Date of birth: 8 March 1906
Place of birth: Vasiliki, island of Lefkas
Arrived in Australia: 17 November 1926
Occupation: Shopowner
Our history in Australia goes a long way back. Some years after my mother’s death, my father decided to come to Australia. He arrived in 1923. He was in his mid-forties.
I came aboard a French ship called Vill-de-Virdin, which was an old semi-cargo ship. I was among the only four Greeks aboard. The rest of the passengers were mainly Italian, French and Germans.
In those days only islanders and some Macedonians (1) migrated to Australia. I had my father who through sponsorship was able to bring me to Australia. In the twenties only 100 Greek people were alllowed to migrate every year. Besides the 28 pounds you needed for the fare, you also had to have 50 pounds to show at customs. the purpose of this was to show that you had money for survival. If you didn’t have money they sent you back with the same ship.
The money was in fact more than plenty, because for example, you only paid 2 shillings for accommodation, and food was also cheap. The ship took 37 days to reach Melbourne. I arrived on the 17th of November, 1926.
This photo was taken in Lefkas, my beloved island, when I went there for a holiday in 1979. It’s a typical scene of life there. I’m dancing with friends and my wife who is on my right.
[Before migrating to Australia] I was living on Lefkas. The majority of its area is mountainous. The people there owned a lot of goats in those days. My village is near Vasiliki – about a quarter of an hour away by foot – but we are originally from Vasiliki.
Life in Greece [when I migrated] is the same as it is now. Our country has always been poor. She can’t change because she is poor. First of all, the country is over-populated – she has a large population for her area. Secondly, she is full of mountains and rocks. It seemed that God sifted the Earth. Christ passed from here [Australia], sifted the Earth and then went to Greece. He emptied the rocks there. So we [in Greece] have all the rocks and you have all the earth – it must have happened that way.
And something which is continually tormenting Greece is the army. There must be thousands [of soldiers] under arms continuously because everyone is threatening the country all the time. And it is for this reason that Greece remains poor, she can’t stand on her feet. There is no industry and there are no minerals – Greece doesn’t have any. These are the things that make Australia rich.
The early years [in Australia] were very difficult. We could not find work anywhere except in restaurants. My father and I sold fruit and vegetables at the Victoria Market – we had a stall there. In Greece, he didn’t sell anything – he had orchards and a garden, but that’s how things were here. In those years we had to find a Greek place to work, because the Australians didn’t want us. We had no hope because we were foreigners. They had no contact with foreigners or … other people. A few [foreigners] were in fact locals – they were called locals, but they were still foreigners. If anyone started to cooperate with them, the others who were working at the factory went on strike.
In 1930, I bought a restaurant which was on the corner of Lonsdale and Elizabeth Streets. I was happy with it, but Myer (2) bought it from me just after the war.
This photo was taken in 1949 when I moved to Warrandyte. The money I got from the restaurant enabled me to buy a farm of 25 acres which had chooks and fruit trees, as well as a reception centre on Gully Road, which was used for functions such as dances and parties that were held by the Greek people.
After the war I brought a lot of my people here – relatives, friends and unrelated people. I brought about 40 people here through the DEME (3) and sponsorship. I had them in my house until they found jobs, and some of them were even married there.
This photo was taken in 1949 when we attended a Greek dance organised by Mrs. Vrahna (4) [the Greek teacher] for her students in Melbourne. My wife and I are on the far left of the picture. The others are friends and relatives.
Mrs. Vrahna was a teacher from Limnos. She didn’t come through any Government assistance or anything, she came as a migrant. She was the only teacher available, and she was very good of course. God bless her soul, she was a very good woman.
We are Australians only because of our fate – isn’t that so? I am Greek – I can’t become Australian. I’m Greek and I’ve tried, no matter what, to keep my children Greek – and I suggest you do this, if you can. If you have a family, plant that Greek identity in your children, to think that they are Greek, to mix with Greeks, to go to all the Greek functions so that they become Greek – you look after them. We Greeks don’t like to change our identity.
This is my most recent photo, and it was taken in 1981, when I was speaking at a dance organized by the Brotherhood of Lefkas. I was the president then, but now I am too old for that demanding position. The Brotherhood now has a lot of members and it’s getting bigger all the time. It’s good to see many greek people getting together.
We didn’t have anything like this in the early days. there were many coffee shops and restaurants in the city, in Lonsdale Street, and there are still some now, but not as many. In those years you had to go to the city to do your shopping because those shops sold everything. Outside the city there weren’t many Greek shops.
When I came, Evangelismos (5) was the only Greek Orthodox church. People could not go to church easily. The community was small and most of them were working on Sunday. It wasn’t easy.
After the war things changed 1000% – there was an enormous difference. When the war finished, Australia needed migrants and through propaganda, she tried to bring out as many Greeks as possible. After these people began to migrate, naturally life became different: the Australian’s attitude changed and the press changed in favour of migrants, not against.
1 Macedonia – Northern subdivision of Greece.
2 Myer owns large department store in Melbourne.
3 DEME was an assistance scheme that paid some or all of Greek migrants’ fares to Australia. The scheme was administered through the Greek and Australian Governments.
4 Mrs. Alexandra Vrahna was the head-mistress of all Greek Orthodox Community Schools from 1939 – 1960.
5 Evangelismos was the first Greek Orthodox church, built in Melbourne in 1902.
Source: ‘1985. Brunswick City Council. For a better life we came’. Collected and edited by the Brunswick Oral History Project. Images taken after 1955 are available in the print publication. Original images available in exhibition boxes in storage at Brunswick Library.