Autumn is olive picking time, not only in the countryside but also in the urban sprawl of Athens and its environs. In my home in the northern suburb of Maroussi, surrounded by glass office buildings, my forty-three olive trees, stately, silent and silver grey, sprouted thousands of large, black, juicy olives.

Antonis, the garden minder, with his errant Albanian hopeful, spread the nets on the ground to catch the never-ending flow. Initially averaging 100 kilos per week, the take increased to 300 kilos a month later. Each olive is picked individually from the tree or the ground. On Saturday I loaded the heavy sacks into the car and headed for the olive press at the foothills of Mt. Hymettus in Peania.

On my first visit, the press, housed in a long, ramshackle building, is calm; two stoic nuns unload their wares onto the ramp. The olives are automatically washed, ground up into a paste, distilled, separated from the pits and eventually transformed into gleaming pure virgin oil dripping lusciously into a vat, aroma strong. A small boy dips a piece of black bread in the oil; the foreman smiles. I anxiously wait my turn, watching my olives and my labor transform into opaque liquid. Twenty kilos of oil for my 200 kilos of olives. I drive home, pour it into glass bottles, label it, and promptly use some for dinner. The label says ‘The Soap Factory’.

Traditionally, soap was made with olive oil. My grandfather pressed the olive pits in Piraeus to eke out the oil remnants; his company, Pallas Athina, supplied soap factories throughout Greece, including those of his sons. My father’s factory, bombed in Piraeus during WWII, moved to Maroussi and operated until 1956. Oil and soap were part of my heritage, as is the soap factory at the bottom of my garden.

On my second visit to the Peania olive press, friends from California, Annie and Kevin, joined me. This time the scene was different- olive season had started in earnest. Lines of laden trucks were blocking the entrance; no nuns, no small boys. The foreman, looking harassed, told me that they were working around the clock and that it would be better to return on Monday-early. I take my friends to the Vorres Museum nearby and to the stalagmites gracing the Peania caves. Monday morning, cold and rainy, I trek the rivers of water, hauling my perishable load. The wait is long but the oil is welcome. Back to Maroussi, hard at work picking more olives; the supply seems endless. It’s a race against time; if you leave the olives too long the acidity level increases, and the olives rot. The following week, another 200 kilos- chaos at the press- another long wait for the 20 kilos.

Next day I leave for London carrying 8 bottles of oil. The customs man at Athens airport is curious so I give him a bottle; good oil is always appreciated. I sit on the plane and muse over the weeks of picking and pressing. I feel relieved that another olive season is over. All year I will enjoy the oil, share it with my friends and family and the errant customs man.