In the early days of the summer of 2007 Greeks awoke to find their country alight: literally. Forest fires had broken out in the thickly carpeted hills around Athens. Within a week or two they had also erupted with unparalleled fury across wide areas of the Peloponnese, Evia and even as far north as Epiros. Satellite pictures showed a pall of billowing smoke drifting skyward, ash covered many neighbourhoods of Athens, thousands lost their homes and 66 hapless souls their lives. All the while, incessant talking heads on Greek TV loudly proclaimed this to be Greece's worst disaster of recent times; it was widely believed that the fires were deliberately lit, adding insult to injury. The 2007 firestorm not only had an ecological fallout, but also severely dented the reputation of the conservative government of the New Democracy party of Konstandinos Karamanlis. Such was the anger directed at the government - accused by many of idly standing by while their country burned - that in the September 2007 national elections Karamanlis was returned with a majority of only two in the 300-seat parliament. It was a wake-up call and he knew it.
All this came at a time when the three-and-a-half-year-old Karamanlis Government had considered itself to be sitting pretty. Greece had been revelling in the European spotlight for some time, enjoying a residual glow after the success of the 2004 Olympic Games, their unexpected triumph as UEFA football champions in the same year, and Patras being the European Capital of Culture in 2006. Yet for all their pride in and celebration of recent achievements, the Greek population proved themselves to be, ultimately, pragmatic and illustrated that politics is never far from the core of the Greek psyche. In the land where democracy was born, true democracy still prevails and the will of the people can be as strong as the winds that fanned those calamitous fires.
Greece is a country with a hallowed past and an at-times turbulent present. Appreciation of the achievements of its classical past has tended to overshadow its development as a free nation since the War of Independence from the Ottomans in 1821. Many foreign Hellenists imbued with a romantic ideal of the Greece of Pericles and the Parthenon are blithely ignorant that Greece today is a vibrant modern European country. It is equally a land where the languages of recent migrant communities from the Balkans, Africa and Asia - not to mention the English and German of EU migrants and retirees - contribute to Greece's status as one of Europe's more recent multicultural societies.
As recently as 1983, when it acceded to the EU, Greece was essentially a conservative, agrarian society famous for olive oil, coups, beaches and islands. Its transformation since its induction - alone, at the time, among the southeastern European nations - to the Brussels-led club of prosperous nations has been no less than dramatic. It could once take up to two years to obtain a landline for a home - now Greeks boast more mobile phones than fixed-line phones. Internet hotspots pop up like mushrooms, while car ownership, once the privilege of the affluent few, is now a consumer commodity enjoyed by the majority. While sleeping on beaches was once de rigueur for travellers in the carefree '70s, tourism is now most definitely pitched to the middle to upper-end markets and sleeping rough is now oh-so out.
This has created mixed blessings for visitors: better facilities inevitably come at higher prices; faster and safer sea travel has replaced more romantic slow boat voyages to rocky isles; wholesome, home-cooked food may be hard to find amid the surfeit of tacos, sushi or stir-fried lamb; homey, boxlike rooms tended to with a smile have been usurped by airy, air-conned self-catering apartments with nary a Greek face in sight to say kalimera (good morning).
Yet the fact that Greece continues to enjoy a steady influx of foreign visitors is easy to explain. The Greek people still have the welcome mat out. It is they who, after all, make Greece. Without the indomitable bonhomie of the Greeks themselves, Greece would be a different place altogether. Their zest for life, their curiosity and their unquestioning hospitality to the visitors in their midst is what makes a visitor's experience in the country inevitably unforgettable. The Greeks may curse their luck at times, distrust their politicians and believe 'oiling' the wheels of bureaucracy a fact of life, but they maintain their joie de vivre, their spontaneity, their optimism.
And, of course, their homeland offers myriad experiences, landscapes and activities. Greece is the pulsing nightclubs of Mykonos and the solemnity of Meteora; the grandeur of Delphi and the earthiness of Metsovo; the rugged Cretan hillsides and the lush wildflowers of spring. It is the blinding light of the Aegean sun, the melancholy throb of rembetika (blues songs), the tang of home-made tzatziki, the gossip in the kafeneia (coffee shops). It is the Parthenon - solitary and pristine - lording it over the hazy sprawl of Athens.
So, the job at hand is simple: decide which particular Greece you want to experience. Then come and find it.
Last updated: Sep 23, 2008
