An animal rights organisation known as the People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA) has suffered severe backlash for demanding farmers not kill the mice plaguing their properties in regional Australia.
PETA Media Officer Aleesha Naxakis came under fire after telling farmers to avoid using poison to kill the animals, instead to use humane traps to allow them to be “caught gently and released unharmed.”
“These bright, curious animals are just looking for food to survive,” Naxakis told NCA NewsWire.
“They shouldn’t be robbed of that right because of the dangerous notion of human supremacy.”
The mouse plague is costing farmers up to $150,000, a NSW Farmers’ survey has found. Photo: NSW Farmers
Naxakis’ comments have sparked an angry backlash from farmers and Deputy Prime Minister Michael McCormack, who lashed PETA as “idiots who have never been outside the city”.
“The real rats in this whole plague are the people who come out with bloody stupid ideas like this,” he said, according to news.com.au.
“Their thinking around this is reprehensible, when you have farmers struggling.
“You have these people who have never left the city and wouldn’t know if their backside was on fire, then all of a sudden they’re telling farmers what to do?
Deputy Prime Minister Michael McCormack Photo: ABC
“The only good mouse is a dead mouse.”
Last week the NSW government announced a $50m rescue package, free poison for farmers and mice bait rebates of $1000 for small businesses and $500 for households.
NSW Deputy Premier John Barilaro slammed the PETA spokeswoman’s comments as “ridiculous” and an “insult” to farmers doing it tough.
“I would laugh if this wasn’t so serious,” he said.
The Greek island of Corfu welcomed its first cruise ship of the new season on Tuesday, hoping much awaited tourists will help salvage losses incurred during 2020 due to the coronavirus.
Corfu port authorities said some 600 tourists from countries including Italy, France and Germany were on board the Costa Luminosa, operated by Italy’s Costa Cruises, and all safety measures were being adhered to in the port.
Some of the passengers expressed their delight at being able to travel again.
“It’s freedom, enjoying life, you really feel much better. You’re not in prison anymore, you’re free and that really does you good,” said French tourist Robert Maran from Lyon.
Passengers of the Costa Luminosa cruise ship wearing protective face masks make their way at the port of the island of Corfu, Greece, May 18, 2021. REUTERS/Adonis Skordilis
Greece opened its doors on Saturday to tourists from the EU and other key markets such as the United States, Israel and Britain, lifting the need for people to quarantine as long as they have been vaccinated or tested negative for COVID-19.
Costa’s first ship to resume cruises in Greece and the second to restart operations overall, is one of four scheduled to resume cruises this summer in the Mediterranean.
It set sail from the port of Trieste on May 16, and besides Corfu, will also stop in Athens, Mykonos, the port of Katakolon near Olympia in Greece, and Bari in Italy. It will operate until mid-November for some 27 cruises.
The Costa Luminosa cruise ship prepares to moor at the port of the island of Corfu, Greece, May 18, 2021. REUTERS/Adonis Skordilis
According to the company website, safety measures due to the coronavirus include a reduced number of passengers, social distancing, testing before embarking and midway through the cruise, as well as daily temperature checks when passengers disembark and re-enter the ship, as well as during excursions.
Masks will be required when necessary. The crew will also undergo frequent tests.
Another cruiseship, Mein Schiff 5 with about 1,000 passengers, was the first to dock at Piraeus Port this summer holiday season, Piraeus Port Authority said.
Tourists visited the local sites on the island wearing masks and underwent temperature checks at the museums.
“At last we’re coming back on track to freedom and work,” said tour guide Wafaa Spirou. “Safety and hygiene measures are being respected both by us and by our clients.”
Bill Papastergiadis, President of the Greek Community of Melbourne (GCOM), and Professor Pirpiris, Treasurer of the GCOM, met with Australian Health Minister Greg Hunt to discuss the country’s vaccine progression and the Greek Australian community.
Bill Papastergiadis congratulated the Morrison Government and Minister Hunt for their exemplary work in maintaining Australia as one of the few countries globally to be largely covid free.
