I realise this has nothing to do with Greece, but if anyone had a sense of 'grecofilia', of 'interdependence',
it was John.
TRANSCRIPT OF JOHN PEEL INTERVIEW 31.01.04
LISTEN AGAIN: http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio4/hometruths/20040203_strange_hobbies.shtml
photo by James Beedon/Katz Pictures 
JP: Tony Brown emailed 'Home Truths' to tell of his strange, and possibly environmentally reckless, hobby. In a way though, Tony's hobby found him - rather than vice versa. I'll let him explain.
TB: I was in the local pub on the first couple of days after I'd arrived in this village and somebody nodded, as you do, and then we bought a drink and he was telling me he was a farmer, and I said, 'Ah! That"s interesting because I've got an interest in the soil as well'. And he said, 'Oh, what's that, my 'ansome?' I said, 'I collect soil.' And he just, looked at me. He was stunned. Completely stunned. And that's what started it. It became a joke at first and I won't tell you what sorts of samples were brought to me but I'm sure you can guess.
JP: So how did it all begin?
TB: Well, my wife and I took a trip from Plymouth to Roscoff in Brittany, and you, they put you over therefore a couple of hours to do some shopping and, just waiting for the ferry to come back, I was looking at the soil and I thought, 'Blimey, all the battles that've been fought over soil'. And then I picked some up and it smelled of, erm, beetroot. And I thought,'That's nice', and I don't know why, I just put it in a plastic bag and put it in my pocket.
JP: Mmmm...
TB: And when I came back, I was emailing a friend in Arizona and, erm, he works for the Hopi Indians, and he said, 'Oh, I'll send you some soil.' And that was just like the beginning of it. It's just steam-rolled.
JP: H...how many...er...different soils do you have?
TB: There"s about twenty-four, I think.
JP: Mmm.
TB: From various parts of the globe. Erm...
JP: Oh, you mentioned the fact that the one from...er...France smelled beetrooty...
TB: Yes.
JP: W...I mean do they all have different smells?
TB: Yeah, yeah they do. It's weird. Erm, Morocco's lemony, believe it or not...
JP: Mmm...
TB: Portugal's sort of er, mint and cinnamon, erm, Greece is nice, ha.
JP: Don't you think that it's the case that if you'd taken a sample of soil from a couple of feet away, it would have been different?
TB: Ha. Completely. Ha.
JP: Mmm..
TB: I was amazed at the Sahara one. I thought, 'God, it smells just like mustard', until I realised it was in an old mustard jar.
JP: Ah, that could be an explanation for it.
TB: Ha. Ha.
JP: Ha. Ha.
TB: But how do you explain things like mahogany, you know, it smells woody and, er, chocolatey, and things like that.
JP: And, er, er, colour-wise, do they vary a great deal?
TB: Oh, yeah. The hotter the climate that the soil comes from, the paler. Erm...like, erm...the Sahara is very, very powdery, pale...
JP: Mmmm...
TB: ...orange...
JP: Mmmm...
TB: ...going to Greece which is really, grey, mmm..rusty...and Portugal's very terracotta.
JP: OK, and whereabouts do you keep all of the soil?
TB: Oh, just in jars. We've got a really long windowsill, and er...it, it, it faces south and that's probably why they're full of grass and things growing in them.
JP: And, and, er, you, your wife, I'm afraid I don't know her name but d, d, d,...
TB: Sandy.
JP: Sandy. Oh, course, somebody did mention she was called Sandy...How approp...
TB: Oh blimey...just seen the connection.
JP: How appropriate is that! You've only just noticed it? Tony, come on. I can scarcely...
TB: Honestly.
JP: ...believe that.
TB: Honestly. I asked her to marry me because it fitted with sandy brown.
JP: Ha. ha. ha.
TB: I thought that sounded good.
JP: She take an interest in your soil, ha, ha?
TB: She, she wouldn't even go in the room.
JP: And you have...er...two step children, I understand...
TB: Yeah, Jon and Catherine.
JP: What do they...what do Jon and Catherine think about your soil collection?
TB: Catherine, she was the one who brought me stuff back from Portugal and Grand Canarias. She's sort of...sympathetic. I think it's a bit like giving sugar to the dog.
JP: Ha.Ha. ha.
TB: Whereas, Jon says things like, 'Get a life'.
JP: Well of course, er, you"d be hoping you could now expand outside our own world and get soil from Mars and the Moon and so forth.
TB: Well, I was thinking of writing to NASA, you know, but actually...
JP: ..got any to spare...
TB: I wouldn't mind some sand from the, the Mariana Trench, isn't it in the Pacific?
JP: Oh, the, the deepest place on Earth, or whatever, is that the one?
TB: Yeah, 6,000 feet or something.
JP: Mmmm.
TB: Or Everest maybe.
JP: Oh, so, so, you"re now maybe, moving away from countries into geographical locations really?
TB: I'm just getting cocky, I think.
JP: OK. Alright. And the older ones - have they deteriorated at all?
TB: Only one from Morocco, it, it just went sort of green, ha. ha.
JP: Mmmm...OK...I wonder if it"s actually legal to, to bring in...
TB: ...I don"t know...
JP: You've never discovered that? One worry would be that, er, it might be mistaken by, er, eagle-eyed customs people for drugs as it ever happened?
TB: Yeah, yeah.
JP: Don't know if any of your collectors had to explain themselves to the authorities?
TB: Me. I was coming back and the Customs Officer opened my case and the, erm, the plastic bag that had some, erm, stuff in it...
JP: ...Mmm...
TB: ...just split open and this soil was all on the bottom - it was like a powder...
JP: Yeah, and he thought he"d got you banged to rights, as they say.
TB Yeah, he looked really chuffed.
JP: Mmmm.
TB: He dabbed it and put it in his mouth. He said, 'What"s this friend?'
JP: He, he, he.
TB: And I said, 'I think it's Benidorm'.
Much shared laughter.
JP: See you again sometime.
END
John said his job as a disc jockey was no more important than that of the number on a page...
...but then he would say that, wouldn't he?
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