As rain lashed the windows of St Catherine’s Greek Orthodox Church Hall in Malvern East on Sunday afternoon, warmth gathered around a long communal table laid with yiayia’s embroidered tablecloth.
It was a feast where memory, migration and storytelling took centre stage. The launch of We Walk Beside Our Past: The Voice of Those Who Remember Forward and In the Name of Me transformed the hall into something far more intimate than a traditional literary event.
Guests sat in a circle around a table layered with embroidered cloths, family relics, recipe cards and symbolic objects drawn directly from the stories themselves.
As each contributor read excerpts from the anthology, they moved to sit beside personalised placemats representing their narratives, turning the launch into a living archive of family memory.
Hosted by writer and contributor Sia Papageorgiou, the afternoon drew a packed and notably multicultural crowd, including a number of former ESL students of author and educator Dr Chrisoula Papas, who came to support the teacher who had once helped them find language and belonging in Australia.
“What’s been so special about this afternoon is that we’ve been able to experience both the collective and the personal side of memory,” Papageorgiou said. “The stories shared across families and communities, and also the deeply individual experiences that shape who we’ve become.”
The anthology We Walk Beside Our Past, edited by Dr Papas, brings together nine Greek Australian voices reflecting on migration, family, language, identity and inheritance. Alongside it sat Papas’ autobiographical novel In the Name of Me, an unflinching exploration of dual identity, assimilation and self-reclamation.
Award-winning poet and writer Angela Costi officially launched the anthology, describing it as “an anthology of poems, stories and recipes, all of which hold the past not as something abstract or conceptual.”
“Rather,” she said, “the past is embraced like a beloved friend.”
Costi praised the collection’s emotional and sensory depth, where “poem and story sit in conversation across generations.”
“This anthology did bring me home,” she said, “with its view of memories as vital as orchards, its horizon of anecdotes as precious as islands, and its landscape of memory as irresistible as a Greek Easter feast.”
Throughout the afternoon, contributors read deeply personal excerpts touching on grief, migration, inherited trauma and cultural belonging.
Writer Georgios Metaxas reflected on the tension of growing up between cultures.
“Physically I was born on Australian soil,” he read, “but my spirit was a sojourner of meaning, like a restless soul desperately searching for peace.”
Sia Papageorgiou’s reading of inherited proverbs from her mother drew both laughter and recognition.
“My mother had a saying for everything,” she said, as her mother watched proudly, fighting back emotions as Sia read. “Language is more than information. It’s connection. It’s identity. It’s love.”
Contributor Ourania Papageorgiou evoked vivid scenes of Sunday lunches and migrant family life.
“The table was always dressed for the occasion,” she read. “Sunday lunches were almost sacred.”
Helen Bozikis captured the grief and continuity carried through food and ritual.
“The kitchen is the epicentre of belonging,” she reflected in The Essence of Home.
Presenter Phyllis Dimakakos described In the Name of Me as “a memoir about courage.”
“The courage to speak. The courage to remember. The courage to forgive. And the courage to stand fully in one’s own name,” she said.
She highlighted the memoir’s engagement with inherited trauma and identity, and its use of kintsugi, the Japanese art of repairing broken pottery with gold.
“What has been fractured is not hidden, but illuminated,” Dimakakos said. “Damage becomes part of beauty and meaning.”
The emotional centre of the afternoon belonged to Dr Papas. Taking the mic at the close, she paused before speaking candidly about growing up in Port Melbourne and watching migrant ships arrive at Station Pier.
“This book began towards the edge of Station Pier,” she told the audience, “where as a child I watched ships arrive carrying not only people, but stories, memory and dreams.”
She described storytelling as “an act of resistance against erasure.”
“Telling my story provided the opportunity to untangle myself from my history and untangle my history from within,” she said. “What once felt like weight became perspective.”
There were moments of palpable emotion across the room, particularly during readings on Cyprus, migration and family separation, yet the afternoon never lost its warmth. Guests also laughed at familiar references to Greek mothers, inherited sayings and crowded family tables.
One of the most touching scenes came after formalities ended, as former ESL students lined up to embrace Dr Papas, take photographs and thank her for helping shape their journeys in Australia.
Outside, Melbourne remained cold and rain-soaked. Inside, over coffee and cake, guests lingered for hours in the soft glow of conversation and memory.
On signed copies of her memoir, Dr Papas left a final handwritten message that seemed to capture the spirit of the afternoon:
“May you find strength in your story.”
