May 2, 2017 by Effrosyni Moschoudi

Remembering my grandparents, Spyros and Antigoni Vassilakis

My mother was born and raised in Corfu, and her parents, Spyridon (Spyros) and Antigoni became in time like second parents to me. Way more than grandparents are, and not just because they have always been visiting us in Athens in the winter, but also because I got to spend 3-month holidays with them in Moraitika, Corfu, on their small home on the hill, mainly throughout the 1980s.

My granny, with whom I shared a very special bond, passed away on May 2, 2016. Granddad died a few years earlier, in on May 5, 2010. As a result, early May for me has become a time that inevitably brings me sadness, but somehow floods my mind with loving memories and fills my heart with blessings at the same time, too.

Having inherited my grandparents’ house in Moraitika, it was hard opening the door and finding an empty house inside for the first time after my grandmother’s passing. What’s more, I was burdened with the gruesome task of having to go through my grandparents’ belongings, deciding what was to keep, what to throw, and what to give to charity. The task took days, and it was a surreal experience.

Being interspersed with short bursts of summer holiday fun, it felt odd to do this too but, somehow, my mission was accomplished. At the end of my holiday, I had given loads of clothes and medical equipment no longer needed to a couple locals, who were grateful to have them, my husband and I had scrubbed dirty and moulded walls and ceilings clean, the house was tidy and aired after having being left uninhabited for a long time, and our minds were enriched with beautiful new holiday memories.

I share with you today a couple photos I took while sorting through my grandparents’ personal belongings. I found these in their aged bedside cabinets.

I quickly recognized all the items in the above photograph from old memories and was deeply moved to see Gran Antigoni had kept a couple of the handkerchiefs I used when I was little. The moment I saw them I remembered them as mine. Those among you who have holidayed in Corfu in the 70s and 80s may recognize the item in the middle as a pill box. They were all the rage in the 80s, being sold in many shapes and with various depictions on them in the souvenir shops at the time.

As for granddad’s things, the only item I didn’t recognize was the binoculars. They are dented, as you can see, and you couldn’t see much through the lenses, but he must have been fond of them as he kept them all the same. I can only imagine how many years he must have had them! As for the torch, Granddad had a few, and this one is the oldest I can remember and probably his favourite! It’s the one he used during our annual ‘pizza nights’ at the beach when the August moon was out – a memory that made its way into The Ebb, the semi-biographical novel I wrote to share my love for my grandparents with the world. Speaking of The Ebb, which is set in 1980s’ Moraitika, this is for my readers: Sofia’s dented fork is also real… and I have proof. Scroll down below to see a photo of it 🙂

Granddad Spyros, born in Moraitika in 1913, was one of the children of Stefanos Vassilakis, the priest and teacher of Moraitika in the early 1900s. Granddad never had an education beyond elementary school but his impeccable manners towards family and friends as well as his loving, giving heart were prominent parts of his character. During the forty odd years that I was blessed to have him in my life he’d always been upbeat, sweet and loving and I never witnessed him lose his temper or fight with anyone, not even when he had every right to. And believe me, in my typically dysfunctional Greek family he had many opportunities to act that way.

Being the son of a preacher, Granddad spent Sunday mornings sitting with a radio and chanting along to the priest and the hymn singers. He also chanted in the church with gladness whenever asked. As I share in The Ebb, he had an odd affinity for the TV remote control, driving Gran to a frenzy. Actually, all his eccentricities that I share in the book are true, and he was a man who loved to laugh and entertain others too. Near the end of his life, he kept asking us to be merry when he dies, saying he wanted people to laugh, not cry, at his funeral. I last spoke to him (on the phone from Athens) three days before his passing at the age of 97. His mind was crystal clear, his voice jovial, like a young boy’s. His answer to my question ‘How are you?’ was a hearty laugh and the typical answer, “Got to be here another day!”

Granddad loved a good joke. Once, when he was well into his 90s, we were sitting around the table and he was laughing his head off with his own morbid joke. He had recently paid the council for a family grave and had had it decorated with the marble top and cross, and even his own picture, ready for the big day! Apparently, a local had passed by and seen the grave and told another: ‘Crikey! When did Spyros Vassilakis die? I never heard!” Someone had told Granddad and he relayed it around the table, laughing heartily at the ridiculous notion someone had thought him dead, even though he had set the scene perfectly for anyone to be fooled! And that was Granddad. He had this wicked sense of humour that often annoyed Gran and led to those ‘fights’ at the table that always caused me and my sister to exchange glances and chuckle no end.

