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| Map of Kastellorizo |
Although
Kastellorizo's official name of Meyisti means "Biggest", it's
actually among the very smallest Dodecanese islands with 9km2 extension and 500 residents. It's just
the biggest of a local archipelago of islets. It's also extremely remote,
located more than 100km east of Rhodes and barely more than a nautical mile off
mainland Asia. At night its lights are
outnumbered by those of the Turkish town of Kas opposite, with which Kastellorizo has
excellent relations.
The
island's population has dwindled from around ten thousand a century ago to five
hundreds now. Having been an Ottoman possession since 1552, it was occupied by
the French from 1915 until 1921, and then by the Italians. When Italy
capitulated to the Allies in 1943, 1500 Commonwealth commandos occupied
Kastellorizo. Most departed that November, after the Germans captured the other
Dodecanese, which left the island vulnerable
to looters, both Greek and British. By the time a fuel fire in 1944 triggered
the explosion of an adjacent arsenal, demolishing half the houses of
Kastellorizo, most islanders had already left. Those who remain are supported
by remittances from more than 30,000 emigrants, as well as subsidies from the
Greek government to prevent the island reverting to Turkey.
Yet
Kastellorizo has a future of sorts, thanks partly to repatriating "Kassies"
returning each summer to renovate their crumbling ancestral houses as second
homes. Visitors tend either to love Kastellorizo and stay a week, or crave
escape after a day. Detractors dismiss it as a human zoo maintained by the
Greek government to placate nationalists, while devotees celebrate an
atmospheric, little-commercialized outpost of Hellenism.
