tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-85036023245485334882024-03-05T21:24:04.287-08:00Yanko's Go-HomePage - EnglishYank_ohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14232324419358386226noreply@blogger.comBlogger19125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8503602324548533488.post-54719294145969292332019-07-11T11:30:00.001-07:002019-07-12T08:18:38.231-07:00Out of the oddity<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
All of 2015 was an odd year in Greece, politically speaking - in the very middle of an odd seven-year (gl)itch that started in early summer 2012 and ended last Sunday.<br />
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Early May 2012 was when a bunch of anti-establishment parties gained one third of Greece's popular vote. Left-wing Syriza, a radical evolution of a Euro-communist group formed after USSR's Czechoslovakia invasion, started to take over the bulk of former socialist (Pasok) voters. Nationalist Independent Greeks (a splinter from conservative New Democracy) exceeded 10% and the neo-nazi Golden Dawn entered parliament too, with 7%. This sum subsequently grew to nearly 50% and, during the 2015 referendum, formed the core of the 61% anti-bailout result.<br />
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The referendum proved useless - as ex PM Tsipras now admits, it served basically as a "moment of freedom" before the hard realities sank in. During the same evening, finance minister Varoufakis resigned as he realized that Tsipras had decided to strike a deal with the lending institutions. The day after, Greek President Pavlopoulos held a meeting of all party leaders save for Golden Dawn. There are no minutes taken from that long conversation but the results were soon obvious.<br />
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The defeated opposition parties of New Democracy and Pasok supported Tsipras and more than counterbalanced his parliamentary losses, passing the new package through parliament. Tsipras' gamble paid off as, in September 2015, he called an early election, which he won with a virtually unchanged percentage. As the Independent Greeks reentered parliament, the result of January 2015 was replicated, meaning Tsipras got an easy 4-year extension as PM.<br />
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What had changed since January is that he no longer had to live up to any promises. The election was not won on any platform, as neither government nor opposition had any. The third bailout package had defined policy and each new tranche typically meant additional corrective measures. The opposition stopped supporting the government in parliament as Tsipras was passing one after another unpopular measure, including the deal on "North Macedonia".<br />
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What did change for the opposition was the election - after six months of interim leadership - of a new leader. Ever since Kyriakos Mitsotakis, son of a former PM and statesman, came as an outsider to finally win the two-round contest, he took the lead in opinion polls. From anecdotal information I can confirm that centrists and socialists without New Democracy ties very openly supported Mitsotakis from day one.<br />
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Conveniently for both sides, there were no elections planned before May 2019. The poll margin for New Democracy remained more or less unchanged, with both parties gaining in popularity and causing attrition to Pasok and the other centrist group called Potami. Although -typically for Greece- the four years were hardly dull, there seems to have been no single event that catapulted Mitsotakis or caused Tsipras to collapse.<br />
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There were clear benefits for Greece in passing certain bailout-related measures (privatizations primarily) without street protests. At the same time, the economy did not rebound (there was recession in Tsipras' first two years and only mild growth from 2017), investments did not exactly fly and taxation / social security burdens became worse, if anything. Unemployment fortunately fell, partly through public-sector employment and with clear tendencies of the Tsipras government to promote labor-intensiveness and favoritism. However, the brain drain continued and those left behind depended largely on the support of extended households and pensions.<br />
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People found easily reasons to express their anger - and two strong ones appeared during 2018. The deal with (NATO-EU on) Skopje was criticized not just by maximalist nationalists but also by moderates (including Mitsotakis) who additionally hammered the lack of internal public dialogue in Greece and the perceived absence of additional material benefits for Greece. Also importantly, the fire east of Athens that killed over 100 people was outrageous not just <i>per se </i>(although a similar disaster had happened near Olympia in 2007 and Greece's public emergency response services proved incapable once again) but also in terms of communication handling. Although Tsipras cut short a visit to Mostar, Bosnia, on arrival he joined an on-camera emergency meeting where no reference was made to the large number of dead already known (as it turned out) to the authorities. Greater Athens (Attica) prefect Dourou, a Syriza party-mate of Tsipras and till then assumed to be his no. 2, was widely criticized for poor coordination of emergency response and has since then been indicted for negligence that caused multiple deaths.<br />
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The defeats for Dourou (in regional elections in May) and for the whole anti-bailout political trio (in May's European and then July's national election) were clear. The Independent Greeks have disappeared (their voters now apparently supporting a new, small and even more eccentric pro-Russian party), Golden Dawn failed to enter the national parliament (but did elect one MEP) and Syriza clearly trailed New Democracy -everywhere but on Crete- and are now out of power.<br />
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Tsipras seems to have been the last one-use government in those 7+ years. Papademos in 2011 and Samaras between 2012-2014 also took office under bailout terms. Mitsotakis carries a name causing strong negative feelings among the bulk of onetime '80s <i>Pasoki</i> who now largely support Syriza - but seems to have won over a portion of the electorate that rarely vote for ND. The pro-European alliance formed by necessity under Papademos and Samaras was forged with emotional participation during the pre-referendum hot months. Much of this alliance gave Mitsotakis his surprising 40% share of the vote, a percentage that ND hadn't seen since 2007. Despite party history, Tsipras' gross mismanagement of the crisis in early 2015 (causing a third bailout that would have been largely avoidable otherwise) has helped Mitsotakis to be perceived differently: Not as a leader of the party that contributed to the crisis (smartly, he had often differentiated himself from ND's party line of voting) but as the one that can lead Greece's path out of the oddity - and back to normality.<br />
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To a normality that is, anyway, limited by continuing debt repayment commitments and "enhanced surveillance reports". But that can still express itself in many ways, if there is a will.<br />
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[<b>Statistical addendum:</b> Part of the returning normality is the comeback of less fragmented politics. The two leading parties have over 70% of the vote - the last time this happened was 2009. At the same time, the political center has become again the main playing field - the main part of the spectrum where votes swing. New Democracy gained almost 12 percentage points since the last time - almost two thirds of that came from the center and left. And Syriza's net loss of 4 points was also primarily to its right.]</div>
Yank_ohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14232324419358386226noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8503602324548533488.post-51997188743544637262018-12-11T09:27:00.001-08:002018-12-11T09:28:10.225-08:00The seven-lived seagull<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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The seven-lived seagull</h2>
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I came to the world in 1938, at Genova's Ansaldo shipyard. These same facilities produced the Andrea Doria after the war, an ocean liner that sank shortly afterwards in the Atlantic after a fatal collision with another boat. </div>
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I had my own wreck too, but survived. As a matter of fact, I'm seven-lived. In the beginning I was meant to transport bananas to Italy from its African possessions, Somalia and Eritrea. The initials of the company owning me - Regia Azienda Monopolio Banane - gave my my first name, Ramb III.</div>
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Before however I was used at all for commercial purposes, my country entered the war and transformed me into a warship. Under the same name I escorted Italian convoys, until I retired to Trieste, hurt by a British torpedo. There I went through the Italian capitulation, following which I changed hands and name. As the Kibbitz I was laying mines for the Germans in the Adriatic, until I fell on one of those myself. These things happen. </div>
