Preparing for Lent
Greek Carnival or Apokries is a family celebration with street parties, parades, and masquerades. Carnival ( from Latin: carne and vale = goodbye to meat) marks the days before the fasting begins. The word Apokries in Greek comes from the words apochi and kreas (abstinence + meat) so, it means avoiding meat.
The Greek Carnival is divided into 3 weeks, all preparing for the fasting. The first week opens the carnival and starts with a specific church celebration. The second week is called Kreatini in which one is allowed to eat meat every day.
Tsiknopempte
The Thursday in the Kreatini week is called Tsiknopempte. Tsikno means the smell of grilled meat and Pempti means Thursday. This Thursday is a day to take your family out to a tavern and eat grilled meat. Tsiknopemptee is also the day when the parties start and the first masquerades for the Greek Carnival make their appearance.
The last week before Lent is called Cheese Week, White Week or Tyrini. Only dairy and fish are allowed during that week, no meat. The carnival celebrations end on Kathara Deftera or Clean Monday.
Greek Carnival in Patras
The best-known Carnival is in Patras, including a children’s carnival with a large parade of school children. Patras’ carnival is one of the most famous in Greece. It ends with the burning at the stake of the King of Carnival and a big parade of floats and costumed groups. Thousands of locals and tourists attend the carnival.
Carnival has some unique characteristics such as the oath of the participants and their taking part in decorating the city. Two effects mark the carnival’s start: The departure of the carnival’s train from Athens that goes through different cities up to Patras’, and the official appearance of the carnival’s queen.
Celebrations in Galaxidi on mainland Greece
Each year, the little harbour town of Galaxidi in the Peloponesse is covered with more than 1.5 ton of coloured flour. This is thrown on the locales and the tourists who attend the most insane battle. The traditional flour battle symbols the end of the carnival period.
Flower festival The historic legacy and the causes of these fights are unknown. According to local tradition, in the 19th century, when Greece was ruled by the Ottoman Empire, carnivals were forbidden. In spite of the prohibition, the locals danced in the streets with their faces coloured with coal as a protest against the government. Later on, they added the coloured flour tossing.
The flour battle takes place on Clean Monday. During the holiday, hundreds of people, dressed in plastic cloths, their paces are coloured with black coal and safety goggles on their eyes, fill the streets.
Trata Carnival in Skyros
Another Carnival celebration of Skyros is the “trata“, which reenacts the life of sailors. The performers, who most of them are fishermen, satirize in rhyme situations and events regarding life in Greek society in general. With these satirical verses, but also with their costumes, the performers manage to amuse the spectators of this performance, which reaches its peak on the last Sunday of the Carnival.
On Ash Monday, almost all the inhabitants of Skyros, dressed in traditional local costumes, gather in the square of the village, where they sing and dance local songs. (source: www.visitgreece.gr)
Gaitanaki
The Dance of the ‘Gaitanaki’ is a unique part of Greek carnival: it is a group dance of men and women with colourful ribbons. One person holds the pole and twelve dancers hold each one of the twelve colorful ribbons that are fixed on the top of the pole and hang from it. Tradition says that the twelve ribbons symbolize the twelve months of the year.
Clean Monday and Koulouma
The carnival ends on Kathara Deftera or Clean Monday. On this day, the fasting begins and the Koulouma or (traditions related to Lent) start. On Clean Monday, most Greeks leave the city for the countryside to spent family time, to have a picnic and to fly a kite. The traditional food eaten on Koulouma is taramas, a red kind of caviar, halvas, a cornstarch sweet and a Clean Monday bread called lagana. Many local bakeries are open on Clean Monday and sell this special bread.
Kyria Sarakosti
Kyria Sarakosti is another wonderful tradition that helps us to mark the weeks of Lent. Children in Greece make a paper doll or bake bread called Lady Lent or Kyra Sarakosti, who has seven legs, representing the number of weeks in Lent. Each week, kids remove a leg and count down to Easter.
