Easter is the great holiday for the Orthodox Church. Unlike Catholics who celebrate Christmas with special honors, and for whom Easter, the emphasis is on the Crucifixion, Orthodoxy prepares throughout Holy Week for the Resurrection. All this frenzy of days - combined with the holidays in the village, the first messages of spring and the rebirth of nature -, the decoration and the procession of the Epitaph, the Resurrection with the lanterns and the fireworks, the bend for the culmination of rituals, has been imprinted in our memories and are one of our most beautiful childhood memories. The memories of our innocence.

Easter in the village - in this case in Hydra - and a rare book from my father-in-law's library accidentally fell into my hands. A book that evoked the same feelings in me, feelings of lost innocence. The driver of Roger Tourte Mykonos is a book - it has no date, but from the descriptions I guess it is late 50s, or early 60s - half a century back.

This 64-page illustrated book with hundreds of colorful landscapes and well-documented texts is a unique documentary of the era that describes the author's enthusiasm for the island of Mykonos, made me feel happy - joy for what is left and for what I lived on my favorite island, but also sad for the many disasters it suffered - and I want to share at least part of the joy.

The scholar, award-winning French architect, painter and lover of Aegean architecture, Roger Tourte (1902-1972), whose works have been exhibited at the Georges Pompidou Center (Beaubourg) in Paris, loved Mykonos very much and this book is a guide with breadth and depth. It deals with all aspects of Mykonian life and captures and describes them in a very lyrical way. Nothing escapes his sight. The map of the island, the neighborhoods, the streets, the stairs, the houses, the chimneys, the churches and the chapels, the Paraportiani, the windmills, the pigeons… At one point it reminded me of my own "Signs of the Aegean" in terms of organization of funds!

"Greeks living in the big air…'s even trying to be part of it…"

"Greeks live in the" countryside "and have a good time everywhere except at home"

“Geometry of volumes, diversity of viewing angles, games suffering from the surfaces, the stairs of the houses of Mykonos make fun of us! Some lead nowhere, others start on their own and mate along the way. ”

"Le poeme des cheminees" - "The poetry of the chimney sweeps"

"Waiting for their Don Quixote"

In a lyrical and extremely technocratic way, Roger Tourte describes the operation of the windmill, in fact he parallels the art of the miller with the fisherman, in terms of sailing, and adds historically that the windmills came to Greece in the 8th century AD from Asia Minor, while in antiquity the mills operated with the momentum of water.

"The 2.000 houses are inhabited by 3 people - really how many and what size houses are there on the island today? - and 360 churches (5 more than the people of Mykonos were proud of at that time!)". He travels them all, sketches them and makes his architectural comments about the anonymous architecture. And of course Roger Tourte bows with admiration to the Paraportiani complex!

He travels around the island and thus shows us the landscapes of Mykonos, from the sea and from mountain peaks… His sketches show the purity of the landscape but also the density of habitation.

Wanting to describe the area of ​​the Mykonian house, he starts with "Space Vital 4X6 m"

"Vital space 4x6 m", "house as much as you can and vineyard as much as you can" as was the quote that characterizes the Aegean islands In 24 square meters (along with the thick outer walls) the life of a family in the Aegean islands.

The Easter of innocence, the years of innocence, the places of innocence.

Lucky those who lived them and those who recall them to enrich our daily lives.