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The damage made me dock at Fiume. During the allies' attack, I was one more target for their warplanes. They sank me - and when I came back to the surface, the town had a different name and a different country. It was Yugoslavia's Rijeka. Apparently my hull was robust. My new homeland's Navy took me to the town with the Roman theater and transformed me into its educational boat. This withdrawal from the frontline felt like an honor, although a bit premature: I wasn't even fifteen years of age. </div>
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There, in Istria's Pula, by the name of Galeb (Seagull), I attracted Marshal Tito's attention. The President used me as his personal yacht to the end of his life. I travelled him all the way to Greenwich on an official visit to London - and entertained important guests of his: leading politicians like Nehru and Khrushchev and stars like Kirk Douglas and Sophia Loren. </div>
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I'm still known as the Seagull, despite changing countries and owners after my country collapsed. The Yugoslav Navy took me to Montenegro after Croatia's secession in 1991. From there, a Greek shipowner bought me in 2000: John-Paul Papanikolaou, a friend of Onassis' and the owner of, among others, the yacht that has his daughter Christina's name. </div>
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The tycoon had great plans for me: he would convert me to a luxury boat and would lease me for a hefty price. He took me to the top shipyard of Rijeka - but never got me back. A financial loose end - rumored to amount to a six-digit amount in English pounds, but I don't swear (I'm a seagull, what do I know?) - gave the Croatian authorities the opportunity to confiscate me. My final handover to the City of Rijeka, in 2009, made a lot of people happy, including the left-wing mayor Vojko Obersnel and the local anti-fascist organization. </div>
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I didn't escape damage to my body at times of peace. I nearly sank at least once during my standstill; and today I'm rusting away at a corner of the main port. But I got optimistic again in the last few days. The reason was the 69 million kuna -almost ten million euro- approved by the European Union to support Rijeka as the cultural capital for 2020. An important part of that amount will be earmarked for my repair and display (the rest will be granted for the iconic onetime sugar plant, dating back to the 18th century). </div>
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Maybe my wings cannot stand the effort of travelling me across the tough Adriatic, especially when the northerly Bura or the southerly Jugo are blowing. And so what? I have lived seven lives, in peace and in wars. It is enough that someone will look after me and spruce me up, me the old seagull. And, who knows, maybe through my own lifting the city of the Italian-mannered carnival could pick up as well - exactly a century after the treaty of Rapallo, granting to it a short-lived independence and making it a test-field of fascism. It isn't only good things that have come from the powerful neighbors on the west. </div>
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And this is something that even the seagulls know.</div>
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Yank_ohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14232324419358386226noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8503602324548533488.post-89471075353259530932018-07-05T09:13:00.001-07:002018-07-05T09:13:27.011-07:00Run<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
I swear that she kissed me awake.<br />
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The news must have sounded unreal to my wife. Even exciting. A snap referendum, with only a week's time for campaigning - wow!<br />
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I had gone to bed early, with a planned road trip ahead of me. Despite the worrying latest news - of people queuing in front of ATMs - Friday fatigue had helped me sleep fast.<br />
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And there I was, seated bleary-eyed in front of the TV and wondering. Not whether it was real -it sure was- but what it really meant. Some idea we did have, from earlier Cyprus or Argentina footage, from warnings spelt out after the abandoned 2011 referendum idea, from the very term <i>bank run</i>. You just run.<br />
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I still needed to sleep but only managed part of what I hoped for. Show had to go on. I hit the road with my son, not too late in the morning. We made all the right stops for coffee and lunch along the 600-kilometer route, trying to enjoy the ride. Our destination was an attractive one, after all - the seaside Thessaloniki, where the young lad would spend three weeks in an English-speaking summer boarding school.<br />
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I hardly enjoyed the first break and the cold coffee I ordered. A text message had come from a worried colleague seeking my advice. I don't quite remember what I answered but most likely it was a tip for caution and vigilance - what else could it be?<br />
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<i>Run.</i><br />
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It was extremely nice along the north Aegean waterfront. Following a stroll along part of the revamped promenade we watched a Swedish street performer and then had dinner with an old MSc classmate and her daughter. We chatted a bit about what was to come, but only a bit - there was so much to talk about, spanning some fifteen years (and thankfully the youngsters developed their own interesting conversation, largely ignoring us).<br />
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The next morning I drove my son to the school, situated in an uphill suburb. All along the drive we saw people queued in front of ATMs. At the school I met the mother of another student who told me she regretted having paid the fees in advance. For a moment I wondered whether we should have cancelled this luxury. Then I thought, perhaps cynically, that at least the school would make sure the kids would be sheltered and fed for three weeks, no matter what.<br />
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Sensing my conflict, the nice lady gave me her number, offering to help in case of any emergency. My friend had suggested the same the night before. <i>But nothing will happen</i>, I kept telling myself, even as I walked down to the parking lot to pick up the car for the drive back home.<br />
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It was a long drive and only started a few hours later, after several futile stops for cash withdrawal (the only ATMs without queues were the empty ones, and the non-empty ones would soon dry out), a <i>gyros</i> lunch and a downtown coffee. And then I hit the road.<br />
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<i>Run. </i>But not exactly in the right direction. Somehow I felt I could afford to fool around a bit more, so I took the Edessa road instead of the tollway and decided to drive for the first time ever along what some people believe was "Greece's first motorway".<br />
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As I wrote in my <a href="http://yankogohome.blogspot.com/2015/06/casino-route.html">Greek blog entry</a> of those days, <i>this 60-km stretch belonged to my personal terra incognita</i>. For the most part it isn't really a motorway. Only a small part, including the 16 kilometers between Polykastro junction and the border have a divided cross-section. Traffic-wise this is more than enough and it is really puzzling to see as many as three (!) lanes per direction at the Edessa road interchange.<br />
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Apparently the road was meant as a facade for those arriving from onetime Yugoslavia and the rest of Europe. Even today, with the facilities otherwise looking relatively shabby, an international driver would be impressed by certain unusual signs leading to the Karasouli allied cemetery or to the only roadside Greek mosque at a huge rest area. It was the main gateway from Europe - and to Europe, of course.<br />
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<i>Run.</i><br />
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It was a leased car, meant for travel within Greece. This must have stopped me, together with realizing that it would be irrational and ridiculous. Even if I'd had the documentation to cross the border (a passport and a green card, as a minimum), where exactly would I go? The nearest I could find any friends was probably Vienna. My family, obligations and job were all south of the border and even if payments should get delayed (which in the end didn't really happen) there was no way they could reach me on the other side.<br />
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I filled up the Nissan using a credit card - it worked - and drove back towards Athens and Corinth. At my last stop I heard the announcements on capital controls and called once again my family. Everything seemed under control. On arrival in Corinth the streets were busy. No ATM queues, nor protests of the slightest sort. People were actually partying to celebrate the local festival in honor of Saints Peter and Paul.<br />
