Covering most of the peninsula of Thessalian Magnesia, which juts out from the eastern coast of mainland Greece about half-way between Athens and Thessaloniki, is the Pilion area, dotted with villages strung out along the beaches.
Ever since Antonios Benaki transformed his townhouse into the museum which now houses a vast eclectic collection of artifacts, from Coptic embroideries and Chinese ceramics to Byzantine treasures and Greek folk art, the Benaki Museum has played a dramatic role in the cultural life of Greece. The Museum is only part of the Benaki Saga, but a chapter that has contributed to the preservation of neglected areas of the Greek heritage. The innovative tradition established by Antonios Benaki and continued by his descendents is now entering a new phase at the Museum.
The lemons and oranges seem to reach into my window. After the maze of multi-storey dwellings in Athens, the rain-slippery slopes around Kolonaki Square, the pock-marked asphalt, the cars parked on sidewalks discouraging even the most determined walker, Nicosia looks like a peaceful suburb, a garden city — a walker’s city, where nobody walks and everybody drives even for short distances.
Under fragrant cedars and pines on Mount Lykavitos, a few steps from the paved paths, one still comes upon flower-covered slopes blue with grape hyacinths or sprinkled with cow vetch and tiny pinks. Were it not for the constant din of Athens traffic rising from below, one might imagine it to be the countryside, and contemplate what it must have been like before the encroachment of apartment buildings which now cover Lykavitos’s flanks almost to the top.
When Greece and Ireland decided to establish diplomatic relations in 1975, and proceeded this past year to open resident embassies in the two capitals, it was, of course, not simply to provide an opportunity for the Greeks and the Irish to get better acquainted with each other. One of the main reasons for this decision was related to Greece’s endeavour to join the European Economic Community. Ireland has embassies in all EEC countries.
On the bustling corner of Fidiou and Harilaou Trikoupi streets in downtown Athens, in the midst of shoe shops, electrical appliance stores, book-sellers and less-than-elegant window displays, stands one of the few remaining neo-classical buildings in Athens. Somewhat weathered, its ceilings extravagantly high, its balustrades polished to a bright sheen by the hands that have grasped them, its tall windows admitting only enough light to illuminate the dark, wood-panelled walls, the gracious building is the home of the German Archaeological Institute of Athens. Built in 1897 according to designs commissioned by Heinrich Schliemann from the German architect, Ernst Ziller, to whom Athens owes some of its most beautiful, neo-classical edifices, the building once satin a vast garden which stretched all the way to Panepistimiou Street.
Driving along the autobahn from Stuttgart to Munich, I pass a heavily-laden truck making its way up a steep incline. Painted on its sides in bold white letters is the name of the firm, SARANTOS HELLAS, and in smaller letters the message, Umwelt-freundliche Reinigungs – und Pflegemittel. Waibiingen – which roughly translated means: ‘Cleaning materials friendly to the environment’. Waibiingen, its place of registration, is a small town near Stuttgart. The juxtaposition of the Greek name and the message in German brings to mind the subject of much discussion in recent years about Greeks in Germany.
The notes of the music he plays have never been transcribed but have survived since ancient times.
Long after the last concertgoers had left the Herod Atticus Theatre, a few lonely figures emerged from the vaulted arches and walked out into the chilly night. Zubin Mehta, the Los Angeles Philharmonic’s Indian-born conductor, trailed by some close associates, strode down the steps, disregarding a huge, gleaming, black limousine waiting at the foot of the steps, and crossing Dionysiou Areopaghitou, directed his steps towards Filopapos Hill.
