what's in an expression... (a little rant)

One of the reasons I started this blog was to give "foreigners" a few insights to what goes on "behind the scenes" so to speak, but also behind the facade of the Greek Psyche, or Soul...

And what better way to do this, other than through the examination of everyday expressions, sayings, even songs...

Just like any of the "big" languages of the world, Greek remains very much alive.. and kicking I might add. Kicking against the bastardisation of itself, be it through modern day use and abuse or even by government decree...

(I was intending to go into the subject of Greeklish here, but got waylaid..so here is a little rant for now)

Och Aderfe

This is an expression that means in straight translation "Oh brother". Now "brother" is sometimes used in Greek in the sense of "bro" a way of calling someone you may not know but want to be friendly. And oh? or rather Och, as it is pronounced in Greek? well that is a way of showing pain..or anguish in this case..at things that cannot be controlled , things we can't do anything about.

Och Aderfe has defined the Greeks for at least 30 years if not more.

It means "why bother?" There is nothing you can do, nothing you can change. There is no point in complaining aderfe about the things that do not work in the government, no point in complaining that your hard earned money will be taxed until there is nothing left, no point in complaining that even though you have been without a job for seven years we will tax the fact that you own a house, or a car, because we can...

Och aderfe no point in doing anytihng at all... just shut up and pay your taxes, or if you can avoid it, do so, because Och aderfe that is what the clever ones do...

There is even an  -ism of it.. Ochaderfismos... the very greek reaction of shrugging the shoulders to say "there is nothing we can do"  there is nothing we can change Och aderfe...we will always be Greek, even if being Greek has become a bit of an insult or something to be ashamed of... Let's just go and drink a frappe in the liston and let the others worry...

Och aderfe if oyu can't handle it go away..go away and become European, see if we care... Och aderfe we will always be in power here..for aderfe we have trained them well to be an Ochaderfist like us...

Here is another expression that  goes with "Och aderfe" another greek favorite... "Oti fame, oti pioume ki oti arpaxei o kolos mas..."

"Whatever we eat, whatever we drink and whatever we get up the ass... " now there's a defining sentence if there ever was one...

There I've had my little rant..

more soon on definitive Greek expressions.. and feel free to ask for explanations on some if you want. Just send a comment...

Words

I really need to get back into my writing...

Often ideas will come up and I ll be too far from some way of note taking, or driving, and ideas get forgotten.. One of my favorites (and quite possibly one which will guarantee a dearth of material and inspiration) is Greek words with very specific or peculiar meanings..

Words being the basis of communication, they often convey so much more than a simple meaning..

Words convey feelings and beliefs, they have histories, they often define the speaker, even in their abuse...

Take the greek word "Stratokavlos". Little known I am sure to my englsh speaking friends it means "he-who-gets-a-"hard on"-out-of-anything-army-related".

Reserved usually for the skinhead, nationalist type, it also defines many of those working for the Armed forces, Police etc. not all...

the Greek Stratokavlos reads magazines like "Defence news"  often sports a tatoo of the Greek flag or an ancient warrior, is pretty good at some form of hand combat, or likes to think he is, often goes hunting, and believes violence to be a solution to most problems...

Bit like Israel really...

I get to meet many Israelis. A lot of them have boats and sail our waters (obviously they are safer)
I don't like  what is happening in Gaza, and why not say it I don't like what the Israeli government is doing in Gaza and Palestine, but I cannot and will not fall into the trap of defining a "people" by the actions of its "nation" or government. Yes I do wonder if maybe the Israelis opposing their governments decisions and actions could do a bit more against it...but I get the sense that Israeli Ultra-nationalists have done a great job over the years of creating a strong following of Stratokavlous citizens... both men and women go thorugh National Service and no joke like here... they are seriously trained killing machines... and they believe what they are doing is right.

A lot of the Israelis I have met over the years have this air of "superiority" they truly believe they are "better" or seem to exude this...but then again so do many of the rich americans and ultra-capitalist and neo-liberal  twats I have met...

