with which to continue this adventure. Something very permanent from which to view the metaphorical offing – not to worry: a view of the ships at anchor off Piraeus is only a short walk away – somewhere to pause, replenish, repair, gather intelligence, and inspiration before sailing out again into the world, to suffer and profit – commercially, financially and emotionally – from the voyages of our lives.

The port, my eventually renovated and refurbished home: the interface between land and sea, between business and peace, between action and reflection, between experience and hope, between the noise of the multitudes and the peace of solitude. As the storms of the world increase in frequency and ferocity, this is a nice idea to hold on to. What’s next? It only remains for me to set sail on fresh voyages to gather the means to strengthen the idea, to be able to not only physically rebuild this neglected house as something new, but to strengthen the idea of a home port so that both the sea and the hinterland can benefit. Ships need ports, and vice versa, and both are lost without each other.

Simon Ward