Granddad also loved to joke with his friend Andriana, a local woman, and mother of Leftis from Romantica. Granddad and Mrs Andriana had approximately the same age and often joked with each other, betting who would pass away first! As he lay in his bed towards the end, Granddad heard the church bell toll intermittently in the typical single strike that signalled a death in the village. He turned to Gran and said, ‘Andriana’s gone’, which was indeed the toll of the bell for her passing, but we will never know if it was just a guess or if he knew somehow. The next day he died too.

Above all Granddad’s delightful eccentricities, one stands out for me as the most endearing: he always carried a little plastic comb in his shirt pocket and loved for me and my sister to comb his hair when we were little. Ever since I remember myself this ritual kept going strong. When I stayed or visited his house in Athens as a little girl he’d sit on his armchair, pat his shirt pocket and give me a cunning grin. I’d then rush to him, take the comb from his pocket and begin to comb his hair for a long time, the longer the better for him, but it was something I enjoyed too so much that time just flew. Often, before I knew it, he’d be fast asleep while I did this, sometimes even snoring loudly! He’d often wake up a little later to find he had all sorts of plaits braided on his head with colourful plastic hair clips at the end of them. He had the softest, snow-white thin strands and to this day I remember how they felt in my hands.

Outside the house in Moraitika – early 2000s

When Granddad passed away in 2010, I asked Gran if she had one of his combs to give me. She gave one to me and one to my sister and we both treasure them. Often, when the going gets tough in my life, I take it in my hands and tell Granddad my troubles. It always helps me to soothe any kind of heartache or mental strain – the comb having been established as the ultimate symbol of his love in my heart and mind.

I was deeply moved and very fortunate to find these old documents in an envelope in my granny’s bedside cabinet last summer. Time had rendered them gossamer thin but the writing is still legible in most places and it’s been preserved quite well despite the dozens of humid winters. These documents were my granddad’s call to military duty twice: the first in 1935 and the other in 1945.

The document of 1935, when Granddad Spyros was 22, had him registered as a coffee shop seller who was assigned to serve as a telephonist in the Communications Corp (I translate all this to the best of my ability seeing I am not familiar with military jargon). The rules that were mentioned overleaf state that the person called to duty was obliged to appear on the date specified. It was also stated that a delay of one day in showing up would result in imprisonment, while a delay of two or more days would automatically declare the person a deserter, which was punishable by death, or a life sentence in prison if evidence was put forward for their defense. There was also a clear instruction in bold to treat the assigned post and the document itself as confidential.

The document of 1945 called my granddad to duty in Acharnes, Athens in September 30th, 1945. He was 32 at the time. The document listed the same kind of rules overleaf, although with less severity compared to the other document. It was also stamped in Patra in October 1945 and there’s writing beside it but sadly it’s impossible to make out what it says.

What I do know about granddad’s service during the war was that he fought in Albania and when released from duty he returned to Corfu on foot. I also know that in Corfu he was stationed in two places: the (Venetian) Old Fortress in Corfu Town and in the Palace of Mon Repos in Kanoni. In the latter, he served as a cook and rubbed shoulders with Greek and English officers.

Gran is pictured with one of her brothers and her father in Corfu town

Gran Antigoni was born in Lefkas (Lefkada) in 1924. Her father, Nikolaos Kopsidas from the village of Karya, Lefkas, owned two inns in the island capital but a devastating earthquake that destroyed many buildings in town, including his two businesses, forced him to leave the island and seek a new life for himself and his family in Corfu. Granny was about four when she moved to Corfu. Brought up in the ancient quarter of Campielo of Corfu town, she spoke melodically, her vocabulary rich with unfathomable Italian-sounding words dating from the island’s occupation by the Venetians. When she was nineteen, one of her brothers made friends with my granddad who was thirty years old at the time. Granddad would often say that when he first led eyes on my demure grandmother she was wearing a long pleated skirt and the sight made him loose his mind (‘tin itha ke vourlistika’, were the exact words!). The rest is history, as they say.

