If things were different, today too, Saturday, 25 March, celebrating the Annunciation, Lakis would wake up at 6.30 in the morning without waiting for the alarm clock to go off. He would go to the toilet to pass water. Moving his bowels would be postponed due to constipation. After this, Lakis would return to his bedroom and, thinking it was still early, he would snuggle in bed for another three quarters of an hour. During this time he would neither go back to sleep, nor read the paper, but would think over a few things. Then he would yawn repeatedly five or six times and get up. He would go to the bathroom again, shave, wash, tidy himself up, and would then make his breakfast, that is a medium coffee. Between coffee and dressing he would again mull over a few things. Then, without hurrying, he would begin dressing. Lakis would follow the schedule he had set to the letter.

If things were different...

I made my decision - important or unimportant, what does it matter? - after the incident that morning at the doctor’s. The day before I had received a letter from my wife. I had read it so many times, I had almost learned it by heart. I picked it up again without unfolding it. I smoothed the folds with my fingers. The touch alone made her words come alive in my mind.

My dearest Lakis,

I received your letter and you cannot imagine how glad I am that at last God has taken pity upon us and it seems that our troubles will soon be over. What can I tell you, Lakis, my dear? To think about what we’ve been through all these years, by the Holy Virgin, you wouldn’t wish it on your enemy! They’ve given you a few peanuts, peanuts, what do you think? First they squeeze you dry like a lemon and then they get rid of you just like that, but anyway, it’s better than nothing, beggars can’t be choosers. Let’s not dwell on it. God’s in his heaven and looks down upon us. We’ll be alright. First, you come back, God willing, and everything will be fixed up. We’ll think of something, we won’t just sit idle, we’ll manage a wage, we won’t starve. God will provide. As long as you are well, don’t worry, ok? I know how sensitive you are and how you bottle things up inside. We are all well here. Except that the boy misses you and frets about it. Sometimes he even jumps up in his sleep in the middle of the night. But only sometimes. I talk to him, explain things to him, but for how long? He’s beginning not to believe me. It’s not as if it’s just a matter of a few days. I’ve had enough. A whole lifetime. Oh well, maybe our troubles will be over soon. I pray day and night. I’ve received the one hundred dollars you sent me, ok.

I’m thinking of selling that block of land I got for my dowry at Potamia and putting the money towards building a house here in Koula’s neighbourhood. There’s a small block here up for sale. Reasonably priced. What do you think? Anyway think about it. Maybe we can have a little haberdashery shop downstairs, something like that, and live upstairs.

Bambis started his national service a few days ago. They’ve sent him near the border, to Euros, the bastards...

Apostolis and Ririka have called it off, and all because of 50,000 drachmae. His old man is unrelenting. There goes the engagement, everything. They’re extremely upset. It’s awful...

I don’t know what else to write about. I shall be awaiting your reply anxiously, as soon as possible. Think about what I’ve written. Many-many greetings from Dad, Ririka, brother-in-law Theodoros and everybody.


That night I wanted to feel optimistic. I even tried. Finally, what with the indigestion, the heartburn, what can I say, I didn’t quite manage it. I slept restlessly, without nightmares, but restlessly nevertheless.

This is a photo of Lakis as a baby: about three months old. Some 5 kilos or so. In his cradle, a curl falling on his forehead. And holding a rattle. His eyes half-open, half-closed. Smiling? Crying? One can’t tell.

This one’s taken at his christening: Two fat, hairy arms are holding him and showing him off above the front, and he is howling. A few darkish faces around, with moustaches, appear to be trying to make him smile. Somebody is madly pointing to Lakis’ male member as if directing the lens not to miss this detail or as if insisting that only this detail be photographed. The day he became a Christian.

The newly baptized at three years: Standing on a chair and posing in his summer clothes. And with a beauty spot on the nose. But did Lakis ever have a beauty spot? Later on it turned out that it was neither artificial, nor a touch up by the photographer, nor anything else for that matter. It was simply fly shit, a spot that disappeared when scratched with a fingernail. The mystery was thus solved. Lakis regained his natural look.

Lakis the pre-schooler: At a village fair, 1932-33 (?).

Lakis the second grade pupil: Memento of a school excursion to the cemetery of the Church of the Prophet Elijah. Panoramic view. August 6, 1935.

Lakis the high school student: wearing the school-cap with the owl on it. Standard-bearer; 1940. The year of the historic NO.

Lakis the Cub...

Lakis the soldier: 3rd Infantry Regiment. Fiorina. Winter, 1948.

Lakis on the ship PATRIS: Migrant, bound for Australia. June 18. Anno Domini 1960.

Memento of Lakis’ and Toulas’ wedding: Holy church of Saint Nicholas, Marrickville, 1967.

