Freedom or Death: A Greek Battle Cry

 Jeff–Saturday

MANTO MAVROGENOUS

March 25^th is fast approaching.  It's a two-for-one holiday in Greece: Annunciation and Greek Independence Day.  The former celebrates Mary learning from Archangel Gabriel that she was with child, and the later marks the day in 1821 when Greek Orthodox Bishop Germanos of Patras raised the Greek flag at the Monastery of Agia Lavra in Greece’s Peloponnese and inspired a more than eight-year struggle (1821-1829) to throw off nearly 400 years of Ottoman rule.

Bishop Germanos raising the flag (Theordore Vryzakis)

In towns and villages across Greece, school children proudly parade the country’s blue and white flag.  Aflutter, the flag is reminiscent of Greek seas but it holds a deeper meaning.  The white cross honors the contribution of the church to the country’s enduring battle for freedom and its nine blue and white bars honor the nine syllable rallying call shouted across the land during Greece’s struggle for Independence: Eleftheria i Thanatos—Freedom or Death.  (Though some say they represent the nine letters of ελευθερια in the Greek word for freedom, the idea is the same.). 

Petros Mavromichalis

Greece’s larger cities also hold military parades, and Greek communities around the world join in celebration with parades of their own.  But this is not about any of those events, or for that matter whether the Revolution actually began a week earlier in another part of the Peloponnese when the ruler of its Mani region, Petros Mavromichalis, raised his war flag in Mani’s capital city of Areopoli and marched his troops off against the Turks.

No, this is about a small Cycladic island’s personal War of Independence heroine, Manto Mavrogenous (1796-1848).  Her statue stands at the foot of the main square on Mykonos’ harbor,  and soon it will be surrounded by palm fronds—an ancient symbol of triumph, victory, and the sacred sign of Apollo—in honor of a life truly worthy of an epic film.  Or a tragic opera.

Manto Mavrogenous Square, Mykonos

Born in Trieste to a wealthy, aristocratic Greek merchant family, Manto Mavrogenous studied philosophy and history, was fluent in several languages, and drew her fire for Greek independence from her father, a member of Filiki Eteria, the secret society dedicated to freeing Greece from Ottoman rule. 

She was thirteen when her family returned to its roots in the Cycladic islands, first to Paros and after her father’s death to Tinos.  War broke out when she was twenty-five and she left for Mykonos, the place of her family’s origins, to convince its leaders to join in the Revolution.  But what she offered Mykonos and indeed all of Greece was far more than words.  When Ottomans attempted to land on Mykonos, she commanded the forces that repelled them.  She used her fortune to outfit ships and crews that battled pirates and the Ottoman fleet, and to send soldiers to fight for freedom on mainland Greece, as well as to support the families of those who fought.

Manto even sold her jewelry to support the fight and pressed the world to allow Greece to be free.  This is from her letter to The Women of Paris: “The Greeks, born to be liberal, will owe their independence only to themselves.  So I don’t ask your intervention to force your compatriots to help us. But only to change the idea of sending help to our enemies.” 

Demetrius Ypsilantis

In the early years of the war she met Demetrius Ypsilantis, a well-educated son of a prominent family, brother of the leader of Filiki Eteria, and a politically connected war hero.  (Yes, that city in Michigan was named after him, a town perhaps better known today for “the world’s most phallic building,” the Ypsilanti Water Tower.)  They became engaged and Mavrogenous’ beauty, bravery, and selfless commitment to Greek independence brought her fame across Europe. 

Bust of Demetrius erected in foreground of "The Brick Dick" of Ypsilanti.

It seemed a fairy tale, but that was not to be.

During their engagement Mavrogenous’ home was totally destroyed by fire and her fortune stolen.  She moved in with Ypsilanti but in time he broke off the engagement.  Deeply depressed and virtually penniless, she never recovered.

Her memoirs were written on Mykonos but she spent most of the balance of her life amid poverty in Greece’s first modern capital, Nafplio, before finally moving to Paros where she died penurious and in oblivion at fifty-four.

The great debts owed to her for financing so much of Greece’s Revolution were never repaid.  Unless you count the palms, thanks, and honors bestowed each March 25.

The back of a Greek coin worth less than a penny

Freedom or Death.

––Jeff

The Star From Calcutta, Here At Last!

 Sujata Massey

At long last, THE STAR FROM CALCUTTA has arrived!

