POISED AT THE STARTING LINE

photoshop double whammy

2008-10-30T22:20:00.006+02:00

Exercise 3. Realistic golf ball scene. Created entirely using custom brushes. Very time consuming and tedious. I'd rather paint!

Exercise 4. Photo collage using masks, selection tools and channels. A public service announcement to draw people's attention to the fact that it's tough being a senior in Athens, and we should all be nicer to them. Even when they push, shove and complain on the bus proi proi.

progressive.brain.research

2008-09-30T23:34:00.003+03:00

Here's my next assignment. These are all for an advanced photoshop class, by the way (thank god they let me skip basic!). The concept was to do a 'euro collage' - one of those high tech futuristic ads with grids and glowy bits that are popular in the corporate world these days. Soooo my thing, right? Anyway, I guess it turned out OK.

Next up, a photorealistic illustration (using custom brushes) of a golf ball in grass. Given that I've hardly ever used brushes in photoshop, this might take a while! And seriously, golf???

New Directions

2008-09-30T00:27:00.006+03:00

Hi everyone!

It seems I still have some readers out in blogger land, despite my long (regretful) absence. Thank you all for your e-mails - it's nice to know you're appreciated!

In answer to your questions as to the future of this blog, I can't say at this time. Currently, I just don't have as much time/energy to dedicate to this blog as I used to. As so often happens, life got in the way! Life in the form of three new directions:

First, I started a new job just over a year ago, one that involves staring at small type all day so writing is the last thing I want to do when I get home (my eyes! my burning eyes!). The job, incidentally, is going fairly well. It's a bit repetitive, but low stress and definitely an improvement over the last one!

Second, I got married this past August, so much of the past year was taken up by wedding preparations (despite the casual beach party nature of the event) and extra freelance work to fund the whole thing (we politely but firmly rejected our parents' offers for help, wanting to maintain control. Ha ha! How naive we were!)

Third, I've resumed my studies, picking up on a field that I almost embarked on years ago before being swept up in film: graphic design. I've also decided to double that with web design to expand my options. It's an online course (as the going rate for courses in Athens is roughly 15,000 for the three years!) but seems to be a good one.

So, since I'm not planning to write anything here for the time being, and as all my energies are going into this course, I thought at the very least I'd share with you all the projects I'm working on. Here is the first:

The assignment was to make an ad for an ipod-like gadget inspired by the silhouettes used in the Mac campaign, but with a retro background. Everything in the ad was made from scratch. Cheesy logo not mine!

As for the future... well, who knows what it holds? I'm still hoping to move to Lesvos, which is the whole reason I'm doing this course - there seems to be a need for graphic/web designers in the market there. Till then... be well! My husband (still sounds funny saying that), my cat (now large and fattish) and I (tired but overall happy) will certainly do our best to stay that way.

Not a Merry Christmas for Tatiana

2007-12-26T23:02:00.001+02:00

Locked in a cage, Tatiana tries to escape, killing one and injuring two in the process, and is shot dead. Sad that someone had to die, but if she hadn't been locked up in there for the amusement of humans it wouldn't have happened.

And why did they have to kill her? Were there no tranquilizer guns handy? At a zoo?

The story so far.

AHMET

2007-08-30T19:17:00.000+03:00

On my way home today, a skinny little man got on the bus and, with a small bow-like gesture, asked if he could sit beside me. I responded that indeed he could, and so he sat and gave me a shy smile, and I smiled back, and etsi started a conversation. It wasn't a terribly singular conversation, but it made an impression on me. So this, to the best of my memory (and slightly condensed), is how it went:

AHMET: Where are you from?
ME: Canada.
AHMET: Ah! Toronto!?
ME: No, Montreal.
AHMET: Ah, Montreal. I have a friend in Canada. But I thought that you were from France.
ME: Really, France? Why?
AHMET: (Shrugs and gestures - at my attire, I suppose.)
ME: So, where are you from?
AHMET: Pakistan.
ME: And how long have you been in Greece?
AHMET: Two years.
ME: And before that?
AHMET: Oh, many places... many places... Always moving nowadays, you know? People are always moving, here, there. How many days are you here for?
ME: I live here. Four years now.
AHMET: (Total shock and incredulity registering on his face.) Why??
ME: Well, my father is Greek.
AHMET: And your mother?
ME: Russian and Polish. (This seems to sit better with him.)
AHMET: And your name?
ME: Ranya. You?
AHMET: Different name, Ranya. Hello, I'm Ahmet. (We shake hands.)
ME: So, do you like it here?
AHMET: No. It's very bad country. Not friendly to foreigners at all...
ME: That's true...
AHMET: You like it?
ME: Well, it's got its good things and its bad things, you know? Like anywhere.
AHMET: Yes... good and bad... Job good?
ME: No, not really. I want to go to the islands, to a village. I think it'll be much nicer there, close to nature.
AHMET: Yes, probably much better... Funny to hear different opinion about Greece! I like to hear that... Interesting.
ME: What about you? Have you found a job here?
AHMET: No. Two years I'm looking now and I haven't found anything. Very bad for jobs here. I'm small man, you know? So it's hard for me to find...
ME: Yes, I imagine it's much more difficult for you here than for me...
AHMET: Yes, very difficult. Government very corrupt, police very bad. Worst country in Europe. And now they let these people die in fires... very bad, very bad.
ME: Yes. It's horrible... So, you want to leave, then?
AHMET: Yes, I want to go to Spain. I have friend there. And little sister in Holland. No problems.
ME: And your parents are still in Pakistan?
AHMET: Yes, and my other sister. Studying medical in Islamabad. In two years she'll be doctor. Very good for me, very good for my family.
ME: You must miss Pakistan. Do you ever think of going back?
AHMET: Yes, of course. But very bad country, too. Government changing every two years, very corrupt. And no jobs. But maybe, if god is kind and I make money in Spain, I can go back.
ME: What do you want to do in Spain?
AHMET: Open business, if god is kind. You know, like McDonalds?
ME: A fast food restaurant?
AHMET: Yes.
ME: Well good luck with that!

Ahmet seemed to find this very funny (I guess relying on luck for something, instead of god's kindness?) but alas it was my stop so I bid him farewell and went to get off. As I did, though, he called out, still smiling like it was a really good joke, "Good luck to you too!" And so we parted.

I wasn't going to editorialise, but allow me just one comment, please. Perhaps even more interesting than the conversation were the reactions of the Greeks and other immigrants on the bus:
The 20-something Greek cool guy, studied nonchalance, eyes continuously averted and headphones in, but he managed to make his way over to near where we were sitting, and kept leaning in to hear better.
The 50-something Greek man, openly staring, completely flabbergasted.
The 70-something Greek woman, openly distasteful, many shakes of the head and mouth turned down in distaste.
The 40-something Filipino woman, openly hostile, seemingly directed (from the angle of her glare) at Ahmed. Perhaps he was breaking some unwritten social rule by talking to me, a non-immigrant?
The 30-something African dude, completely impassive. In fact, he seemed to be the only person on the bus not at all phased by our talk.

And those were only the people within my line of sight.

And isn't it sad that just a simple, everyday conversation engendered such a strong reaction?

And also, it just occurred to me, why are people from less developed countries called 'immigrants', while we from the West are called 'expats'? Are we not immigrants, too?

FIRES

2007-08-26T23:46:00.000+03:00

What a sad reason to return to the blogging world, but I really feel the need to join Ellas devil and others in expressing how at a loss for words I am regarding the fires.

Or maybe I do have a word: enraged.

At whom is this rage directed? Politicians? Arsonists? I can't say. It's just kind of a blanket rage, I guess, the rage one feels when one sees something one loves being destroyed, and can do nothing to stop it.

So there's another word: impotence.

It's awful sitting here, watching the news in spurts for as long as I can take it, in a mournful, funereal silence, and not being able to DO anything. Anything to help. Anything to punish those responsible, either by their actions or by their lack thereof.

With elections looming ahead, I am left with no one to vote for. There is no lesser of two evils here - both are equally bad. Not even, anymore, a small party I can trust and rely on to not make me cringe when they state their opposition. So politically, too, I am impotent.

And what of the victims of the fires? Those who have lost their livelihoods, homes and loved ones? Is no aid being organised for them? Will there be no international relief funds set up, as there have been for numerous others the world over who have experienced tragedy of late? Karamanlis has promised those affected 13,000 euros compensation. It's almost better to offer nothing at all, no? The amount is just insulting when your home, your crops, your family is gone. And on the other hand he's got a spare million lying around for those who provide information leading to the arrest of arsonists. What should our priorities be, really? Does the need for revenge, to make someone pay, surpass the needs of the victims? Here, too, I am impotent, unable to offer any comfort, help or words of support to those whose lives have been ruined.

I can't help thinking, too, of the irony of the blood tax, a term fittingly coined by teacher dude, that these fires will no doubt serve to pay.

Most of all, however, watching the ashes fall, I feel sad and devastated at the senseless loss of our beautiful land and forests, which neither we nor our grandchildren will see restored in our lifetimes, if ever. The rains are coming next week, or so they say, and while they may aid in quenching the thirst of the fires, they will also wash away the detritus left by them - nutrient rich ashes which, if allowed to soak into the soil undisturbed, would render it fertile again. If they are washed away, the land will become completely and permanently barren.

We can only hope for the best, hope without reason that the government will manage to pull itself together in the wake of the blazes and take measures to minimize the damage, start reforestation, and most of all do whatever it can to stop the land from being developed. Sadly, I fear that none of these things will come to pass, and that the half of Greece which has been burnt will be lost to us forever.

In the face of that possibility, I am truly left speechless.

UPDATE: The Hellenic Red Cross is accepting cash donations for the purchase of essential items for those in need. These can be deposited at the following bank:

Bank of Attica
23 Omirou Str, Athens – Greece, under the indication ‘Fires in Greece'
Bank account: 069/84298361
IBAN: GR54 0160 0690 0000 0008 4298 361
Swift Code: ATTIGRAA XXX

For details, visit www.redcross.gr/files/preliminary_emergency_appeal.pdf

Thanks to buruburu for the link.

HOW TO TRAIN YOUR BOYFRIEND TO LET THE CAT ON THE BED

2007-06-13T13:31:00.001+03:00

uuurgh!,
originally uploaded by kassandrapoised.

Having a boyfriend can be a great thing. They’re cute, cuddly and entertaining, and offer companionship for many years. They are even know to reduce stress! Many people own boyfriends, and mostly the experience is a rewarding and pleasurable one. However, every now and then boyfriends can exhibit undesirable behaviour which they must be trained to suppress. Unfortunately, unlike cats, training boyfriends can be a bit tricky.

For example, imagine the following situation. A new cat enters your life and moves in with you. Your boyfriend, though normally an easy going and open minded dude, and though not overall averse to having a new playmate, may nonetheless become exceedingly territorial about one particular area, an area which was previously uniquely his domain: the bed.

The reasons for this reactionary behaviour are unclear. Perhaps it is simply a matter of instigating boundaries and maintaining control? Perhaps it is the thought of urine and faeces being tracked directly from litter box to bed? Perhaps it is indeed, as he claims, a matter of not being able to sleep for fear of turning and squishing said cat?

Whatever the root of the problem, finding a solution can be difficult. When all attempts to reason with boyfriend have failed, when boyfriend flat out refuses to sample – just for one night – how pleasurable it is to have a cat snuggled up in the crook of your knee or arm, purring away, when boyfriend turns up nose at all proffered treats and bribes, it’s easy to get frustrated and not know what to do.

But there is a solution out there! Our new, scientifically proven training method has been specially designed to make stubborn, recalcitrant boyfriends come round to your way of thinking. Now you, too, can alter your boyfriend’s troublesome behaviour – and all for the low low price of $29.99! Call today to learn more, and you'll soon be sleeping well at night with your boyfriend to one side… and your cat to the other.

END ADVERTISEMENT

Please, if anyone knows where I can get this product, or how exactly it works, could you let me know? Thanks,
R.

UPDATE: Six months later and I'm happy to report that not only does Ziggy enjoy the comfort of our bed nightly, but the boyfriend has fallen deeply deeply in love with him, slathering him with love and attention and care, playing with him for hours upon hours, feeding him gourmet cat food and petting him and greeting him the second he walks in the door and... and... in general spoiling him rotten. Hmmm. I think I might be a bit jealous... Hazo baba!

Ladies and Gentlemen, meet... ???

2007-06-12T11:39:00.001+03:00

So this is my new baby, everyone. Isn't he adorable? We have not decided on a name, yet... are torn between "Ziggy" and "Samba" (short for Sambucca) and can't decide because "Ziggy" is cooler, but harder to say, and "Samba" in Greek (so says my boyfriend anyway) sounds like a girl's name. So I said, pretend its name is "Sambas" cause anyway when we address it that will be said as "Samba"... but he didn't seem convinced...
Any ideas? Ziggy? Samba?

DEVELOPMENTS

2007-06-11T12:09:00.000+03:00

In other news...
I FINALLY FOUND A NEW JOB!!!!!!

!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

The work sounds a bit boring (mostly proofing, of medical texts moreover) but the environment seems lovely and the boss sane and nice, and at this point that's what I need before I go insane as well!

I turned in my resignation last Friday and have 2 weeks left in this &%$#% place before I can finally leave! Needless to say, I had a rather uncomfortable encounter with my boss but the deed is done and I can finally relax!

In other other news...
I AM GETTING A CAT!!!!!!!!!!
!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

He is an absolute darling... was found left in a box on the street by a little girl who lives nearby and took him in. But her mom doesn't like cats and made her get rid of it. So she put him outside in the garden of a man who lives across the street from her, and who happens to be one of the guys who does audio recordings for my (ex!) company, and... the rest is history.
The only thing is, I'm starting to get the impression that the guy doesn't want to let the cat go (it quickly adopted him as its pet), and the little girl definitely doesn't want him to go, so now I kinda feel guilty! I mean, I'm supposed to be helping a stray cat find a home, and at first that was how it was presented to me, and now suddenly I feel like I'm ripping the cat out of the hearts and arms of people who already love him! However, I live around the corner and will give the girl my address so that she can stop by and visit him if she wants, and hopefully this will make everyone happy.
I went today and got litter box, carry case, food, etc, and will officially take him in today after work. Now I just have to find a name for him... and, more importantly, someone to look after him for 2 weeks in august (the little girl, maybe?). I can't wait to show him his new home!!!!!

That's all the news for now... next update... ?????

BLOG THEFT FOLLOW UP

2007-06-11T11:44:00.000+03:00

Thank you all for you kind words and support regarding the splog which has been stealing my content (original post). I have duly added the site to all the black lists that exist out there, and sent a notice to google adsense about it. After a lengthy wait, I received a reply, and have posted it in full below, so that if this happens to any of you you will know what to expect from them. Which is, as you can see, not much! Since my attorney is on vacation to Mars at the moment, and since my bank account cannot withstand any fees associated with the fact that I would be "liable to the alleged infringer for damages (including costs and attorneys' fees)' and given this is the States we're dealing with, who have a very odd idea of justice, and since I'm not sure whether I do have the right to request that my posts not be used (since I don't disallow it under the copyright, if linked back) THEN I figure I'm just going to have to live with it.
I hope that, after such a long time of not posting, the guy has got tired of stealing from me. I suppose I'll know shortly after posting this!
The other thing that keeps floating around my head is the google motto "Don't be evil." humph. OK, splogs are not google's fault, but you'd think they'd be a bit more helpful in aiding normal people fight them! So I found some sites regarding the evil/not evil status of google, such as this one. Interesting reading indeed! As someone who held off using google as my search engine for a long time (they really do NOT give the best results, as far as I'm concerned, and I never like jumping on bandwagons) I finally switched because the services they offer (personalised home pages, google earth, etc.) are really so useful. Now I'm starting to wonder if I was a bit hasty!
And one last word to my splogger: if you ever do check your blog and see these posts, well. Ask yourself: is the money you make off of my work is enough to ease your guilty conscience? And even if it is you should know that, in these circles at least, and probably in real life as well, you will forever be known as a LOSER!

-------
FROM GOOGLE ADSENSE:

It is our policy to respond to notices of alleged infringement that comply with the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (the text of which can be found at the U.S. Copyright Office website: http://www.copyright.gov/) and other applicable intellectual property laws. In this case, this means that if we receive proper notice of infringement, we will forward that notice to the responsible web site publisher.

To file a notice of infringement with us, you must provide a written communication (by fax or regular mail, not by email) that sets forth the items specified below. Please note that pursuant to that Act, you may be liable to the alleged infringer for damages (including costs and attorneys' fees) if you materially misrepresent that you own an item when you in fact do not. Accordingly, if you are not sure whether you have the right to request removal from our service, we suggest that you first contact an attorney.

To expedite our ability to process your request, please use the following format (including section numbers):

1. Identify in sufficient detail the copyrighted work that you believe has been infringed upon. For example, "The copyrighted work at issue is the text that appears on http://www.legal.com/legal_page.html."

2. Identify the material that you claim is infringing upon the copyrighted work listed in item #1 above. You must identify each page that allegedly contains infringing material by providing its URL.

3. Provide information reasonably sufficient to permit Google to contact you (email address is preferred).

4. Include the following statement: "I have a good faith belief that use of the copyrighted materials described above on the allegedly infringing web pages is not authorized by the copyright owner, its agent, or the law."

5. Include the following statement: "I swear, under penalty of perjury, that the information in the notification is accurate and that I am the copyright owner or am authorized to act on behalf of the owner of an exclusive right that is allegedly infringed."

6. Sign the paper.

7. Send the written communication to the following address:

Google, Inc.
Attn: AdSense Support, DMCA complaints
1600 Amphitheatre Parkway
Mountain View CA 94043

OR Fax to:

(650) 618-8507, Attn: AdSense Support, DMCA complaints

Regards,
The Google AdSense Team

Original Message Follows:
------------------------
From: rkarafilly@gmail.com
Subject: Google AdSense DMCA Complaint
Date: Wed, 25 Apr 2007 15:00:04 -0700

Url: http://blogroot.net/
PropertyCode: ca-pub-7976427294976685
LanguageCode: en
Notes:
SPAM REPORT!!!! This site has been feeding off my blog, stealing all my posts, since March. It is a splog! It has no useful, original content of its own.

I'VE BEEN THE SUBJECT OF BLOGENTITY THEFT!!!

2007-04-25T18:25:00.000+03:00

I am pissed off. Really. As far as I can tell, here's what's happened.

Some loser guy/gal (the photo is of a guy, but who knows if even that is real) has started a blog called the 'Root Blog Project" for the sole purpose of gaining advertising bucks. Too lazy to write his own posts, he is stealing (apparently at random) posts from other people, and posting them on his site, under his name. There is no backlink to the original authors of the posts, not even a reference to their names.

So basically at least eight of MY POSTS are up on his site, displayed within the context of the stars and stripes he has decided to decorate his sidebars with.

In the about section he claims:

"Hi! There is my blog.
My photo is here, please, write comments to this page, if you want contact me."

Yeah right. Note, he does not say anything to the effect of "I will be posting other people's work on this blog cause I am too much of a brain dead moron to think up anything of my own," to at least give people some idea that they are reading stolen work.

He also does not let you comment unless you have a worpress account you can log into, which I don't. But if someone does and wants to cuss him out on my behalf (he says to leave comments in the 'about' section - probably cause he doesn't bother to read the rest) please do!

This is the thief's address. (I'm not posting a direct link to it, cause I don't want to give him the satisfaction of having one more technocrati rating.) http://blogroot.net/

Go check it out and see if he's ripped off your stuff too.

And does anyone know if there's a way to shut him down? I've got a creative commons copyright up on my blog, so if that means I can get him in trouble I'd really like to.

The real irony would be if this post gets ripped off as well, and displayed on the blog which is stealing it!!!!

Update: SO sorry, I was mistaken about 1 thing. There IS a link back to the sourced posts, so clearly displayed that it took me ten minutes to find. At the very bottom of the articles (meaning you don't even see it unless you click the 'more' button at the bottom of the page) is the sentence: (get ready for it)...

originally from source.

Clicking on 'source' will take you back to the original article, so I guess he is not actually breaking any copyright laws since I allow people to use my work so long as they attribute me. I am now thinking of changing that, since the spirit of it has been abused - too bad for anyone who might have wanted to use it for good.

GREEK ANECDOTES ANTHOLOGY

2007-04-24T22:31:00.000+03:00

I just read one very funny post on Melusina's blog about crossing the street in greece and almost died laughing. I then skipped on over to Flubberwinkle's blog and found a very similar, in terms of style and humour, post about seat lurkers on the bus in greece... and almost died a second time.

And at that very moment, the germ of an idea sprung into my head. Within a few seconds it had blossomed, and a pretty neat idea I think it is.

Many of us blogging in Greece have written humorous, anecdotal-style posts about various aspects of modern greek life and society. These anecdotes are like 'snapshots,' if you like, perfectly conjuring some small splinter of life that is generally banal to those of us who live here, but mad-sounding to anyone who doesn't. And when we read it we, too, realise how mad it is, and that we would almost have become inured to that madness (and what a sad thing that would be) were it not for the post.

Well, I think these little anecdotes deserve more than being relegated to the dusty corners of the archives section of our blogs. I think we should start collecting them together and, once we've done so and a final selection has been made, maybe post them on a separate blog of their own, or maybe even a real collective web page - if some web savvy person is willing to come up with one - or some other clever idea I can't think up on my own. Suggestions are welcome.

So, in detail, here's what I propose:

NOMINATING:
- In the comments below this post, 'nominate' posts that you think are worthy of being anthologised.
- Please include:
1. the name of the post
2. who wrote the post
3. a brief description of the subject matter
4. a link to the post.
- Please read previous nominations and avoid nominating a post which has already been nominated once.
- Nominated posts can be written in Greek or in English.
- Feel free to nominate your own posts.
- All nominations MUST be published ANONYMOUSLY (to avoid any potential hurt feelings). (All other comments, re. the idea in general, do NOT have to be anonymous).
- Nominated posts should be similar in subject matter and style to the description above. i.e they should be:
humourous in nature
about a single EVERYDAY aspect of Greek life
something that most Greeks/foreigners living in Greece will have experienced, too.
- Nominated posts should not be purely complaints about some part of Greek society the author does not like. i.e. if it is complaining, at least it should be doing so humorously, and not be denigrating Greeks or Greece as a collective whole (or anyone else for that matter).
- If you have previous posts that almost meet these requirements but don't quite (e.g. you talked about several things in one post) it would be a good idea to re-post a modified version of the original so that it can qualify. Or write a whole new one!

