1991 – The Year of the Tightrope
On the eve of a new year, some people sing, others drink; some feast and others dance. Greeks, whose passion for all the pleasures of life is proverbial, do these things – and more.
Our Town
A Spirit of Place
Surely Lawrence Durrell stood in celebration of life. He said that he learned this wisdom in Greece, but he was always a leg-puller and one can’t quite be sure.
Walking Out
When Prime Minister Mitsotakis left in mid-September on his ill-fated trip to Japan to support Athens’ bid for the 1996 Olympics, he appealed for a few days’ truce since the political scene was heating up over the austere social security bill.
The Retsinagones and the Coca-Colympics, or Martin Luther King, Jr, Zei
At midday on September 18, a warm clear late summer day, crowds of young people carrying flags had gathered in Syntagma and Omonia Squares. In Piraeus, ships were deck out with pennants.
The 1996 Olympics: the Bid and the Challenge
With only a few weeks to go until the final decision as to who will host the 1996 ‘Golden Olympics’, Greece is resorting to a number of political and public relations moves in an attempt to convince the International Olympic Committee (IOC) that it is best suited to stage the Games.
In Search of an Apprentice
In order to get a proper perspective on anything happening in Greece today, it is best to start several thousand years back.
Athens: The Human Resource
Like city people everywhere, Athenians go through periods when they revel in self-criticism. They like to think they have the most polluted atmosphere, the noisiest streets, the most congested traffic jams, the fewest green areas, and the greatest concentrations of concrete.
Time, Hard Work and Sacrifices
Some men are born great; some have greatness thrust upon them. Others are great because they are the only ones around who are capable of picking up the pieces.
The Unbearable Lightness of Being Greek
Now that the political posters have been pulled down and the fliers swept up and the plastic flags furled and put away for the third time in a year, maybe it is time to take stock.
“Unpredictable, Ungovernable and Irrelevant”
When the US ambassador to Greece delivered a letter to Defense Minister Tzannetakis from his American counterpart Dick Cheney advising that the Ellinikon and Nea Makri military bases would soon be dismantled, the extraordinary thing about this casual exchange is that it passed almost unnoticed.