“Not enough could be said about the freedoms we have enjoyed in Australia considering the difficulties experienced in most parts of the world. This achievement in Australia cannot be understated,” Bill Papastergiadis said.
Papastergiadis raised a number of issues that were relevant to not only Greek Australians, but everyone in the country.
The President asked to what extent the uncertainty of opening international borders impacted the uptake of the vaccine. Papastergiadis said that “many people in the community had expressed a view to me that they would delay taking the vaccine given the protracted timeline for when borders were opening internationally”. Clearly, this presented a “catch 22” situation for the Federal Government.
Minister Hunt acknowledged this issue and said in clear terms that “the quicker people got vaccinated the quicker the Government would consider the opening of international borders.
“It’s up to all of us to get vaccinated. I speak regularly with the Prime Minister on this issue and when can’t emphasise how important it is that people get vaccinated”.
Minister Hunt made the point that “the issue of opening of the international borders is a matter that is constantly being considered by the Federal Government. A key factor to this is vaccination”.
Papastergiadis also asked about whether a travel bubble could be opened between Greece and Australia, providing Greece proceeds quickly with vaccinating its citizens so that it is a safe place to visit.
Minister Hunt thanked the President, saying “this is an issue we will look into. No doubt the Federal Government will consider the possibility of travel bubbles with countries other than New Zealand. It is something the Federal Government can consider in due course”.
Minister Hunt was effusive in his praise of Greece in its initial dealings with covid. He noted that it was initially one of the world’s success stories.
Minister Hunt noted he had planned a family trip to Greece which unfortunately had to be abandoned because of covid. It was a country he certainly wanted to visit once borders were opened.
Bill Papastergiadis also raised the issue of vaccine passports and whether home quarantine for those vaccinated was being considered. Minister Hunt said those are factors the Government are constantly examining.
Minister Hunt concluded the discussion by enquiring into Bill Papastergiadis’ role as Chairman of South Melbourne FC.
Minister Hunt asked “is it still called Hellas? It is one of the wonderful clubs of Australia and it will certainly be an exciting time when the B League is set up. Promotion/relegation would add another dimension to football in this country”.
Consul General of Greece in Adelaide, George Psiachas, sends his message to the Pontian Community on the 102nd Anniversary of the Greek Pontian Genocide.
In his message, Mr Psiachas stresses that despite the struggles and persecution, Pontian Hellenism remains an important part of Greece’s modern history.
Read the full statement below:
Today, the ubiquitous Hellenism honors the memory of those who lost their lives in the Pontian Genocide during the period 1914-1923. During that difficult time, hundreds of thousands of Pontians were killed or exposed to torture, starvation, cold, and other hardships and many were displaced.
Pontian Hellenism, which has suffered so much persecution, remains deeply patriotic, and is now an important part of modern Greek society, creating and producing rich cultural work, prospering economically and participating in the political life of modern Greece and the Greek Diaspora.
I bow to the sacred memory of the Pontians, and I congratulate the Pontian community here, in Adelaide, especially through Pontian Brotherhood Brotherhood of SA, which recently inaugurated its new cultural Center, that will now shine in Adelaide as a beacon of Pontian Hellenism.
May 19 every year marks a day of remembrance for the Greek Pontian Genocide in Asia Minor. In honour of this day, The Greek Herald has 10 facts you may not know about the Greek Pontian Genocide.
1. The toll: Pontic Greeks alone made up roughly 38% of the Greek Pontian genocide casualties. Around 350,000 people, including children, died between 1914 and late-1922. That’s a yearly average of just under 39,000 deaths between this period.
Greek and Armenian refugee children near Athens. Photo: Wikipedia.
2. The Pontic Greeks were increasingly seen as a threat by the Ottoman Empire after the Balkan War and WWI. The Committee of Union and Progress (CUP), an ultranationalist movement of Young Turks, became a political party and began to run the Ottoman Empire with a vision of ‘total Turkification.’ They believed the Pontic Greeks were threatening the current Muslim-majority nation state and, therefore, commenced a genocide.