From left to right, Ioanna, Gran, and Stephania

Granny lived and breathed for her daughters, Ioanna (my mother) and Stephania, who were also brought up in Campielo.

When I came to be, it was a story of love both ways. Granny and I soon developed a very strong bond. When I was little I’d often stay in her rented house (in Athens back then) and I was so attached to her I called her ‘mama’ (mum) and refused to fall asleep unless she held my hand. Gran would often laugh and say I gave her a hard time back then, seeing that as soon as she moved her hand away from my grasp I’d snap my eyes open, which meant she had to give me her hand and wait for me to fall asleep all over again.

: Here I am pictured in Corfu town’s square across from Liston

: Corfu town with Granny and cousins (I am the girl in the skirt)

Although my grandparents lived in Athens when I was little, we often visited Corfu in the summer to stay with my aunt Stephanie’s family in Garitsa (coastal quarter of the town next to Anemomylos). My grandparents had inherited a small quarter of my great-grandfather’s house in Moraitika but they needed to build upon it to make it a proper home with the necessary commodities first. They managed this in the early 1980s so I began to spend my summer holidays for three months at a time in the village as of then.

In The Ebb, I share many of the terms of endearment Granny used to address me. There is an entertaining one I didn’t share, which tickled my husband’s funny bone so much he uses it for me now. The term is ‘kontessa’ (countess), my granny’s way of teasing me whenever, as all kids occasionally do, I acted lazy or self-indulgent. Every time my husband Andy calls me that now if, say, I snooze a little longer in bed, there is a tug in my heart, but the feeling is wonderful, knowing the term of endearment survived, somehow.

: Nerina was never far from Gran whenever she stayed with us in Athens

In the few last years before her passing at the age of 92, I was been blessed to have had Gran stay in my house in Nea Peramos (near Athens) for a month or so at a time during the winter. Back in 2011, when the above pictures were taken, I had a dog, Nerina, a sweet and benevolent soul. I guess she must have found in Gran a kindred spirit, as she’d follow her around the house, especially when Gran cleaned fish at the sink as you see in the above photo. To stretch her legs, I often took Gran to the seafront for a stroll and as Gran loved eating fish, she often proposed we buy some for lunch straight from the fishing boats.

On sunny days, more often than not, she would suggest a walk in the fields around the house to pick wild greens. You’d think a 90-year-old would cringe at the thought but Granny was tireless. She didn’t mind at all bending over for an hour to pick greens and often did a little gardening too, picking sprouts of spearmint from one place to put them in a new spot, or just watering my plants. She loved to be around plants and did the same in her tiny yard in Moraitika till the day she left it behind the last time.

My grandparents’ children, Ioanna (my mother) and Stephania

When Gran and Granddad started their life together in the 40s, times were hard. If they needed to visit Moraitika from Corfu town, they often walked the whole way. That’s a 45 minute ride in the bus today! As a young married couple they lived in Campielo as I said before where, to make ends meet, Granddad used to do deliveries for a refreshment company. He made the deliveries all over town riding a horse carriage. During the summer, he worked a lot more hours to meet the higher demand, often on all days of the week. He’d leave home at first light and return after dark when the kids were in bed. As a result, his little daughter, Stephania, called him ‘o babas o chimoniatikos’ (winter dad) as this was the only part of the year where she got to see him.

Later in life, to seek a more secure future, my granddad took his family to live in Athens where he worked at the Skaramangha shipyard. In my debut novel, The Necklace of Goddess Athena, I mention the scrap fabric pieces that the workers used to clean their hands from the dirty work. Granddad would often take the odd scrap home and Granny made clothes for their children from them.

: Here I am pictured second from right outside the house with cousins, my sister, and other family members.

Back in Moraitika is where sheer bliss began to pour into my life. Roughly from the age of 12, I began to stay with my grandparents nearly every summer from early June to early September. I played and swam daily with a multitude of cousins and village children and as neighbours I had a host of great-uncles and great-aunts who’d each inherited a part of my great-grandfather’s big house. Every morning would find me and the other children playing with a ball or cards under the mulberry tree or on the cemented step that can still be found today outside the house.

