Daily Archives: October 7, 2014

Pipinos, the first submarine to be constructed in Greece, was launched on Monday in Skaramangas, west of Athens.

The launch was attended by Prime Minister Antonis Samaras, Deputy Prime Minister Evangelos Venizelos and Defense Minister Dimitris Avramopoulos, among other dignitaries.

The Pipinos, a Type 214 diesel-electric vessel, is the first of three submarines commissioned by the navy to be built by the Abu Dhabi-controlled Hellenic Shipyards.

source: ekathimerini.com

Με την βοήθεια ενός ”ερευνητή” που μπαίνει στους χώρους που μέχρι στιγμής έχουν φέρει στο φως οι επιστήμονες, οι θεατές μπορούν να δουν σε προσομοίωση τους χώρους των πρώτων δύο θαλάμων του Τύμβου με τις Καρυάτιδες και τις σφίγγες.

Σχεδιάστηκε από το amfipoli-news.com και βασίζεται στις επίσημες διαστάσεις και αναλογίες που έχουν ανακοινώθει από το Υπουργείο Πολιτισμού και Αθλητισμού.

Οι φωτογραφίες που χρησιμοποιήθηκαν ανήκουν στο Υπουργείο Πολιτισμού και Αθλητισμού και προέρχονται από τα επίσημα Δελτία Τύπου που ανακοινώθηκαν τους τελευταίους μήνες σχετικά με τις ανασκαφές στον τάφο της Αμφίπολής.

H 3D αναπαράσταση σε μορφή online τρισδιάστατου παιχνιδιού θα ανανεώνεται κάθε φορά που υπάρχει επίσημη ανακοινωση από το Υπουργείο Πολιτισμού και Αθλητισμού σχετικά με το ταφικό μνημείο.

Περιηγηθείτε στην 3D online έκδοση της Αμφίπολής με ένα κλικ ΕΔΩ.

Ο ”ερευνητής” έχει τη δυνατότητα να περπατήσει με τα βελάκια του πληκτρολογίου και πηγαίνει μέχρι τον 3ο τοίχο, πίσω από την οποία εντοπίστηκε η σπασμένη μαρμάρινη πύλη του τύμβου. Πατώντας το ”C” μπορεί κανείς να στρέψει την κάμερα 360 μοιρες βλέποντας προς όλες τις κατευθύνσεις.

Με το ”F” γίνεται πλήρης η εικόνα στην οθόνη και με το ”R” ξεκινάτε πάλι από την αρχή, για να ακολουθήσετε τη διαδρομή που θέλετε.

Πηγή:madata.gr

Το “θαυματουργό” μπαλονάκι

Ένα μπαλονάκι γεμάτο αλμυρό νερό -saline- είναι το μυστικό με το οποίο έχασε 40 κιλά ο Μανόλης Περδής, αδελφός του Ναπολέοντα Περδή και συνιδρυτής των καλλυντικών Napoleon.

To βάρος του Μανόλη είχε φθάσει τα 134 κιλά και έπρεπε να κάνει κάτι. Το χειρουργικό μαχαίρι, τον απωθούσε, ενώ, αντίθετα, το μπαλονάκι με το αλμυρό νερό που του προτάθηκε, ως εναλλακτική λύση, ήταν κάτι το οποίο αποφάσισε να δοκιμάσει. Τοποθετείται, να σημειωθεί, στο στομάχι και ο ρόλος του είναι να εμποδίσει τη λήψη μεγάλων γευμάτων. Ο ίδιος θα πει ότι από έξι φλιτζάνια μακαρόνια που έτρωγε πριν, για να χορτάσει, τώρα τρώει μόνο ενάμισι.

Με τη μέθοδο αυτή έχει χάσει 34 κιλά, από τα 134 που ζύγιζε και γιατρεύτηκε από το διαβήτη 2 που έπασχε.

Ο Έλληνας ειδικός γιατρός, Γιώργος Μαρίνος, από το Gastric Balloon Australia, ο οποίος έχασε με τη μέθοδο αυτή, ο ίδιος 25 κιλά, προειδοποιεί ότι το βάρος που χάνεται μ’ αυτόν τον τρόπο, θα επανέλθει σε περίπτωση που το πρόγραμμα αυτό δεν συνοδευτεί από τη στήριξη ψυχολόγου και διατροφολόγου.
«Το μπαλονάκι απλώς σας δείχνει τον τρόπο του πώς να καταναλώνετε μικρότερες μερίδες και ότι μπορείτε να ζήσετε τρώγοντας πιο λίγο».
Να σημειωθεί ότι η μέθοδος αυτή απώλειας βάρους ενδείκνυται για όσους είναι υπέρβαροι αλλά όχι παχύσαρκοι και πρέπει να χάσουν 20 -30 κιλά.

Πηγή: Νέος Κόσμος

Ο ομογενής Νίκος Πάππας

«Ο κάθε άνθρωπος έχει τον ήρωά του. Και ο δικός μου ήρωας είναι ένας σύγχρονος Έλληνας. Είναι ο Νικ Πάπας» λέει ο διάσημος Αυστραλός ηθοποιός, Ράσελ Κρόου.
Το 2002 ο Αυστραλός ηθοποιός μαζί με τον μεγιστάνα, Πίτερ Χολμς α Κορτ, αγόρασαν την ομάδα ράγμπι του Σίδνεϊ Ράμπιτος.
«Ανέλαβε την ομάδα και κάνε την και πάλι πρωταθλήτρια Αυστραλίας». Αυτή ήταν η πρόταση (εντολή) τότε του Ράσελ Κρόου στον πιο στενό και έμπιστο φίλο του, τον δικηγόρο Νίκο Παπαναστασίου (Νικ Πάπας), ο οποίος είναι, ακόμη, συγγραφέας και λάτρης των καλών τεχνών, του αθλητισμού, ενώ έχει προσφέρει πολλά στην ομογένεια, αλλά και στην Ελλάδα.