Three busy years of writing, editing and marketing have brought the wisps of my old film fantasies to life as the fifth Perveen Mistry historical mystery novel. Here’s my elevator pitch:

Perveen Mistry, Bombay’s first woman lawyer, gets her most glamorous client yet: Subhas Ghoshal, the director and founder of Champa Films, a silent film studio that features his wife, the beautiful daredevil actress Rochana, as headliner. The couple is threatened by a rival film company in Calcutta as well as the omnipresent British government censors. 

Perveen brings her best friend, Alice Hobson-Jones, to a preview party for the studio’s next film. Amid the drunken revelry, arguments and liaisons develop. The morning after brings death, a disappearance, and much more of a legal challenge for Perveen, especially since Alice seems to be holding secrets from her. Sailing, a menagerie of performing animals, romance and international intrigue mark the novel. It's onsale in the USA now, and the Indian edition will appear in all South Asian territories in the last week in March. Here's what the Penguin India edition will appear:

One of the challenges in writing about film was locating old Indian films to study and inspire the fictional film (a story within a story) that I dreamed up for Rochana and others from Champa Films. Due to the fragile nature of old film rolls, much of it is gone, although I found some clips online. It looks like many films were about women, and I found myself wondering quite often about the female-centric plots for films like Barrister's Wife. 

One film you can easily find on YouTube is Karma, an Indo-German-British production from 1933 starring Himanshu Rai and Devika Rani, the Bengali filmmaking couple that inspired my fictional characters of Subhas and Rochana Ghoshal. Karma is a fascinating film that features a 4-minute kissing scene, which served as the longest lip-lock world-wide for many decades.

I adored learning about old studios in India and traveled to Bombay, where I visited the very old Mehboob Film Studios and the vacant Imperial Theater as well as the National Museum of Indian Cinema, a fantastic group of buildings that house artifacts of many eras and screen old films as well. 

The old Imperial Cinema

In Mumbai with historians Amrit Gangar and Sifra Lentin

The museum’s founding curator, Amrit Gangar, graciously met with me and answered my obscure questions. One of the most interesting things I learned was that early Indian film audiences were crazy for action heroines whose physicality expressed rebellion against authority. These films showed stars like Durga Khote and The Fearless Nadia racing cars, swimming rivers and fighting with swords were very popular in the 1920s and ‘30s. Many actresses were of mixed South Asian-European ancestry or came from families who had immigrated from the Middle East, including those of Jewish heritage. 

The nation of Germany also plays a surprising role in the book. One of Bombay’s greatest studios, Bombay Talkies, had both a German director and a cinematographer, colleagues that Himanshu Rai and Devika Rani met at Emelka Films in Germany during the 20s and 30s. Being German in British-controlled India between the two wars was a discreet operation due to lingering resentments and suspicion. I had fun talking with Sneha Mathan, narrator of the  audiobook, as we worked out what the novel’s character Hans Becker might have sounded like. I myself am Indo-German, so it was very heartwarming for me to bring this aspect into the novel.

You can’t make a film without a team; and I certainly found the same was true in writing a book about film. I close with resounding applause to the off-camera real life crew and of course, my beloved fictional characters and old Bombay locations who will continue in upcoming Perveen Mistry productions.

Royal Bombay Yacht Club bar

 

Sujata has upcoming events to celebrate and sign The Star From Calcutta. Coming up soon are appearances at The Ivy Bookshop in Baltimore on 3/18; Politics and Prose in Washington DC on 3/22; Queen Takes Book in Columbia, MD on 3/27, and Backwater Books in Ellicott City on 4/10; and McIntryres Books, Pittsboro, NC, on 5/9.

5 things that New Zealand does really, really well

Karen Odden - every other Thursday

My husband and I were supposed to visit New Zealand in March 2020 for our 30th anniversary. Needless to say, that didn't happen. 

So for our 35th, we decided to reboot the itinerary and the adventure, and now we are smack in the middle of our trip to New Zealand. (Our Sara isn't here at the moment, alas!! But she did give me some pointers.) 

From Auckland, we went north up to the Bay of Islands, then we went south and east to Coromandel Peninsula, and then we headed south, through Rotorua, Lake Taupo, and Cape Kidnappers (where the blue line ends); eventually we will make it to Wellington and then to the South Island. Every day, from my passenger seat (on the left side of the car), I'm astounded by how beautiful this country is, how there are delights at every turn. OK ... I have to share Jack-Jack the leering goat! And an Atticus Finch sighting!

No one wants to see all my pictures or read some long travelogue of mine ... but I do want to share 5 things that these New Zealanders do very, very well. 

