While browsing on the internet I came across this somewhat older but nonetheless exciting and still current article about Ikaria. I was amazed when I even found myself mentioned by name! Alex von Roll gives a nice insight into the living conditions of the Ikariotes, the role of women, the comparison to the neighboring islands and, particularly excitingly, the importance of the political exiles, which he describes in a clear historical outline of Byzantium, the sultans, the time of the pirates up to modern history. As I read, the connections become clear and I realize: The red island hasn’t changed all that much.
The Red island
Ikaria, a discovery in the Sea of the Crashed. For decades the island was cut off from the flow of money from Athens because it supported the left-wing exiles from the civil war. The backwardness is a clear advantage.
■ Alex von Roll, Text and pictures
Never before has an island captivated me as much as Ikaria in the Sporades near the coast of Asia Minor, the island to which Byzantine emperors, Ottoman sultans and Greek colonels sent the unpopular and rebellious into banishment. Why Ikaria has been treated so neglectfully by those in power since ancient times is a mystery to which one can only invent an answer. Ten days weren’t enough for me to air it.
The 40 kilometer long and 15 kilometer wide island within sight of Samos is not particularly beautiful. The islands that tourists love to fly to all have more scenic charm, more impressive monuments and a more important history. But they have significantly less character. But it’s not immediately obvious.
The 40 kilometer long and 15 kilometer wide island within sight of Samos is not particularly beautiful. The islands that tourists love to fly to all have more scenic charm, more impressive monuments and a more important history. But they have significantly less character. But it’s not immediately obvious.
I got a taste of the island on the second day, when I climbed from the coast through a gorge into the mountainous island for two hours and came across Christos Raches, one of the three largest of the perhaps forty towns on the island, the only one of the three which is not by the sea, and of course the most beautiful. Anyone who comes to the cozy village at eight o’clock in the evening will find a deserted place. Life only begins at nine, when people come to the village center after working on the scattered small farms with densely overgrown terraces. Then the shops and taverns open, the children play, people gossip and eat and discuss until well after twelve, a unique event that even the major media on the mainland devotes a story to here and there. The Gaulish village in the Icariote Mountains that defies customs.
“Mon âme est un trois-mat, cherchant son Icarie.” My soul is a three-master in search of its Ikaria, wrote Charles Baudelaire in his poem “Le Voyage”. I heard this wonderful sentence in front of the small monastery of Theoktitis, whose cells duck under huge monoliths. I sat there and was amazed when an older lady traveling alone emerged from the bushes, with whom a stimulating conversation soon developed. It began with the retired Greek professor from Besançon reciting Baudelaire, including the verse about the three-master looking for his Ikaria. What kind of Ikaria could that be? A place where the soul flies so high that it is burned by the sun? The final reality of life that ends in a crash? The lady knew more: A contemporary of Baudelaire had published a socialist utopia called “Icarie,” which could perhaps be what was meant.
The still sparse tourist facilities have settled on the mostly steep and barren banks and lead a life of their own. The real life of the island takes place in the villages above. On the one hand, this has to do with agriculture – still the Ikariots’ most important source of income – and, on the other hand, with the pirates, who made normal life on Ikaria impossible for centuries.
“Mon âme est un trois-mat, cherchant son Icarie.” My soul is a three-master in search of its Ikaria, wrote Charles Baudelaire in his poem “Le Voyage”. I heard this wonderful sentence in front of the small monastery of Theoktitis, whose cells duck under huge monoliths. I sat there and was amazed when an older lady traveling alone emerged from the bushes, with whom a stimulating conversation soon developed. It began with the retired Greek professor from Besançon reciting Baudelaire, including the verse about the three-master looking for his Ikaria. What kind of Ikaria could that be? A place where the soul flies so high that it is burned by the sun? The final reality of life that ends in a crash? The lady knew more: A contemporary of Baudelaire had published a socialist utopia called “Icarie,” which could perhaps be what was meant.
The still sparse tourist facilities have settled on the mostly steep and barren banks and lead a life of their own. The real life of the island takes place in the villages above. On the one hand, this has to do with agriculture – still the Ikariots’ most important source of income – and, on the other hand, with the pirates, who made normal life on Ikaria impossible for centuries.