The mulberry tree in front of the house always causes myriad fond memories to come to surface. This lane that leads to the village church has been my playground for many happy summers.

Towards midday, we’d all descend to the beach in large numbers for our daily swim. In the afternoons, after our siesta, my cousins and I would go for long walks accompanied by my grandparents or the odd great-uncle. One of them, Great-Uncle Lilis who was a retired teacher at the time accompanied us in our walks military-style, shouting out ‘ena-dyo, en-dyo’ to give the marching rhythm but of course we kids laughed it off. We did find it endearing though so from time to time indulged him by parading like little soldiers for him as he followed last on the side of the road, supervising us.

Most of the time, we’d walk along the Corfu-Lefkimmi highway and stopped at Messonghi past the tiny bridge near the turn off to Agios Mattheos where the petrol station is today. Beside it on the corner, there was a cafe owned by my uncle Thanassis Tsatsanis from Messonghi. This was our resting place for a refreshment or a sweet before our long walk back home on the hill in Moraitika.

All the things fun I just mentioned, interspersed with out-of-this-world good meals prepared by my granny only repeated themselves the next day and the next after that, for three months at a time. I am sure, therefore, you can imagine my joy every time June came when I was a youngster, and the absolute heart-wrenching sorrow that hit me when September arrived each year and it was time to go.

: Corfu memories

As I have said many times and also recorded in The Ebb, Gran Antigoni was an amazing cook and prepared her meals in a tiny kitchen barely big enough for two people to stand in it. These photos from the early 2000’s serve as proof!

Speaking of proof, here is a picture of the dented aluminum fork described in The Ebb. Every summer, on my first day in the house, Gran would take it out of her ancient cabinet drawer and set it in front of me at the table with a glint in her eye as Granddad chuckled. You can imagine what it means to me now they are gone. I took this photo last summer, and it was quite emotional when I set it down on the table to eat with my husband, without either of my grandparents present for the very first time. But of course, their love remains inside me, safe, where neither time nor death can ever take it away.

Below, I share a couple videos from happy days with my grandparents. These were taken in the summer of 2004.

The two first videos feature my conversations with my grandparents as I take the video and Andy and Granddad watch Gran BBQ fish for our lunch. During that time we elaborated a lot on the fact Granddad was difficult to cook for because there were many foods he didn’t like much (fish and meat included). I then tried to convince him to have some fish but he seemed intent on only having the boiled greens and skordalia (garlic dip) that were to be served with it. By the time Gran serves at the table, she and I have managed to annoy him somewhat to a hilarious effect right at the end of video 3.

“San polla de lete?” (Don’t you think you’re talking too much?) quips Granddad in his typical mock-stern tone. It made my grandmother and I laugh many times as we watched this video together after his passing. Grandma would laugh while her fingertips caressed his face on my tablet’s screen, the words ‘Spyro mou…’ issued wistfully and repeatedly from her lips.

I hope you’ll find the videos entertaining, even those among you who don’t understand much Greek, if only for the mannerisms and the real-life depiction of a typical ‘row’ between my grandparents at meal times as described in The Ebb.

vid_2004-bbq1

vid_2004-bbq2

vid_2004_serving_lunch

I truly believe that Granny and Granddad were sister souls. They were married together for 67 years and remained in love till the last day when Granddad died peacefully in his bed in Granny’s arms. Granny often relayed how he opened his eyes and gave her one last, intense look, before he closed them again, this time, forever. Granny said it felt like he was aiming to take her image along with him.

Last year, my grandmother’s parting words to me were said over the phone and during a rare moment of lucid thinking as osteomyelitis had long begun to cloud her mind since her fatal fall. Even though she kept silent or mumbled to herself whenever I phoned the old people’s home in Limnos where she spent her very last days, during that call I was lucky to make out these words: ‘Na eisai kala kyra mou, na eisai panta kala’ (may you be well ‘my lady’, may you always be well). I knew that day this was goodbye. And I was right; she died just a couple days later. I do hope in her heart she knew I was there when that happened, if only in spirit.

Goodbye Grandma. Goodbye Granddad. Until we meet again.

Wondering what Moraitika, Corfu is like? Visit my guide to Moraitika and marvel at the endless possibilities of summer holiday fun on offer.