VOTING:
-Once a reasonable number of posts have been nominated (do I have to specify a number in advance? I think it'll become clear when we've exhausted the supply, and can just play it by ear. What do you think?) I will, after a week's advance warning, 'offically close' the nominating period.
- From that point on, all further nominations will be rejected (ie deleted) and the voting period will begin.
- in the comments of this post again, 'vote' for the posts that you think deserve to be included in the anthology by referring to them by NAME and AUTHOR.
- Vote for as many posts as you like, several within one comment if you like, or each alone.
- Again, all votes must be ANONYMOUS.
- Please be honourable, and only vote for each post once.
- I will post a one week warning before the end of the voting period (again, I assume it'll become obvious when voting has tapered off, but if you think it should be more restricted let me know) and then voting will be closed.

At that point I will tally the results and publish a list of the chosen posts... and we can decide via comments and general consensus where to go from there.
C'est tout! Sounds fun, no?

THE BIRTHDAY CAKE CONSPIRACY

2007-04-22T23:02:00.000+03:00

It being my boyfriend's birthday tomorrow, I decided to bake him a birthday cake. However, not being the most experienced of cake-bakers (and, OK, being a bit lazy), in a remarkable show of foresight I stopped by my local supermarket last Friday and purchased 1 box of Betty Crocker devil's chocolate cake mix and 1 (very large-looking indeed) tub of her icing.
Past experience has sold me on the Betty Crocker icing - I can never get mine quite as thick and creamy as she does - and so I figured her mix would equally surpass mine. In that I was not disappointed. Carefully following the instructions, I mixed in the eggs, butter and water (adding tons of bitter chocolate chunks to the mix, cause my boyfriend is a chocoholic) and poured the batter, as per the written instructions, into a TWENTY-SIX centimetre cake tin. The cake came out of the oven, and a sneaky taste off the bottom confirmed that yes, Betty makes a mean chocolate cake.
All well and good. But then came time to spread the icing on the cake. Being (as aforementioned) a bit lazy, rather than make 2 separate cakes for a layer cake I usually just slice a normal cake in half and slip a bit of extra icing in between. Well thank goodness for my laziness! Having used a very average amount of icing as filling , I slapped on the top half of the cake and started spreading the rest around to cover the sides and top. However, it soon became clear that the icing that remained in the tub was barely going to suffice for decent coverage. Intrigued, I looked at the directions and, lo and behold, in plain lettering on the side of the very large-looking tub, it was indicated that the amount of icing held within is only sufficient for a TWENTY-THREE centimetre layer cake.
OK, so this was not actually a huge problem as, for good measure, I was going to cover the icing with a thick sprinkling of chocolate shavings, thus concealing any patchy bits. BUT WHAT IF THIS WERE NOT THE CASE? What if I wanted JUST a nice, thick creamy layer of icing over a 26 centimetre layer cake? And what if I were not so lazy, and had actually made two separate cakes, thus creating a much greater side area to be covered? Well, I'll tell you what if. I would have to buy a SECOND pot of icing - a pot whose contents would largely go unused, thus prompting me to make a second cake, purchasing a THIRD tub of icing, so as not let the contents of the second tub go to waste.
Now, I'm pretty sure this is not simply an oversight on the part of Betty Crocker. After all, she's been in the business of making cakes for a quite some time now, and surely during that period someone has pointed out to her the 3 centimetre discrepancy. No, I am left with no option but to conclude that Betty is a sneaky little b**** who has come up with a clever ploy to make us bake (and eat) more cake than we want to. So given this scenario, when I slip into my little string bikini this summer and see more unsightly bulge than I'd like to, I'll know who to blame. Yes, I'm talking to you, Ms. Betty Crocker.
But now for the icing on the cake - metaphorically speaking this time. As a final touch I wanted to spike the cake with birthday candles. And, since my boyfriend inconveniently refused to stop getting older at the age of 24 (and has now reached a whopping 31) this meant buying 2 packs of candles as the largest pack available only contains 24 (leaving me with a - rather useless since I don't know any 17-year-olds - surplus of candles). But anyway, I sucked it up, bought the two packs, and went to put them on the cake - only to realise that along with each set of 24 candles only TWELVE of those little plastic candle holders-that-stop-the-wax-dripping-all-over-the-cake were included. What the %#*$??? What use to me are 24 candles if I've only got TWELVE candle holders? What am I supposed to do - whittle the ends of the candles down so that two will fit in each holder??? By my calculations, in order to have enough little candle holders to support all 31 candles on my boyfriend's birthday cake, I would have to buy not two but THREE packs of candles, leaving me with a surplus of 5 candle holders and FORTY-ONE (!!!!!) candles!
Now that this birthday cake conspiracy has been exposed, I trust we will all take up arms against Betty Crocker and the other birthday cake paraphernalia manufacturers, demanding that the amounts of things that go together, within a said package or group of packages, make some logical sense.
Otherwise, I'll just have to boycott birthdays altogether.

P.S. This is the finished cake, sans candle holders:

the good, the bad and the interesting

2007-04-19T00:09:00.000+03:00

OK so I've been gone for a while... Oh the guilt! Oh the shame! Can you ever forgive me dear readers?
Oh the hyperbole...
OK so what's new?
First, a very belated χρόνια πολλά to everyone... hope you all enjoyed the holidays.
Second, I got a neat-o new digital camera and have been spending my time hanging out at flickr, so if you want to SEE what I've been up to, head over there (link in sidebar) and check my pictures out!
Third, I'M GOING TO THAILAND THIS SUMMER! It's official, the tickets have arrived. Yay!

So much for the good news.

Now for the bad...
As if the endometriosis wasn't enough, I've been diagnosed as having a heart problem. Oh joy! Okay so it's nothing at all serious - one of my valves doesn't shut quite all the way, leading to a bit of blood flowing backwards, which creates a heart murmer - meaning, out of nowhere, about a month ago I started having these awful heart palpitations - or should I say HAMMERINGS - every day, throughout the day. So y'know, being an optimist I automatically assumed I was dying. But after several weeks of anxiety and doctor's appointments and more fun IKA experiences - which I'll be sure to relate in the near future - I've discovered that I'm fine and there's pretty much nothing I can do about it. So I've cut caffeine out of my diet and the palpitations are almost gone now... literally just a little murmur every now and then and... sorry, did you catch that? I CAN'T DRINK COFFEE ANYMORE!!!

AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!

It's been an uphill battle, let me tell you, but every day, little by little, I'm getting used to life without coffee.

My head no longer droops through the morning hours...
I'm able to make it through the afternoon without a little nap with my head on the keyboard...
And I've returned to my regular night owl habits, after a period of actually hitting the pillow at a reasonably normal hour.

SO that, as they say, is that. Chalk another one up for stress-related illnesses created by my wonderful company.

And I'm not alone in my complaints. Pretty much all of us in the office are suffering from some weird illness... stomach ulcers, knee pains, back pains, shoulder pains... you name it, we've got it! A bunch of 20 and 30 somethings sitting around listing our illnesses like a group of old yayas. Isn't life great?

Once again.... DOES ANYONE OUT THERE HAVE A NICE, INTERESTING, STRESS-FREE JOB TO OFFER ME?? PLEASE???
Ah well, the search goes on... as do plans for getting out of here and heading for the island one day, but of course that's easier said than done.

Anyway, to leave you all on a more positive note... here's the interesting
As many of you may know, there's a reporter going round from Epsilon magazine (inset with Sunday's Eleftherotypia) interviewing us foreigners who blog in Greece about our experiences here. I'm looking forward to reading the article and seeing what everyone had to say... and how we're portrayed in the article. Here's to our 15 minutes of fame!
I'm off to bed now. Goodnight.

GOOD INTENTIONS and a strange dream

2007-02-24T20:12:00.000+02:00

Well, another post-worthy topic has gone by and I have not written about it though I promised I would. I assure you that I will give myself a good smack as punishment, and will get to it when I can summon the energy to do the research and compose at the level required.
Alas, things have been a bit crazy of late. Again. Lots of overtime at work and a general lack of energy basically sums up the last couple of weeks for me, which also means that nothing particularly interesting has happened so really you haven’t missed much.
In fact, the only thing of note I can easily relate was a dream I had a few nights ago. It was one of those extraordinarily vivid dreams that leave you convinced that what you've dreamt has some special significance, but try as I might I cannot unravel what that might be. Maybe one of you will have better luck.

So, I am on a beach - not a beach in Greece, I think, nor any beach I can remember visiting in real life. It is a long beach covered in grey angular flinty rocks, which are obscured by sardine-like rows of beach chairs and vulgar holiday-goers for as far as the eye can see. I'm not sure what I'm doing here - not sunbathing, as I am not wearing the right kind of clothes - but, as I wander among the throng, I'm approached by a persons/persons (this bit is rather hazy) who somehow relay to me that there are ‘demons’ among us. They are not demons in the usual sense of the word (nor were they referred to as such in the dream) - rather, I understand, they are something like evil spirits who have taken human form in order to suck out our - again ‘souls’ is not the right word - more like our energy, individuality, whatever it is that makes us us, leaving behind withered automatons who continue on in a bland, disconnected manner – the kind of people who DO in fact walk among us, as far as I’m concerned. You know what I’m talking about: people who seem to have no real interests whatsoever and just go through the motions of life, finding what satisfaction they can in materialist pursuits and the like; people with no aspirations, self-knowledge, culture, higher thoughts… the majority of people living in the West today I fear.
Ahem. Back to the dream. So, though no-one is able to tell that something has happened to these people once their ‘souls’ have been drained, it seems that now that the truth has been revealed to me I will be able to see these ‘demons’ for what they are, and am instructed to join in some kind of underground effort to vanquish them.
Again this is hazy, but I am given a set of magical words or ritual of some kind which, if I see a demon approaching me, I can use to transport myself to another plane of reality - a kind of interim place, a gateway between the planes so to speak, which the demons cannot access and from which I can reach yet another plane. I am then left to my own devices, without a clear understanding of what it is I'm supposed to do to fight these creatures, and continue my walk.
Sure enough, before long I see a man approaching me through the crowd and discern, as he approaches, a horrible ghostly presence - snaggle-toothed, with hollow swirling eyes - a shadow hiding within the human form. As he looms closer, emitting a disturbing lonely wail only I can hear I, terrified, say (?) the first ‘incantation’, and immediately find myself... elsewhere.
I am on the same beach, but it is empty - no people, no chairs, no sign of life. Everything is still, no wind shakes the grass on the cliffs above, and though small waves do lap at the shore, they make no sound for all sound is muffled, and the landscape is black and white - the black and white of a negative film, where all the bright spots are dark and vice-versa.

This is a non-place and, I intuitively understand, if I tarry here too long I will forget everything and will wander around like a drone until I kill myself by, say, walking brainlessly off a cliff or into the water. Suddenly chilled, I quickly invoke the second incantation and again am transported.
Once more, I am on the same beach, devoid of people. But where before there was death here there is an abundance of life. Everything is hyper-coloured - the water an intense turquoise, the grass a brilliant tender green. It is beautiful, and hypnotic.

I wander awhile, forgetting why I'm here, and eventually reach a point where the cliffs sweep into the sea, blocking view of the coastline beyond the curve. Here there is a low rocky shelf which juts into the sea and, in its centre, a rock pool filled with tepid water. And in the water are people, playing, frolicking and diving into the sea below. They are naked, and don't notice me - and I don't try to speak to them because again I intuitively understand that, though these seem like healthy normal people, their capacity for thought is that of a cat or a dog. They are there only to enjoy life; the sun on their backs, the coolness of the crystal water.
Taking my cue from them I splash into the calm, mirrored sea, diving under the surface. Trails of huge, silvery bubbles stream from my hands and feet as I move through the water. These are attractive not only to me but, apparently, to large schools of fish which swim over to investigate. I am enjoying myself thoroughly, happier than I have ever been, when yet again a chill passes over me. I have the sense that a cloud has appeared overhead, but when I look up through the clear surface the sky has retained its pink-tinted blue hue. However, the water has lost its brilliance and the gentle grazing fish have become somehow menacing. I am reminded that there are demons which I am supposed to be somehow battling, and realise that this place is just as dangerous to my sense of self as the last - that is, if I stay here too long I will forget myself entirely and - it suddenly occurs to me - end up like the infantile group of people splashing around giddily and senselessly not too far away.
I have to get out of here, I decide, and do whatever it is I'm supposed to be doing to fight the evil among us.

Of course, just as I decided this, my ******* alarm went off. AAAAargh.

So, anyone, what does it mean?

SHAME ON ET3! BAN ANIMAL CIRCUSES!

2007-02-10T21:11:00.000+02:00

I am sitting here with the TV on mute in the background, by chance on channel ET3. As usual on a Saturday evening, they're showing footage from a circus... you know, the kind you usually sit in a big tent to watch, but on TV instead. Who watches this show every week I don't know, cause it's deathly boring - just people doing lame stunts and tricks and the like, but today is different; I just glanced over and saw that they've got THREE TIGERS and a guy FORCING THEM TO DO TRICKS with a LONG ROD on. I am so #%&*$#% furious right now I can't express it. It's bad enough that they give permission to the animal circuses (most of them from Italy) to even perform in Greece - just yesterday I saw a truck drive by advertising YET ANOTHER one, and thoroughly cursed it to hell - but now they are being SANCTIONED and essentially advertised on STATE TELEVISION.
Have we learnt nothing? Do the people taking their kids to watch these things not realise what is happening to these animals behind the scenes? Things that would make their kids have nightmares for weeks if they were to see them?
AAAAAAAGH.

On a more positive note, yesterday I attended the (wonderful) Thanassis Papakonstantino concert, which was being held to raise funds for the 'Steki Metanaston' - a group for immigrants' rights and support. The place was packed and full of high spirits, and hopefully lots of money was raised... will post at greater length tomorrow or Monday on the show/collective. There was also a protest today at Omonia for immigrant rights, but I'm afraid that after standing for 5 hours last night and getting up early for a greek lesson my poor body couldn't face it... If anyone else attended let me know how it went...

IT'S MY FUNERAL AND I'LL PLAY WHAT I WANT TO

2007-02-04T22:28:00.000+02:00

I’ve been tagged (cursed?) by toomanytribbles! For the top five songs I’d play at my own funeral. Wow. And no I’ve never considered this before. But it’s very High Fidelity – which is a great book and movie – so I’ll do it.
It’s REALLY tempting to come up with the 5 funniest titles I can think of (eg Queen’s ‘Another One Bites the Dust’, The Jam's 'Going Underground', or The Pixies ‘Monkey Gone to Heaven’) but I’ll resist the urge and try to take this semi-seriously.
Problem is, I really don’t want a typical funeral, people crying and blabbing on about what I was like… just dump me in the ground or cremate me thank you very much, show’s over – no service, definitely no church, and no dumping a huge bill for the ceremony on those I leave behind.
Hmmm. I may have been watching too much Six Feet Under of late.
However, I suppose the loved ones I’ve left behind will want to get together to mourn me somehow, and how better than a party? So, the top 5 songs that I, as DJ, would play at my hopefully-not-too-weepy funeral party:

1. The Beta Band – Dry the Rain
Manages to be melancholy and uplifting at the same time. And always a favourite of mine.
[alas no video available]

2. Baz Lurhman – Everybody’s Free (To Wear Sunscreen)
My last chance to dispense words of advice to any youngsters I might have left behind. Especially appropriate if I’ve died of skin cancer – but then, of course, it might be considered a bit tasteless.

3. INXS – Never Tear Us Apart
For my significant other. Unless he’s managed to beat me to the punch. In which case, what the hell, play The Pixies ‘Monkey Gone to Heaven’.

4. Cousteau – Of This Goodbye
Well there’s gotta be ONE "go on and have a good cry, then" number, right?
[alas no video available]

5. Paul Weller – Long Hot Summer (live)
Has that melancholy ‘it’s all over’ feel. Also hopefully my life will have been like one long hot summer. Also – I've got my reasons… let's just say this one’s a must. And it's gotta be played last.

[NOT the right version, but will have to do.]

Now... mwah ha ha... who to tag... definitely teacher dude, cause I like his taste in music and he'll probably figure out a way to turn this into a neat-o lesson... documentarist - who wants to bet that a song by The Cure will make its way onto her list? And, lastly, emilyz cause I think it's about time she got tagged for something!

THE BEST OF INTERACTIVE FLASH ART, FLASH TOYS & FLASH GAMES

2007-02-01T21:35:00.000+02:00

It’s been a slow couple of weeks at work so I’ve had plenty of time to fiddle around the Net finding fun things to do – all under the pretext of ‘conducting research’, if anyone asks. And what I’ve been looking at is stuff made with the program Flash.
Of late, I’ve become increasingly interested in the potentials of flash, and especially interactive flash art, which, in a world where sliced cow is heralded as a masterpiece because everything else has been ‘done’, may just be the last ‘real’ art left for us to discover. And there truly are some insanely gifted people out there. Moreover, thanks to the web, their art is instantly and easily accessible to us, within the comfort of our own homes, so long as we can afford the cost of Internet.
So, rather than keep this plentiful entertainment to myself, I’ve decided to compile a list of my personal faves – the crème de la crème of what flash artists have to offer - from interactive art and toys, to games where the point is to enjoy the process rather than experience the dubious glory of shouting “I won, I won!” to an empty room after hours of nail biting action. Are you ready to become glued to your screen for at least the next week? Sure? Have you got a recent version of the flash plug-in installed? Your headphones and mic plugged in? OK then, here we go!

INTERACTIVE ART
Yugo Nakamura, at yugop.com, is the most out-there and ‘arty’ of the bunch. The pieces have a relaxing and meditative quality to them - in contrast to the site, which is alas rather hard to navigate - but here are the highlights as I see them.
I can’t find a direct link for the first one, but it should come up automatically as you enter from the main page. If not, click on number 06 (at bottom left) to access JAMPACK, set it to ‘semi-automatic’ and click to create bubbles, then click on one and move it to bounce them all around. The longer you hold down the mouse button, the bigger the bubble you create.
Fun, no? Also try:

BORDERS
Click on the screen to change the type of waves, and move your mouse around to make them undulate.

BLACK RIBBON
Click on the screen to start your ribbon, then move the mouse around to make it grow and spin. Ooooh. Hours of fun.

He’s got TONS more neat stuff in the archives section – well worth sifting through it to find what you like. Some downloadable stuff too, like CLOCKBLOCK, which is a clock screensaver where each digit is represented by video of a hand stacking blocks.

Next, from the no-doubt twisted mind of zefrank, who 'likes you the best', no less, come a collection toys, art and games guaranteed to satisfy your urge for interactivity. Here is some of the artier stuff - scroll on down for the toys and games.

MEDITATION FLOWERS
Lovely. That's all I've got to say. Oh, and you'll need a mic hooked up to your computer.

SOUNDMAKER
For those noisemakers out there. With psychedelic images to boot. I tried to get a rhythm going, then just gave up and enjoyed bathing in the random sounds and looking at the images, which is why this goes under 'A' for Art.

WHAT WE WANT
An interactive, ever shifting collage of facial features, crossed with personal ads. Click then browse over to change the parts. Weird, but thought provoking.

Last in the Art section, a little something from westykid, who gets my vote for being the most personable-sounding of the bunch. More on him further down; for now just enjoy...
WINDMACHINE MONSTER
Insane, but too cool. Just keep clicking the machine thing, and get a… ummm… treat.

TOYS
NEW! FEED THE HEAD
Undoubtedly thought up by someone on heavy doses of drugs, Feed the Head is nonetheless undoubtedly cool. Although the swallowing your own eyeball bit is rather gross. And the animals in the brain are just plain weird.

NEW! ACROBOTS
Help piles of colourful acrobots perform gravity-defying stunts.

As promised, more stuff from Mr Ze:
SCRIBBLER
Turns your chicken scratchings into works of art.

YOUR MAMA
Record a prototype mother's facial expressions separately and try to get them to sync up. Is yo mama pissed or pleased?

SEQUENCER and CAROL MAKER
For all wannabe composers. Your choice – chirpy elves or groovin’ drum beats.

FROG
Hope you kept that mic handy! Here you can animate a frog to speak… with your voice. It's freaky how fun this is.

And one more entry from westykid:
TANK DRESSUP GAME
The coolest dress-up game on the Net.

Then, once you're all dressed up and ready to go, throw on your dancing shoes and head on over to www.globz.net. Click on 'all our games' and then on MICRO-DANCERS, where you get to choose your music and line up as many funky little dudes as you like, then animate them to get down to the beat - in sync or solo. You can record their dance number, too, then play it back and check out your skills as a choreographer. A trick I figured out – if you click on 'play' straight from recording, then reselect the little dudes and do another move at whichever point in playback you like, the second move will be added on after the first, and so on. Much easier than trying to get them to do a whole sequence live!

GAMES
Some more from zefrank...
SIMON SAYS
Like that game you used to play when you were a kid, where you had to memorise sequences of sound and colour and play it back in the same order as the machine... But with funny video faces. Of course.

ATHEIST
I won’t ruin the joke.

Now, here is where westykid, aka Adam Westerman, comes into his own. This guy is, like, 18 years old, but I think he’s a budding genius. His work is still rough, but damn, it’s got STYLE!!! ,
UNDERLAND
Part of a game ('the' game?) in progress, but I really love the graphics and style of it as is - even if there's not much point to gameplay. Anyway, that's what we're aiming for here, right? Aimless fun.

ROCK ROCK GEM
Fun game, for those who like things more fast-paced. Same great graphics.

NEVERMORE 1 and NEVERMORE 2 are his more developed games. FANTASTIC artwork. Soooo original. Neat storyline being developed. I can see these all coming together into something really fabulous in the near future. And then he’ll be a millionaire. Clever little bugger!

And now for something completely different. If cute n’ fuzzy is your cup of tea, check out www.ferryhalim.com, where you’ll find a plethora of sugary games, most of which are centred on themes like teamwork and friendship and cute little animals. Great for kids, and great for you, too, if you’re having 'one of those days' and need a little pick me up.
AMONG THE CLOUDS
Float along in your hot air balloon, enjoy the wind in your face, and collect little green round things… that is, if you feel like it. Otherwise, just bask away - but don't forget to keep clicking every now and then!

