The hunt for authenticity
People looking for an authentic Greek summer experience in the age of Instagram feel a bit like initiates of some secret club, wanting to keep their discoveries well hidden from the world. “Guys, we went to X. What an amazing island! It was like being back in 1980s Greece,” a traveler will tell their friends, immediately adding: “But don’t go telling anyone else about it, or it will get spoiled too.”
Another friend gets mad every time he reads another list of the “Top 10 best tavernas.” “Why do people do that?” he asks in an exasperated tone.
The hunt for authenticity is getting harder and harder. Finding a taverna that serves good, traditional Greek food, without fancy vinaigrette and lime dressings, is something to get excited about. We all have our “secret” places – beaches, remote churches, out-of-the-way tavernas and small seaside villages – that take us back to different times and maintain that unbreakable bond with a simpler, unaffected Greece.
I travel back to that Greece at the sound of people sitting around a big table at a village festival celebrating the local church’s patron saint and banging the table with a spoon to the beat of the music as the host fills our plates and glasses. Or at the sight of a perfectly serene man cranking up the old engine of his well-tended fishing boat at sunset.
Our mind tells us that the country needs to move forward, that the taverna needs to survive and the untouched island put on the path of growth. But our heart tells us that by doing all this, we’re losing a piece of our soul and a massive comparative advantage. There is a winning recipe, however, and that’s what we need to aim for. Because when we strike that perfect balance between the authentic and the modern, that’s when this country really shines and enchants its foreign visitors. And this is accomplished when the younger generations take over the family business and work at it with the same amount of love and commitment, but with greater professionalism. When they refuse to sell up, not just out of pride, but because they have found a way to make it pay while also staying on the same course.
As for the incurable romantics, we will continue visiting our special places with the hope that they’re “still there” and will continue to seek new places for our private favorites list.
In the meantime, in the race against the Instagram hordes, we’ll continue to have small wins here and there, or maybe losses – like the man who was frantically looking for a small beach featured in some influencer’s post, only to discover that it was full of aggressive wasps.
