Voices of Hellenism Volume I, Number III

Φ ωνές Vo i c e s

2015

Volume I, Number III

BO by Calliope Iconomacou

A Literary Journal of Voices of Hellenism Publications

Theosis by Angelica Sotiriou

Copyright © 2015 by Voices of Hellenism Publications All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods, without prior written permission of the publisher, except in cases of brief quotations embodied in critical reviews and certain other noncommercial used permitted by copyright law. Rights will revert back to the authors after publication. Permission to use individual works should be obtained by contacting the respected authors. For requests, write to the publisher “Attention Permission Coordinator,” at the address below.

Voices of Hellenism Publications, P.O. Box 1624, San Mateo, CA 94401 www.voicesofhellenism.org Ordering Information: Quantity sales. Special discounts are available on quantity purchases by corporations, associations, and other large bodies. For details, contact the publisher at the address above. Orders by U.S. trade bookstores and wholesalers. Please contact distribution: Tel: (650) 504-8549 or visit www.voicesofhellenism.org.

Subscriber Services: A single subscription provides three annual issues for three years, $50 in the U.S. and $80 in all other countries. All payments should be made in U.S. Dollars. Direct all inquiries, address changes, subscription orders, etc. to: email info@vhpprojec.org; telephone: (650) 504-8549; mail: Voices of Hellenism Publications, PO Box 1624, San Mateo, CA 94401. Editorial and Publishing Office: 1040 S. Claremont Street, San Mateo, CA 94402. Postmaster: Send changes of address to Voices of Hellenism, PO Box 1624, San Mateo, CA 94401.

Printed in the United States of America Third Edition ISSN: 2330-4251 LCCN: 2015903537 Volume I, Number III is dedicated in loving memory of Frank J. Buonocore, a humble and kind-hearted soul who was called to his reward December 10, 2014 after 89 beautiful years. May his memory be eternal!

Φ ωνές Vo i c e s Poetry

Aegean Sea

9

Chip Dameron

Dionysus at the Seven Eleven

10

Peter Hadreas

Delphi in Ruins

13

Chip Dameron

Walking on Rhodes (Περπατώντας στην Ρόδο)

14

Sophia Kouidou-Giles

Coffee in Greece

15

Andrea Potos

Samos: Looking Back From Athens

16

Lee Slonimsky

Pythagoras Looks Ahead

17

Lee Slonimsky

Patmos: Isle of Hellas

18

Dan Georgakas

Sometimes a Walking Tree

20

Dan Georgakas

57 21 Katherine Hastings 22

Achilleas Katsaros

Somewhere in Between—You

23

Anastasia Soundiati

(Κάπου ανάμεσα—Εσύ)

Lost Quetzal in San Francisco

24

Thanasis Maskaleris

Sweet Frumenty

25

Sotirios Pastakas

Overdose of Happiness

(Υπερβολική δόση ευτυχίας)

(Translation Irini Hatzopoulos)

(Translation Belica Antonia Kubareli)

Messenger Mentor

26

Nick Johnson

A Holy Day in New York City

27

Katherine Hastings

A Prayer For a New Soul

28

John Kyriazoglou

Too Much The Clouds are Overbearing

29

Jonathan Beale

The Letter (Το Γράμμα)

30

Despoina Anagnostaki

(Translation Krystalli Glyniadakis) Bronze 38 Dean Kostas Signs 39 Angelos Sakkis

Greek Easter Dinner

40

Andrea Potos

Bouzouki Player (Μπουζουκτζής)

41

David Halitsky and Amethystos

2015 | VOICES

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Fiction

Childhood City

43

Harry Mark Petrakis

Gilda 51 Xara Siomou (Translation Irini Hatzopoulos)

Paros, 2012

57

Paul Kennebeck

Whispers of Winter

65

Toney Dimos

Choirboy 69 Leonard C. Costopoulos

A Woman's Life

73

Akrevoe Emmanouilides

The Color of the Moon

75

Alkioni Papadaki

(Translation Anastasia Soundiadi)

(Το Χρώμα του Φεγγαριού)

The Antithesis of Margaret (in Eight Phases)

79

Steve Pastis

Cicada's Choice

81

Nitsa Olivadoti

The Road Trip

85

Apollo Papafrangou

Crossings 91 Belica Antonia Kubareli

Creative Non-Fiction

Greek Lessons, Turkish Diet Pills, and

Independence

93

Dena Kouremetis

Star-Spangled Banner

97

Constance M. Constant

The Unbelievable Wedding Dress

101

Lula Tamaras Ossipoff

The Enchanted Gown

102

Betty Rozakis

The Caretaker and The Matchmaker

103

Irene Sardanis

If There Is a Holy War, Which Side Is God On?

107

Vicki Gundrum

Paleokastritsa: Corfu’s “Most Beautiful Spot”

109

Richard Clark

Academia & Scholarship 121

Pablo A. Pérez

The Elgin Marbles Story

129

George T. Karnezis

Greek Neo-Nazis Versus Immigrants

133

Belica Antonia Kubareli

Roster and Genealogy of Emigrants

from Greece Settled in Chiloé (1800-1900)

Κατάλογος και Γενεαλογία Ελλήνων

Μεταναστών στην Περιοχή της Τσιλοέ

Art

Children and Spirits (Πνεύματα και παιδιά)

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137

Eleftheria Lialios

Biography Panagiota Christo Kockos: A Biographical Sketch

147

George Peter Daskerolis (Edited by John B. Vlahos)

Culture

D N A

151

Giorgos Neophytou

(Translation Rhea Frangofinou)

2015 | VOICES

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Notice of Controversial Content Disclaimer We recognize that some of the content herein may be controversial in nature. Please read the following disclaimer.

Voices of Hellenism Literary Journal (Φωνἑς), its editors, board members, associates, and interns are not responsible for: ǑǑ personal, political, social, or economic views expressed by its contributing authors and artists ǑǑ views and opinions expressed by any advertisers or partner organizations ǑǑ the content of websites and links referred to by the Voices of Hellenism website ǑǑ copies of or references to existing or deleted pages on our site published by third parties ǑǑ controversial or political content on our website or in-print publications The views expressed herein are the respected views of the individual contributing authors and artists and not necessarily the views of our publisher, editors, board members, affiliates, volunteers, or interns.

Although we take great care to avoid published content that might be offensive or inappropriate in nature, we would be most grateful if you would notify us at info@vhpprojec.org in case you encounter such content on our website or in our publications or have any other concerns. For more questions on our policies regarding controversial content, please email us at info@vhpprojec.org. Thank you.

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Φ ωνές Vo i c e s

Founding Editor and Publisher Annamarie P. Buonocore Associate Editor Steve Pastis Editorial Board Dena Kouremetis, Nick Tarlson, Nick Mamatas, Betty Rozakis, Vicki Gundrum, Paula Wessels, Irini Hatzopoulos, Krystalli Glyniadakis, Giota Tachtara

Voices of Hellenism Publications Board of Directors John Vlahos, Paul Manolis, Steve Pastis, Alexandra Kostoulas, John Kyriazoglou, Vickie Buonocore, Virginia Lagiss, John Bardis, Thanasis Maskaleris (Honorary Chairman), Annamarie P. Buonocore (Executive Director) Scholars Emeritus and Deceased Fr. Leon Contos Sponsors Dr. Peter Hadreas, Annamarie P. Buonocore

Translation Board Irini Hatzopoulos, Krystalli Glyniadakis, Peter Nanopoulos

Printer

Art Director/Graphic Designer Ranya Karafilly

Western Web Printing 707-444-6236 For all your printing needs

Graphic Designer Stella Christouli Intern Lea Buonocore

www.voicesofhellenism.org Volume I, Number III ISSN: 2330-4251 We accept submissions on a rolling basis with an August deadline for each issue. Voices of Hellenism is published once a year. We also welcome editors, board members, volunteers, and interns for two-year terms. Voices of Hellenism Publications is a 501c3 nonprofit corporation in the state of California.

LETTER FROM THE EDITOR Toward the New Voice

D

ear Readers, It is with great joy that I present to you the third issue, Volume I, Number III, of Φωνές.

Voices of Hellenism started three years ago with a simple goal—to help the Greek community’s writers and artists disseminate their work to the greater Greek Diaspora and beyond. In editing and publishing our last three issues, we have worked with many talented writers and artists to achieve that goal. I could not be more proud of where we are today—offering Greeks of all backgrounds a legacy of pride for literature, language, faith, and culture.

Voices of Hellenism is a community effort of native Greeks, Diaspora Greeks, and Philhellenes coming together to build an idiosyncratic literary platform in which a diverse group of writers and artists have a voice. I am proud to have started such a journal and to be the publisher of such an elegant publication. But none of it would be possible without the support and expertise of the editorial board, board of directors, interns, and volunteers.

Nonprofit literary journals are not an easy task and without proper community support, we cannot continue to publish each issue that presents excellent works of fiction, poetry, nonfiction, scholarship, and avant-garde artwork. At this time, I appeal to each and every one of you to see the importance of such a literary platform. Consider donating to our 501.C3 nonprofit or contemplate becoming a volunteer. We offer year-round editorial board, translation board, board of director, and internship opportunities for volunteers of all ages and walks of life. Above all, I encourage each and every one of you to write.

In editing and publishing a balanced journal like Φωνές, I have witnessed writers become better at what they do and have become a better writer myself. My work with this journal led to

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ΦωνέΣ | VOLUME I, NUMBER III

my first novel, which will be completed in October of 2015. Reading and volunteering with our publication encourages creativity, progress, and a connection to the Greek community unlike any other. We are intellectually stimulating, and our focus is community combined with academia. We are a small, independent publisher that stands by the contributing author.

In building the Greek-American literary scene, we are encouraging creative growth for future generations of our people. Like always, it is my fervent hope that you will enjoy the published works in this issue. It is also my hope that you will consider becoming involved with Voices of Hellenism in some capacity. I wish you happy and healthy writing and reading in 2015.

Sincerely,

Annamarie Buonocore Publisher, Founding Editor 2015 | VOICES

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POETRY

Aegean Sea

by Chip Dameron It almost makes you want to believe again in the gods— Poseidon’s royal blue mantle dominating the azure sky, the islands on the horizon calling out our old Greek names.

2015 | VOICES

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Dionysus at the Seven Eleven

by Peter Hadreas And so the six-foot four Pakistani, Who was not more than thirty, But already had a beer belly That peeked through his Hawaiian shirt, Saying, “Hello from the Maui Marriott,” was working the night shift at the Seven-Eleven off Tully Road in South San Jose, a store that nobody wants to be in, not for long anyway.

A kid was staring at the magazines.

He kept pushing something back into his pocket.

He couldn’t have been more than twelve years old.

His face cracking through the hood of his sweatshirt Like the moon through a littered alley.

The big Packy yells at him: Hey you, Pachuco, You wanta rob me?

Chinga tu madre!

The Hispanic-looking kid froze.

The big Packy ran around the counter and shoved his hairy hand into the kid’s pocket.

He pulled out the red candy vines Like he was ripping out living flesh So, the kid began to howl.

Nobody could understand what he was yelling about.

This would have been OK for a minute or two But the kid wouldn’t stop.

The kid’s got a problem, I figure.

He has fits.

I think, maybe, I should put a pencil in his mouth Or a coffee stick or a toothbrush, otherwise, he might bite off his tongue, if he doesn’t stop, and he won’t stop.

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A cop with a slick razor-cut hair that looks like the side of an eel, opens the glass door.

And the kid keeps on yelling, demonstrating he’s got good lungs but bad timing.

The bull handcuffs the kid in no time.

This makes the kid yell even more.

The bull figures he can do better than that.

He’s got a jacket out in the wagon.

And goes out and gets it.

In a minute, he’s got the kid’s arms in the jacket.

But even then, the kid doesn’t shut up.

The bull hauls the kid out to the wagon, the kid hollering all the way.

Only when he turns on the siren does he drown his voice out.

In the parking lot, I see it.

There’s no mistaking it, looking like a corsage of crushed camellias in a circle of blood.

The kid must have bit his tongue off, or part of it.

The cop probably didn’t even see it in the dark.

I go back and tell the Packy about it.

He just shrugs his shoulders, “What do you want me to do?”

Didn’t the Packy ever hear of microsurgery?

Everybody’s heard of sewing male organs back.

Why not tongues?

So I call 911 on my cell.

In about 15 minutes, a female paramedic arrives with a vat looking like an old style ice cream maker.

Rubber gloved, she places the piece of flesh into an interior so cold that mist comes out of it.

When they arrive at the police station, The kid’s sleeping.

They must have drugged him.

2015 | VOICES

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His arms and legs stretched out like a panther lying across folding chairs.

The bull cop had put a tag on the kid.

I guess he had I.D. in his pocket.

He wasn’t Hispanic or Pakistani Or Iraqi or Irani.

The twelve-year-old was pure Greek.

He was on a visit from Gythion, and he wanted to buy some candy.

What he didn’t know was that his cries awoke the god Dionysus who said: This is not your world.

This world is sham.

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Delphi in Ruins

by Chip Dameron As I walk past the world-centering omphalos and take in tiered ruins on Parnassus’s fragrant slopes, where no Pythia now inhales the fabled trance-inducing fumes while priests interpret her ecstatic raving, I think of Alexander, impatient to make his indelible mark, grabbing her by the hair until she blurted out “invincible,” then striding off past the waves of poppies, their bright-red throats clotted with black crosses, toward a future that would prove to be fatally unpredictable.

2015 | VOICES

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Walking on Rhodes Περπατώντας στην Ρόδο

by Sophia Kouidou-Giles

Listen to footsteps over pebbles, flattened by centuries of passersby Over the floor of the churchyard, and the Knights’ Castles Tireless smiths crafted shaping elegant roses, deer, swords and artful meanders Gifts of beauty, love, strife and all universals.

We walk them today, unaware Of the lessons, of the wisdom of the ages Surrounded by crowds and the enormity of the sea.

Άκου τα βήματα των περαστικών πάνω στα λαξευμένα χαλίκια, Στο προαύλιο του μοναστηριού και τα Κάστρα των Ιπποτών. Ακούραστοι μάστορες φτιάξαν τριαντάφυλα, ελάφια, σπαθιά και έντεχνους μαιάνδρους Δώρα ομορφιάς, αγάπης, διαμάχης και όλων των κοινών. Τα περπατάμε σήμερα δίχως επίγνωση Για τα μαθήματα, την σοφιά των αιώνων Περιτρυγυρισμένοι απο το πλήθος και την απεραντωσύνη της θάλασσας.

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Coffee in Greece

by Andrea Potos Brought to boiling in a briki, with just enough foam enough sugar to bounce off the bitterness that becomes thick and rich to my tongue, four or five sips full is the most I get, yet it sates in some untraceable way and I am left, peering at what remains in the bottom of the cup, what my Yaya and the other Greek ladies would tip over onto a plate to read their dark futures in the grounds.

2015 | VOICES

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Samos: Looking Back From Athens

by Lee Slonimsky It’s funny what associations last, and bridge the gulf of years. That lemonade a vendor used to hawk, as pungent as a sunwashed grove. We passed him daily on our walks: beyond the road, blue shimmer of the bay.

In bed by noon, the afternoon a swoon of love, heat-drained fatigue, then rootlessness.

There is no wandering like that of youth.

Awakening at 5 PM, the terrace next— iced tea with lemon as the sun declined— the future vague as filmy dusk’s descent, its early stars bejeweling sky and sea.

Now, hint of lemon on this sudden breeze from who knows where, quite like a sorcerer: it conjures you at peaceful Strefi Hill: Almost that swoon. Almost that morning walk.

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Pythagoras Looks Ahead

by Lee Slonimsky His fingers slide so slowly into leaves, his arms become thick branches. Greenery is clothing now, for wear through centuries, until his guise bows to mortality and he’s reborn, perhaps as dragonfly, the too-brief prince of glide, descend and skim whose June cannot go past September.

He’ll fly all autumn long regardless, past all gloom— now become a hawk in south of Italy— reflecting on his immortality.

Such transmigration is the greatest gift that atoms in their weavery allow.

No time to mourn each phase that he has left: each new form’s all the world that he will know.

2015 | VOICES

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Patmos: Isle of Hellas

by Dan Georgakas (Mosaic: a single image created by small pieces of inlaid materials) The Orthodox church dark and chill faded frescoes just uncovered by the tremoring of the earth large-eyed faces peering through gray time as from behind a scrim silver and gold suspended from the chapel ceiling because desperate men caught in wicked seas had promised in this place where Saint John the Divine wrote Revelations.

Bill, the Greek American from contemporary Detroit, moves from the interior of the church to the patio scans the mountain for the grotto of the Apocalypse his eyes smart under the brightness of Aegean light the cloudless blue extends until shattered from behind by a sun too powerful to be looked upon directly even through the darkest of glasses.

A cluster of houses ascends the slope whitewashed so thick the walls curve at their base and melt into the street to meet the drift from the walls across the lane a corridor of white a stairway in time the crisp air crackles with the heat of vision.

Basil, the Byzantine from Rhodes, sits by the shore amid jagged rock beaches and breakwaters so often quays for mariners for Greeks and Venetians for Medes and Turks and Syrians for all who ever tested the Bosporus.

Temple bells summon monks for worship black robes whisk against white marble women in black dresses scrub the streets a startled gull flings itself from a tower soaring sunward into the blue wings taut a silent gliding grace banking where sky seems to meld with sea descending like a leadened dart into a patch of quay white.

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Saint John the Divine, the “I, John, saw these things” artist John creating his most imaginative ecstasies here in grotto dark spewing vengeful monsters cloaking spleen in righteous prophecy cursing the empire of the seven hills perhaps adoring the very whore he mocks.

Basilius, a client of Julius Caesar, finds peace in a cove where corrupt dreams split like overripe olives the old vision of a screaming challenge to the sun declined only in an earthward swoop allows the gathering of riches the return to soil however brown and rocky the refreshment of the sea the opened door the touch of other living things.

A cruel certainty in the rocks futilely assembled into walls to pen sheep and goats a brown pocked with fecund green the clear and clean of darkest blue by brightest white white bleaching white into searing purity.

Basildes, father of Herodotus of Athens, sits with a glass of red wine bemused by those who flay themselves with guilt throws away his worry beads utters a final paean to the sun in that instant between the ringing of bells when with a soft sigh a gull drifts aimlessly amid sifting sails and tritons.

For in the beginning before “I, John” before the first William before the Word was earth and air and fire and water in a place called Patmos isle of Hellas.

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Sometimes a Walking Tree

by Dan Georgakas Sometimes a walking tree tiptoes like a ballerina. Other times a walking tree marches like a marine.

Sometimes a walking tree pirouettes to a high crevice or a sunbaked plain.

Occasionally a walking tree finds fertile soil.

At times, tap roots strain, limbs sag, leaves tremor, more tender spines snap, Sometimes a walking tree is envious of trees still rooted in the home orchard.

And sometimes not.

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57

by Katherine Hastings Heat and radiance, a hot river of gems, tend to speak directly from your body to my desire.

No other splendor but your form could spend me in this candled light or in time require a thought quick or deep in regret of this hour.

No need to deceive ourselves with excuses; you say the history of us is honey sweet with a touch of sour.

Conscienceless, we embrace and whisper adieu, cradle the font, the vessel, the dream, the thought of lovers strolling barefoot in dew, and I suppose a weed or two, something tattered and wild. Naught threat, naught rip of the roots, just a planting of those unconflicted seeds, a quick-breath whorled will rocking us on a sea of need and, for now, forgotten ill.

2015 | VOICES

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Overdose of Happiness Υπερβολική δόση ευτυχίας

by Achilleas Katsaros

Corruption of veins tickles happiness with chains electric brains ignite their philosophical theories mouth of lily blows rust to death ruins floating up the knoll dive for your mistaken birth.

Η διαφθορά των φλεβών γαργαλάει την ευτυχία με αλυσίδες ηλεκτρικοί εγκέφαλοι βάζουν φωτιά στις φιλοσοφικές τους θεωρίες το στόμα του κρίνου φυσά σκουριά σε θάνατο ερείπια επιπλέουν μέχρι τον λοφίσκο ψαροντούφεκο κάνουν για την λάθος σου γέννηση.

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Somewhere in Between—You Κάπου ανάμεσα—Εσύ

by Anastasia Soundiati Translated by Irini Hatzopoulos Island—a living painting with colors perfectly interwoven.

Basil pots flood the air with their aroma.

As for the violet sunset, colorful flower arrangements intoxicate the honeybees.

The seagulls sing.

The hearts sing.

The light speaks.

Sneaking in through the cracks of the cliffs, the breeze caresses the body.

Emerald waters, a loving embrace Seabirds, vigilant custodians of the island's secluded coves … Rebirth … Redemption At the border of these colors, in the passage of time, somewhere in between—You. Νησί—ένας ζωντανός πίνακας με τέλεια δεμένα μεταξύ τους τα χρώματα. Γλάστρες με βασιλικούς πλημμυρίζουν τον αέρα με τη μυρωδία τους. Όσο για το μενεξεδένιο δείλι, πολύχρωμες ανθοταξίες τρελλαίνονν τα μελίσσια. Τραγουδούν οι γλάροι. Τραγουδούν οι καρδίες. Μιλάει το φως. Χαϊδεύει το κορμί η αύρα που τρυπώνει μέσα απο των βράχων τις σχισμάδες. Τρυφερή αγκαλία τα σμαραγδένια νερά. Και τα θαλασσοπούλια, άγρυπνοι φρουροί των απόμερων κολπίσκων του νησιού. … Ανάσταση … Λύτρωση Σ' αυτά τα σύνορα των χρωμάτων, στο διάβα τον χρόνου, g. 2005 κάπου ανάμεσα—Εσύ.

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Lost Quetzal in San Francisco

by Thanasis Maskaleris Walking on Polk Street I was stunned by the sign Quetzal Internet …

You, sacred symbol of freedom, how can you be outside your home in Nature?

You, who stopped singing after the Spanish Conquest of your holy land, and in captivity you always died, how can you be tangled in this new maze of the Internet?

The sub-sign of the Café, Organic Coffee, and the neighboring alleys named “Willow” and “Olive” will do nothing to make your new habitat more natural … here where the young of Francisco have become computer maniacs …

If you were lost in this temperate city, you should at least be in the company of birds near the statue of St. Francis, in Golden Gate Park— not in this concrete wasteland where the only birds are greedy pigeons— their only rhythm the “click”-adjusted head movements …

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Sweet Frumenty

by Sotirios Pastakas Translated by Belica Antonia Kubareli Sweet frumenty in a container from a friend, sea rusk a bit of feta cheese, that’s my tomorrow’s meal.

No man needs feeding two or three times per day.

I licked my dish, like I do sixty years now.

Silence remains uneaten beside me.

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Messenger Mentor

by Nick Johnson Thank you people For the words you brought me In search of my personal mystery For the advice you shared when I was scared Caught up in a conspiracy For the good book you gave me to read when the demons tried to take my spirituality For the bad ties you taught me to break when my life was being dragged to the concrete.

Thank you, For your teaching To listen carefully In order to receive the word which holds the key For allowing me to see Peace is all we need Thank you, For showing me how to love you The way you love me unconditionally.

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A Holy Day in New York City

by Katherine Hastings There is no sun. There is no sky.

There are no stars opening like crystal flowers. The winter streets are narrow alleys, sit in brick piles stacked up, up, to wall-lock the world.

Before us, in the forever dark, each hour has had the light erased, except for the light clung in our fists, kept hot in our pockets, brought yesterday from billions of light years away.

One wonders here how many know their names. The Lion, the Virgin, the Bear.

There, out the window, the streets—stories and more stories below—are wet but there is no way to know if the wind blows.

The steady voice of traffic is my ocean, accompanies me down the mountain, over the divide to the pacific shore.

Dogs run free there. I walk. At 92nd Street and 3rd Avenue, the wind folds umbrellas, breaks their spines. Take-out is held tightly in plastic bags. A little girl in hot pink boots searches for small lakes.

The black dog in his flouncy yellow slicker prances down the street looking like a sunflower. Not even tourists mind this rain. It is nature. It is real.

They tilt their heads and open their mouths wide, as though their lives depend on it.

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A Prayer For a New Soul

by John Kyriazoglou Oh My Dear Lord!

Facing myself in time, I have to make some decisions long overdue.

To rid my sins as much as possible!

To renew my inner soul and heart again.

Oh My Dear Lord!

I don’t just need new clothes to cover my frail body, But a vibrant heart, brand new and merciful, A new and lovely soul full of sympathy, Able to give, to give and give!

Oh My Dear Lord!

Facing myself in time, again and again, I need a brand new soul indeed, To offer love, friendship, pity and happiness, For I want to relieve human pain to all sufferers.

Oh My Dear Lord!

Please help me in this effort of mine!

For I want to be a better person, To provide and give more love to all, To serve in your great name and divine glory.

Oh My Dear Lord!

Please give me a dream to inspire me, Give me a definite mission to follow, Give me a name worthy of your blessings, Please give me a guide to follow!

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Too Much The Clouds are Overbearing

by Jonathan Beale Too much the clouds are overbearing And then and there and then Light a cigarette—inhale and breathe.

Deal me in said the black skinned man Why, would you lose? Said they Just deal me in and let us play.

The hand was dealt: the outcome made And on the itching hands they did act The ash flicked, the beer supped—bets made The Blackman left with his pockets full He felt the morning sun, still he cannot care As there is still apathy to be fulfilled.

Then a break in the storm, which was silence They stood, staring blankly back at each other The hardest stones were still to fall, yet destined to …

Beneath these overbearing clouds—waiting Life and death just tossed upon … silence As the called coin landing revealing its message.

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The Letter Το Γράμμα

by Despoina Anagnostakis Translated by Krystalli Glyniadakis Dearest, I am writing you today one more letter lest I alter your well-worn silence.

I’ll be brief.

There’s no more room for sadness on this sheet nor for redundant frills or explanations.

I want you to know I paid a visit to our home recently.

As beautiful, as airy, and as earthly as it was then.

Everything in place everything tidy and in order.

Our love let nothing change.

The freshly painted shutters, eyes wide open in this household portrait, have stolen something from the far off sea ―the color blue.

And on the inside, framed windows still carry the blur of childhood loves and drizzles.

All trees stand clean and whitewashed, laden with memories of green.

Cicadas have pitched camp on our cherry plum again grinding away at orchestrating their midday concerts.

Out in the yard my eyes fell for a second on the little stool and I saw, as if on a tricolored photo, our grandma 30

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grinding trahana for winter on the stone mill, hair like the silver moon, garments black, smile of pink.

At the edge of the yard, our father’s somber stare ready to police our mischief.

And every room is filled with lavish, Easter light.

The linen in the closet still carries the perfume of our mother’s velvet skin.

I opened up the cutlery cupboard with reserve, fearing I might break something, brother, and jinx this familial harmony.

In the closet opposite our holy icons hangs your cap initialed MSS (Marathokampos Secondary School) and your bag, filled with sixth grade books as you left them, untouched by time and wear.

Without a single browse.

Everyone asks of you, brother.

Nobody’s forgotten you.

The music teacher keeps your place in the band ―the best accordion he had― and the English teacher speaks of your great proclivity to languages.

Takis is still expecting you to meet with him for ouzo on the square and Kaitoula’s been preparing a new dress so that you may escort her to the Philharmonic prom on the fifteenth of August.

My brother, I want this letter to be the sweetest letter I have written you.

I’ve kneaded my thoughts

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in grandma’s dough trough molding them into beautiful phrases like Christmas candies, the kourabiedes and melomakarona you used to love.

I baked them in the fire in the old kitchen, having first cleaned the place of ashes from your burnt dreams.

Our home smelt deliciously of Christmas.

See how beautiful my kourabiedes are, spread under sprinkled sugar! All white and perky they stand side by side on the copper pan like soldiers ready for parade.

After I shaped them, I scribed upon them words I’ve always wanted to tell you.

If you shake the sugar off you’ll read I love you, I miss you, I think of you.

Before I baked the melomakarona I stuck plenty of cloves on them.

My nose broke open to their aroma as I am hoping your silence will.

My dearest brother, it’s been so long maybe you have forgotten me it’s been so long.

What was I saying? Oh, about melomakarona.

I am hereby wrapping in this paper your favorite sweets.

Look, these two-three drops you see on paper are not tears, they’re orange flower water for the kourabiedes.

I also enclose two red moons, one for the obfuscation of your soul, the other for the road.

I seal this letter with a kiss.

I incense it with rosemary to exorcise the evil separating us, I paint upon its envelope two doves sat on two arches made of laurel leaves.

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Sunset has filled the garden with red melancholy familiar to my available soul.

Time’s flown with all these sweets and I’ve failed to notice how quickly and how far that curséd feeling took me.

The wind’s suddenly picked up.

It brings a voice, in waves, familiar.

I cannot recognize it.

Maybe it’s mother’s.

Karlovasi, August 2014

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Αγαπημένε μου, Σου γράφω σήμερα άλλο ένα γράμμα μήπως και μεταποιήσω την πολυφορεμένη σιωπή σου. Θα είμαι σύντομη. Δε χωρούν πια άλλες λύπες σ’ αυτή την κόλλα μήτε περιττές καλλιγραφίες κι εξηγήσεις. Θέλω να ξέρεις πως επισκέφθηκα το σπίτι μας πρόσφατα. Όμορφο, αέρινο, γήινο όπως τότε. Όλα στη θέση τους τακτοποιημένα και νοικοκυρεμένα. Τίποτα δεν άφησε η αγάπη μας ν’ αλλάξει. Τα φρεσκοβαμμένα παραθυρόφυλλα μάτια διάπλατα ανοιχτά σ’ αυτό το σπιτικό πορτραίτο έχουν πάρει λίγο απ’ το γαλάζιο της θάλασσας στο βάθος. Μέσα απ’ αυτά, τα κορνιζωμένα τζάμια φέρνουν ακόμα τη θολούρα απ’ το ψιλόβροχο των παιδικών μας ερώτων. Όλα τα δέντρα καθαρά, ασβεστωμένα, φορτωμένα πράσινες θύμισες. Τα τζιτζίκια κατασκήνωσαν και φέτος στην κορομηλιά μας και με τα μούτρα έπεσαν να ενορχηστρώσουν τις μεσημεριανές τους συναυλίες. Έξω στην αυλή, για μια στιγμή καρφώθηκαν τα μάτια μου στο μικρό σκαμνάκι και σα φωτογραφία τρίχρωμη πέρασε αστραπιαία απο μπροστά μου η εικόνα της γιαγιάς να κόβει τραχανά για το χειμώνα στον πετρόμυλο, ασημένια φεγγαράτα μαλλιά, μαύρα ρούχα και ροζ χαμόγελο.

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Στο βάθος του κήπου το αυστηρό βλέμμα του πατέρα έτοιμο να βάλει τάξη στις αταξίες μας. Σε κάθε δωμάτιο άπλετο εαρινό πασχαλινό φως. Τα σεντόνια στη λινοθήκη κρατούν ακόμα το άρωμα απ’ το βελούδινο δέρμα της μάνας μας. Άνοιξα το μπουφέ με τα σερβίτσια με προσοχή. Φοβήθηκα μη σπάσει κάτι αδελφέ μου και φέρει γρουσουζιά σ’ αυτή την οικογενειακή αρμονία. Στη ντουλάπα, απέναντι απ’ το εικονοστάσι κρέμεται το πηλίκιό σου με τα αρχικά Γ.Μ (Γυμνάσιο Μαραθοκάμπου) κι η σάκα με τα βιβλία της έκτης, όπως τ’ άφησες, ανέπαφα απ’ το χρόνο και τη φθορά. Ούτε ένα ξεφύλλισμα. Όλοι ρωτούν για σένα αδελφέ. Κανείς δε σ’ έχει ξεχάσει. Ο δάσκαλος της μουσικής κρατάει τη θέση σου στην μπάντα για το πιο καλό ακορντεόν και η κυρία των Αγγλικών μιλά για τη σπουδαία κλίση σου στις γλώσσες. Ο Τάκης σε περιμένει για ουζάκια στην πλατεία και η Καιτούλα ράβει ένα καινούριο φόρεμα για να τη συνοδεύσεις στο χορό της Φιλαρμονικής το δεκαπενταύγουστο. Αδελφούλη μου, Θέλω το γράμμα μου αυτό να’ ναι το πιο γλυκό που σου’ χω γράψει. Ζύμωσα τις σκέψεις μου στη σκάφη της γιαγιάς

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κι έπλασα τις πιο όμορφες φράσεις σα Χριστουγεννιάτικα γλυκά, κουραμπιέδες και μελομακάρονα που τόσο αγαπούσες. Τα φούρνισα στο τζάκι της παλιάς κουζίνας, αφού πρώτα καθάρισα τη στάχτη απ’ τα καμένα όνειρά σου. Μοσχομύρισε το σπίτι μας Χριστούγεννα. Για δες τι όμορφοι που είναι οι κουραμπιέδες σου, χώθηκαν κάτω απ’ την πασπαλισμένη ζάχαρη. Στέκονται ολόλευκοι, καμαρωτοί, ο ένας δίπλα στον άλλο στο μπακιρένιο ταψί σα στρατιώτες έτοιμοι για παρέλαση. Όταν τους έπλασα, χάραξα επάνω τους μ’ ένα κοφτερό μαχαιράκι τις λέξεις που ήθελα πάντα να σου πω. Τίναξε τη ζάχαρη και θα διαβάσεις «σ’ αγαπώ», «μου λείπεις», «σε σκέφτομαι». Στα μελομακάρονα, πριν τα φουρνίσω έβαλα μπόλικα μοσχοκάρφια. Έσπασε η μύτη μου απ’ τη μυρουδιά, ελπίζω έτσι κι η σιωπή σου. Αγαπημένε μου αδελφέ, πέρασε τόσος καιρός, μπορεί και να με ξέχασες, πέρασε τόσος καιρός. Έλεγα λοιπόν … για τα μελομακάρονα. Τυλίγω σ’ αυτή την κόλλα τ’ αγαπημένα σου γλυκά. Να, έσταξαν και δυό-τρεις σταγόνες, όχι δάκρυα, ανθόνερο για τους κουραμπιέδες. Σου εσωκλείω και δυό κόκκινα φεγγάρια το’ να για τη συσκότιση της ψυχής σου και τ’ άλλο για το δρόμο. Σφραγίζω αυτό το γράμμα μ’ ένα φιλί. Το θυμιατίζω με δεντρολίβανο να ξορκίσει το κακό που μας χώρισε

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και ζωγραφίζω στο φάκελο δυο περιστέρια κάθονται πάνω σε δυο αψίδες από δαφνόφυλλα. Το ηλιοβασίλεμα γέμισε τον κήπο μια κόκκινη μελαγχολία γνώριμη στο διαθέσιμο της ψυχής μου. Πέρασε η ώρα με τα γλυκά και δε κατάλαβα πόσο γρήγορα με ταξίδεψε το έρμο το συναίσθημα. Ο αέρας που δυνάμωσε απότομα φέρνει σαν κύματα μια γνώριμη φωνή. Δε ξεχωρίζω. Μπορεί να είναι και της μάνας..

Καρλόβασι, Αύγουστος 2014

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Bronze

by Dean Kostas The Greek and Roman Galleries, the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York His veined hand reaches toward us.

Encased in verdigris husk, this annealed man no longer moves through battlefields and agoras, brothels and temples.

Encased in verdigris husk, he no longer flees battlefields and agoras, brothels and temples.

Gape into his sockets’ sepulchers: He no longer sees.

His carnelian eyes once glinted in torchlight, watching.

Gaze into his sockets’ sepulchers: vestals carried lilac stalks.

His carnelian eyes glinted in torchlight, watching ephebes balance bowls of wine, vestals carrying lilac stalks, chanting anapests from dusty Eleusis.

Ephebes balanced bowls of wine.

Now, bronze entombs their voices, decanting anapests from dusty Eleusis.

In moment’s monument, Bronze entombs his voice.

This annealed man breaks free from moment’s monument: his veined hand reaches toward us.

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Signs

by Angelos Sakkis Signs all through the countryside declare poleitai to paron, the present is for sale or the present is being sold right now this very moment even while you are reading this There seems to be a general agreement here so many signs must mean some critical mass, the people’s voice Sign of the times, as well as a sign of things to come, a very inauspicious sign indeed, for it means the future can’t be far behind (These vivid colors of the classical landscape do they imply or do they hide the tragic gap, the wound, the violent slant of the brushstroke canceling everything in a slash?

And how did we become so callous, so indifferent, so far beyond redemption?)

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Greek Easter Dinner

by Andrea Potos Fortified with an extra slab of wood in its center, the dining room table is wreathed by the rarely-seen: godparents and aunts, uncles and the children of second cousins.

Mounds of rosa marina rice rest in bowls, lamb leaks its juice on Grandmother’s platter, succulent meat of resurrection, the rising done over and over in voices singing Christos anesti with each clink of the glass and scrap of fork against plate— Christos anesti with each smash of blood-dyed egg against egg—voices lift like a wine-soaked Jesus beyond the roof.

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Bouzouki Player Μπουζουκτζής

by David Halitsky and Amethystos

Tonight, like any other night his hands will carry the weight of our unhappiness, not unlike Christ’s hands the weight of our sins.

Απόψε, όπως κάθε βράδυ, στα χέρια θα σηκώσει το βάρος της θλίψης μας, όπως τα χέρια του Χριστού το βάρος των αμαρτιών μας.

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FICTION

Childhood City by harry Mark petrakis

I

wrote earlier about my illness causing us The Shadow, Lights Out) weren’t broadcast to miss two summer vacations at the cot- until evening.

I began by reading comic books and tage. The disorder began when I was about twelve. Unlike other boys my age possessing adventure stories in the pulp magazines, boundless energy, for a few months, I felt which I quickly exhausted. As my confinea growing listlessness. My apathy roused ment continued, I turned to more substantial the concern of my parents, and Naka took books, at first drawing on our home library. me to our family doctor. A series of x-rays When those books had been read and I asked revealed tubercular lesions on my lungs. The for more, my brothers and sisters started only therapy in those days (except for those bringing home books they’d purchased from families who could afford a sanitarium in the the sidewalk stalls of bookstores for 10 cents mountains) was bed rest. Our doctor ordered to 25 cents apiece. There were novels and travel books, histories and memoirs. I was me to bed for a month.

I came home excitedly from that first especially drawn to the classic adventure visit to the doctor to undress and jump into novels, which I read and reread, Captain bed while it was still daylight. Since I felt no Blood and Scaramouche by Rafael Sabatini, different than I had before the cheerless diag- The Count of Monte Cristo by Alexander nosis, my initial reaction was elation. I was Dumas. I also loved nature stories such as being spared doing homework that evening White Fang and The Call of the Wild by and, as an added bonus, I wouldn’t have to go Jack London. About that time I read Jack to school the next day. Even more reason for London’s novel, Martin Eden. Τhe story of joy, I would experience that vacation bounty an unlettered seaman who taught himself to write, it became one of the most influential for a whole month!

I’m not sure how long that euphoria books in my life. When I read that novel the lasted, but after a month, when we visited first time, I enjoyed it, but did not grasp its the doctor again, and he prescribed a sec- significance until a second reading some ond month and following that a third and years later. By that time, I had dropped out fourth month of bed rest, the elation passed. of school in my high school sophomore year.

I entered a period when my days were filled Suddenly, that moving story of the young, self-educated sailor dreaming of becoming a only with boredom and despair.

My confinement to bed came before the writer became my dream.

Through the course of several months, advent of television. There was radio, but the programs I found exciting (Jack Armstrong, perusing one weighty tome after another, I

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read the complete Book of Knowledge. For the weeks I burrowed into those volumes, my dreams teemed with random events and dates, snatches of history and lines of poetry.

I think the reading became a refuge for me, a sanctuary against a growing depression bred by inactivity.

After almost a year in bed, my condition worsened. A cough developed in my chest, and with it, a nagging pain when I took a deep breath. The handkerchief I held to my mouth became speckled with blood. I was weary of bed, suddenly scared of what was going to happen to me. My room had become my prison.

Our family doctor began visiting me to spare my traveling to his office. One evening after he had examined me, I heard him speaking in a low voice to my parents. I rose from my bed to crouch in the doorway of my room and heard him telling my parents gravely that my condition had become critical and that I needed to be sent to a sanitarium. I did not know what sanitarium

meant, but I equated it with a dying-place from which I would never return.

My parents and Naka sought to reassure me, but I was convinced I would be sent away to die. In terror of being transported to the dying-place while I was asleep, each night I desperately fought to remain awake.

Night after night, Naka sat with me in a chair beside my bed until exhaustion closed my eyes.

There were events during that period of illness that remain vivid for me to this day.

The first was the entry into my life of two girls, perhaps 17 to 19 years of age. Both came from city orphanages to live with us, their principal duty to help care for me. My mother provided them room and board and gave them some spending money each week.

One girl was named Olga and the other girl Mary. I cannot remember their last names.

Olga came first. She was a stocky-robust Russian-Orthodox girl who limped because one leg was several inches shorter than the

Return of our Common Dream Marmaron Aim Global Protest! by Odysseas Anninos

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other. She also had a large discolored birthmark blemishing one side of her throat. She had a habit of rubbing her fingers roughly against the stain, as if trying to wipe the blemish away.

Olga was a powerful girl whose strength, at first frightened and then fascinated me.

When she changed the linen on my bed, I’d sit in the armchair and marvel at how easily she lifted and flipped the mattress. Her strong, unsightly hands with stubby broken nails that she chewed down to her fingertips also intrigued me.

From time to time, Olga would light a cigarette near an open window, brushing vigorously with her hand to disperse the smoke.

“You don’t say nothing to your father or mother now, you hear?”

I’d nod that I understood.

“If you do talk, you know what I’ll do to you?”

I’d nod again feeling an excited tightness and fear in my chest. She’d chuckle and wink, raising one of her broad, strong hands, “You’ll get this,” she said slowly, relishing the effect she was having on me, “You’ll get it you know where …”

“I know,” I’d say.

Olga bullied and teased me, never with cruelty, but in a playful demonstration of her dominance. She’d lift me easily from the bed in her powerful arms and I’d see the glaring birthmark on her throat and the small hairy moles on her cheeks. On one occasion, when she was putting me back in bed, she gave me a light, teasing smack on the seat of my thin pajama trousers.

