| The
British teenage girls magazine Fab 208 held a competition in
1967-1968 with the winner contestant winning a free trip for 2 to meet Cat in Greece. This
is the article which followed Cat and the Kittens on there holiday excursion. This article
is courtesy of Chris and Annie Abrams
WINNER FLIES OFF TO MEET CAT
 On Saturday evening, September 2nd Mary Knight and Teresa Kill left
London Airport to keep an exclusive date. A rendezvous with CAT STEVENS in Greece: part of
Mary's prize for winning FAB-208's Holiday in Greece Competition.
The remainder of the prize
is a glorious three week holiday of sea and sunshine at the Club Mediterranee at Aighion
in the Golf of Corinth with a friend.
And Mary chose her
work-mate Theresa (Kit) to go with her.
They arrived at Paddington
Station from Glastonbury, Somerset, at 7.40 p.m. and had to make a mad taxi dash through
London and out to London Airport to catch the BEA Comet to Athens.
Neither of them had flown
before but they were both far too excited to be nervous.
"I couldn't believe it
when I heard I'd won," Mary told FAB. (She prefers to be called Elaine-her second
name.)
"I used to read my
sister's copy of FAB and noticed the competition. So I went in for it on the off chance.
"I never thought of
Cat one of my particular favourites before, although I loved his songs. But now I'm going
to meet him I can't wait."
She wasn't going to have to
wait too long to meet Cat either. He was due to fly out on Monday (4th) with two of the
FAB Gang, June and photographer Peter.
So there'll be more news of
Elaine and Kit's exciting holiday later.
CAT & KITTENS
 This is the story of a Cat and two Kittens on their hols in Greece, told by
JUNE SOUTHWORTH (in words) and PETER PUGH-COOK (in pictures). The Kittens were Kit and
Elaine, winners of FAB's competition for a three-week holiday in Greece at The Club
Mediterranee, and 'the Cat was Mr. Stevens, who met them there. And a good miaouw was had
by all!
On a sunny Monday morning,
with our two FAB readers safely seen off to a dream holiday in Greece, Cat Stevens, who
was to meet them out there, was waving goodbye to his dog Wilhelmina and looking forward
to a big family reunion in Greece with his father-already on holiday there - and masses of
relatives he hadn't seen since he was thirteen years old. From that moment on, all Cat
could think about was seeing Greece again.
Of course, we nearly missed
the plane….. a small matter of Cat diving into every record shop along the way to
pick up a copy of his LP, Matthew And Son "to make sure everyone out there knows
what's happening to me" ... but a sweet B.E.A. man (where do B.E.A. find them all?)
put us on a super Trident jet with his blessing.
At Athens, the sun hit us
like a wall of fire as we stepped from the plane. Cat soon disappeared under a cloud of
relatives to an evening of dining and wining to the endless jangle of bouzouki players and
Zorba music.
Mary Elaine Knight,
seventeen, and her friend Theresa (Kit) Kill from Somerset, were having the time of their
life at The Club Mediterranee, home of guests on B.E.A.'s Silver Wing holidays near
Aighion on the Gulf of Corinth.
Meanwhile, FAR photographer
Peter and I were well on the way to Aighion to see them, having left Cat re-discovering
"my second home" in Athens with promises that he would meet the girls the next
day.
We drove through exquisite
little villages where donkeys held the right of way and giant sunflowers blossomed; and
open countryside, where purple mountains rise from dry red hills and cut into hard blue
skies.
Just beyond the picturesque
town of Aighion, we turned a bend in the road and came upon The Club Mediterranee with a
sense of surprise. It’s set on a peaceful headland and conjures up visions of a sort
of well-supplied Treasure Island, where people live in superior grass huts and use beads
instead of money. It's easy there to forget that the world stretches beyond the bend in
the road.
When we arrived, lunch was
ready. I have never seen such vast portions so temptingly served. . . masses of juicy steak, super-fresh green salad, grapes by the branch, and
giant cheeseboards. And since the Club is run by French people, the cooking is superb.
Each table was heaped for a feast, and if dear old Bacchus-the Greek god who loved such
pleasures-was watching, I'm sure his mouth fairly watered!
We discovered Kit and
Elaine in a hut called Histoire, donning bikinis for an afternoon on the beach, which is
golden and perfect and owned by the Club. They spoke enthusiastically of a perfect holiday
where sailing, spear-fishing and skin-diving add a touch of the out-of-this-worlds.
"The most important
thing," said Kit, "is the people. They're so friendly here. There are all sorts
of nationalities, but somehow everyone makes themselves understood. We all spend hours
over dinner. There's so much to talk about."
'And then we all go
dancing," said Elaine, "at this fabulous little bar, where you can dance to a
jazz band till three in the morning. It's the most wonderful thing that's ever happened to
me."
We felt sorry that Cat had
missed out on all this and the girls resolved to tell him all about it the next day in
Athens.
Athens is really two
cities. The centre is a smaller New York, where skyscrapers nudge each other and shops
overflow on to the pavements. And around the centre is old Athens, dominated by the
breathtaking Acropolis, where the ancient Greeks built their mighty temples, and governed
the thoughts of half the world.
We joined Cat early in the
day for a sightseeing tour while Kit and Elaine made their way from The Club. It was quite
an experience touring Athens with Cat, who was supremely at home. We saw the great Olympic
Stadium; the Temple of Zeus, the Royal Palace. The guards at the Palace are called evzones,
and wear those absurd little skirts that the Greeks call fustanellas. There was
much stomping of leather slippers, ceremonial marchings and declarations of arms. Arms
being a nasty bayonet with which one otherwise stoic guard slyly prodded photo posers who
out-stayed their welcome!
At the Temple of Zeus, Cat
invited the wrath of the gods with matey greetings of "Hi, Zeusie Baby," and
said he felt a song coming on. I hoped he'd feel better soon.
Elaine and Kit arrived in
Athens, and it wasn't long before Cat worked out that he had the basis for a new trio -
Kit-E-Cat! After much talk of The Club Mediterranee, we toiled up the Acropolis for a
first-hand look at the Parthenon, where it seems all Greece is stretched out at your feet.
At last, the wrath of Zeus descended on us with torrential rainfall, thunder and
lightning. The Acropolis looked magnificent.
Eventually, the day came to
an end. Elaine and Kit went back to their idyllic hideaway, and Cat went off to find his
dad. And so we say farewell to the Cradle of Civilization, land of the philosopher,
bouzouki, moussaka, and a Cat who philosophises through his songs. |
