A Greek immigrant to Australia has retired from his job at the iconic Sydney Opera House that helped build 50 years ago.
Steve Tsoukalas, 73, walked out from the Opera House on Wednesday after spending two thirds of his life working at the building.
“I couldn’t sleep last night … to forget today,” Tsoukalas said to ABC News.
From the moment he sailed into Sydney Harbour in 1964 as a Greek immigrant and saw the Opera House, he knew he wanted to work there.
Within four years he was helping to build it, in charge of a scaffolding team working on the building’s final stages.
Once it was complete, Mr Tsoukalas stayed on as a maintenance worker and cleaner.
ABC says that the Greek immigrant has left his mark too.
He helped to introduce green cleaning, using his Greek grandmother’s tip of cleaning the building’s bronze with olive oil and the concrete with bicarb soda.
Speaking a few weeks ago to Al Jazeera, he reflected on his years working inside one of the world’s most iconic buildings.
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