The phone was standing on its own, upright and ready for calls.

A ring tone like goat bells dinging on an Aegean mountainside started to sound.

Picking up the small digital block with batteries, I heard a tiny voice, sweet and concertedly sincere, saying ” you have to get out now!”.

It was my fitness instructor reminding me that sitting and gazing at the view of two giant cauldrons steaming away needed changing. My position needed changing.

But isn’t that true for all of us, I thought.

Just then, the prime minister’s motorcade rolled up at the main door, orange metallic painted Maybach first, followed by thirty cyclists riding on bicycles with training wheels attached.