Χθες βράδυ (Κυριακή) η ομάδα των Ράμπιτος αγωνιζόταν κόντρα στο Κάντερμπερι -ιδιοκτησίας ενός άλλου Έλληνα της Αυστραλίας, του Τζορτζ Πεπονή-, για πρώτη φορά, μετά από 43 χρόνια, στον τελικό του ράγμπι για την κατάκτηση του παναυστραλιανού πρωταθλήματος.
Ο Ράσελ Κρόου δεν έχει καμιά αμφιβολία ότι η αναγέννηση της ομάδας οφείλεται στον φίλο του ομογενή, Νικ Πάπας.
«Είναι ο σωτήρας μας και είναι ο ήρωάς μου» λέει.

«Η ομάδα ήταν και είναι η πιο δημοφιλής στην Αυστραλία, διότι σε αυτή έπαιζαν πολλοί Αβορίγινες, αλλά και μετανάστες από την Ελλάδα, την Ιταλία και τον Λίβανο. Είναι η ομάδα που έχει δεσμούς με την εργατική τάξη και για πολλούς από τους μετανάστες εκπροσωπεί την καινούργια τους ζωή στην Αυστραλία» λέει ο Νικ Πάπας και προσθέτει πως ακόμα και η γιαγιά του με το μαύρο της τσεμπέρι ζητούσε να μάθει «τι έκαναν οι Ράμπιτος».

Η πολύχρονη φιλική του ομογενή σχέση με τον… «μονομάχο» Ράσελ Κρόου ξεκίνησε από τη λατρεία που είχαν και οι δύο για την πιο ιστορική και δημοφιλέστερη ομάδα του αυστραλιανού ράγμπι, τη Ράμπιτος, που έχει πάνω από εκατό χρόνια ζωής. Έχει κατακτήσει είκοσι πρωταθλήματα (τα περισσότερα από οποιοδήποτε άλλο σωματείο έως σήμερα), αλλά από το 1971 μέχρι σήμερα δεν έχει γευθεί τη χαρά της κατάκτησης ενός τίτλου. Το 1999, μάλιστα, βρέθηκε και εκτός του εθνικού πρωταθλήματος, όταν αυτό αγοράστηκε από την εταιρεία News του Αυστραλού μεγιστάνα των μέσων ενημέρωσης, Ρούπερτ Μέρντοχ.
Όπως λέει ο κ. Παπαναστασίου, τότε έγιναν οι μεγαλύτερες διαδηλώσεις στην ιστορία του Σίδνεϊ από την εποχή του πολέμου του Βιετνάμ με αίτημα την επαναφορά του ιστορικού σωματείου στο εθνικό πρωτάθλημα.

Την εκστρατεία την ανέλαβε ο ίδιος και κέρδισε στα δικαστήρια τον Μέρντοχ. Η ομάδα επέστρεψε στο εθνικό πρωτάθλημα.
«Τα οφείλουμε όλα στον Νικ» επιμένει ο Κρόου και λέει:
«Δεν πρόκειται για την επιτυχία της ομάδας στο γήπεδο. Είναι κάτι πιο σημαντικό. Εκφράζει την εργατική τάξη και, μέσω τη επιτυχίας αυτής, θέλουμε να πούμε στα νέα παιδιά να επιμείνουν, να σπουδάσουν, να γίνουν επιστήμονες» λέει ο Κρόου.
«Ο Ράσελ Κρόου λατρεύει την ομάδα. Μαζί με τον Χολμς α Κορτ έχουν επενδύσει πολλά εκατομμύρια δολάρια για να την ξανακάνουν πρωταθλήτρια» δηλώνει ο κ. Παπαναστασίου.

Μπορεί να είναι πρόεδρος ομάδας ράγκμπι, αλλά είναι και φανατικός ποδοσφαιρόφιλος ο κ. Παπαναστασίου. Εξάλλου, ο πατέρας του, Γιώργος ήταν πρόεδρος για πολλά χρόνια της ελληνικής ποδοσφαιρικής ομάδας του Σίδνεϊ Πανελλήνιος. (Σήμερα λέγεται Sydney Olympic).
Ο Νίκος Παπαναστασίου λέει για τον Ράσελ Κρόου ότι «είναι αυτό που βλέπετε. Πανέξυπνος. Γεμάτος ενέργεια, παρορμητικός, απαιτητικός, ευαίσθητος, θερμός». Υπενθυμίζει, μάλιστα, ότι η πρώτη τηλεοπτική εμφάνιση του διάσημου Αυστραλού ηθοποιού ήταν σε μια ελληνική κωμωδία! «Acropolis Now» λεγόταν η σειρά εκείνη που σημείωσε ανεπανάληπτη επιτυχία.

Αμέσως μετά, ο Ράσελ πρωταγωνίστησε στην ταινία «The Silver Brumby» που σκηνοθέτησε ο ομογενής, Γιάννης Τατούλης.
Η μητέρα του Νίκου Παπαναστασίου, Μαρίνα, κατάγεται από το Καστελόριζο. Το ίδιο και ο πατέρας του, Γιώργος.

