All summer long in 2018, the Roma camp on Skopelos Island was full of visitors. Every week another family arrived for a 7-10 day stay—aunts, uncles, cousins, tons of kids. Lots and lots of people I could photograph. But as the summer of 2019 unfolded, things had changed. Mitsos and his family, my initial contacts, were staying in Aliveri, the large Roma settlement on the outskirts of Volos on the mainland. Others came for a long weekend but then left. “Thoulia,” Evangelia said whenever I asked where so-and-so was. Work. Everyone seemed to be working. Even the wild Mavro was working at the Skopelos town recycling plant.
I knew the time had come to explore Aliveri, the Roma village of about 500 people. In early May, I set out from Skopelos. Once on the mainland in Volos, checking my map programs, I could see a large avenue, Odos Elefderios Venezelos, formed the northern border and I had been told that Aliveri was somewhere in there. But since Aliveri had no street names or house numbers and didn’t show on any maps, I couldn’t just punch an address into Google and expect directions to pop up. I needed to travel and explore using my wits, the way I have always done to find photo subjects, to gain access. And so, I drove from Volos until I found Odos Elefderios Venezelos then continued on over the railroad tracks—that could be a hint—the other side of the tracks—isn’t that always where the Roma are forced to settle? Sure enough, a few more blocks and I began to see Roma riding in pick-up trucks playing loud music and women with headscarves and long skirts selling things from push-carts. This had to be Aliveri.
I parked my car by Nikopoulos Autokinito, a car repair shop, and called my buddy, Mitsos. It was my lucky day. He was having a coffee with his friends at Fresko Cafe just 500 feet away and he was game to show me around too. I picked him up and he was his usual cordial self. “Ah Vera, agape mou! Ti kaneis? Vera my love, how are you? Always a bit too affectionate but my large German Shepherd dog leered from the back seat keeping Mitsos in line.
We turned off the main road onto a dusty road full of pot holes with piles of junk strewn along the way—stoves, parts of cars, plastic vegetable crates. First stop, his aunt’s house, an unfinished concrete block structure, where I photographed Irini, a sad girl in baggy clothes and big sneakers while he caught up with gossip. Next stop, his cousin, Yourgia, in good humor that day, waved her hand dismissively at her one-room shanty furnished with just a tv set, a plastic dining table, and a 6-foot high stack of blankets for beds. Mitsos and Konstandina’s house was just across the way, surrounded with large mulberry trees where we all finished the tour and sat outside and drank coffee. Their house was a bit more upscale, an unfinished concrete 3-room structure with a partially finished kitchen and one big couch in the front room.