Text 6. Cretan vendettas

Assignment. Texts 6-10 are dedicated to Greek Islands. Read the text about Cretan vendettas and explain why the word ‘vendetta’ is not singled out in the body of the text.

Cretans might be famously welcoming to strangers, but they are notorious throughout Greece for murderous family vendettas that have lasted for generations and caused hundreds of Cretans to flee the island.

Particularly prevalent among the harsh mountain people of Sfakia, where whole villages have been decimated due to vendettas, the disputes can start over the theft of sheep, an errant bullet at a wedding or anything deemed an insult to family honour. The insult is avenged with a murder, which must be avenged with another murder... and so the blood feud continues. Modernity has somewhat stemmed the carnage but there are still occasional mysterious cases where police can find no witnesses or people willing to come forward with information about a killing, including an incident in 2007 where an army conscript was shot in a barracks in Rethymno in front of his family and other witnesses but no one would identify the assailant. Avengers have also been known to pursue their targets across Greece and occasionally across the globe (as portrayed in the movie Beware of Greeks Bearing Guns).

Text 7. Easter

Assignment. Read the text about Greek Easter and compare with the Russian way of celebrating Easter.

Easter is the most important festival in the Greek Orthodox religion. Emphasis is placed on the Resurrection rather than on the Crucifixion, so it is a joyous occasion. The festival commences on the evening of Good Friday with the perifora epitavios, when a shrouded bier (representing Christ’s funeral bier) is carried through the streets to the local church. This moving candle lit procession can be seen in towns and villages throughout the country. From a spectator’s viewpoint, the most impressive of these processions climbs Lykavittos Hill in Athens to the Chapel of Agios Georgos. The Resurrection Mass starts at 11 pm on Saturday night. At midnight, packed churches are plunged into darkness to symbolise Christ’s passing through the underworld. The ceremony of the lighting of candles which follows is the most significant moment in the Orthodox year, for it symbolises the Resurrection. Its poignancy and beauty are spellbinding. If you are in Greece at Easter you should endeavour to attend this ceremony, which ends with fireworks and a candle lit processions through the streets. The Lenten fast ends on Easter Sunday with the cracking of red-dyed Easter eggs and an outdoor feast of roast lamb followed by Greek dancing. The day’s greeting is Hristos anesti (‘Christ is risen’), to which the reply is Alithos anesti (‘Truly He is risen’). On both Palm Sunday (the Sunday before Easter) and Easter Sunday, St Spyridon (the mummified patron saint of Corfu) is taken out for an airing and joyously paraded through the town. He is paraded again in Corfu town on 11 August.