Greeks are known for their many superstitions, some of which have regional origins. Here is an assortment of superstitions (or customs) that are still prevalent in the lives of many local Greeks.

Evil Eye
The evil eye is perhaps the most talked-about Greek superstition, can strike a person at any given moment. There has probably been an occasion when you were all dressed-up, and minutes after someone complimented you about your looks, you spilled coffee all over your outfit. That's the evil eye. According to Greek tradition, there are a few different things you can do to keep away the evil eye.

You can buy a blue eye-shaped charm and wear it on a necklace or bracelet. The color blue is thought to ward off the evil eye, but it's also commonly believed that blue-eyed people are prone to give the evil eye. So beware when a blue-eyed person pays you a compliment, as the compliment could end-up in disaster.

Other ways to ward off the evil eye's effect include asking an older woman (such as a mother, aunt, or grandmother) to recite a secret prayer called 'xematiasma,' spitting (or rather a spitting sound), or throwing salt over the shoulder.

Pomegranates
In Greek culture, the pomegranate fruit is associated with fertility, luck, prosperity, renewal, and regeneration since ancient times. The custom of smashing a pomegranate on New Year's Day is very symbolic. According to tradition, the juicy, bounteous ruby-like segments of the fruit fill the home with health, happiness, and joys as many as the pomegranate's arils.  

Perfume
In Greece, there is a weird taboo against giving perfume as a gift, as it is thought of ruining friendships and relationships. To counteract the harmful effect, it is customary that the recipient of the gift gives a coin back to the gift giver.

Garlic
Greeks believe that garlic has the power to keep evil away. You'll often see braids of garlic, or large garlic heads dangling over the entryways of stores, restaurants, and homes. Apart from warding off the evil eye, garlic is also assumed to keep away evil spirits and demons. It is common for some folk to carry a clove of it on them or in their pockets.

Knives
Never hand a Greek person a knife, as giving a knife directly into another person's hand means they will fall out. Instead, you are supposed to set it down and let them pick it up.

Money
Greeks believe that money attracts money, so don't leave your pockets, wallets empty–always leave at least a coin or two–and never withdraw all the money from your bank account. It is also customary that when you gift a wallet or purse, you put a coin or two inside before giving it to the recipient.

Touch Red or Piase Kokkino
When two people say the same words at the same time, Greeks believe it's a sign that the 2 will get into an argument. To avoid the fight, they immediately need to say 'Piase Kokkino' or 'Touch Red' and touch something red, such as clothing or a piece of food.

Spitting
While Greek people spit for several superstitious reasons, the most common is to keep evil away. Spitting, or rather the spiting sound which sounds like 'ftou ftou ftou' is always done 3 times to represent the Holy Trinity. Greek people often say 'ftou ftou ftou' when they hear about another person's misfortune to protect themselves or their loved ones from it. Another common occurrence is with children and babies when people engage in spitting to protect the child from harm and bad luck.

This content has been sourced and prepared by Codico Lab

The Diavlos Restaurant, in the heart of Athens, welcomes foodies to daily Greek cuisine workshops where experts reveal the secrets of traditional Greek cooking and participants partake in the joy of making and then tasting their creations to the tune of Greek music.

Located on Adrianou St, next to the Thisseio metro station, Diavlos is the ideal spot to chow down after a visit to the Acropolis, the Temple of Hephaestus, the Plaka borough or other main Athens attractions.

The warm atmosphere, friendly service and fine food make for a wonderful dining experience. Chefs prepare Mediterranean dishes with the freshest ingredients including everything from the much loved Greek salad complete with feta cheese and extra virgin olive oil to the omnipresent moussaka.

To read more, please visit: Greek Travel Pages

There are some things you might not know about Greek immigration to the United States.  This history becomes particulalry relevant when watching the news these days and political candiates like Donald Trump, supported by huge and vociferous crowds, call for the complete ban of people from entering the United States based in their race or religion.

This is nothing new. In fact– today’s “undesirable” Muslims (in Donald Trump’s eyes), were yesteryear’s Greeks.

It’s a forgotten history— something that only occasionally comes up by organizations like AHEPA or the occasional historian or sociologist. In fact, many Greek Americans are guilty of not only perpetuating— but also creating— myths of our ancestors coming to this country and being welcomed with open arms.

A look back at history will prove that this usually wasn’t the case for the early Greek immigrants to the United States. Greeks, their race and religion, were seen as “strange” and “dangerous” to America and after decades of open discrimination, Greeks were finally barred— by law— from entering the United States in large numbers.

