After a long and heated debate, continuous store hours were briefly introduced last spring, temporarily ending the siesta for this sector of the economy. (Most industries have long been on a straight work day.) Although the ten-week experiment was marred by wild-cat strikes and expressions of outrage —mainly from small shopkeepers who felt that they were being robbed of their time-honoured afternoon rest— many employees and shoppers were pleased. The new regime was, after all, the one followed by most Western countries without danger of revolution or social disintegration.
When the trial period ended last May, Athens went on the current, still-in-effect summer program. It combines continuous hours and split hours: that is, on certain days shops close at around two o’clock and do not reopen; on other days they close a little earlier and reopen in late afternoon. Either way, stores are closed during the traditional siesta hours. This schedule will now continue throughout the winter even though officials had stated earlier that with the arrival of autumn the continuous nine-to-five regime would come back into force. The most surprising aspect of the announcement, however, is that the current shopping hours will end in May. Except for the short-lived experiment early this year, in the past it was customary for shops to go on ‘winter’ hours in winter and ‘summer’ hours in the summer — the latter to allow for a longer siesta during the intense hot weather. With ‘summer’ hours continuing throughout the winter and ending in late spring, the possibility now arises that come summer, ‘winter’ hours may go into effect. Of course, it is also possible that the government, shop owners and employees —who together negotiate such matters— will spend the next seven months devising a diabolical new plan to spring on a population already bewildered by the ever-changing shop hours which have been in a constant state of flux for several years now. Although these possibilities should not be dismissed lightly, a more-reasonable explanation for the recent announcement is that the government has wisely set aside this hot, political issue until after the forthcoming elections. It is, after all, generally agreed that continuous shop hours are inevitable. Meanwhile, Zito la siesta!
Tributes
TWO OF the foremost performers of our time were lost to the world of music in the last thirteen months: the American-born soprano, Maria Callas, who died on September 16 in Paris, and the Greek-born, piano-virtuoso, Gina Bachauer, who died on August 22 of last year in Athens. Thus, a special tribute concert to Gina Bachauer at the Herodes Atticus Theatre on September 19 became a memorial to both artists. (The soloist that evening was Vaso Devertzi, a former pupil of Bachauer and a personal friend of both Bachauer and Callas.)
The choice of the Herodes Atticus Theatre for the tribute to Bachauer was appropriate. It was here, a little over a year ago, that more than four thousand people gathered to hear Gina Bachauer perform with the Washington Symphony Orchestra, only to be informed that two hours before the concert the renowned pianist had died suddenly in her family’s home in Halandri. The Herodes Atticus held special signifi-cance for Madame Bachauer, as she told The Athenian’s Arete Gordon, who describes her meeting with Bachauer a week before the pianist’s death:
It was Friday the thirteenth at the Saratoga Performing Arts Centre in upstate New York. It had rained during that August day, but by evening the skies had cleared and the lush grounds of the original Saratoga Spa were alive with activity as over two thousand people gathered to hear Gina Bachauer perform with the Philadelphia Orchestra in her second appearance at the Festival. A standing ovation greeted her as she moved across the stage, dressed in a severe black evening gown, and carrying a large black scarf which she repeatedly pressed to her forehead during the performance. Her presence was dynamic and the audience was electrified as she began playing Brahm’s Second Concerto. During pauses, she placed her hands behind her, clasping the piano bench, and throwing her weight behind her as if in an effort to relax. Then the heavy form would suddenly spring to life as she leaned towards the piano and those magnificent hands flew across the keyboard with an extraordinary strength and seemingly-effortless agility that was the marvel of the great Bachauer technique. Her performance over, she rose and led conductor James De Priest to the centre of the stage. She refused to accept the standing ovation alone, but repeatedly brought the conductor and members of the orchestra forward to share the audience’s acclaim. We applauded Gina Bachauer that August evening in Saratoga, not knowing that this was to be her final public performance.
Although we were told that she would not see anyone, I sent a note backstage, and her husband, Alec Sherman, an eminent musician in his own right, came to invite us to her dressing room. Speaking in Greek, her eyes filled with tears as she spoke of her love for her native country and her dream for the Herodes Atticus—the Irodio: ‘My dream is to raise the level of music at the Irodio, to bring the world’s greatest orchestras and finest soloists to the Athens Festival, to make the Irodio the foremost music centre of the world, as it should be. That is why I shall bring the Washington Symphony Orchestra with me to the Irodio next week.’ The famous hands gestured broadly as visions of her dream unfolded and she relived memorable moments of her past—of over six-hundred concerts given for the Allied Armed Forces in the Middle East during World War II, and of her debut as a relative unknown at New York’s Town Hall in 1950 where she won immediate acclaim as one of the world’s foremost virtuoso pianists. Ί was so terrified,’ she recalled. ‘There were not even fifty people there, but the stage! The stage seemed miles away and I thought I would never reach the piano!’
