a love letter to being greek.
Celebrating my birthday in Detroit’s Greektown, 2020.
If I were to elucidate the foundation of who I am- my character, values, faith, culture, and spirit, I would unequivocally say it is my Greek heritage. Mathematically, I am 25% Greek, but if you are Greek or know the culture, you know that this is irrelevant. Being Greek is more than a percentage of blood or knowing how to correctly pronounce gyro. Being Greek is an innate commitment to faith, expression, freedom, passion, loyalty, family, adventure, justice, and joy.
The concept I created, VERU, is a Sicilian word, yes. However, before I ever practiced Orthodoxy, I was Greek. Before I went to school, engaged with the world, and decided who I was, I was Greek.
My journey to Greekness was not a straightforward path like many Greek-Americans I know. I did not grow up attending the Greek Orthodox Church, nor did I live near a Greek community. I did not go to Greek school to learn how to read and write Greek, and I didn’t speak it at home. I have never been to Greece. My connection to my Greek heritage was in the town of Lowell, Massachusetts. Every summer, I would visit my yiayia, papou, nouna, nouno, and cousins to get a full dose of the Greek-American life I was missing out on growing up in the Pacific Northwest. When I was a baby, I was baptized into the Greek Orthodox Church, and my godparents were my grandmother’s sister and brother-in-law, who consequently lived on the 2nd floor of the double-decker house they owned together. My yiayia (grandmother) and my nouna (godmother) spoke, wrote, and read Greek fluently, even though they were both born and raised in the US. Their parents were from Mani on the Peloponnese, as were their two oldest siblings.
Every summer, I could not wait to visit my family in Lowell. I looked forward to seeing the cousin my age, who I was very close to, but more so, I could not wait to see my yiayia. She was and continues to be the center of my spirit, even though she passed away in 2007. My yiayia was a typical and atypical Greek. She married outside of her culture in the 1940s to my Catholic Sicilian grandfather (who I called papou, the Greek word for grandfather, because he was surrounded by Greeks and probably just caved under the pressure at some point). She also divorced my papou in the 60s and eventually lived alone in her house. She did not attend church much, but at the end of her life, I believe she reconnected with God. My yiayia was a hard worker; at the age of 14 she finished vocational school and started her career as a seamstress in the factories in Lowell. She made clothes and sewed parachutes during WWII. She was feisty, loving, independent, and hilarious, but she also liked to keep to herself.
One summer, I asked my yiayia to teach me Greek. She taught me how to write Greek letters and say “Kiss me my love” and “I love you” in Greek. I overheard her and my godmother speaking Greek to each other when they didn’t want anyone to know what they were saying, and I definitely learned some choice Greek swear words. She cooked for us, although my godfather was the official chef of the house. He had a little secret kitchen in the cellar where he kept his spices, but no one ever saw exactly what he put in his food, so we could never duplicate it. We ordered Greek bread and sweets from the Olympos Bakery in Lowell and listened to Greek music together. My cousins and I referred to people we didn’t like as malaka and things we didn’t like as skatá.
I went to the Greek Orthodox Church when I was in Lowell with my family and learned how to cross myself properly from watching my older cousin. The incense, icons, and chanting were like a welcome home gift every time I went to our family church Holy Trinity.
However, every time I was in Lowell, I inevitably had a breakdown of grief. I grieved not being with my family, I grieved not having my culture around, and I grieved not being able to practice the Orthodox faith. My mom was never really committed to Orthodoxy, and when she married my dad, who was an atheist, she left her family and the church behind as well. When I was about four years old, my mom became a born-again Christian and started taking me to evangelical churches, where I would spend my childhood and college years. However, toward the end of college, I found myself longing for something different and more profound in my faith. While I had some good experiences in Protestant charismatic churches, I longed for a reverence and tradition I could not find there. It was at this point that I started attending the Greek Orthodox Church in Portland, Oregon. If you ask me why I didn’t just start attending there once I moved to Portland, knowing there was a Greek church there, I can’t honestly answer that. Perhaps part of me felt intimidated by being around Greeks who weren’t my family since I wasn’t raised traditionally, or perhaps I was just conditioned to attend charismatic churches on a regular basis. Either way, when I heard the call at 22, I answered it.
I would spend the next ten years learning about Orthodoxy at Holy Trinity in Portland. I learned Greek little by little, reading the liturgy book that had the Greek, English, and phonetic Greek words side-by-side, and took a Greek class through the church. I learned the liturgical chants and how to sing in Byzantine tones. I started going to confession, volunteered at the Greek festival, was a GOYA advisor, and a member of Philothea. It was in Portland that I began to establish my identity as a Greek on my own terms. I made Greek friends and felt like I had another family I could share my culture with, including being “adopted” at Orthodox Easter by different families in the church every year.
Since I left Portland in 2009, I have attended Greek Orthodox churches in Seattle, Tacoma, Manila (Philippines), and now in Michigan. I am at a place with my Greek identity where the last thing I have to do is actually go to Greece. I recently went to Sicily for the first time with my husband. While it was a beautiful and transformational experience connecting with that part of my heritage, I know without a shadow of a doubt that Greece is where I will find my spirit’s home. Any time I hear Greek spoken, something inside me awakens. The high pitch of a bouzouki stirs my soul. The longing within Rebetiko lights a fire inside me. The colors, aromas, tones, and flavors of Greece, her people, her land, and her Church are an inseparable part of me.
I cannot separate being Greek from being Orthodox. Orthodoxy is not just a choice for me; it is a part of my heritage that was passed down to me by my ancestors for centuries, that eventually called me home. It is the fuel that pushes me to be brave and have faith in the face of adversity. It is the love that allows me to show those around me how beautiful Orthodoxy can be. It is the sorrow and joy that penetrate my heart in a process of repentance and renewal on the journey to salvation. It is the passion that drives me to defend and uplift the faith so that I can share it with the world. This is who I am and who I am called to be, and I hope you will join me through VERU.
