Voted Off The Island?

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One Zach

Back in the fall--before leaving on this massive journey--I had a job on a movie starring comedian Zach Galifianakis. You probably haven't heard of him, but I get a laugh at his joke-filled piano numbers and cracks about Greek-Americans. In person, he was kind of a dick, and I ended up quitting the movie--along with most of the Seattle crew--for labor-solidarity reasons. I did learn something very valuable from Zach before I left, though. I learned that all the Greeks whose names end with "akis" come from the island of Crete.

While I was in Thailand, I did some research on Crete. By the time I asked my parents to come meet me in Greece, we were certain that this was the island we'd find our ancestors on. Then I made the decision to bring Chelly along, we had our adventures in India, got stranded in Kenya, and it began to look like my pilgrimage to Crete would never happen.

But it did happen, ad I surely didn't take this for granted. I spent a lot f the plane ride into Cairo and on to Athens thinking through scenarios and preparing for the detective work I would have to do in Crete.


Clues

Our first destination was Athens, where we spent two lovely nights at the Hotel Austria near the famous Acropolis. Each morning I would wake early to practice Hatha Yoga and meditation on the roof-top patio of the hotel. I had a sweeping view of Athens, with an ocean breeze and early morning sun. During practice, my thoughts went through a ballet of focus, wandering, and crystallization. After practice, I would go to work on the high-speed internet connection in the lobby.

Dad had a little scrap of note-paper that he'd written on during a short phone conversation with his Aunt Franny, before coming to meet me in Kenya. Dad's notes contained a few simple clues taken from a copy of Franny's birth certificate and memory:

- My great-grandfather's full Americanized name. William Kostontinos Nakis.
- The name of his home town. Kronidion.
- The American spelling of his father's name (my great-great-grandfather). Kostontinos J. Nakis.
- The American spelling of his mother's name (my great-great-grandmother). Efrocencyz Lisas.
- His approximate age and the year when he married my great-grandmother Gladys. 31, in 1928.



spell it, NIKOLAOS NAKIS

Weird. Unsettling. But at least he lived to age 78.


Ellis Island

That night--at an internet cafe full of chain-smoking, teenage, video gamers in Porto Cheli--I went back into the Ellis Island database, armed now with my Dad's notes and the notes from the Demarchio in Kranidi. Things were looking a lot more promising now.

I found that "Vasileios" is the Greek form of our name "William", and that many Greek men changed their name from Vasileios to William upon coming to America. In fact, I found an Ellis Island record for a man named "Vasilios Nakis" coming into the United States on April 20th, 1912. I'd found our William Nakis. He was listed as being 18 years old at the time, and previously residing in the town of Dravolitsion. He came alone.

I also found that several other Nakis people had come to the U.S. from Kranidion, Nemea, and Dravolitsion at the time. Some of them must have been relatives, which would disprove thestory we were all told since the time of my great-grandfather's 'death' (or disappearance), that he'd had no Greek relatives in America.

I had most of the facts now, but there were still blanks to fill in. Sadly, the next day was our last day in Greece. Would we ever learn if we'd been kicked off that damn island?


Last Day

We started early in the morning, packing our bags, packing a lunch, and heading into Kranidion. I took my Dad inside to see the Demarchio for himself and all the staff were ecstatic to meet him. They called the lady with the broken English down and they pulled out the books.

This time we were able to find a lot more info. We were also able to get photocopies of the most important documents. It turns out that Vasilieos Konstantinos Nakis was the very same one we'd found online, born 1895 to father Konstantinos Ionnis Nakis. Konstantinos Ionnis Nakis was born in 1862 in Kranidi, to father Ionnis Nakis. He had a brother named Nikolaos. Konstantinos died in the same town in 1930, at age 68.

We thanked them for all their help. I had the lady jot down email addresses and phone numbers for her office, so that I could get more info in the future. Now it was time to find a taxi driver.


Living History

We made our way back to the taxi stand, where I left Mom and Dad in the car and chatted with the taxi drivers. They knew Michaelis Nakis, of course, and they had lots of stories to tell about him. But he wasn't here right now. Bummer.

Then one of the guys exclaimed something and grabbed my arm. He told me that the father of Michaelis is named Nikolaos and that Nikolaos had just been standing around there a few minutes ago. If we went and poked our heads into all the old-timer cafes, we were bound to find him.

We poked our head through a couple of doors and, sure enough, found aged Nikolaos Nakis sitting at a table with a couple old buddies. We were introduced to one another as Nikos Nakis and Nikos Nakis. Then the taxi driver took off to grab a fare.

This was something great. He didn't speak much English and I didn't speak much Greek, but here I was face-to-face with an aged version of myself. He looked a lot like my Grandpa, but healthier.

I got one of the other guys in the cafe to translate for us and me and the elder Nicholas started filling in the blanks. I sketched hm a family tree showing me, Nikos; my father, Arthur; his father, Constantine William; his father, Vasilieos Konstantinos; and his father, Konstantinos Ionnis.

Nikolaos Nakis had quite definitely heard of the oldest two. He was pretty sure we were related, and he gave me all the stories of the family. There was a Vasilieos Nakis, cousin to an older Nikolaos, who had returned from America decades ago, moved to Alexandria in Egypt, then returned to Athens and died in Piraeus in the 1970s. There was also another Ionnis Nakis who returned from America in the 1950s. This Nikolaos I'd found was in fact the son of Michaelis, who was the son of another Nikolaos, who was the son of Ionnis and brother to the Konstantinos that founded my family tree. Whew. Quite the epic.

