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Island Apart: Travels in Evia (Abacus travel)
Island Apart Travels in Evia - Abacus travel Author:Sara Wheeler The seahorse-shaped island of Evia is the second largest in Greece - and most British visitors have never heard of it. Not so long ago the inhabitants were still walking to town to swap a goat for a pair of trousers, and the question of where a bus ends its journey is still largely contingent upon what takes the driver's fancy. Taking an idiosyn... more »cratic look at island life, this is an account of the author's five-month journey encompassing a goatherd's wedding with 250 revellers, Early Bronze Age excavations, sheep's heads in the sink, Coca-Cola and cold goat for breakfast, disastrous rendezvous with unlikely men, and theological persecution by Orthodox nuns bent on converting her. But it is a journey as much about time as place. The author's responsiveness to Evia's present is, on another level, a search for a way to preserve its rich history and rural traditions, as the island's fragile way of life is rendered increasingly precarious by Western culture.« less