In Crete, Christmas never sneaks in with snow. It comes with rain — thick, silver, generous rain that rolls down the tiled roofs and fills the air with the scent of wet earth and bay leaves.
The first time I felt Christmas here, it was not the lights that told me the season had begun, but the rain. Outside, puddles trembled under the weight of the storm. Inside, an old woman named Sophia was stirring a pot of goat simmering in red wine.
The air was sweet with cloves, heavy with steam, and somewhere under all that — the clean, sharp smell of rain sneaking through the window cracks. I sat quietly in a corner, not understanding her words, only the rhythm of her kitchen: the bubbling pot, the low hum of a song without melody, the soft clink of her spoon against the clay bowl.
Sophia did not drink the wine; she boiled it. She poured it over the meat with bay leaves and murmured to herself. It was not exactly a recipe, more a prayer. When she caught my eyes watching, she smiled — not as a hostess but as a priestess of something ancient.
Cretan kitchens are like that in December. Even in the smallest village, the season arrives with the smell of spice and rain. There is no rush for perfection, no panic about decorations — only the quiet certainty that warmth will find its way to the table.
As the goat thickened in its sauce, Sophia brushed her hands on her apron and reached for the bread rising under a towel. Bread, for her, was holy — a small act of faith. The rain kept falling, steady as a blessing.
When she finally lifted the lid, the room filled with a scent that felt like memory itself. She motioned for me to taste, and I did — the wine, the herbs, the storm — all of it tangled together in one spoon.
That is how Christmas begins in Crete: not with carols or candles, but with the smell of a meal prepared by someone who still remembers that cooking is a kind of worship.