I was fascinated by Olga, and encouraged her disapproval, relishing her mastery and control over me. She began threatening me with spankings if I “wasn’t a good boy.” With a mixture of excitement and fear, I went out of my way to disobey her. She obliged by spanking me, first on my pajamas, and, finally, on my bare buttocks.

The firm but playful spankings seemed to fulfill a strain of dominance in her and also nourished a strain of submissiveness in me. They also evoked erotic feelings in me that I had never experienced in the same way before.

Then, one morning at the beginning of autumn, Olga was gone, replaced by Mary, a plump sweet-faced girl who smelled of lavender. There was nothing strong or assertive about Mary, who was feminine and soft and evoked different feelings in me than those I’d felt with Olga.

I can still recall the soft sheen of Mary’s skin, her breasts and nipples embedded against her blouse, and the tantalizing glimpses I caught of her slender legs and thighs when she bent to make my bed.

We became more intimate with one another. When my mother was on her daily charity rounds and Naka out of the house shopping, Mary and I in the apartment alone, she’d recline on my bed beside me.

Feeling her close and inhaling her scents, I couldn’t resist reaching out timidly to touch her. In the beginning she slapped my hand away, but after a while, her resistance softened. She allowed me to caress her hair, cheek, and ears, my fingers moving warily down to her throat.

“Do you think I’m pretty?” she asked.

“Yes …”

“Do you think I have nice skin?”

“Yes …”

“Do you like my eyes?”

“Yes …”

“Do you like my ….” She left the word unfinished, but one of her fingers fluttered across her breast.

“Yes …” I said “Oh yes.”

Slowly I became more daring, and I reached for more intimate parts of her body.

When she didn’t object, excitement and desire made me even bolder. A marvelous moment came when she allowed me to touch

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her naked breasts. She also guided me gently into the first kisses I had ever known.

Slowly, over a period of weeks, my intimacy with Mary became more brazen. In the beginning, she stripped to her slip. After a while, she peeled off that garment as well.

Wearing only cotton panties, she snuggled under the sheets beside me.

She talked to me sweetly, her eyes closed, as if she might be imagining someone older and more mature lying beside her. She stroked my chest and arms, encouraging me to caress her. I had seen my sisters in brassieres, but Mary’s breasts were the first I had ever seen naked, and I marveled at their symmetry and their resilience, the way her nipples sprang back after my touch. One cataclysmic day, perhaps excited by my caresses, she slipped her hand down beneath the sheet and touched my genitals. Despite her touch being light as a bird’s wing, it generated a wild surge of heat through my body.

Then Mary was gone as well, replaced by a prune-faced old woman appropriately named Barboonis, who came in to help Naka with the housework and look after me. The old lady was sexless and humorless, smelling of sweat and garlic, making my room appear dark and dismal whether it was morning or night. With each passing day, I mourned anew the loss of Olga and Mary.

To this day, I understand the influence those two girls had upon my life. By awakening in me those early surges of sensuality, they left in me fetishes of playful spanking and illicit caresses that remain tantalizing to this day.

Another event from that period of my illness that stands out came one Christmas, an ebullient holiday in our large family. My brothers and sister allowed me to sprawl on the living room couch and watch while they decorated the big pine Christmas tree they had carried in earlier. The room was permeated with the 46

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fragrant smells of fresh pine as my siblings began placing lights and ornaments on the tree.

“Those lights are too close together.

They’re lopsided!” Barbara, one of my sisters, would say.

“Your head is lopsided!” my brother, Mike, replied.

“Put the silver ornament higher!” my sister, Tasula, said.

“Stop shaking the ladder!” my brother, Dan, cried.

One of my sisters made sweet, steaming cocoa, gilded with snowy whipped cream floating on top. As I sipped the cocoa, my brothers and sisters transformed the barebranched tree into a majestic pillar of lights, ornaments and tinsel, the peak adorned by a sparkling star.

During the second Christmas of my illness, after the tree had been decorated, my brothers carried into the room a large bulky carton they placed alongside the tree.

“What is that?” I asked.

“None of your business.”

“Who is it for?”

“It’s for you. But you won’t get it if you don’t go to sleep.”

Despite my heated protests, I was sent back to my bed in the adjoining sun-parlor room. But the knowledge that the large carton contained some mysterious gift for me kept me sleepless. I felt myself on the verge of some miraculous revelation. Finally, weariness overwhelming my excitement, I fell asleep.

On Christmas morning, Naka woke me and led me into the living room where my parents, siblings, and Naka’s son, Alex, all in pajamas and robes, were crowded into the room.

My brothers had completed their work after I had fallen asleep, for around the base of the tree was the mysterious gift that had been in the carton: a gleaming electric train

on a circular silver track—a black, sleek locomotive, a chunky coal car, and a string of bright yellow passenger coaches, the cutouts of miniature figures framed in the tiny windows.

My family enjoying my delight, I was given the transformer to hold on my knees.

I moved the switch carefully. The marvelous train responded, circling the track slowly at first, gathering speed as I pushed the switch higher. Finally, whistling like the wind, the train raced round and round the track, the coaches lurching, the wheels spinning furiously, sparks flaring from the silver rails.

I learned later that the train had been the main prize raffled off at the Avalon, the neighborhood theater where my sister, Tasula, worked as a cashier and my brother, Mike, served as an usher. The winner, unmarried and childless, offered to sell the train for ten dollars. My brother (after a hasty phone consultation with my father) made the deal and brought the train home. So on a raffle won by a childless man, the magnificent electric train became my treasured possession.

I played with the train through the holidays, running it round and round the glistening tree. I made tunnels from boxes and created forests by lining the track with my mother’s plants. At the beginning of January, when the tinsel, ornaments and lights were taken down and the pine tree hauled away, the train was moved into my bedroom and connected around the foot of my bed, the transformer placed beside my pillow.

During the months that followed, the train filled the lonely recesses of my hours. I sent it on its journeys in the light of breaking day, the rays of pale winter sun filtering weakly through the windows. I drove it in the twilight, the beam of the locomotive flashing through the shadows, lights gleaming in the tiny windows of the coaches.

In my fantasies, I became the engineer of that Cannonball Express, roaring across

the limitless expanse of the country, speeding through valleys bordered by mountains, racing by small, sleeping towns, crossing bridges suspended over massive canyons.

Riding the winged, swift fury of the train, controlling its power by the barest movement of my fingers, I was provided the means to flee the fear of my illness and the stifling prison of my room.

Long after I had recovered from my illness, during the Christmas holidays, I would sometimes unpack the train and set up its tracks and cars. The task grew more difficult as time passed because the tracks had grown bent, the locomotive light did not work, and the coal car had a broken axle. All these impediments made me finally pack the train away for good.

I forgot about the train for a number of years until one day—after I was married and had left my father’s house—cleaning out the storeroom in the basement of a building from which my parents were about to move, I found the locomotive of my train, a shabby and battered relic. There wasn’t a trace of the coal car, passenger coaches, or any of the sections of track. Holding the locomotive in my hands, I remembered the wild, jubilant journeys we had shared. I was tempted to keep the engine, but because there seemed something childish about remaining attached to a childhood toy, I threw the old relic away.

There were other treasured memories of childhood after I had recovered from my illness and was able once again to join my friends. Among the games we played in our alley playgrounds was Kick the Can, that sport where a goalkeeper guards the can.

Once a player is spotted, the goalkeeper taps the can with his foot and calls the player’s name. The player is then consigned to jail and only the successful kicking of the can by another player will free him.

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Our games of Kick the Can were expansive, sometimes numbering up to 25 or 30 players. Among all the games of Kick the Can we played in the alleys of summer, one stands out for me in a heroic dimension.

The goalkeeper had managed to capture all the players but two, my friend Marvin and myself. When Marvin was captured, I became the only player still able to rescue my 25 jailed companions. From my hiding place in one of the yards, I could hear their imploring voices, “Harry, save us … you’re our last chance … Harryyyyyyy!”

I crept stealthily from yard to yard, crouched behind a row of garbage cans, and then shinnied up a telephone pole to the roof of the garage directly above the jailed players in the alley. As I waited tensely on the roof, the nervous goalkeeper stared to the right and to the left, never imagining that the attack on the can might come from above.

With the entreaties and pleas of my companions echoing in my ears, I watched warily as the goalkeeper wandered further and further from the can. When I felt he had gone too far to make it back before I attacked, I leaped from the roof to an adjoining telephone pole and slipped swiftly to the ground.

The shrieks of my companions alerted the goalkeeper who came racing back … but not before I had given the can a furious kick that sent it rolling and ricocheting down the alley.

My companions joined in a thunderous ovation as they scattered. The goalkeeper stood stricken for an instant, and then collapsed in tears on the stone of the alley.

Some cynical reader might observe that however I seek to ornament the memory, the whole episode was no more than a childhood game of Kick the Can. But if it were only a game of Kick the Can, why do I recall the experience so gloriously after 75 years? It was for me a gilded moment of unmatched triumph and jubilation, which I have been vainly trying to match in my life ever since.

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In the mid-1930s, our small movie theater located near Vernon Avenue and 61st Street in our Washington Park neighborhood was called the AMO. The structure had a shabby facade and a dingy marquee with a display always missing letters, so that the title “Scarface” became “Sc rfa e.” There were more elegant cinemas on the South Side including the TOWER, the TIVOLI, and the AVALON, but the AMO was the cheapest and the one closest to where I lived.

I cannot remember the shop that adjoined the AMO to the West, but to the East, close as the pouch of a baby kangaroo to its mother, was a candy store. This shop was so narrow and cramped a compound that it barely held enough space for a glass candy counter and an antiquated popcorn machine that groaned as it spit out the kernels. The window of the shop held a small bowl of assorted hard candies and a CocaCola placard featuring a beguiling blonde beauty with a tooth-powered smile.

Mr. Bilder, a slightly built, pale-cheeked Greek immigrant with a sad, nervous smile owned the shop. What I recall most clearly was his gentleness and patience. With only a couple of pennies to spend on candy, selecting from the racks of caramels, mints, and chocolates was a crucial decision—one delayed as long as possible. Yet through the lengthy ponderings by my companions and myself, I can never recall Mr. Bilder exhibiting a trace of impatience.

After purchasing our candy, we’d hurry to the movie box-office. The Saturday matinee doors opened at one o’clock with the movie starting at two, but a crowd of us would be waiting in line well before one.

When the doors were opened, we’d surge into the lobby, clutching our tickets. The ticket takers were often old men, tufts of hair sprouting from their gaunt chins and out of their withered ears. Despite their warnings that we walk, not run, we raced to claim our

After the serial segments came the feaseats, changing places several times before ture films. There were any number of them settling on a location.

The afternoon show started with one of I cherished, among them Frankenstein, The the serials that ran week after week. There Bride of Frankenstein, and Mutiny on the was The Phantom Empire, Perils of Nyoka, Bounty. A comedy I especially enjoyed was and Zorro’s Fighting Legion. Another of A Night at the Opera with the Marx Brothers, my favorites was Flash Gordon, played in which the crafty business manager played by the muscular, dynamic Larry “Buster” by Groucho Marx turned the tables on variCrabbe, who each week fought valorously to ous snobbish characters seeking to thwart keep lovely Dale Arden from the menacing him. As the film finished, we’d leap from our seats to rush up and down the aisle mimickclutches of Ming the Merciless.

Saturday after Saturday, I marveled ing Groucho’s crouching walk.

During one summer of matinees, a realat how Flash managed to escape Ming’s destructive death ray or avoid burning to life drama vied with the films for our attention. death in a conflagration that Ming ignited. A pair of merciless invaders from the North All through these serials, bells tolled, clocks Side of the city bought the AMO and installed ticked, wheels whirled—all devices used to their own candy counter in the lobby.

We were outraged and vowed our loyalty heighten suspense. They served their purpose as we vigorously booed the villains and to Mr. Bilder. We not only continued to buy our popcorn and candy from him, a small loudly cheered the heroes.

The Autumn Ends by Odysseas Anninos

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group of us even pledged to boycott the AMO hoping to bring the callous new owners to their knees. But the theater had signs sternly forbidding any outside popcorn or candy. Our bags of popcorn from Mr. Bilder were confiscated while we had to carry the bars of candy deep in our trouser pockets, to be retrieved and eaten furtively in the dark theater. Several boys, with oversized bars that ushers and the manager spotted, were exposed and evicted.

Our plans for a boycott of the theater were also foiled. As Saturday neared and another exciting serial with Flash Gordon loomed, our resolve weakened, our outrage not strong enough to make us relinquish the joy of those matinees. We slipped quickly by the candy store to buy our tickets. Ashamed to face Mr. Bilder, we avoided patronizing his business and hastened his demise. One Saturday matinee, I noticed the front door of the candy store was locked, the shade drawn on the door.

Our disdain for the theater owners did not prevent some of us working for them distributing handbills of coming attractions. Our pay was a free admission to the Saturday matinee.

About a dozen of us would assemble in the lobby early in the morning while one of the managers would distribute the handbills to us along with a stern warning that the most heinous crime we could commit was to dump undelivered handbills in some alley trashcan.

To discourage this practice, older boys were appointed to monitor us. We had several names for them, one of the less onerous being “Rats.” As we made our rounds, slipping the little leaflets into doorways, mailboxes, and

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under windshield wipers on cars, the relentless “Rats” followed in our wake.

Recalling those years, there were many feature films that sparkled like gems through my adolescence—Little Caesar, I am a Fugitive from a Chain Gang and King Kong.

The film that had the greatest impact on me, which I first saw when I was 14 or 15, was All Quiet on the Western Front, the story of young German schoolboys in the First World War who joined the army in a patriotic fervor only to experience despair and disillusionment in the brutal years of warfare that followed.

Those schoolboys, despite being German, were close enough to my own age that I suffered with them the terrifying days and nights of incessant shelling, the senseless charges across No Man’s Land to capture a patch of land they would lose the next day, the wounding and suffering of comrades.

Forty years later, while I was writing The Hour of the Bell, my novel on the battles of the Greek Revolution against the Ottoman Empire in 1821, I drew on the emotions I’d felt while viewing All Quiet on the Western Front.

Meanwhile, as Saturday matinee after Saturday matinee came and passed, alongside the theater, the small store of Mr. Bilder receded further and further into the shadows. The Coco-Cola beauty in the poster faded, the glass bowl of candy gathered dust, the plate glass window darkened. After a while, hurrying to those Saturday matinees I loved so much, I hardly noticed the candy store at all. � Excerpted from Song of My Life (University of South Carolina Press)

FICTION

Gilda

by Xara siomou translated by irini hatzopoulos

H

ours had passed. The ambulance siren was still ringing in her ears. She was sitting on a plastic chair. Her knees were shaking. In her head, the image of the totaled car a few blocks from their house.

She got up. She paced, counting the tiles of the mosaic, resting her gaze briefly on the clock against the pale green wall. She was torturing herself with “what-ifs” and unanswered questions. Why didn’t the airbags go off? Why did she call her on her cell, even though she knew she always avoided it when she drove? If she hadn’t spoken to her, she wouldn’t have heard the crash, the metal being crushed on the other end of the line.

She kept biting her nails, wanting to literally rip them off her flesh. She ran her fingers through her short black hair and scratched her head angrily. Her tight black clothes betrayed her anxiety-induced frailty. Her mascara, running down her face because of her tears, streaked her pale, ashen face.

Zoe kept her distance from Anna’s devastated parents. They were all huddled around the chairs of the ICU. In another room, the young man who ran the stop and crashed into her was at death’s door. She saw signs of agony on their faces. Her guilt began to get the best of her. What the hell had she wanted to tell her? If she had just waited a second, maybe nothing would have

happened. She would have made it home.

Safe and sound.

In six months, they had decided. They had decided to share every waking moment.

The only thing that had troubled Anna was how she would tell her parents. It seemed inconceivable to her to speak to her conservative parents about her personal life.

They always disagreed on this point, but they always respected each other’s opinion. Zoe had come out to her family in her 20s, giving them time to process it all. Even though her mother had never fully accepted it, her embrace was still there, enveloping her as she had when she was little, and that was enough. She was adamant about not wanting to lie to her loved ones. It was much like wanting to see an old friend after a long time, stopping midstride, watching him from afar, but not getting any closer. Anna was very firm and outspoken in her belief that what she did in her bed was nobody’s business. In the end, she just told them that they lived together to save money.

Seeing the surgeon at the door, she snapped to attention like a soldier during roll call. She started to move. She froze. She was reading lips and watching body language in order to understand what was going on. The same door opened once again, and the doctor disappeared behind it. Arm in arm, they turned slightly towards her. Anna’s mom was

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Transmission Innocence by Odysseas Anninos

about to say something but stopped herself.

She couldn’t decipher the look on their faces.

They sat down again, upon their thrones of despair, comforting one another.

She felt like she was drowning; she needed air. She dragged herself to the door, and passed from the cold atmosphere of the hospital to the fifty-degree January weather.

She never imagined that she would have to go through something like this. She lit a cigarette. She walked, as if in a trance, to her motorcycle. She leaned against the handlebars and looked back at the hospital lights.

She could see a light bulb flickering in the corner of her eye. Some curtain was drawn across one of the windows. Her beloved was lying in one of those rooms, and she couldn’t embrace her. She couldn’t lie down next to her, stroke her hair, make up stories like all those she used to tell whenever she couldn’t sleep. She thought about leaving. She couldn’t stand the muteness of Anna’s parents. But … where would she go? Her home was there. She had lived there for five years already. Inside Anna.

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They met one night at a local bar. At dawn, they were still at the same chairs talking about books and movies. Anna came at the most fateful moment of her life. Not long ago her brother had passed away. She was empty. Nothing and no one had been able to make her come to terms with what she was feeling. That night they squeezed two lives into one. The moment they saw each other, they were listening to the song Amado mio at the bar. Ever since then she called her “Gilda,” explaining jokingly that that was the right pronunciation, and not Jilda, like she usually said. “It’ll be our little secret,” they agreed. She remembered the wise words of an old woman they had met in a village during her first vacation with Anna: “My child, two people become a couple as soon as they create their first secret together.” She couldn’t help but think of all the secrets they had created since that day.

Searching her brain for someone to talk to, she thought of their friend, Maria. She typed her number into her cell, and instantly regretted it. She didn’t have the energy to talk to anyone. Looking at the device in her hand, she felt like she was going crazy. Why had she called her? She threw her phone against a tree. She watched it shatter to pieces.

A snack bar had set up shop across the street from the hospital. She ordered a double espresso and sat outside in the cold. A forgotten Christmas garland twinkled limply in the distance. Taxis stopped, picking up exhausted silhouettes. In their hands: plastic bags and tattered suitcases. The taxis stood still, awaiting their next late-night guests.

One car, bogged down by luggage, passed in front of her.

She remembered her trips with Anna.

Always abroad, where they always walked more freely. They would save their money and then go to the airport on a whim to buy discounted tickets, always choosing the next

available flight. It was always Anna’s idea.

Adventurous and one-of-a-kind, she always came up with ridiculous ideas to help them escape their routine. Even their arguments were unique. During their last quarrel, in the train on the way to Thessaloniki, Anna said, “So, now can I kiss the woman I fall in love with more and more everyday?” and defeated her with a passionate kiss.

She flinched suddenly, looking at her watch. She went to the snack bar bathroom to splash some water on her face. She could smell Anna’s perfume, as if she were right behind her, hugging her tight around the waist. She looked at herself in the mirror.

Her reflection seemed angry and wild. She

searched her pockets for tissues to dry her face. Water ran down her neck. Tissues were nowhere to be found. Instead, she pulled out a flyer with a black and white picture of Rita Hayworth. It was for an event in homage of her movies. Her memory suddenly returned.

It was for tonight at the Asteria Cinema.

She cursed herself for having forgotten.

She ran up the hospital stairs. Out of breath, she finally reached the floor of the ICU. Surprised, she saw that a group had gathered.

Everyone was embracing. Crying, they muttered Anna’s name.

She stared speechless. It was her body that understood first. She went numb. She surrendered. Zoe fell to her knees. �

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Ε

ίχαν περάσει ώρες. Η σειρήνα του ασθενοφόρου βούιζε ακόμη μέσα στο κεφάλι της. Καθόταν σε μια πλαστική καρέκλα. Τα γόνατά της έτρεμαν αυτονομημένα. Στο μυαλό της η εικόνα του κατεστραμμένου αυτοκινήτου, λίγα τετράγωνα από το σπίτι τους. Σηκώθηκε. Έκοβε βόλτες, μετρώντας τις ψηφίδες στο μωσαϊκό, καρφώνοντας στιγμιαία το βλέμμα στο ρολόι του αχνο­ πράσινου τοίχου. Βασανιζόταν από ανα­πάν­τητα ερωτήματα. Γιατί δεν άνοιξαν οι αερόσακοι; Γιατί της τηλεφώνησε στο κινητό, ενώ πάντα το απέφευγε όταν ήξερε ότι οδηγούσε; Αν δεν της είχε μιλήσει, δε θα είχε ακούσει τη σύγκρουση, τις λαμαρίνες να συνθλίβονται στην άλλη άκρη της γραμμής. Έβαζε τα νύχια στο στόμα της θέλοντας κυριολεκτικά να τα ξεκολλήσει απ’ το πετσί τους. Πέρναγε τα δάχτυλα στα κοντά μαύρα μαλλιά της κι έξυσε το κεφάλι της με μανία. Τα μαύρα στενά ρούχα που φόραγε την έδειχναν ακόμα πιο αδύνατη απ’ την αγωνία. Η μάσκαρα, νερωμένη απ’ τα δάκρυα, μουτζούρωνε το κατάχλομο πρόσωπό της. Η Ζωή στεκόταν σε κάποια απόσταση από τους συντετριμμένους γονείς της Άννας. Κουλουριασμένοι ο ένας πάνω στον άλλο, στις καρέκλες που βρίσκονταν πιο κοντά στα χειρουργεία. Σε μια άλλη αίθουσα χαροπάλευε ο νεαρός οδηγός που παραβίασε το στοπ και καρφώθηκε πάνω της. Έβλεπε τα χαρακωμένα από την αγωνία πρόσωπά τους. Οι τύψεις είχαν αρχίσει να μεγεθύνονται. Τι στο διάολο ήθελε να της πει; Αν περίμενε ένα λεπτό, μπορεί να μην είχε συμβεί τίποτα. Θα είχε φτάσει σπίτι τους. Ασφαλής. Μέσα σε έξι μήνες το αποφάσισαν. Να μοιράζονται κάθε ξημέρωμα μαζί. Το μόνο που προβλημάτιζε την Άννα ήταν πώς θα το ανακοίνωνε στους δικούς της. Της φαινόταν αδιανόητο να μιλήσει στους παλαιών αρχών γονείς της για τα 54

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προσωπικά της. Σε αυτό το θέμα πάντα διαφωνούσαν, αλλά η μία σεβόταν την άποψη της άλλης. Η Ζωή το είχε πει στην οικογένειά της από τα είκοσί της, δίνοντάς τους χρόνο να το αποδεχτούν. Τι κι αν δεν το κατανόησε ποτέ η μάνα της με τη λογική της, η αγκαλιά της δε μίκρυνε καθόλου, την τύλιγε πάντα όπως τότε που ήταν παιδί κι αυτό της έφτανε. Επέμενε ότι δε θέλει να λέει ψέματα σε αγαπημένους της ανθρώπους. Είναι σαν να θες να δεις ένα φίλο σου ύστερα από καιρό και να σταματάς στα μισά του δρόμου, κοιτώντας τον από μακριά, χωρίς να τον πλησιάζεις. Η Άννα υποστήριζε πως το τι κάνει στο κρεβάτι της δεν αφορά κανέναν. Κατέληξε να τους πει ότι συγκατοικούν για οικονομία. Βλέποντας το χειρουργό στην πόρτα πετάχτηκε σαν στρατιώτης στο «παρου­ σιάστε» του διοικητή. Έκανε μισό βήμα. Πάγωσε. Διάβαζε τα χείλη και παρακολουθούσε τις εκφράσεις των τριών προσώπων να καταλάβει. Η ίδια πόρτα ξανάνοιξε και ο γιατρός χάθηκε πίσω της. Πιασμένοι αγκαζέ, γύρισαν για λίγο προς το μέρος της. Η μάνα της Άννας κάτι πήγε να πει, αλλά δεν το είπε. Δεν μπορούσε να κατανοήσει το βλέμμα τους. Ξανακάθισαν στο θρόνο της απόγνωσης παρηγορώντας ο ένας τον άλλον. Ένιωσε να πνίγεται, χρειαζόταν αέρα. Σύρθηκε ως την έξοδο και πέρασε από το παγωμένο κλίμα του νοσοκομείου στους δέκα βαθμούς του Γενάρη. Δεν μπορούσε ποτέ να φανταστεί ότι θα βίωνε κάτι τέτοιο. Άναψε τσιγάρο. Περπάτησε σαν υπνωτισμένη ως τη μηχανή της. Στηρίχτηκε στο τιμόνι και κοίταζε τα φώτα του νοσοκομείου. Μια λάμπα ξεψυχούσε σπιν­ θηρίζοντας στην κόρη των ματιών της. Κάποια κουρτίνα τραβήχτηκε πίσω από ένα παράθυρο. Σε ένα από αυτά τα δωμάτια, βρισκόταν ξαπλωμένη η αγαπημένη της και δε μπορούσε να την αγκαλιάσει. Να ξαπλώσει πλάι της, να της χαϊδέψει τα

μαλλιά, να αυτοσχεδιάσει ιστορίες σαν αυτές που της έλεγε κάθε φορά που δε μπορούσε να κοιμηθεί. Σκέφτηκε να φύγει. Δεν άντεχε αυτή τη μούγκα των γονιών της Άννας. Όμως, πού να πήγαινε; Το σπίτι της ήταν εκεί. Εκεί κατοικούσε εδώ και πέντε χρόνια. Μέσα στην Άννα. Είχαν γνωριστεί ένα βράδυ σ' ένα μπαράκι. Το ξημέρωμα τις βρήκε καθισ­ μένες στις ίδιες θέσεις να μιλούν για κινηματογράφο και βιβλία. Η Άννα ήρθε στην πιο μοιραία στιγμή της ζωής της. Λίγο καιρό πριν είχε χάσει τον αδερφό της. Είχε αδειάσει. Τίποτα και κανείς δεν μπορούσε να τη φέρει σε επαφή με το μέσα της. Εκείνη τη νύχτα χώρεσαν δύο ζωές σε μία. Τη στιγμή που κοιτάχτηκαν, ακουγόταν το τραγούδι Amado mio στο μαγαζί. Έκτοτε τη φώναζε Γκίλντα, αφού της εξήγησε γελώντας ότι αυτή είναι η σωστή προφορά κι όχι Τζίλντα που λένε συνήθως. «Θα είναι το μυστικό μας», συμφώνησαν. Θυμήθηκε την κουβέντα μιας σοφής γριάς σ’ ένα χωριό όπου πήγαν την πρώτη τους εκδρομή με την Άννα: «Παιδί μου, δυο άνθρωποι γίνονται ζευγάρι μόλις φτιάξουν το πρώτο ολόδικό τους μυστικό». Και πόσα μυστικά δεν έφτιαξαν από τότε … Ψάχνοντας στο μυαλό της να μιλήσει σε κάποιον, της ήρθε η φίλη τους, η Μαρία. Πάτησε στο κινητό τον αριθμό της, μα τελευταία στιγμή μετάνιωσε. Δεν είχε κουράγιο να μιλήσει. Κοιτάζοντας τη συσκευή στην παλάμη της, ένιωσε να τρελαίνεται. Γιατί της τηλεφώνησε; Πέταξε το κινητό σε ένα δέντρο. Το είδε να διαλύεται. Απέναντι από το νοσοκομείο διανυκ­ τέρευε ένα σνακ μπαρ. Παράγγειλε έναν διπλό ελληνικό σκέτο και κάθισε έξω, στην παγωνιά. Μια ξεχασμένη γιρλάντα από χριστουγεννιάτικα φωτάκια ανα­βόσβηνε υποτονικά στο απέναντι μαγαζί. Ταξί στα­ μα­τούσαν ξεβράζοντας ταλαιπωρημένες φιγούρες. Στα χέρια τους πλαστικές τσάντες και ξεθωριασμένα σακ βουαγιάζ. Στέκονταν

για δευτερόλεπτα περιμένοντας να πάρουν άδεια νυχτερινού επισκέπτη. Ένα αμάξι φορτωμένο βαλίτσες στην οροφή πέρασε από μπροστά της. Θυμήθηκε τα ταξίδια με την Άννα. Πάντα στο εξωτερικό, εκεί όπου περ­ πάταγαν πιο ελεύθερες. Έκαναν οικονομίες και πήγαιναν στο αεροδρόμιο τελευταία στιγμή ν’ αγοράσουν εκπτω­τικά εισιτήρια, διαλέγοντας την πτήση που έφευγε πρώτη. Ιδέα της Άννας. Περιπετειώδης και πρωτότυπη, σκεφτόταν πάντα απίθανα πράγματα για να ξεφεύγουν από τη ρουτίνα. Ακόμα και οι τσακωμοί τους ήταν πρωτότυποι. Στην τελευταία διαφωνία τους, μέσα στο τρένο για Θεσσαλονίκη, η Άννα είπε: «Μπορώ τώρα να φιλήσω τη γυναίκα που ερωτεύομαι κάθε μέρα όλο και περισσότερο;» και την αποστόμωσε με ένα παθιασμένο φιλί. Τινάχτηκε απότομα κοιτάζοντας το ρολόι της. Πήγε στην τουαλέτα του σνακ μπαρ να ρίξει νερό στο πρόσωπό της. Μύριζε το άρωμα της Άννας λες και βρισκόταν κολλημένη πίσω της, αγκαλιάζοντάς τη σφιχτά από τη μέση. Κοιτάχτηκε στον καθρέφτη. Το είδωλό της αγριεμένο, έξαλλο. Έψαξε στις τσέπες της για χαρτομάντιλα να σκουπιστεί. Το νερό έτρεχε στο λαιμό της. Χαρτομάντιλα πουθενά. Έβγαλε ένα φέιγ βολάν με τη Ρίτα Χέιγουορθ σε ασπρόμαυρο φόντο. Ένα αφιέρωμα στις ταινίες της. Η μνήμη της επανήλθε επιθετική. Ήταν γι’ απόψε, στο σινεμά «Αστέρια». Διαολόστειλε τον εαυτό της που ξεχάστηκε. Ανέβηκε τρέχοντας τα σκαλιά του ΚΑΤ. Λαχανιασμένη έφτασε στον όροφο της εντατικής. Έκπληκτη είδε ότι είχε μαζευτεί κόσμος. Όλοι αγκαλιασμένοι. Έκλαιγαν παραμιλώντας το όνομα της Άννας. Κοίταζε βουβή. Μέχρι που το σώμα της άρχισε να καταλαβαίνει. Μούδιασε. Παραδόθηκε. Η ζωή λύγισε στα γόνατα. �

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Conte Crayon by Peter McNeill

FICTION

Paros, 2012 by paul kennebeck

T

ransfer madness—a Babel of languages—more than that, a Babel of curses on the dock, on the ramps—gestures, attitude, anger, impatience in a hundred tongues; transferors stop at the foot of the metal boat ramp, confused. Other passengers pile up behind them, blocking fellow travelers exiting, the happiness level sinking.

Deckhands shout commands in a language those exiting do not understand. Taxi drivers wave and implore. The baffled arrivals fumble with luggage, sunglasses, and transfer documents, seeking a place where they can store their bags and wheeled suitcases.

Vendors on the side of the concrete dock hawk bottles of water and sesamehoneyed rolls. The vendors confound the arriving buyers by making change in the wrong amounts in currency the buyers do not comprehend. Never has a sesame bun been sold at such a price. The vendors vie among themselves for the best rip-off of a harried, sweating, and angry transferor. At the end of the transfer season, the vendors hold a celebratory ouzo-fest at Rou’s Taverna where prizes are awarded for the best price obtained on a honeyed-sesame roll; the higher the price and the smaller the roll, being the winner.

The girl emerged from the dark hold of the ferry with a wariness vacationers don’t possess, carrying a single messenger bag.

From inside my storage shed under the

upraised corrugated door, I had a view of her. She was slim. Jeans looked good on her.

Sometimes she stayed on the island a night, sometimes two nights. Most people catch the same-day ferry out of here. We’re that type of island.

This is what’s important about the girl: Whenever she came to the island, somebody here died.

The ferries she came in on—huge, dark and cavernous inside—loud, churning the sea, racing across the waves, landing in port and disgorging the passengers from the deep interior loaded with Fiats and Peugeots—those ferries come hour after hour, day after day.

The big ferries, the Flying Cats, the fast ones with the double hulls, came hurtling in out of the sea’s low horizon, charging to the port like in a race, the ship suddenly turning, water churning, foam rising, the ship turning and backing, no longer headed in, but backing in, wharf rats grabbing hawsers thrown to them from the ferry, latching them around bollards, the metal exit ramps already lowering before the ship has even stopped moving, the ramps hitting the concrete and the girl coming out of the dark hold with the other travelers, their smoking cars, their motorbikes, their backpacks, their luggage, piles of complex tourist gear, like troops in a landing zone. Those ships come screaming into the port everyday, stay-

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ing ten minutes, off-loaded, on-loaded, each captain trying to set a record for the briefest time in the port.

What kind of island has people fighting to be here the shortest?

The girl didn’t use the storage shed.

The irreducible core function of much of the commerce of Paros lay in the fact that the flying boat from Piraeus or Tinos or Samos arrived around noon, and the flying boat to Iraklion or Mykonos or Athens departed at about four. The transferring passenger was thus obliged to pass four hours on the island.

It was necessary there be a place where the passenger could temporarily rid himself of his cumbersome suitcase, parcel, coat and backpack.

That’s what I’m for.

Have you ever flown? Changed planes?

Been stuck in a terminal? The only reason you are in the terminal in the first place is to leave it?

That’s Paros.

“Paros is a place where people don’t return. When you see someone who does, and returns more than once, you remember. When the person also seems to be able to smell death’s arrival like a dog in an old folks’ home, you start to speculate.”

Usually you never ever see the passengers again. They come here to leave. The girl was different.

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a short-sleeved dark blouse, jeans and canvas shoes, carrying that leather messenger bag. Tourists wear shorts, T-shirts, sandals, shades, and sun hats. When she looked at me, she nodded. No smile. Nice face. Dark hair.

Greek.

And then she was gone. Passengers came to retrieve their bags, the shelves in the shed emptied, and a day was done.

The next morning Kyrios Galonas died.

This is what my father told me. When Stelios is your father, everything is explained.

Kyrios Galonas had battled my father over the Tavli board for years. My father was ill, but not, it turned out, as ill as Kyrios Galonas. My father disowns me when I talk about Paros. “Go to Mykonos,” he said. “Go to Thira. Be a damn tourist.”

The ferries coming in and leaving like they’re trying to see who can stay here the briefest time? My father says that’s the orders from the Sea Scheduler. The ferries do that in every port. Sitting in port is wasted downtime—losing more money than is already lost.

I went to the funeral service. Everybody on the island knew Galonas. Before he became weak and ceased emerging into the sunlight, he baked bread for one of the tavernas that served the ferry passengers. The island being what it is, the tavernas basically made their money at lunch.

After Kyrios Galonas died, Kyria Fotos died. She was elderly and had been ill and in pain. Passing was a blessing, most people said. The yiayias weren’t buying it, eternity in hell being the ultimate downer. The medication she received dampened some of the woman’s pain.

Kyria Fotos died, and I didn’t see the girl who I now know arrives at a death. If I had paid less attention to the Metaxa and rice at the makaria, I might have seen her. Or maybe she wasn’t there.

I saw the girl next when she appeared helped Stelios push not one but two sagging on my bench beneath the olive tree as if wheelchairs into the ferry.

We got the two yiayias up the ramp. They she were waiting. I hadn’t noticed her walk up—I was engaged with the luggage. All were ill, returning to their villages in the those little wheels on the suitcases are ter- Peloponnesus. Each grasped claw-like the rific for moving around on the dock from canvas packages of vials that will keep the ferry to ferry but do not store well on a pain away until they arrive home. A son had shelf. Stand suitcases on their wheels, they told them there was medicine in the village. roll. Lay them on their sides, they don’t fit A little. But hurry.

Transfer madness: The dock vendors tell right, and the owners don’t tip. But there of marriages falling apart as they watch, she was. witnessing revulsion that will never be recTurned out she was early.

Not the next day, but the day after was onciled no matter how much counseling. The the death. Kyrios Pappageorge. I didn’t know vendors watch the passengers who are late, him. Maybe he was one of those natives who who missed a transfer, whose little plastic returned from Chicago in their old age to die, wheels on their suitcases collapsed and broke and—Oh God—are stuck on Paros. I learned which he did.

Paros is a place where people don’t return. my English from transferors stuck on Paros.

The girl’s arrivals pretty much spread When you see someone who does, and returns more than once, you remember. When the over the summer. The Etesian winds have person also seems to be able to smell death’s been blowing for several hundreds of thouarrival like a dog in an old folks’ home, you sands of years, low pressure over upper Greece, high pressure over Anatolia, causstart to speculate.

If you were in my position, wouldn’t you ing winds to come from the North over the think what I thought? Wouldn’t you sur- waves, narrow segments of water churned to mise that the reason someone died here was white on days when you can sniff the wind because the girl had come to the island? Or and smell the forests of the Balkans, smell that the reason the girl came to the island the Balkans’ pains, Balkans’ heartbreak, its was because someone had died? Or I suppose departing souls.

Sometimes when the winds are high, the you could be less rigorous in your analysis and think there was no connection between seas in the narrow passages between Paros the girl’s arrivals and the souls' depar- and Antiparos become furious, and the fertures, which meant you believed a whole ries halt for a day, maybe two. The girl came lot in chance. From the shade of the shed, once when the ferries were stopped, hitching I watched sunlit, white-capped blue waves a ride on some small container vessel, she as move slowly toward me. There were probably seasick as any tourist.

I saw her walk toward me on the dock, other explanations someone swifter than me the area empty of hucksters for taxis, hotels, could come up with. and restaurants.

When she looked at me, I waved.

The engines never stop, the ferries rock on She did not wave, but she came over to the waves as they load and unload. In port, tied up, you’d think they’d settle down a little, me. She was pale and sat down quickly on relax maybe. With the metal ramps rock- the bench, putting out a hand on the rail, ing—you can hear the clank of steel against steadying herself. I couldn’t resist. “Who steel—with passengers crowding behind us, I died?” I asked.

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“She already died?” Her voice was low, serious. She lowered her head and crossed herself.

“Who?” I asked.

“The widow Thanos.”

From her back, when she’s hurrying away from you, she looks athletic, thin, with grace in her speed.

On a morning when the waves were just the right color of calming blue, I sat outside at a marble-topped table and watched Alex go behind the zinc counter, pour water into a briki, measure a teaspoon of coffee into the water, place the briki on a small electric burner and stir the coffee. I saw him glance at me, at the sea behind me, until foam started to rise in the briki.

I could see the waves not ever stopping.

Beneath them were the fish, never sleeping, eel, goby, and turbot terribly disturbed by the commotion caused by the ferries above them,

churning their world into chaos. When you bring the silver fish in on a net, you can see their eyes and mouths misshapen in anger.

The transfer season was coming to an end. Let me ask you. Do the hotels on the islands close for the winter because the tourists aren’t coming? Or do the tourists stop coming because the hotels are closed?

Travelers had left behind suitcases and had forgotten coats, shoes, phones, glasses, ointments, manuscripts, and silverware. The island, a waste bin for remnants of lives unclaimed.

At the end of the season, everything ratcheted up a notch. A yiayia—unable to think clearly, unable to see or speak with lucidity, her mind a hive of memories, none of them recent— was left behind. After that, a beagle, then a small male child.

Alex lifted the briki, held it in the air until the foam receded, replaced the briki on the burner and watched the foam rise one

Hydra Port by Odysseas Anninos

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more time. He’s a good man. At the stovetop, Alex poured foam into the demitasse resting on its gleaming saucer, then poured the thick coffee so as not to disturb the foam.

He placed the demitasse and saucer, a glass of cold water, a small biscuit and a book of matches on a tray and delivered the items to me, placing each item on the table.

I smiled at the smell of coffee on salt air in warm sun. I stirred the demitasse carefully, not to bother the foam, picked up the cup carefully, bent my head, and sipped loudly. I placed the small cup in its saucer and sat back and nodded at Alex. The waiter returned the gesture. Ritual is good.

I saw Lieutenant Volos’s shadow and then I saw Lieutenant Volos himself in full uniform and thought of confiding in him.

Lieutenant Volos was practically family— almost married a cousin. Things went bad with the cousin, and now I suffer for it.

Lieutenant Volos checks the shed maybe once a week and then we step next door to the taverna for a Greek coffee I buy. He is interested in smugglers, smuggling being an old Greek tradition and the basis for some island family fortunes. Stelios says Lieutenant Volos isn’t interested in smuggling, he is smuggling.

When Stelios is your father, everything is explained.

I speculated about telling Lieutenant Volos how I puzzled out the relationship between the girl and the deaths. He spotted me on the patio. I did the expected thing and nodded to the chair next to me. Alex saw the Lieutenant and placed another briki on the flame. The Lieutenant was a big man, burdened with too many free meals. He sat in the chair and studied me like a cop can do.

A gypsy girl selling roses entered the patio, glimpsed Lieutenant Volos, and left.

“Are you ill?” he asked.

He leaned forward, sniffing. He could see I was sweating. “The psychiatrist lady doesn’t visit me anymore,” I said.

“She’s left the island.”

“Why?” “She wanted to continue to get paid. Now she works in a clinic in Iraklion.”

I didn’t know she had left the island. She was enjoyable.

The Lieutenant and I talked and sipped coffee. We were pleasant to each other.

In the end, I did not confide about the girl and the deaths. I did not want a cop looking into my life. I’d be buying coffee every day forever.

During the transfer season you’d swear all human beings come from the same mold, the way they hurry down boat ramps, fight for taxis, deal with mouthy children, and grab their luggage. If there were a Nobel physicist or poet among them, you’d never know it. Everybody was the same, except for the girl.

When I returned, she was on the bench at the storage shed, reading a newspaper. I’m not good at that. I’m better at spoken, not written.

“Money,” she said, looking up at me from the paper. Her tone was not happy. “No money, no medicine.”

“The Sea Scheduler shut down the money.”

Her dark eyes told me personally she was not amused. “I have heard of the Sea Scheduler. There is no Sea Scheduler.”