1. Pastries. Omg, I had no idea. The first morning, we had a pastry in the Britomart area of Auckland that was as flaky as any croissant I've ever had in Paris, with a decadent maple almond paste inside like I've never tasted anywhere. It is NOT SHOWN here because I ate it before I remembered to take a picture. 

Another highlight, the next morning, a raspberry pastry (shown, as I managed to take a picture before I gobbled it). A few days later, there was a blackberry and white chocolate muffin at the Hahei Cafe. Truly, if I had to pick only five foods to take to an island to live for eternity, one might be that maple almond pastry. Coffee is excellent as well, and the cafes are ubiquitous.

2. Lotions and body wash and honey and wine! We are moving from place to place, but at every stop there are yet more exquisite natural products. I wish I could bring them all home. I'd need another suitcase. Or two.

3. Rocks. I have never seen so many gorgeous rocks amidst water and in the landscape. This is Cathedral Cove, in Coromandel Peninsula. We hiked down to it along the coast, and the tide was just coming in. Breathtaking, honestly. 

4. Vistas. Inland, there are miles and miles of vistas -- green pastures and farmland and rolling hills and sheep and cows and horses and corn and hay -- and along the coast, there is water. I'm going to tuck in the vistas you see on the ferries from Auckland because they need to be in my list somewhere. We visited the island of Waiheke, walked on the pristine pale sand beach (vista, yes), and then went up to the Mudbrick Winery for a tasting and still MORE vistas. 

5. I've saved the best and most important for last. I'm absolutely wowed by the way that the native Maori culture is celebrated, linguistically present, and part of the fabric of daily life for all New Zealanders and visitors. Many signs show the Maori words first, and the English translation below. Towns have retained their original names. A high point was visiting a living Maori village in Rotorua, where the guide walked us through and explained their alphabet and the history of their spoken and written language, how they used the geothermal land where they live, and the history of how they have kept their culture thriving. (Below, he is explaining the way the body is mapped onto their meeting house.) It was utterly fascinating. I kept thinking to myself, "I am so so glad I didn't miss this."

And now I'll stop. 

If you've been to New Zealand, please feel free to share YOUR favorite things.

Walking in Oviedo: How a Compact, Walkable City Improves Health, Mood, and Community

 Introduction

When I relocated from Los Angeles to Oviedo, I expected a cultural shift. What I didn’t expect was a physiological one. The simple act of walking—built into daily life here—has altered my blood pressure, mood, and sense of connection to others.

Oviedo is not a large city, roughly comparable in footprint to Richmond, Virginia, but without skyscrapers—these are largely prohibited in the historic urban core. The result is a compact, human-scale environment where daily needs are embedded within walking distance.

Grand buildings, but no skyscrapers

Why Walking in Oviedo Works So Well

Oviedo is structured for movement on foot. From my home, nearly everything I need is within a 5–40-minute walk—groceries, pharmacies, cafés, parks, and medical care.

Pedestrian-only streets

When needed, walking is supplemented by:

• A reliable and punctual bus system
• Readily available taxis
• Pedestrian-friendly streets and plazas

Urban researchers consistently show that compact cities encourage daily physical activity because walking becomes the easiest option rather than a planned exercise activity.¹

Evidence-Based Benefits of Walking—and My Experience in Oviedo

1. Reduced Blood Pressure

                                                                                (Image: AI)

Regular walking has been shown to significantly reduce blood pressure. A meta-analysis of walking interventions found reductions in both systolic and diastolic blood pressure among participants who incorporated walking into daily routines.²

My observation:
Since living in Oviedo and walking daily, my blood pressure has dropped enough that I require less medication.

2. Improved Mood and Reduced Depression

Walking and moderate aerobic activity stimulate endorphin release and improve neurotransmitter balance. Large studies show that regular walking can reduce symptoms of depression and improve overall psychological well-being.³

My observation:
My baseline mood has improved noticeably since walking became a daily part of life rather than something scheduled. One medication down, one more to go! 

3. Lower Chronic Stress

Research shows that walking—especially in pleasant urban environments—reduces cortisol levels and sympathetic nervous system activity.⁴

My observation:
The constant low-level tension I experienced while living in Los Angeles—traffic, noise, scheduling every movement—has largely disappeared.

4. Increased Social Connection

Walkable environments foster incidental social interactions, which are strongly linked to improved mental health and reduced loneliness.⁵

My observation:
Walking in Oviedo creates small but meaningful interactions—eye contact, greetings, shared sidewalks.

Contrast that with freeway driving: thousands of people in proximity, yet complete isolation.

