Summer on Mykonos is HOT!!!

The Party is on. It’s heating up over here in every way imaginable, and for the sake of our respective cultural futures, in many ways I hope no sane person possibly could. Come September, a lot of summer time partiers will confront soul-baring reflections on more than a few moments of their time on Mykonos. But for now it’s all about baring everything else.

Here you’re overdressed if more than 12% of your body is hidden. Okay, I’m exaggerating, it’s 12.5% and that measurement only applies if you’re human and between the ages of 18 and 25.

We, who represent multiples of that class, should be required by law to keep 125% covered at all times.

The tough part of writing all this is getting photographs. I’m uneasy about traipsing along the beach with a camera snapping photographs, especially with so many The Hulk-size folks likely to take offense. And my surreptitious iPhone snapping technique requires work. The last time I tried I ended up with a terrific collection of thumb shots.

So, I’ve settled on a different sort of plan: Use someone else’s photos (thank you, Dimitris Koutsoukos, for a few) as representative of Mykonos’ hot summer life. Representative not just of the tourists who flock here, but of the extraordinarily accepting people who live on this glorious island.

Hard to imagine anywhere in this world where locals are more willing to allow strangers to freely turn a basically conservative island society every which way but straight—that’s straight as in straight and narrow.

And on that segue, permit me to make a brief observation on all the current tabloid talk about John Travolta’s recent visit here with his wife, Kelly Preston.

Mykonos is not a “gay island.” Yes, the open nature of the Mykonian people and the island’s two dozen glorious beaches attract a sizeable international gay crowd—one to which the island openly acknowledges a debt of gratitude for much of its world class flair and style—but by far most of the boys and girls who party here are interested in cross-pollinating.

Now that I’ve hopefully offended all genders, let me put up a few more photographs to make sure I’ve effectively nailed my coffin snuggly shut, hopefully with the vodka inside.