*By Dimitris Kyriazis
Maria Petra returned after 16 years to the city where she was born and raised, Xanthi, with a very specific vision in mind for the balanced development of the city, but also of the Greek countryside in general.
PASTALI.AMKE, which she created together with two other fellow travelers from Xanthi, aims to rescue, promote, highlight, preserve and ultimately reuse Greek productive culture and Greek productive heritage in the primary, secondary and tertiary sectors. For her, the imperative connection of productive past and present is more necessary than ever if we want the region of Greece to have a sustainable future.
The Faerop Festival, the fruit of PASTALI.AMKE, is the first festival of productive and industrial heritage in Greece. It emphasizes construction site seminars, modern industry, the rediscovery of the historical past and the connection with the productive present, but also artistic creation that the organizers seek to be inspired by our productive history and to help us face our productive identity without fear and obstacles.
“I was born and raised in Xanthi, where my parents were civil servants. Both of us come from the region, my father from Evros and my mother from the prefecture of Kavala. Xanthi in the 1980s and 1990s was a lively provincial city, which supported its operation on the many cooperative factories. It had received a wave of internal migration from other parts of Greece due to these ventures that were founded on the initiative of Alexandros Baltatzis. It was and still is a city with intense social and cultural activity.
I left Xanthi to study in Thessaloniki, in the Department of History and Archaeology, where I stayed for four years. Then I did my master’s degree in the Department of Cultural Technology and Communication at the University of the Aegean in Mytilene. I ended up living in Lesvos for 16 years and worked in private education and periodically at the Ephorate of Antiquities. Lesvos for me was a particularly peaceful place, rich in history and with a special approach to things. It became my second home for many reasons and this bond will never be broken. We always return, I believe, to places that shaped us.
In 2019, I returned to my birthplace, Xanthi, for family reasons. Returning to a familiar place after 20 years, especially during the pandemic, was not particularly easy, however, the familiarity with the area and especially the acquaintance with people with common interests was very important for me to stay and redefine my relationship with Xanthi. I returned to stay and not as a transient.
Xanthi is never boring. It is a peculiar Greek province, with a mixed population and rich cultural activity. There is quick and easy access to a rich natural environment (one of the most forested prefectures in Greece).
PASTALI is the fruit of the creation of three friends and collaborators, who grew up in Xanthi. First of all, let me tell you that the word comes from tobacco processing. Pastaliasma was the processing of the best tobacco leaves, the sorting. Why “pastali”? Not only because we are housed in an old tobacco farmhouse, a pre-industrial space, declared a protected site by the Ministry of Culture, but also because the pastaliasma also included the meticulous work of choosing the best.
PASTALI.AMKE is a first step towards opening up the issues of productive heritage in our region and beyond in an organized manner. The company’s main objectives are the rescue, promotion, promotion, preservation and reuse of Greek productive culture and Greek productive heritage in the primary, secondary and tertiary sectors.
Furthermore, our aim is the necessary promotion and recovery of the cooperative idea and education, the foundations of which were laid by the pioneer of the cooperative in the region of Eastern Macedonia and Thrace, Alexandros Baltatzis, together with his associates, and embraced by the workers of our region in all positions. The necessary connection of the productive past and present is more necessary than ever.
Every rural community and municipality must “resurrect” spaces, memories and people in order to regain the ballast that gives stability and balance to societies. We study our productive past for a primary and essential reason and that is to recover our productive perception. Knowledge is power only when it is clearly put into practice.
PASTALI as a space, beyond the fact that it is the headquarters of PASTALI. AMKE and the Faerop Festival, is evolving into a research, education and hospitality station, where the role of industrial archaeology will be dominant.
PASTALI.AMKE is housed in the village of Chrysa. Chrysa has been a mixed village since 1922. It was founded by Ottoman Muslims around the end of the 18th century. The village was called Kiretsiler, that is, Asvestochori. The residents were involved in tobacco, Kiretsiler basma was once considered the most aromatic tobacco in the world. From 1923 onwards, the village expanded with the creation of Nea Chrysa and the settlement of refugees, mainly from Asia Minor and a few Thracians. I must point out that the majority of people of refugee origin in Xanthi were from Eastern Thrace. The village is now a settlement, it has been united with Xanthi.
The idea for the Faerop Festival was also born through PASTALI. This is the first nationwide festival of productive and industrial heritage. Faerop was a slang expression of tobacco workers from the English phrase “we got fired”, that is, we were fired or “thrown out”, when they were not “wise” or when their work was over, as their work was seasonal. However, here the word is used upside down, euphemistically, in the sense that we are doing the festival so that we do not eat “faerop” from our place.
The Festival therefore began in 2024, is based in Xanthi, but we wish to connect with other parts of the region. This year it starts in mid-September with an emphasis on construction site seminars, modern industry, the rediscovery of the historical past and the connection with the productive present. There is also artistic creation, which we want to be inspired by our productive history and to help us face our productive identity without fear and obstacles. PASTALI.AMKE, through the Faerop Festival, in which we want other organizations to participate, which is already starting to happen, is trying to raise the issue of an unpaid promissory note for our region, the collapse of large cooperative ventures, with honesty, scientific validity and social involvement.
I feel justified in my choice to return to Xanthi because my place and my targeted activity regarding industrial heritage is a rich and creative field.
I would like to change several things. Infrastructure is a big problem. We have, for example, a degraded hospital, while the needs are great. Unemployment also, which forced and is forcing a large percentage of the population to emigrate.
I would like it to be a cleaner city, the public space is not taken care of, and for this not only the local authorities but also the citizens themselves are responsible. Traffic is an issue that requires changes in both the functioning of the city and the mentality of its residents. I would like our gaze to be turned back to production and the balanced development of the countryside. The prefecture of Xanthi is unfortunately a hydrocephalic prefecture.
If you mean decentralization as an individual choice, I would suggest to every interested person to pay attention to the issue of work, quality of life, which for me also has to do with free time. And of course the supportive social environment. To try before deciding, initially with frequent visits, without exaggeration, without embellishment. Overall, I would say that there should be an organized proposal over time for decentralization. But how will this be done when the primary sector is receiving many blows, when any factories remain in large urban centers? At the moment there is no political body in Greece that raises planned issues of decentralization. The findings about the withering of the countryside are not enough. We here, as much as we can, want to stay in our place and production is the only way, I believe.”
Source: lifo.gr
