Every year the Greek town of Galaxidi gets covered in 1,500 kilograms of coloured flour that residents and visitors from home and abroad throw at each other in a tradition that marks the end of Carnival season celebrations.

The messy festivities take place – ironically – on a day known as Clean Monday, which marks the beginning of the Eastern Orthodox Lent. The ‘flour war’ involves hundreds of people who paint their faces in charcoal, dance on the streets, and throw large qualities of rainbow-coloured flour at each other.

Some of the participants wear goggles, marks and even full suits for protection, while others chose to observe the messy mayhem from across the harbour. Locals say that it takes days to clean up the streets and buildings after the battle.

Though the origins of the tradition are hazy, it is supposed to date back to the nineteenth century when Greece was a part of the Ottoman Empire. As Carnival was then forbidden, people took to painting their faces in coal and dancing on the streets in defiance against authorities, and the flour-tossing was added later.

Galaxidi is located on the Greek mainland, about 200 kilometres northwest of Athens. It is just one of the many places where the three-week Greek Carnival season takes place in full swing every year before Lent.

In Greece, Carnival is known as Apokria, and just like its Latin counterpart means saying goodbye to meat-eating (‘Apo” means ‘away’ and ‘kria’ – meat, just as ‘carne’ in Latin means ‘meat’ and ‘vale’ – to take leave of).

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