Person-centred, travel documentary with Ina Tarantou.

Ina Tarantou travels and gets a view of the "Alterlife". The exact location is not important. The journey becomes the destination and life is experienced through the eyes of the persons she meets. Stories of people whose actions manifest optimism, strength and hope. Through their "eyes" we see life, history and the beauties of our country. People who, despite the adversities, never gave up, took risks and developed new businesses, brought to light unexploited parts of the Greek landscape, and revived local products.

Further or closer to the urban centres, each story lets us in with its own beauty to another side of the Greek landscape, Greek society and Greek reality. Sometimes looking to the future, other times tracing back the deep roots of the past. It is the conveyance of the feeling of...breathlessness. Up on the castle of Skyros, on the top of Mt. Helmos counting the stars, to the playing of the philharmonic orchestras in the alleyways of Corfu at Easter, reaching down to the Cavo D'oro, walking on a tightrope over the gorge of the Aoos river in Konitsa.

Because life is even more beautiful, when you see the Alterlife!

With words that seem to convert the infinite, Odysseas Elytis praised the island of Santorini: “Shivering within the repentant clouds, a bitter stone, tested, unyielding. So that pain may be etched into its core, so that hope may be etched as well — with fire, with lava, with smoke.”

The truth is that the island’s story is one of the most beautiful tales of the eternal struggle between humankind and nature. Life, eruptions, dust, darkness — and then life again. And always, from the beginning.

We were first welcomed by the eminent archaeologist Professor Christos Doumas, director of the Akrotiri excavations since 1975, who spoke to us about the discoveries that reveal the culture and environment of Santorini’s ancient people. From there, we stepped into another kind of “cave” — the traditional taverna of Minas, open since 1967 near the archaeological site, where we cooked with Mrs. Margarita.

Together with Thomas, an architect, we wandered through Finikia, admiring and discussing Santorini’s hidden corners. Later, we met Dimitris and Alithini, two painters who live with their caravan by the sea. Finally, we encountered Andreas, a master ceramicist who has been shaping art from earth and water for five generations, with countless awards to his name.

In this way, we completed the first tribute of “A Different Life” to Santorini, focusing on the art of survival — the people who, despite adversities and challenges, built culture out of ashes. In this place where nature once raged and the land was buried in darkness, natural disasters cannot end civilizations, as long as the people who create them endure.

The question remains: what kind of culture do we create today? Does it hold space for the essential human values — respect, love, honesty, justice? Woe to us if we believed otherwise. Around us shine bright examples, and it is on these we must focus, to live with hope… to live an Alterlife.