It was first announced by the Government that because of the coincidence, May Day would be celebrated on the second of May. Later, this edict was superseded by another declaring that May Day would be celebrated on the first of May after all, Easter Monday notwithstanding. There is nothing, however, to prevent officials from changing their minds again; pronouncements on holidays have often in the past been marked by suspense, with final decisions being made at the last moment. Until May Day has come and gone, we cannot be certain when it will be observed.
May Day’s designation as “the day of the workers” is a fairly recent development, incidentally, dating to the Second Socialist International held in Paris in 1889. Since then it has been celebrated throughout Europe as Labour Day.
Although some uncertainty remains, it seems likely that May Day this year will be in situ and find many Athenians out of town rounding off their Easter holidays. On May Day, city dwellers and villagers alike make the traditional excursion into the nearest fields and woods to enjoy the sun, to gather flowers, and to “catch” the May, according to a Greek expression. Makeshift garlands are draped on the inside and outside of automobiles and twined around bumpers, aerials, rear view mirrors, and windshields. With their vehicles thus gaily festooned, drivers slowly and cautiously make their way home. This year, those already on the road returning home after the Easter holidays need only stop their cars by the nearest flower-speckled field to gather flowers and “catch” the May. Those relaxing at home after the Easter Sunday festivities will have to bestir themselves into making wreaths of flowers, or wandering down to the nearest florist to purchase ready-made ones, and by early afternoon garlands will have appeared on balconies and front doors throughout the city.
These May wreaths are left in place until June the twenty-third, the eve of the feast of the Nativity of St. John the Baptist, when they are removed. Today, householders often forget to remove them on that day and the wreaths’ dried and gnarled remains stay on display indefinitely. In the past, May wreaths were not likely to have been abandoned to such an ignominious fate. On the contrary, the twenty-third of June was the occasion for another celebration during which bonfires were built and the May wreaths were ceremoniously burned. This revelry, which marked the end of spring in our clime, was similar to Midsummer Night celebrations observed on the same date in Britain.
The May Day customs themselves are also similar to those in other parts of Europe. In Greece, young girls will rise early to collect the morning dew which they apply to their faces to keep their complexions fresh the year through. (Samuel Pepys in his Diaries describes the same practise in England in the seventeenth century.) In some areas of Greece, a young boy is decorated from head to toe with flowers and is then pursued through the village by other youths, dancing, singing and playing instruments. In other areas, a long piece of wood or clay is decorated with fruit, flowers and ribbons, a sort of mobile Maypole. Not surprisingly, it is associated with fertility.
Although spring may arouse love’s
fancies, some superstitions associated with the month of May can run interference with its course if a couples’ thoughts turn to marriage. It is widely believed that only donkeys marry during May and that it is unlucky for humans to wed during this month. (Couples disregarding this belief invite the suspicion that their haste is due to a lack of restraint during the rites of spring.) This superstition can be traced to ancient times — indeed, Ovid refers to an “old” proverb that it is unlucky to marry in May — and was probably related to the “Lemuria”, a Roman festival, celebrated on the ninth, eleventh, and thirteenth of the month when it was believed that unhappy ghosts came up from Hades and went on the prowl. Thus, only the most impetuous would consider marrying in May. Nuptials are out during Lent, of course, and so it can be a long stretch when May, as it does this year, follows immediately on the heels of Easter. For young couples waiting impatiently for the coming of June, it may seem like a very long springtime indeed.
Up in the Clouds
FROM a contributor: Remember the Olympic Airlines television commercial which featured bouzouki music, a passenger dancing on board a flight, and a voice saying, “But, please, no dancing in the aisles”? Well, there was live bouzouki music and considerable revelry on board when on March 30 the Lufthansa Airbus went on a quick jaunt over the Saronic Gulf, but the passengers refrained from dancing in the aisles. The occasion was to introduce the press to the Airbus, the short and middle range jet which can carry two hundred and fifty passengers in its spacious cabin and since April has been flitting back and forth daily between Dusseldorf, Munich and Athens, and four times a week between Frankfurt, Athens, and Jeddah.
The Airbus’ genealogy is a multinational one. The offspring of French, German and Spanish ingenuity, its parts are built by eight different firms in various countries including Holland, England and the United States. While the Airbus carries passengers, the “Super Guppy” is a specially constructed transport plane which carries the Airbus’ parts, many of which are immense, from the various countries of origin to Toulouse where they are assembled. The relatively quiet, fuel-conscious Airbus has been in the service of several European and Asian airlines since 1974. (In the United States, Eastern Airlines has leased several and is now ordering twenty-three of their own). The new run to Athens is expected to pick up much of the traffic between Greece and Germany. According to the National Tourist Organization, tourists from Germany last year spent approximately one billion dollars in Greece, and this is expected to increase this year.
