Look at the faces of these fishermen from the Greek island of Paros. How many stories can tell their sparkling eyes, thinning hair and rugged deep wrinkles skin. For them, the familiar taste of sea salt on the lips, and the merciless sun and treacherous winds were the best of friends.
Day by day these people go to sea in their tiny wooden boats. They are all named after wives and daughters, and every morning, before sunrise, these Eleni, Nosy, Damali and Waist leave the local port to the sea wolves for their the helm can continue the work that they were doing their fathers, grandfathers, great-grandfathers.
A few of these left in Paros – real hereditary fishermen. Private fishing here has long been under threat. And the reason is not only in large companies and the EU: no new those who can pass his life’s work. Sea wolves from the island of Paros became an endangered species. And they know it. And probably why every morning they left port with head held high and with no less pride every night back, even if the catch was poor.
Photographing the fishermen of Paros Austrian Christian Stamper (Christian Stemper) began many years ago when I first visited here during the holidays. For a long time none of the “wolves” did not agree to enter the lens, allowing you to remove only the boat. They don’t trust outsiders, and the Austrian with the camera the more looked suspicious.
Only a few years later Stamper managed to make friends with the locals. First “broke” the 77-year-old Yannis Perantinos (pictured above), which is a big part of his life at sea on his boat Popi.
Another fisherman Kostantinos Stratis (photo above) while shooting Stamper admitted that he was disappointed his former colleagues, who for compensation from the European Union got rid of their boats, and, “swallowing the bait of the EU, now catch only ourselves.” It’s true: the EU paid the Greek fishermen, the reward that they had left the fishery, and thus tried to gain control over fishing in European seas.
Panayiotis Visadakis – one of the young fishermen of the island. Only recently did he start counting his seventh decade. Visadakis out to sea on his boat Ypapanti Nauossa.
Vaggelis Parousis, who was born in 1945, said Stamper that lives for fishing. “If I can’t see the sea, I do not live,” he said.
“I learned from my grandfather and my father,” says the fisherman Thanassi Tantanis. “This knowledge will be lost, because there is no one to inherit the tradition. When we leave, everything will end”.
“I feel empty when approach – in this moment I have a sense that I’m useless.”
“My children want me to stop. I told them: if you love me, you must let me go. My whole life is in the sea.”
In the photo above – Spiros Tantanis, almost reached 80 years, and his boat with a hard to pronounce name Evagenlia-Stella Naoussa, named in honor of his wife and daughter.
Filippas Tsantanis and boat Ilian Parikia, where he was taught to fish grandfather.
Nikitas Malama Tenios and his boat Panagia of Naoussa.
Petros Aliprantis pictured above – not only the fisherman, but one of the few professional shipbuilders on the island.
Petros Delentas believes his Piso Livadi, Manolis boat anchor that keeps it on the island.
Alexandros Kritsalis – another “young” birds of Paros: he’s almost 50. In his words, the boat Coral Parikia, where he goes to sea, “loves like a man.”
Parousis, with his boat Meropi Aliki, says he wouldn’t survive 24 hours in Athens, away from the beloved sea. “I would have gone crazy.”
Pictured above is the Fisher Athanassios Karapetis and boat Despoina Pariki.
The short video below talks about how the shooting took place Christian Stemper.
Sources: DailyMail, stemper.at
- © Photo-materials: Christian Stemper
Egor Lanin
Author ruYachts
Journalist, news editor. The team ruYachts.com 2014. Major topics: motor yachts, concepts, gadgets and technology.
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