A DAILY CUP OF TEA
Help a cute duo of mice collect sugar cubes for their tea while avoiding bouncing balls, falling books and the like.

WAKE UP CALLS
You’re falling falling faaaaalling on a floating leaf, and liberating butterflies from their cocoons as you go. Strangely therapeutic.

THE POND
Click to create ripples and send the acorns in the ducks’ direction. How many can you feed?

Well, that's about it for now. If I find anything else interesting I'll add it on as an update, but really I've sifted through tons of sites and these were the only ones which met my standards - keeping in mind that my criteria excluded anything needlessly violent or stress-inducing. If you've got any other ideas or favourite sites that follow in this vein, post them in the comments. Happy playing!

UPDATE: More surreal fun at Modern Living. A interactive take on... well, modern living!

I HAVE INTERNET AGAIN!!!!!!

2007-01-27T20:37:00.000+02:00

And so ends yet another 2 month internet-less odyssey.
Sometime mid-November, we decided to switch from a shared LLU Vivodi account to a full one. For those who don't know what this means: basically here in Greece there is the government phone/internet provider, big bad OTE, who until recently controlled all the phone lines. This meant that even if you got your internet from a private company, you still had to pay OTE ridiculously large amounts of money for use of their line. Thankfully, this has been changing. Now there are several companies with their own lines but, a couple of years ago when I first moved, the only company which did was Vivodi, so we had initially decided to go with them. So started my first odyssey, which left me on my own for a whole summer without phone or internet. Vivodi was not to blame for this however - OTE was. Basically, they try to make the procedure as difficult as possible for the private companies, to discourage people from switching to them, and take months to approve the switch, or whatever it is they have to do. Anyway, at the end of this period Vivodi informed us that the lines they had had available in our neighbourhood were used up, so we ended up having to go the OTE route for our phone and line after all, and just used Vivodi for the internet. Ahhh!
Then in November we learnt that Vivodi had more of its own lines available in our area, and decided to make the switch and at last cut OTE out of the deal entirely. Vivodi's phone service is far cheaper than OTE's, who still charge you per call made rather than letting you talk freely. Vivodi, on the other hand, give you lots of free minutes and have way cheaper calls to mobiles and long distance. Not to mention their internet is economical and fast. In fact, we've been very happy with them for the last few years. (NOTE TO VIVODI - you realise I'm giving you free advertising here, right? How 'bout waiving the set-up fee in return, huh?)
Anyway, we thought it would be simple. After all, we had a Vivodi account already, right? They told us it shouldn't take more than a couple of weeks. We cancelled our OTE account accordingly. But, of course, OTE had its way and has managed to stall Vivodi for the last 2 months - something to do with letting us keep our existing phone number. The bastards. Although I'm sure the fact that the switch coincided with the holiday season and everyone taking off on holiday didn't help. Either way, yet again I found myself unexpectedly cut off from the world wide web and all forms of communication besides my cell phone.
But at last, yesterday, it went through. The guy came and hooked us up. We're wireless now, too, so I can actually use my nice Mac powerbook without having to hook it up each time. Yay!

So basically this very long and boring explanation is to apologise to all of you that I know and love and with whom I have not been able to communicate properly in the last two months. Sorry. Let the gates of communication open!!! We will speak soon.

And to my loyal blog readers (I've still been getting visitors all this time it seems, even with no updates) the journey will continue.

And now I really must go lie down and nurse a hangover. Before going out again. Jesus, I've gotten so damn... SOCIABLE these last few months without internet. It's unbelievable. Will it now all change? Will I start spending my Friday and Saturday nights with Mr Monitor and Mrs Keyboard again? We shall see...

and now for... the world debut of photosynthetic

2006-11-27T22:55:00.000+02:00

OK guys just a quick one... I am otherwise engaged in other things at the moment - like finding a new job cause mine has finally become TOO MUCH, and developing myself a 'web presence' to be more attractive to employers.
So as part of that I am uploading my films. At last. Here is the first, 'photosynthetic', made with a group of talented people who have since all gone on to do nothing related to film as far as I know.

It's a bit too high quality I think, even for high bandwidths, so if you're really interested you'll have to be a bit patient. Press play then go read something else. I'm working on uploading a lower quality one but since this one went up you tube seems to be having technical difficulties each time I try to upload...
ALSO please note we edited this baby on a Steinbeck - that's one of those antique machines where you actually cut and splice the film together with tape, by hand, and have you got any idea how much it costs to make a final print off your work roll??? A lot!! Which is why we never did it - this is the one and only print we laboured over, hence all the dirt and dust and tape and jumps... sorry. Though actually in some ways I think it adds character?
DISCLAIMER: any resemblance to other films, living or dead, is entirely accidental. They either came out after we made this one, or we hadn't seen them yet. I swear. (Damn Hollywood copycats stealing ideas from students!!! The shame!)
LASTLY if you can't figure out what it's about... that OK you're not really supposed to. I'll give you a hint... insomnia... deaf photographer... obsession... doppelgangers... OK that's enough.
And yes, I know this is totally the pretentious artsy film all student filmmakers have to make... you gotta problem wit dat???

My second film, 'ish', you can see at this link. My co-filmaker (or partner in crime as she likes to refer to our partnership) Aisling - now there's a girls who has gone on to a career in film - at the National Film Board of Canada, no less! One of the few times where the tacky phrase 'you go girl!' is appropriate I think... but I digess. That's a topic for my next post, to be entitled 'Montrealers Who've Made It'... later...back to the plot - Aisling posted it a while back but for some reason the embed on her blog no longer works (hear that ais?) hence the direct link... this one's nice and lo-qual and fast... though OHHH! The pixels!!! They hurt!!!! All that money on REAL FILM and it came to this??? ANyway I'll be posting a higher quality one on my page as well to wow all prospective employers. when the bloody you tube feels like working. Sorry, I'm not very techno-friendly at the moment... it's all been conspiring lately to drive me completely insane.

Also job hunting sucks. Making an online resume sucks even more. And plus I think I'm underqualified for most jobs that I care to do. Time to go back to school!!! Or escape to the bloody island already... but for that I got to save some cash first... which makes sticking with my crappy (but well-paying job) a good idea... Agghhh!!! Conundrums!!! Confusion!!! Indecision!!! What am I to do??

Well, here's hoping my next post finds me in a better, saner frame of mind. Ha ha.

BLOG ON BLOGGING ON BLOGGING ON BLOGGING...

2006-11-16T01:06:00.000+02:00

Ellas Devil tagged me, ages ago, for the meme about blogging that’s been going round, and thanks to my lengthy absence I’ve only just noticed. But I always say better late than never, so here goes!

Do you like the look and contents of your blog?
Well, given that I've just spent the last two days giving my blog a facelift, yes I like the looks! It was a real pain in the butt to do, too – all these little image bits that had to be downloaded, adjusted, uploaded… and they still didn’t all work out right but I don’t think anyone will notice unless they look real close… I hope. But I like the colours – vibrant and lively, and not quite as pink as the last one (though still too pink for some - you know who you are! What can I say? I like magenta!)
Regarding content - I usually end up thinking everything I’ve written is drivel a day or two after posting it, and I always have the uneasy feeling that I should be posting about some stuff that is, I dunno, a bit more serious and important maybe? But I suppose I have managed to produce some vaguely amusing stuff here and there...

Does your family know about your blog?
I told my mom about it but she didn’t ask to see it so I didn’t volunteer the info. Perhaps she was being ‘sensitive to my needs’ and didn’t want to push me into telling her. Such is our relationship, sigh. My dad doesn’t know a computer from a vacuum cleaner, so he’s out too. I did tell my stepmom about it – I think she’d like it – but she doesn’t have a connection at home and isn't likely to check it out the rare times she heads over to the net café. I can’t remember if I told my brothers or not, but they’re self-involved teenagers so what would they care!

Can you tell your friends about your blog? Do you consider it a private thing?
I have done. Most of my friends have blogs, too – check them out in my blogroll! As for private - private shmivate! If I wanted it to be private I'd write it down on paper in a journal and hide it under my bed. As soon as you've posted something on the WORLD WIDE web, your privacy has gone out the window - you never know who'll stumble across your 'carefully guarded' secrets... in fact, SEVERAL old friends of mine that I'd completely lost touch with found me just by chance - which, though it was nice to hear from them again, was kind of freaky. I mean, I immediately started ticking over all the people I have known in my life to make sure there isn't anybody out there that I DON'T want to be found by...

Do you read the blogs of those who comment on your blog? Or do you try and discover new blogs?
I generally read the blogs of the people who've left comments - on other people's blogs, too, not just mine. Especially if it's an interesting comment. There are so many excellent blogs out there though, and so little time to read them all, that mostly I keep it local unless something really catches my fancy. I definitely don't go trawling through random blogs hoping something good will come up.

Did your blog positively affect your mind? Give an example...
Ummmm… in that it has helped me to not entirely lose my ability to speak English within a limited English-speaking environment, and has kept my writing muscles limber, yes. Therapeutically/psychologically speaking? I’m not so sure. I enjoy writing the posts, cause I enjoy writing generally. I enjoy having a 'captive audience' that I can blab away at (my mom always called me a chatterbox)... but I don't enjoy the feeling of guilt I experience when I look up at the clock and realise I've whittled away the entire evening doing it, especially when there is something else I could have/should have been doing (I have time management issues). And I don't think it really helps me get things off my chest or deal with my issues in the way that it seems to for other people. Basically it's just another time-wasting guilty pleasure, like watching Lost every Friday night...

What does the number of visitors to your blog mean? Do you have a traffic counter?
Yes, I have a traffic counter, and yes I check it. My ego is about the size of a peanut so it can use the boost it gets from lots of hits! Everyone likes to think they’re interesting... don't they?

Do you imagine what other bloggers look like?
Not really… I've kind of naturally developed a hazy impression of what all the people whose blogs I frequent look like, taken from their profile pics I think (even if those pics are completely abstract) and from they're writing style. No doubt I'm way off, though.

Do you think blogging has any real benefits?
Of course! For those people who actually write about important stuff, that is... ie, not me. But for those that do, those that care, it’s a great way to disseminate and share ideas. For the rest of us… it sure beats watching Survivor.

Do you think that the blogosphere is a stand alone world community separated from the real world?
Kind of… I mean we’re all real people living in the real world (I hope!) so we all bring real issues and ideas to the table, but somehow the act of writing about them puts us on a separate plane of reality from those who're purely living them - as though writing relieves us of the 'duty' of really participating in and experiencing life; we can choose instead to just intellectualise our reactions or feelings to things. But then again, I had a love hate/relationship with computers from the get-go - read my first post ever to see what I mean - and am uneasy about the implications of digitising so much of ourselves... I guess it's more a philosophical/metaphysical uneasiness than anything based on solid grounds for complaint.

Do some political blogs scare you? Do you avoid them?
Depends on the politics! Some people’s views make me sad, that’s all. And yes, scared I guess for the fate of the world. I do avoid them cause I don’t like feeling that way.

Do you think that criticizing your blog is useful?
There’s a difference between criticizing my blog as a whole - as in, "what is this garbage and why do you bother to write it, you waste of space" - which is not constructive, v.s. someone criticizing something I have said – which is. Even if I vehemently disagree with them, at least it gives me a chance to rebut or defend myself. And sometimes I might actually learn something new or come to see things a different way. SOMEtimes…

Have you ever thought about what would happen to your blog if you died?
Upon my death, my spirit will be magically infused into the blogosphere, and will keep my blog updated through the ether. At last, everyone will know what the afterlife is like!
...But seriously, this is exactly the type of question which, when I start to think about it, makes me uneasy about having so much of myself on the net. Because we are communicating directly with each other (unlike publishing a book) yet have never met each other in the flesh, we have essentially created a purely digital, yet (within the medium of the web) very real identity for ourselves - an identity which exists independently of our earthly bodies. To go back to the question of whether we imagine what other bloggers look like, I'm sure we've all formed some impression - given a 'body' so to speak - to the digital entities we are communicating with, because this is what is natural for us - to communicate with concrete presences. So each of you reading this has an impression of who I am, of me as a physical entity, but you don't know me - you know the version of me I choose to present you with. For all you know, I could be a fat middle-aged balding man named Joe living in Alaska, but the entity I have chosen to call Kassandra and the picture of Kassandra that you have formed for yourselves from my writings exists - as a distinct individual - and has little to do with who Joe is. So if Joe dies, does Kassandra necessarily die too? Even if this blog were eventually taken off the net, the digital entity of Kassandra, perhaps entirely fictional, would continue to live on in the minds of all the people who read this blog. And since she never really existed, could she ever really be considered dead??? (Now pause to let the goosbumps settle before reading on. And no, I am not a fat middle-aged balding man named Joe living in Alaska. I am who I say I am. Except that my real name is not Kassandra. Unless 'I' refers to my digital self, not my physical self, in which case it is... :P)

Which blogger has had the greatest impression on you?
Oooh loads. But most notably emilyz because of her beautiful writing, flubberwinkle and melusina because of their humour and quite simply for coming across as lovely people, devious diva because she reminds us of all the serious things we might otherwise choose to ignore, ellas devil for keeping me up to date on what is going on in the country when I can't be bothered to watch the news in Greek, and buruburu for getting me into this mess in the first place (and for, every now and then, writing something so completely level-headed and fairminded on a seemingly complicated issue that it just blows all the dust away - though I still haven't forgiven him for switching to Greek for a while there!). Seawitch used to be on my list, but then she had to go and move to Canada and get all contented and happy with life or something... grumble grumble...

Which blogger do you think is the most similar to you?
EmilyZ. I think we’re both at similar stages in life, and we both like cats and ethnic food, among other things. Though I have the sneaking suspicion that she's ATHLETIC (shudder), which I most certainly am not, and she probably reads a lot more quality books than I do. (Though if anyone wants to send me some quality books, I'll gladly read them!)

Name a song you want to listen too.
At the moment I'm quite happy listening to the sound of silence, thank you. (Or rather, I should say the sound of my computer fan humming.)

Tag some people.
buruburuburu, documentarist, mel… it’s your turn! Also the rather mysterious mr melancholy, I'd be curious to see what you have to say...

HELP!

2006-11-14T01:26:00.000+02:00

Are there any html geeks out there who can take a look at my source code and tell me how to lower my banner so there isn't that big gap between it and the top of my posts/sidebar?
&*#@!*
Thank you!

(and don't ask how I got it there in the first place... dumb luck I think.)

So, how's the water?

2006-11-12T20:48:00.000+02:00

Well. It's Sunday evening, I've got a pile of laundry waiting to be hung out and a sink full of dishes begging to be washed, so this seems like an excellent opportunity to ignore all that and dip my toes in the water again, so to speak, by attempting to write a new post.
But what to write about? Is blogging like riding a bike, or have I lost the knack of spewing my guts out in the hope that some poor soul will actually find my ramblings interesting?
I suppose I should begin by reporting a truly miraculous occurrence - miraculous to me, at least.
This past weekend my father came to Athens... for the SECOND TIME in as many months.
Wow.
Now this is a man who, it would seem, is bound by a sturdy iron chain - one end of which is strapped round his ankle and the other end to the bottom of the huge gangly olive tree that has sprouted, for at least the last couple hundred years, at the foot of our garden, in the middle of the fields and sheep where our house is situated, on the outskirts of the village of Molivos on the island of Lesvos.
(My my, it seems that my sentences have grown since last I wrote. Bear with me.)
This event, of my father's multiple visits, is miraculous because, as far as I know, and excluding the last couple of months, my father has only ventured away from his beloved garden (which will surely wither and die if deprived of two days of his attention) to come to Athens twice IN THE LAST TEN YEARS. And then for only half a day. But both these times he has actually stayed the whole weekend!
Now, either he's finally figured out (two years down the road) that he has a daughter with a comfortable permanent residence (where he is more than welcome to stay) and the requisite sofa and TV available for his nap time, or it just so happens that two weddings have gone down here in Athens in the last months that actually demanded his attendance.

The first wedding was my second-cousin's (the big sister of the cousin/parter in crime often referred to in these pages) and was a lovely event - everyone, besides the stressed-out bride, enjoyed themselves thoroughly and, to digress a moment, I can truly say it was the best wedding I've ever attended. It took place in a small church somewhere near Peania or Kanza (on the outskirts of Athens - and we nearly died driving there in the rain thanks to bad signage which led to us driving ONTO an off ramp of the Attiki Odos - but that's another story). Thankfully the rain stopped just in time for the ceremony, the setting was lovely, the priest genial (he even cracked jokes throughout the ceremony), the dress simple and elegant, and the guests for the most part dressed with a modicum of taste - a first for me at any Greek social event! And actually a disappointment as I was deprived of my usual favourite pastime at such boring social drags: mocking the elaborate bespangled costumes of the other guests.
However this was more than made up for by the reception, held in the Italianate courtyard of a winery (if that's what they're called) with excellent booze, gourmet food, and the amusing pastime of running around with my cousin and other assorted relatives, watching as they tried to sneak cigarettes away from their parents' eyes. It was like being 16 all over again! One girl actually announced she was going to the bathroom, then waited expectantly until it dawned on me that I was supposed to follow her. Good grief.
Mind you, the ceaseless 'kai sta dika sas' (and to yours) got a bit tiresome, not to mention being told about 6 times in a row that 'did you know so-and-so is your third cousin' (I hadn't known at the beginning of the night, but by the end I was starting to wish that the family connection between me and the girl, a rather insipid creature in a neon-green bouffant mini-dress, could be severed immediately) but despite these mild annoyances, my father and I had a very good time.
So that was visit number one; a nice wedding, followed, the next day, by a relaxing meal of mezedes where my boyfriend and father proceeded to bond over army stories and football. Typical. (Here in Greece, before men can be friends or talk about anything interesting, they have to get a few things out of the way: namely, where were you in the army and what interesting/terrible things happened to you there; what football team do you support, and finally, what are your politics. If they agree on at least 2 out of these 3 things they can, in my experience, take the relationship 'to the next level'. If, however, a common ground cannot be found within these three critical parametres, that's it. No bond will ever grow between them. And though my father and Panos had met before, they had never talked at length so, needless to say, I was relieved to have that out of the way between them.)
One last thing of note regarding the first visit: my father had arrived early Friday morning, before I left for work, and I simply had not had time to go shopping or cook anything before he came (as usual, he had left it to literally the last minute to tell me he was actually coming) so, feeling rather guilty, I had left him with a hunk of thawing mincemeat, a can of tomatoes and a packet of pasta, and had told him to fix his own lunch. I returned, however, to the sight of him be-aproned, spoon in hand, preparing his famous (really weird-sounding if I were to tell you the recipe, but excellent nonetheless) pasta sauce, having explored all the shops in the neighbourhood to procure the necessary ingredients. Moreover, I have the sneaking suspicion that, had the house been a mess as well as the pantry bare, he would have scrubbed it top to bottom like a proper Greek mama - this man who, in his own home, cannot even be bothered to throw out used tins of cat food. Humph!
I tell you this because it ties in to visit number two. This weekend my father arrived to attend the wedding of the daughter of a family friend, a local Molivos girl and fellow dentist whom he helped set up in practice here in Athens. And this time he came prepared!(I won't bore anyone with the details of this wedding - let's just say that for every good thing I said about my cousin's wedding, in this case you could say the opposite.)
Yesterday morning, (earlier than I would have liked to be woken up on a Saturday but never mind) my father arrived at my door wearing his oversized coat and raggedy colourful sweater, grey hair and moustache blowing wild (looking, as a friend of his later commented, like a compatriot of Toulouse Lautrec's) and clutching a faded green duffel bag. He gave me a hurried hug then, with rushed pride, wrenched the bag open and pulled out two enormous bags of fresh-picked wild mushrooms. Before any 'Hi, how are you's' could be exchanged, I was required to quickly transfer these to the fridge before they could sweat any more in their plastic prisons.
Now, I guess, would be a good time to mention that my father is a huge wild mushroom aficionado. He is actually considered something of an expert on the island, often helping others determine whether something is edible or will impart an instant and horrible death, and has a shelf of books on the subject and a lifetime spent tramping the fields of Lesvos in search of the succulent treasures. And though his long, rambling eulogies to the mushroom often get boring, and my stepmother must cope with a veritable carpet of mushrooms covering the sizeable dining table end to end each winter, we don't complain because the end result is just so very delicious.
If you've never had fresh-picked wild mushrooms, or (heaven forbid, like my freak of a boyfriend, don't like mushrooms at all) my rapture at the sight of those two bags will no doubt be lost on you. If you do, however, enjoy the velvety texture and the rich, heavenly taste, it won't, and you will no doubt start salivating as I now describe to you how, on Saturday, my dad whipped up a simple but exquisite field mushroom and cep's soup for us to feast on, and today a dish of pork chops which had been marinated in wine overnight, then slowly braised with a spoonful of capers and heaps and heaps of no less than 5 varieties of mushroom, for just about the tastiest resulting dish I have ever had the pleasure of savouring. And I've still got a portion of it sitting in my fridge for tomorrow's lunch! Oh joy!
So, to end this lengthy gastronomical post, here's hoping my father will be making many more trips to the ends of the earth that we call Athens, bringing with him more mushrooms (or, if they're out of season, wild asparagus, or in fact any of the other goodies he likes to collect). And now I suppose I had really better get on with doing those dishes! So farewell, dear readers, if you have gotten this far, and till next time - whenever that may be!

Sorrrry!!!

2006-10-31T23:12:00.000+02:00

Dear readers, (those who might still happen by now and again) I suppose I should issue an official statement of sorts... And apologise for not having done so sooner. Sorry for my long silence, and for abandoning you all without a word. The simple fact is that after my summer without computers I realised how much longer and fuller the days are when I'm not spending my free evening hours glued to the screen, and decided to let my blog rest for a bit longer. I did this cold turkey, so to speak, cause I knew that once I started again - even to say that I'd no longer be writing - I'd be hooked. I have still been popping in now and then to read all my faves and keep up with you guys, and have been trying to spend the rest of my time more productively, and sociably (with people in the flesh) than last year.
However, with this chilling rain we are experiencing, I find my fingertips are itching again. I'm not sure I'm ready to plunge back in all the way - but perhaps, slowly slowly, I'll start blogging again. We'll see... till then, have patience dear readers.
PS you'll know I'm back when I start commenting on other blogs again, so don't waste your time looking in here unless you see me elsewhere!
K

TELL YOUR FORTUNE WITH YOUR iPOD!!!

