My Unique Lifetime Association with Patrick Leigh Fermor
Helias Doundoulakis / Gabriella Gafni
Although many accounts have been written about Patrick Leigh Fermor, the great travel writer, prose poet, adventurer and Renaissance man, few are more deeply personal and direct than this narrative by Helias Doundoulakis, author of I Was Trained To Be a Spy, Books I & II. The German presence was still everywhere on the island of Crete in July, 1942 when Helias, a nineteen-year-old member of his brother Georges famed resistance movement, went to the bus station in Chania Porte to greet Patrick Leigh Fermor (then known to the Greeks by his code name, Mihalis), who was scheduled to replace Captain Thomas Dunbabin of the Special Operations Executive (the SOE), the British equivalent of the United States Office of Strategic Services (the OSS), formed to assist local resistance movements fighting against the Axis powers. Filled with a spirit of adventure, young Helias hardly knew what to expect of the new captain, and was stunned when he encountered the charismatic Leigh Fermor, whose carefree - often dangerous - approach to life excited and intrigued the boy. What followed was a unique lifetime friendship that surpassed both mens expectations. Now, in his golden years, the author pays tribute to his memories of Leigh Fermor, and commemorates a time long gone, but never forgotten. Read this compelling account, and get to know two very remarkable figures and the heroes that supported the cause of freedom.
