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BOOK BUILDING

In August 1953, Kefalonia was devastated by a series of earthquakes. “People on the islands were left homeless and their economy was shattered.” This tale is about one of the villages in Kefalonia: Farsa. Its surviving residents abandoned their mountainside village for a new settlement located down the slope.

Decades passed by…

**

“The faculty programme director from Huxley College of Environment at Western Washington University, Bellingham WA, U.S., asked the Kefalonia Governor whether the island would benefit from an American university-sponsored, applied research programme to address the island’s most pressing priorities,” narrates one of the essays in the latest issue of ‘Journal of Education for Sustainable Development’ ( www.sagepublications.com).

Farsa was chosen as a pilot project. The village had remained uninhabited for 50 years, and the remnants of the 160 former structures were intact, when students from a university decided to apply their learning to the rebuilding work.

“The faculty met with the Farsa village leadership to devise a research programme based on the community service learning model. Village leaders emphasised the importance of respecting the village’s past while planning a sustainable future.”

Therefore, an interdisciplinary curriculum was drawn up, involving “urban design and planning, environmental resource management, historic preservation, sustainable technology, agro-ecology, transportation planning, and social anthropology.”

Introduced in 2005, the curriculum evolves each year based on the progress accomplished.

Using GIS (geographic information system), CAD (computer-aided design) and so on, the students could accurately develop baseline site plans of the 400-year-old historic village design, because the skeletal template was undisturbed post-quake.

“Surrounding the village lie extensive olive orchards, abandoned bee hives and vineyards, which comprised its agricultural economy,” the essay’s author Nicholas C. Zaferatos describes.

“With the assistance of the former villagers now living in the ‘new’ Farsa village and elsewhere on the island, individual homes were identified, measured and deconstructed to characteristic features of architecture and building style and to begin to uncover the social history of Farsa village.”

The philosophical approach adopted in the Kefalonia programme is one of “threading the past with the future,” says Zaferatos. It combines “the wisdom of the past with the efficiencies of sustainable technologies in order to revive a sustainable future in this seventeenth century village,” he adds.

“The curriculum consists of 10 ‘floating’ courses which include site planning, architectural design, sustainable infrastructure design, green building techniques, energy systems, sustainable tourism and economic development, agro-ecology, community finance, and Greek language, history and culture… The classes are taught by American and Greek faculty.”

Each academic quarter, students and faculty present their findings and recommendations at community meetings in Farsa and in Athens where a large proportion of villagers now resides.

“During the summer months, when many Farsans return to the island for vacations, community educational meetings are held to report on progress and to ensure that a general consensus is reached on overall plan development. Linguistic gaps are bridged with the assistance of the Farsan leadership fluent in English and the programme’s on-site Greek staff, who provide translation assistance to students and faculty.”

Here are a few highlights:

The design process considered the reuse of local materials, such as the ubiquitous stone rubble, as primary aggregate material.

Hazards-mitigation requirements are factored in for the new construction, because the village is still prone to severe earthquakes.

Management of wastewater effluent disposal, integrated with olive orchard irrigation, is expected to revive the agricultural economy.

The students have developed a ‘walking trail’ map, reflecting ‘the unique and rich physical and natural history of Farsa’.

A tourism plan is in the works, “based on discussions with property owners interested in ‘pooling’ their residences as guest rooms.” A hotel cooperative would maintain and manage the guest units, and “the hotel business concept assumes a village carrying capacity for 20-40 guest rooms scattered throughout the village.”

The ruins of the old village are still clearly visible on the mountainside, evoking memories, nostalgia, and hope, observes Zaferatos. A hope that is being realised as the restoration work progresses.

To the Farsans, the programme “has served as a catalyst for reawakening their dream of village restoration” after a 50-year dormant period. And, to the students, the skills they have acquired through the programme can be transferred to other cultural community contexts.

“In 2006, the Kefalonia project received the Mediterrania Honorific Award, a prestigious international recognition, for its innovative applied research approach to sustainable rural development.”

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