Σε εκείνον οφείλει την αγάπη του για την πατρίδα και την ελληνική γλώσσα. «Στο σπίτι μας είχε βάλει επιγραφές που έλεγαν «εδώ μέσα μιλάμε μόνο Ελληνικά»» θυμάται με νοσταλγία ο κ. Παπαναστασίου και συμπληρώνει:
«Ο πατέρας μου έλεγε ότι για να πάω μπροστά θα πρέπει να πετύχω στην ευρύτερη αυστραλιανή κοινωνία, χωρίς ποτέ να ξεχνάω την καταγωγή μου. Προσπάθησα να τηρήσω τη συμβουλή του». Και τα κατάφερε. Μπορεί ο πατέρας να είχε έντονη παροικιακή δράση, πρόεδρος του Πανελληνίου, πρόεδρος της Διακοινοτικής της Αρχιεπισκοπής και επικεφαλής πολλών κορυφαίων ομογενειακών φορέων, αλλά και ο Νίκος Παπαναστασίου όχι μόνο δεν υστέρησε, αλλά τον ξεπέρασε!

Εκτός από πρόεδρος της ομάδας Ράμπιτος, είναι και νομικός σύμβουλος της Αρχιεπισκοπής Αυστραλίας, καθώς και γραμματέας του Αρχιεπισκοπικού Συμβουλίου. Παράλληλα, είναι πρόεδρος του μεγαλύτερου αυστραλιανού μουσείου, του φημισμένου The Powerhouse Museum του Σίδνεϊ. Μάλιστα, με αυτήν την ιδιότητά του φροντίζει να αναπτύσσει τις πολιτιστικές σχέσεις Ελλάδας-Αυστραλίας. Είναι, επίσης, μέλος του Αυστραλιανού Αρχαιολογικού Ινστιτούτου της Αθήνας και εκ των διευθυντών του κλαμπ των Καστελοριζίων Σίδνεϊ.

Την αγάπη του για την Ελλάδα την εκδηλώνει και με έναν άλλο τρόπο: έχει γράψει τέσσερα βιβλία, από τα οποία τα τρία είναι αφιερωμένα στο ακριτικό νησί του! Το Καστελόριζο.

Και πρόσφατα ήρθε στην επικαιρότητα για την εναντίωσή του στη Χρυσή Αυγή!

Πηγή: Νέος Κόσμος

«Να μη συμμετέχει σε δημόσιες εκδηλώσεις», λένε συνδικάτα της χώρας.

Με επιστολές τους προς τον πρωθυπουργό του Βελγίου, Έλιο ντι Ρούπο, και τον δήμαρχο των Βρυξελλών, Ιβάν Μαγιέρ, τα τέσσερα μεγαλύτερα γαλλόφωνα βελγικά συνδικάτα ζητούν να μην επιτρέπονται στη χώρα δημόσιες εκδηλώσεις με τη συμμετοχή της Χρυσής Αυγής.

Αφορμή για τη σύνταξη της επιστολής στάθηκε η δημοσιοποίηση πληροφοριών για διάσκεψη νεοναζιστικών οργανώσεων με θέμα «Χρυσή Αυγή: ο πολιτικός αγώνας και η στρατηγική της έντασης», που πραγματοποιήθηκε στις 4 Οκτωβρίου στο Βέλγιο σε μυστικό τόπο συνάντησης.

Βάσει πληροφοριών που έχουν δημοσιοποιηθεί σε ακροδεξιές ιστοσελίδες, τα βελγικά συνδικάτα υποστηρίζουν στην επιστολή τους ότι τη διάσκεψη οργάνωσε ο «ιταλικός πολιτιστικός σύλλογος ZenitBelgio», που έχει εγκατασταθεί στο Βέλγιο από το 2013. Επισημαίνουν, δε, ότι το Zenit έχει αποστολή την προώθηση της φασιστικής ιδεολογίας (ένα από τα ιστορικά πολιτικά πρότυπα είναι ο Βέλγος Ναζί, Λεόν Ντεγκρέλ) και συνδέεται με το ιταλικό νεοφασιστικό ρεύμα «Casa Pound».

Στην επιστολή τους τα βελγικά συνδικάτα τονίζουν επίσης ότι από το τέλος Αυγούστου, ακροδεξιές ιστοσελίδες του Βελγίου και της Γαλλίας προανήγγειλαν μια διάσκεψη για τη Χρυσή Αυγή, προγραμματισμένη για τις 4 Οκτωβρίου, με ομιλητές δύο συνεργάτες των ευρωβουλευτών της Χρυσής Αυγής, τον Κωνσταντίνο Μποβιάτσο και τον Αλέξανδρο Λύρη, καθώς και έναν Ιταλό, πρώην τρομοκράτη της ακροδεξιάς και πρόεδρο του κινήματος Casa Pound, τον Γκαμπριέλε Αντινόλφι. Τα βελγικά συνδικάτα σημειώνουν, επίσης, ότι κάποιες από αυτές τις ιστοσελίδες ανακοίνωναν ως τόπο διεξαγωγής της διάσκεψης τις Βρυξέλλες, ενώ κάποιες άλλες ανέφεραν τη Μονς.

Τα βελγικά συνδικάτα στην επιστολή τους τονίζουν ότι αν επιτραπούν διασκέψεις παρόμοιες με αυτήν της 4ης Οκτωβρίου, ή άλλες εκδηλώσεις με τη συμμετοχή της Χρυσής Αυγής, είναι πολύ πιθανή η παραβίαση του βελγικού αντιρατσιστικού νόμου.

