Can trees speak about history? What would their stories sound like? This ongoing series gathers small testimonies — fragments of voices tracing how, when, and by whom the trees were planted. Through these living witnesses, the project invites an engagement with the microhistory of the Greek settlement in Nea Ionia, one of the cities founded after the forced Population Exchange of 1923, following the Treaty of Lausanne.
1.
Πορτοκαλιά / Orange tree / Portakal ağacı
Possibly planned by Charalambo Eliadi, my great grandfather, in the same garden he planned a mandarin tree, a lemon tree, four pomegranate trees, a pear tree along with other herbs and flowers. Charalambos Eliadis was a textile merchant in Minor Asia and the priest in the Evangelical church. Due to his belief he wasn’t entitled to property upon his arrival in Greece. The laws of the treaty of Lausanne are referring to Muslims Turks and Orthodox Greeks. He stayed in Nea Ionia where he founded the Turkish speaking evangelical church of Nea ionia. This orange tree has accompanied me all my life through the season, as it is the first thing I see in the morning. I observe for many years its seasons, and its fruit.
Irodou Attikou 27 Nea Ionia
2.
Ευκαλυπτος / Eucalyptus / Okaliptüs
The Eucalyptus trees were planted by the prosfiges (refugees) form Minor Asia along the riverside because of the intense problem with mosquitos in areas like Nea Ionia, Nea Filadelfia and perhaps in other areas as well in Greece.
Irakliou Avenue 187, Nea Ionia
3.
Κουμ κουάτ / Kumquats / Kamkat
The Kumquat tree in Menemenis 18, Nea Ionia, is unique in the area to my knowledge, I haven’t managed to find out who planted it. I believe that could be planted to be useful like the olive trees in the story which follows from the owner of the house.
Menemenis 18, Nea Ionia
4.
Κήπος / Garden / Bahçe
I meet Mrs Archontia by accident in her garden as I take photographs of it from the pavement. The trees were planned by her husband forty or fifty years ago. Her mother arrives in Greece with her neighbors during the exchange of populations. Her mother had to stay back because there was no space in the boats. At the last minute she threw the girl in the boat to her neighbors – she explained to me- she stayed back in a burning city. They never learned what happened to her mother (the grandmother of Mrs Archontia). Her mum was always sad, she explains when she was telling the story of her mum, how she threw her on the boat to save her. But this is life she explains to me.
Archodia Tapoli, Miltiadou, Nea Ionia
5.
Μουριά (Συκαμιά) / Mulberry / Dut (Morus Nigra)
When they come to Greece in 1923, what amazes me in the stories is that dates and landmarks on the map are always blurred. Like if they don’t know exactly the place, the name, the date, like if it is not of importance.The craft that he knows is to grow silkworms. Starting from what he knows he plants the Mulberry tree that now is at least a hundred years old. Today the Mulberry tree is in the garden of what was their house and today is the flower shop of his daughter, with whom I talked with. Nea Ionia had a lot of mulberry trees because of that plant in the pavement, maybe from the people, maybe from the municipality, i don’t know’, she says. Most of these trees have been replaced today with bitter orange trees from the municipality.
Mertzetakis Tsortsis, Evagelikis Sxolis 12, Nea Ionia
6.
Ελιά / Olive tree / Zeytin ağacı (Oleaceae)
“When the municipality decided to plant bitter orange trees my father asked to plant an olive tree, so it is useful. He never collected the olives himself; he was an accountant but maybe someone wanted to collect them.”
Mertzetakis Tsortsis, Evagelikis Sxolis 12, Nea Ionia
7.
Μουσμουλιά/ Loquat / Yenidünya
I never managed to find who planted the loquat tree, even though it has been cut out many times before, she reaches almost to the third floor. The building behind the tree looks like it was builded after, maybe in the 80s. With all the people in the balconies with whom I talk they say that it was always there nobody knows who planted it. I remember it for at least 43 years. The big white building seems to be in the time of ‘antiparochis’, they would give the land and their howse to a house contractor and then they would get some apartments from the building. I assume that probably the tree is where the garden of the house was.
Solonos 14, Nea Ionia
8.
Αμυγδαλιά / Almond tree / Badem ağacı
My grandpa arrived in Greece when he was 10, after he married Sofronia Hliadi, they built a country house at the Vasilika of Salaminas where he plants the almond tree. In spring Van Gogh’s painting comes to life from my window. Eight pomegranate trees are planted around the plot, one loquat tree, a pear tree, a lemon tree, vineyard and flowers are planted in the small garden. Around it only pine trees, olive trees and the sea are five hundred meters more or less.
Εliadis Ilias, Vasilika Salaminas