I am loathe to put a "tag" on a people.. There are some really nice Israelis just like there are nice Arabs and Jews, and Greeks, and Americans...and every other race under the sun...

Why do we say "race"? it implies thjat someone has to come first and that is not true...

There a lot of nice people out there... everywhere.. just like there are a lot of Stratokavloi and wankers..everywhere... even inside us...inside almost everyone there is an idiot-in-waiting... the enemy is within..

That's where the fight is...

We need to make ourselves our better. for our children's sake. for the sake of life....

to be cont'd

A night in your city...

I was walking. Holding my head up high and looking left and right. Tall, elderly buildings stood next to me and in front of me, immovable observers of an unusually hard, to my eyes, reality. I crossed an almost empty square, filled only with birds that moved aside for me to pass. In the distance a young father photographed his daughter, a crazy little fairy dancing with pigeons. A lunatic shooed imaginary flies away, completing the image. I crossed the street, just in case things looked better from the other side of the road. No such luck. I continued down your city's street and stood on a corner waiting for redemption. It came in the form of an angel with eyes red from crying. In his hands he held a soul removed. Bloody.

I was driving. I could feel the wind on my face trying to clean me. I helped him by opening up the throttle a little more. The roar of the engine momentarily filled the emptiness inside me. I found the way easily. Would I rather have got lost though? Deep inside your city. Parts of it scare me, but I prefer them to how scared I feel when I gaze into your empty eyes. Or the feeling I get when I watch your city's children begging in the kafeneia and pedestrian streets... You know I like your city. You can tell from the way I look when I wander round it. You don't know that I look like that, because of the feeling of your arms around me, the smell of your hair, the pressure of your body on mine at every sudden braking...

I was sitting. On the screen folders were flying from one side to the other, transporting pieces of life, of souls, of personal stories with good intentions. The blues embraced the beat of my heart and calmed it. Outside the night already covered your city with that feeling of eternal dawn I have only experienced here. I rolled another cigarette and remembered the way your eyes lit up the first time you saw me use the little roll-up machine that rolls them so straight and neat.. You wanted to try it too, and I took you through it, step by step, until your eyes lit up even more... Now, yet another thing, touched by your presence will acquire new meaning. I feel uncomfortable. Sort of like a penitent vampire. I see the colour emptying out of your life, drop by drop. Just as drop by drop it colours my life, my things, my hands, my mind, my heart...

I was sleeping. And in my dream I woke up. And I was in your nightmare. I was angry at myself because I wanted to wake you but I could not move. I could see your form under the sheet, reminding me of things I would rather forget. That's why I wanted you to wake up, to get up, to stop reminding me of these things. I thought of singing to you, but I'd forgotten the words. I thought to write you a note, but could not find a pen. I thought to e-mail you, but the computer would not start. I thought to turn the motorcycle on and rev high so you would wake up from the noise, but I could not find the keys. When I finally did, the lock was frozen and they would not go in. I remembered how loud your phone rang but all the telephones I found had lost their buttons. I opened my mouth to scream, but all that came out was an endless stream of featureless black birds.. I could not breathe...

I was awake. The house was quiet. I could feel that a few hundred meters away you were still asleep. I hoped your morning's sleep was better than my night's. I stepped out onto the balcony and allowed the sun to warm me, because I felt quite cold. I took two gulps of hot black coffee to wake me up. I stood at the railings looking down. I took a deep breath of your city so that I would remember it... in vain...In a few days I would be gone and that breath would have been displaced by thousands of others. I went for a wash, and discovered a wrinkle. I dedicated it silently to you and got ready for my departure. Your city may rob me of your scent, but to make up it wraps its tentacles around me and pulls me like a rubber band. I think she kinda likes the idea of adding yet another victim to the others, especially with such a great excuse.

