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KINGS, SYMBOLS AND CITIES: CONSTRUCTING THE DIVINE
A few years ago, at a meeting of Victorian Christian leaders in Parliament, the then Premier Ted Baillieu, an architect by training commented on just how intrinsic churches are to the skyscape and...
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JEWS AND 1821
According to tradition, after Patriarch Gregory and other Orthodox prelates were cut down from their place of execution soon after the outbreak of the Greek Revolution, the Ottomans ordered that the...
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IN THE NAME OF THE GREEK
This year’s Census gave rise to an interesting cultural phenomenon: the perennial debate as to what our ethnos should be called. As debates go, it is rather baffling. Considering that we have been...
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FOR THE LOVE OF BOOKS: THE LAST GREEK BOOKSHOP IN MELBOURNE
“It is not who we are when we read a … book that is most important, but who we are when we close it.” St Mark the Ascetic. Books are revered in our traditional culture. Our entire way of life for the...
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SPIRO AND THE LAND TAX OF THE GREEKS
I am convinced that if Kafka were alive today, he would be writing a novel about a man who, during the pandemic, has the distinct misfortune to call a Victorian government agency and then spends his...
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SMYRNA RELIEVED: JOICE LOCH, ETHEL COOPER AND THE AUSTRALIAN CONNECTION
In the aftermath of the First World War, humanitarian catastrophes abounded. The end of hostilities found Queensland-born, author, journalist and Quaker Relief Mission worker Joice Loch in Poland,...
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HEXAMILION: A STUDY IN FUTILITY
“People discovered within themselves a fragment of the Other, and they believed in this and lived confidently. People thus had three choices when they encountered the Other: They could choose war,...
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HAIR
I have a confession to make. All my life I have dreamed of having long hair, a felicitous state of hirsuteness that eludes me, since I appear to be biologically incapable of sprouting anything more...
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IN THE PARK DURING LOCKDOWN
At our local park, it always happens like this. Sundry parents, engrossed in their iphones, look up occasionally and call out to their children, who are attempting to extricate themselves from sundry...
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20 YEARS OF DIATRIBE
It seems like only yesterday that fresh out of university and having written the NUGAS column for three years, I was afforded the unique privilege by then editor Nick Psaltopoulos of writing the...
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ΕΙΚΩΝ
«καὶ ἐμοσχοποίησαν ἐν ταῖς ἡμέραις ἐκείναις καὶ ἀνήγαγον θυσίαν τῷ εἰδώλῳ, καὶ εὐφραίνοντο ἐν τοῖς ἔργοις τῶν χειρῶν αὐτῶν». Acts 7:41 Standing on Dionysou Areopagitou Street, close to the...
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DIRE SONGS OF MY TRIBE
Last year before the onset of the pandemic, I was apprehended by an older acquaintance singing to my children, the lyrics of Roza Ekskenazy’s immortal song: Πρέζαόταν πιεις. «Σαν μαστουρωθείς, γίνεσαι...
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STORM IN A TEACUP
Mercifully, the Victorian government social media advertisement promoting vaccination against the dreaded coronavirus, the subject of this Diatribe, is not in Greek. Most of the time, the Greek in...
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BYZANFEST 2021
Byzanfest is the brainchild of Melbourne-based Chris Vlahonasios. Established in 2014, it is an international film festival totally dedicated to Orthodox Christian cinema. According to its founder,...
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HER VOICE: GREEK WOMEN AND THEIR FRIENDS: A PERSONAL APPRECIATION
Two Christmases ago, my mother informed me that she had been afforded the honour, by Women’s Food For Thought Network Founder and community activist Varvara Athanasiou-Ioannou, of contributing her...
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EVMENIOS: BISHOP OF KERASOUNTA
If names signify the essence of an existence, then certainly this is the case for the newly enthroned bishop of Kerasounta, who is headquartered in the Archdiocesan District of Northcote. The name...
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ΦΙΛΟΤΙΜΟ: THE MURAL
«Όταν βγήκε το σόρρυ, χάθηκε το φιλότιμο». Old Greek Australian saying. For a supposedly untranslatable concept, the idea of «Φιλότιμο», something which is apparently encoded within the DNA of all...
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CONSTRUCTING HELLENISM
Marking my ceremonial return to the office last month after lockdown, I was crossing the street when I overheard two construction workers snigger with the high-pitched nasal diction that characterises...
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THE ABC OF THE TWELVE DAYS OF CHRISTMAS
It is usually at the term of the season that the familiar lament takes place: Christmas is just an excuse to sell things. It is overhyped. It is a day in which you stuff your face and then lie torpid...
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SEELING THE FARM
Of all Greek brotherhood buildings around Melbourne, one of the ones I have the fondest memories of, is that of Pontiaki Koinotita in Brunswick. For years, its Friday night Taverna events were the...
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