Walking on the waterfront of Kavala, sounds, lyrics, songs come from the past into your head.
You stare at the boats and ships, the seagulls on the masts, you feel the smell of scales and fish bones in your lungs. You light a cigarette and inhale the smoke. Then you see in front of you, as if in a vision, men dressed alike, with sweaty, tired but always smiling faces, packing tobacco leaves. Carts with their wheels creaking on the pavement, a message from the city to the whole world, with the characteristic smell that is found in every corner of Kavala.
Now, at this moment, they are all pouring into the streets, like a fist, ready to fight for their rights. And all around are policemen, savage, on horseback, armed, and thugs ready to quell the people's uprising. "BREAD - WORK" some shout and fall down wounded by the blows. They water the tree of labor with their blood; from the depths of the earth it begins, reaches to the stars, with men shining like planets on its foliage.
Slowly, night falls, you ascend into the city, seeing in the dim light of the gas lanterns, tobacco warehouses and houses that belonged to the aristocracy of the old era, with coat of arms gables and large heavy gates with the smell of smoke alive inside them, and ornate columns with spires supporting balconies on which children who have now died or grown old play.
And the wrinkled old men today look at the rusty locks on the tobacco warehouses and the doors of their houses. Tears fill their eyes, wiping them quickly and hastily with their sleeves, so that passersby won't see them.
You take the last drag. You put out the cigarette; that's it, you're here again, in the present, with cars and motorbikes. You see the tobacco warehouses and the old mansions, crumbling from time, ready to become cement towers too. You feel like you're losing a relative, every time you watch your grandparents' past turn to dust. Why doesn't anyone care about restoring the buildings!? Why doesn't anyone respect the history of the place that nurtured them!? A big question remains on your lips. Why!?