Your city wants me here. Wandering through her streets, lost in endless concentric circles, lost in a labyrinth with a thousand foreign Minotaurs chasing my shadow. Looking for your house, aided by a book of maps with one page missing. Your page. Lighting the way are neon signs that go off just as I try to make out the name of the road I didn't take. Following buses in the hope they stop outside your house. Asking drivers for information while they stare at me silently. Passing in front of shop windows and seeing my reflection, wondering if I know me. A witness to its everyday bittersweet madness. Trying to leave.

Goodnight.

Nekkid...

During the 4 (and now almost 6) years I have been blogging, I have written about a variety of subjects, some of them serious and others of the "lighter" variety... (I shall let my readers be the judges of which is which...)

Recently a "new" reader of mine (and a rather good looking one as well...) commented on how she likes the way I sometimes "bare" my thoughts, reveal my sensitivities, don't hide behind some silent or cynical mask, some funny or hard shell...

What you see is what you get.

The last few months a piece of song is often playing in my head... "O Gatos" (The cat) by Vasiilis Papakonstantinou.

"oh no my good people, I am no tomcat,
I am only a human full of feelings..."

That's the way it is...I am a human full of feelings.

(to be honest, the song is one that, like so often happens, I had misheard the lyrics-or remembered them wrongly-so instead of feelings I thought it said "errors". It would suit me to go with "feelings" as I would not need to admit to "errors"...haha.. but that is how I thought it went... so let's strike a balance and say I am full of feelings and errors...

(a translator's comment...the above does not "translate" very well, but I hope you "get" it...)

I like to be open about such things. I believe that our feelings and our errors make us what we are. And that, in our journey through life, when we choose to develop relationships, whatever kind they may be, it is always better to be ourselves. Naked, without "makeup", without masks...I have been known to overdo it sometimes...

This is the self we require the others to love. And not some other self, some fake created in order to satisfy vanities and desires, be they our own or the other's...

I am now 45 (now almost 47). A couple of years ago I met an old friend and she rather openly (and in a very German way) told me she always thought of me, saw me as a child. And she still does now...

I didn't know if I should be happy or sad about this. Deep down I was happy, but maybe also a little worried..about when I will finally grow up.

This past summer (2012) I went for a midnight skinny dip on a moonlit night. For the first time after a loooong time... As I plunged into the water again and again, the moon lighting up my bare bottom ostentatiously, I felt really free. Swimming in the dark sea, without fear, diving, at home... ( I would so much like to say "my tight little bottom" but that era is long gone...)

Although I I try to be open and honest, naked, I know that I carry "baggage" from my life up to now. We all do.

Hangups, neuroses, fears, prejudices... buttoned up and hidden behind suits of armour and masks we try to move through life. We try to set up relationships, we need them, be they social, love, or friendship.

How though, when we make it so hard for others to know us?

 "I am looking for friends" said the Little Prince. What does that mean--'tame'?"

"It is an act too often neglected," said the fox. It means to establish ties."

"'To establish ties'?"

"Just that," said the fox. "To me, you are still nothing more than a little boy who is just like a hundred thousand other little boys. 

me, when my age was less than the years that have passed since then...

And I have no need of you. And you, on your part, have no need of me. To you, I am nothing more than a fox like a hundred thousand other foxes. But if you tame me, then we shall need each other. To me, you will be unique in all the world. To you, I shall be unique in all the world . . ."
"Please--tame me!" he said.

"I want to, very much," the little prince replied. "But I have not much time. I have friends to discover, and a great many things to understand."

"One only understands the things that one tames," said the fox. "Men have no more time to understand anything. They buy things all ready made at the shops. But there is no shop anywhere where one can buy friendship, and so men have no friends any more. If you want a friend, tame me . . ."  ♥

(Antoine de Saint-Exupéry)

I love. I care. I sometimes choke on feelings of injustice. I sometimes feel helpless to change much. I often get tired of how obsessively people tend to disregard where others are "coming from"...
Every person we meet has walked a path in life which has led him or her to where they are now. We cannot understand them unless we know that path. If we cannot find the way or the time to find out, let us not judge at least... Let's just love them for whatever good they brought to our lives...even if not obvious...

