Our director’s story about today’s Orthodox Christian tradition:
“This morning I ate with my grandson the traditional polysporia soup, a soup made of all cereals, following a tradition of thousands of years: The Day of polysporia – The Greek version of Thanksgiving Day.
It is a major religious day for the Orthodox Christians, 21/11 as we celebrate the The Virgin’s Entrance in the temple (Eissodia tis Theotokou).
In Greece is a special day as it is connected with the end of the agricultural work related to the planting of cereals. People celebrate the day by preparing and eating a special soup of cereals which they sweeten by adding honey or petimezi (molasses).
This celebration is not something new, as it is actually a continuation of Ancient Greek ritual called panspermia during which farmers offered seeds to Dimitra asking the Goddess to bless their cultivation of cereals, It should noted that the reasons of this day existence is very similar to the USA’s Thanksgiving day.