Athanasios Emanuel Protopsaltis
My father, Athanasios Emanuel Protopsaltis, nickname Blaveri, was born on the idyllic village of Mitata on the Aphrodite’s island of Kythera at the turn of the twentieth century 1900. We know very little of his childhood. He attended school for two years and at the tender age of nine he was shipped off to Piraeus to earn his own living. His first job was washing glasses and crockery at a taverna in Troumba, an area near the harbour, famous for its small-time criminals and deviants.
He soon resigned from that job and used his meagre savings to buy a ticket for a trip to Alexandria, Egypt, where his sister lived with her husband Dimitris Tsaloumas and his brother Yiannis who was married to the sister of Dimitris Tsaloumas, our aunty Anthipi.
His stay in Alexandria was short because he found a well paying job at a classy bakery/restaurant at the small township of Damanhur.
The situation in Greece was chaotic and divisive. King Constantine insisted that Greece must remain neutral in the WW1 not so much for the benefit that neutrality would bring to the country, but mainly because he was pro- German.
Venizelos, who was a shrewd politician, maintained that joining the Allies would be more beneficial because with their aid we would be able to repel the Ottomans from Asia Minor and realise the “Big Idea” of spreading our Nation on both sides of the Aegean Sea. He went to Thessaloniki where he created a new government of the “New Hellas” and a Greek Army “The Defence”.
My father left his job in Egypt, travelled at his own expense to Thessaloniki, presented himself to the Enlistment Bureau, lied about his age and served as a soldier for the Greek National Army until the catastrophe of Smyrna in 1922.
Dad remained a loyal Venizelikos throughout his life. I remember when Venizelos died in Paris in 1936 my father came home from work clutching a black bordered newspaper, crying like a child.
- What happened, why are you crying? Did your mother die? asked my perplexed mother.
_ Worse than that. Venizelos died.
My father was above all proud that he was Greek. He always wore his war medals on Independence Day, the “OXI” day on the 28th of October, and since he came to Australia, on the Anzac Day.
You can read more about my father, and our familys' subsequent life in Alexandria, Egypt, by reading my book, My Four Homes.
When Published: 2009
Publisher: Kytherian World Heritage Fund
Price: $25
Available: Jim Saltis Ph. 93999767, and
Email Jim Saltis
and Kytherian Association
Email KAA
Description: The English translation of ΤΑ ΤΕΣΣΕΡΑ ΣΠΙΤΙΑ. ΜΥ FOUR HOMES