The Immigration Act of 1924 imposed harsh restrictions on Greeks and other non-western European immigrant groups. Under that law, only one hundred Greeks per year were allowed entry into the United States as new immigrants.

Much like today, when politicians and activists like Donald Trump use language against a particular ethnic group— like his call to ban all Muslims from entering the United States, the same was the case a hundred years ago. Except then, Greeks were one of the main targets.

There was a strong, loud and active “nativist” movement that was led by people who believed they were the “true Americans” and the immigrants arriving— mainly Greeks, Italians, Chinese and others who were deemed “different” and even “dangerous” to American ideals, were unfit to come to America.

As early as 1894 a group of men from Harvard University founded the Immigration Restriction League (IRL), proponents of a United States that should be populated with “British, German and Scandinavian stock” and not by “inferior races.” Their biggest targets were Greeks and Italians and the group had a powerful influence with the general public and leaders in the U.S. government in their efforts to keep “undesirables” out of America.

To read more, please visit: Pappas Post

Ever wondered what Odysseus ate on his long journey back to his native Ithaca or what bread made from a 2,500-year-old recipe might taste like? The flavors of the ancient Greek world are being rekindled in London at the moment, in pop-up dining fashion.

Prepared by The Philosopher’s Stove team, the meals are based on recipes found in ancient manuscripts or fusions of old and contemporary culinary traditions. The ad hoc dinners began in May this year, with an emphasis on venues located in the British capital’s northeast.

“Given that we cannot re-enact the ancient Greek flavor palette, our project is an attempt to interpret the recipes through today’s contemporary reality, based on our own flavor horizon,” noted Stathis Georgiadis, a historian and co-founder of The Philosopher’s Stove. “We try to be as faithful as possible to recipes and references we come across to during our research, always working with the ingredients used back then. The feedback we get from those tasting our dishes is that the food is tasty, special and kind of off-the-beaten-culinary track.”

So far diners have been savoring a collection of antiquity-inspired dishes, including Dionysus’ Finger Food, a platter of vine leaves stuffed with minced pork and fried shrimps in a sour honey dipping sauce, Circe’s Pig, triple smoked pork cooked in wine, white grape juice, honey and spices – a recipe found in a papyrus at ancient Oxyrhynchus – and Cicero’s Burger, a vegetarian mix of chickpeas, walnuts, onions and spices, served with a smoked yogurt sauce and fresh coriander.

Ancient Greek poet Archestratus is widely considered to have laid the foundations for the art of gastronomy in 4th century BC Syracuse. His culinary laws included the use of quality ingredients in harmonious combinations, light sauces and a touch of spice.

The culinary spine of ancient Greek nutrition, says Georgiadis, was based on cereals, bread, fish, dairy products, cheese, eggs, honey, legumes and certain fruits – at the banquet table these were frequently accompanied by watered wine.

Have contemporary Greeks kept anything from the nutritional teachings of their ancestors?

“They certainly have. Above all, the high quality of raw materials produced on Greek soil and the purity of a number of ingredients which are intrinsically linked to Greek cuisine, such as olive oil,” noted Georgiadis. “It’s also about a certain balance and a sense of gastronomic wealth – this kind of cuisine includes almost everything. Another major factor is the notion of gathering around a table as a means of socialization. The way we get together to eat and share our food, the transformation of ancient Greek symposia, and their importance for individuals and society as a whole.”

To read more, please visit: ekathimerini

by

Elis Kiss and Christine Sturmey

In Greece, underwater excavations of Lechaion, ancient Corinth’s partially submerged harbour town, reveal the infrastructure of more than a thousand years of flourishing maritime trade. Researchers from the Greek Ministry of Culture and Sports and the University of Copenhagen are using cutting-edge methods to uncover the configuration and scale of the harbour.

Corinth ranked among the most economically and militarily powerful, and enduring, cities of the Greek, Roman and Byzantine periods. The city had an exceptional geographical advantage in the North East corner of the Peloponnese and controlled the Isthmus that facilitated land travel between Northern and Southern Greece, and travel by sea between the Western and Eastern Mediterranean.

Corinth, which lay some three kilometres from the sea, built on this natural advantage by constructing two harbour towns – the main harbour Lechaion on the Corinthian Gulf to the West, and Kenchreai on the Saronic Gulf to the East (see map to the right).

"According to ancient sources, most of the city's wealth derived from the maritime trade that passed through her two harbours, eventually earning her the nickname ‘Wealthy Corinth’," says archeaologist Bjørn Lovén from the University of Copenhagen and co-director of the Lechaion Harbour Project (LHP).