I want to write that we have more to "gain" from standing "naked" opposite others, but I am making a conscious effort to avoid this vocabulary which has invaded all facets of our lives, and reduced everything in life to profit, loss, debt and credit...I am tired of it...we have allowed it too much room...

Standing then "nekkid" opposite others, we allow them to see us for what we are...

Tomorrow's friend, mate or lover, fellow human, fellow "naked" person...

Back in the times I used to pose for gay magazines...(and yes, I 'm joking)

Originally posted in Greek on the 12th of September 2012

The woman in me

I know this may sound unbelievably gay (on my straight "arhidia" as I would say in Greece) but as a youngster in high school, I often used to watch the other boys feeling up the girls as they made their way into class and wondered... a) what were the bums thinking about, and b) why did the girls put up with it...

I always believed women to be worthy of respect and correct polite behavior, something no doubt to do with how I was brought up... yet the fact that this made it extremely difficult for me to acquire a girlfriend, never rang enough bells or turned me into the cynical misogynist that some of my mates turned into ...

I spent a fair part of my teens battling with the label of "gay", a label that many "well-meaning" macho men and future speed-freaks and petty criminals took upon themselves to lumber me with. Their assumption was probably based on the fact I had friends I held conversations with, rather than spend my time doing wheelies and talking about women and sex in a demeaning way while leering after every female that passed... Then again it may also have had something to do with my  hairstyles (I had highlights and braids at some point during the eighties...) or a tendency to wear scarves with tresses and various bracelets (I went through a hippy phase too) It was the Eighties for god's sake!! (although I wanted it to be the sixties...) Anyway it never bothered me too much as I knew which way my preferences went...

The next ordeal I had to go through was the army. You don't get a choice of who you are stationed with There I had to go through listening to men talk about women again in a derogatory way. A classic joke about this kind of man, is that every woman is a whore except for his mother and sister...I got through this without changing my attitude, although there were times when I had to grunt an implied approval in order to conform with the norm and not make myself a target... thus feeling like my namesake saint, who denied all contact and knowledge before the rooster crowed... (Matthew 26:34)

I'll risk another wrong impression and state, that I often felt in touch with the woman in me.
I do believe that in every person there is a little of both elements, the male and the female, if anything it helps explain some of the things we see around us!

What does this mean practically though?

It means I like to cook, and also to take care of people, my friends, my children.

It means I don't see sex as a god given right of mine, but as a higher expression of love and affection.
It means I am an incurable romantic.
It also means I have no hope of becoming a speed freak (the Greek word is Kangouras, meaning the guys in souped up vehicles roaring about all over the place, in utter disregard for rules and regulations of even basic polite behavior). I will also very rarely watch a game of football (unless it is with the right company..they know who they are...)
I won't hunt, I don't like guns, I often cry through sad scenes in films, and I have never lit a fart.. (and never will)
It meant that I would hold a baby in my arms at 12 and think "One day I will become a father and hold a baby of my own"
It meant that when I finally did at 25, I would often bottle-feed her and change her nappies happily, bonding as early as possible...

It means I feel totally comfortable to ask a woman if she breastfeeds, without fearing misunderstanding, and even being able to offer advice which I learned from my wife.

I like to believe that the contact with my "female" side makes me a better Man, but I won't go too far with talking about myself, maybe the women in my life should comment.

I love women. there is nothing like the arms of a woman to take all your troubles away, nothing like the love of a woman to cure every wound (and nothing like her whinging, but I'll leave that for another post...)
Nothing like the way a woman blooms and becomes beautiful when about to become a mother...

Muddy Waters said it all when he said:

"A big black mama is gonna carry me to my grave..."




John Lennon once said: "Woman is the nigger of the world"...he wasn't far from wrong.




 Tom Robbins says that once upon a time, thousands of years ago, women ruled the world. Then men took the power and things went to hell..

I know what you are going to say.... Margaret Thatcher, Imelda Marcos and others.. Well, allow me to say they were overly in touch with the man in them...