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July 7, 2016 by Effrosyni Moschoudi

Old photos and memories from Corfu

Today, I thought I’d share a couple of photos that my author friend Stephanie Wood sent to me recently. One day, Stephanie saw one of my posts about Moraitika, Corfu and the name rang a bell. Next, she was going through old photo albums and found evidence that confirmed her suspicions: she’d spent a holiday there back in the 80s but, over the years, had forgotten the name of the Corfiot village she stayed at. When she wrote to let me know, and to send the photos she found, I felt delighted. If I could re-acquaint her with such a blissful part of her past and, what’s more, stir in her the desire to return there one day, I felt my work was done.

It’s been a year now that I’ve been shouting it out from the rooftops of Twitter and Facebook that I am mad about Moraitika and Messonghi, the villages I set my romance trilogy in, and called them Vassilaki and Messi respectively in the books. It gives me great pleasure when people write to me to say they’ve been there in the past and that my posts caused them to start dreaming about them again, spurring them on to return!

So, to keep the fire inside your hearts kindling, this post is for all of you who, like me, adore these two quaint, heavenly corners of the world. Those among you who’ve been visiting since the 80s may enjoy remembering how these villages looked back then. You’ll need to forgive the low resolution, of course. These are grainy, as they should be, otherwise they wouldn’t be so precious, right?

Corfu 2

This picture from Stephanie was easy to identify as a picture of Moraitika beach.

Now, this one gave me a hard time. It took me a while to identify the place and finally I realized it’s the road heading towards Moraitika as you come from the river bridge. Actually, this spot is very close to the bridge but it’s missing the big roundabout that’s in the middle of this road today. Back then, there was no roundabout and, depending on when in the 80s this photo was taken, there’s a chance the Messonghi river bridge wasn’t even built yet!

Corfu 1

Throughout the 80s, there were many restaurants offering live syrtaki dancing every night in Moraitika but only one had its dance floor by petrol pumps! And that was Paizanos petrol station on the main road (a petrol station still operates there today, and it’s situated near the bookshop/post office).

Corfu 4

This one is the last of Stephanie’s snaps and it’s my favourite, simply because it’s a picture of Martaouna, the pyramid-shaped mountain on the right that I can’t get enough of marveling at when in Moraitika or Messonghi. Visible from both the villages, it houses the village of Spilio. Next to it, the Chlomos mountain is missing the two tall masts that are visible on the top today.

You can see a similar view of these mountains from the 80s in another picture courtesy of another Messonghi lover, my friend, Julie Reeves:

Messonghi beach 1982 by Julie Reeves

This was an utter delight for me when I first laid eyes on it. At the time, there were few touristic businesses in Messonghi and this photo reflects this. I used to stay at my aunt Rini’s house (aunt Rini was the sister of my grandfather, Spyros Vassilakis) for a few days at the time back then and would spend the whole day with my cousins Rini and Sofi Tsatsani. The house was just behind the building in the foreground. Seeing this photo caused a myriad of precious childhood memories to flood into my head.

Thank you Julie Reeves and Stephanie Wood for bringing back these memories!

I hope you’ve also enjoyed this short trip down memory lane. If you have similar old photos that show how these villages used to be in the 70s or 80s feel free to contact me as I’d love to see them. If I have a nice selection, I’d love to post a similar post in future again.

Before I go, to let you know that the terrific site Tripfiction asked me to contribute to their blog and, you know me, I came up with an article about my favorite place in the world – Corfu. Read it here and find out, among other things, what is the best time in the year to visit Corfu town and where on the island you’ll find freezing cold waters even in the summer! Ok, so I’ll spoil the surprise on the second one because I feel compelled to share the below pictures! Just look at these gorgeous views of the bay at Paleokastritsa that Julie Reeves took the other day:

In case you haven’t heard of Tripfiction before: If you search for your favorite locations in the world on this site, it will show you books set there! Nifty, huh!

Have you holidayed in Moraitika, Messonghi, or anywhere else in Corfu? Leave a comment and tell us all about it!

