Page 59 - Studia Universitatis Hereditati, vol 11(2) (2023)

was 16 and was my parents’ shepherd. We at Christmas and Easter. Once a border guard
have always been friends. He came from the asked him: “Do you want us to let you pass and
‘Turkish’ village next to ours and my father take you to your old village so you can see your
took him on as a shepherd. He fled after the house again?” He replied that he did not: “The
war, when the people of our village went to past is the past. I do not want to have a heart
burn down his village. They took everything attack. Now only stones remain, nothing else
they could, but I only took two hens. [πέτρες να μείνουν]! Let me just see this lady. I
When they found each other after 1990, she ate bread in her house for several years and we
said to him: “The two hens I took from you, my ‘Turks’ do not forget when we eat bread in an-
friend, will be replaced a hundredfold.” The first other’s house.”
time, he came on horseback through the moun- This account helps us to understand the flu-
tains. He found his friends again, even though id nature of ethnic designations, which is also re-
he had not seen or contacted them since the flected in the many ways in which the groups that 59
make up the frontier society refer to themselves,
ti My husband took him to the store and gave no doubt reflecting the adaptation of pre-nation-
1940s.
al affiliations to the dominant discourses of the
him everything he could, everything that
following period. Leonidas Embirikos and Lam-
ta the horse could carry back to Albania. Since bros Baltsiotis have clearly shown how the term
that time, we saw each other constantly. He
“Cham” can be highly significant in this respect,
came to visit us and we went to Albania. His
as it is used to designate realities that are some-
house consisted of two small rooms and a
times quite diverse (Baltisiotis and Embirikos
di lounge with a fireplace. He had taken noth- 2007). Similarly, the recent adoption of the term tales from the greek-albanian borderland ...
ing from his former village in Greece when
“Arvanitès” (Αρβανίτες), rather than “Cham”, to
he fled. He was only a shepherd and had a
designate the Albanian-speaking Christians still
very simple life. After 1990, we saw each oth-
er every Easter. Initially he would come over living in what is now Thesprotia speaks volumes.
Usually used to designate Albanian-speaking
here to cross into Greece. I always prepared some centuries, this term seems to be used here to neu-
here, but later we had to meet up at the bor-
Orthodox groups from old Greece who have
der as he did not have the papers he needed
been present in Attica or the Peloponnese for
brioches [κουλουράκια], sweets [γλυκά]
tralize the question of linguistic otherness in
and lots of clothes for him at Easter, and he
this border region, by turning it from a transna-
brought us a lamb. We used to call each oth-
tional issue in relation to Albania into an inter-
er and meet up at the border crossing-point
nal Greek question. The linguistic group of Al-
to pass on clothes to his children that our
studiauniversitatis
children no longer wore. He could no longer
in two as a result of these distinct names: on the
come here for lack of papers. In 2002, my banian speakers in Thesprotia is therefore split
one hand, the “Arvanitès”, i.e. Albanian-speak-
husband died. My friend found out about it ing Orthodox with a Greek national conscious-
and came over. Anyway, he stayed all night ness, and on the other, the “Turco-chams” or “Al-
long with his forehead resting on his friend, bano-chams”, who are understood to be Muslim
crying while softly speaking words in Alba- Albanians who are historically linked to the Al-
nian to him. He took part in all aspects of banian nation-building process.
the funeral even though he was ‘Turkish’. He In the field, this dissociation is operated
went to the church and sat down with us at and endorsed by the radicality of the memorials.
the meal that is prepared for the dead.
In Kestrini, it is a person “of another religion”
From then on until he died in 2010, they (Αλλόθρησκος), therefore someone who is re-
met at the border crossing-point twice a year: sponsible for the death of the person honoured.