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Sifnos: the island of Greek gastronomy
I was born and raised in Greece, a country with a rich history, and a healthy and delicious cuisine. As a child, I would often hear the word ‘tselementes’ being used to refer to any cookbook. So, I naturally assumed that it meant ‘cookbook’. Not quite so. I later learned that Nikolaos Tselementes was a Greek chef and cookery writer born on the island of Sifnos in the late 19th century. 130 years later, this small Cycladic island is considered the capital of Greek gastronomy. Sifnos is located in the western Cyclades, northeast of Milos and south of Serifos, which I also visited last summer. Despite the island’s close proximity…
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Religion, maps & meditation
I recently watched ‘Mary Queen of Scots’. Written by Beau Willimon and directed by Josie Rourke, the film stars Irish American Saoirse Ronan as Mary Stuart, and Australian Margot Robbie as Queen Elizabeth I. It tells the story of the legendary Scottish queen whilst portraying the role that gender, politics, and religion played in British history. Religion I was born and raised in Greece, a country where religion still plays an important role in most people’s lives and is also closely intertwined with the State. This should come as no surprise: religion and politics have been entwined in the country’s history for millenia. According to the latest statistics, 90% of…
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Serifos: the Greek island where time stands still
In June 2017, Kate Lough shared her ‘10 reasons why you should visit the Greek island of Serifos’. She wrote that she ‘found a Greece that seemed to have stood still since the 1960s and where island life remains unspoiled by mass tourism’. I visited Serifos a year later, in August 2018. Oblivious to Kate’s article at the time, I came to the same realization: Serifos reminded me of a Greece of a different era: it was the Greece that starred in the 1960s movies I used to watch as a child. Again and again, during my time on this small Greek island, the phrase ‘time stands still’ came to…
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9 Secrets to Happiness from the Cultures of the World
In the foreword of Happy: Secrets to Happiness from the Cultures of the World first published in 2011, Maureen Wheeler, Lonely Planet co-founder, writes that ‘happiness in travel comes from the moments you are aware how lucky you are to be in that place, at that time, and how wonderful the world is’. As I’m reading this book, I’m reflecting on my own travels and what traveling means to me. I first traveled abroad at the age of eight; visiting Thailand and then Singapore was such an eye-opening and character-shaping experience, for which I’m always going to be grateful to my family. As I’ve recently written, for me, traveling is…
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Skyros: the island of wellness & wellbeing
My home country, Greece, has 6,000 islands of which 227 are inhabited. Having been to a dozen (including Mykonos, Santorini, Amorgos, and Koufonisia), I am often asked to provide tips and inside information. When people ask me which Greek island is my favorite, or which one to visit (a frequently asked but rather difficult question to answer), Skyros is always the first to come to mind. I have to admit that I am somewhat biased, as this is my late grandfather’s home island; not only I have precious memories of spending my early childhood summers there, I also have beloved relatives still living on the island. For this reason, I’ve…
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The Traveling Psychiatrist: Wanderlust & Wellbeing
Wanderlust Being a non-native English speaker, I was well into my twenties when I first came across the word wanderlust: the wish to travel far away and to many different places. Yet, now that I know this word, I realise that I have been familiar with its true meaning since I was eight, when I first stepped into a plane, and then into a foreign country (Thailand, and then Singapore). The following year, I traveled back to Far East Asia (Thailand and Indonesia), and that is how I became addicted to traveling. At the age of nine, I had already experienced my wanderlust, and from then on, I would travel…
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5 tips to achieve New Year’s resolutions
Happy New Year! At the end of each year, many of us make resolutions and set goals for the New Year. Health, fitness and wellbeing resolutions tend to be the most popular ones: we resolve to exercise more, eat healthier, drink less, quit smoking and so on. Come the 1st of January, we have the best intentions to achieve these goals. Yet, a year later few can share a success story. According to a recent Australian survey, 2 in 3 people failed their New Year’s resolutions. Instead of examining the reasons for failing, let’s focus on those for succeeding, and identify 5 tips to make it more likely to achieve…
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Counting my blessings: End-of-year reflection
In my post ‘10 tips for better mental health & wellbeing (part 2)’, I wrote that positive thinking and gratitude can help improve our mental health and wellbeing. To help create a more positive mindset, I use a simple yet effective strategy: reflection and gratitude. At the end of each day, I spend some time noting the positive things that happened on that day. I often advise people to do the same by identifying and writing down three positive things about that day. This can enhance positive thinking and help us focus on the positive aspects of our everyday lives, rather than dwell on our shortcomings. As this year is…
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X-mas Book Flood: Jólabókaflóðið, Yule & Murder
I’ve always enjoyed reading crime novels. As a child, I read all Agatha Christie novels during my summer holidays. Recently, I’ve introduced reading to my daily life; commuting to and from work offers a perfect opportunity to read; I no longer have to wait for my holidays to do so. Yet, I’m actually looking forward to the Christmas holidays (sadly, I will only be off work on Christmas, Boxing and New Year’s Days), so I can read in the comfort of my own home (with Christmas music playing, as well as a few mince pies and mulled wine on the table). Perhaps, I’ll even have a few new books to…
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Gluten- & guilt-free clementine (mandarin) cake
My birthday is on the 20th of December. Every year since I was a little kid, I’ve been having a party either the weekend before or the one after my birthday (usually before). This year, however, I decided to have my party a couple of weeks earlier, on the 8th of the month. Amongst the finger food and a large selection of mince pies from Waitrose, I also decided to bake my Caribbean-inspired banana and papaya bread. It would perfectly compliment the tropical guava rum punch cocktail I had already prepared. But then I realized that one of my friends was gluten-intolerant, so she wouldn’t enjoy the banana and papaya…