Study Abroad in Paros 2022: Documentaries About Wildfires, Wildlife Hospitals, and Island Life

Part 2 of 8 in my travel series from the summer of 2022.

Back to Greece (Thursday, May 19th)

My colleague, Albert William, and I are resuming our study abroad in Paros, Greece and have brought 11 students to the island. We come here each summer (with the exception of the last two summers due to COVID) to make documentaries about the island. Since I got here Tuesday morning after staying the night in Athens, I’ve been basically unpacking, meeting with people, figuring out our films, taking pictures, and showing students around. Tomorrow is the first official day of class when things will start to get underway.

Back on a Bike (Monday, May 23rd)

I rented a bike, as I usually do, and this morning was my first opportunity to take it out for a ride. I got up at 5:00 and did a 20-mile loop out of Parikia and up toward Naousa and then the back way up to Lefkes. It’s a very hilly 20 miles—the major hill being the steep 3K climb to Lefkes. (There’s an even steeper road to Lefkes that was part of the last race I did here a few years ago. It nearly killed me and I had to walk my bike part of the way. I might try that road again. We’ll see.) It was so good to be back riding on Paros. There’s a 70K race on Sunday, but I’m not sure I’m going to do it.

I stopped the bike as I approached the top of the Lefkes hill and took the shot below facing Naxos in the distance, the biggest island in the Cyclades. The nearby hill in the back right is burned. Wildfires are increasingly becoming an issue on the island, and for that reason we’ve chosen it as one of our documentary topics this year.

The Aegean Wildlife Hospital

After my morning ride, we took the team over to the Aegean Wildlife Hospital, Alkioni, and did our interview with Marios Fournaris. Marios established the hospital in 1995. It’s mainly a hospital for birds and is the only licensed bird hospital in all of Greece. It’s run entirely on donations and volunteer efforts. The work being done there is impressive. Marios gave a great interview.

Yesterday, Albert and I met with Marios as part of a site visit prior to bringing all the students and doing the interview. On that trip we got to see the various birds they currently have in the hospital. Since it’s a hospital and not a zoo, visitors don’t really get to see most of the birds—it would overly stress them. Here are some pics from that visit. I hope to shoot some b-roll of them for the doc.

[photos with captions: White Golden Eagle (very rare), White Stork, Falcon, Black Vulture, Eagle Owl]

The Final Weeks (Friday, June 10th)

The last couple of weeks have afforded no time for blog entries. We’ve been working on several films virtually every day. In order to get any cycling in, I have to hit the road no later than 5:30, which I did several times over the last couple of weeks. That really helps keep my energy up and my mind clear. Thank god for bikes.

I’ve also been helping students with 12 films, which included several interviews. In addition to the animal hospital film, we have a film that looks at the 2021 fire on the island. It’s an ambitious film about a very serious and delicate subject. We

interviewed four people for it:

Rula Kavali lives with her husband and children in an area near the fire. They lost several irreplaceable olive trees and all their beehives to the fire as it came dangerously close to their house.

Elena Symeonidou has been in two of our previous films: one on Paros Park and the other about farming practices on the island. She’s a great resource and advocate for sustainable land practices.

Bernie Steinbach, an Austrian expat, has been documenting the fire from above with a drone and making 3D models to raise awareness of the risk of fire.

Haris Giortzidis is from the municipality and helped coordinate volunteer support for the fire brigade.

Doing all these interviews and shooting b-roll and drone footage for the fire took a lot of time and coordination, but in the end the film turned out really well. I like taking on topics like this with the students.

Agios Minas Monastery

Another film was about an old monastery called Agios Minas that a guy named Frank has been restoring for years. A great-grandfather of his built the original church at the monastery hundreds of years ago, and now it has been handed down to Frank.

Frank in a courtyard of the monastery. Frank has dedicated a lot of time and money to preserve the monastery.

In addition to these films and some others, we did several about expats who have been living here on the island for decades. It was great to hear their stories of what the island was like before it became such valuable real estate.

Some of The Films

Alive and Wild- Alkioni Wildlife Hospital

Fire On The Mountain

A Monastery Renewed

Hamburger Nick

Ekatontapyliani

The Screening

Last night, we screened all the films publicly, as we always do, and we had our largest audience yet. Once all the final films are posted to Vimeo, I’ll post a link to them here.

[photos of Albert, students, and audience]

Here are some more from the screening evening.

Tomorrow, I set off for Naxos, the large island next door. I hope to basically rest and recover from the intensity of the last couple of weeks. And to take some photos, of course.