Yala-Yala is the local celebration held for Epiphany. This custom is participated in by the young people who are due to join the army. From the morning of the eve of the Epiphany they gather at the harbour and with myrtle and palm leaves they decorate the boats from which they will dive the next day. In the evening, the Municipal and Community Authorities welcome them at the “Ermioni Town Hall”, wishing them well and then they dine at a tavern in town. In the evening the young people go around the village, from house to house, dressed in traditional sailor uniforms, singing the yala-yala and receiving treats and wishes. In the morning they go to the Metropolitan Church of Taxiarches (Τthe Archangels) to ask for the church’s blessing and go down to the harbour where the decorated boats are waiting for them. Until the consecration of the waters, the young people rock the boats with vigor while continuing the song “yala-yala”. “Into the sea I’ll fall, deep in the waves, to catch your embroidered apron, yala-yala”. I will kiss you matter if you are the Mayor’s girl, even if I go to jail yalla-yalla”. With the third dive of the Cross and the icon of the Virgin Mary into the sea, they fall into the cold water. The lucky ones who catch the cross and the icon, in addition to the blessing, receive as a souvenir a golden cross, a gift from the municipality and the church. This custom originated many years ago, when those who worked on merchant ships, sponge divers and fishermen, i.e. the people of the sea and salt, would fall in the sea for the cross.
