Nowadays one is more likely to be approached in the same fashion by a perfectly respectable individual furtively offering from beneath his topcoat a banana. That species of tropical fruit has now become one of the most sought-after luxury items in Greece and is transforming law abiding citizens into smugglers, and reducing them to cloak and dagger antics.
During the American Prohibition Era, reputable citizens were forced to frequent speakeasies and to consort with unsavoury characters if they wished to drink spirits. Those with a little enterprise managed, of course, to set up stills in their bathrooms and produce bathtub gin. Banana speakeasies, as far as we know, have not sprung up in Athens yet, and Greeks cannot readily begin raising illegal bananas in their backyards or on their balconies. As it is, we are hard put trying to raise respectable bananas on Crete—even with our best agronomists providing their expertise and the entire weight of the Government mobilized behind the effort. These Cretan bananas— which share none of the attributes of the human beings native to the island who are known for their strength, vigour and pride— account for one of the major domestic issues facing the Nation.
According to Larousse Gastronomique, there are thirty known varieties of bananas, but our edition predates the debut of the Cretan variety otherwise, we are certain, they would have warranted a special mention. Other reference books we consulted note that bananas are cultivated in tropical regions of both hemispheres, but with horticultural advances have been grown in other warm areas. These successes may have provided inspiration to the former government officials who decided that we should grow our own bananas on Crete.
In researching the subject, the officials and agriculturalists no doubt read that bananas grow in bunches called ‘hands’ and that each banana is called a ‘finger’. Indeed, they seem to have taken this description literally because the species of banana grown on Crete is only slightly bigger than a grown man’s index finger. When peeled, it reveals a rather puny sliver of flesh that may be swallowed in one gulp.
It hardly need be said that these pitiful specimens need protection and, indeed, for some years now the Government has come to their rescue and waged a determined battle against their mightier cousins from abroad. Foreign bananas entering the country are penalized with staggering duties and, once Cretan bananas make their feeble appearance, foreign bananas are barred entry. This regulation, according to official explanation, is designed to protect local banana production. We suspect, however, that soft-hearted officials cannot bring themselves to subject our poor Cretan bananas to the humiliation of being on display at green grocers next to the virile foreign ones. To further bolster the Cretan banana’s self-image, their prices are hiked up to astronomical levels, often higher than those of their voluptuous imported cousins. In the last year, for example, their price reached 180 drachmas a kilo (that is, approximately five dollars, or two pounds sterling per kilo).
All these prohibitions and embargoes have only sharpened the fertile imaginations of the citizens who have developed a passion for bananas, preferably imported ones. A long queue at supermarkets is usually a sign that a shipment of bananas has been received. In lower-income neighbourhoods, some will stand in line for half an hour and when their turn comes select a single banana which is carefully weighed and whose price is calculated down to a single drachma.
In January, while the Cretan banana trees were hard at work trying to produce another bumper crop, imported ones were allowed into the country and since they were selling for a mere one hundred drachmas a kilo, we took our place in line and carefully selected one —which cost twenty drachmas. More reckless souls, however, choose the illegitimate route. In an attempt to avoid the heavy embargoes (or Cretan bananas when in season), they make contacts with the underworld and buy bootlegged bananas. Innocent tourists, unaware of the implications of bananas in Greece, are astonished when a customs official (who may have taken only casual note of extra bottles of whiskey or cartons of cigarettes) becomes frenzied at the sight of bananas, leads them off to carefully weigh the fruit, and informs them that they must pay an enormous amount in duties on anything above the allotted two kilos, or eat the excess bananas on the spot. Otherwise the bananas will be confiscated.
Indeed, the Nation can sleep peacefully in the confident knowledge that the authorities have the situation under control. At the northern borders, at major ports, and at airports, the law enforcers are on vigilant patrol and every day brings to light new reports of banana-smuggling arrests. Of course, the odd illegal banana does occasionally slip through their nets, and, indeed, in late January, five hundred crates of ‘aromatic, first quality bananas’ from Austria, all destined for the black market, made it across the border and all the way down to Athens. According to newspaper accounts they were hidden in a truck, driven by one Lambros Garefos, which arrived at a northern check point at four in the morning. Despite the hour, the authorities were not caught napping. Mr. Garefos was told to pull over, but he raced off before they could stop him. We were relieved to read that he was_ finally located in Athens the next day with part of his smuggled cargo —two Opel sedans — but the bananas themselves had disappeared. Nevertheless, Mr. Garefos was apprehended. In future, we are certain, he will think twice before embarking on any banana-smuggling expedition, flooding the market with illegal and forbidden fruit, and corrupting the morals of addicted adults and minors.
Weaving History
FROM Ela Grapho: The exhibition of costumes woven by Katerina Iliadis which were on display in January at the Museum of Folk Art are a tribute to ancient Greek culture in a practical, historical sense. A history of a people includes not only a description of its rulers, wars, and monumental artistic achievements, but also its customs and way of life. Mrs. Iliadis has recaptured the dress of the ancient Greeks and reproduced examples for use in the theatre, as well as for individuals who wore them as clothing here in Athens and abroad to give ‘new life’ to the ancient mode of dress.
