About Joanna Watters

I live in the village of Nidri on the Ionian island of Lefkada, a move I made in May 1995.

Some people thought I was mad, others thought I was brave. I felt neither. Having reached an obvious crossroads in my life it was a natural step. I left my hectic London life behind and for my first season I rented a room in an old rickety house. It had dodgy electrics, a leaky shower and a donkey in the back garden. The orange and lemon trees were so close that I could pick the fruit from my balcony and the stunning night sky was an astrologer’s paradise.

Helping people with readings

Having put everything in storage I’d arrived with a rucksack, my ephemerides – astrological tables that tell you where the planets are each day – and my tarot cards. In those days legislation around such things as work permits was practically nonexistent. I simply set up a table on the seafront, alongside the artists and the girls doing hair wraps and selling handmade jewelry, and did on the spot readings for tourists. We all worked from about 7.30pm when the heat of the day was cooling, to around midnight. I met some wonderful people, heard harrowing, humbling and uplifting stories, and honed my tarot reading skills in the process. It was only in my second season that I realized that a wealth of material was passing through, or under, my hands. I started to write up the stories and these led to the publication of my first book, Tarot for Today.