2006-07-07T22:53:00.000+03:00

This meme was too cute to resist. The idea is, you set your iPod to shuffle, then press next for every question. The song that comes up is the answer to the question! Neat huh?
I got some freakily sensical (OK that's not a word, but it should be - as in the opposite of NONsensical) answers (or maybe I'm reading too much into them?)
This is also a good way to take a peek at what other people are listening to (and yes, I have very diverse taste in music).

Feel free to post your results in the comments, or just link to them.
(I suppose any mp3 player will do, even just iTunes, Winamp or Media Player on your computer - so long as you don't cheat and look ahead. Unless the iPod specifically has some supernatural powers. Let me know what you used to see if there's a difference in clarity!)
Look forward to reading them!

How am I feeling today? Tora kai ego tha ziso (Now I Too Will Live) – Haris Alexiou
If only I didn't have to work so much at the moment, this might actually be true. Perhaps it's what my subconscious is demanding.

Will I get far in life? Here Comes Your Man – The Pixies
An ambiguous - and rather disturbing - answer. Apparently where I get in life will depend on my man. But whether this man will help me get far or not isn't specified. A closer look at the lyrics is not especially revealing - all that seems clear is that there will be a "wait so long".

How do my friends see me? Sure Thing – St Germain
Umm...? I guess I can live with that.

When will I get married? I’ll Stop the World I’ll Melt With You – Nouvelle Vague
Not much help in fixing a specific date, but this song certainly seems to suggest marriage is in my future. Humph.

What is my best friend's theme song? Hallelujah – The Happy Mondays
I certainly hope this will turn out to be true.

What is the story of my life? Naïve Song - Mirvais
Ha! If only it weren't true.

What was high school like? We Used to Be Friends – The Dandy Warhols
Succinct and to the point.

How am I going to get ahead in life? I’ll Smash Some Mugs – Eleftheria Arvanitaki
A reference, I think, to the fact that I have to be more forceful in how I confront the world and obstacles. Also perhaps a nod to THE BIG PLAN (those who know what it is should get it), which leads me to interpret this as a sign that it'll be a success.

What is the best thing about me? Word Up! – Cameo
I don't get it. Can someone help me out on this one? Lyrics not clear either.

How is today going to be? Freedom – George Michael
Given that it is almost midnight, I'll take today to mean tomorrow. Leading me to believe that perhaps I won't make it in to work as planned.

What is in store for this weekend? Move On Up – Curtis Mayfield
OK!

What song describes my parents? Smooth Criminal – Michael Jackson
Hmmm... Interpret this as you choose. Given that the question states "parents" and my parents are entirely different people, it's a bit of a tricky one.

What song describes your grandparents? Like Tears in Rain - Covenant
All passed away... all had hard lives... pretty sad, but true.

How is my life going? What a Man – Linda Lyndell
Again a reference to a man. Either this is because I have too many lovey songs on my iPod, or my man is pretty important to my life. And, according to Linda Lyndell, a mighty fine man he is. Which, come to think of, I agree with! So I guess that's one good thing about the way my life is going. Maybe the iPod didn't want to hurt my feelings by mentioning the rest...

What song will they play at my funeral? Step On – The Happy Mondays
Again strangely appropriate. I just might play that at my funeral, too. Wait and see.

How does the world see me? Extreme Ways - Moby
Ha ha! I wish. "Extreme" is something I aspire to but most of the time I think I just manage to scratch the bottom rung of "slightly eccentric"

Will I have a happy life? You Got the Love - Candi Stanton
Once again, my future seems to depend or be intertwined with love. But the lyrics do provide a quite plausible prediction for my future state of happiness: "Sometimes I feel like throwing my hands up in the air... (but) You got the love that will see me through." i.e. life will be tough sometimes but I'll have someone whose love will make it all OK. Sounds like a decent future to me.

What do my friends really think of me? Panic – The Smiths
Ha ha ha ha. OK I'll admit that these days I do seem to be in a constant state of panic.

Do people secretly lust after me? The Other Man - Sloan
Hmmm cryptic but suggestive.

How can I make myself happy? Personal Jesus – Depeche Mode
Find religion? Start my own religion? Humph. Starting to not like this little game.

What should I do with my life? Whole Lotta Love – Ike and Tina Turner
OK OK Mr iPod. I get the point. My Future=Love. A whole lot of it. Fine.

Will I ever have children? Apopse Thelo Na Pio (Tonight I Want to Drink) – Haris Alexiou
Hah! A clear indication, I think, that I am not yet ready to ponder that particular question.

What is some good advice for me? Get Down Saturday Night – Oliver Cheatham
No argument from me. I really should get out and down more.

What is my signature dancing song? I Got the Blues – Della Reese
Ha ha ha. Is this a reference to the fact that I'm a big complainer? Actually I think my signature dance song would have to be Diana Ross' 'Upside Down' - from that summer that I worked at a club and the other bargirl and I would get up on the bar to dance to it, Coyote Girls style.

What do I think my current theme song is? Summertime – Billy Stewart
Yes! Well, maybe not right this minute, given that I haven't seen daylight since last weekend (except through my office window). But am looking forward to "summertime, when the living is easy" just as soon as the holidays start!

What does everyone else think my current theme song is? Nowhere Fast – The Smiths
Oh dear. I hope not.

What type of men/women do you like? Working With Fire and Steel – China Crisis
Ahhh... no comment.

What kind of kisser are you? Crazy – Gnarls Barker
Damn straight!

What's your style? Suntoucher – Groove Armada
Not sure what style that would be, but it has a nice ring to it.

What kind of lover are you? Surround Me With Your Love – 3-11 Porter
Hmmm....

What would be playing on a first date? Not If You Were the Last Junkie On Earth – The Dandy Warhols
Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha! Depends on who the date was with, I suppose.

Where do you see yourself in 10 years? Under the Milky Way - The Church
Cool.

IT'S NOT JUST GREECE - INTERNATIONAL BUREAUCRACY SCANDAL REVEALS!

2006-06-24T21:19:00.000+03:00

This is for everyone who complains about Greek bureaucracy, and thinks it's not a problem anywhere else in the world. It's for all those foreigners who incessantly complain, and for all those Greeks who regard me dubiously when I tell them their country is not the only one with a red tape problem.

It is an e-mail my friend in Canada sent to the government office in charge of issuing drivers' licences. And if you didn't know better, you'd swear it was Greece!

Read on and you'll see...

"There are many things that I can complain about the SAAQ. Getting my first driver's license has been more trouble than it is worth. first the strike last year - occurred the day before my original written exam -after already waiting over 2 months to do that, I had to wait another 2 months. when finally I was able to write my exam it took over five hours to get through it, even though the test only took 20 minutes. I was shuffled around from one line to another - never receiving even a smile from a single employee.

my driving exam was scheduled in late April - the earliest appointment available was on June 7th. over a month and a half later! my "appointment" was for 12:10 pm. the security guard at the front door of the henri bourassa center wouldn't let me take a number until the time of my "appointment". this should not be called an "appointment for a driving exam", as you call it, rather it should be an "appointment to take a number." finally as I walked into the waiting room, almost every single employee left their windows and went off to lunch - leaving me sitting and waiting for almost two hours while employees wandered around doing nothing. why would you schedule an "appointment" in the beginning of the lunch hour? it just get things even more backlogged. ridiculous that I could see all of the employees chatting in the back room and ignoring the 300 people waiting to be served - why aren't the breaks staggered like any other place of business - you can't send all of your employees to lunch at the same time without closing the shop!!!

Finally being allowed to take my exam, and passing it, just to come back and get ANOTHER NUMBER (this being the fourth or fifth) to wait to have my photo taken. while getting my photo taken, the woman noticed an error in my address (which I had just changed with the first agent I spoke with (I wrote it down for him and he STILL didn't enter it correctly) she changed it by removing one letter from the street name (good thing she knew Decarie and how it was spelled)

finally after almost three hours (better than last year but still too long) I was free. having been given a temporary piece of paper permit and being told that I would get my license by the 16th of June. well, today is the 16th, it isn't here and the rude man that I just spoke with on the phone told me that it's MY responsibility to got BACK to the saaq AGAIN and have my picture taken again and they would mail it again AFTER that.

it is utterly ridiculous the way that I have been treated by all the employees that I have encountered at the saaq both last year and this year. the man on the phone basically called me an idiot by telling me that maybe I didn't see it in my mailbox. excuse me? I’m not blind, or I wouldn't be allowed to drive. I have a herniated disk in my lower back (partly due to sitting and waiting so long at the saaq last week) and can't even get out of bed for another week and yet, I am expected to get to the saaq before June 26th to have you take a photo that you already have on file - twice.

the service that I have received from your "company" (if only it were privatized maybe we would get some real service) is abominable, shameful, and disgusting. your employees (thanks to the union probably) lack enthusiasm and any drive to be helpful; instead they are constantly scowling at customers and treating them like they are a hassle, as if the people who pay their salaries are disturbing them somehow. and lucky me, I get to do it all over again. and if Canada post manages to lose it the next time, then it will be my fault again, and I will have to go through the process until the end of time."

Original post here.

Also see a more personal account of the ordeal here.

SUMMER IS OFFICIALLY HERE

2006-06-24T19:53:00.000+03:00

Hi faithful blog readers... if there are any left?
This is just to let you know that I have not dropped off the face of the earth, died and gone to heaven or hell, joined the trend and moved back to Canada, or any such thing. I have quite simply been:
- taking care of some mundane practical matters in my life (like the messy state of my house, the empty state of my refrigerator, and the scattered state of my brain. I guess I'm having one of those "I've got to be a responsible adult" months.)
- racing to watch seasons two and three of Six Feet Under, which we finally managed to get our hands on, before Panos leaves for Mitilini this Monday (we finished both seasons last night - yes that's 2 seasons in under a month. And I have to say we have become increasingly disappointed and disillusioned with the series as it goes on. Please, someone, does season 4 get any better? As in, does any of the black humour, focus on at least semi realistic drama, etc, come back?)
I have also more recently been:
- On a short (5 day) vacation to Sifnos last week. Which was very nice. Unfortunately, I have no pictures to share with you as the digital camera broke on the first day. Grrr. I must say though that the real pics, taken with my Exacta of course, are amazing. Maybe I'll do a brief write-up on what I though of Sifnos in the next few days. Maybe. If it rains and cools down a bit.
Which brings me to the fourth and last thing I've been doing recently: melting from the heat. I mean seriously, guys, when it's 37 degress out, who can be bothered to site on a sweaty desk chair near a box emitting even more heat, rather than just wilting somewhere on the bed? Besides, the ceiling fan (newly installed by handyman Panos!) is in the other room.

Besides that not much new. Just saw the Botero exhibit this morning, which was pretty fantastic. Oh, and yeah, I'll soon be boyfriend-less for the next month till I join him on the island in August (nothing compared to the near-3-month separation we underwent last summer!) Also am hating my job more and more with each passing day. Gotta figure out something temporary I can do until The Plan is put into effect, cause I don't know how much more I can take.
And c'est tout.

So postings to this site will most likely be fairly erratic for the summer - and non-existent in the month of August, but bear with me. We should be back up and running during the winter months!

Besides, it's SUMMER. Go OUTSIDE. You shouldn't even be online right now! Go to the sea or something. Sunbathe on your balconies! Drink frappe at an outdoor cafe! Whatever! Just get out there and enjoy yourselves!

KALO KALOKAIRI!!!!

IN WHICH WE ARE ALL RESPONSIBLE

2006-06-05T23:23:00.000+03:00

I've been reading and watching and thinking along with everyone else about that little boy, Alex, who was murdered. It truly is horrific and tragic and has made all of us stop and think - about what I'm not sure - many scattered thoughts are tossing about in my brain as I try to comprehend how children could do such a thing.
But one thought that seems to be crystallizing - at least in the posts and comments I've read - is whether or not the murder was racially motivated.
Personally, I think it more likely that Alex was murdered because (from the looks of his photo and what has been said about him) he was a sweet, sensitive, fragile little boy who wore glasses. That's all the reason kids need - kids filled with hate, that is. And if race came into it, I think it was more likely that they were trying to find a "good" reason for hating him (because it's really hard to say outright that you hate someone for being happy and good) - a reason society conveniently provided.
But there's no question that hate was the cause, and hate at that age can only come from the surroundings. In a way, the kids responsible are just as much victims as Alex; victims of a society that bred such hate and unhappiness in them that they were capable of committing this terrible act. And while it's possible that these kids would have grown up to be awful people, it's just as possible that they would have risen above their milieu. Just because you're a savage at the age of 12 or 13 doesn't mean you'll end up as one. From the kids I've observed there's a tendency when they're in packs for the worst in them to come out, the most primitive and animal. Who's to say, they might have outgrown that.
Or perhaps the enormity of what they have done will somehow shock them into realising how awful hating is; perhaps they may grow up to be decent people as a result of what they did - people who will carry with them for the rest of their lives the burden of it. Neither can I believe that they've spent the last months sleeping sweetly - if there was an adult involved, I suspect they were coerced into silence, or so terrified at the magnitude of what they'd done that they didn't know what to do, and have been wretched and terrified all these months. I'm hoping that's the case anyway, cause to believe otherwise is really to accept that mankind is evil - something I try to avoid. Even when adults are horrible, hateful and racist, I try to imagine what they might have been through that made them that way - not to excuse them necessarily, but to understand what makes them tick better, to understand better how to prevent more children from growing into people like that, and maybe even to understand how better to convince them change their minds.
So while first I mourn for Alex and his mother, I also mourn for the other kids involved, who were victims of their society and who will have a heavy burden to carry with them all their lives.

The other thought which struck me is one I encountered on Devious Diva's post on the subject - the notion that "we are all responsible, in some way, for what has happened". We are all (well, most of us) resposible because we allow this society of haters to continue unattacked. We generally don't challenge, we don't speak out, we don't try to nip hatred in the bud. Perhaps your first reaction is "that's not true, I'm always speaking out against hatred and racism." I'll be honest, it was mine. But then I realised that the people I "speak out against it" to are the already converted, or the "safe" ones; that often I won't confront the people who need to hear it most because I have too much to lose. An example:
I don't hesitate to try to convince my aunt for hours that all the thieves in Thessaloniki are not Albanians - that not all Albanians are thieves, and that Greeks commit these crimes too. This is because she is my aunt, she is sweet and goodnatured and will love me no matter what I say (and it seems it doesn't matter what I say, she stands firm in her beliefs).
But when a girl at work makes numerous slurs against Albanians (for example, when arguing with her boyfriend about his choice of hotels for their vacation she said "What am I to stay there, an Albanian?") I keep my mouth shut.
Why?
I could say to myself that she doesn't really hate Albanians, she's just using a figure of speech (though such figures of speech are the most dangerous cause they're the easiest to let slip by, and the clearest indicators of how pervasive racism is).
I could say to myself that it's a lost cause: she's not one of those people who's willing to listen to any criticism, and is likely to fly off the handle when confronted (as she did when we tried to broach with her the fact that we didn't like her constant gossiping).
But the actual fact of the matter is that I don't say anything because it would make my life difficult. Why? Because I have to sit with this girl in a room 8 hours a day, and for the most part we manage to be friendly to each other (though I think we both know we couldn't care less for each other in terms of having anything in common or anything real to say to each other) and were I to confront her, no matter how nicely or persuasively, it would create a strained atmosphere - an atmosphere I would have to live with every day.
So I grimace, with my face to the computer screen, and keep my mouth shut - a coward.
So that's how we're all to blame. By allowing these opportunities to at least try to talk to people, to try to make them change their minds (no matter how futile it seems) slip by. Through our complacency, we are to blame.
If you are one of those people who does speak up each time you hear something racist or hateful said or done (in a constructive fashion of course) then this post is obviously not directed at you. For the rest of us - myself included - I guess we'll just have to keep working at it.

MY SOUL, MY SOUL FOR A HOT SHOWER

2006-06-01T01:07:00.000+03:00

I am currently sitting here killing time while waiting for four pots of water on the stove and my kettle to boil.
Why?
Because my thermosifono has been broken for three days now and I simply CANNOT muster the courage to take YET ANOTHER freezing shower.

It was OK the first day, when it was a really hot sweaty night.
The second day I just kind of splashed some water around and called it a shower.
Today I'm seriously wondering if those people who say cold showers are good for your health are off their rockers. Do they really mean ICY cold? Or just lukewarm?
So I've run a shallow bath with cold water, and am dumping the hot water in, one pot at a time.
This might take a while. I started with one pot and the kettle... It didn't really seem to take the icy edge of at all... So now I'm waiting with all burners going full throttle...
Next thing you know the fuse will blow.

Why haven't I called a plumber?
BECAUSE MY BOYFRIEND THINKS HE CAN FIX IT HIMSELF.
What a cliche.
OK he can actually probably do it, being pretty handy, but he's currently setting up and running two shows at the theatre, and has hardly been home the last few days... so too bad for the bloody boiler.
He did call his electrician friend for advice, who asked if the little light is blinking.
Apparently not. Apparently this means that it's the thermostat that is broken. Apparently the thermostat should be really easy to replace.

Time will tell...

The leaking pipe we had a month ago was also apparently easy to fix, but apparently not so judging by the amount of grunting and swearing coming from the vicinity of the bathroom while he was fixing it.

I suppose I should be grateful to have a boyfriend who is willing and able under normal circumstances to do these things.

But right now I just want to take a HOT SHOWER.

***

UPDATE: 5 pot and 3 kettle-fulls later, and the 1/3 of the way full bath was warm... just barely.
I must conclude that this is an interesting scientific experiment exhibiting the natural tendencies of cold water to REPEL HEAT.

And if you don't approve of my scientific method, TRY IT YOURSELF! And see what conclusions you draw. Brrr.

IN WHICH I MEET THE RUDEST COUPLE ON EARTH

2006-05-31T23:18:00.000+03:00

Today, I decided "bikini-figure-be-damned" - I'm going to have an ice-cream!" So I stopped at the periptero to pick up the yummy frozen goods on my way home.
Hovering over the ice-cream fridge was a couple. By the looks of it they were in their mid-twenties. But judging by how they were acting they could have been 5 or six.
The two of them were prancing in front of the freezer, blocking access to it from all angles, while squealing delightedly and trying to decide which ice-cream flavour to get.
Now, I'm all for acting like a kid sometimes, so I smiled on them benevolently while trying to edge past and grab my tub of "Scandal Extra Gooey Caramel Nut" or whatever it's called. But as soon as I tried to dodge in to the right, there'd be an oblivious, happily shrieking body between my hand and the ice-cream. Try from the other side, same result. I felt like I was trying to get a ball into the net past the offense or something.
Finally, with great agility and perseverance, I managed to reach in and snatch my prize from behind the human wall, and went to pay. Behind me, the couple continued making a spectacle of themselves - but OK. I had my ice-cream, I was happy. I reached into my bag, pulled out some money, and went to hand it to the periptero lady.
If this was a movie, the next scene would be shot in slo-mo: my hand extending towards hers, hers towards mine, frozen in a Michelangelian pose. Then, just as she was about to grasp the dough, the couple appeared at my side and the girl proceeded to SHOVE ME out of the way, and thrust HER OWN money in the periptero lady's face, all the while screaming "Se parakalo! Emena prota! Emena! Ella, Ella, Se Parakalo!" (Please, me first! ME! Come on Please!)
The periptero lady and I stared at each other a moment, stunned, then the amazingly unphaseable woman shrugged, rolled her eyes, and gestured to ask if she could let them go first - since apparently there was no saying no to them. I shrugged back, and gestured in turn expansively in their direction (all this gesturing was necessary because making oneself heard over the girl's screeches would have been impossible).
While the obnoxious brat - ahem, sorry - girl, got her change, I just stared open-mouthed at the guy, silently asking him what the hell planet they were from. He kept right on giggling - though to give him credit his giggles did start to get a bit uncomfortable, and was I imagining that he looked a bit shame-faced?
The best part of all this was that they were in no kind of rush: after they had paid, the girl continued to look over stuff in the drinks fridge while I continued to exchange disbelieving glances with the periptero lady. (What the heck do you call the periptero people anyway? You can't call them shop assistants, cause they're not in a shop, right? Any ideas?)

Now I know a lot of you are going to be saying I should have said something to them BUT:
a) either they were on drugs (though it didn't look that way) or so ridiculously unaware and self-centered that nothing I could have said in my not-so-sophisticated Greek would have gotten through to them, and
b) doing so and getting into an argument would just have raised my blood pressure and put me in a bad mood for the rest of the day...
...so I chose to laugh it off instead.

But REALLY!!!! I'm still speechless!

IN WHICH I LEARN NOT TO COMPLAIN SO MUCH

2006-05-30T20:16:00.000+03:00

On my way back from work today I sat on the bus directly in front of two immigrants. I’m not sure where they were from, but they were communicating with each other in very broken English, so evidently not from the same country.
The woman was trying to fill in some official document, and the man was trying to explain to her how to do it: “This is for your name, this is for you passport number. Then you have to go to the police station to get it signed, then somewhere else to get it stamped…” and so on. I think we all know the steps involved in getting official documents in Greece.
So I was remembering what I had gone through to get my docs when I first got here – barely speaking any Greek at the time – and what a hair-pulling, nerve racking hassle it had been. And I had had GREEK people helping me. Greek people who not only knew the system perfectly, but also spoke my language and were able to explain everything clearly.
Listening to these two people struggling to figure out what the hell they were supposed to be doing, I suddenly felt ashamed for the amount of moaning I had done when going through the same crap. I can only imagine that what they go through is at least 100 times worse than what I did – not only do they have more papers to get, they have no one to show them the ropes thoroughly, and are likely to be treated with a lot more disrespect and impatience than I was by the public employees.
I really don’t know how they manage it, but they have my respect for their courage and determination.

