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You are at: Home page Her Work List of Songs Yorgalakis

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Yorgalakis
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Lyrics

In yonder machalá,1 amán,2 o Yorgalaki, yonder,
there’s running water running there – they call it silver water.

If any mother drinks of it she’ll not give birth to children.
– You drank it, mother, didn’t you, so you’ld not give birth to me?
But having given birth to me, what do you want of me now?
I’m wandering in foreign lands, in foreign lands I labour.
They’re foreign girls as wash my clothes, in dolly-tubs they wash them.
They wash them once, they wash them twice, they wash them thrice and five times.
And having washed them out five times, they cast them in the alleys.
– Go fetch your clothes, my foreign lad, go, fetch your coarse old homespuns.
Take them, and to your mother hie, hie with them to your sister.
– Had I but mother and sister here I would not bring them to you.

Translated by John Leatham


1machalá: aTurkish word meaning quarter or neighbourhood
2amán: a Turkish exclamation meaning oh!, mercy!, help!

Original Lyrics

Ο Γιωργαλάκης

Πέρα στον πέ- πέρα στον πέρα μαχαλά, αμάν Γιωργαλάκη μ’,
στον άλλον παραπέρα
τρέχει νερό τρεχούμενο, το λέν’ ασημονέρι.

Κι όσες μανούλες κι αν το πιουν όλες παιδιά δεν κάνουν.
– Δεν του ’πινες μανούλα μου, να μη μι ’κάν’ς κι ’μένα;
Κι αν μούκαμες τι μούθελες κι αν μ’ έχεις τι μου θέλεις;
Εγώ στα ξένα περπατώ, στα ξένα παραδ’λεύω.
Ξένες πλένουν τα ρούχα μου, ξένες τα σκαματίζουν,
τα πλένουν μια, τα πλένουν δυο, τα πλένουν τρεις και πέντε
κι από τις πέντε κι ύστερα τα ρίχνουν στα σουκάκια.
– Πάρε ξένε μ’ τα ρούχα σου, πάρε και τα σκουτιά σου,
πάρτα, σύρτα στη μάνα σου, σύρτα στην αδερφή σου!
– Σαν είχα μάνα κι αδερφή, δεν τα ’φερνα σ’ εσένα!

Information

  • Region: Thessaly
  • Area: Magnesia, Keramidi
  • Categories: Immigration Song
  • Rhythm: 2 beats
  • Duration: 03:38

Collaborators

  • Singer: Domna Samiou
  • Flute: Petros Athanasopoulos-Kalyvas
  • Violin: Ilias Soukas
  • Tambouras: Christos Konstantinou
  • Lute: Kostas Philippidis
  • Goblet drum: Yiorgos Gevgelis
  • Informant (source of the song): Aglaia Choutzoumi

Albums

  • Songs About Greeks Far From Home (LP)
  • Songs About Greeks Far From Home

Recording information

Studio recording, 1989.

Domna Samiou taped the song in Keramidi, Mount Pelion, sung by Aglaia Choutzoumi (80 years old), in 1976.

Dances in Good Old Days
Aglaia Choutzoumi. Keramidi, Mount Pelion 1976 © Domna Samiou Archive

Yorgalakis
Aglaia Choutzoumi. Keramidi, Mount Pelion 1976 © Domna Samiou Archive

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