“Greeksville”

“Greeksville”

The suburb of Matairangi/Mt Victoria has a strong Greek connection, as Joanna Newman of the Mt Victoria Historical Society explains.

There are strong Greek and Cretan communities in Wellington, one of which is centred on Mount Victoria.  Hania Street is named after the old capital of Crete and many people of Greek heritage still live or own property in our suburb.  

There were two main waves of Greek immigrants. The first came in the early 1900s, fleeing poverty and persecution. They laid the foundation stones for the second wave who arrived in 1950.  Most came to Wellington – in 1966, 76% of all Greeks in New Zealand lived in Wellington.

The first to arrive found it hard to get work because of language difficulties so a number set up their own businesses, particularly in food.  Many of these eating places were established around Courtenay Place and became institutions in their day. The famous Green Parrot has been owned by Greeks since 1946 and is still going strong. (Mojo’s founders are second-generation Greek.) 

Greece immediately after World War II was in the grip of a bitter civil war and this prompted the second wave of migrants to leave for New Zealand. The earlier trail-blazers realised they could never go back to Greece, as some had hoped, and many brought their relations out. 

Mount Victoria appealed as a place to live because it was close to their businesses. Naturally, they rented in Mount Victoria.  When they could afford to buy their own homes, they bought here.  “Why?  Because it was handy to work”, one descendent, Stathy Boolieris, told Mount Victoria Historical Society. And they loved it because of the sun: “That reminded them of the Mediterranean – they liked plenty of sun.” As a youngster, Stathy used to call Mount Victoria ‘Greeksville’. 

Part of building a community here was establishing a church.  The distinctive Greek Orthodox Church in Hania Street, correctly called the Cathedral of the Annunciation, was built in 1970.  It was not the first church on the site, however. A Greek Orthodox Church was first erected in that location in 1947, on land donated by John Kathistides, a Greek Cypriot.  It was housed in a prefabricated U.S. Army medical barracks transported from Trentham to Hania St (then called Lloyd Street).

You can read more about the Greek experience on the MVHS website - the church (Newsletter 72) and the experiences of a Greek immigrant (Sophia Anthopoulos under ‘Mt Victoria Stories’).