Kostakis’ birth: Spring, 1970.

Lakis the worker: Just before the accident. Autumn, 1972.

Somewhere here the album comes to an end. Lakis’ life in snapshots. An emptiness follows. The emptiness. The last page of the album empty. With only the self-adhesive cellophane on the grainy, silvery surface. Bottom right, near the edge, the wings of an insect - a mosquito? - have become caught and have been flattened, the fossilized remains of a parasite that once lived.

This is Lakis, that is me. And this is my life in photos. The first phase, of course. I call it the prehistoric phase. For purely personal reasons I have divided it into prehistoric and post-historic. The latter starts from O, nothingness, emptiness. And thus it proceeds up to where it proceeds, up to where it has now got. For this latter phase there are no details, documents, photographic or otherwise. Besides, how could there be since there is this emptiness? But how can emptiness exist? And yet I want to believe that it does exist, since I exist and wish to understand it. I know, of course, that even in this respect I am late and exhausted with the effort - a no-hoper all my life! - since others have recorded in detail this latter phase of my existence. The difference, however, is in one very significant detail. Nobody - and I stress this, nobody - has managed to record or even conceive of the existence of my discovery. I am the sole possessor, with exclusive rights to this secret - don’t listen to what others, those who have sold out, may say. Because, as far as I am concerned, I will never breathe a word about this strange individual, Lakis, who, evil tongues say, and they can say it all they like, is a bit cuckoo, especially now that I know first hand that he’s being watched day and night, non-stop; and his head is wanted on a platter. My decision is final, irrevocable, as they say. There’s no going back now, not to please anyone.


The cuckoo clock strikes 11.30. I yawn repeatedly. I look at my watch. They’re synchronized. For some time now I’ve got a mind to dismantle this blasted cuckoo. Just like this, for no reason. It’s been getting on my nerves lately, more and more. It ruins my sleep. Often, when I’m sunk into deep sleep - after the twelve odd tablets I take daily - I think I can hear police patrols, their sirens howling, invading my home, arresting me. At other times it’s as if I can hear the church bells of my village ringing in mourning. I jump up from my sleep in quite a state. I don’t know whether this is fear or what. It was my wife’s bright idea, a month before she left for Greece - nearly three years ago now - to buy it. She had read about it in magazines, and it was fashionable, she said, for a modern home to have such an item of furniture, elegant, practical and at the same time inexpensive. That’s how she had put it. As for me, however, whether due to superstition - in my village the sound of cuckoo was considered to be an evil omen foretelling death - or due to the state of hypertension I was in lately because of my situation, I couldn’t bear it any longer.

I feel my body feverish, my head heavy. Pure lead. But I can’t get to sleep. Tonight I’m going to be awake all night. I’ll certainly be awake all night. Before anything else comes the protection of my home, my property, myself. That’s a top priority. They’ve marked me out. They’re pointing their finger at me. I am, they say, guilty. Anything’s possible. Another coffee would be too much. To hell with these coffees. Perhaps I’ve ended up like this because of so many coffees. Ended up?

Perhaps I should lie down like this, without undressing. Not to sleep, just to lie down, to rest for a bit. My body’s like a log. Alright then. I go to the door. It’s bolted from inside and with a deadlock. The back door likewise. Now the windows - one is only human, sometimes one forgets - everything’s ok. Except that when it comes to the bedroom window I adjust the Venetian blind carefully, I leave it open just enough for me to be able to check what’s going on outside. Ah, they won’t catch me sleeping and they’d better believe it. I’m not a fool. They’re watching me; that’s fine. But I won’t give up without a fight. I go to the toilet to pass water. I pass water very frequently while, on the contrary, I suffer from persistent constipation. The side effects of the medication, the doctor said.