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<i>They don't give a f*ck - they breed their chicken and plant their tomatoes so they're not afraid of starving</i>, was a communication expert's explanation for rural Greece's apparent indifference to banking restrictions. He knew better - and actually surprised me by foreseeing the key resignations (of the finance minister and the opposition leader) in the wake of the referendum. His cool head helped me exercise the caution and vigilance that I advised to others.<br />
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No partying on either of those Sundays. A lot of TV, internet and talk until late in the night. Then I needed sleep. We would all run, but not immediately. In the meantime, she kept kissing me goodnight.<br />
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Yank_ohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14232324419358386226noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8503602324548533488.post-30814877053343315622018-07-04T08:16:00.000-07:002018-07-04T08:16:04.823-07:00No (to Stiglitz)<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
"It is hard to advise Greeks how to vote on 5 July. Neither alternative – approval or rejection of the troika’s terms – will be easy, and both carry huge risks. A yes vote would mean depression almost without end. Perhaps a depleted country – one that has sold off all of its assets, and whose bright young people have emigrated – might finally get debt forgiveness; perhaps, having shrivelled into a middle-income economy, Greece might finally be able to get assistance from the World Bank. All of this might happen in the next decade, or perhaps in the decade after that".<br />
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That's how economist Stiglitz had explained his preference to a No vote in the Greek referendum, 3 years ago these days. Given that the Tsipras government ignored the referendum and adopted harsher terms (with cross-party support to counter defections of his own radicals, under an "emergency" setting), it is quite possible that such detached intellectuals still feel at ease with their lighthearted 2015 advice.<br />
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After all, the No became a virtual Yes and some of Stiglitz's warnings are partly confirmed (also because they were vague enough and/or have a 10-20 year horizon, by which time he will probably be dead or senile).<br />
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It is tricky to challenge specialists outside one's field but one can still legitimately wonder, whether this cry-wolf game (on Greece then and on Italy etc. today) does any good to the very people these savants are supposed to care about.<br />
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Like the expert himself, I have made up my mind on this last point, and it is a confident No.</div>
Yank_ohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14232324419358386226noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8503602324548533488.post-78018011111595646972018-02-01T09:20:00.000-08:002018-02-01T09:23:51.139-08:00South Balkan dialogue<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
There are so many occasions of stalemate or deterioration that it automatically looks encouraging whenever solutions are sought. It is therefore tempting to rejoice in advance of the Macedonia-naming dispute resolution, as it was in the early '00s to look forward to the plan for the far-trickier Cyprus issue. However, experience from that latter UN-mediated endeavor shows that good intentions and high hopes won't suffice.<br />
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As a European citizen frustrated with unfriendly borders I would be glad to see the neighboring country (by whichever name is agreed) to prosper, be safe, join prestigious and demanding institutions and become a place welcoming people and not encouraging out-migration. It is exactly the thing I have been hoping for my own country, which was fortunate and able to join the E(E)C and has stayed in the fold even in hard times. Unfortunately, prosperity, safety and demography are areas where we have been deteriorating. And this is largely due to our bad selves and very little or not at all due to others.<br />
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Surely not due to the landlocked country to our north. It is a pity that the naming issue has prevented a warm-up with the people I consider the Greeks' closest relative, culturally speaking. We are, of course, a nation without siblings, a bit like Hungarians - which explains some collective similarities in attitudes (see e.g. the Economist's recent graph on elements of national identities). Our main ethnic group is neither Slavic nor Turkic. But the populations descend from subjects of the East Roman empire with an Eastern Orthodox church tradition. Physical barriers in the area were not impenetrable, at least not in the north-south direction. Food, music and some intermarriages (or mostly the legacy of the latter) still echo some of the community shared among South Balkan Christian folk before the advent of modern nation-states.<br />
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Events of the last century and a half cannot be narrated in the same way by current nationals of the countries denoted as GR, MK and others in the region; we cannot even agree on terminologies. There will be no suggestion on the dispute resolution on this webpage - it's not my job to mess in diplomacy or politics and this is not a place or time for brainstorming. I am hoping more and more people on both sides of the divide will reach out and realize there are good reasons for both realities: that most people in Greece will not accept a plain "Macedonia" <i>and </i>that most people in the "former Yugoslav Republic" will not accept the total absence of "Macedonia". I'm also quite sure that neither side will prove desperate in the dialogue: there is more than enough stock of national prides. Is there a way to channel these patriotisms into energy that will make the country (each country) stronger and more confident? It would be good if, from now on, there could be more discussion in the region -the whole Balkans and especially the triangle between its highest peaks, mountains Musala, Olympus and Korab- about shaping a future of development than about reasserting known facts of centuries-old world history. </div>
Yank_ohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14232324419358386226noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8503602324548533488.post-51770236881209065112018-01-11T14:06:00.004-08:002018-01-11T14:40:09.330-08:00"I'd make wine from your tears"<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
I loved Prague before I ever got there and maybe this is to <i>blame </i>on the narratives of the 1968 crushing of its Spring, on the bit of Kafka, Kundera and Ivan Klima I read, or the true Bud beer, or the smoothness of the velvet separation of Czechs and Slovaks - perhaps even on the personality of Havel or the class demonstrated by the football team that crushed us Greeks in 1980's Euro when even the Germans couldn't.<br />
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The main damage was done by the visuals, though. Not sure what came first but there were two bits. In ascending order of influence: a magazine feature (<i>Time</i>, I think, but not sure anymore) and a music video. With the latter I wasn't sure at first. After all it was late '88 or early '89. This part of the world was kind of closed, wasn't it? Off-limits. Forbidden, I thought.<br />
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Enter my dad with his early '80s adversity to communism - so strong at times that when I once mentioned the term <i>East Bloc </i>to him, he curtly advised me not to talk so much about it. Not that I really ever did - people who inspired me in my teens were often socialist-leaning but rarely of the pro-Moscow variety. I was convinced (and remain to this day) that no sane person - other than the power-holders - would really ever like to live in these societies.<br />
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What we called <i>East Europe</i> - as if my country were more western geographically than Czechoslovakia - was a terra incognita hidden behind the veil of my indifference and ignorance. I knew of a few iconic monuments and landscapes but nothing of the greying former Habsburg or Czarist cities, the trams and cobblestone streets never too far from a river.<br />
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The opening scenes (or rather, each and every second) of the INXS clip revealed a footbridge with sculptures across a stretch of water that could only be described by the German word <i>prachtvoll</i>, in the same language used by the famous Jewish author of dark situations and by the people that fled the region a few years after being used in the prelude of World War II.<br />
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The sax and violins of <i>Never Tear Us Apart</i> helped strengthen my desire to visit the Czechoslovak and later Czech capital, but this only happened almost a decade after the song's release. My first walk in the former East Bloc, however, was not in sunlit Prague but in dark Brno, on my arrival prior to a business trip. I was dead tired following successive travels but needed to eat, so I took a walk along a street leading up to the only square with a promise of a restaurant. Old trams and even older buildings and barely another walker encountered in over a quarter of an hour: could it still be as bleak these days?<br />