A CASE OF MISTAKEN IDENTITY

2006-05-29T00:05:00.000+03:00

On Saturday night I went over to my cousin's house to celebrate her having gotten a new job. (Here's hoping this one is better than the last few!) I passed through Syntagma to get there, where they're selling lovely plants and flowers at the moment (and I heard that sometime in the next few days they'll be giving them away free!!! Can it be true? I must get myself down there to check it out as I'm busy filling up my balcony to capacity with greenery at the moment, and a few free plants wouldn't hurt.)
Anyway, I picked up a couple of pots of pretty flowers for her as she'd been saying that she'd like to get a few; her one plant, a jasmine given to her by her grandmother, hadn't fared too well over the winter.

When she saw the plants, she continued telling me her jasmine saga: it being pretty much dead, she had cut it back down to soil level in the hopes that it would grow again. And sure enough, something had sprouted - but to the side, not out of the main stem. However, something wasn't right with the newly growing jasmine plant... she wasn't sure what, but she couldn't get it to wrap around the trellis, and it didn't have many leaves. Her sister had even come over to have a look, and had proclaimed that the jasmine would be fine, but my cousin wasn't so sure.
Intrigued, I went out on the balcony to have a look.
"But... where is the jasmine?" I asked.
"Right there," my cousin replied, pointing to the long green stalks coming out of the pot and looking at me as though I was blind.
I walked over for a closer look... already trying to hold back my laughter.
"See," she said. "Here's the old stem, and this is the new growth which has come up. But it just won't stick to the trellis. Can you tell why?"

"Well," I replied. "It could be because what you have growing here is a very fine specimen of GRASS, with some clover thrown in for good measure!" Yes, ladies and gentlemen, the so-called jasmine was in fact some very long, wild grass - the kind with the feathery tufts on top. And my cousin was complaining of allergies... wonder why!
Anyway, after much mirth on my part, and embarassment on hers, the death of the jasmine was mourned over a bottle of wine.
Bad luck for the grass, which had been enjoying frequent watering, love and attention, and will now be promptly uprooted!

A REALLY FUN SITE

2006-05-22T23:53:00.000+03:00

Am I a real geek, or is this a really fun site?

Watch the movie I made here. I'm sure it'll win best foreign film at the next Oscars.

Share your masterpieces in the comments!

IF I HEAR THE "E" WORD ONE MORE TIME I'M GOING TO THROW SOMETHING

2006-05-22T22:11:00.000+03:00

OK so on Saturday I joined most people in watching Eurovision.

We laughed, we cried (if we were Anna Vissi anyway), and we were fairly well entertained.

But then, on Sunday, I wanted to do nothing, take a day off and doss about in front of the TV.

Unfortunately, it seemed that on every single channel all one could find were panels of talking heads discussing WHY IT WAS THAT GREECE CAME 9th.

And not one person had the courage to come out and say - "Hey, maybe it was because the song sucked?'

Yeah, Greece loves you Anna.

But really, enough already. Please. Cause if I hear the word Eurovision one more time....

THE VILLAGE VS. THE CITY

2006-05-18T02:42:00.000+03:00

OK, Seawitch’s post “Waiting” has finally inspired me to put my nose to the grindstone, gather my notes, double check a few sources, dust off the keyboard, and write: THE VILLAGE VS. THE CITY. Seawitch, this post is dedicated to you!

First instalment: The Village. Wait – what’s that you say? What are my qualifications? How can I claim to be an authority on village life? Well, actually I can’t, having only really lived in a village full-time for a year. But being the avid observer of society that I am, or think I am, it was enough – or at least it’ll have to do. So, let's get started then, shall we?

Having just finished university and needing some time to chill out, de-stress, reflect, meditate on life, and all that stuff that recent graduates feel compelled to do, I went and stayed with my father, stepmother and two half brothers (who, since the last time I’d seen them two years previously, had exploded into fully grown, larger than life teenagers) in my “home village” of Molivos/Mythimna, on the spectacular island of Lesvos. I arrived in November, and left the following October, for Athens, just one month shy of a year.

SO, YOU THINK YOU WANT TO LIVE IN A VILLAGE...
The number one complaint of those who live in villages is that there is nothing to do in winter. And rather than try and convince you otherwise, let me tell you exactly how I passed the wintry months there, and let you decide for yourselves.
Days were spent in quiet contemplation – or in building my dream house on the Sims deluxe edition – and evenings were spent huddled round the kerosene stove, reading or having inspiring conversations with my stepmother. Believe me, we figured out how to solve the world’s problems many times over that winter – and more! Alternatively, if there was a good film on telly, we’d all gather round to watch. We also all, as a family, became incredibly addicted to the first season of Six Feet Under, which I’d brought with me on DVD, and, when there was a power failure (which is often on Lesvos), we’d assemble around the old, large scarred table which dominates the main room and play board games like Trivial Pursuit.

I also had plenty of time to try my hand at cooking various dishes – sometimes to the satisfaction of the critics, sometimes not (my dad just can’t understand what is pleasurable about vegetables that have not been cooked to death, and then cooked some more, so Chinese stir-fries were not always met with favourable reviews) and attended various courses – Greek and photography lessons organised by the dimos and “dancercise” classes offered by a long-time ex-pat. I also toyed with the idea of joining the “Carnival committee” and helping to build the floats for the parade, which looked like a lot of fun if a bit kitch, but, unfortunately, the times they met conflicted with my scheduled English lessons.

These English lessons were a bit of work I’d picked up upon arriving, in order to have some pocket money on hand, and were a nice slice of enforced order on my otherwise haphazard days. They were also a great source of exercise! Twice a week I would make the trek into the village from our country house, a 15 minute’s walk away. I’d then schlep up numerous flights of steep, worn cobblestone steps to the castle, and enjoy an hour or so with two eager Bulgarian teenagers. Then it was back down the steps, and another fifteen minutes walk into the country in a different direction, for a lesson with a bright and winsome, though lazy, 12 year-old, who had the curious habit of replacing every verb in the English language with the word ‘take’ – perfectly conjugated of course. Then back into the village, towards the harbour, and up an incredibly steep street to the last lesson of the day – my least favourite – with a psychotic 7 year-old who, though he jumped for joy each time I came and sulked when I left, would spend the entire lesson trying to stab me with a pencil or scattering my materials across the room. Needless to say, my thigh muscles have never been so sculpted, and the steep streets of the village, which had at first left me gasping for breath, were soon overcome as I galloped my way happily up and down them.

If I was in the mood for a night on the town, we’d meander over to the small but cosy Manda bar, one of two places open in winter, and have a quiet drink to the reggae tunes emanating from the oh-so-high-tech tape deck. Or, for more high energy action, I’d join my brothers at Nuevo, the main teenage hangout, and get down to some Skilathika (and if you tell a soul about that I’ll have to kill you!). When I got really bored, I even attended some meetings of the dimos (municipality), of which my father is minister of the environment, and though I couldn’t really follow the proceedings, everybody seemed be terribly enthusiastic about the issues being debated, judging at least by the amount of shouting going on. And of course following these meetings, over lunch, we’d all hash out what had been said, and update each other on all the village news and gossip.

My father being a huge nature/environment buff, there were also a great many excursions out into the wilderness: to cut down a Christmas tree (only one growing right next to another tree, which would therefore not survive on its own, would do), to collect mushrooms and then, later, wild asparagus. Excursions to the hot baths were also organised, and trips up into the mountains to eat at poli paradosiaka tiny village tavernas. Or, often, I'd just set off for a walk into the strangely green (I'm used to seeing them in shades of ochre and rust) fields, camera in hand, snapping shots of curiously formed bifurcating olive trees and crumbling dwellings, and soaking up the gorgeous nature and wildlife.

If all this sounds like heaven to you, then move to a village, now! If it sounds like the 10th level of boredom, you’re probably better off sticking to the city.

NOT ALL A WALK IN THE PARK...
For me, at that time, it was heaven. Whether it would have continued to be heaven year after year is hard to say: it was not all quite as idyllic as I make it sound - the reason we huddled around the stove was because it gets bloody cold there in winter without central heating, and the howling winds and trips up and down the muddy path to the house sometimes got a bit much. Similarly, the frequent power failures (and the tendency of everything else to break down frequently – and take ages to fix) would have become nerve-racking after a point. And the problems being debated at the dimos meetings were serious in nature – ranging from garbage disposal issues (every year, in August, the dump catches fire and spreads noxious black fumes over the area), to arsonists setting fire to large chunks of forest so as to build on the land, to people pushing for (horrible) measures which would allow more cars to pass through the village… and other matters concerning the constant desecration of traditional life, the struggle to preserve of the look and spirit of village and the areas surrounding it – all a losing battle in the face of the money to be made from cheap, poor-quality tourism.

Then there were the courses – attended more in the interests of getting out of the house than in the hope of learning anything. Needless to say, they were terrible – the photography class, especially, I could have taught better than the camera salesman they’d managed to round up for the job. The dancercise lessons were nice, but following them we’d usually go for an ouzo and mezedes, which meant several hours of listening to 50 year-old and up ex-pats moan on about how horrible Greece is. Greek language lessons were also followed by similar ouzo sessions, but at least the people there were less negative (being recent arrivals, and thus still enamoured of their adopted country) and, generally, more interesting.

This, of course, highlights another of the main problems encountered in village life: there is not a huge selection of people to socialise with, and often you are stuck hanging out with people to whom you would not normally give the time of day. If there is one person in the village whose company you actually enjoy, and with whom you have real things in common, you can count yourself lucky. The rest of the time, either out of desperation, or to be polite, you just go along with the crowd and manufacture things you can all talk about.

Why be polite? you may ask. Well, because in a village with a population of 1000 people, max, and three places to go out to, having enemies is something you want to avoid at all costs. If you have had a falling out with someone, you will run into them continuously, everywhere you go, and so you will either be forced to put your misunderstandings aside, if possible, or, when not possible, look through said person as though they are air. Which is a rather strange and awkward thing to have to do, is it not?

And since everybody knows everybody, lines are soon drawn delineating whose side you’re on in other people’s battles, so you get sucked into these things even if you, personally, couldn’t care less, and find yourself giving the cold shoulder to people who’ve never personally done you wrong. Or, worse, you walk into a taverna full of people you drank and ate with just the other week, and are conspicuously not invited to join the party. In short, there’s no such thing as neutrality in the village – or at least it’s nigh on impossible to maintain. People living within shouting distance of each other are sure to have interpersonal issues, and, at some point or other, you too will become involved - don't kid yourself.

These enmities occur because in a small place, with not much to do, people pass most of their time gossiping about each other. So you hear from so-and-so that someone has called you, say, the biggest slut on earth, and are then faced with two choices: pretend you never found out and greet that person cheerily every time you see them, or make them your enemy. This of course means that, often, you are pressured into being friendly with people who you not only have nothing in common with, but whom you think are the scum of the earth and would rather be sending death glares.
Get the point?

But if you find a way around the gossip problem, and find one or two good people to pass the time with, you’re set for the winter. Basically, for lack of anything to do, you make your own fun, sort of like the pilgrims, and often this turns out to be more fun than more orchestrated and pre-coordinated forms of entertainment.
I can honestly say that in my year in the village I was never once truly bored.

WHEN THE MOUNTAIN COMES TO MOHAMMED...
But what happens when the winter is over? Everyone has just spent the season moaning about how dead it is, then suddenly, with the arrival of the summer months, the village is crammed with tourists, xeni, and everyone starts moaning all over again about how busy and crowded it is. And rightly so. Driving anywhere becomes a nightmare as you must navigate past gaggles of tourists (who apparently don’t have cars where they come from) and all your favourite, quiet haunts are suddenly invaded by them. On the beach to which you have been coming with your dog to enjoy moments of solitude, you are suddenly confronted by obnoxious German tourists telling you how unhygienic it is to bring animals to the beach and that they’ll report you to the authorities. Your ears are filled with inane chatter every which way you turn (“Oh! What a nice castle! It’ll be great when they finish building it!” and “Hey – this doesn’t look like Portugal… Where are we?) and the balmy, jasmine scented evenings are shattered by the sound of music and revellers from the open-air bar. For a young person, it’s actually pretty fun (like I need to tell you that!) and teasing the tourists (or in the case of my brothers, doing their best to pick them up) is always good for a laugh. But for those who came to the village to find peace and quiet it can get trying.

Then autumn comes, which is a lovely time of year weather-wise, but also a melancholy one because, as the tourists fly out, shops close, and the village slowly empties of life, you realise you were just getting used to the hustle and bustle, and suddenly everything feels dead, devoid of life, and you start looking to the winter with apprehension, wondering what you’re going to do all these months with nothing open and no one to talk to.
And so on, the cycle repeats itself.

THE PROOF IS IN THE PUDDING...
My mother couldn’t hack it. After 7 years of collapsing roofs and errant plumbers, she’d had enough and called it quits.

My stepmother has kept going now for 20+ years, and loved almost every minute of it. But, with my brothers grown and flying the coop, and with many of the close friends, whose company she relied on, spending more and more of their winters abroad, she is finding herself a bit at loose ends. With nothing constructive to do with her time she is, herself, trying to get away as often as possible to Athens, England, or Dubai (where her brother lives).

The other ageing ex-pats I know are doing like-wise. After years of contented life in the village, they are now getting the inescapable urge to pick up and leave, and go somewhere with a bit more life and culture.
Strange how, as all these people have gotten older, the quiet life which suited them when they were young is no longer enough. With each passing winter, they’re feeling the call of the city ever more strongly. Isn’t it supposed to be the other way round?

TO BE CONTINUED...
But anyhow, next up, the place they are all flocking to: the grand and the glorious, the stinky and filthy, the, to quote Devious Diva, “small and horrible and great and secretive and special and disgusting and wild and unpleasant and wonderful and surprising and different” city, Athens.

2 DEGREES OF SEPARATION FROM JON STEWART... SORT OF

2006-05-07T20:39:00.000+03:00

So my friend Liz went to New York and got to go see the Daily Show and sat 10 feet away from Jon Stewart and I'm insanely jealous.

Read about it here.

PUPPY GIVEAWAY!!! YOU COULD OWN A CUTE, HELPLESS, HOMELESS PUPPY!!!

2006-05-07T00:09:00.000+03:00

On a more serious note: My cousin found two puppies last week and needs to find a home for them.
She was walking her dog late at night when she came across a box in the middle of the street. And in the box were two adorable puppies. So of course she brought them home with her.
She's taken the puppies to the vet and they've had all their shots and received a clean bill of health.
The puppies are 3 months old, and probably a cross between a German Shephard and a Collie.
So if you have a big house, yard, farm, etc. (cause they'll be big dogs), please, take pity!!! They're really, really cute. And homeless. And someone just dumped them. They'd probably make great sheep dogs!
Contact me via e-mail (link top right below my profile).

The really ridiculous thing is that all she's gotten from her entire family is flack for taking them in! They're all making her feel bad, telling her it wasn't her problem and she should have ignored them!!! Now, I really don't understand this behaviour. If you don't have the guts to do the right thing yourself, don't make others feel bad for doing it! Like having to mop up puppy pee isn't enough of a challenge (two puppies = a lot of pee - but she's working on getting them house-trained), to have to deal with unsympathetic family members as well is too much! (And no, she's not sharing accomodations with any of them).

And lastly, to the people who dump their dogs and cats like that: SHAME ON YOU YOU HEARTLESS BRUTES LEAVING PUPPIES TO DIE AND FORCING OTHER PEOPLE TO CLEAN UP YOUR MESS!!! GET YOUR DOG NEUTERED OR SPAYED, OR FIND GOOD HOMES FOR THE PUPPIES THAT WILL RESULT. TAKE SOME RESPONSIBILITY FOR YOUR ACTIONS!!!

I'M BACK

2006-05-06T21:35:00.000+03:00

Hi all, I'm back.
In case you hadn't noticed I was gone, I was away for easter over... well, easter, and returned to a.) tax time looming ahead (don't ask - usual hassle over getting required veveosi from bank) and b.) a big pile of dog poo at work that required lots of overtime and such... including woking from home the entire trimero. This whole job thing is getting rather tiresome. When is my grade 11 (last year of high-school in Quebec) art teacher's prediction for my future going to come true???
Curious? This is what he predicted:
The last day of class, he told everyone what they would be when they grew up - he was kind of an eccentric ex-hippy guy. Anyway, around the class he went - you'll be a graphic designer, you'll be an architect, you'll be a this and a that, and when he got to me he said... "You... you're going to marry a Greek millionaire and live on top of a mountain in Greece and paint all day." At the time I was insulted, but now that real life has reared its ugly head I must admit the idea is growing increasingly attractive by the day.
ANYWAY that's OK I don't need a millionaire. I've got my own plan to escape from the drugery of the 9 to 5 - or 8... or 10... or even 10:30 when the secretaries start calling me up and telling me to leave or they'll lock me in - grind.
Yes I know I've been keeping you all on tenterhooks since my last post about just what this plan is. Ha ha.
(Thanks all for your comments and support by the way. I'll get around to answering at some point when I'm not as lazy as I am now.)
But you'll have to remain breathless for a while longer. All the details aren't yet worked out and I don't want to broadcast something that just aint going to happen. Or maybe I'm just sadistic.
However, my time away at easter was well spent back in the horio, doing a study of all the minutae of village life, that you may all benefit from my experiences there. Based on my tireless and selfless research, I am now preparing a brilliant sequal in what has become known around the Net as the "V.S." series. It will be called BIG CITY BLUES vs. THE VACUOUS VILLAGE.
Sorry. See. Too much work and stress makes me vent through ridiculous, and probably highly unamusing, sarcasm. Therefore someone should offer me a better job in order to stop me from writing this kind of drivel. But seriously now, I am writing up a little post on the subject - as it seems to be one of interest to everyone, with strong feelings on both sides... patience please, it's simmering away in there.
In the meantime: two things I have been doing to de-stress at the end of each long day, which you, my fellow bloggers, may enjoy.
The first, in fact, should immediately be added to your REQUIRED READING list, if you haven't read it already. It is called EURYDICE STREET, by Sofka Zinovieff, a British anthropologist who married a Greek and (after living in MOSCOW - !) moved with her husband to Athens when he was transferred here. Not only will ex-pats identify with much of what she goes through adjusting to life here, everyone (including native Athenians) will learn a lot about Athens, or at least get a new perspective on the city. And never fear, though Zinovieff doesn't shy from discussing the problems she encounters, she doesn't fall into the trap of "Greek bashing" either - extra brownie points from me.
The only criticism I have of the book is that the couple are wealthier than average (her husband is a foreign minister) and her experiences may not be entirely representative of the average ex-pat's - they live by the beach in Vouliagmeni, and think nothing of socialising with a Papandreou and the likes of Koulouglou (from Reporters Without Borders - gasp! I really admire that guy, and got a thrill when I realised who she was having coffee with!) Anyway, I'll stop before I get too book-review-y and bore everyone to death. Here's a real review. (Btw the book is also available in Greek.)
The second mode of entertainment I discovered are three games in a series called Hapland which I think are just really cute and whimsical - not to mention tough. If you don't resort to walkthroughs they'll take you hours, if not days to complete. I cheated, I must admit, but to deter others from doing the same, here's some useful info that might have helped me not give up so soon (it'll make sense once you see the game):
- The torches are those little bracket things over the archways.
- It's not enough to click on things in the right order - you have to click on some things simultaneously as well.
- Little round green things are grenades. You can throw them. Where you are standing and which arrows you click will determine where they are thrown.
- Try to see where the beginning must be, then determine where you want to end up, and what is standing in your way. Then, using logic (and trial and error) figure out how to remove the roadblocks and set everything up so everyone and everything is where it needs to be for the finale - like a complicated piece of disassembled machinery.
- Lastly, as the instructions say, click on EVERYHING, in different sequences and combinations, until some things start to happen that make sense. Then try to string these events together in an order that works, based on your observations from the point above.
Good luck!
And with some luck on my part, I'll soon have enough time and energy to write something with a bit more substance... Here's hoping anyway.

FAREWELL O ATHENS OF MY HEART... I WISH

2006-04-13T21:42:00.000+03:00

I don't know about everyone else, but between the mounds of stinky garbage that are slowly consuming our fair city, the summery weather (which only serves to remind us that we could be lying on a beach somewhere), and the resulting increase in surliness one is encountering on the streets these days, I think it's about time to get the heck out of Dodge, don't you?

I mean, really, what is it that keeps everyone flocking to the big city? Is it the jobs? Cause, last time I checked, they were kind of in short supply. Is it the access to culture? If so, why is theatre, cinema and so on in decline? Does your family live here? Get them to move somewhere else with you. It shouldn't take too much convincing.

Why don't we all pack our bags and go harvest olives, peaches and ouzo on some gorgeous, sun-drenched island? Live the simple life. Drink and swim and laze and soak up the sun all day. Was it not, after all, the image of the sun-drenched island that captured our fancy and enamoured us of Greece in the first place?

I, for one, am currently planning my escape. It'll be tough. It'll be dangerous. It might even be painful. But I know for a fact that I will not live in this city forever. (More on my grand escape scheme another day... it's still in the works, though slowly coming together.)

Don't get me wrong. I am not normally among the Athens Haters. As those of you who have read my blog fairly regularly may have gathered, I actually find it an eternally fascinating city, full of spontaneous drama and hidden beauty.

So when I go, I'll make sure I have easy access to a quickie back in Athens every now and then, for when allure of sleepy island life wears thin and the big city clamours ever louder in my imagination.

But right now, in reality, the clamour of the city is getting to be a bit much.

A semi-irrelevant anecdote:
I was walking to work this morning, alternately beaming with pleasure and grimacing in horror as conflicting wafts of jasmine and putrefying garbage were blown my way, with my arms crossed across my chest cause it was a bit chilly. From the opposite direction came an decrepit, toothless old man. A few meters before our paths crossed, he started blabbering and gesticulating wildly in my direction.
Eventually I made out that he was telling me to uncross my arms. In fact, he seemed positively infuriated by my arms crossed position.
Yet another soul lost to the madness of city life? Or was I breaking some ancient Greek canon I've never heard of? (Or, though this is really stretching it, was he angered by the fact that I was denying him a view of my breasts?)

I continued on my way, dazed, murmuring over and over under my breath: "Oh, it's off to the island I go, I go! It's off to the island I go!"

like we didn't know it already but... SOME PEOPLE ARE SO DUMB!

