Sunset on New Year's Day

On New Year's Day 2024, we strolled down the promenade between the White Tower and the harbour in Thessaloniki. The city seemed to be recovering from a collective hangover from the night before. A thin veil of mist hung over the seafront all day, but occasionally, a warm lick of the sun broke through.

Nobody was in a hurry to go anywhere. Everyone seemed to be exactly where they wanted to be. Groups of friends, families, couples, and a few people enjoying their own company strolled up and down the decked promenade with the Aegean Sea, its surface softly rippling like liquid silver, on one side and the bustling Nikis street on the other.

We walked up to the MOMus Center for Experimental Art and the Thessaloniki Museum of Photography, located in an old industrial section of the harbour. We were lucky to find it open. The Thessaloniki PhotoBiennale 2023 was still on, the subject being "The Spectre of the People”. It examined the rise of populist politics around the world and the impact on, and complicity of, everyday people in the decline of democracy, and the rise of authoritarianism.

After about two hours, we stepped out of the gallery onto the harbour-side pier. The sun was setting, and the light was incredible. The mist had not lifted, and gave everything a few hundred meters from the shore an ethereal softness.

The pier seemed busier now, with more people arriving to enjoy the sunset on the first day of 2024. The atmosphere had an almost tangible sense of community. Everyone seemed connected not only by the collective experience of a beautiful sunset, but by something else, something akin to an invisible thread of culture and belonging.

As the sun set beyond the horizon, purples and pinks replaced the warm gold of earlier. We walked back to the flat, occasionally looking back across the water towards the harbour, not wanting to let go of the moment.

The first day of the year ended well.