“Certainly so.”

“You speak an odd form of English.”

OK, black-eyed Athenian, mock me.

She could tell I learned my English from tourists of all accents, all classes, and all sources. She probably was taught only one type of English. What sort of education is that?

She was stern. “The reason for the lack of medication is that our lovely Greece signed a loan agreement. Greece is screwed. Screwed is a German word. Everybody has to pay medical out of his own pocket.”

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“My father doesn’t have money to pay medical bills,” I said.

“Who does?”

“Tourists.”

“Don’t regard them. Be thankful you live on Paros.”

Thankful? Did she believe like our yiayias did? Listen. Here is a myth to live by. Do you know those unending daily confrontations on our island about transitoriness, about transfer, about comings and goings resulted in this? The children of the island were taught to stay at home.

The island’s myths told of the dangers of Leave-Taking and of Arriving; rather than belittle themselves by viewing their life as a mere momentary halt on others’ travels, the islanders viewed themselves as the Select— those who did not have to purchase a ticket and pack a bag.

“Is your storage shed secure?” the girl asked.

She had never really conversed with me before. “I’m here all the time. When I’m not, I have the pastry-maker’s son come here. He takes in luggage and gives it back.”

“There’s always someone here?”

This was a nice conversation. It is pleasing to discuss matters with a slim, thoughtful girl. She had a nice shadow. “Like the island, I close at night.”

She studied the interior of the shed—the buckled shelves, the suitcases, and bags on them. You could see what she was thinking.

And why shouldn’t we be able to see what people are thinking? It’s for our own protection. She was looking at the corrugated door that slid down at night and locked, like the doors on the kiosks in Athens. She regarded the walls. She didn’t have to worry about glass. The building was brick and wood with a metal door.

“Maybe I could leave something here.”

She had her usual messenger bag, but I didn’t see any other luggage.

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“Let me see your ticket.” Stelios taught me to inspect the ferry ticket as a precaution.

“What ticket?”

“I check the ferry ticket when I take storage.”

“I don't have a ticket.” Her eyes were black stones she could dial up, dial back, using them on me.

“Everybody has a ticket,” I said.

“I ride for free. No ticket. No transfer papers.”

“Who rides for free?”

“Maybe you could help us,” she said.

I was silent. Her eyes dialed up. She didn’t like my silence.

“Someone could leave a package here,” she said. “Pick it up the next day. Maybe the day after.” She shifted her posture, relaxing, and looked at me, like maybe I was capable of pleasing her. “Why didn’t I think of it before?”

I asked her what I had to ask. “How do you know people are going to die?”

Again, the eyes, dialing up, dialing back.

Full control.

“Kyrios Galonas,” I said. “Kyria Fotos, Kyrios Pappageorge.”

“Same as everybody else. The doctors tell me.”

“You’re a nurse?”

“Do I look like a nurse? With a paycheck?”

She didn’t look that pretty right now.

Her tone was tough, business-like.

“Do the cops watch you?” she asked.

“What’s to watch?”

She didn’t like that. I could sense nervousness now, a fear. If horses can sense fear, why can't I? It felt good. This slim girl was curious about me, about the complex commerce of storage and bailment; she was interested; and bothered, nervous. I said nothing.

“This place is designed for storage,” she said, almost to herself. “Someone leaves off a bag. Someone retrieves a bag.”

Then it was as if she suddenly envisioned At least on our little island we hadn’t gotten an impending death. When she hurried away, as bad as some places on the mainland. “My friend?” What a joke. she was graceful, athletic.

She was unhappy with my answer. SomeDo you know what Paclitaxel is? times there is a pleasure people don’t admit I didn’t either. to in making a person unhappy. I’d never “Paclitaxel,” my father said to me.

He had needed it. Kyrios Galanos had see her again, except at a funeral or two, although she never really did stick around to needed it. Kyria Fotos had needed it.

It can cure. But now he needed morphine. attend the services.

It felt good, a small triumph in a kettle It quells the pain when the cure fails.

I made things up to him by being a son of losses. who goes to the pharmacy to get morphine.

He said his legs were bad that day. I remember Stelios died. He was not comforted much by the taut brown muscles of his legs when haul- painkillers. The pain made my father curl up ing in the nets of silver fish when I was a child. like a child, all that muscle and power gone.

The woman in the blue tunic at the He had been a Hercules. “Where is the morcounter of the pharmacy said they had the phine?” he whispered.

What type of system does the Sea Schedprescription from the doctor. But they had uler run? He can't send us the painkillers? not had morphine for a week.

At the makaria for Stelios, the girl didn't “Give us a break,” I said. “It's for Kyrios appear, but a man I had not seen before Stelios Strombos.”

“You are his son. The storage shed king. did. He approached me and guided me into a corner and asked if Stelios had any meds We know. We have no morphine.” left over. He took up space like he knew he “When will it come in?” had a right to occupy it. He was stocky and “They don't send it anymore.” well shaven, and people like him don’t always “They have to.”

“There is no money. The hospitals turn take well to people like me. Maybe I’m wrong.

“Are you from the Sea Scheduler?” I the dying away now because they are dying.

They turn the sick away because the sick will inquired.

He took a moment to study me, a clear get well if they're not dying.” unblinking stare. “Sure”, he said.

He was a walking frown. He carried burThe girl stood by the shed, eyeing the ferry, preparing to leave. “I like the peacefulness dens you and I couldn’t see. He was dressed here. I’d stay if I could.” The girl smiled. Her nicely for a makaria and wore polished dress smile trumped her eyes any day of the week. boots of a type I had not seen before.

“Left over?” I said. “Stelios never had “You’re lucky to live here.”

People start off friendly on purpose, much to begin with.”

“Whatever’s left over can help.” don’t they?

He reached out and touched my arm and Her face changed somehow, a quick darkening, a movement of the lips. “So much what he said was that a web had been woven, a Greek web—a network of various people, damn pain.”

She did not speak. Then: “What do you even medical workers, who gathered meds left over from those who had died and no think, my friend?”

I turned her down. She can’t store at this longer needed them and delivered the meds shed. I knew Athenians. That’s what she was. to those who lived and did need them.

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“Cassandra,” he said, watching me. “They caught her.”

So that was the girl’s name.

He moved forward a step, his frown mythic. “She believed she had found a safe place where transfers could be made—opioids, trail mix, morphine, and Dilaudid. Here on Paros. She was coming here, the morphine

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in her bag, when they stopped her. What it is called is possession with intent to distribute.

She had other meds. No prescriptions for any of them—nothing to make it legal. She’s in Athens.” He touched my arm. “Athens. Cops.

Lawyers. Briefcases. Suits. Ties. Pols.” A dismissive shrug. “Nothing but the Parthenon and pain.” �

FICTION

Whispers of Winter An Excerpt

by Toney Dimos

T

he piano never failed Fernando. It was the one thing that loved him unconditionally. It listened to his pain, confusion and extolled his virtue and accomplishment. The sounds that echoed from it drowned out the cruel hypocrisy and paralyzing fear he battled ceaselessly, replacing them with joy and illumination.

Lately the piano was the only thing that gave him a reason to live. He had lost all that he had once believed gave him purpose: his fiancée, his career, perhaps even his family. As he looked out the window at the view of downtown Chicago, he wondered what would happen next in his life.

He thought about when he first moved into this high-rise apartment two years ago.

At that time, he had thought this would be the beginning of his life with Carolina. Even though he hated the apartment, he agreed to move into it because of her. She loved the view: you could see most of the Gold Coast and Lake Michigan. Even on an overcast day like today, the view captured the serenity and beauty of the city.

He sat at the piano, an antique Steinway given to him about ten years ago by his parents for his sixteenth birthday. Most sixteen year olds covet a car, but Nando desired a Steinway. He grew up in the city on the North

side and was adept at taking the bus, hailing cabs, or most of the time just walking. So he figured a Steinway would be his Porsche.

His father bought it from a dealer who specialized in selling previously used instruments. The dealer told his dad that it at one time had been used at the Chicago Symphony Orchestra, played by renowned musicians from around the world. Nando always wondered if it was true or if the dealer had been trying to hustle his father.

By this time, the piano was the only thing left in the apartment. He had been living in the space alone for the last year and was now just waiting for the movers to take the instrument to his parents’ place only a few blocks away.

He sat, tapping the ‘Middle C’ key with his right index finger, recalling his first piano lesson as a four year old. He had returned to the piano with renewed dedication and zest. His fiancée had left him a year ago. It was the most devastating moment of his young life. His parents and sisters comforted him as much as possible, even though they knew it was for the best.

The break-up had precipitated a total transformation in Nando’s life. At first, it had left him debilitated with grief and hopelessness. He then left his job at a prestigious

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architecture firm and began to pursue his dream of playing jazz piano.

Of course his father had other ideas for his son. Plato Theodopoulos, indeed, loved his son, Fernando, but his love hindered him from seeing his son as an individual rather than his legacy. His choice of name for his son symbolized as much, given their significance—teacher and pupil. Fernando’s legal name was Aristotle Fernando Theodopoulos.

Nando held great antipathy for his father’s choice of names and chose to go by his middle name, which his mother chose after her favorite uncle in Buenos Aires. “Of all the names,” he would say to his father, “why did you choose that one?!”

“His parents loved the Greek capital and never imagined that their son would prefer to live anywhere else. Plato, though, had other ideas.”

“What?! It’s a great honor!” his father would reply, throwing his hands up in the air.

“Men would kill for a name like that. It represents so much of your culture, history, and people. Aristotle! Greatness!”

At that point, Nando would roll his eyes.

And his father would continue: “You also know not only for the philosophers but for the businessman—Onassis. With that name, you are destined for a wonderful life.”

Plato idolized Onassis and emulated his success as a self-made businessman. As a boy growing-up in Athens, Plato followed with great zeal the resourcefulness of Onassis, not to mention the string of stunning women he had conquered.

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for himself. He studied economics at the university in Thessaloniki. From there, he completed graduate studies at Cambridge University. He then returned to Athens to work as an economist for Onassis.

“I met him just once,” Plato would say to Nando, “we shook hands, and he thanked me for my work.”

“Nai,” Nando would say, having heard the story countless times.

“And you know what I said?”

“Oxhi, what did you say?” Nando would play dumb and humor his father begrudgingly.

“I said, ‘no, thank you, Mr. Onassis, for giving me this opportunity and for all that you’ve done for Greece.’ ” At that point, Nando would nod in affirmation, attempting to demonstrate appreciation for his father’s story. In truth, Nando could have cared less. He never was star struck or tried to impress anyone. He attributed his father’s tendency for this as a symptom of his humble beginnings.

Plato’s father was a secondary school history teacher, and his mother was a seamstress who altered wedding dresses. He was an only child, whose parents tried to instill in him a sense of decency and integrity. His father would take him on long walks through Athens, recalling the historical significance of particular sites and structures.

His mother, like many Greek matrons, spoiled him, treating him like a deity. She would take him to candy and pastry shops and the cinemas every Saturday afternoon.

His parents loved the Greek capital and never imagined that their son would prefer to live anywhere else. Plato, though, had other ideas.

Plato spent several years in Athens, working for Onassis. In his spare time, he sipped coffee at cafés dressed in his Italian tailored suits, which he traveled to Rome and Milan to purchase. He chased beautiful women all

She stood on a corner waiting to cross over the city, often fruitlessly. In the summer time, he lounged on the Greek Islands, the street. He couldn’t see her eyes behind namely Rhodes, Corfu, and Mykonos, where her dark sunglasses, but he watched her wait. he chased more women—usually the tourist She had a long, lean figure with dark brown flowing hair that reached the center of her girls, who came from Northern Europe.

The summer of 1970, however, ushered back. She had smooth, fair skin.

“Do you know who that is?” Plato said to a radical transformation in the life of Plato Theodopoulos. He decided to take a two-week his uncle.

“Ah, ha,” said Eleftherios with a chuckle, vacation to Israel, namely to visit his favorite uncle, Eleftherios, in Jerusalem, who served “That is Alexandra Zimmerman, the goddess there as a priest in a small Greek Orthodox of Jerusalem.”

“What? What do you mean?” mission. Eleftherios was the brother of Pla“Well, Alexandra has inspired many suitto’s mother. He brazenly spoiled his sister’s ors, but none have been able to convince her son with gifts, love, and wisdom.

Plato took the ferry from Pireaus and to marry.”

“None?” stopped for few days in Cyprus to visit a “Do you know her?” friend and his family for a couple of days, “Of course, she represented Israel a couple and then pressed on to Haifa, the port city of Israel. Once in Jerusalem, he took a taxi of years ago in the Miss Universe competito see his uncle at the church he ran. It was a tion. She came in second to a girl from small outfit, leaving much time for his uncle Puerto Rico. She is studying now for a graduEleftherios to meditate and study. He found ate degree in art history. She is as intelligent fulfillment spending a quiet afternoon on his as she is beautiful. Her father is a rabbi at balcony, studying theology and history while the Hebrew temple down the street. He and nibbling on feta cheese and semolina bread I have coffee a few times a week, where we which he bought from the Greek baker down debate politics, theology, and the cinema.”

“I see,” Plato said. “Can you arrange an the street, a Spartan, and sipping on homeintroduction?” made wine.

“My son, there’s no way.”

His one indulgence, however, was Ameri“Why?” can Motown music and the cinema. He loved “She is Hebrew. You are a Greek—a Christhe music of Marvin Gaye and Stevie Wonder, not to mention the Temptations and Diana tian.”

“Why should that matter?”

Ross. At the cinema, he enjoyed French and “What? You are going to convert to American pictures, namely the works of Truffaut, Godard, and any Hollywood pro- Judaism, because she will never become ductions with Audrey Hepburn or Sophia Orthodox.”

“Never?”

Loren. He counted Charade and It Started in “Never.”

Naples as his favorites.

“Let’s just meet and see.”

Plato and Eleftherios spent much of their “Let me talk to her father. We meet tomortime together walking around the city, visiting historical sites and lunching in cafes. row around noon.”

The next day came, and Eleftherios introOne afternoon, they sat outside, sipping Greek coffees and scanning some newspa- duced his nephew to the Rabbi at a local café. pers on his uncle’s terrace, when Plato saw David was polite, but knew immediately the intentions of his friend’s nephew. “No way,” the woman who would change his life.

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he said, “impossible. With all respect, I can and Plato married in a civil ceremony. Religion was not as important as the faith they tell your nephew is unsuitable.” had in their love for each other. They honey“Why do you say that?” Eleftherios said.

“Look at him in that black suit and those mooned in Tel Aviv and Beirut, where Plato dark sunglasses. He’s just like Mastroi- did his best to limit his ogling of the beautianni in La Dolce Vita, chasing women and ful Israeli and Lebanese girls in bikinis on the beach. carousing.”

For a short time, they lived in Athens “My nephew is no angel, for sure, but he is a man now and wants to settle down. I’ve before moving to New York City. A prestigtalked to him about Alexandra and what is ious investment house on Wall Street hired Plato, while Alexandra would continue her expected.” studies at New York University. Both had Plato stood quietly out of respect; he wanted to speak up but thought better. extended family there: some of Plato’s lived in Queens, while Alexandra’s clan was in “Hello,” she said, indifferent to his existence.

“Hello, Alexandra,” Eleftherios said, Brooklyn and Manhattan.

After a few years in New York, they standing-up, giving her a kiss on her left moved to Chicago, where Plato began his hand.

She blushed a little, and then looked to own financial venture. Alexandra had been selected as a fellow at Northwestern Univerher father. “Hello, father,” she said.

She looked at Plato, expecting him to sity, while Plato and his cousin, Demetrios “Jimmy” Aristides, started their own finanintroduce himself. He looked to his uncle.

“Alexandra, this is my nephew, Plato,” cial venture called the Pegasus Fund, where Eleftherios said, “he is visiting me from Ath- they speculated on stock index futures.

Within five years, the Pegasus Fund ens.”

“Pleased to meet you,” she said, extending became one of the top performing funds in the world. Alexandra became a full-time her hand.

“Enchanted,” said Plato, kissing her hand. professor at Northwestern. More importantly, “My dear,” her father said, “this rogue they had their first child in 1975, a girl they would like to court you with the intention of named Athena Esther, who would inherit her mother’s looks and brains and her father’s marrying you.”

“Do I want to marry a Fellini character?” tenacity. And soon after, in the spring of 1977, arrived Fernando, the baby boy soon to she said with a playful smirk. be prodigal son. � Plato grinned.

Plato extended his stay in Jerusalem and married Alexandra. Much to the dismay of Excerpted from the novel WHISPERS OF the Rabbi and Father Eleftherios, Alexandra WINTER

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FICTION

Choirboy by leonard c. costopoulos

From somewhere came that obscure, double sensation that what I was experiencing in real time on that steamy August day in Chicago, 1956 was not only the event itself, but also the hint of its imminent transformation into a future memory never to be forgotten.

“S

o how was choir practice? All the saints still in place, glaring down on you from those stain-glass windows of God's house?” My father, already dripping with sweat, was at the pressing machine behind the counter of his small dry-cleaning shop on East 92nd Street. “And those sweet Byzantine hymns, how are they going? It must be nice being only one of two boys in the church choir, huh? I mean all those pretty girls, especially the one who sings by herself.”

“You mean the soloist, Pop?” “Yea, the soloist. What's her name?”

“Stella.”

“What a beautiful voice,” my father said.

“She sings like an angel. And she's gorgeous too, in an immaculate sort of way.” And with that remark he slammed down the lid of his pressing machine, locked the foot pedal in place, pressed the lever near the handle and fired off a burst of steam into a pair of trousers tortuously clutched within the contraption's iron jaws.

“Come on, Pop. Don't poke fun, alright?”

I said. Actually though, I was growing fond of the serenity that goes along with being in

a house devoted to the heavenly host. There was something enchanting, almost mystical, being in the presence of all that seemed so holy and pure. But at the same time, the place evoked certain sensuality. Maybe it was the girls, like Pop said.

“I know. I know. You sing in church to please your mother, right?” He leaned his head over toward a stack of clothes hangers “grab me one.”

Like an interior decorator, he carefully draped a pair of slacks over the hanger's paper guard. After placing the finished product on a rack, he turned to me and said, “Now come over here and give your old man a squeeze.”

My arms could never quite fit around his barrel chest and powerful back. His T-shirt was soaked through, and the bandana he always wore around his neck was drenched.

My dad re-lit what was left of his cigar.

“Jesus,” he said amicably tousling the hair on my head, “you still smell like incense.” How he could sniff anything other than that heavy tang of tobacco swirling around his head from the Perfecto Garcia he was puffing on remains a mystery to this day.

“Give me a break, Pop.” “Ok, listen, today you have to make a special delivery for me.”

“Delivery? We don't deliver.”

“Yea, well, this is a special request from Mr. Mandalakis.”

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Nick Mandalakis. The visuals were Hotel? I thought. I might only be fifteen, instant: gambler, political fixer, well-heeled but I knew a flophouse when I saw one.

“Her name is Salome. Never met her hood and entrepreneur; the most dapper, well-attired power broker on the South Side myself, but according to Tony who brought and owner of the Majestic, South Chicago's her fancy gowns over, she's the new belly premier nightclub and watering hole for dancer over at the Mandalakis place.” Pop some of the lesser movers and shakers in the looked up at the clock and handed me the bill neighborhood. “An important customer,” with the itemized costs, which I put in my back pocket. “Twenty bucks, and be careful my dad would say.

Pop led me over to a clothes rack from with the money on the way back. So let's get which hung three well-stuffed, long, white a move on, I promised I'd have the clothes paper bags of dry cleaning, each of which over there by now.”

I reached up to the clothes rack and, with enveloped about three or four hangers beareach hand, grabbed a fist full of hanger loops. ing floor-length garments.

I winced at the prospect of lugging all Then—dividing the weight as evenly as I that cargo to the Majestic, eight blocks away. could—I draped the billowing payload back As if reading my mind, my dad said, over each shoulder. “don't look so sad, you only have to take this “You know,” said my dad following me stuff down 92nd to the Steel City Hotel, sec- with a pair of whimsical eyes, “with all that ond floor. He took out a piece of paper from white flapping behind you, it kinda looks his pants pocket. “… room 242, that’s where like you've sprouted wings.” she's staying.”

“Whatta 'ya want, kid?” Dominic, the clerk at “She?” “Yea, ‘she,’ the dancer. She's over at the Steel City Hotel placed the racing form down on the surface of the scarred, battered the hotel.”

Figure Drawing 1 by Peter McNeill

reception desk and looked up over the rim of his glasses.

“Delivery,” I said.

“Delivery?” It was as if Dominic had trouble recalling such a word. “Delivery of what? For who?”

I unloaded my freight across the counter top. “For room 242.”

“Ah, Salome,” Dominic finally acknowledged. Grinning, he began swaying his open hand under chin as if it were a fan; something Italians are prone to do when a pretty dame passes by.

“That's her,” I said.

“Just follow the music,” said Dominic.

He jabbed his thumb in the direction of the staircase. “Lucky you.”

Byzantine music, similar to other Middle Eastern tonalities, was something I had grown accustomed to. Those rich, exotic, robust sounds had always provoked a sense of enchantment within me, and now, as they came slithering down the stairwell from room 242, the effect was even more mysterious and wondrous.

I finally reached the landing of the second floor. Just down the hall, to the left, was the dancer's room. I managed to fold the bags of garments across my arm and knocked on the door.

“Who is it?” Her voice was soft, breathy.

“Macedonian Cleaners,” I said. “Delivery for Miss Salome.”

“Macedonian, huh.” The voice had suddenly lost its luster.

But the door suddenly swung open and there she was.

“Stella?”

“Hi, Leo. Come on in,” said the dancer.

Stella had joined the church choir last Christmas season. Her soprano was so melodious and had such a range that it didn't take long before the choirmaster, Mr. Demopoulos,

had her singing “Oh, Holy Night” as a soloist during Christmas vespers. The only thing the rest of us in the choir know about her was that she was a graduate student in theology and musicology at the University of Chicago; that she lived somewhere in Hyde Park but was originally from Detroit. Her Greek was nearly flawless, and her knowledge of Byzantine music had so impressed the maestro that he quickly elevated her to lead soloist. And oddly enough, the other members of the choir became so enamored of the new talent that they themselves had little, if any, animosity or jealously toward the new star. Such was the power and richness of Stella's voice.

And now here she was, Salome, standing before me wearing a sequined, beaded, two-piece Anatolian ensemble as if she had just emerged from an audition for the role of Queen of Sheba. Her face beamed from beneath a crown of auburn hair, while her fine olive-colored skin exuded warmth and a perfumed scent which, along with the undulations of her heaving breasts, made my arms go limp. All the dry cleaning must have hit the floor without a sound. I was unaware that I had dropped anything at all.

“Surprised?” Stella said, looking me over, making me feel as if I had gone stark naked.

“Yes. I mean, yea, a little.” Like some dockworker, I bent down, grabbed all the hangers with one hand and hoisted the heavy load up from the floor all in one motion.

“Well, a woman has to make money to get an education these days, you know. The U. of C. isn't cheap, and I always pay my own way. By the way, how much do I owe you?

Where's the bill?”

“No charge. Mr. Mandalakis prepaid,” I lied.

“Yea, that figures. But it still won't get Nick anywhere with me,” said Stella.

“Whatta 'ya mean?”

“Never mind,” she said. "Now I've got to get back to my art.”

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“Art?” I scanned the small flat. No paintings, no easel or brushes or paint or colossal portraits at all.

“My music, Leo,” Stella said. “And my dance. And my voice exercises too.” She then reached over to a small handbag perched atop the lid of her portable phonograph and took out fifty cents. “This is for you. See you in church Sunday.”

As if it had a life of its own, the door gently closed, and I found myself back in that musty corridor of the Steel City Hotel.

“Prepaid?” Prepaid? What the hell is the matter with you, my boy. I never said Mandalakis paid for the dry cleaning! I gave you the tab, remember? You mean she didn't pay you?”

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I handed the fifty cents to my dad.

“And what's this?”

“Take the rest out of my pay, Pop.” “Baloney!” My dad stuffed the half dollar into my shirt pocket. "You watch the shop for a few minutes. I'm going over to the hotel to get our twenty dollars from that bellydancing floozie!”

“Ok Pop, you go ahead and do that. Room 242.”

“Choirboy,” my dad mumbled, the vanquished cigar butt still clenched between his teeth. And as he stormed out through the doorway, he glanced back at me with an expression, which—only later did I realize— I had misinterpreted then as dismay. �

FICTION

A Woman's Life by akrevoe emmanouilides

T

he wedding had been dignified and devout, the celebration restrained and in keeping with their positions in the village.

Moving from one country to another in the midst of animosity and fear was not what she had hoped for in the beginning of marriage, but her father had decided that this young man and his family would be a suitable, acceptable, and timely match.

It was uncertain how long the village would be intact. The priest had been ordered to leave the only church he had served since his ordination, and the next to leave would be her husband, the schoolteacher. Without worship or religion, and without language and letters, their community would falter; the enemy knew where to strike.

The bride wept as her parents kissed her, the bridegroom, and their wedding crowns.

She barely knew this young man who stood next to her and to whom she had been betrothed, wedded, and joined all within a single month.

Both families had brought what they could for the wedding meal, and they shared their contentment at the match with their closest relatives. This was not the time for luxury and pretensions, but it had been appropriately plentiful as befitted the wedding of the village schoolteacher and the daughter of the mayor.

The bride kept her head bowed and spoke little. Her parents were to leave in a few days

and her husband’s family would find refuge in another direction. Her mother reminded her of an old folk saying: “You are my daughter until you marry. Then you become my neighbor.” But they would not be even distant neighbors, for her parents were going east to Russia, and she would go to Greece with her husband’s parents and grandparents.

As night fell, the guests returned to their homes to prepare for their uncertain futures.

They offered the traditional greeting, Na zisete, and the couple replied, Kai sta paidia sas. “May you live a long life” and “May the same be true for your children.”

Her life had been spent waiting, but the wait for a husband had not been long. They had married her to him when she was seventeen.

Sons had come promptly, one the first year and five more as soon as the preceding one had been weaned. They had six sons in ten years. Finally, a daughter would be born. It would have been easier if the last, too, had been a son. She had learned to wait for almost everything.

When she washed the family’s clothing, bed linens, and household cottons, she rose before the sun and drew water from the well.

Gallons she drew and gallons she carried. She collected twigs for the fire that heated the water and waited for it to heat. Each article that had been used during the past week was rubbed through her hands, rubbed, dipped,

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rinsed, and hung to dry, then taken down and folded and put in its place. Her back, arms, and legs were numb, her fingers raw and cramped, and they would be so next week and for dozens of other weeks. Her name was Eleftheria, the Greek word for Freedom.

The houses, stark whitewash and stone, were silent. The village streets had been empty since noon. Neither a child’s cry nor a murmuring voice broke the stillness.

All had been as usual on Market Day. The stalls were heavy and colored with fruit and vegetables from the nearby farm plots.

Squash and eggplant had been plentiful that week. Tomatoes and peppers, plump and crisp, shone next to furry peaches and smooth plums. One robust farm wife invited the villagers first to taste and then to buy her produce. Others shouted to the housewives that theirs was the best on the market.

In the early, cooler hours, business had been steady and brisk, but as the sun rose, shoppers moved quickly on the day’s provisions and hurried to their cool, thick-walled houses.

Eleftheria had marketed early. Today she would stuff tomatoes and peppers with savory rice; there would be fresh bread, a tomato and cucumber salad, ripe peaches, and cool water. Her husband was always on time returning from his classroom. Their sons would follow, carrying books and eager appetites. Five of them were at school, and the baby was still nearby. The heat added to her discomfort, but it would be unseemly to

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mention it. Desperately, she determined this would be the last.

Their marriage had been a long one, dry and dutiful, labored and silent, a struggle each day for life’s necessities. Wars, hunger, and sacrifice were familiar. Books were buried, so they would not be burned. Each night, they prayed they would survive another day.

And miraculously they did, through the years of cruel occupation. Ultimately the war ended, the sons returned to their books and studied diligently so that they might make up for lost years.

There must have been periods of affection, passion, surrender, and even pleasure, for there was evidence in the children who had been born.

Had there been a time of true joy? Perhaps. But the most she remembered now was losing her beloved youngest son, caring for her invalid husband who wept and demanded much. She never had a house of her own, always the daughter-in-law, always in the shadow of his parents.

When he was gone, would she be free or would there be others who needed her attention, her hands, or her skills? Perhaps there would be purpose in teaching grandchildren, time for reading, for handwork, for considering what she might have done, who she could have been.

But she was old, and the days were surely numbered. She must be content and proud of the men and women who loved and admired her for the sacrifices and wisdom they remembered Eleftheria was free. �

FICTION

The Color of the Moon Το Χρώμα του Φεγγαριού by alkioni papadaki translated by anastasia soundiadi

F

otis met Maroussa upon her return from English class. It was Saturday evening.

“Come over tomorrow and see my house.

I'll cook you something you like. Will you come?”

“Sure, I'll come. Will you really cook for me?”

“Tell me what you feel like eating.”

“I feel like … What do I really feel like? I'll put you to the challenge. How about lamb with egg and lemon sauce? Do you know how to make it?”

“I'll ask Aunt Popi. Don't be late, okay?

I'll be expecting you.”

“Don't worry. I love lamb with egg and lemon sauce.”

Fotis got up early on Sunday morning.

He tidied the house, made his bed, put two pink roses, which he had stolen from the garden next door, into a glass, cooked the lamb, covered it so as to keep it warm, and waited.

“Any minute now there will be a knock on the door. It can't be otherwise, she promised.

Perhaps she overslept. Perhaps something happened. Perhaps she got the streets mixed up. That must be it. She'll show up any minute now. There … there will be a knock on the door just now,” he thought.

But the only knock was his heart, beating against his chest so hard it almost broke.

Τη συνάντησε τη Μαρουσώ ο Φώτης την ώρα που γύριζε από τ' αγγλικά της. Ήτανε Σαββατόβραδο. «Έλα αύριο να δεις το σπίτι μου. Θα σου μαγειρέψω κι ένα φαγητό που θα σ' αρέσει. Θα 'ρθεις;». «Αμέ! Θα 'ρθω. Θα μου μαγειρέψεις αλήθεια;». «Πες μου τι θέλεις». «Θέλω … Τι θέλω; Θα σου βάλω ένα δύσκολο. Αρνάκι αυγολέμονο. Ξέρεις;». «Θα πάω να ρωτήσω τη Θεία Πόπη. Μην αργήσεις. Έτσι; Σε περιμένω». «Μην ανησυχείς. Τρελαίνομαι για το αρνάκι αυγολέμονο». Σηκώθηκε την Κυριακή ο Φώτης πρωί πρωί, συγύρισε, έστρωσε το κρεβάτι, έβαλε στο ποτήρι δυο ροζ τριαντάφυλλα που είχε κλέψει από το διπλανό κήπο, μαγείρεψε το αρνάκι, το σκέπασε να μην κρυώσει και περίμενε. «Όπου να 'ναι θα χτυπήσει η πόρτα. Δεν μπορεί, αφού το υποσχέθηκε. Μήπως την πήρε ο ύπνος; Μήπως της έτυχε καμιά αναποδιά; Μήπως μπέρδεψε το δρόμο; Αυτό θα είναι! Όπου να 'ναι θα φανεί. Να … τώρα θα χτυπήσει η πόρτα», συλλογιζόταν. Μα χτυπούσε μόνο η καρδιά του, δυνατά. Και κόντευε να σπάσει.

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“She will show up … she promised. She loves lamb with egg and lemon sauce. There.

Any minute now there will be a knock at the door. That's her! Listen,” his heart was saying.

Footsteps … “That's her. She's coming …”

Nothing!

Again footsteps. “Now that is her at last!”

Nothing!

And night fell …

And she didn't show up.

The night leaned against the glass with the pink roses in it, and they withered.

It was such an icy cold night that the dreams froze over. Froze over and, like worms, shivered in the corners of the bedroom.

Around dawn, he was seized by a stomach ache and started throwing up.

“Perhaps something bad happened to her,” he thought. “That's definitely it. Something must have happened to her.”

And then there was also that covered pot on the gas stove with the lamb and the egg and lemon sauce in it.

And the two plates on the little fly wood table with the blue surface.

And the silence …

Above all, there was that silence, which had fixed its eyes on the door knob and smiled ironically.

That is what he couldn't bear. The smile of the silence!

At some point he got up like a wild dog, emptied the pot into the garbage bin, kicked the blue table over and threw the glass with the pink roses onto the mosaic floor.

“The hell with her! Damn it,” he said, slamming the door behind him.

The following day he didn't go to work.

He hid outside Maroussa's house, and waited.

He saw her wearing a yellow flowered skirt skipping down the steps. Her hair fell like a cascade of waves upon her shoulders, and she wore a carefree smile on her face.

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«Θα 'ρθει. Δεν μπορεί … Αφού το υποσχέθηκε. Τρελαίνεται για το αρνάκι αυγολέμονο. Να. Τώρα θα χτυπήσει η πόρτα. Αυτή είναι! Άκου», έλεγε στην καρδιά τον. Βήματα … «Αυτή είναι. Έρχεται …». Τίποτα! Πάλι βήματα. «Τώρα είν' αυτή. Επιτέλους!». Τίποτα! Και βράδιασε … Και δεν ήρθε. Κι έγειρε η νύχτα στο ποτήρι με τα ροζ τριαντάφυλλα. Και μαράθηκε. Έκανε τόση παγωνιά εκείνο το βράδυ. Και κρύωναν πολύ τα όνειρα. Κρύωναν και ζάρωναν στις γωνιές της κάμαρας, σαν τα σκουλήκια. Εκεί γύρω στα ξημερώματα, τον έπιασε ένα πόνος στο στομάχι κι άρχισε τον εμετό. «Μπορεί να της έτυχε κάτι κακό», σκέφτηκε. «Σίγουρα αυτό είναι. Κάτι θα έπαθε». Ήταν κι αυτή η σκεπασμένη κατσαρόλα στο πετρογκάζ με το αρνάκι αυγολέμονο. Ήταν και τα δυο ρηχά πιάτα στο τραπεζάκι με τη γαλάζια φορμάικα. Ήταν και η σιωπή … Πάνω απ' όλα ήταν η σιωπή, που είχε καρφώσει τα μάτια της στο πόμολο της πόρτας και καμογελούσε ειρωνικά. Αυτό δεν άντεχε. Το χαμόγελο της σιωπής. Και σηκώθηκε μια στιγμή σαν άγριο σκυλί, άδειασε την κατσαρόλα στα σκουπίδια, κλότσησε τη γαλάζια φορμάικα και πέταξε στο μωσαϊκό το ποτήρι με τα ροζ τριαντάφυλλα. «Στο διάολο! Γαμώ το», είπε. Και βρόντηξε πίσω του την πόρτα. Την άλλη μέρα δεν πήγε στη δουλειά, κρύφτηκε και περίμενε έξω από το σπίτι της Μαρουσώς. Την είδε που φορούσε μια κίτρινη λουλουδάτη φούστα και κατέβαινε πηδών­ τας τα σκαλιά. Τα μαλλιά της χτυπούσανε σαν κύματα στους ώμους κι είχε ένα γέλιο ανέμελο στο πρόσωπό της.

His knees bent for a moment, but he found the courage to run towards her. It was too late. Maroussa had entered a small car, kissed the driver, a young man in a black leather jacket, and slammed the door loudly.

The street was filled with cascades of brown hair, yellow-flowered skirts, and black leather jackets …

He bought three packets of cigarettes and went back home.

“I like butterflies,” she had told him once in the tobacco fields. “Butterflies grace all flowers—they nest nowhere.”

“Damn it! I have to find her. I'm sure she will have some kind of an explanation to give me. I must talk to her.”

So from noon and onwards he waited again outside her house, for hours on end.

Stooping. Pale as a sheet, with pain piercing his stomach.

At last, there she was. Hips swaying, she came.

“Marousso!”

“Oh! You startled me. What are you doing here?"

“I waited for you yesterday. Why didn't you come?”

“I'm sorry, Fotis, I couldn't make it.”

“You didn't want to. Isn't that so?”

“Yes, so what. It's my business anyway.

And she tossed her hair forcefully, the way she always did.

“Get lost, you tart,” said the sun, rubbing its eyes. “You will dazzle me with your looks.”

And it hid behind a passing cloud.

Then, a green moon appeared in the sky and a yellow evening star.

And in place of the Milky Way, herds of wild, black horses appeared, foaming at the mouth, tossing their manes forcefully.

Herds of wild, black horses stepped on and crushed the heart of the noon with their shining hooves.

Λυγίσανε για μια στιγμή τα γόνατά του. Μα βρήκε το κουράγιο κι έτρεξε προς το μέρος της. Δεν πρόφτασε. Η Μαρουσώ μπήκε σ’ ένα μικρό αυτοκίνητο, έδωσε ένα φιλί στον οδηγό, ένα νεαρό με πέτσινο μαύρο σακάκι και έκλεισε δυνατά την πόρτα. Κι ο δρόμος γέμισε κύματα από καστανά μαλλιά, κίτρινες λουλουδάτες φούστες και πέτσινα μαύρα σακάκια … Αγόρασε τρία κουτιά τσιγάρα και γύρισε σπίτι του. «Μ' αρέσουν οι. πεταλούδες», του 'λεγε κάποτε στο καπνοχώραφο. «Οι πεταλούδες χαίρονται όλα τα λουλούδια, δεν κάνουν φωλιά πουθενά». «Γαμώ το! Πρέπει να τη βρω. Θα 'χει κάποια εξήγηση να μου δώσει. Πρέπει να της μιλήσω». Και περίμενε πάλι το μεσημέρι έξω από το σπίτι της, ώρες. Σκυφτός. Κίτρινος σαν το κερί, με τον πόνο να του τρυπάει το στομάχι. Επιτέλους να 'τη. Ερχόταν λικνιστή. «Μαρουσώ!». «Αχ! Τρόμαξα. Τι κάνεις εδώ;». «Σε περίμενα χθες. Γιατί δεν ήρθες,». «Με συγχωρείς, Φώτη. Δεν μπόρεσα». «Δεν ήθελες. Έτσι δεν είναι;». «Ναι. Και λοιπόν; Γούστο μου στο κάτωκάτω». Και τίναξε με δύναμη τα μαλλιά στην πλάτη της, όπως το συνήθιζε. «Άντε στο καλό σου, παλιοκόριτσο!» είπε ο ήλιος κι έτριψε τα μάτια του. Θα με τυφλώσεις. Ύστερα κρύφτηκε σ' ένα σύννεφο περαστικό. Και βγήκε ένα φεγγάρι πράσινο στον ουρανό. Κι ένας κίτρινος αποσπερίτης. Και βγήκανε στη θέση του Γαλαξία κοπάδια μαύρα άλογα, που τρέχανε αφηνια­ σμένα και τίναζαν με δύναμη τη χαίτη τους. Κοπάδια μαύρα άλογα αφηνιασ­ μένα, που πατούσανε και λιώνανε με τα γυαλιστερά τους πέταλα την καρδιά του μεσημεριού.

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“What color is sorrow?” the star asked the «Τι χρώμα έχει η λύπη;» ρώτησε τ' αστέρι cherry tree as it stumbled over the frayed tip την κερασιά καθώς παραπάτησε στο ξέφτι of a hastily passing cloud. κάποιου σύννεφου που περνούσε βιαστικά.

“Did you not hear me? I asked you what «Δεν άκουσες; Σε ρώτησα, τι χρώμα έχει η color sorrow was.” λύπη».

“It is the color the sea turns when it «Έχει το χρώμα που παίρνει η θάλασσα embraces the sun. Deep, dark blue.” την ώρα που γέρνει ο ήλιος στην αγκαλιά “What color are dreams?” της. Ένα βαθύ, άγριο μπλε».

“Dreams? Dreams are the color of dusk.” «Τι χρώμα έχουν τα όνειρα;».

“What color is joy?” «Τα όνειρα; Τα όνειρα έχουν το χρώμα “It's the color of noon, my little star.” του δειλινού».

“And loneliness?” «Τι χρώμα έχει η χαρά;».

“Loneliness is violet.” «Το χρώμα του μεσημεριού, αστεράκι “How beautiful colors are! Here's a rain- μου». bow for you to wrap around you when you're «Και η μοναξιά;». cold.” «Η μοναξιά έχει χρώμα μενεξεδί».

The star shut its eyes and leaned against «Τι όμορφα που είναι τα χρώματα! Θα the fence. It stayed there for quite a while and σου χαρίσω ένα ουράνιο τόξο να το ρίχνεις rested. επάνω σου όταν κρυώνεις».

“What about love? I forgot to ask you. Τ' αστέρι έκλεισε τα μάτια του κι What color is love?” ακούμπησε στο φράχτη. Έμεινε κάμποσο “Love is the color of God's eyes,” answered εκεί και ξεκουράστηκε. the tree. «Και η αγάπη; Ξέχασα να σε ρωτήσω, τι “And passion? What color is passion?” χρώμα έχει η αγάπη;».

“Passion is the color of the moon when it «Το χρώμα που έχουν τα μάτια του is full.” Θεού», απάντησε το δέντρο.

“Ah, so passion is the color of the moon!” «Τι χρώμα έχει ο έρωτας;». said the star. «Ο έρωτας έχει το χρώμα του φεγγαριού, And looking away into the distance, it όταν είναι πανσέληνος». wept. � «Ο έρωτας έχει το χρώμα του φεγγαριού … έτσι ε!» είπε τ' αστέρι. Κοίταξε μακριά στο κενό. Και δάκρυσε. �

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ΦωνέΣ | VOLUME I, NUMBER IIΙ

FICTION

The Antithesis of Margaret (in Eight Phases) by steve pastis

Phase One: Introduction to the Problem

Phase Five: A Further Complication:

The antithesis of Margaret had just entered the room. We all thought that Margaret had decided to leave us. In reality, she was still with us, smoking a Winston 100.

Another person, a gentleman in his late fifties, entered the room unaware of the situation.

Phase Two: A Plot Development One of the two opposite beings (Margaret or her antithesis) had begun reading Dutch poetry from a blue piece of paper. The words seemed melodic, but not being able to see who was speaking was really disturbing to us.

Phase Three: A Clarification The poetry was not the original Dutch work but rather translations of American favorites.

Phase Four: A Rude Awakening to Some of Us Margaret realized that the presence of her antithesis had canceled her from our sight.

