"I have written fifteen books and four more containing articles I wrote and were published in newspapers. I don't try to publish all of them because I couldn't sell more than twenty or thirty. I am satisfied with giving a photocopy to my children and some friends".

A century ago, Kallikrates, a mountainous village in the Sfakia province, used to have 500 residents; today only seven people live there - the members of the breeder Manolis Manouselis's family. The only child of the village is his little son who goes to school in the nearby village called Myriokefalos.

Traditional Cretans often go around their business as if they were posing or trying to enhance their masculinity through their roots. That's why they wear "stivania" (leather Cretan boots), turbans and black shirts, which are considered tokens of their Cretan character.

Ever since he was a child, lyre player Manolis Diamantakis, from Fourfouras village of Amari, Rethymnon, had an inclination to music. The only problem was that he had neither a lyre nor a bow. In the beginning, he made a makeshift lyre out of pear tree wood, with strings made of leather straps. He used horsetail hairs for the bow and struggled to play.

If you stop to ask for directions formation when passing through a village of Amari, you will definitely be invited to drink a glass of "raki" (local strong alcoholic drink). Georgis Sarris, from Kouroutes village, is a blacksmith. His shop is on the public road and when a traveler stops to ask him something, Georgis always insists of treating him to something from the nearby coffeehouse. The café owner has placed a bench on the sidewalk, where the blacksmith and his friends sit and gaze at the tops of Ida mountain, which is there, right in front of them.

"I asked which the most southern place in Europe is and they told me about south Crete. I was looking for a nice place to live, where it would be warm and sunny all year. I was dreaming of a home away from the city, which would be near a natural spring and surrounded by trees. The first house I found had no electricity, only a fireplace in the corner. I had to light a fire every morning in order to make a coffee, but later I bought a camping gaz from the village's store".

Kyriakos Litinas is a priest at Saint Paraskevi's church in Amari, a province of Rethymnon. He is very likable among his fellow villagers and a family man, who struggles as much as his people to make do. The village residents are few and it is hard to say if they can even fill a small church. Calliope Kanakakis has been the village chanter for many years. This role is usually assigned to a man with a deep voice, but there was nobody, so Calliope took over.

At the small square's café of the village Agiannis (Saint Ioannis) in Amari of Rethymnon we met Zacharias Dandoulakis, a pensioner, who used to shelter Antonis Brilakis, the unforgettable left party's fighter, during the dictatorship. Even though their political beliefs were totally different, he was hiding him for 17 months and he finally helped him to escape by plane and go abroad, with a different name and passport.