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November 13, 2015 by Effrosyni Moschoudi

A Lifetime of Corfu Summers

The other day, I was browsing photographs from Corfu on Facebook experiencing the familiar melting feeling inside. Nothing else causes that; over the years, despite having traveled extensively around my beautiful country, no other place can make me ache with such nostalgia. And then, I started to wonder: what is it that makes one so passionate about a certain place? Often, I hear my fellow Greeks talk about their beloved village where they were born or brought up and sometimes these places are nothing but a cluster of houses on a mountain top with a plane tree in the middle of a small square. As a visitor, you’d take half an hour tops to go around and see everything and chances are when you leave it behind, you’ll never think of it again. And yet, to the people who hail from it, it has the quaintness of Mykonos and the allure of Santorini; every square foot of soil or concrete a treasure in their eyes. So what is it that makes it so special?

The obvious answer is, it’s their love inside – the memories they hold.

And so, it is with me. From Corfu, and especially the villages of Moraitika and Messonghi, I have a multitude of memories that often flood my mind as I walk past a lane or sit on the beach or saunter along the Messonghi river – some dating back from 40 years, some involving people who are now gone, being sadly missed.

So, here I am today, a bunch of old, yellow photographs in hand, blogging about a few of those memories. To the readers of my trilogy, some may be interesting for the real-life facts behind The Ebb, and for the rest of you, perhaps they will still be of interest, simply for being a glimpse of a bygone world.

So come, walk with me down this memory lane as I unfold my passion for Corfu…

: Early 70s. Main square in Corfu town.

: Early 70s. Main square in Corfu town with gran and cousins. I’m the girl in the dress.

During my childhood, I was forever in Corfu town for a long holiday, staying in Garitsa with my aunt Stephanie (my mother’s sister) and her family or with my grandparents in a rented house. In the early 70s photograph below I’m having a bit of trouble going down the steps of St Spyridon’s church – Gran is holding my hand. Gran was always around when I was little. It’s no surprise I used to call her ‘mama’ back then. I simply refused to fall asleep unless she was holding my hand and it was difficult for her as the moment she’d withdraw her hand I’d snap my eyes open, which meant she had to do this all over again. A few years ago in Moraitika, in my presence, a local lady called Angelina, impressed by the kind way Gran always spoke of me asked her: ‘Oh Antigoni, you love your Frosso, don’t you?’ (Frosso is what people call me in Greek). Gran turned to her, smiled an angelic smile I’ll never forget and said, “Angelina mou, if you were to open my chest and look inside, you’d find a picture of my Frosso there”. My heart swells just thinking about it. Gran’s love for me has always been a blessing and a compass.

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Early 70s, St Spyridon’s Church, Corfu town

I still remember my very first visit to Moraitika where I met many of my great-aunts and uncles for the first time. I couldn’t have been older than ten or eleven and that’s when the love of a lifetime began. This is when my grandparents converted the old storeroom of the original Vassilakis house (the part of it Granddad inherited from his father) into a little home for themselves.

This is a photo of me from the early 80s on the beach in Moraitika. I was about fourteen. This is when the tourism in the village began to take off. Back in the late 70s the sea was so pure that if you dipped your hand in the wet sand near the water you’d get tiny clam babies. I remember looking for them for fun after my swims around the age of 11-12, then putting them back in the sand.

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Here I am pictured second from right. Great-Uncle Stamatis holds a hedgehog that happened to pass by. Granny is tittering from the front step.

In the early 80s, summers were a blast. Other than my grandparents and sister, I was in the company of aunts, uncles, great aunts, great uncles, a bunch of cousins and local children. The lane you can see in the picture above was always hectic! I am the girl in the blue top. My sister is second from the left, the other girls are cousins. Great Uncle Stamatis is holding up a hedgehog that happened to pass by (of course, we let it go shortly later!). Gran Antigoni is having a chuckle sitting on the step outside my great-grandfather’s house that was divided among his children (now owned by his great-grandchildren).

My great-grandfather’s name was Stefanos Vassilakis. He used to be the teacher and the priest of the village at the turn of the 20th century. His, is the only grave remaining today in the old cemetery by the church on the hill (in the old quarter of Moraitika).

If you’re interested in the two churches on the top of the hill, you may also like to check out this blog post, too!