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Living in such a town for over two years now -the former Austrohungarian and then Yugoslav Zagreb- I now know better how they look and especially feel. Their facades may need major investment to look as fresh as the otherwise similar ones in Graz or Salzburg, but everything else is pretty much similar. Never the same - although to buffs of exotic travel they may look as uniform as East Asian faces seem to us Europeans (when we are our narrower selves). Human geography and history - in particular, the cultural diversity we have learned to notice on this continent - can truly make the difference in our perception.<br />
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The second visit to Prague, on a working Friday and a bonus weekend in '98, remains the prettiest of my <i>eastern </i>experiences in the past twenty years. I walked down Petrin hill and up the cemetery, spent time at a bookstore in Josefov (leaving with an amazing Jan Lukas photo album of Greece as it looked before my birth) and at various cafes reading books, chatted (occasionally drinking beer) with people I will probably never see again. Last but not least, I visited the old residence hosting my country's embassy, to get a signed and stamped paper proving* forever that I wasn't among the voters who got a "Mr Nobody" elected to some office (I only need to remember where I've stored it).<br />
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While I'm still living just 8 hours' driving time away, I hope to share this urban beauty with people who couldn't (have) join(ed) me. Maybe we will get lucky this summer, in which case we'll be able to call today's desire "my one and only new year's resolution".<br />
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<i>[This post's title is taken from the song's lyrics, written by the late Michael Hutchence]</i><br />
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<i>*Back then, voting was compulsory; when not voting, it was useful to have official proof you were at a distance above 200 kilometers</i></div>
Yank_ohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14232324419358386226noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8503602324548533488.post-47046436561098374102017-12-11T11:21:00.000-08:002017-12-11T11:21:03.330-08:00Anyone<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
There are only so many times you can chant the <i>Kyrie Eleison</i> or its Ukrainian equivalent <i>Hospody Pomiluy. </i>The exact number eludes me. All I knew on that sunny day was that I had heard the latter quite a few times in the Kyiv-Orthodox* St. Michael's monastery, where I attended my first-ever "Service of the Bridegroom"** in a language other than Greek. However much I was valuing this experience, the absence of seating places -a normal feature of Orthodox churches in several Slavic countries but very rare in my country- soon got the better of me. I could no longer stay standing, or even leaning on the balustrade protecting a preserved restoration of the early part of this historic church, founded around 1100 and destroyed in the crude Soviet 1930s. I needed to walk.<br />
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I must confess (for getting out of church early is not exactly proper religious behavior) that I even enjoyed the fresh air and the unusually bright Kyiv sky. The colorful exterior and surroundings were further adorned by a soundtrack that surprised me. An upright piano was placed at the edge of the walkway, for passers-by to hear and hopefully leave a few <i>hryvnias***</i> for the artist performing in the cool dusk. I'm not sure if I did; sometimes I bypass even those quality petty fundraisers, unfairly mixing them with instances of outright beggary - which I flatly reject.<br />
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That was pre-Easter Monday, a full eight months before my next encounter with an upright piano of that sort. Perhaps it was the same instrument and the same player but I wasn't looking at him and it didn't really matter. The day had surely been different, much different. Fog was obscuring even the tops of multi-storey buildings encountered in the afternoon walk. The gloom got more intense at the site of a huge massacre by Nazis, at what would otherwise be an innocuous and lovely suburban park. Babi(n) Yar**** features a modest set of monuments to the tens of thousands of Jews, Roma and other people executed after the German army occupied "Kiew" on its eastward campaign of 1941.<br />
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Music was needed to our ears after this emotional charge. Not <i>any</i> music but the film classic that translates as "anyone", Morricone's <i>Chi Mai</i>. The piano was now placed at a passage under the famous Maidan square, on the eve of yet another planned demonstration. Joining the dozen or maybe more people around the music surely helped add another precious Celsius degree or two, well above the outdoor zero that prevailed between two fits of typical Ukrainian snowfall. At this transition point, just before taking the deep metro for a quick glimpse of the non-touristy east Dnieper bank, I felt I knew what was the right thing to do. The afternoon tears had dried away and an evening smile shone on my face, as I let a yellow banknote drop into the piano man's hat, before moving on to downward escalators, high-capacity tunnels and two short walks on the wild side. Simple things that <i>anyone </i>can do, I guess.<br />
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*Kyiv-Orthodox means of the Kyiv patriarchate (as opposed to the Moscow patriarchate; the Orthodox church in Ukraine is fragmented)<br />
**Service of the Bridegroom (based on the metaphor of Jesus as the <i>Nymphios </i>mentioned in Matthew's gospel) is heard on Palm Sunday and the two first evenings of the Orthodox Holy Week (pre-Easter)<br />
***<i>Hryvnia</i> is the Ukrainian currency<br />
****Widely known by its Russian name of Babi Yar<br />
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Yank_ohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14232324419358386226noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8503602324548533488.post-5055257127415321822017-06-21T08:19:00.005-07:002017-06-21T08:19:37.185-07:00Thalwegs and jardinieres<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<img src="https://amagi.gr/sites/default/files/styles/large/public/field/image/borders.jpg?itok=jm4hJ7um" /><br /><br /><br />Eighteen out of the twenty counties of Croatia are bordering neighboring countries. The country's V-shape, borne out of historical processes (most notably the Ottoman presence in today's Bosnia), makes it extremely easy to abandon by land - wherever you are, you can meet a border at a maximum distance of 50 kilometres. The most extensive frontier is with Bosnia: 931 km, of which at least half along river thalwegs. When "soon" Croatia joins Schengen -this "soon" being a mobile time target, given the refugee issue- control of entries from the partly Muslim country will be the primary headache of border guards. <div>
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For the time being, pressure is on the opposite side. Traffic jams before the Croatia-Slovenia border, along today's Schengen line, is the only constant content of traffic bulletins, at all seasons -and especially in summers. The millions of tourists flocking by road towards the east Adriatic coasts are allowing this year for even more consumed time and fuel at Bregana and other "hot spots". This is caused by stricter controls on European citizens' passports on entry or exit from the single European space.<br /><br />The situation is made more complex by the variability of Croatia-Slovenia relationships. Contrary to what one would expect of the two countries that almost simultaneously abandoned the old federation, their relationship is not trouble-free. Croatia's entry into the EU came only after an agreement for arbitration on their territorial-water conflict: Slovenes are claiming a corridor that will give them direct access to the Adriatic's international waters, which is denied by the Croats evoking the principle of equidistance. The verdict of the arbitration is expected on June 29th but may not provide a sure, conclusive solution. This pending matter leads to prolonged mistrust, which is expressed in various ways as regards border traffic management. The two sides' disagreement over the cause and manner of managing delays resulted in an extraordinary meeting on the matter, involving Juncker and the two prime ministers at the end of last April. Despite the deal reached, recent reports tend to flare up tensions again, mentioning a possible abolition of common controls at the large border stations - a measure introduced in 2013 as a showcase of friendly cooperation, which is however judged by some to be non-effective.<br /><br />Those of us living in Zagreb, however, have our own way of bypassing queues. Together with the massive facilities on motorway E-70, Bregana also has another checkpoint, a few hundred meters to the west. The namesake village was once connected to nearby Slovenska Vas. Even after independence, Bregana's Croats could go for a quick beer to the Kalin guesthouse, showing their documents to the guard and passing from an opening between the jardinieres delimiting entry to Slovenia. Although nowadays this picturesque passage has been fenced properly, passage by car from the village's main two-lane street has considerably less traffic, giving us the possibility of grabbing a coffee "abroad" in less than a half hour from home.<br /><br />Maybe I shouldn't have used the inverted commas. Slovenia's peculiarity is soon perceived. Belgrade's and Zagreb's Sava is a different river along its upper course: the winding flow on Croatia's plain is replaced by a narrow, wooded valley. Castles with German names such as "Reichenburg" (spelt "Rajhenburg") dominate the area around Sevnica, birthplace of the US's first lady -where, together with the indifferent ice cream called “Melanija” one can also buy a special series of food and other consumable products, branded “First Lady”, at the beautiful castle of the town. Perhaps the most characteristic feature in this corner of Slovenia is the coexistence of Gothic-style churches with factory chimneys, even a nuclear power station. One is tempted to think it is no accident that this former federal state -having a GDP per capita close to Greece's or even above it, already from Yugoslav times- was the first of its kind to enter not just Schengen, but also the Eurozone, even the OECD. </div>