This post went up (in greek) on the 24th of April 2012, almost 2 years ago. Someone, a reader of mine commented that he felt exactly the same way, and also offered another little tom Robbins gem. He said "I would like aliens to come to earth and take away all the balls. Footballs, basket ball, rugby balls...to see if men would maybe evolve into a higher species". My friends comment was the beginning of a strong friendship. His is an amazingly analytic mind, with a wonderful way of thinking, which I admire greatly!


As I translated my post in order to put it in my English speaking blog, I confess to not feeling as "comfortable" with it as I did initially. To my now "two-years-older" eyes it seems a little naive. Yet it was very heartfelt and honest when originally written. I haven't changed my mind, no, but certainly my view has changed.

I have been reading a lot, I am experiencing new things, a new relationship, a new view on past relationships... also Therapy.

Increasingly I understand that we as people, as personalities, are defined by our relationships. It is almost as if without them we could not exist. How could we be defined if not within the loose boundaries set up by the interaction and view of others? And look at how people who avoid proximity with others are often troubled..

What is colour? Only the wavelengths of light reflected by certain materials as viewed by our eyes. And so it is with us. We are the "colour" that  is reflected to others through our relationships.

Just a few thoughts...

Right now I'm feeling kind of flowery and bright on the inside... I must be in love... (smile)

Have a good morning all!

Amola Kaloumba!

When I was young, Clean Monday meant three things to me. First a possibility that I would go hungry, or at best make do with a piece of "lagana" (the traditional flatbread with sesame baked specifically for the day...) and a piece of cheese that my mother would hide from Grandma (it was Lent and thus sinful to eat cheese...).
Second that we might get to have our first  swim, and third, the flying of our kite!!

The first was due to the fact that I was a rather "difficult" child as regards food and practically all the "nistissima"" (food allowed to eat when fasting for Lent) was definitely in the weird food zone to my eyes..shellfish, octopus, kalamari, taramas..there was something distinctly fishy about it all... no,no,no...
The swimming, what can I say, other times? Where we children and ready for everything? I dare say the swimming season then was like the tourist season...longer and it started earlier....

And I come to the third...the kite!


My father made his own. It was an art he learnt as a kid in Piraeus. He was a carpenter by trade, so very much comfortable with the wood, measuring and glueing required.

About a month before Clean Monday, he would organise his supplies from Piraeus. He used a kind of waxed paper, not unlike baking paper or the stuff used to wrap up cheese. It came in a a few basic colours, and could not be sourced on the island. Thin pieces of wood, glue, some special "decorative" papers, in silver and gold, kilometres of string and scissors completed the kit, and he was ready to start work.

The "tail" alone would sometimes take days, every little tuft of paper carefully cut to the same length, often many colours bunched together and all spaced out evenly. Where the bridle connected to the edges, he would add more tufts of coloured paper,  to make for better balance.

Ready for take off..

Every year he made a different one. He never made the same one twice, and he never kept one for next year. He would either take it apart and recycle the frame, or once it was high enough, he would cut the string and set it "free".

One year the plan was to get it as high as possible. Armed with 2000 meters of string, we proceeded to Kassiopi, our favorite kite-flying and picnic spot. Reel by reel, we joined the string, until the kite was so high we almost could not see it. A piece of string that went up to the sky, on its own, and we in turns, held on to it, happy and laughing. To my eyes the kite was flying somewhere over Albania, amongst the birds and clouds...

Another year he made a different one, a "Smyrna" kite as he called it.  It had a very different shape, and it also was a bit more "technical" to fly. The frame was made of bent bamboo strips. I think he had always wanted one, since he was a child, and he finally made one. His mother, my grandma, was a refugee from the Asia minor catastrophe in 1922.

The "smyrna" kite

Another "thing" about the kites was the matter of "size" (men...) Obviously he wanted to make them bigger and bigger, but there was a limit. The size of our car. Or rather cars! My father had a car rental business at the time, so we had a choice... So one year he decided to make a really big one and use the company minibus. If my memory serves me well, that years design was a Sun. Golden rays, a bright smile, yellow and orange... but it was too big!! So he had to opt for putting it on the roofrack...

