It all started when I dropped in on Sandy.

Sandy was a brave expatriate English woman living in Batsi who had worked for many years at Dolphin Hellas, and, being a painter by inclination, had tried to make a life out of her art. Like so many talented artists, she was forced to work in other areas, but she sold her paintings in a shop in Batsi. I had recently been to Athens in reply to an advertisement in the Athens News in search of a job playing the synthesiser in a hotel. That in itself was a story. I had expected some kind of audition, but instead the gentleman who was recruiting people to play the instrument in a hotel in Crete asked the question: 'do you play the synth? How well do you play the synth?' I explained that I played the synth extremely well (a lie - my only experience of playing the synth was when I had played keyboards in a bad rock band who were 'going to revolutionise rock music'). It seemed that he was recruiting people on the grounds of how well they said they could play the synth, as my main rival for the job, a Czech guy, said "I can play the synth extremely well - I'm the best; I'm better than him".
Though I needed the money, it seemed that the Czech guy sounded more desperate for a job than me. Later, we met up in the street, and over a truly horrible Greek coffee in a dirty cafe, he explained that he was a poor semi-refugee from Czechoslovakia, (this was 1990, just after 'the changes'), he was starving, and he needed the job so badly. At least I could get a job teaching English.
I could have told him easier said than done, but I didn't know anything then about TEFL teaching, and besides, I wanted to get away from Athens.
My decision to relinquish the battle, however, was prompted by my desire to return to Andros, and by the feeing that an interview without an audition was dodgy. The guy who was recruiting didn't like my confident air, which was a disguise, because I felt very insecure. I knew from my experience of playing in a bad rock band, that a person who has been classically trained may find it difficult to be as spontaneous an improviser as the raw musician.
I thought the whole project dubious anyway, and - no sour grapes - told him I was dropping out of the battle. I returned to Andros and remembered that Nikos and Ada had told me about about a piano in a hotel in Batsi. The difference was that this had not been advertised, so it was up to me to find out about it.