Having made sure that the bread knife is under my pillow, I lie down. The ceiling begins to spin above me. My ears are buzzing. I grasp my head in both hands in an attempt to stop the spinning. This lasts for a few seconds but they seem like hours. These dizzy spells have become more frequent lately. But ended up? I try to dismiss this thought from my mind with a movement of my hand, as if I’m dealing with a bothersome insect. I could never end up. Of course I’ve faced certain difficulties, there will always be difficulties. But that’s the lot of human beings. It’s all part of the story. What can one do? That’s life. It’s true that that damned accident has cost me a great deal. It’s crippled me. It’s ruined my nerves. But hang on, brother, it’s only natural! After all this, what do you expect. The old body is a machine and it’s been pushed to its limits. And sometimes it breaks down after so much pushing. But in this case, my case, it hasn’t broken down. Tired, yes. Suffering, yes. But ended up? How so? The doctor called all these things ‘psychosomatic symptoms.’ As for me, who’s the one suffering - and what I know I know, let them say whatever they want - I say that it’s nothing but hypertension. It’s not an octopus we’re dealing with but a nervous system. How much can it take? I laugh at the image of the octopus. I want to catch him laughing, to catch his mug in the mirror, in the act, at the moment he’s laughing - full face, profile, horizontally, vertically, making faces and such. I’m dying of curiosity. I want to get up. I try to get up. Nothing. Immobilized, paralyzed like that time they gave me morphine. That’s how I feel. A nice feeling. Rubbish. ‘Why should I bother,’ I think. Anyway, it’s been quite some time, years in fact, since I’ve seen him laugh. Perhaps others have caught him laughing recently. That time at Lome was something else. Far on the horizon the clouds had gathered for good. The sea wild. The sky black, heavy, like my head right now. We had downed a few ouzos of the EXIST brand and had become tipsy. The pregnant cloud was ready to burst above us. We must find an octopus, we must find an octopus. Andrikos had the inspiration to buy one from a fishing trawler. And the shower did come down. ‘You must laugh, you must laugh as much as you can! Laughter does one good!...’ my doctor had recommended. ‘Laughter therapy will save you, will save us...’ he corrected himself and, as was his way, patting me in a friendly manner on the shoulder as he was seeing me out. It was then that I came up with the slogan: ‘Push yourself, strain, laugh!’ Except that, no matter how much I strained, I could neither laugh nor get my bowels to move, if I did not take those miraculous little chocolates twice daily. The last time I saw Lakis laugh, or something like that, was when he was a baby in his cradle, three days old. But even then you couldn’t tell whether he was laughing or crying. Strange doings...

No, I was not ill. Only tired. Dead tired.


Wine that was crystal clear. They were grinning from ear to ear. One of them had tied the hind legs of the animal tightly. Another had sat on it around its middle to stop it moving. And a third had immobilized its head with his knee. The animal was howling with choked groans. Women and children with runny noses galore had gathered around it in a circle. A free spectacle. Grandfather picked up one of the two knives. Sharp as a razor. He crossed himself. ‘In ihe name of the Father,’ he said. He made the sign of the cross three times on the animal’s throat. ‘May we all be well and do the same again next year...’ he continued. Many children started crying. Others turned their faces away or hid them in their mother’s skirts. A couple of them ran away. Then Grandfather sank the knife deep into the animal’s throat. Hot blood spurted out. Those standing dose by got splattered all over. The choked groaning continued for a few minutes and died down gradually. When the struggle was over, the animal was skinned and cleaned. ‘The fillet is the greatest delicacy!’ said Uncle. ‘The head in aspic is delicious! We’ll have meat all year round...’ added Grandmother. She was grinning from ear to ear. Then they took the head away on a board - it reminded me of St. John the Baptist.

I jump up. I can still feel the handle of the bread knife under my pillow. ‘They’re wanting my head on a platter,’ I think, breaking into a cold sweat. It’s hot. Hot or cold? What had the weather forecast said? At any rate, I feel hot. Besides, I’m lying in bed in my clothes. I had pneumonia once, when I was young, so I’ve got to be careful now. No. I no longer feel the wish to see his face in the mirror. ‘What a sight!’ I think to myself. I’m very thirsty. My mouth’s all dried up. I’m suffocating. And yet I feel too tired to go all the way to the kitchen. Weary, exhausted, I’m going to collapse before I can get there. I’ll faint. Then my eyelids won’t open. No way. Come on, you’ve got to learn to do it; what sort of a man will you become...’ Grandfather had commanded me before sinking the knife. I had also been splattered by a few drops of blood.

Lakis the bigb-scbool student: Wearing the school cap with the owl on it. I took the cap off and held it in my hands. I looked at the bird for a long time, unable to figure out its significance. Strange bird. Then, when I went into the house, I saw the pig’s head shaved, white, decorated, smiling at me with a lemon stuck between its teeth.

Air! He’s drowning! The servant of God Nikolaos... is baptized... He’s suffocating. In the name of the Father... The two hairy arms, like cables, plunge him to the bottom, bubbles escape from his mouth and nostrils, he’s going, suffocating, drowning... Around him laughter... The little brat... at last the surface, a breath, come on my darling, come on!... My lamb, he’s cold... look at the brat, and of the Son... oil, snot, tears, water all suffocate him but the two cables relentlessly, mercilessly persist in plunging him in the water, again annihilating him, irrespective of the fact that he’s screeching and writhing... and of the Holy Ghost... come on now, enough... Congratulations!... Congratulations to the newly baptized... my baby... come, come to your godfather my little heart... the birdie, the birdie, there! The little brat, such stubborness! Congratulations... Well done, many more of the same... Amen. Air!...

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