The moles and warehouses of Lechaion saw vibrant maritime activity for over a thousand years, from the 6th century BC to the 6th century AD. Ships and fleets departed from here laden with cargoes, colonists and marines destined for ports all over the Mediterranean and beyond. 

To read more, please visit: Humanities DK

Low voter turnout, the growing popularity of the far-right, tax hike upon tax hike, widespread disappointment among the citizenry: This is democracy under pressure, in the country where it was born. The publication of “Democracy,” a new graphic novel featuring a broken amphora on its cover, could not have come at a more critical time, launched in the US in mid-September, just days before Greeks headed to the polls for the third time in under a year.

The book describes the establishment of democracy in ancient Greece and was created by the illustrators behind the sensational “Logicomix: An Epic Search for Truth” (written by Apostolos Doxiadis and Christos Papadimitriou): Alecos Papadatos and Annie DiDonna.

The main hero is Leander, who, having witnessed the atrocities of the tyrannical regimes, tries to boost his comrades’ morale as they prepare for the Battle of Marathon in 490 BC by telling them about the birth of democracy as he experienced it.

“Oddly enough, none of the pop culture media have dealt with this story. Either because it is somewhat complex or because the applause is always stolen by the achievements of the 5th and 4th centuries BC. So telling it was worthwhile. It is of course about a dark period, the late 6th century BC – there is some confusion in the historical sources, but where research failed to shed light, we used our imaginations,” said Papadatos.

The plot was developed with writer Abraham Kawa and the book was first published in English by Bloomsbury, and recently translated into Greek by Politeia. “We decided to go this route so that it could compete in the foreign market first,” explained Papadatos.

“Abraham has the rare gift of having one foot firmly in analysis and the other in composition. He is very cultured and is crazy about comics and cinema,” said Papadatos. “He also has that annoying habit of knowing exactly what happens in which volume and on what page of Neil Gaiman’s ‘Sandman’ or how many plot twists there are in every issue of ‘Batman.’ He took the story of ‘Democracy’ and took it a whole new level.”

“Democracy” has received rave reviews in the international media. Science and sci-fi blog io9 has hailed it as one of the best graphic novels of 2015.

To read more, please visit: ekathimerini

Featuring over 2,000 finds from excavations carried out in Larissa, Trikala and Karditsa, as well as donated objects and repatriated antiquities from all historical periods, a new museum in the city of Larisa, central Greece, opened its doors to the public this week.

Materialized with EU funding under the National Strategic Reference Framework, the Larissa Museum aims to serve as a reference point for the history of the central Greece region of Thessaly, covering a wide spectrum of historical periods and areas of interest.

The museum, housed in a 1,500m2 space, is divided into 11 thematic units, featuring exhibits from the Paleolithic to Modern times and covering the development of the region through historic themes such as power, instirutions, society and economy.

To read more, please visit: Greek Travel Pages

On the 6th of January, the Christmas season in Greece officially comes to an end with the 'festival of light' ('ton foton' in Greek), also known as Epiphany.

This feast day in the Greek Orthodox Church is known as 'Theophania' which means 'a vision of God' or 'Christ shining through'. It is considered a very important day for the Greek Orthodox Church. In the Western Church, it is also known as "Three Kings Day",  a celebration of the 3 magi visiting baby Jesus.

In the Greek Orthodox Church, Epiphany is celebrated as the revelation of Christ as the messiah and second person of the trinity, at his baptism, by John the Baptist, in the River Jordan. Another cause for celebration in the Greek Orthodox Church on this day is that Christ's baptism was only one of two occasions when all three persons of the trinity revealed themselves, at the same time, to humanity: God the Father, speaking from the clouds, God the Son, being baptized in the River Jordan, and God the Holy Spirit, revealed as a dove, descending from heaven.

On Epiphany, the Greek Orthodox Church performs the 'Great Blessing of the Waters'. This ceremony is usually performed twice, once on the eve of Epiphany which is performed in the church, and then again on the actual day outdoors with priests blessing large bodies of water, sea, rivers, lakes etc.

The tradition is that a priest, surrounded by brave young men and boys, throws a cross into the sea, either from the harbour or from a boat at sea; the minute the cross leaves the priest’s hand, the divers jump into the freezing water to catch the cross. The lucky one who finds and returns the cross is blessed by the priest. As the cross is victoriously brought back, the priest releases a white dove, as a symbol of the holy spirit. This tradition is carried out to commemorate the baptism of Christ and to bless the waters.