Athens interlude

I spent the latter part of October and most of November in Athens. The weather was glorious. And the rocky, dry, austere landscapes of Greece have always appealed to me. But economic pressures are obviously taking their toll and the country appears to be locked into a downward spiral.

Just down the street from where I was staying is Athens railway station (also known as Larissa Station). The station has seen better days. In the past it was integrated into the European rail network and hosted the Orient Express and an express to Berlin. No more. Today there are no international links. You can get a train to Thessaloniki – if you’re lucky. When I tried to book, there was a notification that part of the line was out of action.

Athens road traffic is heavy and not easy to deal with as a pedestrian. There are many parks, however, including Pedion tou Areos with its oleanders and jacarandas and extensive network of paths and walkways.

There is a quaint little park by Larissa Station but this area (like many areas of the city) is impoverished and run down. Next to the park – as if mimicking the ancient ruins which characterize this part of the world – is a derelict basketball court, two hoops lying on the ground with their support structures uprooted. And overlooking the abandoned court is a residential building with its ground floor a boarded-up and apparently fire-damaged retail space. So many buildings hereabouts (hotels, residential, commercial) are standing idle, abandoned and boarded-up or half-demolished.

Many of the people I encountered seemed stressed, unhappy and not well disposed to tourists. I would go so far as to say that there is resentment towards tourists on the part of a sizable proportion of the general population. Such sentiments spill over into politics. I saw some graffiti touching on this theme (“neighbours not toyrists” [sic]).

I won’t go into the political situation except to note that Greece has a long and strong tradition of radical thought and action. Police – with armoured vehicles and riot shields – were out in force on at least two occasions while I was there to deal with student demonstrations. Trade unions were also involved in the demonstrations.

There is widespread poverty and borderline living. Many beggars, some of them elderly; and people selling bags of vegetables etc. on the streets. In the area in which I was staying, there are dozens of depressing “mini-marts” selling the same limited range of groceries and halal products, businesses run for the most part – and patronized by – Muslim immigrants. Service with a scowl seemed to be their preferred approach – though they may, for all I know, have been very pleasant to their regular clientele.

While in Athens I needed to replace my sneakers and bought a new pair from a cluttered local shop-cum-warehouse run by a Chinese couple who import shoes and jackets from the People’s Republic. The mini-marts accept credit and debit cards, but this Chinese entrepreneur only took cash. The shoes I chose were marked €23.

“For you, 20 euro,” he said. A real businessman this one!

One of my high school teachers (his name was Lionel Lobstein) was said to speak six European languages, all with the same accent. He taught us social studies (geography and history) and later joined the Italian department at the local university. He was full of praise for Greek culture. They had their priorities right, he told us, valuing social intercourse and conversation over mundane chores, etc.. He routinely spent his annual holidays in Greece, sipping coffee and chatting in shaded courtyards (or so the story went). Later I latched on to the poems and novels of Lawrence Durrell, a British expatriate who was deeply immersed in the Mediterranean world.

Even allowing for nostalgic and literary distortions, I have the strong sense of a culture which – exposed to various external forces and (perhaps) internal contradictions – has sadly lost its way.