She scampered around the room doing unpleasant things to us to let us know she was still around.

Phase Six: A Partial Resolution to the Situation Realizing that he knew none of us, the gentleman who had just entered the room smiled to us and left.

Phase Seven: The Final Resolution to Our Dilemma Margaret was saved when her antithesis left the room briefly to visit the ladies’ room.

Upon being able to see Margaret once again, we grabbed her by the arm and quickly departed.

Phase Eight: The Epilogue Margaret is currently married to a bowling alley manager in Canton, Ohio. The rest of us have gone our separate ways. ďż˝

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Nude With Socks by Peter McNeill

FICTION

Cicada's Choice

by Nitsa Olivadoti

A

nxiety continues to plague me. The image of the way my mother looked as the ship departed will be my last memory of her for whatever length of time we will be apart. She was so brave in saying goodbye that I thought it was strange. I knew my mother and could feel her holding back the flood of emotions for my benefit. I am all she has in this world. Despite her efforts, I witnessed the breakdown she had been trying so hard not to let me see.

After I entered the ship, I hurriedly made my way to the edge of the nearest deck, to the left side where I knew she was standing with my Theo (Uncle) Stathis. I wedged myself in between the crowd of people waving to their loved ones with white handkerchiefs.

They were the same white cotton cloths we twirled in circles when dancing. I would always try to get in the lead as my body pulsed to the rhythmic beat. Of course I was always singing. Everyone held hands, and wove in and out of each other, between tables and chairs, singing the most beautiful words about love, heartbreak, and the country we loved so much. I remember my mother and father dancing in the kitchen to one song in particular: “We are poor, but at least we can watch the stars together … our roof is leaking, our hearts breaking, and we are so poor, but we love each other … so you and I and this little house are all we need … with our little ones

sleeping near and the scent of basil blowing in our window …”

The depth always moved me. Music made me sad, happy, excited, anxious, and full of admiration all at once. I am Greek. Drama, love, heartache, my country, and God are ingrained in my being. Though I am leaving, Greece will never leave me. It is impossible to separate Greece from your heart once you have fallen in love with it. Some of the greatest writers, poets, and philosophers have said so. I have heard this explanation of the Greek soul, and I believe it is true: “The most painful experiences a Greek can know: to be an orphan, to be alone, to be in love, and to be far away from Greece. To be far away from Greece is the worst of all.”

As people on the ship wave their handkerchiefs, the mood is somber and nothing like a festive celebration. People cry as they call out to the ones they love. I think it is funny how everything has an opposite, even these small pieces of cloth we hold in our hands. As the handkerchiefs take on the opposite role of joy to collectors of tears and sorrow, the ship prepares to depart. The anchors are lifted. I pull out my handkerchief and wave it as hard as I can. It looks like a white flag surrendering. My surrender.

It took some time to locate my mother and Theo as I scanned the crowd. Finally, I saw them. I waved at them and excitedly jumped up and down. But suddenly, I froze.

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Like a frightened deer, I could not move a bone in my body, my eyes locked on the horrific scene below. I became paralyzed. My mother and Theo were not waving, laughing, or crying. My mother was struggling to stand. She threw one of her arms around his shoulder. He held the hand she draped over his shoulder with one hand and with the other he supported her at the waist. Her feet dangled a few inches from the ground. Her head hung low as she shook it back and forth.

I shuddered as chills ran up my spine. This image of her burned my eyes. It was too painful. Her body collapsed in anguish, and my heart broke into a thousand pieces. Seeing her like that was the moment that unglued me completely. I felt sickened from the pain of our separation. I became horrified with my decision three weeks too late. I started to scream: “Mama! Manoula-mou! (Μom! My mother!) Over here! I love you. I love you … please … over here! Please! Look up!”

“I will miss the smell of sweet jasmine and gardenia blooming on warm summer nights when soft breezes carry their perfume.”

I did not know if she heard me calling, she did not look up. My Theo helped her rest on a large rock and she buried her face in her hands. He stood with his hand on her shoulder and looked up at the ship. He waved toward it, but I could tell he did not see me.

“Theo! Theo!” I cried.

He took a seat next to my mother. I panicked. My breathing grew fast and heavy, my heart ready to come out of my chest. I tried once more to call to her as loud as I could, but the ship turned on its propellers, drowning out my voice. We started to move.

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“Mama! Mama!”

Soon the ship was out of the harbor. My mother and my Theo quickly looked like tiny specks on my homeland. I stood on the deck, stunned. My handkerchief fell from my hand, into the ocean.

I make myself relive that horrific scene over and over. I cannot stop myself from seeing it, my mother’s collapse. The last glimpse I had of her makes my heart sink. Around my heart, an invisible fist squeezes tighter and tighter with every beat. I am anxious, alone, and I feel like I might die. There is no one to catch me if my legs get weak and I faint. I must be brave. Compose yourself, Eleni, I tell myself. The wind whips my hair. Good-bye Manoula. Good-bye my Greece. I cry.

For the last three weeks, I have lived in a dream. It was a nice dream, this fairy tale in which I lived. I was happy, weightless, curious, and excited. But today, I finally woke up.

It feels like a bucket of ice water has been thrown at me, leaving me shocked and gasping in surprise, because reality is hard and at times shocking, but fantasies are wonderful and euphoric. I am not living in a fairy tale anymore. I flinch and shudder. I am wideawake. The truth is, it was my choice to leave, mine alone.

I wish my mother did not always want for me what I wanted. If so, I would not be going away from her. She would not have pressured me if I said no to George’s proposal, but she did not try to change my mind when I said yes. I look toward home as the sea widens between us. A warm, salty breeze tickles my nose and dries my tears.

I have heard the Atlantic is not as pretty, blue, or warm as the ocean in Greece. I will miss my ocean. I will miss the feeling of family, warmth, and sunshine. I will miss the smell of sweet jasmine and gardenia blooming on warm summer nights when soft breezes carry their perfume. I will miss the persistent humming of the cicadas in the treetops. My

constant singing had brought my nickname Tzitzika (Cicada) to life. I wonder about my new family in America. Will they understand me and like me? Will they be nice to me? Will they be as serious as my husband? Worry consumes me. In Greece, everyone I knew was so vibrant. Life may not have always been easy, but it was fun and full of love. Even during the war, my life was beautiful.

The late fall weather started to settle in before I left. I heard that in New England it is very cold and that winter has begun. In my mind, I am ready for summer, not snow.

I know that it will not be for many months, but I can hardly wait. I have already decided I will not like winter in my new home, but I will survive it. Cold weather and cold people have never agreed with me. I belong to the summer. But I will be brave like my mother until the warm days come back around. For the cicada, winter means death. I relate to the cicada’s pain, as I sail into a cold sea, because part of me is dying as well. � Excerpted from the novel Cicada's Choice

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The Blue Door by Sharon McNeil

FICTION

The Road Trip by apollo papafrangou

The Peloponnese region of Greece resembles a hand with three splayed fingers, the grasp of a giant reaching into the ocean: fitting since this section of land holds such prominence in the scope of world history.

Traces of many ancient sites scatter along its rugged flesh; birthplace to a plethora of Grecian traditions and heroes, both mythical and real. To the east, at the edge of what could be viewed as the pinkie of this hand, lies the village from which Tasso hails. Further up is the site of the ancient theater of Epidavros, still home to some of the best natural acoustics in the world. Further on is the city of Nafplio, the country’s first modern capital. A bit to the west is the site of Mycenaeas, the ancient city-state belonging to king Agamemnon.

It seems to Angelo, examining the map spread out upon his thighs, that the distance separating all these places is too great to traverse in a single day, but his father assures him that’s not the case. According to Tasso, a journey around the entire peninsula can be accomplished in a few days. This trip won’t even require traveling half that distance.

Angelo sits on the edge of his bed as morning sun filters through the curtains.

He’d awakened about five minutes before, surprised to see that his father hadn’t left for work, instead standing over him with the map in hand. Today is the day, apparently, though Tasso has given no previous hint. But,

this is Greece, Angelo thinks, land of spontaneous action regardless of any consequences, and let the feathers fall where they may.

Today is also the day, Angelo seems certain, when he will confront his father about their past troubles and try to come to some understanding, never mind the consequences.

“If you want to eat something before we go, better hurry,” Tasso says, coming into the room again gleaming from a shower.

Angelo thinks of a shower, too, but his father looks impatient. To be with him, he wonders—despite what he’d said on that evening with Xandria—or just to get this over with, like a session of quality time prescribed by conscience if not by a court? “It’s all right. I can wait.”

Soon they are on the road, embarked upon the odyssey. Pink Floyd’s Dark Side of the Moon plays on the stereo. Good driving music though it is, the album would enhance the experience more if the traffic flowed as smoothly as the soundtrack; if the dri­ vers sharing the morning highway weren’t Greek drivers who stomp their brakes and smash the gas, swerve among the two lanes like demolition derbyists hungry for collisions—or at least for the thrill of narrowly avoiding them.

Angelo gradually adjusts to the spastic rhythm of the ride. Momentum lurches him forward and then shoves him back against the seat with bobble-head effects. Not that

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Tasso seems to be having any trouble navi- ing doom. But the baker only shrugs and says, “Ellada has weathered countless wars, countgating this chaos.

Trash lines the roadside; odd that Angelo less catastrophes. This, too, she will weather hadn’t noticed it, or at least this much of in time.”

And probably litter, too, thinks Angelo. it, on the way from Athens. The landscape Back in the car, the bread is fresh and is tarnished by discarded food containers, paper goods and random plastic. Aluminum warm and immediately staves their hunger, cans glare in the sun, scattered in the dry while the lemonadas counteract the rapidly yellow grass and around the bases of byway increasing heat. Angelo is just finishing trees like garish rotting fruit. Angelo knows his share as they come to their first stop on that outside the cities recycling and other this tour: Epidavros. At the ancient theater, methods of trash reduction have been slow Angelo stands center stage. Nothing more to be accepted by people who for many cen- than a wide round of earth back-dropped by a cluster of trees and facing a towering turies had little post-consumer waste.

A while later, Tasso pulls off the main half circle of thousand-plus-year-old stadium seating. Yet he seems to feel it vibrate with road and drives into a small village, no more than a dozen little houses, a church, a kaf- the collective breaths of unseen spirits.

But, the living are not absent here: forty enion, and a bakery. They stop at the bakery, and Tasso buys loaves of olive bread and or so tourists speak a variety of languages as cold bottles of lemonada from the proprietor. if reenacting the Tower of Babble while camAngelo asks him about the economic crisis, eras snap and whir in a chorus of captured expecting the man to cringe, or yammer out moments. Angelo looks around for his father a panicked rant about some quickly impend- and finally spots him on one of the weath-

Porta by Sharon McNeil

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ΦωνέΣ | VOLUME I, NUMBER IIΙ

ered stone slabs of the bleachers. Angelo breathes deeply and listens, but if there are any birds about their songs are drowned by the chattering tourists. Surely he will recognize, or surely there with be a sign, when the time has come—as The Walrus said—to talk of many things.

Back in the car and they reach Nafplio to take a walk through the city’s Old Town.

The Venetian influence is readily apparent in the architecture, which utilizes dramatic archways and beautiful wrought-iron balconies. They trek to the harbor with its view of Bourzi castle rising from the middle of the ocean like a relic of Atlantis. Then they move on to the castle of Palamidi, a giant fortress accessible via more than a thousand steps ascending the steep mountainside.

Angelo puts a hand to his brow, shading his eyes against the sun, and gazes up at the structure high above the city. He is overcome by a sudden urge to be up there, almost as if something waits for him—the sign he’s half expecting? The sign he feels he deserves?

“Let’s give it a shot, Dad,” he says, finger pointed skyward.

Tasso thoughtfully eyes the castle. “That’s quite a climb, Angelo. I’ve done it before, but it’s not easy.”

“I want to, Dad.” “You sure? In this heat?”

“Yes.” “Okay. After you.”

They begin the ascent, and despite his need or his hope, it isn’t long before Angelo feels the burn in his leg muscles. Ropes of fire coil along his calves and up the backs of his thighs. He keeps his gaze on the ancient steps, watching his feet rise again and again.

The surface is slippery in places where the stone has been worn as smooth as glass by the tread of centuries of feet shod in everything from sandals to combat boots and Nikes. He slips a few times, but Tasso is right behind him to prevent a fall. Higher

and higher they climb. The reward upon reaching the castle is a mighty view of the entire city and the sparkling ocean beyond.

No wonder royalty had chosen to fortify their kingdom at this particular spot where surroundings can be viewed from all sides, and any attack from even the most formidable foe would be anticipated and promptly thwarted.

“The Venetians built this place. Really something, isn’t it?” Tasso says, resting a palm on Angelo’s shoulder and, surprisingly, puffing a bit.

Angelo nods, his own chest heaving from the exertion. The air up here is fresh and seascented, feeling clean as if it were new and first to be breathed by gods. He watches a flock of seagulls collect at the very crest of the castle.

“Dad?” “Yes?” But Angelo suddenly feels dizzy, wavers dangerously close to the cliff’s sheer edge. His father grabs his arm. “Careful, Angelo, this isn’t America where they put rails around everything.”

“Yeah, I should’ve remembered that.”

Tasso studies him with concern. “Are you all right?”

“Yeah, I’m fine. Guess it was just the climb.” Angelo smiles a little. “Even being here all this time I’m not in as good a shape as you.”

Tasso laughs. “I’m wearier than I may look, Angelo. Let’s rest awhile. What were you about to ask me?”

“I … forgot.”

They stay up here for another twenty minutes or so in silence, admiring the view.

Finally, they begin the descent. Angelo glances back once, up to that clear quiet place in the sky, the very place he would have imagined choosing to make his demand.

Back on human soil again, immersed in twenty-first century air, they stop at a small

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It takes a moment for Angelo to realize kiosk to buy sodas before driving on. A while later they stand under the Lion Gates that he’s being asked that question. He turns at Mycenaes. The lions are carved into the to see a family of four—Mom, Dad, Buddy rock in hind-legged stances, heads lifted and Sis—obviously American in their Old skyward as though in mid-roar; two jun- Navy gear and bright fanny packs.

“Yeah,” he says a little gruffly, annoyed by gle kings barring savage teeth over a single this inane interruption. crown.

The father holds out a digital camera.

Interesting though that is, it’s not an especially remarkable place. The air is just “Would you take our picture in front of the air. Not much different from Oakland breeze gate?”

Again the crow makes a mocking sound, on a hot summer day. The only bird in sight is a single scruffy crow pecking at bits of and Angelo feels another flash of anger. This obviously isn’t the right place. Or the right time. And, like everything else in his life, he’s seemingly fucked this up, too.

“Unfair that the truth when He takes the camera and forces a smile. he’s heard it should be so Feeling like the cynical crow, who must have seen this thousands of times, he waits for the simple, that his father wasn’t family to pose, carefully sights through the a better man.” viewfinder—this is important to them—and snaps a picture.

“Thank you very much,” the mother says, tourist litter. It seems indifferent to Angelo, slowly and distinctly, and then they are gone, like a homeless gypsy child who sees no hope probably to purchase refrigerator magnets shaped like the Parthenon. in begging. Yet suddenly Angelo asks: “Can you answer my question?” Tasso “Dad, why did you leave?”

Tasso looks puzzled. “I’ve been right here asks abruptly.

“What?” the whole time.”

“Why are you asking this now?”

“No. I mean, why did you leave the counAngelo glances at the crow. Guess it’s try … America … after you and Mom split as good a time as any. “We need to talk up?”

The crow gives a caw, which sounds more about this, Dad. I need to talk about this.

Don’t tell me you never think about the way derisive than encouraging.

Tasso steps back a pace as if trying to things ended between you and Mom … and size up Angelo, the sun directly behind him between us.”

Tasso looks puzzled again, genuinely so he morphs into a dark silhouette against a puzzled and not just stalling to think of an backdrop of luminous gold.

Strangely, the crow’s mocking croak answer. After a time he says, “I thought we’d seems to give Angelo strength, or maybe just grown beyond it. Moved on with our lives fires his anger. “Can’t you say something? and put it behind us.”

Angelo frowns. “You obviously have. But Anything?”

“I didn’t just leave,” Tasso finally responds. that’s no surprise, it would’ve been easy for “And you know that. Where is this coming you.”

“Easy? Why would you think …?” Now from all the sudden?”

Tasso looks angry, though just for a moment, “Excuse me, do you speak English?”

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“You are not disappointed in me? Or then he spreads his palms. “What else could I have done, Angelo? In the States, aside angry?”

“No, Dad. Not anymore. … Did I ever have from you and your mother, I was practically any right to be?” alone.”

Tasso regards the crow again, who has Angelo starts to speak, but Tasso holds up a hand. “The Greek Community, you are gone back to scavenging trash. “Of course about to say? Just because there is one, such you did. But it is you who must decide if you as there is where we lived, does not mean I want to hold on to that anger, to carry it felt I belonged to it. And when I moved out with you for life. As we grow older, Angelo— of our house, I was really alone, so what was or maybe I should say mature—we realize I to do?” He eyes the crow as if it might be that those who should never let us down an eavesdropper, a witness to an admission probably will in one way or another. But of something that really should have been that does not mean they still don’t love you. private. “I waited until you were almost It only means …”

Angelo nods. “That no one is perfect. eighteen, until you were on the verge of becoming a man. Then it was time. Not to And sometimes maybe that’s your own fault get away from you, but to get back to myself. for expecting perfection. Comic book heroes To again be the man I really am in a place who have no faults.”

Tasso smiles. “Even Greek heroes were where I really belong. In a place where I’m not alone.” His earnest eyes hold Angelo’s. never perfect. Nor were their gods.”

Angelo smiles now. “Can I ask you “I’m sorry if it seems like I abandoned you.

Truly I am. I kept in touch as much as I could another question?”

“That’s a question already.” through the years, didn’t I?” “Deja vu. Is Xandria really the first “Yes,” Angelo admits.

“And still, I’m sorry. That things didn’t woman you’ve been with in a while?”

“Who told you that?” work out between me and your mother. That “My cousins.” sometimes I took out my anger on you. That “So typically Greek. And yes.”

I wasn’t a better man than I am. What more “I guess your kamaki days really are can I say?”

Angelo studies the scruffy old crow, behind you then.”

Tasso laughs. “The past is behind us all. which now appears to study him back through eyes like molten gold. This sud- Besides, I told you that I was never really denly seems very anticlimactic after all these much of a—” But Angelo cuts him off with, “You’re years of building up. Unfair that the truth when he’s heard it should be so simple, that not disappointed in me anymore?”

“Anymore? Angelo, I was never disaphis father wasn’t a better man. But, no, not simply a better man, but the perfect man pointed in you. If sometimes I was hard on that Angelo always thought he should be. you it wasn’t because I was trying to make Whom Angelo thought he deserved. Why? you meet my expectations. I only tried to Because his own life wasn’t perfect? Wasn’t show that you weren’t as …” Tasso seems to even average because of how he’d been born consider word choices, and Angelo makes it easy for him. imperfect?

“Handicapped?”

There seems a million things he could “I suppose that must do,” Tasso agrees. say—perhaps a million things he should say—but he finally just says, “Thanks, Dad.” “As handicapped as you thought you were.”

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“As in, be all you can be?”

Tasso does not seem to get reference, yet he clearly understands the meaning. “Yes, Angelo, all you can be if you want to be it.”

The crow takes wing and circles, seeming to perform aerobatics only to show that it can, cawing down at Angelo, who simply ignores it.

His father puts a hand on his shoulder.

“Time to go home, son. Are you hungry? We didn’t have lunch. And by the time we get home, Voula and Elias will have already

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eaten. There’s a good souvlaki place just up the road.”

“Oh. I’m okay, Dad. … Unless you want to stop?”

“What about something to drink? Are you thirsty?”

Angelo is about to say no; he’s tired and just wants to get home. But then he reconsiders. “Sure, Dad. And a little souvlaki sounds good.” � Excerpted from the novel Wings of Wax

FICTION

Crossings by belica antonia kubareli

N

ine months she went up and down the river Lune, from Lancaster to Preston on foot. Every now and then she bent over the waters, filled her mug, and drank. She started at spring with the ducks. She’d walk on the banks, searching. In summertime, she would swim naked. In winter, she tried to walk on the ice but fell.

For nine months, she checked the waters and the banks, drinking from her mug. She was mumbling: “What’s the use? I kept my promise and scattered you in the river. You

believed everything returns; I didn’t. I wanted a stone to kneel in front of you. What’s the use of this water? I am looking for a gray line of your ashes, and I know that with time, it is fading. But I will come again and again, everyday, until I drink the whole river.

And then she got arrested for drinking pollution. “For your safety, Madame,” they said, “You are not allowed to drink.”

“Death is what I drink,” she replied, “death.” �

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CREATIVE NON-FICTION

Greek Lessons, Turkish Diet Pills, and Independence

by DENA KOUREMETIS

G

rades were becoming a nail-biter for Mrs. Giorgiou strolled around the room and me, even on a pass-fail program at my randomly pointed to students, who were then Athens-based American college. I did well supposed to count off. When we were up to in courses I liked and hoped for miracles to the number forty, she looked at Lydia.

“She-REN-deh,” Lydia managed, soundtake place for others that perennially eluded my interest; I was a slacker when it came ing as if she were a southerner waving a to the tough stuff, and I knew it. Freedom white flag.

“Open your mouth, please,” said Mrs. Papwas spoiling me, permitting me to take full advantage by employing my now well-honed pas. “It’s ‘sah-RAHN-dah.’”

Again, Lydia spoke through her teeth. management-by-fear-of-disaster reflexes.

Thankfully, Modern Greek was one “Seh-REN-deh.”

“Lydia, can’t you hear the difference? Say course I would have no trouble passing even though our instructor, Mrs. Giorgiou, ‘SAH,’ with your mouth open as if you were appeared noticeably less tolerant of hyphen- in the dentist’s chair.”

“SAH,” said Lydia. ated Greeks than those she considered to “Now say ‘RAH.’ Isn’t that what Amerihave had no exposure to the language while cans say at football games?” growing up.

“RAH,” Lydia said.

“How can you not know this word?” she “Good. Now say ‘NDAH,’” and Lydia asked a half-Greek Nevada boy named Bob one day in class. “Did your parents not speak obliged.

“Put it all together,” Mrs. Georgiou a word of Greek at home?” Bob sheepishly responded, admitting that he only heard it ordered.

“SAH-RAH-NDAH,” said Lydia, as spoken occasionally at church and never understood a word except at Easter time, her mouth opened wide. The entire class when he could remember to say, “Hree- applauded as if a blind person had just received vision. We could feel her pain.

STOHS Ah-NEHS-tee.” (Christ has risen).

When I got in trouble with tenses and Mrs. Giorgiou also came down hard on any Greek-Americans demonstrating poor pro- possessives, I enlisted the mentorship of nunciation of her native tongue. Lydia from native speakers at my dorm, several of whom Southern California had a tough time with helped me prepare for exams and corrected Greek vowel sounds. Teaching us our numbers, my homework assignments in exchange for

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Whereas just a few hours before I felt as if my giving them private guitar concerts. I had suddenly discovered the beauty of bartering. I could pass the exam blindfolded, the definiOn the flip side, biology was my nemesis. tions I had seemingly cemented so indelibly in Synapses in my brain simply did not fire my head had now disappeared like a fig leaf from the moment I entered the classroom off a statue’s private parts. I sat and marked until the moment I left. Try as I could to my answers as best I could. Then I crawled remember genus names, bodily systems, and back to my bed to sleep the rest of the day.

The next morning, grades were posted for the steps of photosynthesis, I bombed on tests. This was the only course I might not all to see. Searching the list, my eyes rested pass, and it terrified me. I could not imagine on a C-minus next to my name. To the surconfronting my parents with a failure when prise of the students crowded around me checking out their A and B grades, I let out all I needed was a C to receive credit.

The night before a huge biology midterm, a whoop of joy. I knew I was in the clear for I sat with some other students, memorizing credits, and I was eternally grateful.

Small miracles can and do occur, but as much of this foreign scientific language as my brain could hold. I was good at memoriz- perhaps they are not really miracles at all if ing, but if a multiple choice answer on the you’ve risked too much to see them happen. exam was worded differently than what I had From then on, I contended that staying up committed to rote memory, I knew I’d be lost. all night to study would reap me no greater Just before midnight I was ready to give rewards than studying for a few hours and up when Andrea asked me if I wanted to stay taking my chances, getting a decent night’s up all night to study. “Well yeah, but I know sleep, and steering clear of Turkish diet pills I can’t,” I offered, as my eyes began to go for the remainder of the term. half-mast. She then produced some tiny pills, assuring me they were a form of No-Doze. A taste of being on my own …

“Really? I’ve never taken a No-Doze before.

I’ll try it.”

Despite my thrill at having earned my The pills worked, but after a while, the college credits, by Easter time, I felt I was effects had my heart pounding and my in a bit of a vacuum. The dorm was about to mouth dry. “Are you sure these are just No- close for spring break, and I had few plans Doze?” I asked Andrea. because I’d never looked that far ahead. For “Well okay—they’re Turkish diet pills— the few days around Easter, I would accomsame thing,” she responded. I tried to pany Marietta and Andrea to Andrea’s banish thoughts of having been poisoned and relatives’ house in Sparta, where we would pressed on. see an entire town stay up all night on Easter By the time the sun rose around six eve, and I would take communion dressed in o’clock, I felt invincible, citing definitions, blue jeans. I considered spending this importhrowing around scientific terms, and spout- tant Orthodox holiday with my own relatives, ing out processes. By seven o’clock, however, but I felt a bit uptight around them, always I began to crash. The test was at nine o’clock trying to make a good impression so as not and suddenly I could not stay awake. Some- to embarrass my parents six thousand miles one roused me by eight thirty, and in my away. Guilt over having neglected them most sleep-drugged state, I zombie-walked across of the year didn’t help. the athletic field to take my midterm, the When we returned, the bulk of the spring only one I had scheduled that day. holiday remained. Some girls were going 94

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home for a week, other students had the funds to travel, and some would stay with local relatives. Not considering any of those alternatives as options, I approached Jesse, another student, with the idea of caretaking his apartment while he was away. After checking with his roommate, he agreed, but asked that I clean the place up a bit in exchange for the freeloading privilege.

Jesse’s place was in a quaint little neighborhood not far from school. A tiny grocery store sat below it, and bus lines ran in every direction. As I put down my small suitcase, I looked around the apartment for anything interesting, since there was no television, there were few books, and I knew no one in the neighborhood. He and his roommate were not terribly messy guys, but cleanliness had escaped them. I compared the state of their kitchen and bathroom to the dorm room I once shared with Suzie, who sat on her bed holding a magnifying mirror while spilling makeup on white sheets. The apartment was neglected and begging for some TLC. In the living area, my curious eyes rested on the reel-to-reel tape recorder Jesse had mentioned. Flipping it on, songs of the ‘70s and late ‘60s began to fill the rooms; the sounds of hip American musical artists carried me back home. Jesse had explained that it was easy to have music stores in downtown Athens record a collection of American LPs all on one tape instead of purchasing the vinyl. This selection got me up-to-date with all the music I had missed since I’d left the states and in some respects before then, since my father refused to let me collect much of the current pop and rock music, dubbing most of it “garbage.”

Soon I began dusting to Tears of a Clown, mopping to Let It Be, sweeping to Ain’t No Sunshine When She’s Gone, and scrubbing to I Feel the Earth Move under My Feet. There must have been fifty songs on the tape that would become committed to memory without

the aid of Turkish diet pills. The more lyrics I learned, the cleaner Jesse’s place became, and my spirits began to improve.

Eight months of non-stop socializing had suddenly made me appreciate my own company. I was in bliss. I had never experienced this kind of independence; purchasing and cooking my food, staying alone at night, and pretending to have my own digs, even for a short time. During the evenings, I would wander over to a nearby open-air theater to watch a badly dubbed movie. Once I even visited Thea Vasiliki and Theo Stathi, who thought me very bold to be staying on my own. I had time to reflect. No voices were on hand to distract me, and my mind began to race with possibilities of feeling like this again when I finished college and could get out from under my parents’ watchful eye for the duration—a full two years away. My year in Greece was nearly over, but it felt as if I were living in an entirely new reality.

Having viewed myself as a forgotten entity at the beginning of spring break, I felt wonderfully renewed by the time it ended. I profusely thanked my friend, handing him his keys on the day before classes resumed. Arriving back at the dorm, I listened as the girls excitedly recounted the events of their vacations. Some had new boyfriends, others talked of their mother’s home cooking, and the rest had wearied of travel and were glad to be back.

When asked what I had done with my time, I received a few curious reactions when I simply said, “Nothing,” followed by, “… and it was wonderful.”

The school year not only introduced me to the company and support of other women, it permitted me to get to know men as friends as well. “Little Pete,” a bespectacled boy from Canada, became one of my buddies.

During the last few months of school, Pete and I hung out, exchanging our impressions of life in Greece from our limited perspectives, cracking up at one another’s jokes.

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Just before school ended, we hopped a ferry to Hydra, an island that permits no motorized vehicles. The lack of buzz-bikes and cars made it almost idyllic, as the locals use handcarts, horses, and donkeys to move things and people around. Pete and I found a deserted, somewhat rocky beach, where we camped out in sleeping bags and woke up the next morning riddled with sand flea bites. We spent the next day permitting the salt water and sun to heal our wounds, and after enjoying three-drachma (about 15 cents) gyro sandwiches at a nearby restaurant, we returned home to prepare for finals.

Pete was a good conversationalist, had a great sense of humor, and was an attentive listener. It wasn’t the same as having a girlfriend, and it wasn’t love-chemistry.

The last boy of my school year was a dark-haired, mustachioed, guitar-strumming Iowa-born Greek-American lad named Nicky with a last name few would even attempt. He was sweet, attentive, and introspective, and we became closer as the school year ended but knew we would soon part.

Unbeknownst to me, I had fallen into the trap young women even now find themselves ensnared by: bad boys were fascinating, and nice guys always seemed to finish last. It was the bad boys who held my attention. They were skilled at verbal boxing and one-liners, moving with great ease and knowing what they wanted. Simple, sweet guys like little Pete or Nicky, perhaps capable of growing with someone, never stood a chance, and I wasn’t able to realize how special they were until much later in life.

As each passing week got us closer to summer, I liked to think that the band of coeds atop St. Friday hill at the tiny concrete

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college was a bit sad, like I was, perhaps because they were beginning to realize our time together was now limited by only weeks and days instead of entire semesters. I doubt most of them attached as much importance to it, however.

Early summer meant long, early Saturday or Sunday bus rides to the sun-kissed beaches of Glyfada, situated just outside Athens beyond the airport. My friends and I frequented a private pay-beach; a perfectly groomed resort for which we were willing to put out what was left of our parents’ monthly allowances rather than use the free public beaches nearby. The sands were powdery white, the waters crystal blue and shallow for hundreds of wading yards. The music from the bandstand was palatable, the snack bar was full of goodies, and the beach chairs were plentiful. There were even classy little private cabanas in which to change into and out of our beachwear.

As we indulged ourselves during our waning school year days in the sun, my friends and I spoke of our plans while turning to bake each side evenly. Andrea would return to Boston. Debi had applied to school in Texas to pursue a language degree. Marietta, the youngest among us, would return to New Zealand to attend university there. And even though I had never discussed with my parents the idea of my staying on, I wanted to in the worst way. I could not wrap my head around the idea of going from my current existence back to the heart of the American Midwest. I was not, however, optimistic about my prospects. � Excerpted from the eBook Climbing St. Friday

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STAR-SPANGLED BANNER

By Constance M. Constant

“I

f we’re still in Greece in June when the lively nighttime Athens, Mrs. Ethel pointed school year ends, you’ll come join us,” out the tiny window for me to catch my first sight of the illuminated Parthenon. On terra my parents promised fifteen-year-old me when they left Chicago that April to cel- firma again, I enjoyed a jubilant reunion ebrate Pascha (Easter) in Greece. Neither with my parents.

My ears continued buzzing with the believed in missing school for travel; it just wasn’t an option. Still, they wanted me to see residual sound of whirring propellers the the “old country,” as my older siblings had next day as my father led Mama and me up to the Acropolis. The truth was that I had before I was born.

My sister and brother were blessed to not spent much time with Papa during my meet the grandparents I would never know childhood. He worked long, hard hours, first when they traveled to Greece with my par- at the Austin Lunch, his restaurant on Chients prior to the outbreak of WWII. It had cago’s West Side, and in later years, at the been my parents’ first visit to their patrida family magazi, a Northwest Side liquor store (“fatherland”) since Papa’s emigration in and bar. When his business responsibilities were thousands of miles away, our 1955 1907, and Mama’s in 1921.

Returning in 1955, my parents left my Greek travels finally afforded us the special adult siblings behind to run “the store” and gift of time together.

My father had always been a history to oversee me as I finished my sophomore year of high school. In May, a letter from “buff,” especially of the ancient Greek variPapa arrived, instructing my sister to make ety. His patrons took pleasure in his habit arrangements for me to fly to Athens in the of cheerfully chatting with them while tendcompany of two reliable family acquaint- ing bar and connecting the day’s news to ances. When the Constellation, a propeller history. When the magazi closed after midairplane, lifted off for Europe in mid-June, night, he relaxed at home in his brown easy I was in the “good hands” of Mr. Paul, chair by reading Greek authors, translated into English. Our bookcase featured Homer, Mrs. Ethel, and Trans World Airlines.

My chaperones were caring companions Herodotus, Thucydides, Greek dramatists, on the direct flight from Chicago that took Plato, and Aristotle, along with American more than 24 hours to reach Athens. Gener- history books about Washington, Jefferating extra excitement were re-fueling stops: son, and Lincoln. My personal contact with Gander, Newfoundland; Shannon, Ireland; Papa’s library occurred weekly. I dusted the Paris; Geneva; Milan; and Rome. Minutes hardbacks during my regular Saturday mornbefore the enormous plane touched down in ing house-cleaning stints while I listened, 2015 | VOICES

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engrossed, to Grand Central Station, a mod- father trailed behind, soaking in as much of ern radio program. Quite familiar with the the ancient world as possible. Then suddenly, his full head of white hair and animated covers, I still had not read my father’s books.

Papa’s profound knowledge of Greek his- hazel eyes, enlarged by eyeglass lenses (Papa tory shined when we climbed the Acropolis resembled Harry Truman), appeared below (in those days, visitors could still walk inside our open bus window. “Come down off the the Parthenon), took in Euripides’s play, bus and follow me, Connie. It’s Agamem“Hecuba,” at the ancient theater of Epidaurus non’s tomb!”

Following his quick steps to take in the (Academy Award recipient Katina Paxinou site before bus departure time, we breathplayed the title role), and walked over the ruins of mysterious Mycenae and celebrated lessly arrived at the darkened “beehive” tomb.

Olympia. He proudly introduced me to my “Look!” he said. “A marvel of ancient engiGreek roots by explaining the significance of neering! They say the great Agamemnon was what we were seeing, in a way I could both buried here.” My father was as thrilled as a understand and enjoy. Papa had started kid meeting a baseball hero; better yet, he life in America as a poor, thirteen-year-old wanted to share his excitement with me.

Surely my parents’ hometowns were on shoeshine boy who, with dictionary in hand, taught himself English by reading the daily our itinerary: Mama’s Alea in Tegea, southnewspaper—with no chance of going to col- east of Tripolis; and Papa’s Mercovouni, lege. Yet, my mother and I agreed that he northwest of the city. But my father didn’t know how his youngest daughter, born and would have been a great history professor.

At the end of our Mycenae excursion, raised in modern Chicago, would take to Mama and I boarded the tour bus while my his somewhat primeval village. So, riding

Crepuscular Series Landscape #7 by Angelica Sotiriou

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through other hamlets at the start of our Arcadia like a glorious cathedral dome, vilGreek travels, he worked some psychology lagers hustled at their tasks in the dry heat, on me. He’d say, “See this village, Connie? fearing an unexpected summer cloudburst —Mine’s not as good as this one.” Papa was would disastrously arrive to ruin an entire preparing me for culture shock: my first year’s crop of precious wheat.

It was an activity of biblical proporglimpse of a place he loved—yet one with no running water, electricity, bathrooms, tion. Every woman on the threshing floor or shiny kitchens. And it worked: when I was attired in an almost floor-length, higharrived in his Mercovouni, I found it better necked dress with long sleeves. Extra-large, black or bright yellow cotton scarves covered than expected, even picturesque.

We visited his village several times before female heads, faces, and necks, with only eyes we returned to the U.S. at the end of July. My exposed, to protect them from the mighty sun aged grandparents had sadly passed away and relentless dust. With no mechanized farm before 1950; “Grandpa’s house” belonged to machinery in sight, four blindfolded horses, Papa’s younger brother and his large family. each tethered to a post, traveled around and We celebrated my father’s name day together around four individual circular paths genin that Mercovouni homestead on the last erously strewn with hand-harvested wheat. day of June: the feast of the Holy Apostles. Each horse pulled a close-to-the-ground, Known as “Paul” in America, Papa’s baptis- wooden platform constructed with multiple metal runners underneath, somewhat like a mal name was “Apostolos.”

The exquisite, cerulean sky was as clear sled. Farmers controlled their horses’ reins as a Waterford goblet on June 30. The by riding atop the platforms. The simple conbrawny Greek sun had parched the Arcadian traptions forced wheat kernels to pull away foothills circling Mercovouni—its hillsides from hay stalks by applying pressure to the strewn wheat. radiated in brilliant amber. Entering the Close by the circling horses, women and village from Tripolis by taxi, we passed the church of St. Demetrios Neomartyros on the children worked at continuously tossing right side of the road, and then the one-story cut wheat up into the air with long-handled village school on our left. But further on, we pitchforks. As the grain rained back onto the unexpectedly drove from crystal clarity into ground, heavier wheat kernels fell into place a surreal cloud; it mysteriously hung in the near their feet, while the breeze blew lighter air at ground level, like yellow smog. The cab straw into colossal, yellow piles, next to driver was not surprised. “It’s threshing sea- the golden grain. The English word for this process is “winnowing.” No doubt, the idenson,” he explained.

“Of course,” Papa said. “This is the aloni— tical scene had been re-playing at the start of summer in hamlets all over Greece—for village threshing floor.”

The large, level field at village center was millennia. Years later, Mercovouniotes modteeming with farmers. Women, men, children, ernized; companies with threshing machines and their horses energetically toiled inside were hired to do the vital work, and the aloni the yellow cloud, feverishly employing nature was turned into a park.

We spent the entire day in Papa’s village. and sweaty, hard labor to separate wheat kernels from chaff. The men had covered their After a family name day dinner, attended by mouths and noses with handkerchiefs, like more people than I ever imagined we could be cowboys, to avoid breathing in the churning related to, Papa’s old boyhood friends arrived powder. Even as a cloudless, blue sky covered in the early evening to wish him “hronia polla”

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(“many years”). The women of our family graciously offered trays of vysino (sweetened sour cherry preserves), thick Greek coffee, and homemade retsina wine to post-dinner visitors. Kerosene lamps were lit after sunset, and the women, including Mama, began washing dishes outside in the courtyard with water procured from one of the village wells. By then, the older men had stationed themselves around the dining table; tousled white heads and craggy, mustached faces dimly revealed themselves in the glow of sparsely burning oil. And, in time, the lively old guys began singing together, a cappella, while sipping retsina from glasses without stems. Papa told me the songs dated back to the Greek revolution. And that’s when my cousins invited me to go outside—to hang out together.

The most extraordinary night sky I had ever seen was illuminating the outdoors. The village street was better lit than the home’s interior. An immense full moon glowed brilliantly while a group of us chatted together under an unending spread of concentrated, white stars that helped me comprehend the Milky Way. One curious village teenager asked me, “Do you have a moon in America?”

“Yes,” I answered, politely. “In fact, it’s the same moon that you have here.” But before I could inquire as to why he asked the question, which puzzled me, I heard my father calling for me to come into the house again.

Returning to the courtyard, I learned why Papa had summoned me. “I want you to sing the Star-Spangled Banner,” he said.

“Star-Spangled Banner?? Why?” I asked incredulously. “Me? Sing alone? To people who don’t understand the words?”

“I’m going to translate,” he stated, matter of factly.

Singing a solo to people I barely knew was the last thing I wanted to do—ever. But

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saying “No” to my father about something he had set his mind to was not an option either.

With my stomach flip-flopping, I lagged behind Papa as the two of us walked into the crowded, muted living room. My dear Aunt Stamata eyed my uneasiness and sympathetically pulled up a chair for me to sit on—in the middle of the group. And lowering myself onto the straw seat of a rough, ladder-backed chair, I nervously became aware that the darkish room was full of eyes focusing on me.

As Papa finished his brief account, in Greek, of the British attack on Baltimore’s Fort McHenry during the War of 1812, I watched eerie shadows shifting in the flickering lantern glow. Daring to shyly peek at the packed room of curious Mercovouniotes, I noticed that the soft light of the kerosene flames was faintly illuminating our audience—gold teeth sparkled in the darkness.

Glancing up at the encouraging look on my father’s face, while avoiding eye contact with anyone else, I grasped his signal, took a deep breath, and let go: “Oh, say can you see …”

Embarrassed to the core, I sang softly and slowly in the crammed, shadowy room, while Papa translated each line of Francis Scott Key’s national hymn. The anthem seemed endless as I crooned it alone, but I finally and gratefully arrived at “O’er the land of the free and the home of the brave.”

Relieved, and shyly smiling at unexpected, cordial applause, I looked up and caught Papa’s satisfying grin.

The trip to Greece with my parents when I was fifteen is a warmly remembered, singular event in my life. With time for one-on-one togetherness with my parents, I enjoyed the blessed opportunity to know my father better, and it was in the “old country” that I learned that Papa, a proud Greek, was also a very proud American. �

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The Unbelievable Wedding Dress

By Lula Tamaras Ossipoff

O

n August 17, 1952, lovely Teia Tamaras was married to handsome Manuel Nuris at the Annunciation Cathedral in San Francisco, California. The elegant, candlelit wedding began with the bride gracefully walking down the aisle in her beautiful wedding dress. Little did anyone know that this dress would have an unbelievable history.

After Teia wore the dress, her sister, Lula, was married to Alexander Ossipoff on September 25, 1960, also at the Annunciation Cathedral. When looking for a wedding dress, she soon realized that her sister’s dress was much prettier than any she had seen, so Lula became the second bride to wear it. She also copied her sister’s candlelit wedding because she remembered how beautiful the ceremony had been when she was a young girl of sixteen.