2006-04-10T23:25:00.001+03:00

HA HA HA HA HA ha ha ha ha...
*GASP*
HA HA HA HA HA HAHAHAHAHAHHAHA
*GASP*
HA. HA HA. hah.
(deep breath)
Sorry I just discovered this gem of a site.
The posts are funny enough, but even better are the comments from the people who don't realise that it's satire.
HA HA HA HA HA HA HA
Sorry I can't stop laughing.
Some people are so dumb.
Oh gosh.

WARNING: WHAT FOLLOWS IS A SEVERE CASE OF THE BIRTHDAY BLUES

2006-04-09T20:53:00.000+03:00

Well today was my first full day as a twenty-six year old.
I spent it emptying ashtrays and mopping up alcohol from my coffee table.
Hopefully not a omen for the year to come!
Suddenly I understand why most Greeks prefer to rent a table at a bouzouki joint for their birthdays.
Sorry this is just the hangover speaking. To clarify: it was my birthday yesterday, and to celebrate I had a house party, which was lovely, and I had a great time, and got to see a lot of my favourite people that I see only too rarely, and enjoyed myself thoroughly. Couldn't have asked for a better birthday!
Generally I love having house parties, even if what follows isn't so nice, and for years I never had the luxury of celebrating my birthday properly cause it always coincided exactly with exam time, so I'm making up for it now.
However, after my distinctly teen-aged behaviour last night, I am pondering what exactly it means to be 26.
I am one of those people that never really got over being a teenager; it was such a wild, exciting, new time, filled with melancholia and depression of course, but made up for by moments of extreme joy, and by the fact that everything was so VIVID (and no, it wasn't drugs talking...)
So, while I stopped acting like a teenager a long time ago (I think when I moved out on my own at 18 or so) I still think of myself as one in my head: that is, I sneer at the typical "adult" dreams of having a home, husband, mortgage, stable job, nice things, kids, etc... I find more clothes I like at teen stores like Bershka than... well I wouldn't know cause I've never set foot in a posh "grown-up" store - for one thing cause my wallet doesn't support it... my idea of the perfect vacation is backpacking around with no plan and no money.... I think it's important to be informed about all the shit going on in the world, and to maintain crazy idealistic theories on how to fix it, and so on. Yet more and more my life is starting to resemble the grown up vision which I so dread. No matter how hard I insist that "I don't wanna grow up" I see it happening, slowly but surely.
I read a great passage in a book by Stephen Fry once - I can't remember if was in his autobiography, or in the highly autobiographical "The Liar", but, as a teenager, he wrote himself a letter to be opened when he reached his thirties. The letter said something to the effect of: "Everything you are now is a lie. Everything you used to be, when you wrote this letter, was true and beautiful, and even as you laugh and try to dismiss yourself as a silly teenager, remember that THIS IS THE REAL YOU SPEAKING, and who you are now is a FAKE."
OK anyone who's read the book will know I'm paraphrasing horribly, but that's the essence of what he had to say which has stuck with me for yers, and which I have always tried to live by - that is, I have tried my best not to become a materialistic, consumeristic, self-obsessed, satiated, self-satisfied, COMPLACENT, happy, stable person.
Such people, I fear, don't THINK. They don't care about anything besides themselves, or about any issues except those which might affect their finances.
Yet here I am. I own a house which I have spent time and money making beautiful. My wardrobe is slowly morphing into something halfway-decent and mature looking. I have started wearing real perfume. People have stopped telling me a look 16, and instead are telling me I look my age. I have a 9-5 office job sitting in front of a computer (which I always SWORE I would rather kill myself than have) and I am too addicted to my reasonably fat (by Greek standards) paycheck to find the courage and leave and chase down something I might like doing better. My friends all get tired and want to go home by 3 in the morning, and prefer listening to jazz and having conversations than getting crazy listening to Guns N' Roses.
Next thing you know I'll be going to the gym every day, want to own an expensive new car (then sell it in a year), spend 3/4 of my paycheck on ridiculous designer clothes, and start talking about which new mobile phone kicks the most ass and what Anna Vissi has been up to lately. Then I'll decide I must have kids by the time I'm thrity, and get sucked up into some kind of ridiculous church wedding, white dress and all (puke!).
Oh god, I'm depressing myself!
Now I know that there are alternative ways to grow up (or not grow up) to this. But I have never been an especially radical or a strong person, and have always had to fight really hard to avoid the mainstream current I'm surrounded by. OK maybe in my head I'll never be that shallow, but I fear that pretty soon my life is gonna start looking that way.
Part of what is seriously freaking me out is that my boyfriend, who is thirty, grew up in a small town on an island, and while he is by no means a small-minded, small town boy, he does have some extremely (by my standards) conservative attitudes. (Don't tell anyone, especially not my dad who is a fervent Synaspismos supporter, but he and his family vote NEO DEMOKRATIA. Shudder.) Moreover, all his thirty-something friends from the island have gotten engaged/married in the last year, and are busy doing their best role-playing perfect grown up couples. And while my boyfriend doesn't want this himself, just having to socialise on occasion with these people makes me gag. I'm not saying there's anything wrong with them necessarily, it's just not me, and I'm thrust into playing that role when I'm with them - and just the proximity to that kind of people makes me nervous. Cause what if it is me in 4 years? And what if close proximity every day to someone who wears dress shirts, shows me glossy brochures for travel resorts saying "Isn't this nice?", and likes fancy new cars, changes me? Well of course it will. It already has.
Sorry, I'm rambling and going round in circles here, so I'll end it now. No conculsion. Evidence inconclusive. To be determined post mortem.
Oh dear, better to not mix drinks next time I think!

HANDS OFF!

2006-04-03T22:42:00.000+03:00

You know what pisses me off? The fact that suddenly, now that blogs are really trendy, all these CORPORATIONS are getting one. It seems that every commercial web page, from news sites to recipe collections, have a blog or editor's blog.

Now, as far as I've understood them, blogs are there so that average, real people, who don't have the luxury of owning a WHOLE SITE and making money off it, can air their views. It's a great form of alternative media, a case of citizens taking a primarily commercial medium and using it to their own ends.

And now, of course, the mainstream is trying to CO-OPT it for themselves. As always happens: whenever an underground movement really takes off and the mainstream media can't subdue it, they try to change it to fit their mold.

Well, sorry guys, it won't work this time, cause we're not going to read your stupid blogs, are we? As if you have anything intersting to say that hasn't been approved by your corporate sponsors and double-checked by your lawyers! And we'll continue to write whatever we want on our blogs, spreading whichever message we choose to spread, whether informative, radical, alternative, activist, or just plain funny!

So there!

JUST ANOTHER SATURDAY

2006-04-01T22:58:00.000+03:00

Well, another Saturday has passed over a bottle of ouzo - only today it was really SUMMERY outside, and thus a million times better than last. (For those of you reading this from Montreal and going on about how nice the weather is there, I'll have you know it was WELL into the 20's today. Ahhh.) I got a real kick from watching all the tourists who've suddenly invaded our city. There I am, still wearing a jacket etc., and they're wandering around the city (always with a really lost/helpless expression) sporting tank tops, sunhats and sunburns. OK, the weather's been nice, but surely not hot enough for sunburns??!!??
Anyway I discovered two really nice places to go out. One was called GLIKI - somewhere in some not-crowded backstreet of plaka, a kind of funky but non pretentious mezedopoleio. Great food, great atmosphera, a little of the beaten path. Perfect. Sorry I can't tell you all where it is cause those twisty Plaka streets really throw me for a loop and I'll be hard-pressed to find it again on my own. Then we went to a little bar in Exharia, and the drinks and conversation continued... till now.
The only problem with these afternoon drinking sessions is that I really don't have the energy to then go out at night. The fact that I'm not nineteen is starting to show, I think, at least internally. So instead I'm sitting here listening to all this goth/techno/dance music my little brother dumped on my computer off his portable hard drive, getting a real kick out of it. Currently playing song has the lyric "clone your lover". Ummm yeah. What can I say, it reminds me of my youth. Nothing like a bit of Covenant blasting through your headphones to clear the ouzo haze. Maybe I will go out after all!

DOCTOR PANTS DOWN LOOKED ROOM

2006-03-23T22:35:00.000+02:00

Allow me to join the trend of posting about the searches people have done which have led them to our blogs. (There's a bit of a thrill in checking out other people's searches - it's like peeking inside their brains, isn't it?)
Along with the to be expected google searches for: "canadian citizen living in Athens Greece" and so forth, I got the following:

a voice thing when pou type it it talk about the thing s you typing

... I don't know what to tell this person. Maybe to do a search for 'a brain thing when you think it it help you make sense about the things you thinking'

AND (most mystifying of all):

doctor pants down looked room

OK I'm stumped. Was he looking for porn??? Was she molested by her doctor and looking for a support group??? What???!

COULD SOMEONE TELL ME PLEASE WHEN THE COOKING GENE KICKS IN?

2006-03-23T21:19:00.000+02:00

We've been talking, the last few days at work, about cooking. Not the most scintillating of subjects perhaps, but our conversation has revolved around the fact that most of us seem entirely incapable of bringing our own homemade lunches to work, and on just why this is the case.
How is it that we’ve become such a lazy, shameful, fast-food/take-out generation?
If it weren’t for the rather limited fast food options immediately available to us within a 2 block radius - Goodies, Pita tou Papou, and Everest – we’d be lost. And those few of us who do manage to bring homemade lunches are regarded with bewilderment and something approaching awe.

Don't get me wrong: I love food, and I love to cook - in theory at least. That is to say, when I have a special occasion for which to labour, and the luxury of having the entire day to do it. And I've been told (OK, no false modesty here, I know) that I'm a damn good cook. …Perhaps I should have more dinner parties.
But, truth be told, on a regular basis I am something of a sporadic chef. I'll manage to whip up at least 3 decent meals a week for about a month, then go almost two months more without so much as lifting a ladle or lid. The sad fact of the matter is that the buzz I get from crafting a creative, original, delectable meal fades when it is required of me daily. After 8 hours of work, no less.

My boyfriend is not much help either when it comes to my dilemma. No, he’s not a typical Greek man; he's a whiz with the iron and the laundry machine, and does his fair share of dishwashing and tidying up. But food and cooking, alas, just don't interest him very much. He is strictly a meat and potatoes (well, bread since this is Greece) kind of guy. Anything resembling a fruit, vegetable, bean or lentil is immediately suspect and unappetizing. Not to mention anything which is just a little bit spicy - even ordinary pepper is too much for him! (I have trouble understanding why he isn't suffering from a serious vitamin deficiency and languishing, sallow and weak, on the couch all day, but anyway.)
Needless to say, this doesn't provide me with much incentive to cook anything nice or different. When I do, he just won't eat it. Which is fine by him (he prefers souvlaki from the place downstairs over just about anything anyway) but not much fun for me. After all, what is a cook without an audience?

The other major roadblock to my cooking consistently is what must come before the cooking can begin, namely grocery shopping. It has always been something that I've disliked intensely. Moreover, I have never gotten the knack of buying really useful food. What I mean is that, though I may buy an entire shopping cart (worth 100 euros) full of food, once we get home and put it all away I am suddenly confronted by the fact that there is nothing to eat! I'm not sure how this is possible, or what food-stealing elves may be hiding in my cupboards and refrigerator, but still it remains the case. Perhaps it's that I’ve bought nothing quick to eat. But then, if I decide to cook something “real” and substantial, it seems I don't have any of the necessary ingredients for anything!

I know the solution to all my woes, of course. All I have to do is sit down once a week, search the site epicurious.com for 5 inspiring recipes or so, and base my week's shopping list on that.
Yeah right! I'm afraid that that level of organisation and forethought is quite beyond me.

What I want to know, though, is when the grown up gene will kick in? After all, I don't imagine that our parents were born knowing how to meal-plan, shop and cook. They must have learned at some stage though because, by the time they had us, they had managed to get it together and plunk down three square meals a day.
But I just don't see that ever happening to me, and the years are ticking by ever more quickly. Do you have to have kids for this mysterious cooking gene to start working? Or does it automatically activate once you've reached a certain age? If so, what age exactly would that be?

Please let me know, cause I don’t wanna be a fast-food girl no more!

VINDICATED!!!!

2006-03-19T02:43:00.000+02:00

When I told everyone about the hell I went through to get my health book at my local IKA office, everyone looked at me kind of askance, as though I was making the whole thing up. Apparently, not all IKA offices are as bad as mine - most people went once, waited an hour or so max (and complained mightily about it), and that was that.
I, on the other hand, made a total of FOUR trips to my IKA office (IKA Patission) before I got the book. The first time I showed up at 11. OK that was overly optimistic. They had, of course, stopped giving out numbers. So the second time I got there at 8:30. The place only opens at 8:30, for god's sake! After stopping to ask for some information, I got to the correct floor at quarter to 9.
They had stopped giving out numbers.
Ahem.
OK, so I went back a third time, arriving at ten to eight.
I got a number! Number ONE HUNDRED AND EIGHTY ONE.
And remember, this is FORTY minutes before the place even OPENS.
So the guy "organising" everyone told us to go away and come back in a couple of hours. "OK, that's not too bad," I thought to myself. "At least we don't have to sit in there for ages while waiting."
So off we went, sat and drank coffee in a dismal cafe for a couple of hours, and returned at 10 expecting to served.
On the number display board was an evily red-glowing number ONE.
"How is this possible? What's going on?" we inquired. Turned out the computers were down, so they hadn't opened yet. And no, they didn't know when the computer would go back on, but anyway, my number 181 wouldn't get me to a wicket before the place closed. Right. Might I add that I was losing time off work to do all this? I was starting to wonder if it was all worth it...
So the FOURTH time, I showed up at QUARTER PAST SEVEN. The lineup already stretched two blocks from the front door.
At quarter to eight, they started letting people in a few at a time. By the time my turn came round, I ended up with number TWO HUNDRED AND ELEVEN. OK. This time I was determined to stick it out. I sat down on the filthy IKA stairs in the hallway (the tiny waiting room was jam-packed with smelly humanity) and proceeded to read my way through an entire book, popping up periodically and futiley to see how we were doing.
There were three wickets open for all these hundreds of people.
The numbers advanced all too slowly.
Finally, at A QUARTER TO ONE, my number came up, and I was shortly and uneventfully(thank god) the proud owner of a drab health book, printed on cheap, chewed-up looking paper. I had never in my life felt so ecstatic to hold something in my hands. If I have a child one day, after I've given birth and am handed my baby, I think I will feel something approaching the happiness I felt, holding that damn book.
OK, don't believe me? Think it can't have been QUITE so bad, that I'm exaggerating? Well, I have news for you my friend, literally. The other day, while flicking channels, I came upon a piece on the MEGA evening news about - you guessed it - IKA Patission, and what a truly abysmal, impossible, ridiculous branch it is. I cheered and danced up and down as the pictures of what had been my private hell flashed onscreen, and laughed at the disgruntled old men and ladies who were surprised that there weren't any numbers left at eleven o'clock!
I felt... vindicated!
Strange, huh?

A Note From the Editors

2006-03-19T01:03:00.000+02:00

We, the editors, would like to apologise for the recent lack of activity on this blog, on behalf of its negligent author. We are very disappointed in Kassandra, and are seriously considering having her flogged for her lack of dedication. We will not accept any excuses, such as that she has been working 1o to 12 hours a day in an attempt to make up hours lost (due to sickness/obsessive and lengthy commenting on the blog). We stand firm in our decision. No pleas for mercy will penetrate our stony hearts. Thank you.

Kassandra says: Ah! The voices! In my head! Make them stop!

OK OK, no I'm not schizophrenic. That's just the voice of my conscience talking. And damn, while I've been "away" everone has been writing such interesting stuff on their blogs it'll take me ages to catch up.

Anyway, I've just got back from a very nice ouzo/mezedes with my cousin, and have a head bursting with thoughts, fighting with the ouzo fog that is trying to subsume everything with its sticky sweetness. My cousin has that effect on me - she's very vital and alive and no matter how much ouzo I drink we always have the most intersting conversations.

And the product of our conversation today is a Plan.
Yes, that's capital P Plan.
And we need your help.

As we all know, those of us who live in Athens anyway, life here can be a bit... frustrating to say the least. The lack consideration, empathy, decency, and basic politeness that one encounters on the streets - the result of living in a city overrun by the human swarm - is not only annoying, it is de-humanizing and may affect us more deeply, in terms of our psychological well-being, than we realise.

Something must be done!

To this end, we have decided to publish a manifesto of sorts (I do like my manifestos, don't I?) entitled: Twenty (30? 40? 50?) Steps to Being a Selfishly Successful Athenian. (working title - suggestions welcome).

This manifesto, when completed, will be photocopied and plastered over the city, at least until our supplies of change for the copies run out.

The items in the manifesto will be along the following lines:

1) When I'm driving in my car and see someone trying to cross the street, I will put my foot to the gas pedal and do my best to run them over. And I will remember that children, pregnant women, and old ladies are worth bonus points.
2) When the metro arrives and it's time to get on, I will forcefully push and shove my way through the people trying to get off, scattering their bodies left and right in my attempt to claim my prize - a seat. And should an old lady, pregnant woman, or injured/handicapped person get on, there is no way I will offer them my hard-won seat.
3) When a woman is trying to get on or off a bus, encumbered by children and a baby carriage, I will sit back and smile smugly as she struggles to get them all on safely. Never in a million years will I help her lift the carriage up.

And so on and so forth.

But that's just three items, and we're aiming for at least 20, or more if we can think of them. So please, if you've got any witticisms/criticisms you'd like to contribute in that vein - that is, scathingly sarcastic tips for being an asshole in Athens - feel free. (Maybe that should be the title!)

And perhaps when it's done you will see your contribution pasted on a marble pillar somewhere.

Thanks, and never fear, I will be posting more frequently from now on.
K

MORE RANTING ABOUT SEXIST ADS

2006-03-01T18:35:00.000+02:00

Ah, one of my "favourite" buffalo jeans ads, which was to be seen from my apartment building in Canada.

I was reminded of this in a discussion with seawitch in the Dewars post below.

As I said in my comment, this ad was on a huge banner, in a part of town where kids were walking by every two minutes.

Does the girl in the ad look old enough to you to be sitting like that? I think she looks like she's waiting to be raped - her body language/ posture is so vulnerable - not have consentual sex with someone. Actually it looks like someone just picked her up and threw her in the corner, smashing her head on the wall - maybe hence the dazed look.

It's by far not the worst of the ones they had up, either - some of the girls in the others were far younger looking.

Is it sexy? Maybe. Did it sell jeans? Probably, to women who sadly want to look like that. Does that make it appropriate??? For little girls to see and probably emulate???

I found the picture on this site, on media literacy which I haven't checked out yet, but at first glance it seems pretty informative and relevant to the discussion we've been having about media awareness.

DEWARS - YOU'LL NEVER BE TRULY MINE

2006-02-28T01:50:00.000+02:00

Has anyone noticed the ad campaign for Dewars whisky that's been running the last few months (here in Greece anyway - it's probably older in the rest of the world)?
In case not, here's the concept: a guy/girl has been working at a good, stable, but perhaps somewhat restrictive or stuffy job. Inspired (by Dewars, of course) they quit this job to pursue the "career" they have always wanted - a really cool, "free" job that lets them "express themselves" fully.
There are two versions, one with a guy, one with a girl.
So, the guy: he's a classical concert pianist. He quits, leaving behind his "tux and bow-tie" to play piano in smokey jazz clubs. We see him playing in the club, having a grand old time, everyone cheering him on, loving him, he's letting loose, discovering the music he has always loved, etc. It's quite a nice and effective ad, actually. You really admire this guy, and think he's pretty cool for giving up such a good job for his passion. You probably envy him a bit.
So I was just about to give Dewars some kudos, when I see the girl version.
She's a detective. Woman cop. Which is already a pretty cool job if you ask me. But, get this, she quits her job to go work in a bar, DANCING in a CAGE above the crowd. A CAGE. Oh, and she "kept the handcuffs". WHAT THE *#@%$*&???!!!
So, if we follow the logic of the first ad, dancing in a CAGE is a job to be envied? This woman is cool? To be admired and, perhaps, emulated????
Obviously this ad is not oriented towards the female market, but it is still such a transparent piece of male-chauvenistic, keep-women-in-their-place-dancing-in-a-cage GARBAGE - It really makes my blood boil that people still make these ads - and that there must be a market for them since advertisers supposedly do tons of market research.
And people try to tell me that "my generation" is lucky cause we don't have to deal with sexism.
Urgh!!!

Η ΠΟΛΗ ΜΑΣ ANHKEI

2006-02-26T21:17:00.000+02:00

Η ΠΟΛΗ ΜΑΣ ANHKEI
Originally uploaded by kassandrapoised.

So I've finally gotten round to getting some of my photos online. I really like this one... "the city belongs to us". You can access it and the rest thanks to Flickr by clicking on the badge in the sidebar.
I don't actually have that many photos in digital format, at least not that I've taken myself, cause I'm really oldschool and will never, EVER give up my old analog camera for a digital one. Well, never say never, but I will always insist that nothing beats the grainy, glowing LIFE of a "real" photograph. Digital ones can look great superficially, but they don't have soul.
Luckily, I've got this amazing, quite rare camera that belonged to my mom. It's called an Exacta, was made in East Germany in the 1970's, is built like a tank, and has got a Carl Zeiss lens which takes just amazing photos. But unless my boyfriend gets his scanner fixed one day you'll never get to see the photos I've taken with it. I guess digital has some benefits...

ON THE GREEK DOCTOR'S COUCH...

