Easter in Kefalonia

(The following account of Easter in Kefalonia, Greece is adapted from an email I sent out to friends and family.)

I hope all is well, and that you are enjoying the first real days of spring. I am still in Greece, believe it or not....I still feel dazed by the whole idea, but here I am.

Thank you to everyone who's sent emails. I reach long arms across the ocean, or across the various countries of the European Union, and give you big hugs.

I have some days off school as it is Easter break (Greek Easter is a bit later than the "other" Easter. Why are there two different Easters anyway? Seems like this is something I should know, but I don't. *Scratches head and muses on knowledge either never acquired or long forgotten*.

I'm still teaching at the Salevris language school, and also doing some work on the side writing for an EFL book publisher, which has been interesting, and a creative outlet. I'm always a bit more sane with a creative outlet.

For Easter weekend I visited the Island of Kefalonia (Ionian islands). The family across the street are good friends, and good to me in a way that is almost saintly, and they invited me to spend a few days at their summer house. The maternal branch of the family (Zenia's side) has roots in Kefalonia; they worked in the navy and on various ships, which is quite typical of many people of Kefalonia, so I'm told.

Now I will tell you about Easter on Kefalonia. If you wish to see more photos, go to http://www.flickr.com/photos/trionatrog/
Click on the Islands of Greece album. In addition, the Greece and Environs album has some more photos of the Nea Victoria at Piraeus, and there's a few leftover photos of London and Greenwich in the England album.

Kefalonia is a big island, with many beaches/historic sites/villages. I just saw a corner of it. What set the mood for me are the steep mountains and giant Cliffs that slice the sea. The drive from the port town of Sami to the village of Assos, where I stayed, is exhilarating and hair-raising. The (narrow) road is cut out of the side of the mountain, and it's a hour of hairpins and switchbacks. A long way down is the incredible blue and turquoise sea. Rigas, (Zenia's 14 yrs son and my travelling companion) told a cheerful story about a boy who fell down one of the cliffs. The villages went in a boat to look for him, or what might be left of him, but all they found was very tiny pieces, like the tip of one finger.

The steep mountains and cliffs give the island a mood that is both inspiring and foreboding. Before descending to the village, I felt like a prophet who had ascended the mountain on a pilgrimage. Once you go down into the village, it feels like you are in the navel of the island. Assos (pop. approx 50-100) is on the edge of a bay, which is formed by another islet that is joined to the main island by a narrow strip of land, like a cojoined twin. The 16th Century Assos castle is on the small islet. It was built to help defend the island from Pirates.

There's a rocky little beach, which does fine for swimming, as well as tavernas by the sea. The owner of the one where I went married a Russian woman, and the family would chat away to each other in Russian. They were very nice. The other people I got to know were Katerina's family. They run the local market, and her husband drives a taxi. They have 3 children, Maria (in her 20s, I talked w/ her a lot), and Costas and Spiros (friends of Rigas). I'm not sure what the rest of the villagers do, but they seem happy doing it. There's a harmony about the place that suggests the people have learned to live with nature, with their history and with the need to balance old and new, comings and goings.

I set out to explore the second day I was there, and started with the Assos castle. The walk up to the castle give you a great view of the village and surrounding mountains.

The ruins take up most of the adjoined islet, but there is not too much left and most of the space is full of trees and wildflowers in brilliant colours. The ground looked like someone had thrown a purple and red and yellow afghan down on it. The silence was overwhelming. In the middle there is a fairly modern structure that I thought might be an insane asylum, but actually it is a jail, abandoned in the 1950s. There's also a church from the 1880s that is still standing. I rang the bells as I went by - ding! dong! It sent chills down my back.

The castle is beautiful and peaceful - almost. Something about it also made me uneasy. An inexplicable feeling grew on me that this was not a good place - something bad must have happened there. Perhaps it was just the silence and my over-active imagination. I stayed a long time, and took many pictures, but when I tried to go back there a few days later I had to force myself to go in, and I didn't go very far.

History buffs can learn more about the castle here: http://www.agni.gr/kefalonia_travel_guide/kefalonia_exploring/assos_fortress.asp

If my Greek wasn't limited to a vocabulary of about 50 words, most of them pertaining to food, I would like to ask the locals for more stories about the place. Kefalonia has a fascinating history, with a lot of conflict. One part of it was the inspiration for the book/movie Captain Corelli's Mandolin. According to the website: "During World War II, in 1941, the island was occupied by the Italian troops which were allied with the Germans. In 1943, Italy capitulated and its troops refused to leave from Kefalonia. As a punishment, the German forces killed more than 5000 Italian soldiers."

More Kefalonia history here:
http://www.kefaloniatravel.com/kefalonia_cephalonia_history.html


Back in the land of the living, I had a good time swimming. About a 10 minute swim across the bay is a cave you can swim right into. Oooh! There are a lot of caves along the coast of the island. I wanted to explore some of those that are accessible only by water, but decided against swimming too far because the water was still quite cold, and if I got stranded anywhere along the coast it would be quite useless to call for help, or for anyone to reach me except by boat, since the beaches are enclosed by giant cliffs.

The next interesting thing I experienced were the Greek Easter celebrations. This was a first, and I am so glad I could be in a village for Easter. On Good Friday some of the young men from the village - well all of them, there aren't that many - carried the symbolic grave of Christ around the village. The rest of the people followed after them.

Midnight Saturday was the other religious ritual. Everyone from the village gathers at the church - it's a small village, they can all fit - where the priest does the Easter service. I was actually quite moved by the ceremonies, which surprised me, because although I have my mystical side nothing that I've seen or heard in a church has ever made an emotional fizzle in me. The Greek churches are not something I've wanted to explore, because the minute I stick my head in one I feel claustrophobic. But the little church in Assos looked friendly at night, with all the lights on inside, and people smiling and greeting each other. The rituals, which might have seemed archaic and slightly ridiculous in a city, seemed warm and spontaneous in a little village.

The service began inside, and then we lit candles and everyone went outside. The priest finished the service outside and officially declared Christ resurrected. The teenage boys set off fireworks - they look forward to this for weeks. Of course they were impatient to wait for the priest and they set them off early to scare people. But when the actual moment comes the fireworks are delightful. The rest of the people hug, kiss, and shake hands. Thankfully I got through this without setting anyone's hair on fire with my candle.

Easter Sunday is the end of the Holy Week fast, and by golly does it ever end. We went to Katerina's house where they roasted 3 lambs on a spit. It takes several hours and everyone takes their turn turning the spit. See photos. One of the relatives - I can't remember his name now - made it his particular responsibility to get me involved. So I had my chance to turn the lamb, which was fun until I somehow knocked the spit down and the lamb almost went in the coals - oh dear! It didn't though, and next time around I made sure my technique was flawless. Despite, of course, the boys who still had fireworks left over and kept trying to roll one under a chair or table when no one was looking.

One lamb is eaten while the others are cooking, on the go, and then *afterwards* is the real meal where the other two are eaten. Everything is delicious - of course, it's Greece! Still though, I hope I don't see a lamb again for at least a year. Rigas and his friends kept telling me, with completely straight faces, that if I didn't eat "everything" then people would be "terribly offended." Rascals... And when I complimented the grandmother on her homemade wine, they tried to convince me to drink the whole bottle....natch, I was too smart for that one!

Well, it was great, and Assos is a wonderful place to walk. It is very quiet and there is a local shepherd who has a flock in the hills. Sometimes the only sound you can hear are his bells (like the bells hanging over the stairs at home....for family and anyone else who's been in my house and remembers them).

This photo best captures the mood of Assos, Kefalonia for me.