For many young Greeks, summer is all work for a bit of play
Many young Greeks who cannot afford a holiday at the country’s more popular destinations are choosing jobs in tourism during the season
Yannis Rossopoulos boards the last ship leaving Piraeus’ Gate E8 for the islands of the Saronic Gulf on the evening of July 6. His destination is Ermioni, a small port town on the Argolida peninsula, where he will spend the entire summer season working as a cook in a five-star hotel. He rolls a cigarette on the small deck, before the ship sets sail. This is the first time he will be working in the summer season. He is doing it mainly for the experience – he is studying cooking in Athens – and also for the money. But there is a third reason for his decision. Finding a job on an island was the only way he could spend the summer by the sea.
“I couldn’t go on holiday because of money – the accommodation, tickets, entertainment and travel were all too expensive. If I could, I would have gone. I had searched a bit in Paros, Mykonos, Ios and Samos, but they were very expensive,” he tells Kathimerini. Since he didn’t have enough money even for a few days on an island, his other option would be to work in Athens. Instead, he chose to work in Ermioni.
“You get away from home, you meet new people and you work. Leaving Athens also relaxes your mind a little, not having to constantly see apartment buildings,” he explains. The same applies for his friends, all of whom have gotten jobs for the summer. “We said that we’ll meet again after three months,” he adds.
He is not the only Greek experiencing a reality that would have seemed impossible to most until a few years ago: one where seasonal jobs do not only represent a period of difficult – and for many essential – work, but also an escape, a way for young adults to enjoy the famous “Greek summer,” to be near the sea, the islands or other summer destinations, while getting paid.
Hard working hours
“I work from morning to night, but at least I’m not in Athens. It’s sad to want to work in the summer just to see the sea, but this is my reality at least,” says 28-year-old Nefeli Sofikiti. Since the beginning of June, she has been working in a cafe in Kotronas, a coastal village in the Mani peninsula of the southern Peloponnese, where she will remain until the end of September. Before agreeing to this particular job, she had also spoken with the owner of a beach bar in Santorini and another businessman in Mykonos. “They offered between 1,300 and 1,500 euros a month, but you started at nine in the morning and had to work until one at night, without a day off, seven days a week,” she explains, noting that she preferred the cafe in Mani because the conditions are more relaxed. She has her own room, they provide her with two meals a day and she works for around 10 to 12 hours a day instead of 16 – and the sea is right there.
“I like it much better than being in Athens in the heat, not seeing anything, not being able to go anywhere because I would be working. I wouldn’t be able to go on vacation and spend 400-500 euros for four days on some island. I think about it a lot because when you return, you have a load of expenses,” Nefeli says. “That’s why I chose to get a seasonal job, because I thought that way I would at least go for a swim – I would work, but it would be like taking a mini-vacation.”
Nineteen-year-old Vassilis Iliakis will spend the summer on the island of Kythira, where he already works as a waiter at a restaurant in Avlemonas. He is a student at the University of Athens’ Department of Digital Industry Technologies in Evia, so the choice to work over the summer was not made for practical reasons, as in the case of Rossopoulos. “I work for the season for the money, which is quite good,” he tells Kathimerini, adding that the location of the job also played a role in his decision. He works from three in the afternoon until 11 at night, but when he finishes, he goes out. “I go for a walk, a lot of night swims, I go out for a drink and I wake up just in time for work – night swims come at a price,” he says jokingly.
Vassilis couldn’t afford to go on vacation either. He rents a house on his own in the winter, so everything he makes goes towards the rent and bills. “If I didn’t have the choice of seasonal work, I would have to spend the entire summer in Athens. You are always going to work overtime, but at least here you wake up and have the beach in front of you. If you are in the right frame of mind, everything is a vacation.”
Another thing that seems to be happening a lot this summer – according to seasonal workers’ posts in various social media groups – is employers at holiday destinations canceling agreements at the last minute. This happened to 22-year-old Evgenia Katifori, who is studying to be a nutritionist in Athens and has been working seasonally for the past three summers. “I’ve been to Lefkada, Crete and Andros and this year I was booked to work as a receptionist at a hotel in Santorini, but they canceled it at the last minute,” she tells Kathimerini. Now she’s been spending her days looking for another job on an island, ideally in Santorini.