The co-hosts of the jaunt in March were Airbus Industries and Lufthansa. With what may have been a calculating eye on those one billion tourist dollars to be generated from Germany, they went all out to put their best foot forward for the benefit of the press. The one-hour, airborne inauguration was preceded by cocktails and a lavish luncheon before take-off, and champagne and bouzouki music up in the air, all managed with German deftness and Greek charm. After circling the Saronic Gulf, we were returned to Athens and gently brought back down to earth.
Parking Principles
ALTHOUGH we have long been concerned about traffic congestion in downtown Athens, the recent announcement by the Government that certain major streets will be off limits to parking caused us some moments of anxiety until we spotted the key word, “streets”. Like all good Athenians, we prefer to park on the sidewalks and presumably this practice will continue unimpeded by the new regulations.
Visitors to Athens observing automobiles parked at curbs and on sidewalks in a breathtaking variety of angles—usually horizontally but occasionally vertically if the driver has overlooked one of the ubiquitous, gaping, subterranean stairwells that appear at regular intervals on Athens sidewalks—often leap to the conclusion that Athenians flagrantly ignore parking regulations and are disdainful of pedestrians. Careful analysis of the seemingly random pattern of parking usually reveals the opposite. The Athenian driver upholds a scrupulously literate interpretation of the traffic code as well as an excessive concern for his fellow citizens.
Consider what happens when a driver finds himself on a narrow street where parking is restricted to one side only and all the spaces on that side are occupied. Confronted with such a dilemma, drivers in other cities will stealthily park on the illegal side of the street, willingly running the risk of receiving a parking ticket or having their cars towed away by the ever-vigilant police. Law-abiding Athenians rarely resort to such overt transgressions. Instead, they deposit their vehicles on the sidewalk thus staying within the letter of the law and sparing the authorities considerable inconvenience.
If the sidewalk is a particularly narrow one, the more considerate drivers are careful to angle their cars in such a way that a small portion of the rear end of their vehicle juts out onto the road, allowing passing motorists to manoeuvre around it with a minimum of inconvenience. This parking technique also demontrates the drivers’ consideration of the pedestrian, in particular the elderly and the infirm. By parking at a diagonal across the sidewalk, only a corner of the front fender meets the wall of the building. Thus the less agile need only leap gingerly across, or step up on to the fender and down, to continue along their route. Other drivers, believing that the majority of citizens are able-bodied, and that keeping them fit is of paramount importance, park at a right angle to the sidewalk, forcing pedestrians to scale the vehicle and crawl across its breadth if they are not up to a hurdle, or to detour to the road where they must then sprint out of reach of oncoming cars.
Particularly skilled drivers carefully squeeze their automobiles into the limited space of a corner. Pedestrians arriving at an intersection find their progress completely obstructed and must then retrace their steps until they find an adequate opening between other parked cars. On a busy day they may have to backtrack several blocks. Occasionally, the pedestrian arriving at a corner blockade turns back to discover that another vehicle has pulled up behind them on the sidewalk and completely hemmed them in. With a little vigorous enterprise, however, the pedestrian can clamber out of the impasse.
Traversing the streets, pedestrians may sometimes feel like one of Princess Ann’s steeds being trained for a steeplechase, but it keeps them in good shape, and although city dwellers are sometimes annoyed to find that the entrance to their building is sealed off by a car drawn up on the sidewalk, it has positive social benefits, bringing neighbours together in a spirit of camaraderie. Other tenants are usually eager to come to the rescue, the more cantankerous types with sledgehammers or wrenches to dismantle the offending vehicle. Such drastic methods are not necessary, however. Tenants on the ground floor will usually cooperate by allowing their fellow tenants to climb out their windows.
In the wake of the no-parking-in-the-downtown-thoroughfares regulations have come other announcements of measures to alleviate traffic congestion. Among them are plans for above-ground and underground garages. After examining the streets involved in the new proposals, we have concluded that parking garages will not be necessary. Vassilissis Sofias, for example, has wide expanses of serviceable sidewalk which will easily accommodate two or three rows of cars. Panepistimiou (Venizelos) Street may present a few problems because of the presence of several long-established sidewalk cafes and restaurants, such as Orfanides, Flocas, and Zonar’s, but we feel certain that the owners of these establishments will prove cooperative and move their tables indoors. Ermou Street is another matter entirely. It is too narrow, and presents some minor problems, but these, too, can be easily resolved. Among the possible solutions are that all the shops and department stores move to other quarters, or, alternatively, that sidewalks be banned to all pedestrian traffic.
