Speaker background
Mary Faletas was born in 1950 in the working-class suburb of Kaisariani in greater Athens. Her high school graduation coincided with the coming to power of the Greek military junta in 1967. In search of a brighter future, Mary migrated to Australia, six months after her husband had arrived by ship. Mary began working in factories, but eventually acquired her teaching qualifications. She also assisted other migrants in her capacity as a health education officer.
Interview summary
Mary discusses her family and educational background. She describes the circumstances in which she met her future husband, and why they agreed to migrate to Australia. Mary details the factors that led her to becoming a Greek language teacher in Sydney’s western suburbs. Much of the interview draws on her career in education.
Interview highlights
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Mary talks about her motivations to come to Australia.
Mary: My husband has a large family. They were not doing well financially. He was working at a petrol station at the time. Meanwhile, seamstresses who had migrated were relaying information to my mother, as did many of my father’s nieces. My mother had always wanted to come here. It was my father who held us back. My mother slowly managed to convince him to leave.
Interviewer: So, your parents left.
Mary: My parents didn’t leave. However, they had encouraged Costa [Mary’s fiancé] to leave. He went first and then I followed. My parents later came as tourists. My father really couldn’t live here.
Timecode 09:12 - 10:01
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Mary discusses the effect of the availability of meat on the health of Greek migrants.
Mary: Oh yes! Very much so. Indeed, many of our friends, people older than us, used to say, ‘When we were young and could eat meat, we didn’t have any. And now that we have it, we cannot eat it’ […] The bad thing that happened to us is that we plunged ourselves headfirst into the protein and we now suffer the consequences.
Timecode 26:44 - 27:17