After a few years, the wedding dress left America for a journey to Greece, where their cousin in Thessaloniki became the third bride to wear it. But the dress had much

more life in it, and their aunt soon told Teia and Lula that six other girls also wore the dress. You can imagine the wear and tear it took, but it was like a “Timex” watch: “It took a licking, but kept on ticking.”

In April 1984, when Lula and her family went to Greece, Lula asked her aunt about the wedding dress. Would you believe her aunt had it wrapped up as if it were ready to return home? She said, “You take it home with you, as you have two girls who someday may wear it.” So after 22 years, the incredible dress came home.

In 1989, Lula’s daughter, Alexia, was getting married. She remembered the wedding dress, so she asked her mom if she could try it on. It was unbelievable—it fit her to a tee, except for some minor alterations. Her Aunt Teia then beaded the entire dress. Alexia also wore her mom’s headpiece, which was also changed just a little.

On October 8, 1989, Alexia Ossipoff was the tenth bride to wear this beautiful dress.

Teia and Manuel Nuris (1952); Lula and Al Ossipoff (1960); Alexia and Richard Kleinekorte (1989)

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She looked radiant as she walked down the aisle to be married to Richard Kleinekorte.

This year, Teia and Manuel Nuris will have been married 63 years. They are the proud parents of Tom (Liberty) Nuris and

The Enchanted Gown A lifetime of sentimentality Filled the heart of this Hellene.

This Beauty of Maramara From a town in Asia Minor.

Aphrodite enchanted Intoxicating those that sought union.

Couples sealed through circled procession Three times for enraptured joy.

The delicate glow of the shimmering fabric …

Enveloped Teia like the classic in the Louvre.

Twas a visual that permeated Lula’s being.

This charmed quality soon to be hers.

This mesmerizing portrait …

Couldn’t be silenced.

A cousin in Thessaloniki craved the spell.

This marriage gown crossed the Pond …

Graced at the alter by six more.

It endured an Odyssey of thirty-two years …

Beckoned to return to the San Francisco Bay. Alexia …

The daughter of Lula Longed for her turn.

Her aunt added beading …

Adorned her silhouette.

Wisdom permeated the threads of this garment.

Athena embraced these tapestries of union.

These descendants of Penelope and Odysseus A deep fair weathered passage On this far away shore.

by Betty Rozakis

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Annamarie (Robert) Balian, and have five grandchildren, and a grandson-in-law.

Lula and Al Ossipoff have been married 55 years, are the proud parents of Maria (Andrew) Allen and Alexia (Richard) Kleinekorte, and have two grandchildren.

Alexia and Richard Kleinekorte have been married 26 years and are the proud parents of a daughter and a son, Anna and Christian.

Alexia and Richard were the last couple to be married in the old Annunciation Cathedral; a few days later, the great earthquake of 1989 occurred, resulting in extensive damage which forced the parish to build a small chapel, along with new offices and a gymnasium/hall, followed by the breaking of ground in 2014 for a new cathedral at the same Valencia Street location, which by the way sits in a newly revitalized South-of-theMission area of town.

Lula took the dress to a reputable cleaner to be cleaned and was told that it had to be put into “intensive care,” and would cost somewhere in the area of $200.00. Because it also needed alterations, she took the dress to a seamstress to find out what that would cost.

The seamstress told her to go to the cleaner across the street to have it cleaned before she started any work on the dress. Lula was with her sister, Teia, that day, and they took the dress across the street. This cleaner gave them an astounding quote of $15.00. Recovering from being dumbfounded, Teia said, “Go for it! Let’s take a chance.” Because the dress was made of nylon tulle and lace, it came out beautifully. Lula then went ahead with the alterations and the dress turned out “unbelievable.”

Some comments were made, such as: “Wow, they really got their money’s worth.”

But the real story is not that they saved money, but that the dress carries a proud and unbelievable history, filled with touching memories and love. �

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The Caretaker and The Matchmaker

By Irene Sardanis

O

ur 1940's tenement was located at 752 Trinity Avenue in the Bronx, a poor neighborhood with dark grey six-story buildings with dingy apartments. In the cold winters, we would huddle together in the apartment to keep warm. In the summertime, we populated the structure’s tarred roof where we tried to cool off. It was also the place we took the laundry and hung it out to dry. It was fun for me to look over the ledge and see the view of lights from the top of our building as well as peer into other apartments. I hoped to get glimpses of what happy families looked like.

My brother had enlisted in the Navy and was stationed on submarines, and my father was gone, having abandoned our sinking ship. That left women without men in our home—my mother, two sisters, and me.

We were the children of Greek immigrants. The eldest was Ti, 20, then Effie, 14 and lastly me, aged 10. I idolized my big sisters. Ti, the “classy” one, was always dressed in conservative, tailored clothing. She was a quiet beauty with dark hair and warm brown eyes. She was studying to become a nurse. It was she who took me to my first ballet, Sleeping Beauty, and then later, to see my first opera, Carmen, with the free tickets her teachers gave her knowing of our family’s meager economic circumstances. Their

generosity enabled her to open up an entire world of music and dance to me.

Effie was the family spitfire, dating gorgeous, dangerous Puerto Rican guys from Spanish Harlem. After she spent an evening out, I would be regaled by her stories of how she met the most recent boyfriend, how tall and gorgeous he looked on the date and what a great kisser he was. She would tell me of parties where everyone danced the mambo until they dropped. I envied her wild child experiences.

The last time my father left us, it took months for us to realize he was not coming back. I adored him, blaming my mother for his having left us once again. After a while, my mother had longer and longer periods of darkness and became increasingly depressed, spending countless hours in bed. As her tirades and screaming rages increased, my sisters both managed to escape, finding other things to do and places to go whenever Mama took to her bed. My mother’s dark room was full of religious icons of Christ on the cross, Mary Magdelene at Christ’s feet, and mother Mary with the baby Jesus in her arms, while the odor from her self-made prison smacked of walls painted with some pungent, acrid liniment that permeated the air of our tiny apartment.

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Veil by Angelica Sotiriou

When my sisters scattered, I got stuck taking care of my mother. I brought her tea in bed, played Greek music on our phonograph to cheer her up, and rubbed her arms and legs with some god-awful smelling ointment. “Take care of Momma,” my sisters would call out as they left the house. No one knew what clinical depression was in those days. People did not seek help for abject sadness and despair; they just tried to live through it as family members did their best to survive around them. At some point, the message became clear that it was my job to raise my mother’s spirits, doing my best to satisfy any wish she had so that I might get her the hell out of bed. I failed miserably at my job, never able to do enough to help her find a release from her misery and bitterness as she pushed the world and everyone in it far away from her.

During these periods, I’d go to the window and watch my friends playing games, jumping rope, tossing a ball, and I wished more than anything that I could be with them. Instead, I felt chained to my mother’s 104

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bed. As much as I blamed my mother for my father’s departure, I also felt sorry for her, pitying her for having been dealt a bad deck of cards in life. I wished there was something I could do to ease her sorrow, make her laugh, or give her hope for the future. My love for her saw me operating in a kind of optimistic child-like vacuum, thinking I could help restore her health and get her on her feet. I had this naïve idea that my efforts would someday result in her cooking meals for us once again, as well as inviting people over to visit, bringing some life into our dismal existence.

One day as I looked for something to distract me from my heavy duties, something in the daily newspaper caught my eye. It was an ad that read: “Clara Lane, Jewish Matchmaker.” It continued, “If you are lonely and would like to meet a good, eligible man, call me. I can help introduce you to someone who can be the beginning of a new life for you. Please don’t wait. Call or write me now.”

The photo of her next to the advertisement was one of a kind, smiling, grey-haired

woman in her sixties with a bun caught up on top of her head. With a feeling of desperation and foolish optimism, eager to do something to help my mother find companionship, I felt Clara Lane and I could magically make a difference. Just looking at my mother buried in her bed wallowing in despair, I knew she wanted someone to care for and love her. Perhaps this could work.

We did not have a phone, so I wrote to Clara Lane, pretending to be my lonely, unhappy mother, searching for the right man to rescue her from a life without hope.

“I would like to meet a nice man,” I scribbled.

That should cover it. I hoped the woman could not detect that a ten-year-old was the sender of the note. Ironically, my mother was illiterate and unable to even sign her own name, so this would have to do.

Once the note was stamped and shoved into the mailbox, my ten-year-old brain tried to forget all about it as I went about my caretaking duties. Asking this woman from the newspaper ad for help was more like sending a prayer out to the universe—a plea for someone to come and rescue all of us—not just my mother.

A few weeks later, Clara Lane answered me. It was exciting for me to receive a response from her. Hell, it was exciting for me to get a letter from anyone. She said she had several eligible men she would like me to meet.

Now what? Clara’s intent was to introduce me to Jewish eligible men and my mother was Greek Orthodox. Of course I had never seen an ad in any newspaper for a Greek matchmaking service. Arrangements in our Old World culture were usually made between close friends and relatives and, of course, there are no cultures I can think of that would dream of setting up a legally married woman anyway. My mother was only separated—not divorced—from my absentee father. Knowing my representations in this

letter were akin to mail fraud, I feared getting caught and punished. Suddenly, the idea of trying to find someone for my mother felt like a big mistake.

Of course, instead of seeing a new man court our mother, we would have preferred my father to return home a changed man— one with a regular paycheck, sobered up,

“With a feeling of desperation and foolish optimism, eager to do something to help my mother find companionship, I felt Clara Lane and I could magically make a difference.”

giving up his gambling and womanizing for good, and becoming a responsible father and a loving husband—something which even at my young, impressionable age, I knew he could never be.

My fantasies were sparked by movies I had seen on Saturday mornings—romantic films where a man and a woman who initially hated each other magically (with music, song, moonlight, and Technicolor, of course), ended up madly in love. I just wanted someone to courageously walk through our door and help change our lonely lives—Jewish or not.

Shaking off what I finally considered to be a silly idea, I decided to put Clara Lane out of my mind for a while.

A day came when we got my mother to reluctantly agree to see the play Babes in Toyland, my very first musical. What a feat it was to get my mother out of bed to perform her private “douche,” an old country hygiene ritual consisting of washing under armpits and privates. She selected one of her color-

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less synthetic ankle-length dresses, put on thick dirt-colored beige stockings (efficiently rolled up and knotted at the knee to keep them up) and finally put on black shoes that laced up the front. At the end of all this, she looked more like she was going to a funeral than a play.

The hardest part for us was getting lipstick on her. “No, no!” she’d say in Greek, pushing us away. “Only poo-TAH-nes (loose women) paint their lips.” But we would persist, both my sisters holding my mother’s arms to her side while I, the designated lipstick-applier, tried to hold her face tight as I beautified her. “Come on, Ma,” I’d coax. It was a slapstick comedy—as if she were a child being forced to eat her spinach.

Of course we all secretly hoped that if we dressed my mother up a little, perhaps some nice man might find her attractive.

We were late for the performance as the usher rushed us to our seats. Mama kept poking me with her elbow asking me in Greek to explain what the play was about.

“What are they saying?” she pleaded, as people nearby gave us dirty looks, shushing us.

Why was I always stuck being my mother’s translator? I just wanted to take in the colorful costumes, the music, the dancing, and enjoy it without her bugging me. Because of her limited understanding of English, Mama seemed bored with all of it, mumbling, “eh, eh,” sucking on her teeth, and dismissing the experience. Her ability to find joy in anything she was not familiar with seemed nonexistent. Times like this made me wish for anyone else’s mother but my own.

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We arrived home exhausted. Just getting Mama out of bed and dressed for the occasion had been exhausting. Walking the five blocks to and from the subway station with her to attend the performance had been like climbing Mount Everest.

Whenever another outing opportunity presented itself, we found ourselves repeating the process I just described, each of us hoping that this time it would be different— that my mother would find some excitement in seeing something new, that she would get dressed without our fussing over her looks, and finally welcome an occasion to leave the dreary house. Her capacity for laughter and joy, unfortunately, was quite small.

Weeks had passed since I had first contacted Clara Lane. I had ignored her persistent letters encouraging me to contact her. What a stupid idea, I thought sadly, that some strange, wonderful man might ever come to our door and romantically whisk my mother away. Eventually the letters stopped. And after a long while, I think we both gave up.

I will never forget those caretaking days in a dreary Bronx apartment when time seemed to move like molasses. I still look back on the ten-year-old me, who felt responsible for the person who was supposed to be taking care of her, instead of enjoying her own childhood, while her sisters did what they could to survive their own. They color my existence to this day, reflecting both sad as well as laughable memories, often getting me through life’s challenges. �

CREATIVE NON-FICTION

If There Is a Holy War, Which Side Is God On?

By Vicki Gundrum

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woman with a handbag with serious hardware is a particular type. This one to the right is my cousin’s wife, and you might admire her beauty but not her purse, for she too is out of work. My cousin is retired, and his pension was cut in two. Their two daughters work for free, so they might be high on hiring lists if a position opens.

As for the man making the sign of the church and the steeple with his hands? Is he a Greek or is he an immigrant? In the United States, he might be derided as a spanger—small change panhandler, sitting on the sidewalk, eyeballs at crotch level asking every­body walking by for money. But in Greece, his presence in the fast-fabricated cardboard church preserves dignity. A Good Samaritan could give him money and a cool drink of water.

Greek-Americans are immigrants or the children or grandchildren of immigrants.

Some in Greece hate the recent immigrants to their country; some U.S. citizens hate the immigrants at the U.S. southern border. I saw a video of a Native American man on the U.S.-Mexico border shout to anti-immigrant protestors: “None of you were invited. Put away your bogus reasons.” The man with long black braids was pushing a baby stroller.

The others were white and angry with brown children.

The twisty coastline of Greece and her 2,000 islands have been a natural refuge since the time the Greeks did not live on land but the edge of the sea.

Everyone from the Sea Peoples of the ancient world to the Barbary Coast pirates hid their sailing ships in the rick-rack coast of Greece. They were brutal in swordplay, and with clubs, plundered port cities and trade ships, enslaving the sons and daughters of Greeks. Men often joined the very pirate ships that attacked their own towns or their own merchant ships.

The Greeks on the edge of a sea were fishermen and traders. The pirates were the entrepreneurs of their day.

Fisher folk left the coast and trekked inland to the mountains to save themselves.

They missed the sea, sun, and food. The poor

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soil on rocky slopes gave up weeds, brush, and trees. The mountain Greeks learned to eat the weeds and hunt deer and wild boar.

When snow fell in winter, they gathered wood for fires, keeping a weary eye out for wolves. The people toughened into brutes of the land, each village isolated in its own mountain valley.

After hundreds of years, the mountain people and the fisher folk still shared a language, but they were not of one soul. The mountain people were cold and hardened like the rocks. Those by the sea were carefree and floated on song and wine.

In World War II, when Mussolini invaded Greece from the north, mountain Greeks fought back. They threw rocks and set fires.

They captured the guns and tanks of the Italians and pushed them back over the border into Albania, giving the Allies the first victory in the war. Newsreels in American movie matinees celebrated Greek fighters.

Hitler had been ready to send his troops north to Russia that summer, but when Mussolini’s soldiers failed, the Nazis instead marched south into Greece. Many more peasant women joined the ranks of front-line soldiers. The mountain Greeks fought the Germans, but the Greeks were out-gunned.

The battles moved south, and all Greeks joined in the fighting.

The Greeks always fight—they fought the Barbary Coast Pirates, the Huns, the Persians, the Trojans, the Romans, and the Turks. They held off the Nazis until winter when Athens fell. A swastika flag was raised over the Acropolis. That night, a Greek citi-

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zen climbed the flagpole and tore down the swastika. The people would never rest.

Many Greek resistance fighters had died by the time the Nazis retreated north.

The fact that the Greeks delayed the Nazi push north to Russia until winter meant the Germans froze in their summer uniforms fighting there. The Germans were cold, tired, and low on supplies. The Russians in Stalingrad stood their ground, and the Nazi campaign to conquer the world died.

Greeks fought one another in the Civil War. Greek friends and family argue politics between servings of mezedes and dessert.

Greeks are brave and afraid during these bad economic times and seek the help of Europe for the sorrows of the immigrant refugees escaping their miseries.

Greeks saved Europe. Does the world not know this? The world can forget this if it isn’t known.

The Golden Dawn is shameful. They are thugs who do not love people or speak. Their lips are closed, and they wear masks and clenched fists in the videos I have seen.

There must be democracy, so the people have a say.

That ragged coastline, which beckoned pirates that frightened Greeks north who toughened as mountain survivors and fought back Mussolini’s fascists and set cold, dispirited Nazis on the way to their end at Stalingrad, is the same coastline through which Middle East war refugees seek entry to Europe today. Sometimes it is not so great to be the world’s favorite country. �

CREATIVE NON-FICTION

Paleokastritsa: Corfu’s “Most Beautiful Spot”

by Richard Clark

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urling the jib as our small boat navigated the entrance to Paleokastritsa, a small village on the northwest shore of Corfu, it immediately became apparent that it lived up to all I had heard about it. Our anchor dropped some three fathoms through water so clear we could witness the flukes nestling into the silver sand of the seabed.

All around, the hills are dressed in olive groves. Cypresses towering over the verdant blanket that drapes itself all the way down to the sea pierce orchards of lemon trees. It is hard not to wax lyrical about Paleokastritsa; it wears its sobriquet as the “most beautiful spot” on the island in a relaxed fashion, confident in the knowledge that few are likely to dispute this.

This magnificent crop of bays on the northwest coast is presided over by the serene Monastery of the Virgin Mary or, more literally, the virgin of the ancient castle, from which Paleokastritsa gets its name. In the middle of summer, this spot can become a victim of its own beauty as hordes of tourists swarm all over Agios Spyridon and Alipo Bay. Away from these peak periods, it is easier to appreciate these silvery beaches that clinch the emerald waters just as settings grasp stones in some priceless ring.

All around, the hills are clad in lush forest before falling away into the sea with a flash

of white cliff. If you’re approaching by road, glimpses of the Ionian flicker enticingly through the trees before revealing the true splendor of their bounty as you approach the shoreline. I have visited this spot before, but this time we have come at it from the sea, as most would have until the 1820s, when the British High Commissioner of the island, Sir Frederick Adam, liked the spot so much that he commanded an access road be built across the hills. He bequeathed the island some beautiful buildings, including Mon Repos villa, but to my mind, opening up this enchanted corner of the island so that people can experience its sublime natural setting is an even greater legacy.

The ruling aristocracy during the period of British occupation would load their wicker picnic baskets into their traps and trot out of Kerkyra for rest and relaxation on the shaded hills and sun-baked beaches of the peninsula. Long before them, however, the advantages of this site had been recognized.

This is alleged to have been the capital city of King Alkinoos, ruler of the Phaeacians, where much of Homer’s Odyssey is related before the king avails Odysseus of a ship to deliver him home to Ithaka.

It is not difficult to believe that it was here that a naked Odysseus, clinging to the wreckage of his raft, was washed up and

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discovered by the Princess Nausicaä. Like Mouse Island off the coast of Paleopolis on the opposite coast, here the offshore rock of Kolovri lays claim to having been stopped in its tracks, the winged galleon petrified by an angry Poseidon for returning Odysseus home.

Take your pick; both tiny islands have reasons to claim this link. It’s not difficult, lying here on the warm pine decking of our tiny sloop, to imagine being much closer to the land of the gods.

It’s hard to rouse from the deck and take the inflatable tender ashore, but not as hard as the climb up to the monastery high upon the western headland overlooking Liapades Bay. Leaving our anchorage, we take the beach road traversing the headland, which divides our landing place from another, smaller cove where the path rises steeply, zig-zagging its way upward. It takes twenty minutes to climb to the summit at a snail’s pace, but on arrival, we are pleased we made the effort. Every second of our walk was worth the exertion as we enter the monastery, which has stood here since the thirteenth Century.

Its present incarnation is more recent, having been built over the remains of the earlier retreat in the eighteenth century. The lower part of the grounds are taken up by beautiful gardens with stone arches and the bowed branches of trees forming a splendid arboreal canopy to the pathway, which leads upwards to stone steps ascending to the monastery itself. A patchwork of beige, sand, and cream stones pave a courtyard resplendent in blooming bougainvillea, geraniums, and lemon trees.

The late afternoon sun projects a hint of purple, red, and orange hues upon the whitewashed walls of the buildings. This is a working monastery, and eight monks are still in residence, attending to their devotions, ministering to the local community, pressing olives to make oil to sell in the gift 110

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shop, and running tours around this popular tourist spot.

From the terrace, the view is spectacular enough for even the most secular amongst us to consider the possibilities of a life of piety, and the tiny church at the heart of the monastery embellishes the splendor of the environs with manmade masterpieces.

Inside, the walls are ablaze with frescoes and icons, the wealth of which belies the small size of the church. A giant chandelier illuminates the lectern, and saints and apostles look down from the walls. Above a doorway in the southern wall is perhaps the most famous of the works to grace the chapel, a painting of the Last Judgment.

Above all, a Tree of Life carving spreads its branches casting a celestial shadow over us. In the Eastern Orthodox religion, the tree is symbolic of a link between its appearance in the Garden of Eden in the Old Testament and the cross on which Christ was crucified in the New Testament. Whatever it signifies, to those who gaze toward the ceiling of this exquisite little church, it could be said that the chiseling and hewing of such timber on display here is as close to a modern day Garden of Eden as one could get.

Outside, a cat sleeps atop a stone-capped, whitewashed wall in the shadow of the honey-colored belfry—its three bells waiting patiently to call the monks to prayer. A butterfly swoops around a pithos, cascading scarlet blooms as a tourist throws a coin into the well and makes a wish that some day they will return.

There is a museum that exhibits a further impressive display of Byzantine and more modern icons, the most striking of which is a representation of the Dormition of the Virgin, celebrating the falling asleep of Mary before her body is reunited with her soul in heaven in the assumption.

We step back outside; the sun is casting a haze. Blinking, we gaze northwest but can-

Paleokastritsa, a small village on the northwest shore of Corfu, lives up to its sobriquet as the “most beautiful spot” on the island.

Paleokastritsa’s namesake, the “monastery of the virgin of the ancient castle”.

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not catch a glimpse of the precipitous castle of Angelokastro that, chameleon-like, has blended with its mountain setting. But that is for another day. It is getting late, and we have plans for the evening. A barbeque screwed down to the guardrails and stanchions waits to be lit. It stands ready to cook red mullet, herbed with fennel, sage and basil, seasoned with oil and lemon juice, salt and pepper and loosely wrapped in foil parcels to steam in their own juices while we prepare a fresh salad on deck and drink a chilled rose wine as subtle and refreshing as the breeze that catches the water of our sheltered anchorage.

With barely a ripple on the water and refreshed by our meal, we decide to make use of the remaining hour or so of daylight and explore further along the coast. With the larger outboard firmly mounted to the stern of our inflatable tender, we head out of the protective arms of the little harbor and skirt the coast.

The visages of the rocks hereabouts are pockmarked with caves and grottos waiting to be explored. Several we could, in these calm conditions, navigate right inside and snorkel around the edges among the myriad-colored fish, the shoals of which seem to stretch forever vertically down the cliff walls to the center of the earth. The water is cold, starved of the strength of the sun, and without a wetsuit, ten minutes swimming is enough. But even back aboard our tiny boat, the caves display a many-varied palette as the evening light descends.

At the portals of these grottos, the cliffs turn from gray to shadowy black and, as they plunge into the chilling depths, the dark blue of the ocean is transformed to the deep red of a well-aged wine. We stay slightly too long, and as the sun slips away, we have to rely on our memory and a powerful torch from the stash bag to feel our way back to our anchorage and a nightcap aboard. On the hills surrounding the bay, solitary lights 112

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exhibit a chimerical display, mimicking the stars which, on this clearest of nights, are putting on a show that makes all others pale into insignificance.

Awaking with the dawn, I untie the tender and row ashore, the oars making the only ripples on a sea of gray, polished granite. We eat some cheese and spinach pies for breakfast, use bread to make packed lunches, and take some chocolate donuts, simply because I remember the bakers here make the best I have ever tasted. Today we are catching the first bus out of Paleokastritsa and heading for Makrades, from where we will commence the little under two-mile hike to Angelokastro.

Fueled up for the day, we head ashore again in time to board the coach that takes the steep, winding road out of the village in its stride. The sun has not been up long but the heat through the plate glass windows of the bus makes clear its intentions for the day.

After we reach the top of the hill, the bus passes through the tiny village of Lakones.

Those few who reside here must count their blessings everyday because it is hard to know which way to turn to best take in the gorgeous views of the west coast.

Looking back down on Paleokastritsa, we imagine we can see our boat nestling among others in the bay, and we can definitely see the monastery to which we had climbed the day before. Ahead can be made out today’s destination with enough clarity of definition to whet the appetite. In the distance, the fortress of Angelokastro stands proud on a stark, rocky promontory, so at ease with its place in the world, it looks as though it was birthed from the rocks that surround it, rather than the lifting, winching and sculpting of man.

From here, the journey is quick. In no time, we emerge in the small village of Makrades, ready to embark on our trek. The disproportionate number of tavernas and ouzeries already going about the business of opening, and the street stalls selling all man-

ner of goods, from embroidery to pottery Constantinople. This lofty aerie stayed in and oil, hint at the volume of tourist trade the hands of these maverick relatives of the which passes here. I am pleased for our early Plantagenets until it slipped through the start, and disembarking at a junction signed fingers of the house of Anjou, whose weak to Krini, we set out straight away toward the rule allowed the island to place itself under the protectorate of the powerful Venetian castle.

Our destination lies at the highest point empire in 1386, the forces of which took the along the whole of the west coast. The cas- castle by siege that same year.

The fact that the present bastion was tle stands nearly a thousand feet above the sea lanes it surveys, which made it one of the built under the auspices of the Komnenos crucial bastions for the defense of the island, dynasty, whose short-lived tenure on the along with strongholds in Gardiki in the island began in 1214 after they wrested south, Kassiopi further to the north and the control of Corfu from the Venetians, is later forts of Kerkyra Town itself. From its in little doubt. Some claim the castle is so lofty position, beacons could be seen across called after Angelo Komneni himself, the the island warning of attack by enemy forces first Despot of Epirus. It is altogether more likely, however, that it was named and privateers.

Finding our way is easy, but reaching after the Archangel Michael as, in the first our destination is not so effortless. From a written reference to its existence in 1272, parking lot beneath the castle, rugged steps Angelokastro is mentioned as the Castrum hewn out of the rock steeply ascend in a Sancti Angeli, which in Latin means the scabrous fashion until, breathless, the mod- “Castle of the Anointed Angel.”

I have to admit to not being great with ern-day assailant passes through the narrow entrance to the inner keep. This is the first heights. Staring down the vertical rocks on bulwark protecting the nucleus of the sanc- the seaward side of the fortress, it is easy to see how, after the Venetians first took possestum, which lies above.

It is thought that due to its imperious sion of it in 1386, it was never wrested from position, heady enough to view approaches their grasp by force, despite the repeated from the Adriatic to the north, there has attempts of the Ottoman Empire’s maraudbeen some form of fortress here since at least ing troops. It was not for want of trying.

The Venetians, on the other hand, were the eleventh century. It is also likely, considering the many advantages bestowed on this determined that the Ottoman Empire, which spot by nature, that it had been an acropolis had enveloped much of the rest of Greece, would not get a toehold into the rest of for many years previously.

Evidence uncovered during an archae- Europe. Weaponry and men were lavished ological dig in the final year of the last upon the island to bolster it against any such century uncovered stone slabs that have eventuality, and the line was drawn here at been confirmed as dating from the Byzan- the southern reaches of the Adriatic.

Alongside the Venetian castles in Kerkyra, tine era. What is certain is that by 1272, the castle was extant. It had been requisitioned the Byzantine sites of Gardiki, Kassiopi, and

by Giordano di San Felice, the leader of the Angelokastro proved too much for the Turks, Angevin forces who took over the island in and despite repeated attempts at siege in 1267 as part of his ruler Charles I of Sic- 1431, 1537, 1571, 1573, and 1716, they were ily’s (later of Naples’s) ultimately thwarted repulsed on each occasion. Glorious victories, ambition to reform the Latin Empire of as these might have been for the Venetian

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nobility and the armies that defended their whom she befriends. As the drunken general wealth and property, these were paid for in lies asleep one night, Judith seizes his sword the blood of the ordinary Corfiots. Those and decapitates him. She transports the head who lived outside of the castle’s keeps were of the luckless invader back to her people as sacrificed to the onslaught of the forces of a symbol of their liberation as the Assyrians successive Sultans as, on each occasion, they retreat from Israel.

But it was not a Venetian, or even a ran amuck at will outside the castle walls.

The cost of keeping “the door to Venice” Corfiot, who masterminded Kerkyra’s libslammed firmly shut has been estimated as eration from the Ottoman onslaught. It was being as high as a hundred thousand people a Prussian aristocrat and mercenary, Johann Matthias von der Schulenburg, who had premurdered or sold into slavery.

The Turks finally got the message in 1716 viously taken much more than the shilling when, buoyed up by having finally quelled from each of the many kings across Europe resistance in the Peloponnesus, their army of whose battles he had fought for them. His some 35,000 troops and auxiliaries boarded final, unlikely victory saw him able to retire ship and set sail from the mainland across in some comfort to his adopted homeland of the short strait to the island. Although the Venice, where he spent his hard-won earnforce landed at Ipsos, the off-lying fleet ings on a substantial art collection. He is were engaged by the Venetian navy and honored on Corfu with a statue that stands sunk, scuttled, or scattered to the winds as nearby the Old Fort in Kerkyra Town.

High on his pedestal, he stands dressed their stranded forces lay siege to the island fortresses. On this occasion, 3,000 locals in the rather fanciful uniform of a Roman picked up what arms they had to join the legionnaire. It is at this spot that every year a 5,000 Venetian troops and their mercenar- procession in honor of the island’s co-savior, ies to repel the repeated forays made on the Saint Spyridon, winds its way to the sea fortress walls. Time and again they came front, and emerging from the narrow streets forward, for twenty-two days, until their of the town, stops and pays tribute to the supply chain finally snapped, and they man who ensured their island would never scampered from the island for the last time. be enslaved by the Turks.

Moving away from the unstable cliff The composer Vivaldi celebrated this great victory in his oratorio of the same year edge we stop to drink water and rest. The entitled Juditha Triumphans Devicta Hol- crenellated remains of battlements poke ofernis Barbarie. This barely disguised like gray, rotting teeth from the gums of the allegory is based upon the Book of Judith, a northeastern fortress wall. The portal to the little known book of the Bible only included castle faces northward. The remains of the in the Apocrypha in the Protestant and circular tower that protected it are still to be Jewish traditions, but as part of the Old Tes- seen looking down over the barracks, which tament in Eastern Orthodoxy and Roman housed the troops outside of the inner keep.

A simple, tiny stone-built church erected Catholicism.

A Jewish widow, Judith—the name itself here as recently as 1784 and dedicated to meaning “Jewess”—becomes impatient when the Archangels Michael and Gabriel stands her nation loses its faith in God’s ability to high upon the acropolis, outside of which deliver their lands from the conquering are eerily fascinating graves cut out of the Assyrians. She takes it on herself to enter the ancient rock into the shape of the humans camp of the enemy commander, Holofernes, they inter.

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Back down in the lower keep, we enter another tiny chapel; a cave dug out of the rock and dedicated to Saint Kyriaki. Beside the entrance is an opening to the sparse quarters that once housed religious hermits seeking solitude while, inside the tiny whitewashed interior of the church, a fresco of the Theotokos and Baby protect a small stone altar on which stand more modern votive icons in frames and a simple cross.

Despite the heat outside, here it is cool and tranquil, a momentary relief. It is hard to imagine a life alone between these desolate walls; but emerging outside it is hard to imagine a place closer to heaven.

The descent is welcoming as we delve downward into the sparse forest of shrub.

The intermittent shade of the trees that cling to the rock protects us from the worst of the heat as we head toward the nearby village of Krini to eat our picnic.

Refreshed, it is still only midday and we decide to explore the coastline further north.

We head back into Makrades to discuss our options over a cold Mythos. We agree to make for Peroulades at the northwestern cape of the island to see the famous Canal d’Amour, taking in the other numerous coastal villages like Agios Georgios, Afionas, and the island’s second spot, named Agios Stefanos.

Usually, bus services on the island are good, but after a discussion with the owner of the taverna, we come to the conclusion that such a trip would be a logistical nightmare. We decide to head back to the boat and pass the afternoon swimming, reading, and sleeping in the sun. We rent a car to make the trip the following day.

I was pleased we decided to make our first stop Sidari, a tourist resort in the north of the island. From here, we would wind our way slowly back along the narrow roads, which make darting sorties to the coast before heading inland to the olive groves,

which predominate the landscape here. I was also pleased it was not the height of the season, for just a glimpse of this resort could only hint at the dubious pleasures it might offer when operating at full capacity. Sidari’s only saving graces were the sunshine and some flat, sandy beaches. The few families walking dejectedly from one cheap souvenir shop to another, whilst waiting until it was time to take in another helping of fish and chips, had plenty of time to rue their illadvised holiday choice.

Hastily we head west out of town to find what we hope will be Sidari’s one redeeming feature, the Canal d’Amour, and it does not disappoint. Leaving the car on a sandy parking lot, we take a well-worn path across rocks, up and down steps until we arrive at a remarkable rock formation. Carved out by the erosion of sea stacks and collapsed arches, this unique series of coves and natural canals is extraordinary. Legend has it that, as the name suggests, any couple that swims together through these waters will end up getting married. At this time of year, when it is quiet, it is indeed a romantic spot.

Here, creamy limestone, topped in a covering of green shrub and exhibiting the strata of centuries of wear, plunges into crystalline blue pools.

Climbing to the top of one of the hills, one can see Cape Drastis. Beyond that, a further five miles out, lie Diapontia Nisia (the Diapontia Islands) in the most northwesterly part of Greece.

Othonoi, Erikoussa and Mathraki make up this small archipelago. The largest, Othonoi, is reputed to have been the nymph Calypso’s island where she held Odysseus captive for seven years before reluctantly letting the object of her affections free aboard the raft on which he was shipwrecked.

Boats to the islands set out from Sidari and some of the other nearby coastal villages, and a ferry runs from Corfu Town. If

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The Canal d’Amour, Sidari, a unique series of coves and natural canals, boasts remarkable rock formations carved out by erosion.

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Legend has it that any couple that swims in the Canal d’Amour will end up getting married.

Photos: Frédérique Voisin-Demery/Flickr

you enjoy seclusion, these beautiful islands might just be for you. Accommodation is available on all three, but is limited, particularly on Erikoussa and Mathraki. Othonoi has the most facilities, having some shops and tavernas and a medieval fort rising out of the olive groves and pine trees on an island hilltop.

Most trips, however, seem to go to Erikoussa and, although facilities are limited, it has beautiful sandy beaches stretching in an arc out from the tiny village of Porto. There is a yacht harbor on Othonoi, and the islands have long been a haven for ships running from storms in the southern Adriatic or fishermen seeking shelter when seas cut up rough off Cape Drastis.

The islands have in the past been a refuge for brigands and pirates, the privateers making a living from sacking ships passing south from Venice and other Italian citystates. But there is evidence that life here went back much further, and remnants of Stone-Age settlements have been uncovered on all three islands.

To the west of the Canal d’Amour, we encounter the small village of Peroulades.

This unassuming settlement could also have appropriated the magical coves we had just left behind. But unlike its brash neighbor, Sidari, it would seem like this might be too much effort for this sleepy, faded village, the closest on the island to the dramatic white cliffs of Cape Drastis. It is a shame, as the natural beauty of that wave-worn coast has a more natural synergy with this somnolent olive farming community.

Some concessions have been made to supplement the meager income from the olive groves, but they appear half-hearted, the village content to bask in the traditions of the past. A few old men sit smoking and chewing the cud in the village square beside an ancient water pump as we feel our way along a road barely wide enough for our car.

The buildings claustrophobically jostle each other as we bump along between them before a steep hill leaves them, and not long afterwards the road, behind.

It soon becomes clear that, if we want to go further, we will have to abandon the car. It is well worth it, as in less than a mile we emerge on top of the striking cliffs of the wind-buffeted cape. Today the sky is clear, and we can see the Diapontia Isles lying at anchor on the horizon. The sense of seclusion is overwhelming. Looking back, there is nothing but olive groves clinging to the limestone cliff tops, and out to sea a lone ship holds course for Brindisi in Italy some 175 miles to the west.

Reunited with our car, we drive cautiously until we meet some tarmac and head to the village in search of sustenance. Turning right at a sign to Longas Beach, we stop at a taverna. Steps descend steeply to a beach previously invisible, as the cliffs are so vertiginous. Deciding upon a swim, we discover that the waters that lie in the shadow of these white cliffs are decidedly cooler than elsewhere and, although they clean away the dust of the day, we are not encouraged to linger, particularly with a taverna with such magnificent views so close at hand.

A traditional pastisada is on offer. This appropriate dish gives a nod to Corfu’s past relationship with Venice and also acknowledges Italy’s invisible presence somewhere over the horizon at which we now stare.

Chicken is layered with pasta and a béchamel sauce in a style similar to lasagna, with a tomato sauce, cinnamon, and paprika then added to mark it out as distinctly Corfiot.

The whole dish is slowly baked in an oven.

The chilled, earthy wine served up alongside it is deep red, but its flavor perfectly balances the sweetness of the tomatoes and spices. We are replete, and the bread-wiped plates sparkle in the sun as testimony to the deliciousness of the meal.

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Relaxed, we are ready for a leisurely drive along the coastal road back to our mooring at Paleokastritsa. It is slow but far from leisurely. This road is a riot of bends, as it in turn flirts with the coast and the mountains inland. This game of hide and seek goes on revealing breathtaking glimpses of the sea one moment, a lush hillside canopy of olive groves the next.

We had stayed before at Agios Stefanos on the other side of the island and were interested in visiting its namesake on this northwestern headland. Taking a diversion to this unremarkable but pleasant enough small settlement, the wide expanse of beach makes it understandable why this resort was constructed here. To the north, the white cliffs stretch away to Cape Drastis shimmering in the haze of the heat radiating off the sea. To the south is the small chapel dedicated to Saint Stephen, after which the village is named.

Beyond is a small harbor. Fishing boats, their blue and white hulls moored amongst the tour boats, are a reminder of a more traditional existence that many still live by.

Looked at on its own merits, Agios Stefanos is a pleasant enough place to holiday. It is unfortunate that it is often compared to so many places nearby that possess such exceptional natural attributes.

One of these is only a few miles away, but its aura lies an eternity distant. Afionas lies at the end of a track that pulls up abruptly just before it feels it might plunge, like Sappho, into the waves beneath. Out to sea lies the island of Gravis with its smaller acolyte Sikia astern, in turn towing another rock like a petrified tender. We park up near the square where villagers sit, as they have for centuries, under the shade of a huge olive tree. In the sunlight, the classic belfry of the small village church of Agios Giannos displays itself as almost pink, as it casts a shadow over a small memorial, a reminder of 118

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an incident that happened in 1996. This simple cream, marble statue stands in memory of Ektora Gialopsos. Ektora died in a Greek army helicopter far away on the eastern borders of Greek territory, believed to have been a victim of a Greek sovereignty dispute with its neighbor, Turkey.

A further manifestation of the animosity so frequently exhibited between these two countries, most visibly illustrated by the ongoing dispute over Cyprus, the ImiaKardak incident showed just how raw the skins of these two nations are when they rub up against one another. Just four miles off the coast of Turkey, the tiny pair of uninhabited Dodecanese islands, known in Greece as Imia and in Turkey as Kardak, became the center of a diplomatic incident when a ship flying the Turkish colors struck ground on the islands and required salvage.

The Turkish captain of the ship disputed the Greek authorities’ right to salvage his vessel. The Turkish government then upped the ante by wading in saying they considered the islands to be Turkish territory. To most, it seems clear that as part of the Dodecanese and under the 1947 Treaty of Paris, which ceded all the islands previously under Italian rule to Greece, these were sovereign Greek territory. Whatever the rights and wrongs of the case, the legal ramifications are still rumbling on.

The mayor of the nearby Greek island of Kalymnos, along with a priest, landed on one of the islands and hoisted a Greek flag, which failed to calm the situation and resulted in a grandstanding Turkish TV channel pulling a stunt and landing some of their own journalists to rip down the flag and replace it with a Turkish ensign. This tit-for-tat continued with the Greek Navy getting involved and again raising the blue and white stripes of Greece on one of the tiny rocks.

Warships from both countries sailed for the islands to land expeditionary forces

ashore on the rocks, the Greeks on the Falakron, is majestic and calls out for us to island to the east, the Turks on its partner move on to Agios Giorgios, one of the pearls to the west, both in ignorance of the other’s of the north west coast.

The road tries to shake us off, deteractivities.

Whilst the two nations played political mined to discourage the casual visitor as it brinksmanship, a reconnaissance helicop- twists and turns, navigating a spectacular ter was launched from a Greek frigate, and headland before coming to rest where a valplummeted into the sea above the disputed ley, looking for all the world as though it is islands. Some speculate that it was hit by cut out of the rock by a river of olive trees, Turkish fire that killed its crew of three, reaches the sea.

Not to be mistaken for another holiday including Ektora. The severity of the incident and the possibilities it precipitated were such resort of the same name near Lake Korrithat both sides covered up the affair for fear sion in the low-lying flatlands of the south of of the consequences, and it required diplo- the island, this village manages to cater for matic intervention from Washington to draw the needs of a loyal group of tourists who the two parties back from the brink of war. return time and again to enjoy the relaxed The dispute, just one of many surrounding pace of life and the pleasures its unrivalled the borders between these two old enemies, beach has to offer in the shade of these is still unresolved. For many, these incidents wooded hills. About three miles of fine shinhave been pushed back into the dark recesses gle and sand stretch out in either direction of their political minds, but here in this tiny from the village, which hugs the coast road.

Corfiot village, one of its victims will always Umbrellas and sunbeds are dotted around the beach. Children build sandcastles and be remembered. swim or take advantage of the many waterFollowing the track past the church, we head toward a narrow promontory that sports facilities.

