Cretanvista Site News & News Reviews - AUGUST 2007 Issue 54 |
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No links to sites with adult content accepted. |
AUGUST WEATHER ..... Hot
days - ranging from 84 F to 96 F - and hot nights - falling only once below 70
F - have left us in a lather. Humidity has been much higher than August norms,
so we have been grateful for any sea breezes.
_____________________________ We
decided to base ourselves in Plaka, a tiny place with a handful of tavernas, a
mini market, a sprinkling of cottages and a few apartments to rent. You can
see Spinalonga from everywhere in Plaka. Your eyes are drawn to it time and
time again. It floats offshore like some huge fortified cruise ship, and as
the light changes during the day, parts of it are thrown into shadow or
sharper relief. Individual buildings are clearly visible from the village, and
it is only too easy to imagine the agony of standing on the shore, looking
across the narrow stretch of water to where a loved one was confined for ever,
destined to die there of a horrible and painful disease. Having
heard that large tourist boats to Spinalonga run from Aghios Nikolaos and
Elounda, we decided to take a small early boat direct from Plaka, to try and
be ahead of the crowds. So, at 9.30 on a bright warm morning we left the dock
at Plaka and made the short crossing to the island of the damned. Many
of the first buildings you come to are former Ottoman or Venetian
constructions, from the time when the island was a fortress guarding the
entrance not only to the Elounda bay, but the bay of Mirabello as a whole. A
small street of houses has been partly restored, with brightly coloured wooden
shop fronts; one of these is a (poorly equipped) shop which sells cards or old
maps of the island. A couple of
former shops display archeological finds, covering all the island’s history
– not only the little section showing enamel bowls, bedpans, medicine
bottles, pipettes and ancient medical equipment. Several
information boards explain the island’s importance over the years, and this
is perhaps where one starts to become aware that the ‘leper connection’ is
going to be very played down. For it certainly is shamefully played down. Once
a cure was found for leprosy, the last patients left Spinalonga in 1957. The
island seems to have been forgotten until the 1970’s, when many of the
buildings built by and for the lepers were knocked down by the Greek
government – perhaps another case of sanitization of the unsavoury past? Over
much of the rest of the island, there is supposed to be some restoration work
in progress, although there is little sign of it except for notices
prohibiting access to areas where buildings have become dangerous. It is
possible, however, to walk through some of the derelict buildings and catch a
glimpse of a life being lived there – here a bread oven, there a lavatory
pit, over there a relic of a wooden staircase leading to a worm-eaten upstairs
floor. The very stones exude the atmosphere, and in the quiet of the morning
it was possible to lean back on a wall and imagine the village street as it
must have existed, peopled with inhabitants in the various stages of their
illness – from the new arrivals, as yet appearing hale and hearty, to those
moving agonizingly slowly on misshapen limbs. One
of the remaining two-storey buildings was the former hospital. All that
remains are a few sun-bleached shutters shading rooms that must have been
witness to appalling pain and suffering. It is still possible to work out
which must have been the kitchen area, which the lavatories, and which the
treatment or individual rooms for the patients. The access from the main path
was blocked off to discourage entry, but a more careful look around the back
led to an entrance where it was possible to creep in and have a better look at
what was there. Another
poignant area is the graveyard. If the small notice “Leper
graveyard” had not been on the wall, it would not have been obvious what it
had been. There are no memorials, no religious artifacts, no book of the dead
– nothing to remind us that hundreds and hundreds of people came here to
exist as the living dead until they ended up under one of the concrete slabs
that now cover the area. In
the distance we could hear the approach of the large tourist boats. Disco
music blared out, vying with over-loud commentary in fifteen different
languages. The peace of the island was about to be shattered, and the
atmosphere destroyed. It was time to leave. |
In the News Drink up and keep the tax man happy...
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