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Where exactly the Balkans end is a long discussion. It is sometimes said that Slovenia -due to its primarily economic peculiarities described earlier- does not belong to them, whereas Croatia only partly. Others may examine geographical factors (e.g. "The Balkans stop at the Sava river") or historical ones, such as "how far north the Ottoman raids extended" - according to one view, the limit was the Slovene small town of Kostanjevica.<br /><br />However you may call our region, if you wish to talk borders -be it in the form of a thalweg or a jardiniere- you are at the right place.</div>
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Yank_ohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14232324419358386226noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8503602324548533488.post-24621475549686953412017-05-22T03:58:00.001-07:002017-05-22T08:12:04.833-07:00A matter of smile<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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We climbed to the Upper Town from the steepest steps, through a children's playground whose existence I couldn't even imagine, hidden as it was behind the Austro-Hungarian fa<span style="background-color: transparent;">çades. Short of breath, I was trying to reach her; it wasn't easy, even though we were both kids of fathers born at approximately the same time.</span><br />
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<span style="background-color: transparent;">At the top level everything became more familiar and predictable. Or nearly so. The usual crowd was enjoying the sweet dusk, some seated at the benches and the diner and others walking as we were. The musical background, however, held a surprise in store. It was difficult for Nina, a third-generation Greek in Zagreb, to know Gadjo Dilo's remake, let alone the original; neither was I able at the time to explain to her the relation between the verbs "sfyrizo" [part of the song's title, "Sou Sfyrizo", <i>I'm whistling to you</i>] and SerboCroat <i>svirati.</i></span></div>
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On coming home after the short walk, I remembered that Nina-Demetra's father had asked me to tell him about Greek crooners. The unexpected fan of [Greek singer] Costas Hatzis wanted to widen his repertoire. However, he hadn't heard anything about [crooner] Jimmy Makoulis - who had been my first answer - nor about Tonis Maroudas, who (as I found out through Google) had first sung the song, more than a half-century ago.</div>
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Music - played either from the rich collection in his mobile phone, or from satellite Greek TV shows with "music for get-togethers"- is what helps writer and veteran journalist Aris Angelis get a little closer to our country, in which his paternal ancestors, from Smyrna, had only lived shortly. The uprooting of the Angelidis family in 1922 [after the Greek-Turkish war and population exchange] was followed by the usual process: a wirefenced camp on the dry [Aegean] islet of St. George's, passage to an installation we would today call a <i>hotspot </i>at Ermioni [in S. Greece] ― and, in the end, a split of the extended family among Thessaloniki and Athens.</div>
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"In the end", I said, but I shouldn't have. The family's adventure had only just begun. In the coming years, the patient woman Eleni Angelidis moved to Yugoslavia, where she lost in turn, one by one, all her immediate family. He husband, a merchant with business reaching up to Belgrade, abandoned her; she had to raise her two kids on her own. Her eldest son Aris was killed in the German invasion of 1941; this is why a street in Bitola is called Angjelovski today, from the Slavicized Greek family name. Lastly, the younger Takis went to the mountains to join Tito's partizans near Banja Luka, together with his stepfather, a military man, descendant of a historical family with its own coat-of-arms, who also became a guerilla. Shortly after the war ended, he begot his only child - but didn't live to see him grow: he died one year later due to an unusual disease. </div>
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<i>Mr. Aris</i>, who took his name from his heroic uncle (and not, as I initially thought, from the more famous and more controversial namesake), didn't have to talk to me about these events. He has written about them vividly in his book <em style="box-sizing: inherit;">From Smyrna to Saigon</em>, a series of interviews ― not only with his Smyrniot grandmother but also with several of his guests in radio shows he ran over the years on Radio Zagreb. Nor did he have anything to tell me about the war of 1991; when I asked him he answered, in perfect Greek, "ikha doulia" (I was busy). When he told me so, while we were sipping wine at his small seaside place near Šibenik, it sounded like evasiveness, similar to that of a Greek clergyman who had used his "studying" as an excuse [when asked about the dictatorship times]. Now, having read the incredible family story, I can better understand not only his unwillingness to speak about the war - despite having the name of its ancient Greek god - but especially the typically Balkan melancholy one often sees on him. </div>
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Despite being relatively tacit, Aris Angelis manages to impress in his own way. Before meeting him in person, I had seen him on a Greek TV documentary of the Balkan Express series. The young reporter was asking him about political life in Croatia, which was then a candidate country for the EU. In a few minutes, the "old hand" took charge. A politician sat - supposedly unexpectedly - at the next table. <i>Mr. Aris </i>became a reporter again and interviewed himself Ivo Josipović, for whom he prophesied that he would become president - something that truly happened some time afterwards. Even during our personal chat, some years later, the retired journalist had his notebook nearby and was taking notes. </div>
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Above all he is a teaser, often with a young child's enthusiasm. Just before we were to watch a football game on TV, he asked me to guess his favorite football team. After letting me struggle with Dinamo and Hajduk and Greek refugee clubs with twin-headed eagle emblems - choices that I considered more obvious due to his family background - he took me by surprise once more. "Aris [Thessaloniki], of course!" he laughed, and then played another Hatzis song, his favorite - and one I hadn't known until that moment: "I zoi ine ypothesis hamogelo" (Life is a matter of smile).</div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEio0pFtD8QMhvf-gmxvM6ZYYldyZGf8TR-_1cH1mGgCt4Uj3SRyAxtjtgrVcIum8z5FAqsXI0leslfjqNgLHOx53NrPhxJJ8QF7IsZzwm0YBqK5nHuQ3lew0S8iFQBfLM3ZSTu4ZWUIJpg/s1600/IMG_1215.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEio0pFtD8QMhvf-gmxvM6ZYYldyZGf8TR-_1cH1mGgCt4Uj3SRyAxtjtgrVcIum8z5FAqsXI0leslfjqNgLHOx53NrPhxJJ8QF7IsZzwm0YBqK5nHuQ3lew0S8iFQBfLM3ZSTu4ZWUIJpg/s320/IMG_1215.JPG" width="320" /></a><i style="font-family: Georgia, serif; font-size: 16px;">Translated from the <a href="http://amagi.gr/content/ypothesis-hamogelo">original </a>published on amagi.gr.</i></div>
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , serif; font-size: 16px;"><i>Gadjo Dilo's song is <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LSWV0lSXJlQ">here</a>.</i></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , serif; font-size: 16px;"><i>Tonis Maroudas' original is <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z2GsuiiIYtA">here</a>.</i></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , serif;"><i>Costas Hatzis' song on smiling is <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4CwgvK17HvY">here</a>.</i></span></div>
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Yank_ohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14232324419358386226noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8503602324548533488.post-86734789571520734332017-05-08T14:18:00.001-07:002017-05-09T10:42:46.286-07:00Greek traces in Zagreb, from 1770 onwards<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<span lang="EL" style="color: #20124d; font-family: inherit; line-height: 17.12px;"><i>Info on migrations of Greeks to Zagreb in the 18th and 19th centuries</i></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: inherit; font-size: 12pt;"><u>Dimitriou family</u></span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: inherit; font-size: 12pt;">The start was made by Gregory Dimitriou, a merchant from Siatista, who landed at Herzegovina around 1770, probably due to the Orlov events or other unrest that </span><span style="font-family: inherit; font-size: 12pt;">made difficult the life of a lot of Greeks, events not rare during the Ottoman rule.</span></span><br />