The beach still retains a sense of serendivides two bays and leads to the Cape of Arilla. Excavations have uncovered evi- ity, large enough to happily absorb all those dence that, as early as the third millennium who come to enjoy it. We decide to take a BCE, Neolithic peoples had settled here on walk along the shoreline as the sun starts to this windy outcrop with its heady outlook go down, and the bay falls asleep, its hidden north to the Diapontia islands and south depths slumbering under a black satin sheet. to the bay of Agios Giorgios and the cape At the end of the beach, where the wooded of Angelokastro far in the distance. On this hills plunge into the water, a sprinkling of exposed headland can be seen foundations alert cypresses look down at their own image, from a more modern era; remains dating fleetingly recorded in that mercury mirror.

As we return along the beach, it has empfrom around 500 BCE. For the visitor today, there is a choice tied out, some couples lingering to catch the of two paths leading down either side of sunset, others returning home to their penthe promontory, providing the option of sions and hotels to wash the salt away or eat descending to a sheltered beach depend- in one of the many traditional tavernas. We ing on which way the wind is blowing. The return to the car to slowly navigate the darkbeach in the tiny cove below Cape Arilla is ened road, which helps keep the secret of this intimate and inviting, but the spread of the beautiful little spot, as we head the few miles wider vista, which unfurls as I glance further south to where our boat lies at anchor in around the whole expanse of the bay to Cape Paleokastritsa Bay. ďż˝

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ACADEMIA & SCHOLARSHIP

Roster and Genealogy of Emigrants from Greece Settled in Chiloé (1800-1900) Κατάλογος και Γενεαλογία Ελλήνων Μεταναστών στην Περιοχή της Τσιλοέ (1800-1900)

By Pablo A. Pérez

Ιntroduction Chile is a country of southwest South America with a long Pacific coastline. It was originally inhabited by Araucanian Indian tribes, colonized by Spain in 1541, and gained independence in 1818. Chile consists chiefly of the Andes in the east, the Atacama Desert in the north, a central fertile region, and a huge southern region of almost uninhabitable mountains, glaciers, fjords, and islands. In addition to its stunning natural beauty, the Republic of Chile boasts an amazing history.

Chiloé is the largest Chilean island, situated within the southern Pacific coastal area, the whole of which is mountainous and covered with wood. Chiloé was conquered in 1567 and was the southernmost tip of the Spanish crown in South America for a few centuries. The island’s annexation to the

Chilean territory occurred in 1826. The history and culture of Chiloé highlights varied inhabitants, emigrants, and their descendants.

The origin and presence of the many different emigrants that landed on the island of Chiloé opens up a new line of research on a very important subject in social history that has been studied in recent years.

This short note records the presence of two emigrants that clearly belong to the Greek nation.

Historical events and concepts The history of the movement of the Greek population starts from Antiquity and continues until the present. In ancient times, the Hellenic diaspora included a plethora of communities along the littoral of the Mediterranean Sea, especially those of Magna

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Graecia in southern Italy (Constantinou 2002, 94). Modern historiography has associated the notion of the Greek diaspora mostly with the period of the Ottoman Empire,1 and later with Greece as an independent nationstate (Laliotou 2005, 85).

It is said by some historians that a Greek sailor, Juan Griego, sailed with Christopher Columbus on his first journey to the New World (Henderson 1995, 161), though other historians suggest that the sailor was originally from Genoa (Ballesteros y Beretta 1945, 168). The first Greek to have landed in America was a man named Don Teodoro (Henderson 1995, 161), a sailor and ship caulker serving aboard the expedition of the Spanish explorer Pánfilo de Narváez.2 In the pre-1800 period, Greek merchant communities also developed in different areas within the territories of neighboring empires, such as the Austrian and the Russian Empires, which enabled through their economic organizations the creation of wealthy merchant communities whose cultural and political affinities were trans-local and whose activities took place within a large network of family, ethnic and religious connections (Laliotou 2005, 85). On the American continent, the earliest known Greek immigrants were 400 indentured servants brought to the colony of New Smyrna near St. Augustine, Florida in 1768 (Purcell 1995, 51).

Valuable topsoil was lost in many provinces of the country when Greeks abandoned productive agricultural lands to take refuge in mountainous regions during the Greek war of liberation from the Ottomans (1821‑1829); 1 Most scholars trace the beginnings of the Greek diaspora back to the period of the conquest of Constantinople—capital of Byzantium—by the Ottomans in 1453, and the subsequent migration of considerable numbers of Greek-speaking intellectuals from the Levant to the West (Laliotou 2005, 85).

2 In October, 1598, Narváez anchored off what is now Pensacola (Florida) to secure fresh water. An agreement was reached with the Indians on the land who, however, insisted on keeping a hostage while the water was to be procured. Don Teodoro volunteered himself as the hostage and went ashore. He never returned to the ship and was presumably killed by the Indians.

Though his life ended tragically, Don Teodoro is the first Greek known to have set foot on American soil (Moskos 2009, 2).

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these developments further impoverished the countryside and set the stage for emigration (Constantinou 2002, 93).

In the nineteenth century, the Greek diaspora also included communities that developed in countries like Egypt, where the construction of the Suez Canal and the cultivation and manufacturing of cotton boosted the advancement of the Greek community (Laliotou 2005, 85-86).

There was no significant Greek immigration again until the latter decades of the nineteenth century, when a flood of Greeks joined the other nationalities making up the so-called new immigration from eastern and southern Europe (Purcell 1995, 51): labor migrants moved from southern Europe mainly to the USA and Canada, but also to other transoceanic destinations such as Australia and New Zealand (Laliotou 2005, 87).

In 1864, for example, Greek merchants established the first Greek Orthodox parish in New Orleans, Louisiana (Constantinou 2002, 93).

In Chile and Chiloé There is no doubt that the first Greek to set foot on Chilean land was Juan Martín de Candia, born about 1514 in Candia (now Iraklio) on the Cretan coast. He came during the conquest of Chile in 1540, and established himself in La Imperial and Chillán, leaving offspring (Opazo Maturana 1941, 86; Opazo Maturana 1957, 77; Roa y Ursúa 1945, 156, Nº 561).

The Greeks influenced the settlement and culture of the country without being physically represented until well after the formation of the Republic of Chile, which occurred in 1810. Usually they were sailors who, for various reasons, were left in port and joined Chilean crews (Peri Fagerstrom 1989, 168).

After the Republic was established, on March 5, 1844 the Chilean minister Manuel Montt passed a decree that the Greek lan-

guage must be taught at the National Institute “tres veces por semana y una hora y media cada día”: “three times in the week and one and a half hours in the day” (Peri Fagerstrom 1989, 168).

Officially, the presence of people of Greek origin in Chile is recorded for the period of 1854-1949 in the following numbers: three for the year 1854, nine for 1865, 47 for 1875, 109 for 1885, 137 for 1895, 319 in 1907, 522 in 1920, 674 in 1930, and 735 in 1949 (Naciones Unidas, “Extranjeros residentes” 1950, Chart 62C). The total number of Greeks is however difficult to gauge because ethnic Greeks came from the nation of Greece—which won independence from the Ottoman Turks in 1821—but also from the Greek populations that had formed around the Ottoman Empire during the Turkish occupation of the Greek homeland (Purcell 1995, 51). Furthermore, it was hard and perhaps impractical for the Greek consular authorities to verify the Greek status or the expatriate identity of those who presented themselves as Greeks abroad, partly because the ministry concerned—Foreign Affairs—had no reason at that time to draw up any special procedure for verifying and checking (Vogli 2009, 105).

As a result, the Greek colony was established gradually. Currently, it numbers over three thousand people, mostly based in the capital, Antofagasta and La Serena. One of the most prominent representatives of Greek culture in Chile was the consul Mustakis Gabriel, who gave life to the “Semana Bizantina” (“Byzantine Week”) and permanent cultural activity (Peri Fagerstrom 1989, 168).

No bibliography cites any people of Greek origin in Chiloé before 1900 (Zorbas D., 2010); and not even the National Census from 1865 provides any evidence of a Greek presence there (Chile, Censo jeneral de la República 1866, 12-15).

Both emigrants recorded in Chiloé appear in the mid- and late- nineteenth cen-

tury, recorded as simply “natives of Greece,” with no further data on their place of origin, except the republic of “Reatin.” They are registered as having been married according to the Catholic rites in 1855 and 1884. There is no evidence to suggest that they arrived together.

This work contributes to an understanding of the composition and origin of the local population of Chiloé, and identifies the presence of ethnic Greeks living outside of their own borders. These people are part of the— mostly unknown—Greek historical heritage of Chiloé, and their offspring could perhaps guide researchers to another interesting study in future.

Studied lineages Juan I. Manuel Juan: Married to María Helin.

II. Manuel Juan: “Natural de la República de Reatin en la Grecia y residente en este departamento [de Achao]”.3 Married according to the Catholic rites on 5th November 1855 in the parish church of Achao4 to María Micaela Loayza (native of Achao; legitimate daughter of Juan Francisco Loayza and María González).

Killin I. Anastasio Killin: Married to Ciriaca Cutsñi.

II. Cosmo Killin: Native of Grecia and domiciled in the parish chapel of Ancud. Married according to the Catholic rites on 7th April 1884 in the cathedral of Ancud5 to María Suárez (native of the parish chapel of Ancud; legitimate daughter of Lorenzo Suar and Manuela Cárcamo). � 3 Translated into English: “Native of the Republic of Reatin in Greece and domiciled in this department [of Achao]”.

4 LMA2, foja 180.

5 LMAn1, foja 181, Nº 433.

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Εισαγωγή Η Χιλή είναι μια χώρα στα νοτιοδυτικά της Νοτίου Αμερικής με μια μακριά ακτογραμμή στον Ειρηνικό Ωκεανό. Οι πρώτοι κάτοικοι ήταν οι φυλές Ινδιάνων Αραουκανών· αποι­ κήθηκε από τους Ισπανούς το 1541, και απέκτησε την ανεξαρτησία της το 1818. Η Χιλή απαρτίζεται κυρίως από την οροσειρά των Άνδεων στην ανατολή, την έρημο Ατακάμα στο βορρά, μια κεντρική εύφορη περιοχή, και μια τεράστια νότια περιοχή απο έρημα βουνά, παγετώνες, φιορδ, και νησιά. Εκτός από την εκπληκτική φυσική ομορφιά της, η Δημοκρατία της Χιλής έχει και μια εξέχουσα ιστορία. Όσον αφορά την Τσιλοέ, είναι το μεγαλύτερο νησί της Χιλής και βρίσκεται στη νότια ακτή του Ειρηνικού και είναι εξ’ ολοκλήρου ορεινή και καλύπτεται από δάση. Κατακτήθηκε αρχικά το 1567 και παρ’ όλο που αποτελούσε μέρος της Χιλής ήταν το νοτιότερο μέρος του Ισπανικού Στέμματος στη Νότια Αμερική για αιώνες. Προσαρτήθηκε τελικά στη Χιλή το 1826. Η ιστορία και ο πολιτισμός της Τσιλοέ αντικατοπτρίζεται σε πολλές μορφές όπως και οι οικογένειές της. Η καταγωγή και παρουσία πολλών από τους μετανάστες που έφτασαν στο νησί της Τσιλοέ ανοίγει πολλές οδούς έρευνας στο πολύ σημαντικό θέμα της κοινωνικής ιστορίας που πρόσφατα μελετάται τα τελευταία χρόνια. Αυτό το μικρό κείμενο καταγράφει την παρουσία δυο μεταναστών που ξεκάθαρα ανήκουν στο Ελληνικό έθνος.

Ιστορικά γεγονότα και ιδέες Η ιστορία της κίνησης του ελληνικού πληθυσμού ξεκινά από την αρχαιότητα και συνεχίζεται έως τις μέρες μας. Στα αρχαία χρόνια, η ελληνική διασπορά συμπεριλάμβανε μια πληθώρα κοινοτήτων 124

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σε όλη τη θάλασσα της Μεσογείου, ειδικά στην περιοχή της Μεγάλης Ελλάδας στη νότιο Ιταλία (Constantinou 2002, 94). Η σύγχρονη ιστοριογραφία έχει συνδέσει την ιδέα της ελληνικής διασποράς κυρίως με την περίοδο της Οθωμανικής Αυτοκρατορίας1 και της μετέπειτα Ελλάδας ως ανεξάρτητης χώρας (Laliotou 2005, 85). Λέγεται από ιστορικούς πως ένας έλληνας ναύτης, ο Juan Griego, έπλευσε μαζί με τον Χριστόφορο Κολόμβο στο πρώτο του ταξίδι στο Νέο Κόσμο (Henderson 1995, 161), ενώ άλλοι ισχυρίζονται πως καταγ­όταν από τη Γένοβα (Ballesteros y Beretta 1945, 168). Ο πρώτος έλληνας που έφτασε στην Αμερική ήταν ένας άνδρας γνωστός ως Don Teodoro (Henderson 1995, 161), ένας ναύτης και καλαφάτης πλοίου που υπηρετούσε στην απο­στολή του ισπανού εξερευνητή Pánfilo de Narváez.2 Στην προ του 1800 εποχή δημιουρ­ γήθηκαν ελληνικές εμπορικές κοινότητες σε διάφορα μέρη μέσα στα εδάφη γειτονικών αυτο­κρατοριών όπως της Αυστρίας ή και της Ρωσίας. Μέσω των οικονομιών τους, επέτρεψαν τη δημιουργία πλουσίων εμ­πο­ρικών κοινοτήτων των οποίων οι πολι­τιστικές και πολιτικές ευαισθησίες ήταν διεθνείς και των οποίων οι κινήσεις έπαιρναν μέρος μέσα σε ένα μεγάλο δίκ­τυο οικογενειακών, εθνικών, και θρησκευτικών συνδέσμων (Laliotou 2005, 85). Στην αμερικανική ήπειρο, οι πρώτοι γνωσ­τοί έλληνες μετα­νάστες ήταν οι 400 υπηρέτες που έφτασαν στην αποικία της 1 Οι περισσότεροι ακαδημαϊκοί συμφωνούν πως η αρχή της ελληνικής διασποράς ξεκινά με την Άλωση της Πόλης, πρωτεύουσας του Βυζαντίου, από τους Οθωμανούς το 1453 και την ύστερη μετανάστευση μεγάλου αριθμού ελληνόφωνων διανοούμενων από την Ανατολή στη Δύση (Laliotou 2005, 85).

2 Τον Οκτώβριο του 1598, ο Ναρβάεζ αγκυροβόλησε στα ανοιχτά της σημερινής Πενσακόλα (Φλόριδα) για να βρει φρέσκο νερό. Φτάσανε σε συμφωνία με τους ντόπιους ινδιάνους οι οποίοι επέμειναν να κρατήσουν έναν όμηρο μέχρι να μαζευτεί το νερό. Ο Δον Τεόντορο προσφέρθηκε εθελοντικώς να γίνει ο όμηρος και πήγε στην ακτή. Δεν επέστρεψε ποτέ στο πλοίο και πιστεύετε πως δολοφονήθηκε από τους ινδιάνους. Αν και η ζωή του Δον Τεόντορο έληξε τραγικά, είναι ο πρώτος έλληνας που γνωρίζουμε που πάτησε σε αμερικανικό έδαφος (Moskos 2009, 2).

Νέας Σμύρνης κοντά στο St. Augustine της καλά αντιπροσωπευόμενοι μέχρι και μετά την ίδρυση της Δημοκρατίας της Χιλής Φλόριδας το 1768 (Purcell 1995, 51). Πολύτιμη φυτική γη χάθηκε σε πολλές το 1810. Συνήθως ήταν ναύτες που για περιοχές της χώρας όταν οι έλληνες εγκα­ διάφορους λόγους παρέμεναν στα λιμάνια τέλειψαν τα χωράφια τους και πήραν τα και έγιναν μέρος χιλιανών πληρωμάτων βουνά την περίοδο της Επανάστασης (Peri Fagerstrom 1989, 168). Μετά την εγκαθίδρυση της δημοκρα­ του 1821. Μετέπειτα εξελίξεις πτώχευσαν περισσότερο την ελληνική επαρχία και τίας, στις 5 Μαρτίου το 1844 ο χιλιανός προκάλεσαν την μετανάστευση (Constan- υπουργός Manuel Montt εξέδωσε διάταγμα πως η ελληνική γλώσσα πρέπει να διδά­ tinou 2002, 93). Στο 19ο αιώνα η ελληνική διασπορά σκεται στο Εθνικό Ινστιτούτο “tres veces επίσης περιλάμβανε κοινότητες που δημι­ por semana y una hora y media cada día”: ουρ­γήθηκαν σε χώρες όπως η Αίγυπτος “τρεις φορές την εβδομάδα και μιάμιση ώρα όπου η κατασκευή της διώρυγας του Σουέζ κάθε μέρα” (Peri Fagerstrom 1989, 168). Επισήμως, η παρουσία των ελλήνων στη και η παραγωγή του βαμβακιού συνέβαλε στην εξέλιξη της ελληνικής παροικίας Χιλή καταγράφεται την περίοδο 1854‑1949 με τους παρακάτω αριθμούς: τρεις το 1854, (Laliotou 2005, 85-86). Δεν υπήρξε άλλη σημαντική ελληνική εννέα το 1865, σαράντα επτά το 1875, 109 μετανάστευση μέχρι τα τέλη του 19ου το 1885, 137 το 1895, 319 το 1907, 522 αιώνα όταν ένας μεγάλος αριθμός ελλήνων, το 1920, 674 το 1930, και 735 το 1949 μαζί με άλλες εθνότητες της ανατολικής (Naciones Unidas, “Extranjeros residentes” και νοτίου Ευρώπης (Purcell 1995, 51) 1950, Chart 62C). Ο συνολικός αριθμός έκαναν τη νέα μετανάστευση κυρίως προς των ελλήνων είναι δύσκολο να μετρηθεί τον Καναδά και τις ΗΠΑ όμως επίσης και γιατί οι εθνικά έλληνες ήρθαν τόσο από άλλες υπερπόντιες χώρες όπως Αυστραλία το κράτος της Ελλάδας – ανεξάρτητο από ή Νέα Ζηλανδία (Laliotou 2005, 87). Το τους Οθωμανούς από το 1821 – όσο και από 1864, για παράδειγμα, έλληνες έμποροι τους ελληνικούς πληθυσμούς που διέμεναν ίδρυσαν την πρώτη ελληνορθόδοξη ενορία στην Οθωμανική Αυτοκρατορία όσο οι στη Νέα Ορλεάνη της Λουιζιάνας (Con- Τούρκοι κατείχαν ελληνικά εδάφη (Purcell 1995, 51). Επιπλέον, ήταν δύσκολο έως και stantinou 2002, 93). ακατόρθωτο για τις ελληνικές προξενικές αρχές να πιστοποιήσουν την ελληνική Στη Χιλή και Τσιλοέ ιθαγένεια όλων όσων παρουσιάζονταν ως Δεν υπάρχει αμφιβολία πως ο πρώτος έλληνες στο εξωτερικό, κατά ένα μέρος έλληνας που πάτησε χιλιανό χώμα ήταν γιατί το υπουργείο με την αρμοδιότητα – ο Juan Martín de Candia, γεννημένος περί Εξωτερικών – δεν είχε λόγο την εποχή εκείνη το 1514 στην Candia (Ηράκλειο) στο νησί να φτιάξει κάποια μέθοδο πιστοποίησης της Κρήτης. Ήρθε κατά την διάρκεια (Vogli 2009, 105). Ακολούθως, η ελληνική παροικία εδραι­ της κατάκτησης της Χιλής το 1540 και ίδρυσε τις πόλεις La Imperial και Chillán, ώθηκε με τον καιρό και έφτασε σήμερα αφήνοντας απογόνους (Opazo Maturana τους τρεις χιλιάδες, κατά κύριο λόγο 1941, 86; Opazo Maturana 1957, 77; Roa y στην πρωτεύουσα, στην Antofagasta, και στη La Serena. Ένας από τους κύριους Ursúa 1945, 156, Nº 561). Οι έλληνες επηρέασαν την εποίκηση αντιπροσώπους του ελληνικού στοιχείου και τον πολιτισμό της χώρας χωρίς να είναι στη Χιλή ήταν ο πρόξενος Mustakis Gabriel

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που έπνευσε ζωή στη “Semana Bizantina”, οδηγήσουν σε μια περαιτέρω έρευνα στο ‘Βυζαντινή εβδομάδα’, και μια μόνιμη μέλλον. πολιτιστική δραστηριότητα (Peri Fagerstrom 1989, 168). Γενεαλογίες μελετημένες Δεν υπάρχει βιβλιογραφία που να καταγράφει το ελληνικό στοιχείο στη Juan Τσιλοέ πριν το 1900 (Zorbas D., 2010), 1. Manuel Juan: Παντρεμένος με María Helin. ούτε καν η Εθνική Απογραφή του 1865 δίνει κάποια στοιχεία για την ελληνική 2. Manuel Juan: “Natural de la República de παρουσία εκεί (Chile, Censo jeneral de la Reatin en la Grecia y residente en este deparRepública 1866, 12-15). tamento [de Achao].3 Παντρεύτηκε στη Και οι δυο μετανάστες καταγεγραμ­ Ρωμαικαθολική Εκκλησία στις 5 Νοεμβρίου μένοι στη Τσιλοέ εμφανίζονται στα 1855 στην εκκλησία της ενορίας του Achao4 μέσα και τέλη του 19ου αιώνα απλώς με την María Micaela Loayza (από το Achao. ως «εξ’ Ελλάδος» χωρίς περισσότερα Έννομη κόρη του Juan Francisco Loayza στοιχεία για τον τόπο καταγωγής˙ αλλά και της María González). ένας καταγράφεται ως προ­ερχόμενος από την Δημοκρατία της «Reatin». Είναι Killin κατεγεγραμμένοι να έχουν παντρευτεί 1. Anastasio Killin: Παντρεμένος με την σύμφωνα με τη Ρωμαιοκαθολική Εκκλησία Ciriaca Cutsñi. το 1855 και 1884. Δεν υπάρχει κανένα στοιχείο να δείχνει πως έφτασαν μαζί.

2. Cosmo Killin: Γηγενής της Ελλάδας και Η παρούσα εργασία συνεισφέρει κάτοικος στην ενορία του Ancud. στη σύνθεση και καταγωγή του ντόπιου Παντρεύτηκε στη Ρωμαιοκαθολική Εκκλη– πληθυσμού της Τσιλοέ και στην παρουσία σία στις 7 Απριλίου 1884 στον καθεδρικό Ελλήνων εκτός των συνόρων της χώρας ναό του Ancud5 με την María Suárez (από τους. Οι άνθρωποι αυτοί είναι μέρος της – την ενορία του Ancud. Έννομη κόρη του κυρίως άγνωστης – ελληνικής πολιτιστικής Lorenzo Suar και της Manuela Cárcamo). � κληρονομιάς, και οι απόγονοί τους ίσως 3 Μετάφραση στα ελληνικά: “Γηγενής της Δημοκρατίας της Ρεατίνης στην Ελλάδα και κάτοικος αυτής της [Achao]”.

4 LMA2, foja 180.

5 LMAn1, foja 181, Nº 433.

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Documentation LMA2 Front of book: “Jndice alfabetico del libro / de Matrimonio desde el año / de mil ochocientos tréinta el 19 de / Abril hasta el 27 de Abril del / año de mil ochocientos cincuenta / y seis. = (1830-Á-1856.=) / Jndice confeccionado por el Cura Párroco / Pbro. D. Germán Ampuero en el año 1931. / [signed:] Germán Ampuero P. / Cura Párroco. / Contiene este Cuáderno 1987 partidas en Jndice. / [signed:] Germán Ampuero P. / CuraPárroco.”, and then a seal that says: “PARROQUIA de SANTA MARÍA DE ACHAO”.

Book cover: “[Libro e]n que se Sient[an] las / partida[s] de Cas[a]Casa [mien]tos / que empies[a] en 1º de [Mar]zo / 6 / viene [illegible] / pres[illegible]io de Quinchao”.

Back of book, on a white paper, glued, and typed: “-A C H A O- / -M A T R I M O N I O S 5-2 / 1830- 1856-”. There is a numbering error: foja 61 does not exist, only as number 64; after foja 103v, the numbering repeats fojas 102 and 102v (that are called bis), after which it continues with foja 104; and finally foja 119 does not exist, because it is called 120.

LMAn1 Book without any front or titles, but saying on the back: “MATRIMO / NIO / L. / I / 1879 / a / 1888”. The record has an index, and covers the first marriages of the city of Ancud.

Έγγραφα LMA2 Στο εμπροσθόφυλλο: “Jndice alfabetico del libro / de Matrimonio desde el año / de mil ochocientos tréinta el 19 de / Abril hasta el 27 de Abril del / año de mil ochocientos cincuenta / y seis. = (1830-Á-1856.=) / Jndice confeccionado por el Cura Párroco / Pbro. D. Germán Ampuero en el año 1931. / [signed:] Germán Ampuero P. / Cura Párroco. / Contiene este Cuáderno 1987 partidas en Jndice. / [signed:] Germán Ampuero P. / CuraPárroco.”, και μετά μια σφραγίδα: “PARROQUIA de SANTA MARÍA DE ACHAO”. Στο εξώφυλλο: “[Libro e]n que se Sient[an] las / partida[s] de Cas[a]Casa [mien]tos / que empies[a] en 1º de [Mar]zo / 6 / viene [δυσανάγνωστος] / pres[δυσανάγνωστος]io de Quinchao”. Στο οπισθόφυλο, σε λευκό χαρτί κολλημένο και δακτυλογραφημένο: “-A C H A O- / -M A T R I M O N I O S 5-2 / 1830- 1856-”. Υπάρχει λάθος στην αρίθμηση: foja 61 δεν υπάρχει, μόνο ως υπ’αριθμόν 64; μετά foja 103v, η αρίθμηση επαναλαμβάνει τα fojas 102 and 102v (επονομαζόμενα bis), και συνεχίζεται με foja 104, και τελικά foja 119 δεν υπάρχει γιατί ονομάζεται 120.

LMAn1 Βιβλίο χωρίς εμπροσθόφυλο ή τίτλους αλλά με την επικεφαλίδα στο πίσω μέρος να λέει: “MATRIMO / NIO / L. / I / 1879 / a / 1888”. Η εγγραφή έχει ευρετήριο και καλύπτει τους πρώτους γάμους στην πόλη Ancud.

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Bibliography – Βιβλιογραφία Ballesteros y Beretta, Antonio. Cristóbal Colón y el Descubrimiento de América. tomo V. Barcelona: Salvat Editores S.A., 1945.

Opazo Maturana, Gustavo. Familias del antiguo obispado de Concepción 1551-1900. Santiago: Editorial Zamorano y Caperán, 1957.

Constantinou, Stavros T. “Profiles of Greek Americans.” In Geographical Identities of Ethnic America: Race, Space, and Place, Edited by Kate A. Berry and Martha L. Henderson. Reno: University of Nevada Press, 2002.

Opazo Maturana, Gustavo. Origen de las Familias del Antiguo Obispado de Concepción 1551-1800. Santiago: Editorial Zamorano y Caperán, 1941.

Chile. Censo jeneral de la República de Chile levantado el 19 de abril de 1865. Santiago: Imprenta Nacional, 1866.

Henderson, George, and Thompson Olasiji.

Migrants, Immigrants and Slaves: Racial and Ethnic Groups in America. Lanham: University Press of America, 1995.

Laliotou, Ioanna. “Greek Diaspora.” In Encyclopedia of Diasporas, Edited by Melvin Ember, Carol R. Ember, and Ian Skoggard. New York: Springer Science+Business Media, Inc., 2005.

Moskos, Charles C. Greek Americans. Struggle and Success. New Brunswick: Transaction Publishers, 2009.

Naciones Unidas. Consejo Económico y Social.

La immigración en Chile, (E/CN.12/169/Add.2), Montevideo: Consejo Económico y Social, CEPAL (Comisión Económica para América Latina y el Caribe); document presented in the Tercer Período de Sesiones de la CEPAL, Santiago de Chile (1st May, Santiago de Chile; 5th-21th June 1950, Montevideo), 1950.

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Peri Fagerstrom, René A. Reseña de la colonización en Chile. Santiago: Editorial Andrés Bello, 1989.

Purcell, L. Edward. Immigration: Social Issues in American History Series. Phoenix: Greenwood Publishing Group, The Oryx Press, 1995.

Roa y Ursúa, Luis de. El Reyno de Chile. 15351810. Consejo Superior de Investigaciones Científicas; Instituto “Jerónimo Zurita,” Sección de Historia Moderna “Simancas.” Valladolid: Talleres Tipográficos “Cuesta,” 1945.

Vogli, Elpida. “A Greece for Greeks by Descent?

Nineteenth-Century Policy on Integrating the Greek Diaspora.” In Greek Diaspora and Migration since 1700, Edited by Dimitris Tziovas.

Surrey/Burlington: Ashgate Publishing Limited/ Ashgate Publishing Company, 2009.

Zorbas D., Alejandro, and Nikiforos Nicolaides.

Valparaíso: Centro de Estudios Helénicos, Universidad de Playa Ancha, 2010.

ACADEMIA & SCHOLARSHIP

The Elgin Marbles Story

By George T. Karnezis

W

hen you enter the room in the British Museum that houses the Parthenon frieze, you can’t help feeling that all those clichés about classical art—its balance, serenity, and energy—suddenly become a necessary vocabulary for describing what you’re seeing. Perhaps I imagined it, but when I visited this room several times during a stay in London, even the lecturing docents seemed to be delivering their observations to eager listeners in more than the usual reverential tones. Somehow this permanent exhibit seemed a gift to the world, lifted into aesthetic space for quiet contemplation and study. Here was our inheritance, here we could understand Shelly’s observation that “we were all Greeks,” or Byron’s leap into the Hellespont and his heeding that fatal call to arms of those Modern Greek rebels against their Turkish oppressors. Focusing on one part of the frieze depicting so powerfully a resisting bull being led to sacrifice, we might even see, if we yield to the gentle expert voice on the Museum’s audio guide, the sculpture that prompted Keats’s image of “that heifer lowing at the skies” in his famous “Ode on a Grecian Urn.” Such an aesthetic experience would have been less possible in this particular room had it not been for the special generosity of a British millionaire, William Duveen, whose name graces this gallery, which he financed to house these sculptures, gathered together at last and properly displayed in their own

room since 1962. Properly, I say, because such a display confirms these figures not merely as artifacts worthy of preservation and exhibition but as works of art, deserving a gallery exclusively dedicated to them.

Duveen’s generosity might be considered a twentieth-century chapter in the continuing history of British affection for classical Greek sculpture, especially for these which, over a century and a half earlier, had been brought to England through the mighty efforts of Thomas Bruce, the seventh Earl of Elgin, and the eleventh of Kincardine, Scotland. Scotland, that part of the Empire so smitten with the example of Greek architecture that, in the nineteenth century, it mounted an effort, which ultimately failed, to reconstruct the Parthenon on a high hill overlooking Edinburgh.

Lord Elgin’s name remains as a label for these marble sculptures, which once adorned the Parthenon’s pediments and made up its interior frieze. There was, however, some unpleasantness surrounding the British Museum’s acquisition of these objects, some question regarding whether Elgin was not so much their savior as a thief whose “rescue” of the frieze also did considerable damage to the Parthenon itself. Any docent will grant that a “controversy” persists and that, yes, it is understandable that Modern Greeks are upset over the sculptures’ removal and plead for their return. British replies to their concerns are not wanting. For instance, in 2015 | VOICES

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his The Sculpture of the Parthenon, P.E. Corbett relates the tale of how the temple had been subjected to considerable abuse and even direct attack by fanatical early Christians until Lord Elgin, taking advantage of his appointment as Turkish Ambassador in 1799, allegedly obtained authorization to remove numerous pieces from the remaining structure, succeeding thereby “in rescuing a substantial quantity of sculpture, much of which had fallen from the Parthenon.” If you listen to the Museum’s audio CD, this rescue narrative persists when we are reassured that “and so the marbles came to Britain,” phrasing that might strike you as disingenuous in its suggestion that these works somehow migrated to England under their own power, and that questions concerning Elgin’s authorization and his clumsy efforts while removing them no longer mattered.

The story of the Elgin Marbles remains more complicated and interesting. It’s not just the fact that the very naming of these sculptures, as required by British statute (“The Elgin Marbles”) grants ownership of them to the country that so named them, and honor to the man who, if we follow one narrative, “rescued” them. For anyone wishing to look deeper into the question of ownership, we leave the hushed atmosphere of the Duveen Gallery and enter into the less tidy and more contentious world of history and cultural politics. In doing so, we can do much greater justice to the complex way that a tradition (in this case, Greek antiquity) gets made, and to how nations like Great Britain and modern Greece position or invent themselves and their culture by their relations with each other. In complicating matters appropriately, we can understand how art and its preservation in a museum, however much it seeks to enlighten and inspire us, can often involve questions that are not merely aesthetic. We can, if we wish, construct a sufficiently complex narrative about the Parthenon’s frieze, 130

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suggesting how such monuments do not simply “appear” as exhibits but sometimes come to be exhibited amidst considerable controversy, which has yet to subside. (One look at the website of The British Committee for the Reunification of the Parthenon Marbles provides us with sufficient evidence of the vitality of the contentiousness surrounding the place of these sculptures).

Here I can sketch a few lines of inquiry or themes that should interest students of both classical antiquity and of subsequent manifestations of “Hellenism.”

Let us return to Corbett’s book on the Parthenon sculpture. It begins with a reasonable caution: while we can “enjoy and appreciate” such art “without regard to its original setting … such an approach is needlessly limiting” if it ignores the original purpose of the art. Accordingly, Corbett offers us some background necessary for deepening our understanding of what such works can mean once we reconstruct the original physical and cultural setting that alerts us to their civil and religious function.

However helpful Corbett’s contextualizing of the frieze is, it does not prompt us to ask why these particular sculptures should have been of considerable interest, not only to Lord Elgin but also to his many competitors, especially the French. Answering this question takes us down some interesting roads in European aesthetic and political history.

Such broad contextualizing invites us to observe France and Great Britain vying for supremacy in Europe and the Mediterranean, both sometimes courting the allegiance of Ottoman Turkey, even though they could see that Empire was already showing symptoms of becoming “the sick man of Europe.”

Lord Elgin now enters this scene as an ardent admirer of classical antiquity, an art collector who believes that England’s cultural and artistic reputation could be enhanced if only these images of antiquity

could be carefully studied to yield those eternal principles for the creation of great art.

Had Lord Elgin known that Napoleon coveted these same statues for the Louvre and was so enraged at the prospect of Elgin’s having beaten his own emissaries on a mission to recover them that he would finally have him placed under house arrest and then ultimately imprisoned during hostilities between France and England, he might have thought twice about his “acquisition.” But it does not matter. Elgin finally succeeded, and it is hard to separate his motivation from his role as an international figure bent on outcompeting the French for this valuable material possession of classical antiquity, thereby claiming Great Britain as a more worthy curator and inheritor of classical art.

But that is not all. As Artemis Leontis’s Topographies of Hellenism makes quite clear, amidst all this competition, the Modern Greeks become those little known others who also assert their rights as inheritors. A short

tale is enough to illustrate how these people in the eyes of many, so bereft of a real nation, were hardly a competitor worth acknowledging. On one occasion, when an ancient statue (not from the Parthenon) was removed from Eleusis, a riot erupted. The Greek peasants regarded the work as sacred and feared that its removal would affect the harvest, but that does not matter. The statue was removed, and Elgin’s response as cited in Theodore Vrettos’s The Elgin Affair? “The Greeks of today do not deserve such wonderful works of antiquity. Moreover, they consider them worthless. Indeed, it is my divine calling to preserve these treasures unto all ages.”

As Corbett reminded us, it is important to situate works in their original setting. On the other hand, time passes and works continue to exist in settings, which, in the case of the Parthenon frieze, clearly no longer have any bearing on their meaning and value for some people, like those aesthetically insensitive Greek peasants. Instead, we have those

Detail from the Elgin Marbles

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wealthy Europeans who are granted privileged entry into such works’ meaning and, as such, claim proper ownership rights.

This tale is not atypical; acquisition of antiquities often meant not only their appropriation, but also the denigration of those people who, allegedly, had so devolved that they were no longer capable of understanding and appreciating the treasures of classical civilization that happened to exist in their homeland. Of course it’s worth emphasizing that there was no Greek nation as yet, so the idea of a Modern Greek identity, while quite real as an experience, had to be conceived independently of internationally recognized nationhood. For those Greek peasants, however, that statue clearly connected them to something from their past. But it was, at least from Lord Elgin’s perspective, a foolish, sentimental, and, it’s fair to say, wrong connection. Only those who knew better could determine the right connection. Thus the statue was removed from Greek soil and rests now in a corner of the Fitzwillian Museum in Cambridge, England.

As I wish to suggest, the question of who acquires, “owns,” and even names the Parthenon Frieze is best answerable by constructing a more detailed narrative, one informed by a deeper sense of history that can impress us with how the question of ownership is linked to world powers’ competing claims of entitlement and, indeed, their sense of themselves as chief characters in a grand narrative of western culture where they also compete as arbiters of high culture. Nonetheless, any Elgin narrative should also remind us that even his contemporaries had doubts about the legitimacy of his “acquisition.”

Perhaps the best-known critique appears in Lord Byron’s “Child Harold”, an attack that extended to others who followed Elgin’s example. Indeed, according to Christopher Hitchens’ The Elgin Marbles, part of Byron’s poem was so scurrilous it had to be excised 132

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from publication. But Byron remained outraged, and in his shorter poem, “The Curse of Minerva,” he seeks to separate the Scottish Elgin’s action from what a true Englishman would have done, imploring the goddess, Minerva (Athena), not to blame England as guilty by association: Daughter of Jove! in Britain’s injured name A true born Briton may the deed disclaim.

Frown not on England; England owns him not.

Athena, no! thy plunderer was a Scot.

Perhaps some final words from another of Elgin’s contemporaries, and cited by Hitchens, best captures what has been lost since the frieze was removed from its original home. They come from H. R. Williams, an engraver and author of travel books on Italy and Greece: “What can we say to the disappointed traveler who is now deprived of the rich gratification, which would have compensated his travel and his toil? It will be little consolation to him to say, he may find the sculptures of the Parthenon in England.” �

Further Reading The British Committee for the Reunification of the Parthenon. www.parthenonuk.com.

Cook, B.F. The Elgin Marbles. London: British Museum Press, 1997.

Clair, William St. Lord Elgin & The Marbles: The Controversial History of the Parthenon Sculptures.

London: Oxford University Press, 1967.

Hitchens, Christopher. The Elgin Marbles, Should they be returned to Greece? London: Verso, 1997.

Jackson, Donald D. “How Lord Elgin First Won – and Lost – his Marbles.” Smithsonian Dec. 1992: 135-146.

Leontis, Artemis. Topographies of Hellenism: Mapping the Homeland. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1995.

Vrettos, Theodore. The Elgin Affair. New York: Arcade Publishing, 1997.

ACADEMIA & SCHOLARSHIP

Greek Neo-Nazis Versus Immigrants

By Belica Antonia Kubareli

G

reece has a population of 11 million and has 2.5 million immigrants according to official statistics. Taking into account the gray numbers in the statistics, there must be at least three million, of which two million are people of color.

In the last three years, immigrants from India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Syria, Palestine, Iraq, Iran, and Africa have been paying between 3,000 to 5,000 dollars per person to be transferred on Turkish ships across the Mediterranean. Usually, the Turkish traffickers abandon them mid-sea close to some Greek island and tell them to swim. Needless to say, many are drowned. If they live, a Greek ship might help them ashore. There, they usually receive temporary assistance from the locals, while the police and the state turn a blind eye. (Social Care as people know it in the UK or USA doesn’t exist in Greece.)

Very rarely, some are detained in a so-called refugee camp, meaning either a derelict school or an open space with tents, without food, medication, clothing, or care.

They have been told that Greece is a paradise. Immigrants also believe that the Greek government will help them survive.

Some think of Greece as a mid-term station on their way to the UK, USA, Canada, or Australia. All of them become disillusioned once they move to the large cities: Athens,

Thessaloniki, and Patra. There, they fall prey to different types of mafia. Some become street vendors selling Chinese products, or cigarettes and perfumes; some work in restaurants or small home industries; a few resort to petty crime. Prostitution and petty drug dealing is often the only solution available to the youngest of them. Lately, the press has reported that newborn children of immigrants are being sold in the streets of Athens to Greeks for 3,000 Euros.

I personally witnessed the case of a seven-year-old boy who was brought to hospital after suffering multiple rapes. Nobody claimed the child. This is the norm: traffickers rent children out for prostitution; the parents forget the child. To cut a long story short, the child died in my arms. Nobody wanted to give him a proper burial. The Orthodox Church informed me that they don’t bury Muslims; the Muslims said they do not have a cemetery in the municipality of Attica-Athens, the Catholic Church was very sorry, but … Conclusion: the child was thrown into the hospital’s incinerator while the podiatrist and I improvised a prayer.

Later, I was informed that this is the typical procedure for thousands of John Does in Greece and Europe.

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with disgrace, and it’s a matter of pride for Greeks to never ask for help, either from fellow citizens or from the State. Additionally, official social work is hardly targeted at foreigners. I have often heard intellectuals saying: “Voluntarism should not exist; those who help immigrants are stealing paid posts.

Africa became a place of war because of volunteers.” This view is held by the majority of Greeks.

“We were forced to shut down seven schools, from which we also provided medical assistance. We taught approximately 500 immigrant students at each school, and our doctors treated at least 50 people per day.”

Volunteers are seen as rich, lazy daydreamers who have nothing else to do but care for the destitute. The mainstream left, communist, and socialist parties only started talking about immigrants fairly recently, during the previous to last round of national elections, but have yet to offer a tangible solution to the problem. The Orthodox Church has made statements (notably in June of 2012) that they are busy feeding the poor Greeks of Athens. “The State,” they say, “should do something for the black Muslims.”

Collectives, groups of activists who reject the mainstream left parties, do a huge amount of humanitarian work. None of us is rich, nor are we lazy. We all work, and we donate money to rent small stores, which we use as improvised classrooms to teach Greek and/or English, or underground storage centers, where we gather medicine, food, clothing, linen, and furniture given to 134

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us by people who care. We help foreigners deal with the incoherent Greek bureaucracy, and work with doctors who vaccinate children and adults and provide checkups to the sick who cannot go to hospital lest they are arrested.

Attica is full of ghettos nowadays. The stores we rent are in the ghettos. Apart from the actual volunteer work, we try to make the immigrants feel that somebody cares.