Ως εκ τούτου, καλούν τις βελγικές Αρχές να λάβουν τα αναγκαία μέτρα, ώστε να μη μετατραπούν οι Βρυξέλλες και το Βέλγιο σε «κέντρο συντονισμού των Νεοναζί της Ευρώπης».

Καλούν, επίσης, τις τοπικές και ομοσπονδιακές Αρχές του Βελγίου να εκδώσουν μια γενική απαγόρευση των δραστηριοτήτων, στις οποίες εμπλέκεται η Χρυσή Αυγή, πλην εκείνων του Ευρωπαϊκού Κοινοβουλίου.

Αναλυτικότερα, στην επιστολή τους τα βελγικά συνδικάτα αναφέρουν τα εξής:

«Στην Ελλάδα, η Χρυσή Αυγή έχει περάσει από το έγκλημα της υποκίνησης ρατσιστικού μίσους στην πράξη. Δεδομένης της ανοιχτά ρατσιστικής ρητορικής τους στην Ελλάδα, είναι σχεδόν βέβαιο πως ο ρατσιστικός λόγος θα διατυπωθεί και στις πιθανές συναντήσεις στο Βέλγιο. Σε μια μαγνητοσκοπημένη συνομιλία τον περασμένο Αύγουστο, ένας από τους ομιλητές της διάσκεψης της 4 Οκτωβρίου, αναφέρει: “αν αυτός που αγαπά τη φυλή του θεωρείται ρατσιστής, ε τότε ναι, είμαστε ρατσιστές”. Η παραβίαση του βελγικού αντιρατσιστικού νόμου είναι λοιπόν πολύ πιθανή αν επιτραπεί αυτή η διάσκεψη ή άλλες εκδηλώσεις με τη συμμετοχή της Χρυσής Αυγής».
Αναφέρεται επίσης ότι «μετά την εκλογή τριών ευρωβουλευτών της Χρυσής Αυγής, διαφαίνεται καθαρά πως αυτή οργάνωση αποσκοπεί στο να επωφεληθεί από την παρουσία της στις Βρυξέλλες, για να συντονίσει τις πιο ακραίες νεοναζιστικές ομάδες της Ευρώπης, περιλαμβανομένων και των βέλγικων γκρουπούσκουλων, όπως το Nieuw-solidaristisch alternatief (N-SA), το Nation και oι Autonome Nationalisten Vlaanderen. Καλούμε τις Αρχές της χώρας μας να λάβουν τα αναγκαία μέτρα, ώστε να αποφευχθεί οι Βρυξέλλες και το Βέλγιο να χρησιμοποιηθούν ως κέντρο συντονισμού των Νεοναζί της Ευρώπης. Δεδομένων των στοιχείων που προκύπτουν από τη ρητορική της, αλλά και από τα ρατσιστικά εγκλήματα που έχει διαπράξει, θα ήταν απόλυτα ορθό οι τοπικές και ομοσπονδιακές Αρχές να εκδώσουν μια γενική απαγόρευση των δραστηριοτήτων που εμπλέκουν τη Χρυσή Αυγή εκτός Ευρωκοινοβουλίου, ακολουθώντας το παράδειγμα του δημάρχου της Νέας Υόρκης, ο οποίος κατήγγειλε την παρουσία της Χρυσής Αυγής στην πόλη του».

Τέλος, σημειώνεται ότι οι πληροφορίες για τη «μυστική» διάσκεψη της 4ης Οκτωβρίου, με θέμα τη Χρυσή Αυγή, στάθηκαν η αφορμή να διοργανωθεί την ίδια ημέρα στο κέντρο των Βρυξελλών αντιφασιστική διαδήλωση, κατά της άκρας δεξιάς και της Χρυσής Αυγής, στην οποία συμμετείχαν περίπου 300 άτομα, με σύνθημα: «Καμία γειτονιά για τους φασίστες και κανένας φασίστας στη γειτονιά μας».

Πηγή: Νέος Κόσμος

The Greek Centre for Contemporary Culture.

With the air of an artist who has embalmed the poignant history of an intensely human spirit in the magical spices of words, the president of the GOCMV has declared that the tower is open for business.

In not only undertaking, but successfully completing this long-needed task, the GOCMV has proven various things to the community at large. Firstly, that the second generation of Greek Australians (comprising the majority of the members of the GOCMV’s current committee), which is more integrated within the broader Australian community, both socially and professionally, can harness a unique set of skills and networks in order to achieve projects that hitherto appeared to be unachievable. It follows logically that in this post-migration age, the acceptable face of the Greek community as a whole to the broader community must be one where second generation Greek Australians, for the reasons stated above, are prominent. Already, we have seen such prominence pay dividends, both in communication and funding and it is to the eternal credit and discernment of the members of the GOCMV that they entrusted their organisation to a committee that included Australian-born Greeks in the decision-making, rather than just a tokenistic capacity. In fact, such trust is historic in itself, for the phenomenon of clinging to ‘power’ or ‘position’ when one has fast exceeded their utility or relevance is so ingrained in Greek culture, and especially the culture of the Greek organisations in Melbourne, that we even have an expression for such persons, inspired by Greek mythology: ‘καρεκλοκένταυροι’, or literally, ‘chair-centaurs’.