2006-02-24T23:13:00.000+02:00

Well I'm back from a week long trip to a plethora of doctors' offices. Seriously: my every waking hour this week has been spent either in my chair at work, or on a couch in a doctor's waiting room. Fun, fun - well, not for me, but hopefully for you, cause here is a detailed account of my journey through the various rooms.
The beginnings of this journey can be found in my post called MY LITTLE ENDOMETRIOSIS.
Since then I've been waiting for the right time of month to embark on the second round of doctor's visits. Well, the time swung round, and off I went.
First, my wonderful sweet kind cousin, who is a very... shall we say, alternative kind of girl, insisted I see her gynaecologist to get a second opinion (in addition to the first, given to me by MY HERO, the doctor at IASO). Rather reluctantly, I went, and not surprisingly, (as this was no regular gynaecologist but rather a family friend) the waiting was funky lo-key: big overstuffed couches splayed around a homey kind of living room; millions of tiny baby eyes staring down at you from collages covering every available wall space; a collection of rather bedraggled plants, and a serve-yourself filter coffee machine.
Unfortunately, after a two hour wait (we'd already shown up 3 hours late, as recommended by the receptionist) the doctor was less homey and comfortable than her workspace. In fact, the 75 euros I paid got me the conviction, held for two days, that I had cancer and was going to die. I was just working on the third draft of my will when my first blood test results came back.
To go back a little - this is important cause Greece gets yet another point in the ongoing Greece vs. Canada Battle: BLOOD TESTS IN GREECE ARE A MILLION TIMES EASIER THAN IN CANADA. It's like this: I am (was?) DEATHLY afraid of blood tests. Days before the appointed time, I start getting strange numbness and weakness behind my knees and elbows, and little whimpers escape my mouth whenever I am reminded of the awful fate that awaits me. On the day itself, I am fairly composed before the ordeal, but afterwards I emerge ashen-faced, hyperventilating, with pain and numbness coursing through my entire body. I swear I am not exaggerating. Ask my friend, Liz, who came with me once. She still has nightmares about the day, and has developed a (previously non-existent) needle-phobia herself.
So, here in Greece, I started getting the same symptoms, started coaching my boyfriend so he wouldn't freak out completely and run out of the office when I turned into a blubbering puddle of cowardly jelly, and tried my best to steel myself for WHAT WAS TO COME.
Which then never came.
My boyfriend is convinced I made the whole thing up to freak him out.
Actually, this is what happened: I walked into the clinic. Two girls were behind the desk - both about 16 years old by the look of it. The younger of the two - about 4 foot 5, blond and pixie-like, gushed at me to follow her to THE CHAIR. Which I did. She then started preparing the needle, and I was like - hang on a minute, aren't you going to call your mommy to do that? (OK she was actually married and just really young looking, but in my panicked state I wasn't noticing details). But anyway, before the question is out of my mouth, she's saying "OK, we're done, sweetie/glykoula mou."
And we were. That was it. I didn't feel a thing. Phew.
Needless to say, I spent the next hour laughing.
My only explanation is that, in Canada, they siphon off extra blood to secretly donate to the blood banks, hence the exaggeratedly large needles they use, and the large amounts of blood they take.
Go Greece!
Incidentally, the results were below the cut-off point that indicates cancer. (!!!) Phew again.
And back to my dissertation on waiting rooms.
So, with my blood tests in hand, I set off to see my original doctor who, if you recall, I had originally seen at the hospital. So I had no idea what to expect from his waiting room. However, the girl who had recommended him to me was definitely a POINTY SHOED kind of Greek girl. If you followed the debate on buruburu and Scruffy American's sites, you'll know what I'm talking about - perfectly coiffed, leading a trouble-free existence of coffee bars and clothing stores, very chi-chi and chic. So, (again not surprisingly) when I stepped into THIS doctor's waiting room, I thought I must have walked into the wrong office. It looked like a posh modelling agency or something - abstract modern art tossed about in every corner, plexi and chrome galore, and a very stylish black girl serving the ladies coffee - your choice: cappucino, espresso, filter, the works, from a very fancy looking machine.
Unfortunately, the elegance of the place did nothing to detract from the waiting time.
I got there at 7pm, on the dot.
The doctor saw me at 11:15pm. (An aside: these doctors amaze me, really. They're up at six, spend the morning at the hospital, then work all night, regularly, until 11 or 12, and still - at least in this case - manage to be cheerful and answer all my questions and more!)
Moreover, since I had to wait so long, the consultation was on the house! Whoopee, as my funds are quickly dwindling due to the constant stream of tests I am having to undergo.
Also, I had plenty to entertain me while I waited. In fact, I barely had time to concentrate on the book I'd brought, foreseeing the marathon wait ahead of me (Eleni Gage's 'North of Ithaca'. Yes, She's Nick Gage's daughter. No, it's not a work of genius, though rather amusing, and, ironically enough, she had ovarian cysts too, and in fact had to delay the start of her voyage due to them!)
Anyway, in the large, main waiting room, equipped with leather couches and all the latest trendy magazines, I was privy to a constant parade of women with bellies bulging out of tight designer pregnancy pants. Really. Who the hell buys DESIGNER PREGNANCY PANTS when you're only going to use them for a few months?? But that's what they were. (Have you ever seen the film Dr T and the Women? It was kind of like that, but more so.) Of course, the non-pregnant women were even more glamorously dressed, and the multitude of attractive staff looked ready to step out onto the ballroom floor. For example, the woman who typed in the info while I got my ultrasound was wearing a flowy, see-through ruffled black dress, stilettos, and huge dangly silver earrings. Humph. I would've at least cast off my baggy jeans if I knew I was going to a fashion show.
As if that wasn't enough, the elegant couple sitting across from me were a constant source of amusement, namely because the husband spent the ENTIRE FOUR HOURS with his head thrown back on the couch, mouth open, snoring loudly. His demure wife, for the duration of this manly display, stared vacantly into space, every now and then patting his bald crown in an absent-minded kind of way.
But whenever this carnival started losing its charm, I had a third source of amusement: the SMOKERS waiting room, into which I kept popping in order to celebrate my state of non-cancerness.
This room was, of course, much smaller than the main one - about the size of a closet, in fact - but everyone who wasn't pregnant was jammed in there. Not only did it hold the lure of nicotine, but there was a TELEVISION on the wall. So we alternated between watching the Pireas riots (which were SO staged - like, "Hello, guys, it's 8 thirty. The news is on. Let's throw some stuff around then go home and drink Metaxa, OK?") and two women who were staging their own, personal, cold war. It went something like this:
WOMAN ONE: It's cold in here. Close the window. (ed. note: What, and suffocate?)
WOMAN TWO: But we're smoking. It's smoky.
WOMAN ONE: Just for a minute or two, OK? I'm freezing.
WOMAN TWO: (grumbling) OK, OK...
five minutes later (woman two re-opens the window)
WOMAN ONE: What are you doing?
WOMAN TWO: Opening the window.
WOMAN ONE: But it's cold. Can't you see it's cold? There's a draft hitting my legs.
WOMAN TWO: I'll just leave it open for a minute or two. I can't breathe.
five minutes later
WOMAN ONE: Are you going to close the window or what?
WOMAN TWO: But I just opened it!
And so on. As far as I could tell, they were at it continuously for the entire four hours. All this because, of course, woman one couldn't concede defeat (or relinquish her smoking chair) by moving to the mainly empty main waiting room and just relocating for cigarette breaks.
But to make a long story... a little less long, it was with some reluctance that I finally made it to the doctor's office. Good news, he's still convinced I have endometriosis, and that, with a small operation, I'll be cured - well, at least until the bloody disease/condition comes back, as is its wont, apparently.
The bad news is that, done privately, the operation costs 2000 euros. And that's just the hospital fee. I didn't get round to asking how much the doctor's fee would be, or the cost of the monthly hormone injections I'd need to get for the next half a year. 2000 is already, sadly, out of my budget.
SO the next morning, having recently (and with many failed trips, pain, suffering, and waiting in lines) gotten my vivliario (health book) I ventured to the nearby IKA office to see what the whole deal was with public insurance. After waiting 10 minutes for the information lady to finish her (I'm sure private) telephone call, I shoved my way through the hordes of smelly people to the basement and got a family doctor written into my book (as required) with something approaching ease. I was then directed to the imioropho to book an appointment with a state gynaecologist.
So, I enter the waiting room. What confronts me: a stark white room, entirely bare walls, linoleum tiles, and a stack of broken chairs in the corner. Nothing else - besides a mass of poor unfortunates who, like me, cannot afford private healthcare, waiting their turn to be... somethinged... through a stained metal door.
Needless to say, after my whirlwind tour of the glamorous private health care world, this was all a bit much for me, and I fled.
So what now? I see two options: apply for private health insurance (and lie and say I'm perfectly healthy, though it might seem a bit suspicious that as soon as I hold that golden card - or whatever they give you - I'll check myself first class into the IASO), or 'Go Greek': pull some strings, call up some favours, rely on connections. In fact, as I type my uncle is speaking to an IKA doctor on my behalf, and my dad is calling up every doctor he knows, to see if someone can pull some strings and get me, IKA offices-free, into a halfway decent state hospital like the Alexandras. Never mind the so called "black fees" - the illegal, but well established fees you must use to bribe the guy doing the operation - if you want to get it sometime before the year 3000.
Jesus. Minus 10 Greece.
But I'll cross that bridge, and all the rest that await me, when I come to it.

ON CONTENT AND COMMENTS

2006-02-11T22:23:00.000+02:00

Some people may be wondering (or maybe I'm just wondering to myself) why, given my interests, political and humanitarian views, I don't post on topics that are more serious, important, or weighty, and focus instead on the trivial thoughts that cross my mind during the course of a day. Well, if only to clear my slightly guilty conscience, the reasons are as follows:
1) I feel that there is already such a large collection of excellent material out there, written by people far better informed and skilled than I, that anything I might have to say would be superfluous. I do try to point people in the direction of sites that I think are worthwhile and that I appreciate by means of my collection of links to the right, which will ever be growing.
2) This period of my life is one of change and adjustment, and I simply do not have much energy to expend thinking about other people or the world's problems. Perhaps this is selfish, but I really need to sort myself out before I can get to other issues. The time may come, however, when Poised at the Starting Line becomes a space for me to rant about All That I Think is Wrong With the World! But not for the time being, so don't hold your breaths.

Nevertheless, I am more than willing to engage in polite and friendly debate with anyone who takes issue with anything I might say, or any of the issues I express an interest in. I am always ready to change people's minds through discourse - if they're open and willing to listen - or to have my mind changed. And for anyone curious or wanting to learn more about the media monopoly and its frequent obfuscation of the truth, propagandising, and related issues, I'd be glad to answer any specific questions you might have or write a post on the issue. Just post these in the little comments box in the sidebar and I'll get back to you.

Lastly, I like to think that I am not a prejudiced person, and that my views and opinions are fair, reasoned, based on fact, and not overly polemical. Visitors to this site: all opinions are welcome, from across the spectrum, but please respect my attempt at fairmindedness, keep your posts cool and rational, and do not insult any person, people, race, minority etc. Such comments will not be tolerated, and will be deleted immediately.
At the same time, if anyone feels I have written anything insulting, feel free to challenge me, but please read what I have written carefully first to make sure you have understood me correctly. Thank you.

Phew!

& NOW IT'S TIME FOR: GREECE... ok ok... ITALY vs. EUROPE

2006-02-09T22:03:00.000+02:00

I was just reminded, by an article posted on Nerd's Eye View, of this HILARIOUS flash movie. It's about Italy vs. Europe, but if you substitute the Italian flag with the Greek one it'll work just fine.

Get ready to laugh your socks off. Trust me. All you have to do is click here.

I guess we're not alone...

THIS POST WILL BE SCANNED BY GOVERNMENT SPIES

2006-02-09T20:07:00.000+02:00

As those who read my first post ever may have guessed, I'm just as paranoid as the average suspicious, media-savvy, post-communication-studies student - that is to say: very. I'll gladly buy into any government conspiracy theory you care to throw my way, and pride myself on having had the wool surgically removed from my eyes. Nevertheless, when my friend, who lives directly across from the American Embassy here in Athens, started voicing fears that her phone lines were being tapped, I had to draw the line. "Come on!" I said. "Don't be silly! Why would they want to tap your phones? You're just a radical, anti-American (government), activist-lawyer-type, after all. They couldn't care less about you!!!"
(In my defence: when theory encroaches on reality it's a bit hard to swallow - even for the most jaded among us.)
Well, I am now having to bite my words: flipping through the tube last night I came across a documentary (on MEGA) about government surveillance and the phone tapping of civilians, or something to that effect - I tuned in about half-way through, just in time to hear the interviewer ask: Do you think the American Embassy here in Athens is likely to be monitoring people's cell phone conversations? And the answer? Yes. (sorry I'm paraphrasing, but that was the gist.)
The person being interviewed was Mike Frost, a whistle-blower who worked for Canadian (ha!) intelligence for 34 years (19 in the communications department).
So I guess I'll be calling my friend now to apologise profusely - but you can be sure I won't use the words b***, t********, or A******* G********* in the conversation!

If you're interested in learning more about Mike Frost or ECHELON (the code name for the system they use to spy on us) check out the following links:

An article from the Village Voice
A CBN news report
Two articles, from the London Daily Telegraph and Covert Action Quarterly
And of course the Wikipedia entry on ECHELON

Vhere'd It Go, My Vertigo?

2006-02-06T22:25:00.000+02:00

Continuing on the "stand up for your health rights" theme, I personally know three people who suffer from vertigo, which I think is rather a lot for one person to know! So, we can assume it must be quite common - but for those lucky enough to not have this disease/condition (what's the difference anyway?) it causes you to suddenly, for no apparent reason, get very dizzy. If you are unlucky enough to be standing when the world starts to spin, you will fall over. If you are furthermore unlucky enough to be standing at the top of a long flight of stairs at the time, you are likely to break your front teeth off. So my first two friends were told their condition was incurable, and accepted this, broken teeth and all. The third was told the same by the first doctor she went to... and the second... and the third... but she just wouldn't take 'no' for an answer, and kept on going and going like the energizer bunny until she found a specialist in the illness. And what do you know? There is, if not a cure, then a way of stopping vertigo when it starts to happen. So if you have vertigo, start taking notes: the procedure is called the Epley Manoeuver, and as far as I understand, involves the doctor twisting your head around in alarming-looking ways until you projectile vomit violently all over the place. Not pleasant, perhaps, but certainly preferable to lying in bed watching the crack on your ceiling spin round for weeks on end. Other recommended forms of prevention are kneading those little squeezy balls when you feel an attack coming on (which probably most people here in Athens could benefit from, come to think of it) and doing crossword puzzles. (Why crossword puzzles? Don't know, but hey it'll make you smarter so what the heck!)
Yet another good example of why most doctors can't be trusted, and why you, at risk of being called 'Argan', should never never take no for an answer where your health is concerned!

MY LITTLE ENDOMETRIOSIS

2006-02-04T20:56:00.000+02:00

So I was diagnosed this past week as having, to quote the doctor, "an illness - no, I mean a disease - no, let's say, a condition" called endometriosis. Why should you care? Well, because apparently 10% of women or so suffer from it, yet it's usually mis - or not at all - diagnosed. I should know. I think I've been suffering from it for ages, ever since I was in my teens, but all the doctors I've seen over the years have dismissed my list of symptoms offhand and treated me like I was a hypochondriac, or exaggerating the pain. And I started to believe it, figured I was just a lazy wimp (the symptoms include fatigue, really really bad cramps, nausea, and so on) compared to ‘normal’ people, and did my best to ignore and dismiss the symptoms, and keep them to myself. But this past week at work I suffered a bout of cramps so bad that I confided in the girls there, who were all so so wonderful I can't thank them enough. They all told me to see a gynaecologist RIGHT AWAY, so one girl made the necessary phone calls to her gynaecologist (saving me the always stressful procedure of making myself understood in Greek) and another insisted on accompanying me to the hospital to do the rest of the translating. The two of us snuck out of work, feeling like two high-school students playing hooky, and headed for the IASO hospital. This hospital is mainly a maternity hospital, apparently one of the best in Athens, and I have to say it had nothing of the dingy, third-world atmosphere I've come to expect from Greek hospitals; if you have any gynaecological stuff to deal with GO THERE. And the gynaecologist my friend had recommended was, to my surprise, wonderful. Miracle of miracles, he took one look at me and knew exactly what I had. Then he sat me down, and to my amusement started explaining everything to me FROM THE BEGINNING. And by FROM THE BEGINNING I mean, like, a complete survey of gynaecology from the time of genesis - i.e. a woman is born with all her eggs, whereas men create their sperm every 30 days, and you have a period because your brain releases certain hormones blah blah blah. So I had to stop him and tell him that in Canada we all learn that stuff in sex-ed class at the age of about ten, and could he please skip it and get to the 'what was wrong with me' part. (Yet another shocking reminder, however, of how ignorant most young Greek women are about these things and how necessary sex-ed class really is - it's about time they got it in this country but with the church and all... we'll see.) Anyway, there we are, pictures of my insides from the ultrasound spread across the table, with his cellphone going off every two seconds, but between the cellphone calls he patiently and clearly explained EVERYTHING to me, drawing cute little sketches to illustrate each point. Now, I'm a "why" kind of person. I like to know, for example, WHY a certain Greek verb is not conjugated like the rest, not just how to conjugate it, and, similarly, WHY, or rather WHAT EXACTLY is going on when there's something wrong with me, so I just loved all this. (I'm actually rather doctor-phobic, I think because in Canada the medicare system makes doctors see as many patients as possible, so they never bother to explain the WHY to you - or maybe they just figure we're too stupid to get it.) Anyway, in short, this doctor is now my new hero. If I didn't think it would break a zillion doctor/patient ethics rules, I'd throw my arms around him and give him a big hug. Instead, I'll send a thank you out to him out into the cosmos by means of this post!
Anyway, to wrap this up cause as usual I'm being excessively verbose, if you suffer from really bad cramps or any of the other symptoms, or in fact if you feel you're not well but have had your complaint dismissed by doctors, INSIST they listen, or go to another doctor - as many as it takes till you find one you feel is taking you seriously. I can't say how much I wish I'd done this earlier. It REALLY REALLY PISSES ME OFF that all these years I was suffering unnecessarily. In fact I'd like to go and give all the doctors who smiled at me condescendingly, and suggested I take stronger pain killers or drink herbal tea, a GOOD SCOLDING. From what I’ve read, knowledge and understanding of gynaecological problems is REALLY POOR since, in this male-centred world, until the late 80’s most of women’s problems were simply shrugged off. So don't let it happen to you!

The Crumbling Legacy of Athens

2006-02-03T18:51:00.000+02:00

A comment made by 'd' in regards to my previous blog has reminded me of a project I've been mulling over for some time now. As I said in my reply to him, I really love all the old neoclassical buildings that survive in Athens, and I'm greatly disturbed by the condition most of them are in. Here and there you see them being renovated, usually by large corporations who no doubt strip their insides, while many others are likely past saving. However, a large number are probably still salveagable, yet nothing is being done! The last remnants of the beautiful city Athens could have been are being completely neglected... I can only assume that tearing them down is prohibited due to their historical status, so their owners are just waiting till they become completely derelict and dangerous, so that they may then demolish them and sell off the property to a company wanting to erect yet more of the (no doubt profitable) concrete blocks. I have also heard that many of the buildings are church property, having been bequeathed to the church in peoples' wills. And the church just lets these properties languish... dropi!!! In any case, I'm interested in photographing and perhaps cataloging these buildings before they all crumble into dust, but there are so many and I have trouble keeping track of the Greek street names. So if anyone has any pet crumbling buildings they would like to see commemorated, please post me their location, being as specific as possible! Thank you.

Greece vs. Canada: the sequel

2006-02-02T22:22:00.000+02:00

Well, ladies and gentlemen, here it is at last, the pros and cons of Greece, according to me. Now, if I wanted to be scientific about it, I’d follow the same procedure as I did with Canada – that is, to list the pros then refute them. However, science is not my aim; rather I wish to challenge the preconceptions people have about both countries. SO since most ex-pats seem to fall into the trap of forgetting all the bad things about their country of origin, in the first installment I tried to remind people why it was they came to Greece in the first place. And since all I hear about Greece (from Greeks and foreigners alike) is endless moaning, I thought I’d start now by listing the most common complaints going round and rebut them, in order to remind people of some of the good things this country has to offer. Πάμε λιπόν, Ελλάδα:

CONS: (according to what most people think)
I’ll keep these short since we’ve all heard the long versions about a million times – feel free to elaborate in your own head.)
1- People are rude.
2- Bureaucracy is a mess of red tape and unhelpful employees.
3- The government and judiciary are all corrupt, and the church has too much money and control over everything, and is corrupt too.
4- Essential services are constantly going on strike.
5- Shops and businesses – especially public bureaus – are never open when they’re supposed to be. And generally the shops close too early too often.
6- The transit system isn’t good, traffic and parking is horrendous, and both drivers and pedestrians alike are taking their lives into their own hands by hitting the streets.
7- The job market is miserable, working conditions are sub-standard, and wages are pathetic.
8- Everything is very expensive. Especially food and going out.
9- The school system is abysmal.
10- So is the public health system, and god forbid you have to go to an IKA hospital for anything.
11- Athens, at least, is a dirty ugly city of concrete apartment buildings and no green space or gardens.
12- Greeks are racist, especially towards Albanians and Poles.
13- No or little effort is being made to improve the state of the environment.
14- The news on some channels is little better than an entertainment program or a soap opera. And they show MOVIES with SEX in them BEFORE KIDS GO TO BED!!!
15- Everything is disorganized, chaotic, and takes three times as long to get done than in other countries.

