The Komboloi: The String of Beads Greeks Don't Pray With – They Think With

Anyone who enters a kafenio in Greece hears it before seeing it: a soft, steady clicking. Click, click, click. At the next table sits an older gentleman, coffee in front of him, his gaze somewhere in the distance. Between his fingers glides a string of glossy beads. That's the komboloi.

Many take it for a rosary. An understandable mistake, but a mistake nonetheless. The komboloi has nothing to do with prayer. Its religious cousin is called the komboskini, the knotted prayer rope of monks. Both names go back to “kómbos”, the knot. The secular komboloi has detached itself from that: you don't pray with it, you play with it. Greeks really do say “paízo komboloi” – I'm playing komboloi.

Nothing is counted in the process. The beads of amber, wood, horn or sometimes silver simply travel through the fingers, usually in an odd number, and meanwhile the mind clears. Good pieces acquire shine and patina over the years from their owner's hands. Some are passed down, and then every bead holds a piece of family history.

Where exactly the komboloi comes from is a matter of debate among scholars. Similar strings exist all over the eastern Mediterranean. But nowhere does it belong to everyday life as naturally as in Greece. It's the fidget spinner among traditions, only with a lot more style and a few hundred years' head start. No screen, no battery, but with a rhythm that says: there's no hurry.

And that's exactly why it fits so well with everything we've written about here. With meraki, which you do with devotion. With coffee grounds, which you interpret at leisure. Drinking coffee, reading coffee grounds, playing komboloi: at the same table, at the same pace.

There may be no komboloi on the table at our place on Arndtstraße, but there's plenty of time. Come by, order a few mezedes, keep your hands free and let your thoughts wander. On Tuesday, 29 September, from 5 pm we're also celebrating our Drachmen Fest with live music and prices like 1960. After that we're closed for holidays from 4 to 15 October and back for you on 16 October.

Kaló méra and see you soon! Your Mastiha Team