Preparing for Darwin’s largest annual multicultural festival is no easy feat, with a small army of volunteers having been hard at work for weeks to put on a feast for this year’s GleNTi.
Throughout the past week, thousands of meatballs and dolmades have been rolled and tonnes of seafood has been prepared for the major Greek festival.
It has all been to ensure that the tens of thousands of attendees at the beloved annual event leave full and satisfied.
Since its launch in 1988, GleNTi has grown in size every year to become one of the biggest weekends on Darwin’s social calendar.
The festival celebrates traditional Greek costume. (Supplied: In The Lens Photography)
These days GleNTi is a two-day extravaganza, with food, dancing, music and plate-smashing filling the busy schedule at Bicentennial Park on the Darwin Esplanade.
Michael Koulianos, president of the Greek Orthodox Community of Northern Australia, which organises GleNTi, said the festival was an annual highlight of Darwin’s event calendar.
“It’s a celebration of our Greek heritage, but also of our families, our community and our standing in the NT,” he said.
“It brings us all together. It brings friends, families but also the wider community together as well”.
GleNTi includes music and dance. (ABC News: Isabel Moussalli)
Volunteers on a roll
On Wednesday, members of the Greek community held a working bee to wrap dolmades for the festival.
The parcels, which are often called “fylla” by Darwin’s predominantly Kalymnian Greek population, are made of grapevine leaves stuffed with rice, meat, herbs and spices.
Katina Vrodos, who has been making dolmades her whole life, said they were one of the festival’s highlights.
“I started [making dolmades] in Greek school … and have continued all these years,” she said.
Katina Vrodos is one of many GleNTi volunteers. (ABC News: Marcus Kennedy)
She keeps a keen eye on the volunteers, ensuring quality standards are upheld.
“This recipe is mine from more than 40 years ago,” she said.
The preparation is a tradition that has been passed down from generation to generation.
High school student Anna Koulianos — Mr Koulianos’s daughter — was among the young people who pitched in.
“I have memories sitting at my Yiya’s table at her house, her teaching me how to do it from a really young age,” she said.
She joked that she felt the pressure of carrying on a tradition so deeply protected by her grandmothers, but also said the practice made her feel “at home”.
Anna Koulianos carries on the tradition of wrapping dolmades, taught to her by her grandmothers. (ABC News: Marcus Kennedy)
There were several other workshops held throughout the week, including rolling meatballs, or “keftedes”, and preparing honey puffs, also called “loukoumades”.
Organisers say all up, there will be about 3 tonnes of souvla, 600 kilograms of dolmades, 2 tonnes of octopus and 800kg of calamari — though the true numbers are hard to quantify.
Many hands made light work of the preparations, with the working bees drawing volunteers from beyond the Greek community.
“We’ve got Darwin High School, we’ve got St John [Ambulance] volunteer corps and a lot of other non-profit organisations taking part as well, including the Filipino community,” Mr Koulianos said.
The festival is being held at Darwin’s Esplanade. (ABC News: Isabel Moussalli)
Politicians also rolled up their sleeves and got to work, with federal MP Luke Gosling and NT Chief Minister Lia Finocchiaro among the volunteers.
“We start our preparations in January every year, but the last three months are quite intense,” Mr Koulianos said.
“That’s when we really gear up, and obviously the last month is sleepless nights to really get everything done.”
Octopus supply impacted
However, not all the preparations for this year’s GleNTi have been smooth sailing.
On Friday, the day before the festival kicked off, an NT Health investigator found one of the GleNTi stallholders, the Kalymnian Brotherhood, had breached food safety standards when preparing their tonnes of octopus.
In a statement, an NT Health spokesperson said it had deemed the octopus “unsuitable for consumption”.
“As a result, Environmental Health Officers have requested the provider dispose of the affected octopus,” the spokesperson said.
NT Health said the decision would have a “very minor impact” on the festival.
The supply of octopus has been restricted at this year’s GleNTi. (Suppled: Adobe Stock)
In a Facebook post, the Kalymnian Brotherhood denied any wrongdoing and said the investigators made “false accusations”.
“We want to make it clear our octopus prep was conducted properly and in the correct manner,” they said.
“We consider this to be sabotage and we are very strong believers in due process.“
The Kalymnian Brotherhood said in the same post the group would not take part in this year’s festival as a result.
Mr Koulianos said organisers had found a solution and octopus would still be available.
“We did stay up all night, rang some suppliers [and] local distributors, and found octopus, so we are definitely going to have octopus this GleNTi,” he said.
“I think it’s going to be enough, probably about a tonne.
“Normally we sell about two tonnes over the GleNTi weekend, but it’s going to be enough for people to taste it, let’s put it that way”.
GleNTi is being held on Saturday and Sunday at the Bicentenial Park on Darwin’s Esplanade.