Some years ago, foreigners were the cheapest workforce for small industries and agriculture, and were welcome. Now, with the crisis showing little sign of abating (despite recent reports to the contrary), the media has brainwashed the suffering Greeks into believing that the so-called “illegal immigrants” are the cause of all their suffering.

This is, however, not the case. Though few and feeble, there are voices that have spoken out and shown that the crisis has little relation to immigrants. Luca Katseli, former dean of Panteion University (where politics, economics, diplomacy, and sociology are the main subjects), published a 10-year study which indicates that rural Greece has benefited greatly from immigrants; that their work increased production by 27 percent.

The same study states that only eight percent of petty crime in the country can be attributed to immigrants.

Nevertheless, since the onset of the crisis the Neo-Nazis (Chrysi Avgi, or “Golden Dawn”) have thrived in the ghettos. Even with most of their leadership behind bars, in the latest 2015 elections they won 17 seats, and were the party with the third most votes. Using slogans like “Greece belongs to the Greeks” and “Greeks are Aryans, not blacks,” or the atrocious “Hitler loved the Greeks,” they have managed to lure unemployed, uneducated people by serving them a scapegoat: poor immigrants, and along with them the volunteers. The fact that the NeoNazis own two TV channels remains largely

unknown. Who is giving them money to maintain these stations? How do they broadcast without an official license?

Part of their appeal is down to the services they offer Greeks who dislike the way their neighborhoods have been taken over by foreigners. It is a fact that in parts of Athens, adolescent prostitution and drugs are a serious problem. In these neighborhoods, Greeks rent three-bedroom apartments to 50 people at a time, yet few landlords have been arrested. Instead, the Neo-Nazis have become armed vigilantes, carrying guns, beating up people of color, and throwing Molotov cocktail bombs.

In the last years, they have ridden in on motorbikes, dressed in black and wearing black helmets, and have raided schools and surgeries founded by volunteers. It’s so easy to throw a Molotov cocktail through a glass window. Our places are very small, and the Molotov burns everything instantly. We run and hide while the men in black destroy whatever remains intact. When we first tried to call the police, their reply was: “Who cares about the blacks? Why are you working with them? Don’t you know they are Muslims?”

So we stopped calling. Besides, rumor has it (and there is a lot of material on record to prove it) that Chrysi Avgi has ties to the Greek Police.

During the final six months of 2012, we were forced to shut down seven schools, from which we also provided medical assistance.

We taught approximately 500 immigrant students at each school, and our doctors treated at least 50 people per day. We were also forced to close down three of the storehouses where we had gathered clothing, food, and

medication, because the Neo-Nazis threw Molotov cocktails that burnt them down— luckily late at night, when nobody was in.

Most of the doctors and nurses who worked with us fled, either to work with larger foreign organizations/charities, or abroad.

The teachers were terrified, and most were stalked, so they stopped any type of voluntarism. The court does not acknowledge us as representatives of immigrants. In any case, no immigrant dares to discuss his/her case openly. Those who still have a home-country to return to swarm the Ministry of Foreign Affairs asking to flee Greece; immigrants whose countries are in the middle of a war beg to be transferred to some other country.

We volunteers are seen as nutcases.

Chrysi Avgi is after us, too. They know where we live and they stalk us. Again, a mystery: who gave them our addresses? Some of us have had “accidents.” We have suffered broken arms and legs from motorbikers who never stopped to see what they had left behind. This is a trend. I’ve stopped going out at night, and when I do, friends always escort me. But they found me twice when I was out walking my dog, and thwacked me until I managed to run up to the Acropolis.

All over Greece, volunteers have stopped for fear of their lives. Even large organizations have lost personnel. Soon, immigrants will find ways to fight back the mobs and the Nazis. The intensification of violence is inescapable, and retaliation will follow. With Chrysi Avgi getting 6.9 percent in the latest national elections, and with the Greeks blinded by fear and despair while the media plays on people’s ignorance, life for those who keep volunteering will only get worse. �

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Children and Spirits Πνεύματα και παιδιά The Stories We Tell Our Children: 2006-2010 Οι ιστορίες που λέμε στα παιδιά μας: 2006-2010

by Eleftheria Lialios

C

hildren dream of placing themselves in books and surreal stories repeated from childhood; of escaping into fantasy and all that it brings to the imagination. These stories include good children and bad children. The children that surrounded Aesop, and his love for story-telling.

His epilogues always had moral lessons to help make life easier, and were free of the ugly consequences of lying, gluttony, and greed.

This series portrays these stories in a haunting manner by including my daughter, Violeta, who enters the story as a ghostly participant. By becoming a part of their history and myth, these memories speak to present day issues of overconsumption, entrapment, a lost connection to animals in a rural setting, as well as a need for play, rest, and most of all fun. The same stories were a part of Aesop's neighborhood in 6th Century, BCE. This work was shot with a 4x5 camera and a 2¼ camera, with double exposures on negative film.

These negatives were then scanned and digitally printed to 19x19 inches. The photographs of the children’s stories are found slides, bought at Central Camera in Chicago 20 years ago, and finally found a place within my work from 2006-2010.

Τ

α παιδιά ονειρεύονται να βάλουν τον εαυτό τους να συμμετέχει σε βιβλία και σουρεαλιστικές ιστορίες απο την παιδική ηλικία, να δραπετεύσουν στο φανταστικό και σε ό,τι εκείνο φέρνει στη φαντασία. Αυτές οι ιστορίες συμπεριλαμβάνουν καλά και κακά παιδιά. Τα παιδιά που περιέβαλαν τον Αίσωπο και την αγάπη του για την αφήγηση ιστοριών. Οι επίλογοί του πάντα είχαν ηθικά διδάγματα για να κάνουν τη ζωή ευκολότερη και δεν είχαν τις άσχημες συνέπειες των ψεμάτων, της λαιμαργίας και της απληστίας. Αυτή η σειρά φωτογραφιών απεικονίζει αυτές τις ιστορίες με ανεξίτηλο τρόπο, συμπεριλαμβάνοντας την κόρη μου, Βιολέτα, που εισέρχεται στην ιστορία σαν συμμέτοχοςφάντασμα. Με το να γίνουν κομμάτι της ιστορίας και του μύθου, αυτές οι αναμνήσεις μιλούν για τα σύγχρονα προβλήματα της υπερκατανάλωσης, της παγίδευσης, της χαμένης επαφής με τα ζώα σε ένα αγροτικό περιβάλλον καθώς επίσης και για την ανάγκη για παιχνίδι, ξεκούραση και πάνω από όλα διασκέδαση. Οι ίδιες ιστορίες ήταν μέρος της γειτονιάς του Αισώπου, τον 6ο αιώνα Π.Χ. Για αυτή τη δουλειά, χρησιμοποιήθηκαν μια κάμερα 4x5 και μια κάμερα 2¼, με διπλοέκθεση σε αρνητικό φίλμ. Ύστερα, αυτά τα αρνητικά σαρρώθηκαν και τυπώθηκαν ψηφιακά σε διαστάσεις 19x19. Οι φωτογραφίες των ιστοριών των παιδιών είναι διαφάνειες που αγοράστηκαν πριν 20 χρόνια στο Central Camera του Σικάγο και επιτέλους βρήκαν μια θέση στη δουλειά μου, από το 2006 έως το 2010.

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Watering Flowers – Ποτίζοντας λουλούδια (2006) Looking Out for the Carnival People – Προσέχοντας για τους Καρναβαλιστές (2009)

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Running with the Chicken and the Pigs – Τρέχοντας με το κοτόπουλο και τα γουρούνια (2007) Three Blind Mice – Τρία τυφλά ποντίκια (2007)

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Stop In The Name Of Goldilocks – Για όνομα της Χρυσομαλλούσας, σταμάτα! (2008) Put Her in a Pumpkin Shell – Βάλτην σε μια κούφια κολοκύθα (2008)

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Sleepy and Winky – Υπναρούλης και Γουίνκι (2008) Little And Big Miss Muffetts – Η μικρή και μεγάλη Μις Μάφετ (2007)

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Time For Bedtime Reading – Ωρα για το παραμύθι πριν τον ύπνο (2006) Bowling In The Winter – Μπόουλινγκ τον χειμώνα (2006)

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Snow White In Thessaloniki – Χιονάτη στη Θεσσαλονίκη (2006) Spanky and the Well – Ο Σπάνκι και το πιγάδι (2006)

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Surprised Red Riding Hood – Ξαφνιασμένη Κοκκινοσκουφίτσα (2008) Rub-A-Dub-Dub – Τρίψιμο στην μπανιέρα (2009)

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Catching the Falling Of Jill – Προλαβαίνοντας την πτώση της Τζίλ (2008) Little Jack Horner in the Corner – Ο μικρός Τζακ Χόρνερ στην γωνία (2007)

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Sleeping With The Fairies – Κοιμισμένος με τις νεράιδες (2008) Old Woman Who Had So Many Kids – Ηλικιωμένη κυρία που είχε πολλά παιδιά (2010)

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BIOGRAPHY

Panagiota Christo Kockos: A Biographical Sketch

By George Peter Daskerolis Edited By John B. Vlahos

P

anagiota Christovergi was born in the village of Gallimi, situated on the island of Maramara, on August 15, 1898. She was the youngest of three children born to John and Fotini (née Savva) Christovergi, who were natives of the village and whose marriage had been arranged in typical fashion, by proxenia (arranged marriage). Panagiota’s brother George was three, and her sister Sophia was one year old when she was born.

Hearing of other villagers’ progress in America, Panagiota’s father John journeyed to Tacoma, Washington, while still in his early thirties. He had learned furniture making in Constantinople, and hoped to find work as a carpenter in Tacoma, which was fast becoming home to the largest colony of Gallimi-born Greek immigrants in the Far West.

From Tacoma, John went to San Francisco, which was still recovering from the severe earthquake and fire of 1906, and built what would be Panagiota’s first home in America: 884 De Haro Street in the Portrero District.

By the time Pangiota arrived with her mother and sister in 1909, the Christovergi home was standing on a double lot with a storefront and garages—though its location was unknown to the weary travelers.1

1 Young George had previously been brought to San Francisco by a brother of Harry’s, Eleftherios, around 1908.

An advertisement for the Themistocles, which carried Panagiota from Constantinople to New York.

The trip from Gallimi to San Francisco had taken five long weeks, during which time they’d been unable to receive news from John.

Fotini and the two girls had sailed on the Themistocles2 from Constantinople (presentday Istanbul) to New York, then traveled to California by train, arriving at the Oakland Long Wharf.3 From there, a ferry took them to the San Francisco Ferry Building,4 and finally a carriage transported them to Rhode 2 Later advertised as the first Greek ocean liner: http://bit. ly/1CkbJOO. 3 The Oakland Long Wharf, later known as the Oakland Pier or the SP Mole, was a huge railroad wharf and ferry pier in Oakland, California.

4 The Ferry Building, a ferry terminal on the San Francisco Bay, opened in 1896, the year Sophia was born, and was the second busiest transit terminal in the world until the 1930s.

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Island Street, where a Greek family lived who knew that John awaited their arrival. At that point, a young man named Chris Katon, who was to become a diary executive, passed by, and went to alert the girls’ father. Shortly thereafter, the Christovergi family was reunited at last.

Panagiota’s recollections are of a warm and open home life. Her father, who assisted the cantor at Holy Trinity Greek Orthodox Church on Seventh Street in the heart of Greek Town, often invited friends to dinner. There were other girls in the tightly-knit church community with whom they could spend some time after church, though theirs was a strictly ordered routine of home and school.

The three children attended a grammar school nearby. George went to high school while working at the Pappas Brothers nursery after school. Sophia attended Mission High School for a time.

Panagiota’s life took on a new dimension when she was in her teens. Harry Kockos was building up his dry goods business at California and Davis Streets in the old produce district when he heard about Panagiota from his brother, Assimakis. Following a meeting at his office, Mr. Christovergi invited him to call at the family home. From that point on, the parents took charge, and the arrangements were made. Panagiota and Harry were married on October 1, 1916.

By 1923, Panagiota was the mother of four children: Amanda (1918), Elaine (1919), Basil (1921), and John (1922). The newlyweds had moved from their flat on Broadway and Jones Streets to Oakland, where they could be near their friends, Nicholas and Helene Damianakis. After a year, they returned to San Francisco and eventually purchased a home in the Richmond District, at 4185 37th Avenue.5 Panagiota and Harry remained there for 37 years before

making one final move to Burlingame, California in 1956.

During the 1920s, Panagiota and her sister Sophia became increasingly active in the newly organized Greek Orthodox community of St. Sophia,6 located at Hayes and Pierce Streets. It was there that Diocesan Bishop Kallistos founded the Greek Ladies Society of San Francisco, Progress (Proodos), which was incorporated in April of 1928. Its purpose was to advance the ideals and interests of Greek-Americans within an American framework through the teaching of the Greek language at local schools after regular classes, as well as the Orthodox Christian faith in Sunday School.

The directors of Progress thereupon obtained a permit from the Board of Education and arranged to have Greek language instruction given at three or four public schools twice a week. Three teachers were assigned those classes: Mrs. Pappadakis, Mr. Pappas, and Mrs. James. The Kockos, Tamaras, and Previkalis children were among those who attended the classes. The Ladies Society raised money by hosting fairs and selling tickets at 25 cents each. It was hard work, but they felt it had to be done in order to preserve the Greek Orthodox faith and language. Eventually, in the 1930s, the classes came under the direct supervision of the parish council.

In 1939, during the presidency of Panagiota Kockos, Progress joined the California Federation of Women’s Clubs. Mrs. Kockos also became a member of the Presidents’ Assembly, which represented the different ethnic groups in San Francisco.

Progress may have been the longest functioning Greek women’s organization of its kind in the entire Far West. From the 1930s through the 1960s, its members presented well-attended dinner dances and

5 Tragically, the wife of Harry’s brother Andrew (Marika) passed away in 1918, a victim of the flu epidemic of that year.

Otherwise, they would have moved into an adjoining home.

6 Reorganized and renamed Church of the Annunciation in 1936.

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entertained a number of Greek officials. In doing so, Progress helped the local Greek community put its best foot forward and ease the transition from its Greek town roots to full Americanization.

Panagiota and Sophia were genuine pioneers. They took advantage of their American education and exposure to a wider social circle to become leaders who aided their beloved Greek community through a difficult period of growth and development. ďż˝

Author note: I conclude this brief sketch with a deep sense of appreciation for the time spent with Panagiota Christo Kockos.

In memoriam: John Christovergi (1867-1937) Fotini Savva Christovergi (1868-1965) George Christo (1895-1960) Sophia Christo Vasilatos (1896-1980) Harry Kockos (1883-1910)

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CULTURE

DNA

by Giorgos Neophytou Translated by RHEA FRANGOFINOU

Characters Mother (Around 60) Son (34 years old) Emilia Man (Voice only) Setting There is a bedroom dressing table with a mirror. On it is a photograph. MOTHER speaks to the mirror and the photograph. SON speaks to the audience.

MOTHER: (her face isn’t seen; only her voice is heard) It’s like a staircase. Like a spiral staircase: like the ones at Aunt Katerina’s, in the old apartment buildings. You could see them at the back. From the kitchen all the way down. Fire escapes.

We used to go there a lot, every other day almost. My mother would take me.

I’d run up and down the metal steps and get giddy. “Stop it,” my mother would yell out, “You’ll get your legs tangled. You’ll lose your balance. Watch out! You’ll fall. You’ll come tumbling down.”

It was not on those spiral staircases where my life got tangled up. That was not where I came tumbling down. I keep falling; always falling. How can I regain my balance? How can I escape? All I want is to go back—to the beginning—to the first step. All I want is to not get old.

SON: I grew up in the shadow of his absent presence, with the guilt of denial dictated by the logic of reality. Slowly but surely, time dissolved all false hopes. But I couldn’t make it go away completely and put my life on a normal road. Unlike my mother, I was not a prisoner of the past. I did not have a past with him. It was an uncertain—or rather unlikely—future that was keeping me captive. I could never allow the present to turn into the past. Time had to be kept firmly in the present tense up to that day. His absence united us. But the prospect of that day kept us apart. Like her bedroom door that I never dared to open when she locked herself in there for hours on end, I never dared to open her life.

MOTHER: The elixir of youth is love. Happiness. Don’t smile—I know what I’m talking about. I know. I read it somewhere. I read everything that has anything to do with this subject and not just that.

If you want to know how to stay young, don’t go to doctors or beauticians: read popular magazines. That’s where you get the best advice. They might be full of rubbish, but on this subject, they are experts. I don’t mean the advertisements. I’m talking about the interviews—the interviews with the stars, models, actresses, singers, that sort of thing. They know. They have to keep young— always young. Perhaps not forever, but for

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a long time at least, for as long as possible.

“Love makes me feel young, so I make sure I’m always in love.”

Headline. Big bold, letters, so that everyone can see. And underneath a photograph of an unlined face. Smiling. Smiling, without a single wrinkle. This eternal smile of yours kills me.

They never say how old they are, over 40 for sure. “Love makes me feel forever young.”

I’m in love too. Always. In the past, in the present and forever and ever … I don’t want to feel young; I want to be young. What I want is to stay young.

“I don’t keep late nights. I try to get to bed early. When I go out, I don’t stay out all night.

I don’t drink alcohol. Just water, just God’s good water. Water is the best thing for keeping my skin moist and fresh. Of course a good moisturizer helps too. And exercise. It is very important to exercise everyday. Apart from keeping my body firm, it helps keep the pounds off and sends oxygen to the body’s tissues to keep them healthy.”

What about when you stay awake without going out?

When sleep won’t come in your empty bed?

When the only thing that will get rid of the thoughts is alcohol and cigarettes?

They all end up under the knife. Well, why not?

As for me, I will end up there later, in future.

When …

You men don’t need it. Especially you, you haven’t changed a bit. Your face is wrinklefree, just two little lines at the corners of your eyes and two commas around your lips.

And that line across your forehead, deep as a riverbed, and a few barely discernible spots of grey on your long, old-fashioned sideburns. That’s all. You are exactly the same.

Unchanged for 30 years.

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Time flows through mirrors. I will throw all the mirrors away. Put up photographs instead, photographs of me everywhere. Time does not alter photographs. Photographs stop time.

They immobilize it at a particular moment, a particular day, a particular year.

That’s all I want, nothing else, to stop time, to go back to that day and freeze time there, to keep it waiting, as I am waiting. Fixed. Oh, God, how that fixed smile of yours is killing me, always the same—and you, always the same. There for 30 years, unchanged.

I hate my envious gaze.

SON: I look incredibly like him. Everyone says so.

MOTHER: You’re the spitting image of your father, the eyes, the nose, the lips, the shape of your face, everything.

SON: We didn’t have many photographs of my father.

MOTHER: Your grandmother had all the photographs from when he was a child.

They’re all gone. The same way everything else is gone. Homes, lives, people running to save themselves.

SON: My father was from a village in Kyrenia. My mother’s photographs of him began from when they got engaged. My father was grown up by then. My mother had them neatly arranged in an album. With dates and notes about where they were taken and on what occasion. We used to look at them a lot.

In the evenings, my mother would always tell me the story behind each photograph. It made her happy; she’d laugh with my father’s stories. She took one of the photographs, framed it, and kept it on her dressing table.

In it, my father was smiling for the camera; his hair was quite long, even for that time, he had long sideburns and a huge forehead. As soon as I was old enough to understand, I’d go in and sit at her dressing table and look at the photograph—trying to see the similari-

ties. I didn’t have sideburns, or long hair, and my hair fell differently on my forehead. No matter how hard I tried, I couldn’t get my parting to look like his. I’d place the photograph next to my face and stare at both of us in the mirror. I’d half open my lips and hold them frozen, fixed, like his smile. It was nothing like it. I wanted so much to look like him. I had to look like him. For as long as he was away at least, I wanted everyone to see him in me.

changed at all. You hardly look a day over 30.”

MOTHER: We live in other people’s eyes.

Our existence is confirmed in their gaze.

What time is slipping on is the creams and lotions, Michalis.

That time I ran into him again I must have been nearly … perhaps I was already … I don’t remember—I was around 40. And yet he said 30. Hear that? 30!

Then he said: “Time is struggling to grasp hold of your face, but he cannot get a hold.

He just slips away without leaving a trace.”

Slips away without leaving a trace!

It’s all about looking after your face properly.

Following the instructions to the letter and using the right products in the right order.

“First wash your face with cold water, to firm up the muscles. Exercising the facial muscles by pulling different faces keeps the muscles strong and elastic and prevents flaccidity.

Rinse with cold water and apply a cleansing “It’s incredible,” he said, “You haven’t changed lotion all over the face, rubbing vigorously at all—you’re just like the last time I saw you.” with cotton wool to slough off the old, dead I was 30 the last time he saw me, and he said cells. Then apply a good moisturizer and I looked exactly the same. You were jealous. after that …” three minutes of treatment That was why I never saw him again. What make time stand still. How many minutes would have been the point? You weren’t there will turn it back? anymore. It was your jealousy I was looking Don’t laugh. I hate it when you laugh. I hate for in his eyes, proof of your love. Nothing imagining it and hearing it ring loud in my else. Why would I have seen him? ears.

He did say it though, when he saw me after all I can’t see it—that’s what gets me. Do you those years. You haven’t changed at all. understand? What gets me is not seeing it.

What about you? What will you say to me All I can see is a fixed smile. I want time to after all these years? be fixed, not your smile.

“You have defeated time,” that’s what Micha- I want a miracle. I want you to step out of the lis said. No, no, that’s not how he put it: photograph. I want your smile to broaden, to “Time was defeated in the velvet threshing turn into laughter, to turn into words, feelfields of your face.” That is exactly what he ings, love, tenderness, worship, admiration, said: “Time was defeated in the velvet thresh- passion, love—mockery even, irony, saring fields of your face.” casm—anything—just to put an end to the Do you know what Michalis said to me?

You used to get annoyed if I so much as mentioned his name. Now even that doesn’t change your expression. I hadn’t seen him for ages. Years. I knew you didn’t like me talking to him, so I avoided him. I ran into him by chance—quite by chance.

Michalis always used phrases like that when he paid you a compliment.

frozen look in the picture, the beginning of a smile that never fully forms.

"No, it isn’t a compliment. You are exactly as I remember you from years ago. You haven’t

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ing, trying to imagine whether you’re still smiling. Are you? Will you ever smile at me again? Will you ever open the door and come in? What will you be like, as you are now?

Will your eyes shine? How faded is your gaze?

How wrinkled is your face? How big are the bags under your eyes? What is your body like? Straight? Stooped? Have you put on weight? Are you thinner? How desirable are you still? How much do you desire me still?

I read somewhere about a singer who used to wear wigs when she was young. She tied her own hair back with an elastic band. Pulled really tight to get rid of the lines around her eyes.

At 30, I wanted time to stop. Can it be done?

Is that why he said it? Have I done it?

I hate mirrors. There shouldn’t be any mirrors in the house. We should hang photographs everywhere. That’s where we should see our faces. The way we want them to be, at the age of our choice, always youthful, untouched by time. Touched only by a cloth to wipe away the dust. Time is dust, dust gathering on us. If I hadn’t wiped away the dust from your photograph, you would have aged with me.

I have not aged. No, I have not. Look at me.

It is your eyes I want to be mirrored in. It is your eyes I want to see me like this. I want them to say: Time has not marked your face. It is from your lips I want to hear: You haven’t changed a bit—when you come back.

I used to wear my hair up too. Combed it into a little ball at the back of my head, like ballet dancers. Even though I had a lot of hair, very thick hair. Not because of the “Wait for me. Wait for me even when the waitlines—I didn’t have lines in those days. I just ing becomes unbearable. Wait for me. I will liked it like that. I liked the style. You always be back, I promise.’’ made me take it down.

And I am still waiting.

MAN’S VOICE: (off) I like to feel it floodSometimes I wonder what I would do if you ing my face—smothering my breath when I had said: don’t wait for me, like you did somekiss you. Its caress excited me. times when you phoned and said, “Don’t wait MOTHER: I never wanted anything to come for me for dinner. I’ll be late.” between us. Not a single hair or an endless And I didn’t. argument. A game.

Now your lateness has lasted years—the I let it down myself later, when the first white years of my life. signs appeared at the roots.

I never said goodbye.

It’s terrible how quickly the white roots keep See you soon, I said, and take care. coming back.

I let it down later to hide the passage of time. SON: I never said goodbye to him when he left. My mother tried to stop him. She was Later. After you were gone. packing a small bag of underwear for him “It is hard to tell you are over 30,” as Michalis and she said: “Don’t go.” He replied: “Can’t be would say. He was in love with me. But you done. I have to. If I don’t go, if the next man were the one who got me, kept me, and still doesn’t go, who will defend our country?” have me.

My mother said: “It’s crazy out there. Where “It is hard to tell you are over 30!” Why didn’t will you go?” My father said: “Whatever is he say 35 or 40? At 40, a woman is still going on, we have to fight.” “Why don’t you young, beautiful, and attractive. And yet he wait until we know what’s going on? Don’t be among the first,” my mother pleaded with said 30. He said it several times. Why? 154

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him. She had a bad feeling and was looking with all the other children and one by one, for a reason to keep him there a bit longer. they would run off home shouting “Dad’s My father smiled: “I’m not among the first; home,” or when their mothers called out, a lot of people have signed up already.” My “Your father’s home.” Emilia always left first, mother started to cry. My father hugged and before dusk, before her mother called. Percomforted her. “I’ll be back soon,” he said haps it was a kind of childish self-protection.

“Don’t worry.” Then he turned to me: “Don’t Her father was dead. She knew he was not you worry, little man,” he said. I felt my lip coming home. My father was always going tremble, on the verge of tears. “No, no, no, to come home. don’t you cry now, don’t you cry,” he said. He I discovered the reason for his absence when took me in his arms, pushed his face into my I was six, during my first day at school. The tummy—he used to do that—and tickled me teacher asked us our names, our mother’s with his nose. I started giggling. He held us name, our father’s, name and what they both tight. He kissed me over and over again did for a living. As it was getting close to and started to leave. He stood for a moment my turn, I felt a strange sense of unease. My at the door, looked at us again, and waved father was away. I didn’t know what he did goodbye to me. I was in my mother’s arms, for a living. I only knew he was coming back wriggling, laughing, and trying to go to him. from somewhere. The teacher asked me the My father turned back, pointed his finger at same questions as she asked the others but me, tickled my throat and said: “Laughing only asked my father’s name and moved on are you, you little monkey?” That’s what he to the next child, a girl. Before she had a used to call me. “Laughing, are you?” Then chance to answer, someone else jumped in: he laughed too. He had a huge, broad laugh. I “Orestes didn’t tell us what his dad does for touched his teeth with my fingers. I was fas- a living.” The teacher placed her hand on my cinated by how white they were and by the head protectively and said “Orestes’s father little dark gap between his two front teeth is a missing person.” I had never heard that that I always tried to push my finger through. phrase before. We never spoke it at home.

He kissed my mother again, and said to me: That night, my mother explained what it “Look after your mother till I come back,” meant. and then he was gone.

After that night, all conversation at home My mother shouted out, “See you soon! Take acquired new content and the words acquired care.” new meaning. What is a “missing person?”

I couldn’t speak yet. I didn’t even say good- There are people who are alive and are with us. There are others who have died and will bye. not return. Others are away on a trip. They I know every detail of this scene. I don’t are somewhere; you can’t see them, but you remember any of it. I learned about it. I was know they are there. Sometimes they come one year old. back, and sometimes they don’t. Missing I grew up with a powerful sense of his person. What does that mean? How do you presence. The presence of a man we were classify a missing person? The silences grew expecting to come through the door at any longer, heavier with meaning, now they hid moment and embrace us, like all the fathers within them secret thoughts, which one of us who leave for work in the morning and come tried to hide and the other desperately wanted home at night. I always waited for him in the to discover. “What are you thinking,” became evening, when I was playing in the streets our permanent chorus. The stories in the pho2015 | VOICES

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tographs stopped being happy. I kept asking: (to MOTHER) And now? Where is he now?

MOTHER: Somewhere, he’s somewhere thinking about us.

We kiss. The sky is blue. Or it could be raining, a cleansing rain. Not a dull day, no fog.

Everything is clear. The crowd walks past, indifferent. And we are at the center. Two figures in an embrace—nothing can separate them now. And the crowd moves past, indifferent to our happiness. The end. It is a happy ending. With tears in your eyes, in my eyes, in everyone’s eyes, everyone who is tired of me, who is avoiding me, who doesn’t want to remember, to wait, all those who pass me by.

SON: But has he got photographs of us?

I could tell that the questions I asked or wanted to ask did not have answers. My questions were painful to her, so I tried to find the answers myself. We looked though the photo albums less and less often until finally they were put away in a cupboard. We stopped looking at them together. I retreated I could not pass you by. into myself. My mother retreated into her Perhaps that woman also stared for years at room. My father’s absence was now filling a photograph, a smile, and a face untouched the house. The waiting was not the same any- by time. more. The image of the return had changed. “Are you hungry?” That’s what I’d ask every In the afternoons, after our games, I would time you’d come home late, “Are you hungry?” leave together with Emilia.

I wonder what it is that I will ask you. Are MOTHER: I remember a film I saw. The you hungry? Can a plate of food wipe away man was away in exile. For many years, 30, all the years of your absence? Will that be 40, something like that. And then he came the continuation of the hasty breakfast you back. The woman stood waiting outside the ate before you left? Has it only been a few house. It is afternoon, a dull day; he stands hours? Will that be my illusion? Whether you there looking tired, tall, thin skeletal, looking are hungry? Will you say, yes, I am hungry, at her with a guilty look. She looks old, her what have you cooked? And then? Will I ask eyes filled with inexpressible sorrow. Bewil- you how you got on? How was your day? Are dered, her eyes are searching for the man who you tired? And you? What will you say to went away. They struggle to recognize the me? Will you look around to see if anything man who came back. She peers at him closely. has changed?

They look at each other for what seems like an Nothing has changed. Everything is just as eternity. “Are you hungry?” she asks him. Just you left it. The same table, the same chairs, three words of welcome, “Are you hungry?” the same plates, and the tablecloth always the Why isn’t our life like an American movie? same color, the same pattern. To the right is It all ends differently there. Coming home is the dresser, next to it a begonia in a pot. The different. You are at one end of the street, at a same. Nothing has changed. Everything is port, an airport, somewhere. You come closer. the same. I wanted everything to be the same.

I am at the other end, a few white hairs on our I kept it, all of it. Every last little thing! temples to indicate the passage of time, just a I still have the same clothes. And all of yours few white hairs on the temples. You might be are still hanging in the wardrobe just as you unshaven. I recognize you. You see me. I run left them. All your friends have got potbellies, to you. You take me in your arms. You lift me double chins. What about you? up high. Your arms are still strong; they can still lift me. You caress my face. My hands At night, I would lie beside your naked body, search for yours. We wipe away the tears. exhausted, happy, complete, I used to wonder 156

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… When my hands explored every inch of your body, I wondered what it would be like later on … How would it be when time had left signs of decay on you? Can anyone still love a body that is marked by time? Do the ravages of time destroy love? Does desire fade away?

I have no answer. I have not experienced it. I cannot say.

I waited for you. You told me to wait for you.

And I am waiting. You promised you would be back. You always kept your promises. I waited, even when despair drowned all hope of your return. That was my role. Was it a role I wanted? Did someone else impose it on me? Did you? We all have a role to play.

This was my role, to wait with a photograph in my hands.

Duty? To sit in the square every Sunday and say that I am waiting for what, for you, for news? Any news? Never! There has been lots of information. All of it written, scored on my body. My face! With each new piece of information—a breath, a smile of hope and then another stab of disappointment. Another line slicing across my face. More weight bowing my shoulders, a new white streak across my hair. Why does sorrow turn your hair white? Sorrow is black like darkness.

These are the things I want to say to you.

How can I say them when I look at your eternally un-aging face? I collected all the things I wanted to say. I feel guilty. I feel guilty because I see my wrinkled face, my white hair, and my broken body. And you? What have you suffered? What has happened to you? Are you alive? Are you dead?

No, no, you are alive.

Where are you living? How? Behind bars, in prison, in dank, filthy dungeons? Where are you? What is crushing your body? Are you hungry? There is always a plate laid out for you. The food is always ready to be heated up again. There are clean sheets to warm

up your body and my own warm embrace in which to wrap you. My embrace will be warm as it was then. I am … I am still 30 years old, just like when you left. Don’t look at me—feel me.

SON: At school, when the teacher asked me a question, I felt … I felt, I don’t know if that’s how it was really, but that was how I felt.

When she asked me a question, I felt all the other children’s eyes on me, straining their ears to hear what I was going to say. I was the son of a missing person, and everything I said had to be absolutely right. When I told my mother something that I had done or said at school, the usual reaction was: MOTHER: Well done! Your father will be very pleased when he comes back. Your father will be proud of you. That’s what he wants of you—always to be first. He will be very pleased when he hears.

SON: Happiness was always put off to some indeterminate time. When father comes back. Whatever I said or did had to be kept.

It had to be kept, for no one knows how long until father comes home to be told. All my actions had to make father pleased when he came home. The grief and sorrow we suffered alone. We never spoke of them. These we did not defer. I was sure that wherever father was, he was suffering. I didn’t know what kind of suffering he was enduring.

That was a vague mystery, something similar to ours. That was why only joys could be saved for his return.

Emilia always came to me during break-time.

We were not in the same class. She was a year ahead of me. I felt that being older, she had taken me under her protection, but protection from what? We often just sat next to each other without speaking. We’d eat our snack together, always close to each other, even during our times of silence. We never spoke of our fathers. She never spoke about hers, and I never spoke about mine. Until one 2015 | VOICES

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day—we were nearing the end of primary school—she said:

EMILIA: She says I shouldn’t talk to you about him because it will make you sad.

EMILIA: I’m going to get a new dad.

SON: I’m not sad, tell me.

SON: (looks at her puzzled)

EMILIA: She doesn’t talk about your father, she talks about missing persons.

EMILIA: My mother’s going to marry Uncle Costas. Someone at work introduced them.

His wife is dead too, but he doesn’t have any children. He loves me a lot.

SON: You’re lucky.

Pause SON: What does she say?

EMILIA: Why doesn’t your mum get married?

EMILIA: She says they’re not alive. It has been such a long time. They must have killed them all.

SON: I’ve got a dad.

SON: My mum says she’s sure he is alive.

EMILIA: What if he’s dead?

EMILIA: My mother says a lot of them are alive too. But Uncle Costas … Uncle Costas says there’s no way they’re still alive.

SON: He’s not dead, he’s missing; he’s coming back.

EMILIA: What if he doesn’t?

SON: He will.

EMILIA: My grandmother says that my mother’s luckier than yours. At least we know, so my mum can start her life again.

SON: I said nothing to my mother that night.

I could not tell her that the thought had entered my mind that if my father were dead, our lives would be different. I was ashamed because I had entertained the possibility that I could acquire a new father, that my mother could start her life again, and that we could rebuild our life. Emilia was my only friend. It was she who had approached me; it was she who had provoked our friendship. She never spoke of her father, and we never mentioned mine either until the day she told me that her mother was getting married again.

SON: Emilia and I never spoke about this again, but I did start to talk to my mother again. I told her that it was possible that father might not be alive and that he might not be coming back. She looked up from the homework she was correcting—my mother was a high school teacher. She stopped what she was doing and came up to me and asked me what I meant.

SON: Lots of people think that the missing persons aren’t alive any more.

MOTHER: What matters is what we think.

What is important is that we don’t write him off.

SON: Will you get married again?

MOTHER: What if your father is alive?

What if he comes back one day?

SON: I asked her if she was sure he was alive.

I broached the subject again some days later.

The thought was going around and around in my mind until I plucked up the courage and asked:

MOTHER: I am not sure about anything. I don’t know, and since I don’t know, I can’t be sure if he’s alive or dead. I can’t just write him off when nothing is certain.

SON: What else does your grandmother say?

Long pause

EMILIA: What about?

MOTHER: Would you like me to get married again?

SON: About my father.

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SON: What does she say?

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SON: I did not answer. I did not know what to answer. It was not a question of what I wanted. I was 12 years old and was just beginning to realize that her life was beyond my own sense of logic.

you dropped it again. Don’t open your eyes.

My love is on every step. Can you see it? My love has made this spiral staircase different from all the others. Come, come up higher with me.”

MOTHER: How can a life be rebuilt? How can someone rebuild it, with what tools, what materials? I’m not the one who ruined my life and should be remaking it now. Get married again? Find a new partner? When I was capable of deciding, I faltered. Now it is too late. I did not want to write you off. I did not want to replace you. You were here— I could see you all the time—you were next to me.

MOTHER: You took me up to the flat roof.

MAN’S VOICE: (off) “Don’t believe what you see with eyes wide open. The only truth is what you can feel, what you can see with your eyes closed.”

MOTHER: You told me that on Aunt Katerina’s spiral staircase that summer evening.

It’s only a fire escape, what am I supposed to feel, a spiral staircase like all the others?

MAN’S VOICE: (off) “No, it’s not like all the others. Close your eyes. Hold my hand.

Put your other hand on the rail, climb up with me. First, second, third step. On the third step, you missed your footing two years ago. Two drops of blood appeared on your ankle. There they are. Keep your eyes closed, so you can see them. Can’t you see them? I can still feel them in my heart. The 10th step is where you always stood when your mother called out for you. Twelve steps further up was your aunt’s flat. That was where you’d sneak one last look at me before your mother dragged you inside. It was on that step that you’d giggle secretly with your cousin, pretending you weren’t looking at me. That was where you dropped the slide from your hair as well. Six steps down, that was where I stretched out my hand to hand it to you.

There was no need to, you said, pretending you didn’t care; I’d have got it myself. And

MAN’S VOICE: (off) It’s not a roof—we’re in the sky.

MOTHER: It’s a dirty roof, I said.

MAN’S VOICE: (off) “Close your eyes.”

MOTHER: I closed them. I received your first kiss. I flew with you to your truth.

Where are you flying now? What skies will you come back from? Don’t look at me when you come back. Don’t look with open eyes at the truth of time. Just feel the truth I want you to see. Feel my flame—the flame, which for 30 years has been raging every night in my empty bed. It won’t go out. It burns me. I am young. Feel me—young, like you in the photograph. I don’t know what I will see when you knock on the door. What will you be like? Young? Old? Laughing? Miserable? Will your hair be gray? Will you be fit?

Will you be crippled? Has my absence bowed your shoulders? What are you like? What will I see? How will I recognize you? Come back.

Come back with whatever picture time has painted on you. I am not afraid of that. The only thing I am afraid of is what you will see.

What is the truth? Is it the one we wanted?

The one we dreamt of? I am the truth. This is the reality here. Carved out day by day.

MAN’S VOICE: (off) “I want to live my whole life at your side, to grow old with you.

I want to live a whole life with you, a whole life, so I can remember it. To remind you and thank you for every moment you gave me.

When we grow old together, I want to hold your hand and remind you of our first kiss, our first love, our first child, the first line on your face, the first signs of gray in your hair.

To remind you of our sorrows and joys and

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tell you that if I could start my life again, I would want to live the same life with you.”

MOTHER: How much life do you want to live again with me? Which life? What would you remind me of? Waiting, that’s all I remember. Endless waiting. Half-finished conversations that always end there, when it … begins … what should I say to you on the night of your return? This is what I remember. Here. Here on my temples. Where I saw the first white lines. When two days had gone by without any news from you, these lines, here on my forehead, when the coaches were arriving with the prisoners, and I waited in the sun looking to find you among them. This is his photograph. Look at him.

Was he with you? Have you seen him?

“I don’t know. There were a lot of us. We didn’t see them all. I don’t know. We were all unshaven. Exhausted, faces change, I don’t remember. Yes, I think I saw him.”

You saw him? You spoke to him? Where?

“There was someone sitting next to me on the boat. He looked like him.” Did he speak to you? What did he say? What was his name?

“So many names. I don’t remember. I never saw him again. We were together, we were surrounded, and we ran. That’s where we lost each other.”

You didn’t come back. The weight of your absence hunched my shoulders. I was bowed down by fear. Why? Where were you? Where was your promise? “I will be back.” It was your promise that weighed heavy, not the words of the others who for years have been saying: they will be back, they will be back, and they will be back.

My eyes blurred, my lips tightened, hardened into a line as I watched those who had sent you to your fate walking among us—alive, present, and unaware.

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stories. I was now in high school, and it was easier to make inquiries. Emilia remained my faithful companion. We spent hours sieving through old newspapers, reports by people who had been there, statements by politicians, reports by committees, and anything and everything that was in any way connected with the missing persons.

Emilia, my valuable assistant, provided the balance between a cold acceptance of reality as dictated by common sense, and the undying hope, which my mother’s face would not allow me to abandon.

The statements that issued from the mouths of the various officials meant nothing to me now. It hurt me that they insisted on keeping alive the hope that our people would come back, especially when I accompanied my mother on her Sunday sit-downs. The presence of strangers there upset me too—people who had nothing to do with our own personal drama. There was no truth in the words they spoke to us. They were just attempts to cover up what they really wanted to say. Spouting words they thought we wanted to hear. We didn’t—at least I didn’t—want to hear their false words of consolation. I wanted the truth.

Only the truth could set me free. I never shared my thoughts with my mother. There was no point. The illusion that he would come back was the only thing that kept her going. For me, the phrase, “establishing the fate of the missing persons,” meant putting an end to uncertainty. It meant breaking the chains that kept my life in a state of suspended animation. It meant no longer putting off my actions to a future time “when he …”—some future undetermined time— would it be soon, would it be in the distant future? No one knew. I desperately wanted to understand why it had all happened. Who was to blame, who should take responsibility and how much? I felt that only then would I find peace. I asked to see my father’s file.

Each missing person had his own file with

all the information that related to him. They refused. I was told that the files were confidential. My mother has not seen it either.

MOTHER: What’s to see? What can a file contain apart from the data that I have collected myself? I have spoken to all the people who had any contact with your father.

SON: Confidential they tell you! Accessing information about what happened to your own people! Examining the facts and trying to understand what they mean! Trying to come to some conclusion of our own! I did not give up. I kept trying. I finally got to see the file before I left for university. My mother and I looked at it together. It contained nothing of importance, but it did confirm what my own common sense had been telling me all this time. Everything pointed to the fact that there was no way my father could have survived the chaos of the war. But what my mother said was: MOTHER: Lots of people saw him alive. He is alive. He is hiding somewhere; perhaps he is in prison. He will come back.

direction. We took the opposite route. I never saw him again.”