3. International recognition. The Greek Pontian Genocide was recognised by Greece in 1994, and is recognised in Cyprus, US, Sweden, Armenia, Netherlands, Germany, Austria, and the Czech Republic. As of May 2018, SA and NSW are the only two Australian states to recognise the Greek, Armenian and Assyrian Genocides. The Hellenic Council and the Greek Orthodox Community of Australia have lobbied for decades for the Australian Federal Parliament to recognise the genocide. Historians and scholars call for recognition of all genocides, agreeing that revising this period of history is damaging to the prosperity of the community today.
4. Pontic Greeks were not only murdered, hanged, punished, and diseased; they were expatriated and displaced to neighbouring countries, mostly “inhospitable hinterlands,” during the 9-year period. The Treaty of Lausanne of 1922-23, the international recognition of the Republic of Turkey as the successor state of the Ottoman Empire, facilitated the expatriation of “approximately 400,000 Greek-Ottomans” in Macedonia and Thrace, and notably Thessaloniki, Pella, Kilkis, and more. Pontic Greeks can now be found all over the world.
5. Ottoman-Greek men aged 21-45 were sent to concentration camps to work for the Empire. These men were deprived of food, sleep and their right to live.
Casualties of the Greek genocide. Source: Pappas Post.
6. The genocide helped Turkey reclaim Pontus. However, the Centre for Asia Minor Studies in Athens has identified as many as 1500 distinct Greek Orthodox settlements in the Pontus region, each with their own unique culture, traditions and way of life. Pontic Greeks in the remote region of Pontus, the Black Sea and Pontic Mountains in northeast Anatolia, are an ethnic Greek-Ottoman minority community. Their proximity to Turkey and their desolation made them easy targets during the genocide.
Greeks in Armenia and Karabakh commemorate May 19 in Yerevan, Armenia (2016). Photo: Photolure.
7. Remembering the Pontians that were forced to serve on the Ottoman side of WW1: The Ottoman government conscribed all Pontian men aged 18-50 to serve in WW1 with execution as the penalty for evasion.
8. What does the day mark? The 19th of May is the day Mustafa Kemal (or Kemal Ataturk), landed in Samsun on the Black Sea shores and intensified the brutal campaign of ethnic cleansing.
9. The Remembrance Day for the Pontic Genocide is May 19th. Two other remembrance days for the Greek Genocide are April 6 and September 14, to honour the victims of the eastern Thrace region and the broader Asia Minor, respectively.
10. At times, the Pontic Greeks took up arms and resisted the Ottoman Empire and began organising guerrilla forces as early as 1915. The idea was not only to escape genocide but to take revenge, as did the Armenians and Azerbaijani people in ‘Operation Nemesis’. Their resistance was aided by the Metropolitan of Amasya, Germanos Karavangelis, and other leading figures such as Vassilios Anthopoulos, Efkleidis Kourtidi, and Kotza Anastas.
The Cottage Kitchen, which was an initiative launched by St Nectarios Greek Orthodox Parish in Burwood last year, has received a second $5,000 Multicultural NSW Covid Community Support Grant.
The Kitchen came about at the start of the COVID-19 pandemic, when the parish board decided to provide free-of-charge home-cooked meals once a week to anyone in the local community who needed support, not just parishioners.
But since its humble beginnings in July 2020, when an initial $5,000 grant from Multicultural NSW made it possible to engage a caterer to get the Kitchen up and running, the initiative has grown significantly and is now in the hands of the Parish’s Ladies Philoptochos.
The Cottage Kitchen. Photos supplied.
“Once the first grant had been used up, our Ladies Philoptochos decided to keep The Cottage Kitchen going themselves,” Christina Efthymiades, Director and Board Secretary at St Nectarios Greek Orthodox Parish in Burwood, tells The Greek Herald.
“They volunteer to do all the meal planning, shopping and cooking and we’ve been covering the cost of ingredients through donations from October 2020 until today.”
The Philoptochos ladies are now preparing about 80 generous-sized meals every Monday for collection at lunch time, or by delivery by our volunteers to those with mobility issues in the local area.
