Little Maid

My name is Anna. I was the first-born child of Demitrius and Olympia Hamilakis, in one of the nine villages of Crete, Greece.

Our home was a small two-room house made of clay and stone. The floor was made of dirt. There was only one kitchen and one bedroom in which we all slept. I had two sisters and one brother. My brother George was the second to the oldest. My sister Natalia was next, but died when she was three years old. Helen was the baby.

We were every poor. Our family only had a few small spots of land. We grew our own crops to survive. We also owned a few olive trees, which produced oil for us. Our family had a few goats that provided cheese and milk. My father traded oil for clothing and flour to make bread. Bread was a necessity to every household in the village.

I began working in the fields when I was seven years of age. Life was very hard. The spring and summer days were very long and hot. Our work day was twelve hours long. We had to weed all of our crops by hand. We also watered them. I’ll never forget when my mother used to wake me up at four o’clock or five in the morning, so that I could be the first to go down to the river and set up the stones to make a direct stream to water our crops. Sometimes I was so tired that I would ask, "Do I have to?" Most of the family members worked together in the fields. Whoever had a young infant would find a shady area in which to lay the child while they worked. Taking care of the infant and field work at the same time was a way of life.

I remember when baby Helen was born. I was about eight years old then. My Aunt Mary was the midwife of the Village. She came over to help with Helen’s birth. As the baby was being born, I was in the kitchen. When I heard the baby cry I went into the bedroom to see my new baby sister. My Aunt Mary suddenly had a terrible frown on her face. She said, "It’s a girl." In those days a girl born to a Greek family was not a very happy occasion. The reason had nothing to do with love, because they loved their daughters very much. The problem was, when the time comes for their daughters to get married the parents of the girl were asked how much money, property or whatever else they had to offer in order to find them a groom. It was also a necessity for the bride to have a complete hope chest. All the clothes and household blankets were made completely by scratch. The mothers and daughters worked very hard to make them.

After a long, hard day in the fields, we would all go home and eat supper. Although our work day was still not quite over, I just felt like curling up on my bed and going to sleep for days. There was only one chore left. We had to prepare wool out of which to make blankets. This took very long because there was a lot to do before the wool was ready. The men sheared the wool for us. The first thing is to wash the wool down at the river. After it was dry, we had to tease it with hand combs and fluff it with our hands. My mother would then spin the wool. Then she would dye it so it would be ready to weave into clothing and blankets.

I also took care of my baby sister until she was a few months old and was able to be taken into the fields while everyone worked. I always wondered why mother would wrap Helen up very tightly with her arms and legs very straight and stiff not even being able to move. They would do this with ace bandages, like a mummy. This upset me. I asked my mother, "How come you do this to poor Helen?" My mother replied, "This will make the baby straight and strong." She explained Helen would benefit from this treatment when she gets older. It was just an old Cretan custom.