I’m pretty sure that no introductions are needed, since Chanel has been a huge part of my life, and of course, of this blog. It only felt fair, to get you to know my best friend a little bit better, since she makes so many appearances around here.
And you know, how you always tell me how beautiful Kefalonia is, and how lucky i am to be living here? Well, Chanel is the one to tell you how life is here, since she moved to Kefalonia from North Carolina. On top of everything, she may have something to share with you, that could be you chance to make a difference if you’re into wildlife and visit our wonderful Kefalonia.
How did you make the decision to move from North Carolina to
Kefalonia?
Kefalonia has always been a part of my life. My Grandfather
was born and raised here and my Grandmother is also from Greece. I visited
Kefalonia a few times when I was growing up and I fell in love. I always
thought that this is the place I wanted to be, but sometimes it felt as though
it was all just a big dream that would never come true. Thankfully I’m from a
family that taught me to dream big and aim high, so I never stopped trying to move
here. Now that I’m here I can truly say it is a dream come true and I am so
happy for it.
Were the first months in Kefalonia difficult to fit in?
Wow, I can honestly say that once winter set in it was
terribly hard for me to adjust. In fact, I planned on moving back to the USA
several times and even applied for a few jobs. I wasn’t quite ready for the
rainy weather (I hate rain, unlike my counterpart Corina lol). We lived in my great
uncle’s house that had no hot water, one little radiator, terrible breezy
windows and a moldy leaky roof. On top of it all we didn’t know that many
people. Of course I had some family still on the Island so that was nice, but I
didn’t speak ANY Greek and it was very hard to find people our age on the
island. I think the last straw was the fact that the shopping is not what I’m
used to.
I never dreamed of living in a place with no marshmallows, cool whip,
canned pumpkins, low calorie foods, canned soups, oh the list just goes on. I
was even scared to get my hair cut! I waited a whole year to even make the
plunge. The things that kept me going were my amazing and supportive fiancé and
my pets – my dog and two cats I brought from America. You may wonder if the
transition was hard for my pets. Ha! My dog became a professional goat herder
after a few days of living on the island (only joking) and my cats finally got
to play in the olive fields after years of being cooped up in apartments.
Needless to say, they did not want to go back to America, they just wish they
could get their paws on some chicken Florentine fancy feast.
It has been 2 years since you moved to Kefalonia. How do you
feel?
Great! I am on top of the world. Seriously. My personal life
is great, I have made friends with the most amazing couple that have made our
life complete here. Nikos and I are going to get married in May and we both
couldn’t be happier. My job is as good as it gets. Finally being able to run
our own conservation project and really do things the way we think they should
be done is GREAT.
It took a lot of hard work to make these two balanced and
great, but we are finally there and we hope life only gets sweeter from here.
The next step is to balance my life in America with my life in Greece. I love
and miss my family and friends in the US, but for now and the indefinite future
skype dates and a yearly visit will have to suffice.
What is Wildlife Sense?
Wildlife Sense is
a wildlife research & conservation project that I started with my partner
Nikos. Most of our conservation efforts deal with the marine environment here
on the island, as our research is focused primarily on loggerhead sea turtles.
Our mission is to protect the rich biodiversity of Kefalonia
while educating as many volunteers and members of the public as possible. Some
ways we do this are to walk the beaches daily protecting nests and newly
emerged hatchlings headed to sea, while also educating visitors of the island
at the Argostoli harbor and researching the behavior of the sea turtles that
feed there every day.
Who can join your program?
Anyone that is 18 or older, able to ride a bicycle on hilly
terrain and can walk the beach/harbor on a hot day can join. You don’t have to
have previous experience, but you must have a desire to learn. We are a bit
different than other volunteer programs because we really want every volunteer
to come away with an understanding of how to conduct research and with some
general knowledge of sea turtle biology and conservation in general.
Last year was the first year of Wildlife Sense.
How was the
experience for more than 100 volunteers?
It was awesome, like one big family. At any time there can
be around 20 volunteers (100 over the whole summer). We camp together, eat
together, have shifts together, tour the island together etc. It didn’t run
like a first year project as Nikos has run and been a part of sea turtle
projects for over 10 years, I kept things organized and was over the moon to
give so many talks about sea turtles and really be in the field teaching about
how sea turtles nest or how hatchlings find the sea.
This island is beautiful, and there is something enchanting
about sea turtles which brings such liveliness to both ourselves and the
volunteers. We all feed off the positive energy and it is just an amazing
experience.