The volunteers make about 80 meals every Monday. Photo supplied.
Ms Efthymiades says the second $5,000 Multicultural NSW Covid Community Support Grant towards the Kitchen will ensure the service remains viable in the future.
“These funds will support the work of our Ladies Philoptochos in delivering this vital service each week and bolster the program, which has been continuing based purely on donations,” she adds.
“We are extremely grateful to Multicultural NSW for the $10,000 worth of Covid Community Support Grants received to date to support The Cottage Kitchen – the smiles on the faces of those who receive our meals are an amazing reward and we know we are delivering a real lift to so many people each week.
Some of the volunteers at the Cottage Kitchen. Photos supplied.
“Our thanks also to our tireless volunteers – shopping, cooking and delivering – who make this service possible.”
The Cottage Kitchen operates every Monday with meals available for collection between 12noon and 1pm from 5 Burleigh Street, Burwood – or can be delivered to people with mobility issues in the local area. Enquiries can be directed to Christina Scalone on 0418 612 187.
Last Sunday, 16 May, the Castellorizian Club of SA welcomed members and friends at their first function since December 2019, with guest speaker author of the book “Kastellorizian Jewellery” Nick Bogiatzis.
Bogiatzis, also a researcher and collector who flew from Canberra specifically for the event, talked briefly about the history of Kastellorizo and expanded on how jewellery and clothing define a culture and its people.
The attendees had the chance to learn more about their family heirlooms and aspects of the Kastellorizian history, including, religion, traditions and customs.
Picture: Castellorizian Association of South Australia
“I wrote this book because growing up in Townsville, I had my yiayia who every ten years would open the Baoulo and in it were all these gold silk brocades and silk velvets and furs. Every now and then she would go to the bank and bring back this box with the extraordinary jewellery and she would say words like ‘matzaria’ and ‘selinato’.
“I wrote it [the book] so the words, the meaning and the stories behind them don’t get lost,” said Bogiatzis who also referred to the way Kazzie migrants adapted and used their jewellery in Australia and why it is important to safekeep their stories.
Pic: Castellorizian Association of SA/Sophie Underwood
Pic: Pic: Castellorizian Association of SA/Sophie Underwood
Pic: Castellorizian Association of SA/Sophie Underwood
Pic: Castellorizian Association of SA/Sophie Underwood
“It doesn’t matter if the stories are true or not. We need to record oral history because this is where our tradition comes from but we need to know the facts that go with it.
“The best place for inherited jewellery is the family. Keep it, look after it and write down what you know about it to preserve its story. We are all the custodians of our culture and we have a responsibility,” he said.
Pic: Castellorizian Association of SA/Sophie Underwood
Some of the women who attended the event adorned themselves in the finest Kastellorizian jewellery handed down to them by their families and had the chance to ask questions about the precious pieces.
The afternoon concluded with refreshments and the popular katoumaria, the traditional Kastellorizian sweet, prepared by the Association’s committee and volunteers.
“It was interesting to see many yiayiades who came to the event with their granddaughters,” Castellorizian Association of SA Commitee Member, Elizabeth Philippou, told The Greek Herald.
“As patrons of the Kazzie club, one of the oldest Greek Clubs in Australia, we understand the urgency of preserving our culture and the need to put it forward for the generations to come. We are the ones waving the flag for the past,” Philippou said, extending an invitation to people of Kastellorizian descent or anyone interested in the Kazzie culture to attend the Association’s upcoming events.
The Dionysus Theatre Company has outdone itself with its latest comedy production, My Mother’s Pension, as everyone in the audience could be heard belly-laughing at the antics of the actors and actresses on stage.
The comedy, which is running for five weeks at the Mytilenian House in Canterbury, reflects a common situation that occurs among many Greeks today, where in-laws move in to help couples financially.
Photo: The Greek Herald / Andriana Simos.
People could not contain their laughter as they watched married couple, Maria and George, along with their daughter, navigate life while living with Maria’s mum who is always complaining of being in pain. Later, George’s dad arrives and throws a spanner in the works by announcing that he has a gay son he knew nothing about until recently.