The construction of the magnificent edifice has caused a marked change in the structure of our broader community. Whereas previously this was largely comprised of disparate insular organisations jealously guarding their own narrow interests, now our community is comprised of insular organisations jealously guarding their own narrow interests, but coalescing around the GOCMV as its central pole. By being inclusive, actively recruiting the assistance and collaboration, not only of Geek organisations, but also of the Greek business sector and interested individuals, the GOCMV has made the completion of its tower an achievement the entire community can feel it has contributed to, and has a stake in. In a few short years, the GOCMV has thus gone from being a highly politicked marginal organisation that appeared to be more interested in guarding and/or promoting certain political ideologies and perpetuating intra-communal strife, to becoming what it always should have been: a sophisticated organisation that can co-ordinate and harness the resources of the entire Greek community in order to provide much needed unity and cater to the increasingly diverse needs of a multi-faceted and ever-evolving Greek-Australian polity. It has done so because its focus has not been the attainment of power or the use of position to bolster one’s ego but rather, on people.

It is trite to remind ourselves that a good deal of the first generation’s useful energy was devoted to construction projects of various natures. In my youth I remember attending function after function devoted to raising funds in order to ‘complete’ or ‘pay off’ the ‘κτήριο’, and finally when such clubhouses were paid off, remaining members of committees would either consider this their own personal achievement and thus allow no-one else to participate in the running of their organisation, or scratch their heads as they realised that in focusing only on construction, they had let the sense of community that had caused the endeavour in the first place to lapse, so that only empty walls remained, lifelessly echoing the futility of the whole enterprise. This is not to belittle the sterling work undertaken by the first generation, and indeed, it still bears the continued burden of much of that work at a time when the second generation should have relieved it of much if it, but rather to illustrate a concerning phenomenon of second generation disinterest and disengagement, one which the current GOCMV is doing much to arrest.

Our track record therefore proves that while we are good at building things, we often build things to keep people out rather than let them in, or don’t know what to do with them after they have been built. This is the challenge presented by the tower to the GOCMV, now that the dream has been realised. Yet the board members are no ordinary dreamers. Rather, they are dreamers whose subtle senses catch, like a shower in the sunshine, the impalpable rainbows of the immaterial Greek world.

Fortunately, the GOCMV is already proving that it will defy the historical trend of exclusionism and elitism. The dedication of four floors of the building to the Cultural Centre speaks volumes for the level of commitment the GOCMV leadership is willing to make towards the entire paroikia. Its English language lectures on diverse topics of interest have provided a unique opportunity to reach otherwise unengaged members of the community and have, in their fourth year, become an institution. Further, the creation of language classes targeted at various levels in order to cater to newly arrived or gifted Greek-speakers also underlies not only the sense of mission, but the sophisticated understanding of the emerging needs of the Greek community displayed by the GOCMV leadership. Out of the woodwork, Greek Australians, and hearteningly, many Philhellenes who hitherto had no contact with or interest in the Greek community, are emerging, begging to be given the opportunity to lend a hand. This renascent, revitalised GOCMV thus is undoubtedly a people-centered community and this approach will certainly pay dividends in the form of enhanced community cohesion, if it continues in the future.

The proof is the large mass that swarmed the foyer of the GOCMV building at its recent official opening. They were told that the opening was to take place at 3.30 pm, yet people were queuing up from noon in order to witness the wonder of our new home, all the while imbibing an air thick with clerical sanctity, heavy with the odours of tradition and the soft warmth of spiritual authority. The crowd waiting to enter was as irreverent as always, commenting, as they heaved and shoved to make it to the lifts, upon the colour scheme, the presence of certain dignitaries and even the hairstyle of one of the GOCMV committee members, all indicative of a populace that has taken the building to their hearts, feels comfortable with it, and most importantly, considers it to be their own. The onus is on all these people, and indeed on the entire Greek community of Melbourne, to engage with the GOCMV, assist it in its worthy endeavours, as we all gird our loins for the future battles that are to come.

For the moment, though, it is proper and right to ascribe glory to the triumphant members of the GOCMV board for their remarkable achievement and to permit them, ever so slightly, to rest upon their laurels, albeit momentarily. For there is much to be done.

*Dean Kalimniou is a Melbourne solicitor and freelance journalist.

source: Neos Kosmos

Athena, oil on canvas.

Featuring a collection of paintings inspired by Greek mythology, the solo exhibition ‘Mysticism’ by Greek Australian painter Diamando Koutsellis will be hosted at the Arthouse Hotel, in Sydney, from 6 October to 7 November.

Koutsellis’ investigation into Greek mythology looks at how ancient mythology can still be relevant in contemporary society.

“The mythology speaks of wins and losses, pains and joys and moments of change and transformation, all of which can lead to personal growth,” the artist says.

“The meanings have to do with knowledge, wisdom, technology and the willingness to explore the unknown.”

Diamando Koutsellis is a Sydney based multidisciplinary artist who works with paint, ceramic sculpture, public and community art.
She has worked extensively abroad and across Australia for over twenty years.

The exhibition is on from 6 October to 7 November, at the Arthouse Hotel, 275 Pitt Street, Sydney. For more information, contact (02) 9284 1200.

source: Neos Kosmos

After the fall of the Berlin Wall, Yannis Lubovicki left Poland and came to Athens in search of work. He lost his job during the Greek economic crisis and now lives on the streets.

In the Athenian neighbourhood of Skouze Hill, a pair of shabbily dressed men, Polish immigrants, sit on a doorstep across the street from a supermarket, wearily asking passersby for change as they wait for store employees to throw away the day’s unsold food. Once the food has been tossed into the supermarkets’ dustbins, they will compete with the area’s other dumpster divers – ethnic Roma – for the stale bread and leftover vegetables.