PROS:
1- OK. So. The great majority of people are rude. Especially in Athens, where the stress of city life drives most people to the edge of insanity, but also, increasingly, on the islands (though whose fault is that? Before the onset of mass tourism and idiotic tourists, Greeks were known as some of the most hospitable, kind and generous people in the world – jaded perhaps?). Nonetheless, among the rude masses you also discover people so fantastically helpful, so kind and considerate and willing to go a mile out of their way for you, that I think a kind of balance is achieved. Furthermore, a lot of Greek rudeness is a method of stress relief – and it works. It does suck when it’s directed at you, but it explains the phenomenon of Greeks being able to switch from full-throttle screaming to joking around and friendly claps on the back in under a second. And, just as we expect immigrants who come to our countries to adapt to our way of life, so too should we be expected to adapt to the Greek way of doing things, through a process my friends and I call DISCOVERING YOUR INNER GREEK. What this process involves is letting go of your inhibitions and having right back at them: throw a tantrum at the supermarket when someone butts in front of you; start yelling at the lady who shoves you on the bus; swear at the person who steals your parking spot from under your nose; throw insults out loud in the middle of the street, whilst shaking your fist, at the driver who almost runs you over. It acts as a form of catharsis - you will be amazed at the feeling of calm that follows once you get whatever it is off your chest, and, rather than hating you, you’ll make a lot of new friends – with sympathetic onlookers, for example – who will recognize you as one of their own. Just remember, once you’ve thrown your fit, LET IT GO. Be magnamonious, and don’t keep fuming about it.
2- Bureaucracy is a mess. No doubt about it. We’ve all had to run around to a million offices, getting a mass of papers stamped about a zillion times by taciturn employees. But again, I feel the exceptions are SO exceptional that they balance things out. For example, a friend of mine was filing her sister’s tax returns for her, while her sister was out of the country, by assuming her identity. Note that the two sisters look nothing alike in their taftotita pictures, but no one commented in the tax office. Not the first time – or the second time – or the fourth fifth and sixth times when the forms were lost and no one could locate them. It seemed as though an impasse had been reached: yes, they could see they owed this much money – it was on the computer – but without the original, stamped, and sadly misplaced paper, they could do nothing. At which point my friend pulled a stunt called PLAYING ON THEIR SYMPATHIES: the tax office employee looked at her melancholically and asked her, “Kyria mou, are you really fed up?” “Yes,” she said. “I mean really, really at the end of your tether?” he insisted. “Yes, I am,” she replied. “I’m about to snap. Δεν αντέχω άλλο. Please, please, help me.” “OK kyria mou,” he said, “I just have to check something with your accountant. Let’s call her”. Of course, the accountant said, “Are you sure you have miss so-and-so there? Cause I’m pretty sure she’s out of the country at the moment.” The clerk looked at my friend. He looked at the ridiculous taftotita. He asked her: “Are you sure you’re miss so-and-so?” “Yes, of course I am.” she replied brazenly. “Hmmm. Of course. I see,” he said, and magically produced a piece of paper, stamped it a few times, and sent my friend off to get a few more stamps and her money. But the amazing thing is that, at one of the stamping points, some clerk actually said, “Oh – I see here you never got your money from last year. Let me see if I can locate the form for you.” A search through drifts and stacks of paper ensued and, just when they were about to give up hope, the paper turned up at the bottom of the last stack, and my friend ended up walking out of the place clutching no less than 8000 evro – cash, to boot! Okay, perhaps that’s more a tale in support of the cons than the pros, but I was looking for an excuse to tell that anecdote. But there is one thing to be learnt from it. Unlike in other countries, where bureaucrats are polite but unfeeling and immoveable in the face of your suffering, Greek bureaucrats are, beneath the tough exterior, quite HUMANE, and can be GUILTED into doing things for you, if you know how. I’ve done it myself – for example, I went to the wrong IKA office, waited a few hours to be greeted by a very dour looking middle-aged lady behind the wicket, who told me, sorry, I’d just have to go to the correct branch. Tough luck. So I pulled the PLAYING ON THEIR SYMPATHIES trick, with success – the lady did the stamping for me there. It’s very useful to know, and it goes something like this (I’ll write it in Greenglish for the non-Greek speakers to practice): “AH! kyria mou, Ti tha kano tora? Eimai xeni. Den milao kala Ellenika. Den boro na pao sto allo meros! Den xero pou einai!! Kai doulevo!!! Prepei na eimai sto douleia TORA!!!! Pira adeia na ertho edo!!!!! Kai perimena yia deka ores, kai eho pedia!!!!! AH ah… the mou! Ti tha kano?” etc. etc. (What am I to do now? I’m a foreigner. I don’t speak Greek well. I can’t go to that other place! I don’t know where it is!! And I work!!! I should be at work now!!!! I took time off to come here!!!!! And I waited for ten hours in line, and have children!!!!!! Oh, god! What will I do?.) This has to be said with much mournful eye rolling, and your voice must slowly rise in pitch throughout, until by the end you’re verging on hysteria and casting yourself about wildly, eyes raised in supplication to god. (No matter how over the top you think you’re going, don’t worry, it’s not too much – embrace your inner drama queen, this time.) Also, said with a terrible Greek accent, it is even more convincing – the hardest-hearted, laziest employee, male or female, won’t be able to deny you!
3- The government and judiciary are all corrupt/The church has too much money and control over everything, and is corrupt: I won’t even try to argue. But really, does this affect you in your daily life, or have you been watching too much Alter?
4- Essential services are constantly going on strike: You mean they aren’t in your country?
5- Shops and businesses – especially public bureaus – are never open when they’re supposed to be. And generally the shops close too early too often. OK this is a pain in the behind, but if I was one of the people working in a shop – something I did do in Canada, till 9 every night, and on Sundays too – I’d be pretty happy about it.
6- The transit system isn’t good: Really? Seems fine to me – at least since the Olympics – if you aren’t living in a far-off suburb. But hey, it was your choice to live in a suburb. Those of us brave enough to live in Athens proper need to have SOME reason for staying here. So, there are masses of buses and trolleys which come all the time, and the metro is fast and handy. Plus, it’s all ridiculously CHEAP!! Come on, people, if you're going to complain, at least pick something that really is a problem! 6.5- Traffic/parking is horrendous, and both drivers and pedestrians alike are taking their lives into their own hands by hitting the streets: Umm… yes. Let’s just skip that one, OK? Besides, New York is just as bad. So there.
7- The job market is miserable, working conditions are sub-standard, and wages are pathetic: Can we skip this one too? Oh OK. Yes, the job market is miserable, but at least Greeks know how to enjoy themselves when they’re not working – and even sometimes (a lot of the time) when they are. Why do you think all those officials are so hard to reach? Just check to see if it’s a sunny day and don’t be surprised when no one picks up the phones. Also, how nice is it to be able to smoke AT YOUR DESK? (Non-smokers, sorry, you really picked the wrong country.) And where else could you take a ONE MONTH VACATION, or call in sick every time there’s nice weather, or, on the other hand, if there’s rain, or snow, or a football game or…
8- Everything is very expensive. Especially food and going out: Yes, but such food!!! Amazing, flavourful, real, fresh, ahhhhh… It’s worth it. And sorry, it’s really not so bad, so long as you’re not eating steaks every day. I think a lot of this talk about how Greeks have no money is that they like to LIVE WELL: good food, lots of partying and drinking, nice clothes, flash cars. Just about the only things Greeks don’t spend money on are their homes. So it's not surprising that most people are broke. (I don’t include of course those with kids who really can’t find a job and are in dire straights. Those do exist aplenty, and my sympathies to them, but most of the people you hear whingeing are doing just that!) (For the record, here are just some things that are much MUCH cheaper here than in Canada: public transit, theatre, taxis, hairdressers, painkillers and antibiotics, wine, bathroom appliances, cigarettes, big concerts, mixed drinks (when you consider that you’re getting at least three times as much alcohol when you order a drink here, rather than the Canadian thimble full), shoemakers and seamstresses, university, rent, purchasing a house... ummm OK so I can't think of many. But it's a good indication of what the Greeks really consider important, isn't it? Ha ha.)
9- The school system is abysmal: Yes it is. This is one thing that really gets me too.
10- So is the public health system, and god forbid you have to go to an IKA hospital for anything: But at least, if you do have to go, you’ll come out with a whole repertoire of stories to regale your friends with!
11- Athens, at least, is a dirty ugly city of concrete apartment buildings and no green space or gardens: Actually, it has quite a lot of parks and plateias, they are just rather subsumed by all the concrete lowering over them.
12- Greeks are racist, especially towards Albanians and Poles: Well first, please note this is misuse of the term RACIST – Albanians and Poles are not a different race from the Greeks. Greeks are not, however and as far as I can tell, racist towards blacks, who are truly another race, and not terribly racist towards Pakistanis. But OK so they are PREJUDICED. I’ve even experienced it: when I speak Greek my accent is not at all English, but it’s not really Greek either, so when I shop for expensive things, I often get the cold shoulder and am told things are VERY EXPENSIVE – until I throw in an English word, and suddenly they’re all over me. However, this prejudice is based, I think, on the fact that the refugee situation here is completely out of control – and the government is doing little to nothing to ease tensions or help immigrants adapt and fit into Greek society. So it’s not surprising that Greeks are reacting somewhat badly to this sudden influx of foreigners into what was previously a pretty homogenous society. But Greeks are in general quite humane and empathetic people. They may talk badly about immigrants – or homosexuals for that matter – but they rarely put that talk into action. After all, how many gay bashings have you heard of happening here in Greece? Here’s another example: I was walking in Monastiraki a while ago when we came across two Pakistanis who had been caught by the police selling their wares on a blanket on the street. One of the men knelt down and threw his arms around the police officer’s legs in a traditional gesture of supplication, and the officer – more out of surprise than anything, I think – kicked him away. So we stopped and started asking – well, OK, yelling – what they thought they were doing beating the guy up. Within SECONDS a HUGE crowd of Greeks had gathered, all of them shouting abuse at the bewildered officers, defending the Pakistanis, and insisting that they be released. One woman thrust her child forward and kept demanding, “Is this the example you give to our children? To beat an innocent man?” So finally the police let the men go, and the mob dispersed, feeling very pleased with itself. But I ask you, would something like this ever happen in more Western countries? Would anyone interfere with two burly policeman, or even glance to see what exactly was going on? And to defend a racial minority that is not exactly smiled upon? That’s what I mean by humane.
13- No or little effort is being made to improve the state of the environment: SHAME!!! KRIMA!!! I was very disappointed to see that the renewable energies bill did not pass last week. And what is going to happen with the rubbish? Will they just keep burning/burying it improperly on the islands, and paying out fines to the EU??? Grrr… OK people, whinge all you like on this one. Maybe if we start causing a big enough fuss something will be done. Unfortunately it seems the new generation of Greeks, unlike their ancestors who recycled and composted even before those terms were invented, are generally apathetic about environmental issues. But to tell the truth, I don't hear many foreigners whingeing about it either.
14- The news on some channels is little better than an entertainment program, or a soap opera: and it’s different where you come from? Face it, the news, especially in the US but in Canada and the UK too, is FULL OF LIES AND PROPAGANDA. It’s just done with more sophistication than here, so you’re more likely to believe it – at least here it is so clearly a joke. And despite it Greeks have a very healthy dialogue about politics and the state of their country. They may not be very well informed, but they re aware and critical of everything and motivated. I was so impressed when I went on the anti-war protest here by the fact that it was not just activist university kids taking part, like in Canada, but mothers, fathers, kids, and grandparents. Right on. 14.5- And they show MOVIES with SEX in them BEFORE KIDS GO TO BED!!! Puh-lease!!!! I can’t believe the number of times I have heard this coming from the mouths of foreigners. Hello! Have you watched TV back home recently?? Feel OK with your kids watching people get dismembered? It’s just the facts of life, people, not pornography, and anyway, if you care so much, shouldn’t you be monitoring what your kids are watching???
15- Everything is disorganized, chaotic, and takes three times as long to get done than in other countries: MMMmmmm and I love it. Just relax, breathe, take advantage of the time you are wasting to think about life, stop for coffee, watch all the amazing dramas that unfold around you on the street – it’s like live theatre! Not a day goes by that I don’t witness some fascinating exchange, some REAL and basic human interplay. So, you’ll be late. So you won’t get the thing done by the deadline. So what? No one else will either. Live a little. Maybe it’s easier said than done, when you absolutely HAVE to get something done and are constantly frustrated, but generally life here is 'organised' to make room for delays, whether due to procrastination or the system – or lack thereof – and you shouldn’t end up in too much trouble. Greeks have their priorities straight – enjoy the things that make living worthwhile, and try to weasel out of the rest as much as possible. That’s why everything is such a mess – the two are mutually exclusive. The things that make Greece such a wonderful place are the very same things that make living here so frustrating – depending on which side of the fence you are sitting on. Try to remember that if you are one of those people who are always carrying on about how much life sucks here. Not that we should never complain – it’s natural to criticize the place you live in - but remember that your country of origin was no utopia either – you came here for a reason after all – and that there is a difference between valid, justified complaining, about things that actually do you harm, and the pointless everyday TRASHING of Greek culture and society that I so often hear going on.

Well this turned out to be a real manifesto. Sorry all. If you’d like to leave a comment addressing one of the specific points I wrote above, perhaps it would be good to start off by stating which point exactly you are commenting on! Thanks, and I look forward to hearing all of you telling me just how crazy I am and that I’ll be singing another tune in a few years’ time – I’m ready for it!!!

Greece vs Canada: fight!

2006-01-20T22:32:00.000+02:00

Well thanks to everyone for popping by to say hi... hmm I feel some pressure now to write a good follow-up! Actually, it's a toss up between two topics today: the one, inspired by Seawitch's blog about whether to stay in Greece or move back home, would be called "Greece vs. Canada: fight!"(Actually, if you follow buruburu's suggestion and enter the two words at googlefight, Canada is the clear winner). The other is inspired by one of my coworker who, as the male minority in the office, enjoys provoking us women by asking questions like: 'So, what's so wrong with marriage anyway'. Giving topic #2 its name.
Well as you can see from the title, I have made my selection for the evening. Topic 2, sorry you'll have to wait for another day.
So what is so great about Greece? Actually to be honest, reading seawitch's responses I started feeling a bit nervous. It's one thing to be positive after two years in, but how will I feel ten years from now, when the novelty has worn off and the rudeness factor has worn me down? So, let's list the pros and cons of Canada:

Pros: (according to what most people think)
- People are polite and civil (unless you're an anglophone in Montreal, like I was).
- You aren't taking your life into your hands every time you cross the road (again with Quebec as the exception).
- Things, like bureaucracy, work more or less smoothly (again... you guessed it... unless you're in Quebec).
- There aren't strikes every other day (sigh... if you're not in Quebec).
- If you are at least somewhat motivated and good at what you do, you will find a decent job and be paid decently for doing it.
- The education system is fairly good, judging by world-recognised standards anyway. (I could argue - but that's yet another topic).
- Everything is clean, pretty, wholesome and well organised
- The transit system, garbage collection, etc are excellent. And they pick up recycling!
- It's a pretty safe place to live (But everyone I know does lock their doors, so I don't know what country Michael Moore visited in Bowling for Columbine!).
- Many people actually live in houses. With GARDENS, and yes, (GASP!) GRASS!
- People are aware and conscious of issues like racism and the environment, and are generally not homophobic, and pretty openminded (unless you come from small-town Quebec, where they haven't yet gotten over the province's Catholic-steeped past. Or the prairie provinces, which spawned a political party that thinks women's place is at home, in the kitchen, barefoot and pregnant, and that gays are an aberration, or BC, where the huge influx of Indian and Chinese immigrants has made people just as racist as Greeks are towards Albanians.)

Cons:
- Much of Canada's famed politeness is "McPoliteness" (of the drilled-in "would you like fries with that with a smile" variety. OK OK, this is better than "It's not my fault", and people on the street certainly are, if not polite, then not outright rude. BUT people are also generally repressed, and carry their withheld rudeness around with them until it explodes at unexpected moments, usually on those they care about the most. They are also afraid to express themselves or show natural human emotion in public. I used to take the same bus to school every day, and on that bus would be a man who must have been over 90, yet still tricked out in a suit and cufflinks. So he'd get on the bus and, being from a generation where people still COMMUNICATED, would sit down and politely wish everyone around him a "gooday to you, sir, good day to you ma'am" etc. And people would just STARE at him. Some would even shift away or change seats, as though he was crazy! (Which he wasn't. Just polite!)
- Bureaucracy works smoothly, to a point, unless you need something just slightly out of the ordinary. In which case you are suddenly confronted with a confused man-machine, who is desperately scanning her/his computer screen for the nonexistent appropriate reply, while you say (through gritted teeth - though politely of course) "Look. It's very simple. All you have to do is stand up, walk over there and..." whatever. Yet they're so programmed they can't even begin to think for themselves.
- Real people at the other end of phonelines no longer exist - even if you dial 0, or 7, or 9 for the operator, you are told the operator isn't there. (Isn't the whole point of operators to be there at all times?) I recently called the Canadian Embassy here in Athens, and was amused to hear the oh-so familiar message: You have reached ... If you know the extension of the party you are trying to reach, please dial it now. If you don't know the extension, please dial 1 for... 2 for... (a bunch of options that have nothing to do with what you need) Or please enter the first few letters of the person's name to get their extension. If you can't do any of these things, you are f*****. But thank you so much for calling.
- Everything is clean, pretty, wholesome and well organised. WHAT? This is a con? Yes. Because it comes at a price: I knew a lady once who really liked to feed the pigeons. Well, guess what. In Canada, feeding the pigeons is a crime which will get you a 200$ fine!!! Drinking in public's a crime too, which maybe sounds like a good thing - but then there's my friend's father, a respectable middle-aged man, who one day decided to have a beer on his front lawn while watching the people go by. Well, his front lawn was a bit small, so his feet stuck out onto the sidewalk - i.e. public property. And - you guessed it - he got a fine!
- Transit is good, but it's so bloody expensive you might as well own a car. And waiting at a bus stop sucks when it's minus 30 outside, even if you know exactly when the bus is coming. And the reason there are no garbage bins all over the place is that you have to keep your garbage inside until the two days a week they come round for it - if there isn't a holiday or they just don't bother showing up. in which case you have to bring it back in again. (and if you leave your garbage outside on a day when they aren't coming round - even if you leave it out the night before so you don't have to run outside in stocking feet and a bathrobe at 8am in the freezing cold as the truck trundles up the block- yes, you can get a fine!)
And while they do pick up the recycling, in Montreal at least, there is only one recycling plant that only does some of the cans. The rest gets dumped like the rest of the garbage... until the day more plants open. AND most people don't know this (cause of course the Canadian news never reports anything bad about Canada - after all, everyone knows it's such a great country. Never mind the seal slaughter and the poor Native Americans sniffing glue on reserves and the mini-wars this leads to ever few years. Nope. Most Canadians don't ever hear about that.) so every week they faithfully spend half an hour of their lives sorting the bloody recycling into paper, plastic etc, like the government asks you to. And if you should, god forbid, let a piece of paper slip into a garbage bag (which must be the big ones - you aren't allowed to recycle your grocery bags by using them for garbage - go figure - or you'll get a fine) if the GARBAGE POLICE search through your garbage and find something recyclable, they will look for something in there with your address on it, and, yet again, fine you! (Needless to say, the possibilites for neighbourly revenge in Canada are endless!)
- This might be a good time to mention the LANGUAGE POLICE in Quebec, who until recently would fine you for putting up any signs or public material in English, unless it's in French as well, in letters at least twice as big as the English ones. (Even a small, in-store notice: please turn off the air conditioner when you leave, was worthy of a fine).
- In fact, it seems you can get a fine for just about anything in Canada - even breathing, if what you are breathing happens to be smoke. How do you think they keep it so pretty? Canadians aren't some special breed of people after all, who come out of the womb knowing how to say please and thank you and collect their dog poop off the sidewalk. And incidentally, try walking down the sidewalk in spring after the snow has melted, revealing a winter's worth of fineable dog poop, which was nevertheless not collected!
- People are aware and conscious of issues like racism and the environment. But that just makes them stop talking about it in public. Privately, they still get nervous around blacks, and many older anglophones stil think French Canadians are an inferior race and that it's too bad we didn't ship all of them down to Louisiana, with the rest of the French "Acadiens" (or Cajuns) to get killed in hurricanes, when we had the chance. Then there's an Arab friend of mine who, after 9-11, grew a beard and wore a bandana just to see what would happen. Well, what happened was that people would get up and move away from him on buses and the street, shop assistants eyed him suspiciously, etc.
- Nobody dares to criticise their country, cause they're constantly reminded of how lucky they are to live there (unless of course they're Native. In which case they don't have to pay taxes but are otherwise f*****.)

Okay. You get the point. Next installment: Greece, the pros and cons.

well we gotta start off somewhere...

2006-01-15T22:24:00.000+02:00

So hi everyone, and welcome to this blog. I've got to admit I'm rather new to this and not quite sure of proper blog etiquette, so if I commit any faux pas please let me know...
Actually I find it quite ironic that I'm doing this. While I'm fond of all the things computers can do for us, I have also always been very wary of getting too attached and dependent on them. E-mail especially rubs me the wrong way, as it trivializes communication while depriving us of natural human interplay (body language and such) and in general I try to stay as de-wired as possible. So why am I here?
Well, I suppose an element of egoism comes into it. I mean, come on, admit it, you've got to be somewhat egotistical to imagine that random people could possibly be interested in the things you have to say. Or perhaps it's just the need to be heard.
In any case, here I find myself in a country (Greece) and a city (Athens) which is my own yet not my own (I'm half Greek, raised in Canada, and, though I feel much closer to my Greek half, still adjusting to what is essentially a foreign environment). And while I've met many nice people here, I have not yet found enough people who like talking about the things I like to talk about on a regular basis. And so I think a large part of my brain is not being exercised, and I am slowly stopping to think about the things that I used to think about and consider important. So basically this blog is my way of re-awakening that part of my brain, and staying in touch with myself.
And if I get in touch with other people who think the same way through it, even better I guess!
And I suppose in time I'll get used to the idea of being completely wired.
Incidentally, what do I mean by wired? Well, basically being wired means interacting with any form of technology. If you walk down a street and a security camera picks you up, you are wired. If you pay for something with a credit card, you are wired. Essentially, as soon as any part of yourself: your image or your personal information, is captured by a technological medium, you are wired.
And when you have something like a blog, you are very intentionally and drastically extending the limits of your physical boundaries. I now, as you read this post, no longer exist just inside my head and in the heads of those who know me, but as a digital entity, spreading myself out across the world by way of the net. I am no longer just me but bits of data hurtling through cyberspace. You could even call me a cyborg, in the sense that who I am is now being extended through a technological medium. Scary thought, huh? Kind of reminds me of those tribes that didn't like having their photo taken cause they thought it would capture their souls.
Oh shoot. I promised no philosophising and here I go already. But I suppose it's appropriate, as I embark on this blog, to spare one last thought to what it is I'm doing!
For those interested, here's a link to a site with further stuff on the subject of being de-wired (going under the name of Luddism, the Luddities being those guys who were against the Industrial revolution and went around destroying technology).
Incidentally, I'd highly recommend the Neil Postman book Entertaining Ourselves to Death, which is not mentioned on the site, though there are other links to his work. Neil Postman being a media theorist, who just died recently, who basically thought the media was turning all our brains into mush. Also here's a link to the wikipedia entry on Steve Mann, who they are calling the first cyborg. Which I suppose he is but they fail to make clear that he is also in some ways a huge proponent of de-wiring, the main reason he wears all that stuff being in fact to challenge the infringement of our rights and privacy by technology.