Gina Bachauer was born in Athens in 1913, to an Italian mother and an Austrian father, but she left no doubt that she considered herself Greek. Ί am a Greek! But as much as I love my country, I wept for it during the Junta.’ She refused to come to Greece during the seven years of the dictatorship. ‘But I always knew what was going on. I kept daily contact with my family and friends in Athens. No matter where I may have been in the world, I phoned them every day and so I was constantly aware of the situation in my homeland.’ Gina Bachauer was a close friend of the Greek Royal Family, speaking of Constantine, whom she had taught when he was a young prince, and of her concerts with Princess Irene, who was also her pupil. Most of all she spoke about her forthcoming appearance at the Herodes Atticus. ‘I’m tired. I’m very tired, but with great happiness we will be getting ready for our trip to Athens. I am filled with deep emotion when I think that I will be playing at the Irodio next week… Every time I walk onto that stage, I feel I have come home.’
She did play once more at the Herodes Atticus, at a rehearsal the day before her death, but never again before the public. A few months later, her husband wrote to me, ‘The shock was so great. . . We have all lost a noble human being who dedicated her life to music and to helping all who needed her aid.’
Maria Callas did not feel this same devotion to the Herodes Atticus, if we are to judge from one anecdote that circulates about her. She was scheduled to perform at the ancient theatre in 1957 but cancelled her appearance on short notice because she considered herself in poor voice. In an attempt to persuade her to change her mind, a member of the Greek cabinet told her that if she failed to appear ‘the government might fall’. To this flattery the diva is said to have retorted, ‘But if Callas appears, Callas may fall.’
It is unfortunate that Maria Callas’s greatness was overshadowed by her private life, and her reputedly tempestuous behaviour—about which enough has been said. Suffice it to say that many who knew her considered her to be remarkably unassuming and kind in her personal relations. Born in New York to Greek parents, Maria Calogeropoulou spent much of her early life in Greece and began her musical training here in Athens at the age of thirteen. At nineteen she sang her first major role at the Lyriki Skini, the National Opera Company. Three years later she returned to the United States, but soon moved on to Italy where she earned her first world wide acclaim.
One of the most remarkable tributes paid to Maria Callas after her death came from the distinguished English music critic, Desmond Shawe-Taylor on September 18, 1977 writing in The Sunday Times: ‘No singer since the days of Caruso and Chaliapin made a greater impact on the musical world,’ he said, although noting the frequently-alluded to vocal flaws that occasionally marred her performances. ‘The truth, I believe, was that Callas was the greatest artist of her age in her own field—and with an instrument at her disposal that, for all its fascination, was sadly uneven,’ he continued. ‘With that instrument, however, she could achieve effects beyond the reach—beyond even the imagination—of lesser performers. Among her contemporaries, she had the deepest comprehension of the classical Italian style, the most musical instincts and the most intelligent approach.’
Maria Callas had overcome and risen above many adversities during her life, not the least of which were an unhappy childhood, obesity which verged on the grotesque during her youth—and coloured her self-image thereafter—and a rude and, certainly in the public eye, humiliating end to her prolonged relationship with Aristostle Onassis, presumably a major figure in her life. Although her last few public performances received mixed reviews, the spark was still there, and many believed she would return to produce a final, glorious coda to a remarkable career.
Blocking A One Way Street
AFTER a rubberneck tour of the the city’s neighborhoods, members of the International Congress of City Planners, which met in Athens in mid-September, aired the view that Athens was not in the best of shape. Plans drawn up in the 1830s influenced the layout of what is now the nucleus of the city and were suited to the tiny capital of a fledgling nation. An early census reveals that in 1824 there were nine-thousand people living in Athens in sixteen-hundred dwellings. Indeed, as recently as the 1950s the small-town origins of the city were still quite apparent. It was not unusual for audiences arriving at the Herodes Atticus theatre to be met by a flock of sheep which had wandered off from its customary grazing land on Philoppapos Hill. In the last fifty years, however, the city has grown ten-fold and in the last twenty years the population has grown from one to three million. Post-war prosperity, which began in earnest in the late Fifties, brought a building boom which spread a jungle of reinforced concrete across Attica, and an influx of vehicles to whom the citizens abdicated their rights as pedestrians.
Such, of course, has been the fate of many modern cities. Several of the participants at the International Congress noted that the problem in Athens is compounded by the astronomically high price of land, a condition reinforced by the fact that real estate, up until recently, was virtually the only steady and secure investment for most Greeks. This has led to construction keyed to maximum profit with little regard for human needs. The city planners maintained, nevertheless, that the situation can, and must be ameliorated by drastic overall planning and strictly enforced legislation. Meanwhile, the high density of the population is cramping the city’s open spaces, clogging its streets, and suffocating its population.
During the City Planners Week, however, a mother in Patissia —one of the most heavily congested neighborhoods— adopted a very simple approach to her urban agglomeration problems. Weary of taking her children long distances to bicycle and play, Maria Yorgandaki parked her car across the entrance to the one-way street where she lives, blocking it off to all traffic, and led her two children out to play. At first, the drivers in the cars blocked by the barricade were irate. The mood quickly changed, however, when other children ran out into the street with their bicycles, wagons, balls, and other toys. An elder resident watching with approval said, “I was raised in this neighborhood and hardly recognize it any more. In the old days we always played in the streets.” We would like to think that Maria Yorgandaki has started a revolution which will spread. No amount of planning or legislation will transform Athens overnight, but much can be done to improve the intolerable conditions, if people learn to assert their rights.
