28 years ago today, on July 23, 1996, Aliki Vougiouklaki breathed her last after her long battle with pancreatic cancer.
In a post on her Instagram profile under her name, which is managed by her son, Yannis Papamichael, she uploaded a snapshot of the trisagion held in her memory on Sunday. In the photo, he is shown, among others, with his wife, Eleni.
In the post, he wrote:
“1996-2024. 28 years have passed since the day you left us. There is not a single day that I don’t think of you. No one has forgotten you, you continue to raise generations with your films and the little kids you always loved so much are watching and admiring you! The funeral service was held on Sunday in a closed circle with my wife Eleni, my good friends Nikos and Kostas and Aliki’s friend Konstantinos Gioulekas, Deputy Minister of Macedonia and Thrace.”
The chronicle of her illness and death
In April 1996, during the period when the performances of her last play ‘The Melody of Happiness’ were being given in Thessaloniki, Aliki Vougiouklaki had severe stomach pains, which she believed were caused by the many antibiotics she had taken because of a bronchitis that was afflicting her at the time. After undergoing tests at an Express Service medical diagnostic centre in Thessaloniki, she was diagnosed with a malignant tumour in her liver. Not realizing the seriousness of the condition, she continued for another week with the performances in Thessaloniki, which were finally interrupted on April 29, when the last performance of the play was given.
In Athens, a team of three medical professors discovered the existence of cancer in the pancreas, in addition to the tumour in the liver. On 7 May, Aliki Vougiouklaki travelled to Munich, where she underwent a series of additional tests during her three days there. On 9 May, she returned to Greece from Munich, Germany.
On May 15, Aliki Vougiouklaki makes her last trip to Boston, USA, in a last-ditch effort to deal with her serious health problem.
On May 19 she returns to Athens for good and on May 22 she enters the Athens Medical Center on her own initiative.
After two months of hospitalization, Aliki Vougiouklaki died on 23 July 1996 at the Athens Medical Center after her short and uneven battle with cancer. Her death, just three days after her birthday, plunged the whole of Hellenism into mourning.
On 25 July 1996, the funeral service was held at the Athens Cathedral and her burial took place at the First Cemetery of Athens at public expense, in the presence of many of her colleagues and the general public, despite the stifling heat.
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