There are places where silence lingers like a cat in the sun. And then there is Nea Alikarnassos, Heraklion—a charming, slightly chaotic neighborhood where sleep goes to die.
You may think you know noise. You do not. Not until you have lived here.
The Daily Chorus (a Bullet List of Doom)
- Ship horns from the harbor. You will know when a ferry leaves. Trust us. You will feel it in your bones.
- Planes overhead. Because you live right next to the airport, and those early charters never miss a beat.
- Motorbikes revving under your window for no discernible reason.
- Scooters, which somehow manage to be louder than motorbikes. Magic, or menace? You decide.
- The pressure washer at the car rental place across the street. Sounds like a jet engine cleansing sin.
- Your neighbor’s water spout. Every morning at precisely 7 a.m., he summons Poseidon to fill his bucket.
- A goat in the back of a pickup truck. Not a metaphor. Just a goat. Someone’s “baby.”
- A crow, newly arrived, now auditioning for lead vocalist in the Cretan apocalypse.
- A cat in heat, which can scream like a toddler having an existential crisis.
- A Nokia ringtone, yes, that one. The lullaby of the damned.
- Tzitzikas (Cretan cicadas) chirping like a billion broken alarm clocks in sync, well past midnight.
- The rooster (optional, depending on the year) that crows in defiance of city zoning.
- Fire trucks, which make an occasional guest appearance with sirens and glory.
- Random drunks, who prefer to debate the meaning of life under your window. Loudly. At 3 a.m.
- Your own guilt, whispering sweet nothings like: “You should be sleeping right now…”
Living Loud in Heraklion
You try to make tea. A plane passes. You sit down to write. The neighbor’s spout explodes. You finally close your eyes. Bzzz—cicada rhapsody begins.
Living in Nea Alikarnassos is not for the faint-hearted or light-sleeping. But it is real. It is raw. And somehow, between the goat-in-the-truck moments and the tsitsiki symphonies, it is home.