5. A Stronger Sense of Community

Urban studies show that pedestrian environments increase social trust and civic engagement.⁶

My observation:
There is a palpable sense that people watch out for one another. I’ve seen this during real emergencies on the street. In my own case, the example was small but revealing. One afternoon, I was on the sidewalk struggling to get my backpack on. Without being asked, a passerby stepped behind me and said, “¿Te ayudo?”—“Can I help you?”—and adjusted the straps. That kind of warm, spontaneous assistance is difficult to imagine when everyone is sealed inside cars.

From Car Culture to Walking Culture

Driving in Los Angeles often felt paradoxical: surrounded by thousands, yet entirely alone.

Walking in Oviedo produces the opposite effect:

• You become part of the street
• You repeatedly encounter the same spaces and people
• The city becomes familiar rather than anonymous

Over time, walking creates belonging.

Urban Design Matters

Oviedo’s walkability is not accidental. Key features include:

• Human-scale urban density
• Mixed residential and commercial neighborhoods
• Wide sidewalks and pedestrian streets
• Public services within short distances

Urban planners describe these environments as “15-minute cities,” where daily needs are accessible within a short walk or transit ride.⁷

Oviedo effectively functions this way.

Conclusion

Walking in Oviedo is not exercise in the traditional sense—it is infrastructure.

The city makes movement on foot the most logical way to live. The health benefits follow naturally: lower blood pressure, improved mood, and reduced stress.

But beyond physiology, there is something less measurable and equally important—a restoration of trust in the people around you.

References

1.     Sallis JF et al. “Role of Built Environments in Physical Activity.” The Lancet, 2016.

2.     Murphy MH et al. “Walking for Health.” British Journal of Sports Medicine, 2007.

3.     Mammen G, Faulkner G. “Physical Activity and Depression.” American Journal of Preventive Medicine, 2013.

4.     Hunter MR et al. “Urban Green Space and Stress Reduction.” Frontiers in Psychology, 2019.

5.     Leyden KM. “Social Capital and the Built Environment.” American Journal of Public Health, 2003.

6.     Wood L et al. “Neighborhood Design and Social Interaction.” Health & Place, 2010.

7.     Moreno C. “The 15-Minute City.” Smart Cities Journal, 2021.

 

Italian Food for Thought

Annamaria on Monday

This coming Tuesday is my Birthday.  I have been in tech hell since I returned back to to my beloved NYC after being away for two and half months, hiding out from the storied but this year ICY sidewalks of New York.  I will not grumble about the computer difficulties.  I am blessed to be where I am and how I am as I reach 85 years on this splendid planet.  I am deeply grateful for all the blessings of my life.  Here below is a post from some years ago about one of those blessings - I grew up learning how to cook and always enjoying "every body's favorite food."

The playwright Neil Simon famously observed that there are only two laws in the universe: the Law of Gravity and Everyone Loves Italian Food.  American supermarket shelves have more Italian food items than any other kind—far more than those of any other ethnic group. The average American eats Italian food of some sort at least once a week.

It has not always been this way.

Each of the 2.7 million Italians who poured into the US between 1890 and 1910 brought with him an average of $12.67. They had left starving areas of what they came call the Old Country. When they arrived in the US (90% through Ellis Island), they found a land of plenty, but what they wanted to eat was their traditional food, a Mediterranean cuisine of vegetables, grains, and fruits. They longed for olive oil, fresh figs, pasta, good bread—none of these easy to find at first.

The United States officially expected them to become American and to demonstrate that they were doing so by adopting the American culture lock, stock, and barrel. The Federal government employed squads of social workers to make sure this happened.  An important measure of their success at Americanization was converting Italians to an American diet.  I am delighted to report that this effort was a dismal failure.

Despite the difficulties of finding the ingredients they wanted for their own dishes, Italians refused to accept what America wanted to feed them. One Federal social researcher lamented about a family in her study: “Not assimilated, yet. Still eating Italian food.” What recalcitrance! A 1907 report on Wage Earners’ Budgets in New York complained about Italian immigrants’ stubbornness in this regard: “The Italian believes that the commercial method of canning removes all the goodness from food and that a minimum of processes should intervene between harvest and consumption.” Insisting food should be fresh? What a concept!