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: Mid 80s at the pool of Delphinia Hotel, Moraitika

: Mid 80s in Achilles Palace (from left, my sister Antigoni, I, and a friend)

The 80s where paradise on earth for me as then I’d spend three-month summer holidays in Moraitika nearly every summer. There was fun to be had all day and well into the night. Swimming in the morning, long walks in the afternoon with my cousins and, often, my grandparents would take us out for a meal and dancing in one of the many restaurants who had a dance floor back then. Dancing the Syrtaki was a big thing and I loved it. Everyone had trouble getting me off the dance floor. When I was little especially, big British and German family men would sweep me up off the floor and dance with me in their arms, then buy me ice cream. It was great fun and I still remember it fondly – the ice cream especially!

People were very light-hearted back then, very open. The tourists loved to dance the Syrtaki and there was lots of cheering, lots of laughing going on. A great night out.

My beloved Great Aunt Rini Tsatsani from Messonghi, holding her first granddaughter, my cousin Rini, who was named after her as per the Greek tradition.

As a little girl, I’d often stay in Messonghi as well. This is my late Great Aunt, Rini Tsatsani. She made a cracking good bourtheto, I’ll tell you that! It burned like hell but it was so good I couldn’t stop myself. Bless her soul, she was an angel. Her son Thanassis used to run a corner coffee shop in Messonghi on the main road to Lefkimmi. Their house was just off the seafront by the river mouth. Me and my sister used to stay at Aunt Rini’s house often to spend time with our cousins Rini and Sofi. We used to go to the restaurant across from their house and dance with the tourists every night – often barefoot. The song ‘Tie a Yellow Ribbon’ was very popular back then (it was the mid-late 70s) and everyone danced to it. I remember a young British girl holding me by both hands and dancing to this with me one night. I loved this song and used to run from Aunt Rini’s yard to the restaurant to dance to this whenever the song played – which was a lot. The restaurant owner used to shoo me away but I kept coming back for more. Back then I didn’t speak a word of English, of course. When, later in life, I got to learn the language and was able to decipher the beautiful words to this song, it was like reuniting with an old friend… its nostalgia so relevant to mine for those long-lost carefree days of my childhood on the beach at Messonghi.

Back in Moraitika, the best places for Syrtaki dancing in the 80s were the Paizanos restaurant on the main road (now a petrol station), the Romantica restaurant where Lefteris used to bring out a donkey on the dance floor every night and a pizzeria where the roundabout on the way to Messonghi now is – can’t recall its name but its pizza was exquisite. Often, we’d get a takeaway from there for our annual ‘pizza night on the beach’ under the August full moon – a memory so precious it found its way into the Ebb.

Speaking of fond memories that found their way into the Ebb, here are some more facts for my readers:

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: The real dented fork I always ate with

: The real Sofia!

This aluminum fork with dented prongs has been indispensable on the table over the years. Often, it would be somewhere else than the drawer when you needed it to set the table. Gran and I would go looking for it. It was unimaginable for me to have a meal without it. Whenever I came to Moraitika for a holiday, Gran would hand it to me with a wide grin at lunch time.

In the other photo you can see Gran’s little kitchen. She used to make meals to die for in there.

As for the last photo above, it’s a blurry glimpse of me being the real Sofia – including the blue swimsuit and straw hat mentioned in The Ebb. The hat was a gift I was given back in 1987 by a departing British tourist, who looked and acted very much like Danny in the book. In the trilogy, love triumphs, but in real life my young heart crashed and burned, LOL

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: Late 80s – at the Messonghi river bridge. From the left, a friend, Cousin Olga, I, and Cousin Spyridoula

: My sister and I in a photo taken in Sifnos in the 90s. Like Sofia and Loula, we shared our secrets about boys in a not so liberal social circle and we loved to let our hair down together all summer after a hectic school year.

Other people that inspired characters in the Ebb include my sister, Antigoni, who inspired Loula, as well as my cousins Olga and Spyridoula, who inspired Dora and Nana respectively. Olga passed away too early and too suddenly which was a loss to the world because she was an angel on earth, sharing laughter as much as she could and protecting her own like a lioness. Her kind, giving heart inspired me to create Dora in The Ebb, and Olga in The Necklace of Goddess Athena to honor her memory.

Throughout the 80s and 90s, I swam with my family at or near the pier at Delfinia Hotel. It was very busy back then – offering paragliding and lots of other water rides and activities. It was that little pier that inspired The Lady of the pier series (my books, ‘The Ebb’ and ‘The Flow’ are both set in 1980s Moraitika).

