Epaminondas Remoundakis
Epameinondas Remoundakis was a leading figure in the island of Spinalonga. He was twenty one years old, third year student of Law School, when in 1936 he learned he was suffering from Hansen's Disease. Not long ago, his sister was ill too and was transferred to Spinalonga. Years later, due to the illness, he lost his arm and went blinded.
Remoundakis, one of the few educated people living on the island, was reluctant to just wait death in Spinalonga, living in appalling conditions. He fought to make life better for lepers and demanded from the state better living conditions and treatment.
Remoundakis and the "Fraternity of Spinalonga’s Patients", which he founded, played a catalytic role in living conditions of the patients. Houses were painted, trees were plant, theatre and cinema were created, cafes, barber shop started working and loudspeakers were placed in the streets playing classical music, satirical paper was published and school was opened. It is worth mentioning that Spinalonga had an electric generator even before Plaka had one!
Thus, the lives of lepers were improved and as Manolis Fountoulakis (a cured patient and very well known to the locals) mentioned "From a moment and after the island was not hell. It was a village of good and bad guys, strange and lazy".