The arrival of this son with his secretary, as well as a romantic poetic cardiologist, a whinging cleaner, a hysterical debt collector, an eccentric saleswoman, a ditsy hairdresser desperate for a husband and two quirky plumbers, all sounds a bit random.
Photo: The Greek Herald / Andriana Simos.
But with the fantastic writing skills of Maria Kitra and awesome directing by Lucy Miller, the theatre company manages to pull off a successful play.
So successful in fact, that one performance on Sunday, May 16 was filled to the brim with over 100 people, including the Ambassador to Greece in Australia, George Papacostas, and his partner Gohar, the High Commissioner of Cyprus in Australia, Martha Mavrommatis, and the President of the Greek Orthodox Community & Church of Canberra, John Loukadellis.
Photo: The Greek Herald / Andriana Simos.
One attendee even told The Greek Herald they were “really impressed” with the performance and would recommend it to everyone who asked.
If that’s not a glowing review, we don’t know what is!
Tickets are still available for the play, which is running every Saturday and Sunday until June 6. For enquiries please contact 0401 655 050 or visit: bit.ly/tis-manas-sou.
Thanks to the persistent efforts from the Greek community in Australia in 2020, the Greek language program at La Trobe University was saved for the next three years, on the proviso that certain enrolment targets are met.
Well in some recent positive news, Dr Stephie Nikoloudis, the program coordinator of Greek Studies at La Trobe University, has confirmed to The Greek Herald that she has seen a “steady increase” in enrolments.
“Our enrolments have been steadily increasing since 2018, in part due to the sustained promotional campaign that my colleague, Dr Dimitri Gonis, and I have undertaken, with the assistance of our students, visiting schools, holding information sessions, revitalising the curriculum, and generally spreading the word that tertiary Greek is available to students at La Trobe, as well as students based at other universities through cross-institutional study and stand-alone diploma options,” Dr Nikoloudis tells The Greek Herald.
According to a Facebook post, the exact number of student enrolments has grown from 28 language students in 2018 to 70 in 2021. Dr Nikoloudis says that if these numbers continue to increase, “we can secure the future of the program at La Trobe.”
“It has been inspiring to see the whole community – people of Greek and non-Greek background – come together on this issue,” she says.
“We must not be complacent though – there is still a lot of work to be done and lots of students to encourage to take Greek at university level – whether following VCE or as complete Beginners, or somewhere in between.
“We welcome all ages and all backgrounds – our student cohort is becoming more and more diverse and this makes for a wonderfully stimulating learning environment for all concerned.”
For any further enquiries about the Greek Studies program at La Trobe you can contact Dr Nikoloudis on s.nikoloudis@latrobe.edu.au.
The Australian Embassy in Greece has proudly unveiled the photographic exhibition, ‘Mates and Allies – A tribute to the bonds forged between Australians and Greeks during the Battle of Crete,’ to mark the 80th anniversary of the Battle of Crete this year.
The exhibition, which is on display at the Athens International Airport ‘Eleftherios Venizelos,’ was inaugurated on Monday by the Greek Deputy Minister for Infrastructure and Transport, Giannis Kefalogiannis, Ambassador of Australia in Greece, Arthur Spyrou, and the Marketing and Communications Director of the airport, Ioanna Papadopoulou.
Photos: Facebook.
Featuring 59 iconic photographs from the Australian War Memorial, the exhibition offers a look at the presence of Australian soldiers in Greece during the Greek Campaign, starting in March 1941 and culminating with the Battle of Crete (20 May – 1 June 1941).
Photos: Facebook.
In a post on Facebook, the Embassy wrote that: “the exhibition pays tribute to the service and sacrifice of the Australian and other Allied soldiers on Crete and honours the courage and generosity of the Cretan people, who did not just fight bravely to defend their island but also, at great risk to themselves and their families, sheltered and helped the Allied soldiers to safety.”
The exhibition will be on display in the airport’s Intra-Schengen arrivals area until October 31, 2021.