When he illegally immigrated to Greece two decades ago, Yannis Lubovicki, 43, dreamed of a better life than what Poland – then struggling to adjust to a post-Berlin Wall world – could offer. Instead, he and his companion Christos Gabriel, 53, found poverty. Now they spend their days panhandling and their nights sleeping on park benches. They survive on food from church soup kitchens and trash cans and the water from park fountains. Once a week they walk downtown to Koumoundourou Square and use the public baths there, well frequented by the homeless.

“Don’t give them any money,” says a well-dressed middle-aged woman heading into the supermarket.

“They’ll spend it on wine in a split second.”

If harsh, her words are perhaps true: their breath smells of alcohol, their eyes are bloodshot, and Lubovicki – the woman points to him emphatically – is timidly taking a corkscrew out of his bag.

An estimated one person in twenty is an undocumented immigrant in Greece, a country of eleven million. Many of them, like Lubovicki and Gabriel, are transplants from the former Eastern bloc. Having moved to Greece in search of the economic opportunities that an integrated, prosperous Europe once offered, they have instead struggled to survive, one of the groups hardest hit by financial crisis in Greece. At the same time, they have been scapegoats for the country’s ongoing malaise, with high unemployment and political turmoil – along with a humiliating dose of international ridicule for the former continental success story turned basket case – feeding a brutal, anti-immigrant backlash within Greek society, just as they have in other immigrant magnets such as Italy, Malta, and Spain.

Yet in few corners of Europe have ultranationalism and xenophobia gained as much traction as they have in Greece. Golden Dawn, a far-right Greek political party, has seen tremendous growth since the economic crisis hit. In 1996, it received just 0.07 per cent of the vote in national parliamentary elections; in 2012, it won 7 per cent. Halting immigration is the party’s chief goal. Its leaders declare that “illegal alien-invaders” amount to an irregular foreign army, bent on attacking the country’s social fabric and corrupting its national identity. The party’s extreme rhetoric has, in turn, fed violence, from the murder of a Greek antifascist rapper by a party member, to the stunning attack that Golden Dawn MP Ilias Kasidiaris unleashed on two leftist members of parliament during the live taping of a morning talk show.

Even in Athens, Greece’s cosmopolitan capital, Golden Dawn has substantial support. It won 16 per cent of the vote in last May’s mayoral elections, a huge jump from its share of just 5 per cent in 2010.

“We have been swarming with Albanians, Pakistanis, Africans, and Eastern Europeans,” says the middle-aged woman at the supermarket, who did not give her name.

“Now we have the Gypsy gangs, too.”

Her once-affluent neighbourhood used to be populated by high-ranking military officers and their families, but in recent years the poorer immigrant enclaves in the bordering downtown areas have spilled over here as well.

“That’s why they wanted us in Europe,” she adds – referring to wealthy northern European nations like France and Germany, to keep the Third Worlders away from them so they can continue their petty little lives.”

Gangling and grey-haired, Gabriel walks with a limp and speaks with a thick accent. In his halting Greek, he notes happily that he recently discovered a new hideout, a tiny covered alley alongside a newly built apartment building, where he lies down on the pavement at night to sleep. He and Lubovicki have spent the last five years living in close proximity to the supermarket and its surplus food. Until a few months ago, they had been squatting in a nearby abandoned house, but then the landlord drove them out.

Gabriel has been in the country for twelve years. Back in Poland, he lived through the early years of his homeland’s transition from communism. Post-Soviet Poland quickly reformed its economy to woo investors, privatising its coal and steel industries and knocking down regulatory hurdles. Thanks to vigorous economic growth and rising standards of living, Polish households were optimistic and exuberant, and credit flowed easily. Gabriel, then a coal miner, decided to take out a loan to buy a two-storey house in the southern Polish city of Katowice for himself, his wife, and four children.

The Polish ‘miracle’, however, failed to curb the country’s high levels of unemployment. Laid off and unable to find a new job, Gabriel struggled to pay his 50,000 euro mortgage. Desperate, he immigrated to Greece in 2002, joining a wave of illegal immigrants drawn by the global image of pre-crisis Greece as flourishing and full of promise. Gabriel has not seen his children since he left.

But today’s moribund Greek economy, now in its seventh year of recession, offers little in the way of hope for Gabriel and immigrants like him. In Athens, about 5,000 undocumented immigrants live in derelict buildings unfit for human habitation. When they can find work, conditions are often extreme: migrant strawberry pickers, for example, earn $26 to $33 a day for about ten hours’ work, living in makeshift huts with no access to toilets. Meanwhile, government officials warn of a “public-health time bomb”, with large numbers of new immigrants not inoculated for tuberculosis, polio, measles, and other communicable diseases.

Until the 1990s, Greece was an extremely homogenous society. The wave of Eastern European immigrants that flooded Greece after the fall of the Soviet Union was followed by another wave of immigrants from Africa and Asia in subsequent years, gradually ratcheting up anti-immigrant sentiment among the broader population. Today, as unresolved economic and immigration problems worsen an already festering resentment, Greece continues to vie for the title of Europe’s ‘most racist’ nation.

In recent years, the government has had some success in staunching the flow of illegal immigrants into the country, which it credits in part to an eight-mile barbed-wire fence it erected along its border with Turkey, completed two years ago. The number of illegal immigrants that the government detained fell from 77,000 in 2012 to 43,000 in 2013.

