In the photo above is the “old” primary school of Agiannis. The locals called it the “old” primary school, in contrast to the “new” primary school built in the 1960s on the site of Koutri, on the site of the Karytsiotis school built in 1798 and burned in 1826 by Ibrahim.
The “new” primary school built in the 1960s in Koutri, some of our new fellow citizens justifiably confuse “the new” with “the old”, as the locals call them, because in this place was the school Karytsioti, it was the oldest school.
In the above photo taken in front of the old primary school in 1958 by our fellow photographer and barber Thanasis Koutiva? Our late teacher Leonidas Kolovos can be seen with most of the students of the school, some of them were absent that day. Some students are barefoot, in the summer months most of us did not wear shoes… .. say 100 some years, who did what he could to teach us letters. Most of us farming parents raised their children with a lot of effort, love and an ardent desire to learn letters and “change lives”. The students were divided into two classes, the small classes and the large classes. When our teacher was teaching in one class, he was giving a written assignment to the other class and he was sending an older student to the younger ones to supervise the underdog, often the underdog. my lessons, when he sent me to the little ones, but we found ways to cover them; somehow we learned letters, there were other villages where everything was worse.
The bad thing about the school with a teacher, it was our teacher had to cover material at different ages, say to students of 4th grade, for sixth grade also to students of other smaller grades something very difficult, there was no time to cover all the lessons of all classes. The good thing was that the students of the smaller classes had to attend the lessons of the older classes and this for at least some of them was a great opportunity, they were learning advanced lessons.
We all had our nicknames and mine was the “master”, nice nickname indeed, usually the nickname most of the time was related to what you did. I boasted…. and I always said to many who did not know that my nickname came out, that I was master of everything, indeed a man of moderation and consensus for those who know me.…., for this nickname he was “master”.
I want to admit that the reality is a little different, when we had the late teacher Tassos Kalfagiannis as a child, when the school was one with the school of Astros, it happened a bit like that. Our teacher taught a class in a larger class and asked an arithmetic question to the students in the larger class. When I was very young, I jumped up and said.-Kyrgie… Kyrgie… let me say it. The teacher smiled and said: Say “sirgie” “, They forgot Kyrgios…. I will not mention here the details, that later a classmate of mine who did not have such a good nickname as mine…. tried unsuccessfully to change it for me, but everyone continued to call me today “John” Kyrios
Good fun but let’s say something more serious. It is no coincidence that even today we believe in the “Greek measure”, democratic dialogue, national unity and national reconciliation are the only ways that will get us out of the quagmire faster than exaggeration, lies, euphemism and resins for everything.
Ordinary citizens, not experts and professionals in the public, have and must have the first say.
“We can do it if we want.”
The founding inscription of the Karytsiotis School of Agiannis in practice shows the fervent desire of our ancestors for letters, for “children to learn letters and to change their lives”
«1798 IN THE MONTH OF JULY 18
THE SCHOOL TO PHILOTHEAMON .. “
From the same sigil of 1638 we are informed that Agiannis became a patriarchal exarchate “for the sake of course of the School of Agios Ioannis, operating much older”. According to this passage, a school operated in Agios Ioannis, long before 1638. In Agios Ioannis, there were also “inferior” schools, such as that of Papakyriakos and secret schools, initially in Metochi of the Loukous Monastery, Agios Dimitrios and later in the narthexes of the churches of the village.
astrosgr.com 