Italians persisted in replicating their Old Country diet, often with a vengeance.  For instance, because there were no figs for sale nearby, my grandfather Gennaro had a fig tree. One cannot grow figs in the climate of New Jersey without a lot of trouble. Each fall, before the first frost, my father and my Uncle Joe, supervised by Gennaro, dug up the tree by the roots, lay it down in a trench, covered it with soil, then with straw, and a khaki tarpaulin. When spring came, they dug it up, stood it upright, and replanted it.  Then, the whole family waited for the first green shoots to prove it had survived its winter slumber.

Like all immigrant groups, Italians opened restaurants.  It was in those establishments that Italian cooking took an American turn.  True Italian meals were a hundred years ago and still are served in courses, the first of which is often a pasta dish.  So an Italian might make meatballs (polpette) in tomato sauce, put a little of the sauce and some grated cheese on pasta, serve that and then, as second course, serve the polpette, likely with a vegetable side dish.  But American customers in those early Italian eateries weren't used to courses.  So to accommodate the cultural difference, restauranteurs invented a New World riff on their cuisine. They combined the the first and the second and Tah-DAH--meatballs and spaghetti!

The current state of Italian restaurants in the US seems to depend on whether or not there is an actual Italian in the kitchen.  Many places with Italian names and self-described as Italian serve things far removed from true Italian cuisine.  My personal beefs (!) about this are mainly two.  First of all, the amount of sauce on the pasta.  Authentic Italian pasta might be served with a variety of different sauces, but it is not drowned in Bolognese or carbonara.  Much of the time, in US restaurants, there is three or five times the amount of sauce on the pasta as I would serve at home or one would find in a restaurant in Italy.  It spoils the dish for me.

Worst of all is the insane about of garlic and hot peppers.   Starting with Artusi in 1891, real Italian food experts advise using garlic con parsimonio, parsimoniously.  Here is how I learned as a child to saute vegetables:  Heat olive oil in a saute pan.  Peel and halve (NOT mince) a clove a fresh garlic.  NOTE: I said ONE clove.  Gently saute the garlic until it softens.  (NEVER brown it.  If you accidentally brown it, you have to throw the effort away, wash the pan and start over.)  With a fork, remove the garlic from the oil and throw it away.  Then, add and toss the vegetable in the oil.  Delicious!  The flavor of the vegetable subtly enhanced by the hint (HINT!!) of garlic.

There are a few regional recipes that call for more garlic - like the Piedmontese favorite Bagna Cauda. But they are the exception, not the rule.

Pepperoncini (hot peppers) go into certain Italian dishes, mostly they are Calabrian recipes.  There is NO place for hot peppers in Bolognese sauce.  Or Marinara.  Or--God Forbid--ossobucco or fiori di zucca.

Why in the name that all that is holy, would anyone want to cook these
delicate blossoms and then pour garlicky pesto over them

If you like, you can  overwhelm the flavor of everything you eat with tons of garlic and drown it in hot pepper sauce.  I won't stop you.  BUT PLEASE, don't call it Italian.  In fact, I respectfully request that you NOT give such a dish a name the sounds Italian.

My nonno Gennaro, my guardian angel in the picture above, told me when I was about that age that heavy spices were things chefs put on food if the ingredients are under par or on the verge of spoiling.  Don't eat such dishes, he warned me.  If you are going to put a food inside your body, it must be the best thing you can find.

I learned very young and have practiced all my life the art of Italian cooking. I think the tradition is about more than gastronomic pleasure.  In addition to their recipes and a taste for peaches picked ripe from the tree, Italians carried a family-centric culture with them when they crossed the ocean. Good food was and is the enduring value learned by their descendants. Cooking well to give pleasure in addition to nourishment is a deep expression of the Italian maternal instinct. Those newly arrived women fed their children really good food not only to help them grow up healthy and strong but to spoil them with affection. Family meals were rituals, not only on holidays, but even on an ordinary Tuesday. People didn’t eat out; they gathered around the family table.

At the table is where children learned manners, family lore and values, their sense of belonging to something bigger and stronger than they. When they visited family and friends, meals were always the central activity. I never ate in a restaurant other than a pizzeria before I went away to college. When I became a wife and mother, I never gave it second thought: I cooked. My daughter’s classmates at Swarthmore were astonished to find out that she ate a proper sit-down dinner with her parents every evening.

Italians prepare wonderful food not as an end in itself, but as a means.  The end is to get everyone to sit down together and unite in mutual tolerance and support.  When an Italian calls out "Tutti a tavola" (Everyone to the table), it is the pleasure of the food that draws the family.  Togetherness is the real goal.

Family members all pitching in to create a meal they can enjoy together, trading jokes and tales of their day’s triumphs and tribulations--that’s the Italian way with food. That’s amore.