Changing Feet on a Vertical Wall

I have just seen a Creten goat, halfway up a road cutting, change the direction of his/her climb. The goat was standing on bits of shale protruding from the cutting surface by no more than 2 inches. The goat was facing in a northerly direction and wanted to proceed south. I watched him/her change direction with so much ease... I couldn't believe my eyes. I am still unable to explain what foot movements were employed on such a precarious ledge. It just happened... as easy as pie.

Watching such acrobatics gave me faith in the ability of the Greek nation to overcome its current economic challenges. In its long illustrious history, the nation has rescued itself from far more severe circumstances. And more often than not, they rescued themselves with artistic ease. Take, for example, Greek farmers... specifically in Crete. They don't have one square metre of flat ground to farm. The soil is so thin you need a microscope to gauge its depth. Do the farmers here worry about their handicaps. Do they get up earlier than the rest of the world's farmers... do they work harder? Far from it... from what I can see, they have lots of leisure time. They're smart... they plant trees instead of planting crops. They don't plough their fields each year. They don't do much insecticide spraying. Do they have to rush their produce to market before it spoils? Do they pay half their earnings to transportation companies? Do they hire contractors to keep their boundary fences in good order? Can the goats eat the grass growing between the trees but not have a taste for the olives? Do they use the waste products of the trees for fire heating? They rarely lose production because of drought or excess rain. They grow trees that are reasonably resistant to local pests, local climatic conditions, relatively easy to harvest.

They eat olives for energy... and avoid all the sickness that bedevilles the wheat eaters. These guys have some of the best life expectancy results on the planet.

You can't tell me this all happened just by good luck. The genius of the Crete farmer has been moulding his product and moulding his environment for millennia.

No we have to let the farmers loose to sort out the economic crisis.