Getting near to Kassiopi, my mother was looking out the passenger window at the shadow of the car as it sped on its way. There was something wrong. Shadows were dancing on the roof... "Yianni, I think you had better stop, something is not right..."

He pulled over and got out, took a look at the kite, and got back into the car, without speaking. The mood was not good. He stopped at a local "bakaliko" (grocery store) and asked to buy some of the brown greaseproof wrapping paper they used for the feta... We then proceeded to the port of Kassiopi where he set down to fix it. He gathered the left over strips of paper, cut some patches, glued them up. The kite, even patched up, flew as high as ever. As well as ever.  

a typical Papageorgiou kite

Moments from Clean Mondays past...

my little sister, looking incredibly like her son with long hair and a skirt on!

The picnic

My cousin Vassilis

Grandma next to her son, and my mum and sister behind

In the first photo at the top, and the previous four, did you notice something they have in common?

There is something that "ties" them all together...

It is a piece of string.

This piece of string is something we all need to take care of. This piece of string may be something different to each of us, that doesn't matter. What is important is that it should be recognised for what it is. A connection to our past, a connection between us, a continuation, a feeling of consistency.

In the difficult times we are going through, it will be bits of string like this that will keep us connected, tied together, remembering our past so that we may have a future, and so that we may look upon this future in the same may that Yiannis the kite maker looks up at his kite in the next picture...



Attentively, with hope and with joy in his heart

Looking at the future

PS I was intending to "tie in" the story of the kite that was damaged but was repaired and flew, with the ending, but it eluded me...  so Ι will add the lesson as a postscript. Against all odds, against all the problems and setbacks, we CAN make this world, this life, "fly"...
The world and our lives are changing. The change is our very own kite. And as much as some people are intent on tearing it up into little pieces, we have to use our brains and ingenuity, to patch it up and get it off the ground...

And a little note on the title. Amola kaloumba, is a greek kite flying expression which means let more string out...

PS2 (some years later...) I tried for many years to recreate something of these memories with my family. It somehow eluded me. I tried to make my own kites, they either weren't ready in time or the weather was bad or both.. then as I now have an extended and flexible family, sometimes there was someone missing, others there was family drama and woes.. and lots of rain!! Finally this year, as we set off in not so auspicious weather conditions, we ended up with success!

Yianni, now the granddad, made kites for his grandsons. I managed to fly a lovely kite I bought a couple of years ago in Paxos, and Christofer had his first kite flying experience. Better late than never. There is something distinctly pleasurable in making these simple contraptions of sticks, paper, glue and string take to the skies... For as long as it lasts the soul flies with them too..and the years melt off a little...

granddad with grandsons

one of his kites. they flew higher!!

first time flier

my kite, what?!!

boats can fly!!

into the clouds...

Προσθήκη λεζάντας

the other Yianni kite!

Happpines is holding a piece of string that goes up!

Here's to lots of happy kite flying days...

A 3 letter dirty word...

Greece is gearing up for Euro-parliament, and local government elections, elections which of course everyone sees as a trial run for potential national elections, which may or may not radically change the political scene in Greece.

The governments main opponent is Syriza, the left wing coalition. But some could say that its real main opponent is itself.

The current government is formed by a coalition of the two parties that have been in power during the last 41 years. New democracy and Pasok. The "socialist" Pasok party is now virtually non-existent. But it holds marginally enough seats in Parliament, to keep the coalition government in power for now.

As everyone knows Greece has been "officially" in the throes of  crisis since 2008 (I say officially because in my opinion it has always been in crisis...) But the last few years it has also been controlled or supposed to be controlled by the infamous Troika, a team of European politicians and advisors, intent on passing reforms to make the country's finances viable...

Proedre, the Troika are warning we are a breath away from going bankrupt... -  And what do they propose we do? "Put a tax on breathing..."