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<span lang="EL" style="color: #20124d; font-family: inherit; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 17.12px;">He was followed by his two sons, Naum and Theodore. The family was active in the area between Trieste and Budapest, based in Zagreb. </span></div>
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<span lang="EL" style="color: #20124d; font-family: inherit; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 17.12px;">Naum Dimitriou got married to Catherine Popović. It is not known whether her origin was Greek or whether she was related to Elisabeth Popović, who married another Greek, Constantine Mallin (probable surname Mallinis or Mallinos, also found in Greek West Macedonia).</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="color: #20124d;"><span lang="EL" style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 17.12px;">Theodore Dimitriou got married in 1790 to Afrati or Afratia Afksenti[ou] (the recorded surname is "Aksent", of Kozani) and they begat Dimitrios Dimitriou – later a nationally-acclaimed literary man in Croatia, known as </span><span lang="HR" style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 17.12px;"><a href="http://yankogohome.blogspot.hr/2017/04/blog-post.html">Dimitrije Demetar</a></span><span lang="EL" style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 17.12px;"><a href="http://yankogohome.blogspot.hr/2017/04/blog-post.html"> (1811-1872 [link to my earlier blogpost in Greek])</a> – and several other children:</span></span></span></div>
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<span lang="EL" style="color: #20124d; font-family: inherit; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 17.12px;">Elisabeth (born 1806) – wife of Baron Nikolić</span></div>
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<span lang="EL" style="color: #20124d; font-family: inherit; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 17.12px;">Alexandra (born 1815) – wife of Ivan Mažuranić, the important ruler (ban) who reformed the legal and educational system of Croatia</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="color: cyan;"><span lang="EL" style="color: #20124d; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 17.12px;">Some more siblings - including brothers who reportedly took part in founding Trieste's Lloyds</span></span></span></div>
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<u><span lang="EL" style="color: #20124d; font-family: inherit; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 17.12px;">Mallin family</span></u></div>
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<span lang="EL" style="color: #20124d; font-family: inherit; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 17.12px;">Constantine Mallin (died 1809) begat John and Eva.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="color: #20124d;"><span lang="EL" style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 17.12px;">John Mallin (1786-1854) got married to Sophia, daughter of Naum Dimitriou (and cousin of </span><span lang="HR" style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 17.12px;">Demetar</span><span lang="EL" style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 17.12px;">). He had a store at today's </span><span lang="HR" style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 17.12px;">Radićeva, </span><span lang="EL" style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 17.12px;">the then Long Street (Duga Ulica) – the uphill road linking the downtown Jelačić square to the Stone Gate (Kamenita Vrata) of the upper town. It is mentioned that the prominent bourgeois had taken the title of the "free citizen" and had been exempted from paying dues at all "free towns", in which he traded cereals with the boat "Katarina". He is portrayed as a dynamic merchant, active in the city and the chamber, and a practical person, of deeds not words. </span></span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="color: #20124d;"><span lang="EL" style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 17.12px;">Their son Naum Mallin (1816-1893) excelled in trade. In the area of the St. Joseph Ksaver monastery, close to the Mihaljevac tram station, there is a garden with his name, with "exotic trees" brought from an international trade fair. At 31, Naum Mallin became vice president of the First Croatian Savings Bank and was co-founder of the Croatian Commercial Bank. He became twice an editor of the Agramer Zeitung. He was the administrative vice president of Matica Hrvatska</span><span lang="EL" style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 17.12px;"> </span><span lang="EL" style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 17.12px;">(a foundation for promotion of the Croatian national identity). His signature, as well as that of Anastas Popović, is featured in the contract with A. Fernkorn (in 1864) for erecting the statue of the Croat leader (ban) Jelačić, which dominates the namesake square downtown. For 40 years he was a secretary and treasurer of the Orthodox church community.</span></span></span></div>
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<span lang="EL" style="color: #20124d; font-family: inherit; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 17.12px;">Son of Naum Mallin was John or Ivo (1855-1907). A street in his name exists a bit south of the Mallin park, close to the Romanian embassy. Ivo was a trustee and a lawyer, with a strong role in promoting economic development in continental Croatia. Ivo had two more siblings, Theodore and Sidonia. </span><br />
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<span style="color: #20124d; font-family: inherit; font-size: 12pt;"><u>Popović family</u></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: inherit; font-size: 12pt;">Eva Mallin, Constantine's daughter, died very young - at 23. She only barely got married to Marko Kumanović and gave birth to a daughter, Christine. She got later married to Kumanović's assistant, Anastas Popović, family originating from Greece. Thus, the Popović surname gets again connected to the other branches of the Greek community. Anastas (1786-1872) was co-founder of the First Croatian Savings Bank (see Mallin) and helped this institution survive even after the tough year of 1848 – marked by internal revolt in Austria-Hungary, part of which Croatia was at the time. He was the first chairman of the Commercial Chamber from 1852 to 1866. He was also chairman of the Orthodox community and contributed to the reconstruction, in 1866, of the Orthodox church of the Transfiguration - which nowadays seats the Serbian metropolitan bishopric of Croatia/Slovenia and is located in the bustling Flower Square (Cvjetni Trg).</span></span><br />
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<span lang="EL" style="font-family: inherit; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 17.12px;">Anastas Popović's daughter, Maria, got married to major Stefan Miletić. </span><span lang="EL" style="font-family: inherit; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 17.12px;">The namesake son (1868-1908) was a famous playwright. It is an impressive coincidence that the early leader of Croatian theater was a Greek (Demetar) and the tradition was followed by </span><span lang="HR" style="font-family: inherit; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 17.12px;">Stjepan Miletić, also descendant of Greeks.</span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="color: #20124d;"><span lang="EL" style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 17.12px;">The intertwining of the Popović family with the remaining Greek clans does not stop here. Anastas' brother, Andreas, also got married to a Mallin descendant, and they had three children. For many years the family owned a shop on Jelačić square, where another Greek family also had their home (Gavella - a name to be found in central Greece and Euboea island).</span><span lang="EL" style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 17.12px;"><br /><br /><u>Gavella family</u></span></span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="color: #20124d;"><span lang="EL" style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 17.12px;"><u></u><br /></span><span lang="EL" style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 17.12px;">The centrally located, alternative theater in the name of Branko </span><span lang="HR" style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 17.12px;">Gavella (1885-1962), as well as the street name in the </span><span lang="HR" style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 17.12px;">Folnegovićevo</span><span lang="HR" style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 17.12px;"> quarter </span><span lang="EL" style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 17.12px;">– near the mosque –, are linked to that family. According to his granddaughter, the University lecturer of French Yvonne Vrhovac, Branko Gavella was of Greek origin, although it has been suggested that he was also a Činčar or Vlach (note: this view has also been expressed for Demetar and other Orthodox migrants to the Balkans). His grandfather, George, had migrated to Zagreb and was a successful merchant of rope and blankets. He funded many artists. At the onetime theater (of St. Mark's square, which no longer exists) there was a lodge with his name. The family house, in which grandfather Branko grew, was on the north side of Jelačić square, at the location of the only passage leading to the Dolac market. </span></span></span></div>
