That’s the advantage of our children, they have their grandparents and parents. When we were young we only had our parents. What’s going to happen to our children and our children’s children?
– Vicki Vezos

It’s funny, talking to so many Greek Australians one thing rang true, what if we lose our Easter traditions? As second and now third generation Greek Australians, we cling to all our traditions to be certain we don’t lose anything relating to our cultural heritage and faith.
But as time goes on, it’s inevitable that within them we form our own Easter traditions or they become infiltrated with the traditions of the country in which we reside. Alongside the dyed red eggs is always an Easter bunny. Does this mean the end for Easter or are Greek Australians in Australia hanging on too tight and not letting Easter evolve.
Neos Kosmos talks to ordinary Greek Australians to get their take on what is going on with Easter.
Sue Karantonis told Neos Kosmos the only thing that’s changed for her Easter throughout the years is that she “used to go to church more” than she does now.
“We used to go on the Wednesday night, Thursday night and the rest but now we just go Friday night epitaphio, and Saturday anastasi.
“And we go to the same church, always, so you always catch up with friends – even people who have moved away always come back to their family’s church. And you find you go to the same meeting spots when you’re there, you stand in one place for anastasi, one place on epitaphio.”
“We used to do more with our parents,” Alex Nitsos said, “but now that we have our own families, we do what we can but not as much as our parents do.”
Vicki Vezos was quick to talk about her own traditions for Easter. She said that the group of girls have been friends for 25 years and “they get together before Easter to buy our tsourekia and lambathes”.
I asked the ladies, who all have their own children, if they are scared of losing any Easter traditions to the third and fourth generations.
Vicki said that the “grandparents have had a major role in raising [their] children to reinforce the traditions and symbolism of Easter”.
“That’s the advantage of our children,” Vicki said, “they have their grandparents and parents. When we were young we only had our parents. What’s going to happen to our children and our children’s children?”
Sandra Posocco married a Catholic and said she “finds that [her] children have got partners that aren’t Greek Orthodox and they come along too and celebrate and join in the traditions. My husband actually said to me the other night, because our Easter’s fall on the same night that he doesn’t care what church we go to for midnight mass, he’s just happy to go to church.” She said that when the Easters fall on the same day, they make sure to combine both religious traditions.
But for Kyrillos Tsintikidis, this Easter is going to be like none he’s ever known. He just arrived from Greece two months ago and really has no idea what to expect when it comes to Easter celebrations in Australia – but hopes it’s the same as in Greece.
“I am going to go to a friend’s house,” said Kyrillos. “I don’t know how Greek Australians celebrate Easter, this will be the first time for me.
“In Greece, we go home after church, we eat mageritsa to break the fast and then we go out drinking!”
I asked Kyrillos if he is fasting this year.
“No, I’ve never fasted, I don’t think that fasting makes you a better person. Your actions are not about what you eat.”
Yiannis Dimitrakopoulos said in his 25 years in Australia, he has never, ever had an Easter like he has in Greece.
“In 25 years in Australia, I have never had an Easter, a Christmas, apokries like I had in Greece. Restaurants, cafes they close those days. You go away, you go to the village are around your family, you go to church – it’s the leaving the city that’s not the same. You can go from Melbourne to Ballarat but it’s not the same. It’s not the same as going to your horio where all your family are. Here in Australia, everything is open on Easter Saturday. In Greece the whole week leading up to Easter, everything is shut, so you focus only on Easter. You focus on fasting, on your family, on the religious ceremony. If you haven’t had Easter in Greece, you won’t understand it. No matter what we do in Australia we can’t recreate it.
“One of the reasons is because when our Easter doesn’t fall on everyone else’s Easter, we still have to work.
“We always keep the traditions alive in Australia and I do love Australia, there are so many opportunities here, but there is something so special about Easter in Greece.”
On the other hand, William Adamis enjoys the Easter traditions but isn’t so sure about the religious side of it.
“I went to a Catholic school and there we studied a lot of other religions like Judaism, Islam, Buddhism and that’s when I made the conscious decision that religion was not for me. Religion does some good but it also does bad – it is down to human nature.”
He said that when he was younger he would go to church. “We did go to church in the wee hours of the morning to get the candle lit, but we kind of cheated. We’d wait till around 1 am and then we’d drive up towards the church and pop the candle out the car window and get someone else to light it for us.”
Peter is from a full Greek background and said that there is no way he can get out of Saturday night and Sunday lunch at yiayia and pappou’s house.
“I do look forward to seeing my family as most of them live around Melbourne so it’s a good chance to see anyone. I don’t fast but it’s not because I don’t care, it’s because I am lazy. I did fast when I was younger and as we got older, it turned into a fast on Friday only and now we don’t fast at all.”
William agrees that “it’s all about the food, gathering and catching up”.
Stamatia Tsonis always has Easter celebrations at her house. Married for 11 years, her and her husband have had Easter at their house in a way to give something back to her parents and do something for her family.
“Each year I have a theme for Easter, so this year I am going to do a seafood inspired Greek Easter lunch. It’s a way I’ve taken Easter and made it into my own. One year I focused on having a Middle Eastern salad theme. So I tried to bring the flavours of Greece and Turkey and Smyrna.”
Regarding the religious side of Easter, Stamatia said that with two young children it was hard to go to church but this year she is going to take them to Friday night’s service because it’s relatively early.
“We are going to take them around the church with their lambathes. They were both baptised on New Years so this is going to be our first church service as a full Greek Orthodox family.”
She said her children are getting exposed to many Greek Easter traditions and she makes sure they understand the symbolism too.
“My eldest helped yiayia make the koulouria on Sunday and he will help dye the eggs on Thursday. We have been reading books on the Christ for Easter so this week we are focusing on the stories of Easter for them. And they both love breaking the eggs.
“It’s incredibly important to involve the children, not for anything else but the fact that we do live in Australia and the fact that we don’t celebrate Easter in a horio where we really feel it and really celebrate it and everything stops. Here I really don’t feel that anything stops for Easter. It’s almost like we wake up and go it’s Easter today, let’s eat arni.
“I think when children are very young, it’s a really nice way to remind ourselves as adults that this is a special time and we should celebrate the story of Christ. And keep the tradition alive because one day if our children decide to pick up and go to Greece, they aren’t going to feel separated from that tradition and from our culture. We need to make time to stop and celebrate our cultural heritage and our faith.”
What it does boil down to is that Easter really is a time for family. A highlight for everyone is being with their family, being around loved ones and enjoying everyone’s company.
“The highlight of my family’s Easter is the anastasi,” Alex said. “We go to my parent’s house where my mum makes the best mageritsa. What concerns me is that I don’t know how to make it, she has refined it over the years, but I don’t know how we are going to continue that special tradition of breaking the fast with mum’s mageritsa. The whole celebration of Easter is part of our culture and traditions.”
Vicki said that “even though we were born in Australia we love our Greek heritage and our culture. And I am sure it will continue on as we are so proud of it”.
“It’s even better when the Easters fall on the same time because then everyone can celebrate all together,” said Sue.
“As a teacher, we all talk about our traditions and culture in class, no matter if we teach Greek or not. We talk about the name days and Easter. And they love it when we bring in leftovers in the staff rooms.”