These days, Gabriel stays on constant alert for police raids – not for fear of deportation, as European countries signed the 2007 Schengen agreement that allows citizens of each country to move and work freely throughout the union – but for fear that he may be arrested for failing to pay his bank loan back in Poland. For the most part, though, the police tend to ignore him and other homeless immigrants.

Golden Dawn wishes it were otherwise. These foreigners must be deported, the party argues, in order to save the culture and community of the ‘pure’ Greeks. Ironically, in spite of his slogan of “work for Greeks only”, Golden Dawn’s leader, Nikolaos Michaloliakos, happens to own a hotel in an immigrant Athens neighbourhood staffed by low-wage foreign workers.

In recent months the party’s brazen militancy seems to have backfired to some extent, with two of its leaders now in jail awaiting trial – Michaloliakos for forming a ‘criminal organisation’ and a spokesperson for gun charges.

Nevertheless, Nikos Kyriakidis, a 47-year-old plumber from Athens, insists that Golden Dawn is the only party that will fight against Zionism, imposed multiculturalism, and the growing erosion of Greek culture. Economic anxieties also seem to be at the root of Kyriakidis’ anger. He rails against the “scumbags” of PASOK and New Democracy, that he says destroyed the Greek economy. Although he has a quarter-century worth of work experience, right now Kyriakidis is unable to support his family. They just moved to avoid living in a part of the city that has recently seen an influx of immigrants. Kyriakidis doesn’t want his children to grow up in such a rundown neighbourhood, he says.

In Greece, Eastern European immigrants tend to fare better than other immigrants in one area: racist attacks. Three weeks ago Gabriel and Lubovicki witnessed a gang of thirty young men dressed in black beating Asian immigrants.

“They shouldn’t have hit them, it’s not right,” says Lubovicki, a stubby and gregarious man who fills in the silences of his tall and taciturn companion. The beating took place out in the open, in a public square with numerous passersby. Four police officers were nearby but did nothing, Lubovicki claims. Fortunately, the gang did not bother the two Poles.

“It is the dark ones they are after,” he notes. That is, the Pakistanis, Afghanis, Syrians, Bangladeshis, Somalis, and Eritreans who have built up the country’s largest Asian and African immigrant enclaves.

A group of young men walk down the street, stopping when they notice Lubovicki and Gabriel – half-drunk and reeking of alcohol – sitting on the doorstep.

“I’ll give you ten bottles of wine if you kick this car door,” says one of the men. He is short and fair-haired, in his early twenties.

“Ten more bottles if you sing,” says another, a hulking man with a humpback.

Lubovicki bursts into laughter and says he can’t do it. Gabriel cracks a smile.

The young men seem to know the Poles. They, too, are immigrants – second-generation Albanian Greeks.

Today, those of the country’s unauthorised immigrants who hail from the former Eastern Bloc are chiefly from Albania: in 2013 they were almost a third of all illegal immigrants arrested that year, and Albanians also comprise a majority of the country’s total foreign-born population.

Lubovicki has a daughter of his own, now seventeen years old. His marriage ended after his wife, who had moved out to Greece with him, found out about an affair.

“We had a brawl,” he says. “My wife left Greece in the middle of the night with my daughter.”

Things really got bad when Lubovicki lost his job during the crisis.

The construction sector, which used to employ both men and whose workforce is a third foreign-born, has shrunk by half since 2009.

Their descent into poverty has soured their attitudes toward the free market and made the two Polish immigrants nostalgic for Poland’s communist era, as repressive as it was. They would never have left Poland if the Soviet Union had not collapsed, they point out. Back then, life was good, and they lacked nothing.

These are views shared by a significant number of older Eastern Europeans, according to a 2009 Pew survey. While those under the age of forty tend to favour the economic and political reforms their countries have gone through over the past two decades, the older generations are more sceptical.

Clearly, many have painful memories of the USSR: not just the absence of freedom and dissent, but also the frequent shortages of food and toilet paper, the constant lecturing about Marxist-Leninist creeds, the degrading monotony of Soviet life. But like Lubovicki and Gabriel, some of those who grew up under communism point out that unemployment and homelessness were virtually unknown back then. Their salaries were nowhere near American ones, but the cost of living was negligible.

In recent years, Poland has, like Greece before it, seen rapid economic growth. While many Poles continue to go abroad in search of higher wages, living standards have improved back in their home country. Lubovicki points out that his mother, a professional chef, enjoys a pension and a cosy house of her own.

Lubovicki misses his hometown, a village outside Warsaw. He misses his daughter, who speaks to him by phone every other week. He misses his mother’s cooking. But he does not believe he will go back to the old country anytime soon.

“My mother calls me up all the time asking me to return to Poland, but I can’t because I can’t afford it. I need eighty-five euros to renew my passport and about 200 euros for travel expenses.”

It’s not just about the money, Lubovicki adds. Born ‘Yannus’, he has lived as ‘Yannis’ since he came to Greece – now half his life.

“If I go to Poland, I won’t know a thing. I’ll be unable to adjust there. I have been living in Greece ever since I came of age, how am I supposed to start all over again?”

Gabriel, who used to go by the name ‘Yaroslav’, nods in approval.

“Have I told you I am also a mechanic for all kinds of machines and can do some plumber work?” Lubovicki says, moving on to another, more hopeful, topic.

“I may find a gig like this in the future. I know the tools of the trade.”