Every time we come up to any form of elections the government (whichever it was) tries to do things to make itself look good. It used to be done mostly in the way of "rousfeti" a word which really does say a lot for the potential origins of Greece's woes... You see it comes from the Turkish word "rusvet" which means bribe.
For years pre-election promises consisted mainly of bribes in the form of posts to government jobs, seen as better than winning the lottery in Greece. Government jobs were secure (it was against the law to be fired, no matter how useless you were) and well paid. Very well paid...

As the crisis and the Troika moved in Greece's body of politicians, who I can tell you with absolute certainty are all corrupt, had to find other ways to bribe their voters and backers, but also other ways to line their pockets...

And here is where that 3-letter dirty word from the title comes in... NGO or MKO as it is in Greek.

MKO greek acronym Business Well Organized...

Here is the definition of an NGO in wikipedia.

MKOs as they are known in Greece, have been in the Greek news of late, on a daily basis. Because all of a sudden scandals are been uncovered regarding their funding and operation.

Of course a lot of people are pleased that this is happening, after all it has been our hard earned and thorough the nose taxation that has been paying their expenses just like with our politicians..

The negative side to it is that it is only happening because as we come up to elections they have to somehow make themselves look good.

But we shouldn't look a gift horse in the mouth, should we?

The first scandal to erupt recently was with the "International Centre for the removal of landmines" an organisation formed in 2000 to supposedly remove landmines from various part of the world. To do this work, they were given 9.000.000 euros over the course of 4 years, (2000-2004). I won't go into all the details but part of the scandal is that according to the law, they were supposed to self-fund at least a small percentage of their expenses, yet they had found ways around this too!!

As I write this I am doing a bit of research at the same time. I am no researcher or journalist, as most of you may know... I just like to write and express some thoughts, but this blog, my "English-speaking" one has the extra "target" of allowing English-speaking friends and blog followers the opportunity to gain a insight into happenings in Greece through the eyes and words of a local greek citizen... me!

And the feeling I am getting from this "research" is very much the same as I got when researching the situation regarding the incredible "selection" of public servant "extra benefits" thought up in order to make sure that "their boys" were paid the absolute maximum possible...

Here is that article... 

Here are a few of the NGOs which were created and funded in Greece, with the full backing of our politicians, from the lowliest MP to the Primeministers...

Organisation for the reforestation of the Amazon!
Organisation for the education of statisticians in ex eastern bloc countries
Organisation for the training of constitutional lawyers for Cuba!

Supposedly the above were funded with about 2 million euros...

Another NGO scandal that erupted a couple of years ago was with the "Circle of Patmos" an NGO based on the island of Patmos with supposed interest of promoting religious matters and helping people round the world. They organised telemarathons and symposiums on cruise-ships around the world. All the symposiums (in the Nile and  Amazon, among other places) were funded by the Greek Government. In some cases due to political strife in the countries involved (Azerbaijan,  Egypt) the symposiums were cancelled but the funding was not returned!!

But what does all this mean and where is it all going?

Most Greeks today are not only seriously disillusioned and wondering when the "levee" will "break", but they are also finding it increasingly difficult to play along with the "game"

A few days ago someone I know, an Englishman, mentioned the ongoing scandals and referred to to the "expenses" scandal that tore through the British parliament in 2009. His idea was that just like many lists of corrupt politicians are made public, so there should also be lists of the non-corrupt... and he proposed that something similar be done here too...

What he and I fear many well meaning and good people don't understand is that a list of non-corrupt politicians is the quintessential rocking horse shit... non-existent.

There is no such thing as a non-corrupt politician in Greece. And I dare say there are very few all over the world.

Douglas Adams once wrote this:

“The major problem—one of the major problems, for there are several—one of the many major problems with governing people is that of whom you get to do it; or rather of who manages to get people to let them do it to them. 
To summarize: it is a well-known fact that those people who must want to rule people are, ipso facto, those least suited to do it. 
To summarize the summary: anyone who is capable of getting themselves made President should on no account be allowed to do the job.” 

and that pretty much covers that, for me...