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<u><span lang="EL" style="color: #20124d; font-family: inherit; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 17.12px;">Sources</span></u></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="color: #20124d;"><span lang="EL" style="line-height: 17.12px;">Text by the Croat author Đuro Szabo titled "On an old home and people from old times in Zagreb", written in 1933, part of a bigger project titled "On Zagreb" (</span><span lang="HR" style="line-height: 17.12px;">O Zagrebu, </span><span lang="EL" style="line-height: 17.12px;">in Croatian). Đuro Szabo was a director of Zagreb's city museum. </span></span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="color: #20124d;"><span lang="EL" style="line-height: 17.12px;">Text by Theodor de Canziani Jakšić, in the review </span><span lang="HR" style="line-height: 17.12px;">Acta med hist Adriat (2008), </span><span lang="EL" style="line-height: 17.12px;">volume 6(2), p. 243 onw., titled "The heritage of Dr. </span><span lang="HR" style="line-height: 17.12px;">Dimitrije Demetar in the </span><span lang="HR" style="line-height: 17.12px;">Mažuranić-Brlić-Ružić memorial library and collection".</span></span></span></div>
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<span style="color: #20124d;"><span lang="EL" style="line-height: 17.12px;"><span style="color: cyan; font-family: inherit;">The </span><a href="http://www.mgz.hr/"><span style="color: cyan; font-family: inherit;">Zagreb city museum</span></a><span style="color: cyan; font-family: inherit;">, in which the three first families' names are mentioned, as well as a fourth one (</span></span><span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="color: cyan;"><span lang="HR" style="line-height: 17.12px;">Stova</span><span lang="EL" style="line-height: 17.12px;">), of which I have not yet found any trace. </span></span></span></span></div>
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<li style="font-style: normal; font-weight: normal;"><span style="color: #20124d;">Interview of Yvonne Vrhovac, granddaughter of the playwright, critic and essaywriter Branko Gavella, in the website of the leading newspaper </span><a href="http://www.jutarnji.hr/vijesti/velika-ispovijest-unuke-branka-gavelle-legendarna-profesorica-francuskog-koja-pravi-najbolje-kolace-u-zagrebu-otkriva-svoju-zivotnu-pricu/82615/">Jutarnji</a><span style="color: #20124d;">.</span></li>
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<span lang="EL" style="color: #20124d; font-family: inherit; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 17.12px;"><em>Note: The biblical name Naum is a surname or first name used in northern Greece and neighboring countries. St. Naum was a missionary together with Cyril and Methodius and a church in his honor is located on Ohrid lake, at the namesake settlement of FYR Macedonia. </em></span><br />
<span style="color: #20124d;"><span lang="EL" style="font-family: inherit; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 17.12px;"><em><br /></em></span><span lang="EL" style="font-family: inherit; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 17.12px;"><em>Photo: Zagreb's Orthodox church.</em></span></span></div>
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjTuFvdxD9vv6WB1ueMfH9-ppivdTVLTDf-oRgbluKUWt8jQP2OhMkYtinR9EOjiO5sXFVFXVpru23xFCOsvaJEV0ceSZo4UvrcbQBSLSfqzw9UkYf55lkTvaIDxYlePs7xnIqXUwli8Do6/s1600/IMG_0022.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em; text-align: center;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjTuFvdxD9vv6WB1ueMfH9-ppivdTVLTDf-oRgbluKUWt8jQP2OhMkYtinR9EOjiO5sXFVFXVpru23xFCOsvaJEV0ceSZo4UvrcbQBSLSfqzw9UkYf55lkTvaIDxYlePs7xnIqXUwli8Do6/s320/IMG_0022.JPG" width="240" /></a></div>
Yank_ohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14232324419358386226noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8503602324548533488.post-47353892794351311022017-01-26T13:02:00.000-08:002017-01-26T13:02:29.710-08:00Those who leave and those who remain<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<i>Text published in Greek in amagi.gr site in January 2017</i><br />
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Serb Zeljko Joksimovic did not just fill up the Lisinski concert hall, here in downtown Zagreb, last December, but also made a second, extra appearance. The pop singer's success in the Istanbul Eurovision contest in 2004, above Sakis and below winner Ruslana, is due to the twelve-point scores obtained from most ex-Yugoslav countries - among which the bitterly neighboring Croatia. The Serbian minority, now counting some two hundred thousand inhabitants, probably didn't determine the outcome of televoting. Just six years after the last border arrangement between the two countries -the return of troubled Vukovar to Croatia, in 1998- Zeljko in his way helped bridge some gaps - and continues along the same path, also doing duets, as with Bosniak Haris Djinovic and, recently, Croat Toni Cetinski.<br />
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Their common works are sung in a language which, to avoid hassle, you'd better call BCS (Bosnian-Croatian-Serbian). The limits of rapprochement are felt when you realize how old-fashioned, even unpopular, the formerly familiar term "SerboCroat" has become. Linguist Claude Hagege («On the death of life and languages») writes that the desire for differentiation may justify the identification of languages as separate, even if mutual comprehension still remains. In national divorces, as in human split-ups, there is usually the one who remains and the one who leaves; in the case of former Yugoslavia, those who left - the Croats - made the relatively more intense effort to hammer the identity of their new society using language (too) as a tool. How fresh these efforts are is something I can see in the difficulty of some people to get used to the Croatian month names, which replaced the known Roman ones and are associated with agricultural economy, nature and weather conditions (grass in April/travanj, scythe in July/srpanj, chill in November/studeni).<br />
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Those who remained after 1991 in the country formally called Yugoslavia, now that the scorched earth of the Dinaric Alps and southern Pannonian plain is cooling down, speak of the onetime brothers with a barely perceptible sense of superiority. They remind me somewhat of the references by Turks to the old times when "we all lived together" (Muslims and infidels) in the Empire, harmonically but still under the undisputed ruler. The anger of the Croat that left is mirrored in the complaint of the Serb that remained - or stuck, one may sometimes think - in the past. Although the leader of the Partisan and post-war Yugoslavia was a Croat (with a Slovene mother), his birthplace of Kumrovec is one of Croatia's few places where one will see his memorabilia on sale, in the small part of the village that has been converted to a folk monument. On the contrary, in Serbia nostalgia for the Tito era - as well as anything old and glorious - is much more evident: from the peddlers in the Knez Mihajlova pedestrian street of Belgrade, where the marshal is on display next to Putin, to the very flag of the Serbs, showing a crown that has not been officially worn by a head of their new nation-state.<br />
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We Greeks are now the "brother people" — the expression used by the taxi driver in my first visit to the Serbian capital, before he demonstrated to me his deep knowledge of my country's northern half and its shores. If the Serbs left from something, this was the Dalmatian coast, in which a Belgrade licence plate (or the use of the Serbian word for bread, hleb instead of kruh) can become a red rag. The Adriatic may be closer to Belgrade than the Aegean is, however the masses of Serbia (and FYR Macedonia) systematically visit our seas for years now. Croats, on the other hand, do not. Their Greece is that of the Westerner: the cradle of civilization, which first left its mark on the coastal area long before the Slavs' ancestors descended to the Balkans. Their islands may not boast the sandy beaches of Greek ones nor their size (each of the two biggest is approximately as large as Zakynthos), however they are next to them so they will hardly think of neglecting them so that they can explore ours.<br />
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Self-sufficient and brotherless, that's how they tend to feel as long as their independence is, still, fresh. However, the peoples of former Yugoslavia have ties that are not completely severed; some old links remain or are even revived, not just thanks to ear-friendly tunes and good-looking artists. Joint enterprises among Serbs and Croats are no longer a rare occurrence, nor are mutual invitations to scientific conferences; even the Serbian minority party has declared its support to the current Croatian government, a development signaling hope in a region where people my age are war veterans. Maybe it will be a while before we see again basketball brothers like those of the great "plavi academy", the legendary Yugoslav national team up to 1991 - as immortalized in the excellent film "Once Brothers" by Michael Tolajian on the friendship between Vlade Divac and the late Drazen Petrovic. However - and despite reaction in the beginning - basketball's Adriatic League is a living reality: this supranational championship features the best teams from the countries of the onetime common homeland: those who remained, those who left - and those who somehow found each other again.</div>
