In the dead of winter, when seaside taverns are closed and the cold wind beats mercilessly against the deserted beaches, islanders slaughter their pigs. Pig-slaughtering is still an important annual festival for the locals on Kea, as on all the Cycladic islands.

In the necessarily frugal old-days, it was an essential undertaking; today it is more of an occasion to gather, eat, and drink homemade wine and raki, the local moonshine… MORE

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Despite their colonial history, some islands were never occupied by the Ottomans, as the rest of Greece. By the late 15th century Kea was dominated by pirates, almost deserted by its inhabitants.

It was later repopulated by people who fled from other islands – my maternal grandfather’s family probably came from Patmos, as my mother’s maiden name, Patiniotis, indicates… MORE

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