Akropolis and Hellas Express: the trains of migration

The postwar economic reconstruction of the Federal Republic of Germany largely relied on the labour of unskilled workers from countries of the European South, mainly Spain, Italy, Greece, Portugal, Yugoslavia, as well as Morocco, Tunisia and Turkey. From 1955 until 1973, bilateral state agreements brought more than 4,000,000 ‘guest workers’ (‘Gastarbeiter’) to Western Germany, most of whom worked in the industrial sector. Many of these migrants later returned to their home countries.

Migration from Greece began in the 1960s. High unemployment and underemployment rates, political pressures, and a low quality of life, especially in rural areas where families earned meagre incomes from farming, were some of the factors driving people to migrate. The rural areas which had suffered greatly during the civil war were now experiencing widespread poverty, unemployment, lack of prospects and the oppressive practices of an authoritarian state, leading people to mass migration in search of a better life. The situation was exacerbated by a near total lack of educational and social outlets, especially for the younger and more active portions of society who were suffocating both socially and financially.

The Greek governments of the period actively encouraged this development as a way to relieve social tensions and gain a source of precious remittances. Migration was also promoted as a solution to the country’s lack of skilled labour, since migrants would become a skilled industrial labour force which would then return to the country and staff Greek industries. This prediction, though not entirely unfounded at first, very soon proved inaccurate as the majority of the migrants were actually employed in low-skilled industrial jobs.

Migration flowed towards different countries in Europe (Belgium, Sweden, the UK, France, Austria), but its main destination was Western Germany. More than 600,000 Greeks migrated from the country between 1963 and 1973. The overwhelming majority of the migrants came from rural communities in northern Greece, mainly Macedonia, and many of them had been refugees. First, it was the young men who migrated, but after the mid-1960s, large numbers of women also left the country. For 40 years, rural Macedonia had been inhabited by refugees who resettled there en masse after 1922. Now these areas emptied again, with entire regions like Drama, Kavala, Kilkis and Serres losing a large portion of their younger population. Many of these migrants returned to Greece after 1975.

Greek migrants to Germany initially travelled on the boat ‘Kolokotronis’ from Piraeus to Brindizi, Italy, and from there by train to Munich. In 1963, the Hellas Express train connected Greece with Dortmund, while the Akropolis Express, which was added in 1967, linked Greece directly with Munich. The first item is the timetable for Akropolis Express and Hellas Express in 1968. The line’s operation was halted in 1991 when the war in former Yugoslavia broke out.

The Akropolis has been indelibly imprinted on collective memory through the 1972 song ‘At the Munich train station’, originally performed by Stratos Dionisiou. The music and lyrics were written by Akis Panou.

Oh, my poor mother,

My grim fate has dumped me here,

At the Munich train station

The sun will soon go down

The Akropolis will arrive

How I wish it would bring with it

A friend or an acquaintance

Oh, my poor mother,

My grim fate has dumped me here,

At the Munich train station

Everyone here speaks a different language

I know no one and no one knows me

The places here are inhospitable

And the hearts are cold

Oh, my poor mother,

My grim fate has forgotten me here,

At the Munich train station

Dozing next to me, there’s a hungry hippy

A drunk black man

A pile of human wrecks.

Oh, my poor mother,

My grim fate has forgotten me here,

At the Munich train station.