Then his eyes light up. The sliding doors of the supermarket have opened. Employees bearing huge trash bags head for the dustbins. Lubovicki walks over to find his next meal.

*Stav Dimitropoulos is a Greek writer whose work has appeared in major Greek, US, UK, and Canadian media outlets. This is an edited version of the article that first appeared in New York’s In The Fray Magazine.

Alexandra Stratou’s recipe book guides the reader into the kitchen of a modern Greek family, revealing the important role food plays in building our sense of identity.

For three generations, Kyria Loula cooked for the same Athenian family. She was only 24 years old when she learned her first recipes from the family’s matriarch – the great-grandmother of Alexandra Stratou.

For decades – and the biggest part of her life – Kyria Loula would alter from one to another member of the well-off Athenian family, preparing meals for a week to come.

Her biggest fear was that she will be forgotten once she passes away. But with the cookbook Cooking to Share, written and published in December 2013 by Alexandra Stratou, Kyria Loula will be remembered even by those who never knew her.

The first page of the book reads: “Dedicated to Kyria Loula who cooked our food and to our Yiayia who taught us the importance of family.”

Alexandra Stratou is not your conventional Greek girl. Educated in English school in Athens, Alexandra continued her studies at Brown University, New York. It was at the end of the university that she started cooking with her roommate – with passion, each evening.

“I was introduced to all the potential and freedom there is in each of us to shape our own reality. It was here that I started cooking to share meals with others and where I first dreamt of using food as a medium to communicate and bring people together,” Alexandra tells Neos Kosmos.

It was only logical to her mind then, she tells today, that she learn how to cook professionally, so she embarked on the two year journey of cooking school, at Escuela de Cocina Luis Irizar, in San Sebastian, Spain.

What attracted her to the ritual that food encompasses was the fact that people would come together when they eat.

“I love the taste and I love cooking, but what I enjoy above all is the moment that we all take to sit down and eat.”
After having worked in eight different kitchens, Alexandra was back in Greece after seven years and with a negative reaction to the setting of professional cooking.

“I found the experience of working in a kitchen difficult and didn’t like the atmosphere in some cases.”

For a then 25-year-old with a dream to become a chef and open her own restaurant, this created some dilemmas.

Alexandra’s new job writing for a food website, which introduced her to the previously unknown potentials of the internet, lasted for a year-and-a-half before the effects of the economic crisis made her decide to leave her post.

It was then that Alexandra decided she wanted a more creative job.

“I decided I was going to raise money on Kickstarter in September 2012, to write a book. The thought was to see if there were other people interested in this book – I knew that my family would be happy if I collected the recipes and I knew I wanted to do it, but I didn’t really want to use any resources – like money, paper, or time – for something that other people wouldn’t be interested to have on the market.”

Not even Alexandra knew, before embarking on this journey, what it took to create a self-published cookbook filled with family recipes.

The project was fully funded within seven days of the Kickstarter campaign, and in the space of a month Stratou had raised over 36,000 euros, needed to create the 252-page book.

The book, titled Cooking to Share, appeared on the Kickstarter homepage as Staff Pick and was included in the Most Popular Project section on the website.

The first print of the book, which included an order of 1,400 copies in November of 2013, sold out fast and caught her unprepared, Alexandra remembers. The second printing was delivered in the first week of August last year.

“I think it’s a combination of being able to create the right situation and have a bit of luck and good circumstances. The way this book happened, it’s almost like it had a life of its own from the beginning. I would never have thought that so many people that I didn’t know would want to have it.”

Honouring family, uncompromised tradition, cooking and life, it’s a recipe book that guides the reader into the kitchen of a modern Greek family revealing their annual traditions, a respect for ingredients, and the important role the food we eat can play in building our sense of identity.

“In order to write this cookbook I asked many questions, heard many stories, talked to people inside and outside my family. Through sitting and thinking what I ate and when and what I remembered about each food, made me understand my life, what type of family I come from, what values we cherish. This process made me see what my roots are, not what they are supposed to be because I’m comparing myself with someone else. I went through this process and came out much more grounded. This is my life.”

In all, the book includes 104 recipes. Photographs and hand-drawn illustrations of the food, as well as the author’s own reflections about food and its ability to unite different aspects of a person’s life, accompany them.

“I never saw it as another Greek cookbook, because for me – and I think that’s the biggest difference – the whole book is part of my life, a personal thing, a family affair. It’s testimony to my need to go back to my roots, to think about my life, my past, and to do that through food.”

And as a core element of who we are, food is a great place to start a journey of self exploration, Alexandra says. The one that she embarked upon, while bringing this book to fruition.

“I think in the professional kitchen the food gets stripped of all this emotional part of it. I went back to my past and saw the way that I’ve been eating and that my family cherished food.

“I believe that it is vital to integrate the past you have known with the person you are now and the person you wish to be tomorrow. The food and the way we eat makes up a lot of who we are, it really formulates our experience – or at least did in my life.

“I always had the trouble of saying ‘I’m a cook’, or ‘I’m a psychologist’, because I don’t feel like I can be this one thing. But with this book I created something that is true to me in every sense of the word.”

Apart from the book being a collection of family recipes, it is also a sign of gratitude to Kyria Loula, Alexandra says. It was in her kitchen, in her last days, that Alexandra sat down writing the recipes now featured in the book and listening to her life stories.

“We all grew up with this lady making our food. I wanted to thank her for this, she was a huge part of our lives.”

The book Cooking to Share, by Alexandra Stratou, is now available at www.cookingtoshare.com

source: Neos Kosmos