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: Early 90s- photo of me outside our rooms to let.

: Late 80s-My sister and gran putting the laundry on the line outside the rooms

From the early 80s till the early 90s my family ran a small business of room rentals. Back then, tourism in the village had reached a zenith, bringing wealth and prosperity to everyone among the locals, who made sure to build all sorts of businesses on their land. Every summer I’d return to Moraitika to find new businesses had sprouted everywhere. In the old days, as you went down the main road towards Messonghi there was nothing but fields after Paizanos restaurant (now the petrol station) and Fontana supermarket. As of the mid 80s, slowly, the roadside on either side was filled with businesses all the way to the river.

Speaking of Paizanos, anyone who was around in the 1980s, remembers it from the fun dancing nights we all had there, dancing Syrtaki around the petrol pumps! Other Greek restaurants where I enjoyed dancing include Romantica (now, Leftis Romantica), Moraitis (now closed – it was across from the Coop supermarket) and also Olympia (now, Mr Gyros). At Olympia and Moraitis, I remember dancing as a child from as early as the 70s! Dancing was fun for all the family back then and we did that a lot! Almost every restaurant offered Syrtaki dancing and had a juke box!

The restaurant owners led the dancing themselves, and some did very impressive routines, like dancing with a full glass of wine on their heads, and twirling while lifting a table with their teeth at the same time. Another routine I recall is using clear spirit and a lighter to create a small circle of fire on the floor that lasted for a short while as they danced. I particularly remember the dancing routine of the owner at Jimmy’s taverna, performed by the man himself, and it is still the most impressive I’ve ever seen on the island. Still, for ingenuity, the routine of Leftis at Romantica always stood out as he was the only one who brought a donkey to the dance floor. The ladies among the tourists loved it, and took turns in riding the donkey to have their photos taken. Leftis also danced with a huge water jug on top of his head that belonged to his mother. It was all a ton of fun. My only regret is I don’t have any photos to show you!

If you’ve only been visiting the area in the recent decades, you may be intrigued to hear that the river bridge to Messonghi didn’t exist before the 90s. To get to Messonghi from Moraitika you’d have to turn right at the roundabout (towards Lefkimmi) all the way to Melissa (the location of the Council Office) where a narrow, cemented bridge would allow you to get to Messonghi (the bus from Corfu town could only just about cross that narrow bridge – that was always scary!). It was a long walk between the two villages that wasn’t easy to do – that’s why before the mid 80s people preferred to walk to Messonghi along the beach, then cross the river in the little row boats. Naturally, the building of the new bridge over the river brought a considerable decline to the business for these little boats at the river mouth.

Before I end this long-winded walk down memory lane, I’d like to show you a handful of photos by my Facebook friends and readers, Julie Reeves and Jayne Strange. They are just two of many lovely British friends I’ve made on Facebook over time, who’ve share with me their love and passion for Moraitika and Messonghi. I hope you’ll enjoy the photos they kindly sent me to enrich this post as I didn’t have any images to post from Messonghi in the old days. Thank you, ladies!

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These first two snapshots from the early 80s are by Julie Reeves. I love the first one! I can almost taste my Aunt Rini’s bourtheto just looking at it! Her house is just behind the one in the foreground. Also, I chuckled to notice there are no antennae on top of Chlomos mountain!

I remember the boat rides with nostalgia. I used to enjoy the walk along the beach from Moraitika on the way to Messonghi to visit Aunt Rini and her family before the bridge was made.

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These three photos are by Jayne Strange. She stayed in Messonghi Beach Hotel in the early 80s. You can see views of the river from the hotel and Jayne on the beach. It’s wonderful to catch in these a glimpse of the serenity of the river bank in the old days. Now, with the paved walkway alongside it and the bigger excursion boats moored there it seems like a different place all together.

Martaouna, the ‘pyramid-shaped mountain’ described in the Ebb.

Thankfully, some things don’t change over time. One of them is Martaouna, the lush, pyramid-shaped mountain beside Mount Chlomos. Today, it looks as endearing as in the old days – standing tall like a faithful sentinel of the serene Corfiot villages graced by its presence.