Philadelphia, PA – Announcing the winners of the “LOVE YOUR YIAYIA & PAPPOU” photo contest. The Greek American Heritage Society of Philadelphia has selected 3 winners to be awarded Apple products, including an Apple iPad, iPad Mini, and iPod. Congratulations to Agnoula Marcantonis (3rd place), Soula Philippoussis (2nd place) and Andreas Kalisperis (1st place).

The three winners will be awarded their prizes at the spring “GAHSP Cocktail Party”. The winners and participants work submissions will also be on display. The reception is the organization’s first ever event and is open to all those interesting in preserving and sharing the history of the Greek American community of Philadelphia.

In addition, an installation created from the archives of the GAHSP is currently being prepared that will bring to light the history of the Greek American community in Philadelphia. The event is hosted at the Water Works Restaurant on May 9th 2014. For more information about the event, please visit www.gahsp.org.

Contest Winners

AGNOULA MARCANTONIS (3rd Place)

Yiayia Agnoula (Yiantsos), loves all three of her great grandchildren, but her connection with Christina is a special one. The games are all fun when they play dolls, tea party, or tag and hide and seek, but it got a little more complicated when Christina brought out the touchpad Nouna got her. For once Yiayia was sitting back in awe as Christina led the game.

SOULA PHILIPPOUSSIS (2nd Place)

Every summer my parents take my girls to Greece and then we meet them there. This is how we were raised, being shipped off to our grandparents every summer and they were the best summers of my life! So the bonds between our family, as spread apart as we are, remain very strong. This is a multi-generational picture of my daughter Nicoletta, her yiayia Maria and her proyiayia Sevasti. My daughters both adore their grandparents, who mainly live here, but also yearn to see their great grandparents every summer, as I do to. The longing and the aching that my grandmother feels for her children, and grandchildren abroad is something that I only now, as a mother, can understand.

ANDREAS KALISPERIS (1st Place)

There are several ways Yiayias and Papous pass along our proud heritage to our little ones, and dancing at family functions is one of them. In this picture, at a friend’s Christening, Papou Stavro is teaching his two year-old namesake how to dance Zeibekiko. When little Stavro approached the dance floor with his arms in the air imitating the grown-ups dance, Papou while snapping his fingers and yelling OPA; couldn’t resist picking his grandson up to teach him the right steps. It was a touching and fun moment caught on camera.