Mrs. Iliadis is one of the last direct links to a practice begun by a coterie of unusual individuals who in the earlier part of this century adopted ancient practices as a way of life. The most famous of that group was undoubtedly Isadora Duncan, the forerunner of modern dance, who drew inspiration from ancient sources not only for her art but for her dress. The house she built with her brother Raymond —in Vyronas, just behind Pangrati on the slopes of Mount Hymettus— was fashioned after Agamemnon’s palace at Mycenae. (The skeleton of the house, a place of pilgrimage for dancers from abroad, still stands today, and many efforts have been made to restore it and create a museum.) Raymond Duncan invariably wore ‘ancient garb’, and there are many existing photographs showing him and his wife Penelope swathed in woven togas. (There was very little difference in the appearance of male and female dress in ancient times and wives could and would often wear their husbands’ cloaks. No doubt Raymond and his wife Penelope swapped clothing occasionally.) Raymond usually wore a fillet around his skull, and looked like a cross between a member of an eccentric religious sect and a 1960’s hippy. He was a curious sight in the streets of Paris and New York decades before the flower children.
Penelope Duncan was the sister of Angelos Sikelianos, one of modern Greece’s foremost poets. Angelos was married to another American, the dynamic Eva Palmer who devoted her substantial fortune to reviving the ancient festivals in Delphi in 1927. This, and a subsequent festival in 1930, were the precursors of today’s summer festivals of music, drama, and dance in Athens and Epidaurus.
Eva Palmer did not go naif way. Among other things, which included studying ancient choral movement and chant, and writing music for the dramas, she revived what she believed to be the ancient techniques of weaving and reproduced, as faithfully as possible, the clothing of ancient Greeks. She wove the garments worn by the performers at the festivals. She, too, adopted this mode of dress. At her death, The New York Times wrote that when she had arrived in New York in 1907 and disembarked from a ship wearing a Greek costume, her appearance had created ‘something of a sensation’. Ά crowd followed her here,’ The Times continued, ‘causing her to eschew appearances in public wherever possible.’ Nevertheless, she had announced that she was renouncing modern dress and, indeed, she
continued to wear ancient dress until her death here in Greece in 1952.
Mrs. Iliadis, who worKed with Eva Palmer, dedicated her life to this aspect of her mentor’s work and for thirty-five years has continued to weave and produce costumes using the ancient techniques, without resort to modern methods. Woven complete, to fit the body, the material is never cut. The simplicity of the garments conveys the relationship the ancients must have had between the body and its clothing. The costumes are totally unrestrictive and have an air of mobility and gracefulness. There is something genuinely sensuous about them, even with full sleeves and ankle lengths. As in ancient times, the garments were ‘patterned’ on the loom, the designs being woven into the material. Considering the materials used for the costumes —pure wool, linen, cotton and silk— one recognizes the almost prohibitive cost in reproducing them today. Also on display at the museum was the original wooden loom designed in 1905 by Raymond Duncan who was then living in Paris. The loom was given to Eva^ Palmer Sikelianos who later passed it on to Katerina Iliadis who has used it to weave for thirty-five years, continuing the tradition.
Illicit Archaeology
WE ran into our friend The Knowledgeable Archaeologist the other day and noting a fierce glint in her eye, wondered what was wrong. ‘You seem a bit in medias res, we ventured, ‘perturbed and all that,’
‘Perturbed is not the word for what I’ve been through today!’ she fluted. We looked warily at our watch and mumbled about buses, but to no avail. ‘The buses are on strike,’ she susurrated, punctuating her remarks with an occasional prod with a sinister-looking scholarly journal. ‘Now just listen: I’ve always wanted some aerial photographs of Athens which showed everything. Not just the Acropolis but all the ancient sites so you could see their relationships. You understand?’
Well, frankly, not being one of the Archaeological Wallahs, we did not, but we thought best to remain silent. ‘As I was saying, I looked everywhere and could find pictures of the individual sites but none of the whole area! So, finally, I went to the Statistiki Iperisia,’she said flaunting the Greek term for the Statistical Service, ‘and asked to see what they had. And do you know what they did?They told me that such photos were classified and no one was allowed to see them without a security clearance! Can you imagine that? What possible reason could they have for that? I tried to convince them of the ludicrousness of their position and they practically accused me of being a spy!’
‘Well is that hard luck That must leave you up in the air,’ we said with what we hoped was just the right touch of levity.
‘No, I’ve got them,’ she said prodding me with the scholarly journal and brandishing a fistful of photographs. ‘And where do you think I got them?’
We didn’t dare ask. Was it the CIA, the Turkish Air Force, or a bribed member of Olympic Airlines? What would be the penalty for looking at classified photographs without a clearance? Years of eating mousaka in Korydallos Prison along with Papadopoulos and the other traitors, no doubt.
‘Can’t guess, eh?’ she exclaimed. ‘At a kiosk! For two drachmas each! They’re just postcards! And the official photographs of the same thing are classified!’
We glanced up and down the street to see if we were being observed and made a hasty escape. You never can tell. For all we knew the kiosk-owner might be an agent-provocateur.