Takis Themistocleous, Blue number 20.“We were all running away together to save ourselves. We got to an olive grove. It was quiet, and we sat down to catch our breath. We fell asleep under a tree. Suddenly, we heard gunfire. Someone was shooting at us with an automatic. We jumped up and started to run.

I do not know if he ran too. I never saw him again.’’ No one ever saw you again.

The first page in your file as a missing person is mine. Blue number 1: “My husband, Giorgos Demetriades, left our house at 10 Venizelos Street on July 20, 1974 at approximately 11:00 a.m. to enlist in the army following an announcement by the government, which was formed after the coup, issuing general mobilization orders to all Greek male reserves. On the following day, July 21, at approximately 10:00 a.m., he telephoned to tell me that he was well and that I should not worry. He also told me that they would probably be transporting them to the Kyrenia district in order to fight off the Turkish invasion. Since then, he has shown no signs of life, and I never saw him again.”

MOTHER: You have all been turned into files. File 165. File 307. File 1619. Things are simpler that way. Painless. It is not hard to say, “File 163 is closed.” There is no pain in These are not my words. Don’t laugh—the that. Files can be dealt with, but lives cannot policeman wrote them. He heard what I said be, even when they are lost. Your lives have and then he drafted my statement. I could become sheets of paper in files. Numbered not be bothered to tell him that what he had pages in blue pencil. Blue numbers, each step drafted had nothing to do with you or me. I of yours has become a blue number. Blue never wrote you off with “since then, he has shown no signs of life.” How could he possteps in the darkness that engulfed you. The statement of Pambos Heracleous: Blue num- sibly understand that since then, you have ber 10. “We joined up together. Then they been giving me signs of life everyday—that I split us up. My platoon went up to Pentadac- see you in front of me every single day. The tylos; his went to Kyrenia. I never saw him time you left, the time we spoke was not “approximate.” All the things you said to me again.”

Blue number 15, Anastasios Ioannou of the policeman tied up in a neat parcel—“not Nicosia: “He was in my platoon. We fought to worry.” side by side. Then the cannon shots started. “Don’t be afraid, my darling,” that’s what Someone shouted ‘retreat.’ I saw him running you said to me; “don’t be afraid, my darling. with two or three others in an eastwardly Things are tough, but don’t be afraid; I will 2015 | VOICES

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be careful. Have I ever left you alone? You take care of yourself and the baby. I’ll be back tomorrow or the next day. When I say I’ll be back tomorrow or the next day, I will be back. Wait for me.’’ I am still waiting for you. What file would be big enough for all the days I have been waiting for you?

SON: I spoke to someone, one of those people who used to get up on the stands and orate when my mother and the others joined their silent cry to the silence of the photographs they held in their hands.

“My father is not alive,” I said to him. He looked at me with pity and condescension.

“How can you know that?” was his reaction. “I saw his file.” I could tell that he was shocked and bewildered. His sense of shock and bewilderment transmitted itself to me, and I saw a shadow of fear flitting across his eyes. What was he afraid of? Me? “Does it say in the file that he is dead?” he asked. It did not, but it was obvious. Anyone could work that out if they pieced the puzzle together. “You have to tell my mother,” I told him. “What about hope?” he replied. “What about their hope?’’

I looked at them. I saw no hope. All I could see in them was dumb, helpless despair.

“Why? Only Emilia heard my unanswered whys. Why? Why? Why won’t they tell the truth?

EMILIA: Even if they told them that their people aren’t alive, would they believe it?

SON: She was right. Now that the files and statements had been abandoned to the dust of self-deceit, what kind of logic could open their eyes? What truth could triumph over the false truths of so many years? How many people have said they had “seen” my father over all these years! With what bitterness and anguish had my mother seized on any crumb of so-called information! He had been seen chained in a dungeon. He 162

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had been seen working in a quarry in the depths of Anatolia, trying to send us a message with a fearful look. We heard that they forced him to get married and that he was living with a new family. So many lies told to us by officious committees and officers.

What truth could now be believed if spoken by these same lips? Only my father could convince my mother of the truth. Only my father’s return!

Soon after I had finished my studies, the agreement was signed and work began to locate and open mass graves on both sides.

Unknown remains, dead men waiting for someone to collect them. It was not hard for me to decide. I had to find my father.

He was there, and the only way to identify him was through DNA, a method that had only recently begun to be applied. I told my mother I had decided to give blood for DNA matching. It was possible that the unknown remains they were digging up from the graves that were being opened on both sides included those of my father.

MOTHER: I am not looking for your father among the dead.

SON: I did not reply.

MOTHER: You can do what you want SON: It’s unlikely that he is still alive and we have to accept that. It is common sense.

MOTHER: Whose common sense? Your father said he would come home, and he will come home.

SON: This is a kind of coming home too. Her eyes filled with terror and bewilderment.

MOTHER: You can do what you like.

SON: We never spoke about it again. I never told her when I went to give blood or what steps I took, or the negative answers I was getting when bones were being matched from various graves. Nothing. She did not want to know, and I did not want to add to her anguish. This was my decision. This was a

road I had to follow to the bitter end. DNA testing was the only thing that could give us a definite answer. But would it? That was the question that tormented me. The information on the graves was not always accurate. Time was now deepening my own anxiety. I was consumed by the fear that perhaps we would never know. The certainty I had been feeling was gradually being replaced by doubt about official confirmation which, as time went by, I was becoming more and more afraid might never come.

MOTHER: It’s like a staircase. A spiral staircase: like the ones at Aunt Katerina’s in the old apartment buildings. You could see them at the back. From the kitchen all the way down. Fire escapes. We used to go there a lot, every other day almost. My mother would take me.

I’d run up and down the metal steps and get giddy. “Stop it,” my mother would yell out, “you’ll get your legs tangled. You’ll lose your balance. Watch out! You’ll fall. You’ll come tumbling down.”

It was not on those spiral staircases that my life got tangled up. That was not where I came tumbling down. I keep falling; always falling. How can I find my balance? How can I escape? All I want is to go back—to the beginning—to the first step

it forms the means for the transmission of characteristics. The large DNA molecules are shaped like two long chains spiralling against each other. There are four protein bases: Cytosine, Guanine, Thymine, and Adenine.”

DNA. Deoxyribonucleic acid. Who discovered it? Who invented it? Four protein bases: Cytosine, Guanine, Thymine, and Adenine.

Is that what I have been waiting for all these years? Is that what has spiralled though the unknown to come to me? Is that what I have been imploring to come back? Is that what I am going to ask “are you hungry?” This staircase is unlike all the others. With eyes wide open, I failed to see the truth. Now with eyes tightly shut, what truth can I feel? I count the steps. There is no end. I do not descend the steps one by one. I am sucked up as if by a whirlpool in the ocean. It throws me up and hurls me down like a tornado. Whose hand shall I hold? Where is the rail for me to hold onto? I count the steps. With each step, I bleed. At which step will you bend down and lift me up?

“The deciphering of DNA has impacted on a number of areas of modern life. The sequence of the protein bases in series of three and the myriads of small and large variations in this sequence define the uniqueness of each human being. Analyzing this sequence, Which spiral staircases have tangled me up? which is transmitted genetically from one The first was ours—the one you used to raise individual to another, is an extremely relime up to heaven. The other one was yours— able way of establishing family relationships.” that hurled me into a dark pit. Two twisted perpendicular metal tubes make up the first. I don’t want this testing of yours. I don’t want Each step a sheet of metal. Steps I would these results. I don’t want a bundle of bones climb one by one, to follow your dream. The to knock on my door. What will I embrace? other, an endless chain of chemical com- What will I kiss, your bones? Will your pounds eternally spiralling. Phosphates and remains hold me tight? Will they lift me up? sugars, steps made of protein bases leading DNA. Will that define who you are? Does it me to your final loss. “DNA is a molecu- know the kind of life we had? What does it lar compound made up of nitrogen-protein know about the life I am waiting for? What is bases, phosphates, and sugars. It contains DNA, a coffee cup, a line on my open palm, the genetic information of each cell, and or a deck of cards shuffling my life?

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The cytosines and thymines will not establish your identity. Guanine and adenine will not identify my man. Even if he is unrecognizable, only I can identify him when he returns. In what sequence can you see his smile? In what order will you place the protein bases which will form his caress? On which step of your chain is his tenderness?

Which structure can express his love? You can’t find what makes him unique in any blood. Look in my blood. This is where he took root; this is where he haunts me. I have become flesh of his flesh. I carry him within me, and I will carry him alive, completely alive, only I, forever and ever.

MOTHER exits SON: Eventually the answer came. My father’s remains were found and identified in a mass grave on Pentadactylos mountain range. The first person I spoke to was Emilia.

EMILIA: Your mother?

SON: I never understood whether these words held a question or acceptance. She did not want to go to the Anthropology Institute.

I went with Emilia. On the way there, I was calm. In the lobby, they gave us all the details of how my father was found. Then they said we could go in. I faltered at the door. I was afraid. Emilia squeezed my hand. I went in.

His bones were on a table, laid out like a man asleep. All around were icons and oil lamps. It was like a small chapel. Next to the table was a box with his few personal possessions. On top, was a label with his name and age, 33 years old. I looked at him again.

The man who had come back, who was laid out on the table, and whom I was seeing for the first time was younger than me. Could he really be my parent?

I moved closer and looked at the tangle of bones, trying to see my father in them as I had known him from the photographs. I looked at him for a long time. Fearfully, I touched the bones of his fingers.

SON: I didn’t know how to tell her. I couldn’t pluck up the courage. I felt guilty. The sense “He died from a bullet,” the man who was of satisfaction and release I was expecting accompanying us told us. did not come. I had confirmation that my father was not alive, but what about every- I felt Emilia holding me as my tears began thing else? How did it happen? How did he to fall. die? Who killed him? What were the circum- I stroked his whole hand. It did not have stances? Who were the culprits? Who will the coldness of death. A gentle roughness pay? returned my caress. I looked at his skull. A EMILIA: You know all that, but you will large hole gaped on the right temple. Bewilnever be able to get that confirmed. There is dered, I looked at the man in charge. He lowered his eyes. “I’ll leave you alone for a no DNA for that. while,” he said, and left discreetly. I smoothed SON: My mother embraced Emilia first the few strands of hair on his head. I smiled when we went to her and told her as calmly at him. My father was laughing. A grimace and simply as we could, “They found father’s of laughter was frozen on his skull. The smile remains.” She hugged her and said: in his photograph had turned into broad, MOTHER: Thank you my dear girl. inexplicable laughter.

SON: Then she held me tightly and allowed I touched his teeth with my fingers. They herself to weep the tears she had not wept all were brilliantly white. The gap between his these years. front teeth was not dark. The light from the MOTHER: It had to be done; it had to be done. It is over now.

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oil lamps shone through it. Goodbye, father, I said and kissed his huge forehead …

Enter MOTHER. She is wearing black. She places the photograph center stage. A long, narrow shaft of light lights it. She sits on a chair stage left. SON stands next to her with his hand resting on her shoulder. EMILIA is next to him.

Am I to overlook all their crimes?

Earth to earth and dust to dust shalt thou return. Where is his earth? Give it to me.

Give me that too. I will fashion clay out of blood. I will mould strong arms, a broad chest and lips for one last kiss, for a last embrace.

MOTHER: Blessed is the road on which you walk today.

Who will give my soul rest, O Lord?

Immaculate art thou on this road.

My Justice, Lord … My Justice, Lord …

A sleeping servant am I as I walk on this blessed road.

Blessed is the road on which I walk today?

Where is the bright and peaceful place to which my suffering can escape? In what endless life can I banish my grief and sorrow?

I looked upon the bare bones and said “which is the righteous man and which the sinner …?”

Which is the righteous man and which the sinner, O Lord?

Forgive him his sins, O Lord.

Are we praying for you to forgive their sins too, O Lord?

Do we pray for forgiveness for all their knowing or unknowing sins, O Lord?

Am I to forgive all the sins they committed, O Lord?

VOICE OFF: Our immortal Hero, We are gathered here today to pay tribute to your heroic death.

You fell in the line of duty.

The burial of your remains will put an end at last to the ordeal of expectation and uncertainty.

We are here to bid you farewell and give a tribute of honour for your glorious death.

MOTHER: And me … What about me …

Who will give me back the years I lost?

THE END

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CONTRIBUTORS

Katie Aliferis is a Greek-American poet and writer from San Francisco, California.

Her poetry has been featured in Visual Verse, Silver Birch Press, Velvet Revolution Reading Series, and other literary journals and websites. Her favorite poems are Jane Hirshfield’s “The Lost Love Poems of Sappho” and C.P. Cavafy’s “Όταν Διεγείρονται” (“When Roused”). When not writing, Katie can be found reading, traveling, sipping mint tea, and enjoying time with friends and family. Find Katie online via Twitter (@KatieA_SF) and her website (KatieAliferis.com).

Despoina Anagnostakis was born and raised on Samos, a beautiful island in the north Aegean Sea. There, right by the royal blue Aegean water, she spent a happy childhood and teenage years. At 18, she went to the U.S. to live in Astoria, New York, a Greek community in the 80s, reuniting with her family, who had earlier immigrated there for a better life. She holds a BA from Queens College in Linguistics, and an MA from Columbia University in TESOL (Teaching English to Students of Other Languages).

She was an adjunct instructor at the New York Institute of Technology, and has been teaching English at colleges and state High Schools in Greece for about 25 years. She has been an examiner for K.P.G (State certificate for English) at all proficiency levels.

She loves writing poetry, a creative engagement for self expression for her during the past five years. She deeply values the works of O. Elytis, G. Ritsos and K. Demoula.

Odysseas Anninos was born in 1951 in Athens. He studied piano and advanced music theory at the National Conservatory of Athens and took painting classes at the School of Fine Arts with Professor Dimitri Hitiris. He later studied at a private school where he earned his degree in 1972 as a designer. In 1974, he presented the first projects in his gallery in Heliopolis Attikis. In 1980, he created Annino Design, a decoration and design office, which still exists and specializes in the areas of housing, food, and medical care center decoration. During the period of 2000 to 2004, he was the president of the Pan-Hellenic Association of Decorators (P.E.D) two times.

He is a member of the Bureau of European Designers Association and the International Federation of Interior Architects/Designers. During the same period, he was a member of the selection committee for the certification of qualifications of public IEK (education). Between 2002 and 2003, he taught interior design at IEK XYNI (Greek public schools). He has held solo painting exhibitions in Athens, Corinth, and Patras as well as many group exhibitions throughout Greece. In June of 2012, he presented at multiplex “Athinais,” his latest artistic creation titled, “Beekeeper of Angels” with works inspired by the films of Theodoros Angelopoulos. Having the acceptance of the Angelopoulos family, namely his daughter, Helen, the projects will be presented through educational programs in selected schools across Greece. The exhibition will certainly continue to other municipalities throughout Europe.

Jonathan Beale’s work has appeared regularly in Decanto, Penwood Review, The Screech Owl, Danse Macabre, Danse Macabre du Jour, Poetic Diversity, and also; Voices of Israel in English, MiracleEzine, Voices of Hellenism Literary Journal, The Journal, Ink Sweat & Tears, Down in the Dirt, & (‘Drowning:’ Down in the Dirt July 13) The English Chicago Review, Mad Swirl, Poetry Cornwall, Ariadne’s Thread, Bijou Poetry Review, Calvary Cross, Deadsnakes Review, and The Bichin Kitsch.

He was commended in Decanto’s and Café writers Poetry Competitions 2012 and is working on a collection for Hammer and Anvil. He studied philosophy at Birkbeck College London and lives in Surrey England.

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Annamarie Buonocore is the editor/publisher of three special-interest magazines as well as Voices of Hellenism Literary Journal. When not publishing, working on her novel, or assisting others as a freelancer, she enjoys computers, Toastmasters International, singing, activism, exploring California’s Central Coast, and painting.

She lives in the San Francisco Bay Area and has a dog named Aris.

Richard Clark is a writer, editor and journalist who has worked on an array of national newspapers and magazines in the UK. In 1982, on a whim, Richard upped sticks and left England, the country of his birth, to go work as a teacher in Crete. So began a love affair with the Greek Islands, which he frequently returns to. His books are a series of snapshots of his experiences on the islands he has grown to love. They are less travel guides and more travelling companions. The first, The Greek Islands – A Notebook, was published in 2011, followed by books about Crete, Rhodes, and Corfu. A new edition of his bestselling Crete – A Notebook was released in the summer of 2014, and a Greek translation of this book is in the final stages of publication.

Richard is married with two grown children, and lives in Kent in South East England..

Constance M. Constant, born and raised in Chicago, delighted in family stories when she was a child. Accounts about “the old country,” coming to America, the Depression, and World War II taught her about her Greek roots. After earning her BA degree at De Paul University, Connie taught elementary school in Illinois for nine years until she married and moved to Southern California. She taught GATE (Gifted and Talented Education) classes in the Palos Verdes Unified School District, introducing The Iliad and The Odyssey to fourth and fifth grade students while enriching their English vocabularies with Greek words. Appreciating that modern life had changed so drastically from life in the family stories she recalled, Connie wrote them down to preserve them. The result was her first book, Austin Lunch, Greek-American Recollections (Cosmos Publishing, 2005). Connie is now completing her second book about an American family trapped in Greece during WWII. Leonard C. Costopoulos, a native Chicagoan, has spent most of his seventy-two years on the city’s South Side. Most of his work experience has been in the field of secondary education, primarily social sciences, though he cannot forget the lessons learned in his youth during various summer and after-school jobs. Other lessons he has learned are acknowledged in the form of a BS in Social Sciences from Illinois State University; a MS in Urban Affairs from Roosevelt University, Chicago, and as a Vietnam veteran with an Honorable Discharge from the U.S. Army, 1969. He is married with two daughters and six grandchildren. He has traveled extensively throughout the world and seen many things. After more than thirty years in the field of education, he retired from the teaching profession. Reading and writing now consume most of his time … along with a little fishing with his grandkids.

Chip Dameron, who lives in south Texas, has published five collections of poems. His forthcoming collections are Drinking from the River: New and Selected Poems, 19752015 (Wings Press) and Waiting for an Etcher (Lamar University Press).

Toney Dimos is a fiction writer living in Paris, France. He graduated from the University of Chicago and is working on new works of fiction.

Akrevoe Kondopria Emmanouilides’s work (poetry, short stories, articles) has appeared in various Greek-American publications. In her youth, she worked as the secretary on the ENIAC project at the University of Pennsylvania and on the Electronic Computer Project at the Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton. Both machines were instrumental in the Birth of the Information Age, and author, George Dyson, mentioned her in his book, Origins of the Digital Universe. She was married to the late George Emmanouilidies and lives in a suburb of Los Angeles. Akrevoe plans to write more on the subject of Greek mothers and American daughters.

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Dan Georgakas is best known for his writing about Greek America and Greek film.

He is also an active poet. Two of his poetry collections are And All Living Things Their Children, poems inspired by Native American culture, and Three Red Stars, poems related to political events. Poems with specific Greek themes were first published in the legendary Athene and The Coffeehouse. His My Detroit: Growing Up Greek and America in Motor City will be published later this year in Greece by Oi Ekdoseis ton Synadelfon.

Sophia Kouidou-Giles was born in Thessaloniki, Greece and educated in the USA. She holds a Bachelors in Psychology and a Masters in Social Work. In her child welfare career, she served as a practitioner, educator, researcher, and administrator, publishing articles in professional journals. Her poetry chap book Transitions and Passages received recognition in a juried competition by the Contemporary Quilt Art when she worked in partnership with Deborah Gregory, an internationally exhibiting Quilt Artist. In 2014, her short story Life on Egypt Street won the ninth place in the Fourth International Short Story Competition and was published in a collection of short stories titled The Time Collection. She is currently working on a memoir and poetry.

Vicki Gundrum lives in Denver. She has worked as an editor for Simon & Schuster and as a journalist in Mexico. She is working on a novel set during the Greek Civil War.

Peter Hadreas has a BA in Music and a Ph.D. in Philosophy from UC Berkeley. He started teaching in the Philosophy Department at San Jose State University in 1986.

Before then, he worked several years playing jazz piano in New York City while teaching philosophy part-time at the New School for Social Research. He has published two books, one on the philosophy of Merleau-Ponty and the second a phenomenological treatment of love and hate, and many journal articles on topics in Aristotelian philosophy, phenomenology, philosophy of music, deconstruction, and the philosophy of economics.

David Halitsky’s poems have appeared in The Dark Horse and (The Rockford) Chronicles. When he is not hanging out in the Greek section of www.allthelyrics. com (where he met his co-author, Amethystos), he does software development to make a living and bioinformatics in the hope of making a difference. Amethystos prefers to keep his private life private, but he has let it be known that his homepage is http://apefthon.blogspot.com.

Calliope Iconomacou is a professional freelance artist from Athens, Greece. She comes from an artistic family, and she graduated from Vacalo College Athens Design in 1980 and Athens Superior School of Fine Arts in 1986. She has displayed her artwork in a number of personal exhibitions in various galleries in Europe, including Gallery Pinelo/Istanbul, House of Art Stavrakas Patmos, Gallery Lola Nikolaou, Agathi Gallery, Epohes Gallery, Museum of Minoritten of Graz in Austria, House of Cyprus, the Kydonieos Foundation Gallery, and the Challiot Gallery in Paris. She has also participated in group exhibitions, including one at the BP Oil Gallery in Brussels and another at the Goulandris Museum on the Greek island of Andros. Some of her other projects include illustrating comic books for the Olympic Truce Center and having her artwork installed in Athens metro stations.

Nick Johnson is a Greek American born in San Francisco, California. Nick has also lived in the Peloponnese, Elias, town of Gastouni, Greece, where he built a house and worked as a cabinetmaker. Currently, Nick lives in Pacifica, California. He is married, and has a daughter and four grandchildren. Nick has worked as a realtor since 2004 with Coldwell Banker in San Francisco, California, where he is honored as a top producer in the President’s Circle and has retained the position of number one agent since 2010. He is an accomplished agent in the sale and purchase of residential 2014 | VOICES

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and commercial properties. Nick attends Holy Trinity Orthodox Church where he is a member of the parish council and serves as a chanter. Though Nick has written poetry for many years, his first short story was published two years ago in Voices of Hellenism. For the last two issues, he has submitted some of his poetry and hopes the readers enjoy it. You can find Nick on the social media sites of Facebook, LinkedIn, and Twitter, or visit his website: www.NickKnowsRealEstate.com George T. Karnezis, born and raised on Chicago’s South Side, now lives in Portland, Oregon with his wife, Kristine. He is semi-retired, taught mostly at the college level, and is currently an adjunct professor in Portland State University’s English Department, serving as a mentor to secondary school teachers of dual credit college courses. He can be reached at georgetkarnezis@msn.com

Katherine Hastings is the author of Nighthawks (Spuyten Duyvil, 2014) and Cloud Fire (Spuyten Duyvil, 2012) as well as several chapbooks, including Slow Shadow/ White Delirium with New York poet Lee Slonimsky and Updraft, among others. She is the editor of What Redwoods Know — Poems from California State Parks, a publication that benefited the California State Parks Foundation, host of WordTemple on NPR affiliate KRCB FM, and curator of the WordTemple Poetry Series. Hastings is serving as Sonoma County Poet Laureate for the years 2024–2016.

Achilleas Katsoros is 38 years old and was born in Ioannina. He lives in Athens. He has published two poetry books, Trackers of Winds and The Surgery of the Inner Heavens which was translated from the Greek by Giannis Goumas.

Paul Kennebeck lives in Denver, Colorado with his wife, Filio. They love traveling through Greece, enjoying the culture (meaning food and camaraderie and traveling by ferry) and the cities (Athens, Thessaloniki) and the islands. Paul is the author of several novels.

Dean Kostas’s poems, personal essays, and reviews have appeared in Barrow Street, Boulevard, Chelsea, Cimarron Review, New Madrid, Southwest Review, Stand Magazine, Western Humanities Review, on Oprah Winfrey’s website Oxygen.com, the Harvard UP Web site, and elsewhere. He is the author of the following collections: Rivering, Last Supper of the Senses, The Sentence That Ends with a Comma (which was required reading for a course on alternative poetics at Duke University), and Celestial Rust. Also, he is on the editorial board of Journal of the Hellenic Diaspora, and he edited Pomegranate Seeds: An Anthology of Greek-American Poetry. He has taught poetry writing at the Gallatin School of New York University, The Columbia Scholastic Press Association, The City University of New York, and Wesleyan. Also, a recipient of a Yaddo fellowship, he has served as literary judge for Columbia University’s Gold Crown Awards. His most recent collection of poems, This Is Not a Skyscraper, won the Benjamin Saltman Poetry Award, selected by Mark Doty.

Dena Kouremetis, a professional freelance writer since the late ‘90s, occasionally breaks free from writing for everyone else and hones her skills telling stories about her adventures in life—especially those flavored by her Greek-American background. Her series of pieces (excerpts taken from her eBook Climbing St. Friday) within Voices of Hellenism deal with a year that changed her life—one spent at the American College of Greece (now Deree University). She has been professional blogger for Forbes.com, is an author, co-author or expert consultant for five books and speaks professionally to business groups about the importance of a polished online presence. She invites you to visit her website at communic8or.com.

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Belica Antonia Kubareli, born in 1958, is a Greek author of six novels and translator of more than 80 books. She writes in Greek and English, and her short stories, poems, and articles have been published. She studied theater and translation in Greece. In the UK, she studied Social Applied Studies M.A., did her Ph.D. on Social Criminology and a second M.A. on Creative Writing. She teaches Creative Writing in Greece and in the UK. John Kyriazoglou has a CICA and an Hon. B.A. from the University of Toronto. He is a business thinker, consultant, and author with over 35 years of international experience in Canada, England, Greece, and other countries. He is the author of several books on IT, business controls, and ancient Greece. His books are available at: www.itgovernance.co.uk, major world bookstores, and www.amazon.com. John is currently on the Board of Directors of Voices of Hellenism Publications.

Eleftheria Lialios has a Bachelor of Arts in Psychology from Wayne State University and a Master of Fine Arts from School of the Art Institute of Chicago. She has received a number of prestigious grants and fellowships for her artistic endeavors, including the Illinois Arts Council Fellowship in Photography in 2009, City of Chicago; Department of Cultural Affairs 2005; Arts Midwest 1990; Kodak Near-East 1987, and Fulbright Scholar Full Year Research Grant 1986, just to name a few. She has also been selected for several one-person exhibitions, including the Cloud Walker Exhibition at Zhou B. Center in November of 2008 and Mid-Career Retrospective Chicago Cultural Center 2005, Chicago, Illinois, again just to name a couple. Her work has also been selected for various group exhibitions, performances, and publications throughout the United States and the world. She has taught at various art schools and institutions of higher learning, including her alma mater, School of the Art Institute of Chicago, where she was a first-year student coordinator. She currently lives in Chicago, Illinois where she continues her various art, photography, and writing projects.

Thanasis Maskaleris was born in Arkadia, Greece and immigrated to the U.S. at the age of 17. He studied Philosophy and English at the University of Oklahoma, and Comparative Literature at Indiana University and the University of CaliforniaBerkeley. He has written original poetry in Greek and English, and has translated contemporary Greek poetry and prose extensively. Professor Maskaleris taught Comparative Literature, Classics and Creative Writing at San Francisco State University until his recent retirement. At San Francisco State University, he was the Founding Director of the Center for Modern Greek Studies and spearheaded efforts that led to the establishment of the Nikos Kazantzakis Chair in 1983. He has co-translated, into English, Nikos Kazantzakis’ Russia, and is currently working on a critical-biographical study of Kazantzakis (Kazantzakis and the Cretan Life-force). Professor Maskaleris has also authored Kostis Palamas, a critical introduction to the great poet’s work. His most recent publications are An Anthology of Modern Greek Poetry (co-edited with Nanos Valaoritis), and (just published) The Terrestrial Gospel of Nikos Kazantzakis: Will the Humans Be Saviors of the Earth?, which is an anthology of passages from his work centering on Nature and the workers of the soil—intended to inspire environmental action.

Sharon McNeil studied Art and Theatre at Lewis and Clark College in Portland, Oregon, where she spent time in Greece studying the language and culture. This experience filled her with a love and deep connection to the country of her maternal grandparents and continues to permeate her work to this day. Her most recent body of work is inspired from a return visit in which she spent time on the mysterious and overlooked island of Nisyros, where she spent three months of her previous visit. These paintings were recently seen at the Hellenic-American Cultural Center & Museum of Oregon and SW Washington. More of Ms McNeil’s work can be seen at sharonmcneil.com and at sharonmcneil.artistwebsites.com. Ms. McNeil lives in Savannah Georgia, where she teaches at the Savannah College of Art and Design.

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Peter McNeill is primarily a landscape and figurative artist. Relying on oil paint and various drawing media, he is interested in the effects of light, shadow, and more abstract inspirations in the observable world. He lives and works in Walnut Creek, California and holds a Bachelor of Science Degree in Design from UC Davis.

Giorgos Neophytou was born in Nicosia, Cyprus. He studied Veterinary Sciences at the Karl Marx University in Leipzig where he also did postgraduate studies. He worked for 30 years at the Department of Veterinary Services in Cyprus, reaching the position of the Chief Veterinary Officer. He retired 2007. In addition to his profession, he has written several plays and television shows. He has been involved in the theatre in Cyprus and other countries.

Nitsa Olivadoti graduated from Bridgewater State University in 2000 with a major in Fine Arts with a concentration in painting. Her visual work has been displayed in student shows, online, and in local galleries and cultural festivals. Her passion for creating beautiful art morphed into writing, a passion she had her whole life. In 2009, she began to focus solely on writing as she began piecing together the Cicada Series.

Cicada’s Choice was published in 2012 and Cicada’s Consequence in 2014. The last book of the three-part series, Cicada’s Closure is expected in summer 2015. Nitsa can be contacted at: cicadaseries@gmail.com. Visit her website for more information: www.cicadaseries.com. You may also follow Cicada Series on Facebook and Twitter.

Eleftheria Lula Ossipoff was born on May 4, 1936 to cherished parents, Arsanes and Anna Tamaras, and has an older sister named Teia. She was raised in the Richmond District of San Francisco and attended Cabrillo Grammar School, Presidio Jr. High School, and George Washington High School, where she held various student body officer positions. She was baptized at Annunciation Cathedral and was later active in GOYA and the church choir. After graduating high school in 1954, she went to work as a secretary. She continued her involvement in the Greek community during her working life by serving as Maids of Athena president and singing in the Byzantine Chorale, which Perry Phillips founded in the ‘50s. In 1960, Lula married her husband, Alexander Ossipoff, at the Annunciation Cathedral. After moving to Burlingame in the ‘70s, Lula worked for schools.

The couple has two daughters, Maria Anna (Andrew) Allen and Alexia (Richard) Kleinekorte. Lula and Alexander also have two loving grandchildren, Anna and Christian. She retired in 1998 and is an active member of Philoptochos and the San Francisco Greek Historical Society. She is happy to have her story in this year’s Voices of Hellenism.

Apollo Papafrangou is a writer of novels, short stories, and, occasionally, poems, from Oakland, CA. He is a 2010 graduate of the Mills College Creative Writing MFA program, and is the author of Concrete Candy, a short story collection published by Anchor Books in 1996 when he was just 15 years old. He has since written for HBO Films, which optioned the movie rights to his story The Fence from 2000-2004, and his fiction has appeared in the 1998 Simon & Schuster anthology entitled Trapped, and Voices, a collection of works

by Greek writers published in 2013 by Nine Muses Press, among other publications.

Sotirios Pastakas was born in Larissa, Greece in 1954 and works as a psychiatrist in Athens. He has published twelve volumes of poetry in Greek, as well as translations into Greek of Sandro Penna, Vittorio Sereni Unberto Saba, Alfonso Gatto, and many more Italian poets. For the past twenty years, he has been a member of the Society of Greek Writers, and one of 47 founding members of the World Poetry Academy mandated by UNESCO. He has participated in the International Poetry Festival in Sarajevo (2006 and 2011), in San Francisco (2007), in Izmir (2012) and many others. His last participation in Kalam le-l-Shabab International Poetry Festival was in Cairo on November 3-7, 2013. His poems are thoroughly contemporary and provocative as expressions of the lonely rage of Modern Greek sensibility. Pastakas’ articles on poetry and prose appear widely in magazines and newspapers. He is the founder of www.poiein.gr, an international website for poets, poems and poetry in 2001, and the experimental thraca-magazine.blogspot.com in 2013.

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Steve Pastis has written for the Valley Voice, Greek Accent, Custom Boat & Engine, Baseball Cards,Circus, Rock Fever, Mensa Bulletin, Kings County Farm Bureau Update, South Valley Networking, The Pop Art Times, Parenting Magazine, Cartoonist and Comic Artist, and Cool and Strange Music. His short stories have been published in Signs of Life and Gargoyle. In 1979, he founded The Hellenic Calendar, the longest running Greek-American newspaper in Southern California.

Pablo A. Pérez is a freelance writer who researches the history and culture of the Island of Chiloé, Chile. His studies include ethnographical, demographical, social, and genealogical aspects concerning Chiloé.

Harry Mark Petrakis has written 25 books that include novels, short stories, and essays. He has twice been nominated for the National Book Award in Fiction. A new memoir, Song of my Life, from which this section is excerpted was published by the University of South Carolina Press in the spring of 2014.

Andrea Potos is the author of five poetry collections, most recently New Girl (Anchor & Plume Press) and We Lit the Lamps Ourselves (Salmon Poetry). Her collection Yaya’s Cloth (Iris Press) explores her Greek-American heritage. Her next book, An Ink Like Early Twilight, will be published by Salmon Poetry this year.

Mary Pruitt holds a BS in Math and an MS in Electrical Engineering (EE/CS). She worked in the computer industry for 34 years, starting as a programmer, manual writer, and field analyst, then evolving to director of graphics hardware and software.

She spent 14 years at Xerox Corporation, and then moved to San Antonio Texas to Datapoint Corporation before returning to TRW in Southern California for 10 years.

After retiring from the industry, she lectured at the University of Southern California (USC) for 10 years in the Information Technology department. Growing up with the computer business was fun and enriching. As a volunteer, she chaired the Salvation Army Advisory Board in Redondo Beach CA; was a docent at the Music Center in Los Angeles (president from 2007-2009), and volunteered in the library and information desk at Little Company of Mary Hospital for 10 years. She is a member of the Daughters of Penelope; on the Metropolis Philoptochos board; and is a member of the Moms & Tots committee for the San Francisco Metropolis Strategic plan. Mary currently volunteers in the Education Division of the Music Center of Los Angeles and at St Katherine Greek Orthodox Church Greek school. Mary is a world traveler and enjoys learning. She and her husband, Tom, live in Manhattan Beach C.A..

Angelos Sakkis was born in 1946 in Pireus, Greece. He studied design at the Athens Technological Institute. He worked for a time as an assistant to the painter Spyros Vassiliou, and collected the material for Fota kai Skies (Lights and Shadows), a volume on Vassiliou’s work, published in Athens in 1969. He immigrated to the U.S. in 1970. He holds a BFA from the San Francisco Art Institute. His artwork has been shown in group and one-man shows and is in collections in Greece and the U. S. His poetry has appeared in the Ambush Review and Try Magazine. He has been translating with John Sakkis, the work of poet/multimedia artist Demosthenes Agrafiotis. Their translation of “Maribor” was published by Post Apollo Press in 2010 and received the 2011 Northern California Book Award for Poetry in Translation. Their translation of “Chinese Notebook” was published by Ugly Duckling Press in 2011, and “Now 1/3” and “the poem” by Blaze Vox in 2012. His translation of “When Snow Fell on the Lemon Tree Blossoms” by Leonidas Petrakis was published by Pella in 2012. His poetry collections Memory-of and Fictional Character were published by Zarax Books in 2012. He lives in Oakland, California.

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Irene Vasiliki Sardanis has a Ph.D. in Clinical Psychology from the California School of Professional Psychology. She was born in New York, and both of her parents came from Greece. Irene has been writing personal essays for the past several years.

She has been published in The Psychotherapy Networker, The Sun Magazine, local senior anthologies, and The Daily Planet. During the week, she volunteers at a local Senior Center where she sings jazz standards. She has been married for 25 years to her extraordinary husband and lives in Oakland, California.

Hara Siomou is a writer taking her first steps in the world of publishing. She was raised in a large, loving family and likes watching movies and reading books. She graduated from the Physical Education and Sports Academy at the University of Athens. Over the last three years, she overcame her doubts and inhibitions and started exposing her writing after attending creative writing courses. She recently received a published distinction in a Pan-Hellenic contest for Short Stories. She is now in the process of editing her first novel.

Lee Slominsky’s work has appeared in the U. S. in Best of Asheville Poetry Review, The Carolina Quarterly, Measure, The New York Times, New Ohio Review, North Dakota Quarterly, Per Contra and Poetry Daily, and has received seven Pushcart Prize nominations, and one for Best of the Web. In the U. K. poems have appeared in journals like Agenda, Angle, and Nth Position, and in Australia in places like Otoliths. His fifth collection of poems, Wandering Electron, which includes some poems about the life of Pythagoras, was published in June of 2014 by Spuyten Duyvil Press in New York City. Lee has read his poems in venues ranging from San Francisco to Athens, and conducts a monthly poetry writing workshop in New York City, Walking with the Sonnet. Finally, he manages a hedge fund with a special interest in companies who hire the developmentally disabled, Ocean Partners LP. Angelica Sotiriou is an international professional painter, sculptor, and art educator with a studio/gallery based in San Pedro, California. She received her Bachelors of Fine Art from California State University, Long Beach and a Masters of Arts and a Masters of Fine Arts, cum laude from the University of California at Los Angeles.

She has been exhibiting her art and teaching throughout California for over three decades. She is a sought-after artist in Europe as well. Her works, particularly her large narrative figurative bas-reliefs and large contemplative narrative acrylic paintings, are in private and public collections such as The Grinwald Center for Graphic Arts (LA), Kim Wang and Associates (NY), Linda Balahoutis (NY), Orange County Museum of Art, Terranea Resort (Palos Verdes), The Francisco Martinez Dance Theatre (LA), and Jerry Bruckheimer (LA). Angelica has been a featured artist in exhibits at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art, the Los Angeles Institute of Contemporary Art, Manhattan Beach Cultural Arts Center, Occidental College, the California State Universities: Los Angeles, Dominguez Hills, Fullerton; and UCLA, UC Santa Cruz, and more. An accomplished educator, she recently served as Associate Professor at USC, as artist-in-residence and public artist for the Arts Council for the City of Long Beach, and Angels Gate Cultural Arts Center. In addition, she served as consultant for Professional Development Programs for Los Angeles Unified School District, Los Angeles County Art Museum, and the Museum of Contemporary Art. Anastasia Soundiadi is a teacher-translator born in South Africa, living and working in Greece. She is a graduate of English Literature from the American College of Greece and has an M.A. in Comparative Literature and Literary Translation from the University of Essex, UK. Anastasia has extensive experience teaching English, writing and literature. Her love for poetry inspired her to translate a number of poems as well as short stories and plays in both English and Greek. She has also narrated various documentaries and cultural events for television and radio. She enjoys theater and film, drawing, music, sports, photography, yoga and travelling.

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John Basil Vlahos was born in San Francisco, C.A. in 1935. In addition to being a lawyer, a steward of the church, and a scholar, he enjoys the study of Hellenic art, history, literature, and archaeology—from ancient times through Byzantine and Modern Greek eras. He earned his B.A. and teacher’s credential at the University of San Francisco, then continued his education at USF’s Law School, earning his J.D. in 1969.

John was a member of the Cathedral of the Annunciation, San Francisco, for 18 years.

He held the positions of president of the parish council and chairman of the food festival. In 1994, he moved and became a member of Saint Nicholas Church in San Jose.

He was a member of the Archdiocesan Council for several years as well as a Member of the Diocesan Council for 15 years, and served as legal counselor for the diocese for 20 years. He has been a Member of the Board of Directors of St. Nicholas Ranch for the last 20 years and spent one year as its president. He studied Homeric Greek at Stanford University and is author of the article, “Homer’s Odyssey: The Case for Early Recognition.” He has done substantial research on the history of Greeks in San Francisco and has edited several biographies of prominent Greek immigrants. He actively sings in the St. Nicholas Church choir and lives in Cupertino, C.A. with his family.

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The Philosophy and Science of Yoga: The Power of Self-Expression 5,000 Years in the Making A book by Samya Boxberger-Oberoi ABOUT THE AUTHOR | Born in France, Samya is

a citizen of the world. She travels extensively and lives in the San Francisco Bay Area. Her academic background is in linguistics, literature, and languages. While earning her master’s degree at the University of South Carolina and pursuing her doctoral studies at the University of Texas, she held teaching and research assistantships. She fell in love with technology and moved to the Silicon Valley. She applied her academic knowledge to the software industry and became a successful software executive.

Burnt out, she traveled to Dharamsala located at the foothills of the Himalayas to pursue her dream of practicing yoga. While in India, she completed two Yoga Teacher Certifications.

Upon her return to the San Francisco Bay Area, she decided to share her knowledge of yoga hoping to transform lives. She continues to pursue her quest. This is her first book.

She walks the reader through the origins of yoga, explains the core disciplines and practical applications in the form of exercises, and circles back to the most ancient and influential thought.

Her aim is to capture the greater essence of yoga that spans 5,000 years, initially in oral traditions and eventually in written forms, in fewer than 200 pages.

The book is a thought-provoking, intellectually stimulating read that elaborates on the art and science of yoga in extensive detail.

The author brings credible personal experience and extensive research to the reader, making the book more fascinating than your typical book on yoga. The in-depth history, psychology, medical science, social science, and literary analysis makes the subject of spiritual yoga universal and encourages skeptics of all faith backgrounds to experience the far-reaching benefits of this practice that has evolved into a modern trend from ancient times.

It is a must-read for any individual seeking spiritual enlightenment, liberation, and renewed mental, physical, and spiritual health. – Annamarie Buonocore, Founding Editor, Voices of Hellenism Literary Journal

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“When you set sail for Ithaca, wish for the road to be long, full of adventures, full of knowledge.”

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ISSN: 2330-4251 LCCN: 2015903537