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Mediterranean Quarterly: Spring 2008
the most heroic gures o modern Greek history.” The honored soldier wasmy brother Grigorios, a member o the Greek intelligence service, who wasbetrayed, caught, tortured, tried, and executed by the Albanian Sigurimi on18 August 1953. He was twenty-three years old. I ventured to Athens romWashington to receive the Medal o Exceptional Deeds on behal o the Stav-rou amily, including our long-dead parents.The minister o deense presided over the ceremony and made brie remarks. He was ollowed by the ranking cabinet member, Miltiades Evert,and the chairman o the Joint Chies, General Ioannis Veryvakis. When itcame my turn to respond, I could not do it. I broke down in uncontrollablesobs, releasing thirty-eight years o emotions that ocial secrecy, borderingon callousness, had imposed on me. The honor came too late or my parents.They died not knowing what had happened to their son, because I did nottell them. On the advice o senior intelligence ocers, I had long agreed tokeep his death a secret, supposedly to spare my parents unbearable grie butin reality to protect sources and methods. “Your parents should live with thehope their son is alive,” said Major Petros Dontas, commander o my broth-er’s intelligence unit. “You are now a big man. Why tell them and speed uptheir death?” The “big man,” loaded with a big secret, was seventeen at thetime.The last time I saw my brother alive was at a estive occasion on 25 Janu-ary 1953, his name day. For more than ty years I have lived with the burdeno a terrible secret and the guilt o my inability to make amends to my par-ents. But I have been trying to get to the truth about their son’s death, alwaysacing the daunting tasks o separating legitimate national security concernsrom bureaucratic inhumanity and outright lies. I was determined to ulll apromise I made to my parents on 10 August 1956 — the day I started my ownodyssey to the United State as a political reugee — to nd the truth aboutGrigorios’s ate. I knew I would never see him again but reused to accept theidea o not nding out what had happened to him and why. My mind wouldalways revive the image o Grigorios dancing with unusual passion in cel-ebration on his last name day.As was customary in small Greek towns, itinerant musicians would passthrough the neighborhoods on name days to play a song or two or celebrantsand accept an ouzo or a ew drachmas as reward. No one else was named
 
Stavrou: Searching or a Brother Lost in Albania’s Gulag
 
49
Grigorios in the reugee camp o Ampelokipon, Ioannina. A neighbor led thetroubadours to our one-room barrack and respectully asked my ather i itwould be all right or them to play in celebration o his son’s name day. “Whynot,” said my ather. “God knows what will happen by next year.” Besides, hehad more reasons than one or a little estivity: it was the rst anniversary o our winter escape rom Hoxha’s terror by a miraculous crossing over an ice-covered mineeld.On 2 January 1952 my ather, Athanasios, had led his our boys and their mother out o the Albanian gulag, walking or six hours over a mountainrange that gets its rst snow by late October. Grasping a shepherd’s hookrmly like an ancient patriarch, he trod over the rozen peaks o Mourgana,leaving behind our tormentors, the communist hoodlums o Griazdani, whoon that night were celebrating the New Year with endless harangues againsttheir “class enemy,” my ather. We crossed the border into Greece at 2:00a.m. on 3 January 1952, just as the communist scum ended their celebrationand staggered home drunk. As was their practice on similar occasions, theyred a ew volleys to make sure we heard their avorite slogan, “Long livethe class struggle, down with the kulak.” Unbeknownst to them, the
kulak
(aRussian term meaning “wealthy peasant”), his wie, and his our boys werealready in Greece. For my ather the anniversary o his achievement was wor-thy o celebration every day. But on Saint Gregory’s day he also rememberedwhat he called “the miracle o our passage” to reedom.We all remembered the shock on the ace o a Greek army second lieuten-ant when my ather described the path he ollowed inch by inch to lead hisamily to the village o Tsamanda on the Greek side o the border. “Tell me,Uncle Thanasi,” asked the ocer, “is Saint Basil your personal riend?” Inthe Orthodox calendar the east o Saint Basil alls on New Year’s Day. Theyoung ocer pulled out a map, highlighted the exact path o our crossing,and said with obvious relie, “You and your amily walked over a mine eldand lived to talk about it. Obviously, Saint Basil was looking ater you.”The mineeld was let behind by the deeated Greek communists. But theground we walked over is covered with snow by late October and stays ro-zen until late March. Layer upon layer o snow had rozen over whatever laybeneath, including the mine triggers. Providentially, my ather thought, theheavy snow that was alling on the night o our escape made our walk over 
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