The Cycladic island was her first choice because she really wants to see the place that brings hundreds of thousands of tourists to Greece every year. But she cannot visit it as a tourist, only as a worker. “Tickets, accommodation and life on the island are terribly expensive. I went to Paros last year, before the season started, and even the prices for sun beds were sky-high,” she says. “I have Santorini on my mind for this year. I want to see what it’s like.”
If she does not find a job in Santorini, she will look for work in Thassos, again at a hotel. The money is not great – “It’s good pocket money,” she says – and you don’t really have time to relax or explore the island you work on, “but, well, when I was in Crete for the season, when I had free time, I went for a swim. If you are going to work, you might as well do it on an island, to see a little bit of a new place.”
No more being carefree
Many Greeks, older than the people interviewed for this story, still remember a Greek summer that was diametrically different to the one described here. They remember going to the port of Piraeus without a ticket, getting on the first ferry and paying a very reasonable fare. Arriving on an island without a booked accommodation, they would almost immediately find a simple room, again without paying much. They would spend the summer going here and there, staying with friends, traveling with the whole gang, without a plan, enjoying the sea and a few islands, returning home only when they ran out of money.
“This element of connection with the summer, especially for young people, was something that made the concept of growing up, of being young in Greece, very special – the relationship with summer was special and it is a relationship that has been jeopardized, it has been restricted,” says Stathis Kalyvas, Gladstone professor of government at the University of Oxford’s Department of Politics and International Relations.
“It’s not just about young people, but for them, especially, it was part of their identity,” he explains. “I cannot think of the time when I was a student without thinking of the ‘gang’ going on vacation in the summer. That’s not the case anymore, that connection that was there has been lost and it’s something that comes at a cost because it gives a very different context to your relationship with your country,” he explains.
For Kalyvas, the connection of the country’s citizens with Greece itself was largely influenced by their relationship with the summers here. The loss of this connection is, therefore, of enormous importance. “I don’t think it’s just something we can just skip over; it is also part of the big problem of intergenerational justice. The previous generations were handed over a country with certain characteristics and passed it on with different characteristics. They couldn’t pass on what they enjoyed to the next generations and this is a big failure,” he concludes.
“Now, any contact young people, and not only, have with the islands is like a simulation. As if each beloved island is simulating an authenticity that recalls the older experience of the place which no longer exists, except in some small places,” says Nikos Erinakis, an assistant professor of social and political philosophy and philosophy of culture at the University of Crete, who also teaches at the University of Athens and is the scientific director of the Institute for Alternative Policies.
“Now, whether Greeks or foreigners, we go as tourists to the behemoths of tourism and experience something constructed. We don’t co-create it, we don’t co-develop it,” he says.
As for university students who take on seasonal work hoping to enjoy a few moments of relaxation, he says that they will return from the summer feeling tired and alienated. “It’s called a vacation break because you interrupt the regular flow of things; it’s a deep, human need to be mentally and physically healthy. Even this necessary interruption is being instrumentalized and these youngsters will quickly reach burnout,” he notes.
“Young people depend on the family income for their vacations and in many cases this is no longer there. Many of them, wanting to take a vacation, choose the solution of summer work. It may sound practical, but I am not sure that it will have a happy ending, because the working conditions in tourism are not ideal for combining work and fun, as they involve grueling hours, seven days a week,” says Angelos Loukakis, a professor of sociology at the Athens University of Economics and Business and a researcher at the National Center of Social Research. He says the inability to enjoy a vacation is problematic for the individual but also for society in general. “These young people will find an outlet somewhere,” he says.
Non-sustainable model
According to Kalyvas, we need to rethink what tourism in Greece and what summer in Greece means. “We have to look at this from the start and we will be forced to do it because the model we are following is not sustainable,” he says, noting that the fact these questions have started being discussed in the past two years is a positive thing. It is not only about the immediate future – the Greek summer is in such demand not only because of the sea or the landscape, but because it represents a specific approach to life. “It’s a massive advantage, which is easy to lose, so when you see it, you must develop and protect it.”