I also heard the story of Ionnis Nakis, who'd brought his family to Kranidi from Patmos, where they'd settled earlier in order to flee the Turks. Apparently, our name had been chopped-down in size to hide us from the Ottoman overlords during one of these earlier migrations. The best reason given for our migration and change of name: somebody had killed a Turk. The two men whose names we'd seen on the monument (Antonios Nakis and Ionnis Antonios Nakis) had both died in the Balkans in 1913, fighting against the Turks. They were father and son. We hadn't been blood-feuding. We hadn't been voted off. We'd been freedom-fighters: and we'd eventually won.

At the end of all this talking, my namesake and I decided to draw a family tree. It wasn't complete, but it got down to the basics:

- Everyone stems from Ionnis.
- He had two sons: Konstantinos Ionnis Nakis, and Nikolaos Ionnis Nakis.
- Nikolaos had 12 children, spawning Ionnis, Demetrios, Konstantinos, Michaelis, Panagotis, and others. That was the side of the family which still to this day remains in Kranidi.
- Konstantinos had at least two sons: Vasilieos Konstantinos Nakis, and Aggelos Mokos Nakis. Vasilieos came to America and Aggelos moved his family and some cousins to settle in Nemea.
- Our Vasilieos came to America, changed his name to William, and had two sons: Konstantine William and Edward.
- This Konstantine William changed his name to William Constantine and had two sons of his own: Arthur and John.
- Arthur had two sons: Nathan and Nicholas (that's me!).


Now What?

Okay. Here I was in a tiny Greek village, sitting in a smokey, old-timers' cafe with the 82 year-old Nikolaos Nakis. We'd just somehow figured out the whole history of my family, and now we were just sitting there smiling dumbly. What else were we gonna do?

And in another five minutes, I was out on the narrow streets with the elder Nikos. He dragged me along to find his son Michaelis (now finally present at the taxi stand) and to find my parents. Everyone was introduced in a frenzy. He was taking us all to lunch at his place. We posed for some pictures and hustled off to take another look at the monument.

Now, in context, this monument is much more important than we first thought it was. The Greeks spent 400 years living under brutal Ottoman Turkish rule. During this time, our family fled from island to island, changing their names to escape their overlords. The tribe of Nakis gave birth to some great generals and famous Turk-fighters (or so I hear). In 1821, Greece declared independence. We learned that this particular monument memorializes those from the area who died in a war for independence that lasted until 1930, when the Greeks finally liberated all the lands they were ever going to get back from the Turks. Two of our very close relatives ended up with their names on that monument. There were surely many more heroic Nakii from other parts of Greece, and even Turkey. Maybe someday we would find their monuments as well.

We paid our respects and were quickly dragged off again to meet Nikolaos at his car. The old goat still drove these tiny streets at age 82--oh, well, he should be good at it as he used to be a taxi driver.


Lunch

He took us to his family home, a beautiful two-story village house with over-flowing orange and lemon trees in the front yard. Statues of the goddessed watch over the garden and the flag of Nikos's favorite football team flies from the porch. Inside, we met his adorable wife and explored their cozy, little home.

A few Christian icons graced the entryway, but the living room possessed a shrine to Olympian Zeus. We learned that this was the work of Michaelis, who had left the Greek Orthodox Church to study the old ways (a decision becoming more common in modern Greece). Michaelis did join us after a while, and we had the most amazing lunch in the whole trip to Greece.

It started with homemade breads and local cheeses. There were olives and a salad covered in olive oil. We ate a half-dozen things that I couldn't even try to name. Clean water and strong wine flowed freely. I had many oranges. And there were big, fresh fish (one for each of us). We sat at that table for hours, just eating slowly and gabbing about everyday life in our two countries. We talked about genealogies and gene-tests, but when they compared mine and Michaelis's hand-writing, it was decided we didn't need them.

It was our last day in Greece and we didn't want to leave. We'd finally found some of that lost family. They even planned a dinner or something with some of the other relatives. But it was a long way back to Athens, and we were flying out that night. So we said our goodbyes and hit the road--again separated from the Greek branch of Nakis, but this time not for good. No, I left there with some things in my pocket that no American Nakis has had for a hundred years: a handful of sketched notes and deep connection to my cultural roots.


Get On, Keep On

We stopped briefly at two archeological sites along the road to Athens. The first was the Cave of the Metamorphosis, a monstrously large underground cave system with hidden early-Christian shrines built in honor of St. George (and his Dragon). We also saw the ancient theater at Epidaurus.

Both sites are still used for their original purpose, though the historical situations that gave birth to them--and put them in opposition--are now gone. And that's how I eel it should be, just like Michaelis keeping his Zeus near his Momma's Jesus. All the turmoil is done and the wars are over. Now is the time to re-connect, re-envision, and get on livin'.

So, who wants to go to Turkey?

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Comments

[Nicholas John Nakis]

Explanatory Note
This blog entry was originally posted in March of 2007. It was much longer, and with beautiful full-color digital photographs. Then someone hacked my site and removed it a few months later. I have recovered as much as possible and I'm trying to recover the whole thing. I would love your help if you have a copy of the text or the photos somewhere, or if you know how to find recover this sort of thing on the internet. Thanks!

[Erin]

Hello
Hello! i have loved your blogs and have read them since you first set up your travel blog, you are a really good writer!!