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Argiroupolis Part 5

Thursday 17 June 2010
The Greeks believe in the evil eye or otherwise known as Vaskania. I wouldn't have believed it either until I saw it with my own eyes. One particular day, L was behaving rather abnormally. She threw the doll at little Eleftheria and then picked it up and threw it at me. I've never seen her throwing things at anyone. When I gave her a stern telling off, she howled and cried uncontrollably non stop for half an hour, which was very perplexing as she's not the one to behave like this.

Kiria Eleftheria looked extremely worried and insisted on performing vaskania. We had absolutely no idea what she was going on about. She hurried into the kitchen and came out with a glass of water and olive oil. She then dribbled a small amount of olive oil into the water and to my astonishment, the droplets started to expand and dissipate. She said that someone had unintentionally "cursed" L with envious thoughts. Yanna quickly came over to explain that her mother is one of those rare individuals who were taught the special prayer, one which is passed from man to woman, always to the opposing sex.

Kiria Eleftheria prayed and to test the result, dribbled some olive oil into another glass of water. This time, the olive oil floated on the surface of the water. She repeated the prayer an hour later and again, did the olive oil test and told me all was fine. Sure enough, L started to feel a lot better and was back to her old self. I managed to take photos, albeit blurry ones. I don't profess to know everything about Vaskania but the 3 of us (Jen, Andrew and I) were left baffled and amazed by the whole episode.


V11
This was L's

V12
This was used as a placebo. Note that the oil just floated on the surface.

V21
The droplets of oil in L's glass started to expand and dissipate.

V23
Placebo.


I've planned to stay in Argiroupolis for 5 days. On the day we departed for Chania, Kiria Eleftheria drove us to the bus stop. It was a sad day for all of us as we knew it may be decades before we see each other again. As I turned around to say my goodbye, I saw tears rolling down Kiria Eleftheria's eyes. I don't think I'll ever forget this wonderful and caring lady.

3 comments:

  1. Different cultures have diffferent beliefs and superstitions . with due respect,we keep an open mind. What an experience !!!
    All that matters ,a happy little girl again .

    ReplyDelete
  2. Yeah, spooky. Wouldn't have believed it if I didn't see it with my own eyes. The 3 of us (Jen, Andrew and I) were a little freaked out.

    ReplyDelete

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