Yank_ohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14232324419358386226noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8503602324548533488.post-23995896031187685252016-02-01T10:14:00.004-08:002016-02-01T10:14:37.777-08:00Karlovac(i) talk<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
Bottlenecks cause trouble.<br />
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Four rivers merge at Karlovac, Croatia. The Kupa (ending up at the Sava who in turn meets the Danube) and its tributaries bring down the waters of the Dinaric col in parallel flows. The area often experiences flooding, especially when snow melts.<br />
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But the town is also at a geopolitical bottleneck, not just a hydrological one. It is 15 km away from Slovenia and 50 from Bosnia, twice a border town despite being at the heart of the country. It was an outpost from its very foundation, by a Karl of the Habsburgs who had to face the Ottoman spearhead in the vicinity. Hence it was exemplarily fortified, with moats preserved today as a six-ray park known as <em>Zvijezda</em>, the star. <br />
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Only during the years of united Yugoslavia had Karlovac ceased being next to a national border. Many people didn't know it or confused it with the Karlowitz of the namesake treaty (this one is in modern-day Serbia, they aren't identical). Locals seem to have preserved historical memory. Before the attack of the "Yugoslav National Army" broke out, inhabitants <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/world/1991/sep/02/warcrimes.iantraynor">smelt the gunpowder</a>. In the autumn of 1991, the defence front of Croatian forces was at the southernmost of four rivers (the Korana). The town still hasn't recovered from the damage to its industrial production. </div>
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<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEilrW6MlhsgEfpMovAUbKnYAQrbYVqSmy_9YeeCJwu9FcxUjqd4lejdUi9iWVnmPW_SRYgr2wN1mmdQPfMxTJd4e1MTSdVLZl_hptKAfaNsevsTANzgqM43xMrAeiyVNWD9-7stDu5QifOd/s1600/karlovac_1991oct.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="213" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEilrW6MlhsgEfpMovAUbKnYAQrbYVqSmy_9YeeCJwu9FcxUjqd4lejdUi9iWVnmPW_SRYgr2wN1mmdQPfMxTJd4e1MTSdVLZl_hptKAfaNsevsTANzgqM43xMrAeiyVNWD9-7stDu5QifOd/s320/karlovac_1991oct.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Karlovac bus station during the days of 1991</td></tr>
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Karlovac is peaceful but also melancholic nowadays. The current serene impression (close to dead quiet) on the road dividing the bus and train stations has no relation to the bombed scenery in the photo from 1991. In the main square, the Catholic and Orthodox churches coexist but are almost hidden from the visitor - standing there without info signs, like relatives who got sour just before the party and forget to introduce themselves to guests. </div>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiglbRw6TqAFt71dtxACBfLXxK-gT3QWT_c0Q_weJNHIMdhd3sajFgD8HvTUG8d5FRukwd4inkIZIfCdLy9MeikrS5SPgYRLmpyZupl7yWQ4DDk-hBWvW8U7lPz0I_5L_rS8q0ZM_f5586H/s1600/IMG_5690.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="82" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiglbRw6TqAFt71dtxACBfLXxK-gT3QWT_c0Q_weJNHIMdhd3sajFgD8HvTUG8d5FRukwd4inkIZIfCdLy9MeikrS5SPgYRLmpyZupl7yWQ4DDk-hBWvW8U7lPz0I_5L_rS8q0ZM_f5586H/s320/IMG_5690.JPG" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">St. Nicholas Orthodox church (left) and Holy Trinity Catholic church (right). Karlovac, Croatia</td></tr>
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In a timid attempt to open up to the world, <em>Karl's town </em>hosted a small exhibition on the day of Croatia's accession to the E.U., in 2013. Perhaps because - apparently - there is no "sister town" yet, the exhibition presented several other European cities as <em>related </em>due to homonymous names. All, but one, are related to some Karl [Charles] - a different one from the Austrian that founded Karlovac in the 16th century (as Karlstadt), but never mind.<br />
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To make the exhibition bigger, however, the organizers included the <a href="http://kaportal.rtl.hr/kabina-izlozba-rock-+zorin-dom-predstave">glorious Karlovasi of the Eastern Aegean</a> in the honoured cities. I confess that as a Samian I had been impressed by the similarity of names when I first heard of the Croatian town at the time of the Yugoslav wars. Now that my island's second town has become known here, it may be worth for history researchers to add one more possibility to the mystery of its name, for which no single explanation has proven satisfactory so far - "karlı ovası" is in bad Turkish and supposed to mean <i>snow-clad plain, </i>which is hard to witness on Samos, whereas an etymology related to settlers from Ikaria island, "(I)Kario-va-si", sounds equally implausible too.<br />
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I cannot tell if Karlovac, founded shortly before Karlovasi was first recorded, had been a source of inspiration for Samos settlers. Imitation is not just a modern habit; it was not uncommon back then either. The only certainty is that, 400 years later - i.e. in the early 1900s - Karlovasi was the only island town on the Aegean that boasted a specific transport means, one that has been historically associated with the urban milieu of the onetime Austro-Hungarian domain. Tram, in its horse-drawn variety, existed prior to the war in Karlovasi, as in Karlovac. Can this be just a coincidence? </div>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiOBFRYgvwd1EM6pWgTuKgbb38zZJoxEYcggAlTAH2hX9XhKPbGU6WnVIjCLOCt-TVkFsFi1IrUxXLz60tfN0nV6xpe6s6Eh8Q_T5aeVkSRVzkyLZ57HSEvsTT8OQsJhwK4PS8BFM3jJOUo/s1600/karlovac_tram.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="203" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiOBFRYgvwd1EM6pWgTuKgbb38zZJoxEYcggAlTAH2hX9XhKPbGU6WnVIjCLOCt-TVkFsFi1IrUxXLz60tfN0nV6xpe6s6Eh8Q_T5aeVkSRVzkyLZ57HSEvsTT8OQsJhwK4PS8BFM3jJOUo/s320/karlovac_tram.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Horse-drawn tram at Karlovac</td></tr>
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Yank_ohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14232324419358386226noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8503602324548533488.post-40724225725060437192015-12-30T06:04:00.000-08:002015-12-30T06:04:03.858-08:00Dalmatian motorways<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: Arial, Tahoma, Helvetica, FreeSans, sans-serif; font-size: 13.2px; line-height: 18.48px;"><i>Published <a href="http://yankogohome.blogspot.gr/2015/04/blog-post.html">here</a> in Greek on 18 April 2015</i></span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: Arial, Tahoma, Helvetica, FreeSans, sans-serif; font-size: 13.2px; line-height: 18.48px;">The new [then deputy] minister of infrastructure kept flattering those fellow citizens still naively believing in the abolition of tolls (and bailouts) by a single-clause law.</span><br />
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<span style="color: #222222; font-family: Arial, Tahoma, Helvetica, FreeSans, sans-serif;"><span style="background-color: white; font-size: 13.2px; line-height: 18.48px;">Even an inquiry committee to investigate the alleged scandal could be set up, who knows. For the time being, the government's only achievement on the matter is the reappearance of protesters enforcing free passage with lunchtime daytrips, especially as the weather improves - the struggle being continued in the next hours at seaside ouzo-restaurants (damn' crisis).<br /></span></span><br />
<span style="color: #222222; font-family: Arial, Tahoma, Helvetica, FreeSans, sans-serif;"><span style="background-color: white; font-size: 13.2px; line-height: 18.48px;">This whole anti-toll movement has a very interesting history. To many, it is identified with Syriza - and justly so. Several of today's MPs used to lead the dynamic actions after 2010. A separate "Won't Pay" movement's support got almost wholly absorbed by the new strong left-wing pole in the repeat election of 2012. </span></span><br />
<span style="color: #222222; font-family: Arial, Tahoma, Helvetica, FreeSans, sans-serif;"><span style="background-color: white; font-size: 13.2px; line-height: 18.48px;"><br /></span></span>
<span style="color: #222222; font-family: Arial, Tahoma, Helvetica, FreeSans, sans-serif;"><span style="background-color: white; font-size: 13.2px; line-height: 18.48px;">Nevertheless, the 2008 pioneer was not a Syriza member, not back then at least. The Pasok man from Kalavryta, a former MP and prefect, appeared almost out of nowhere, preparing the ground. By invoking an outdated European directive, early refuseniks claimed that no toll should be levied on the Corinth-Patras route. </span></span><br />
<span style="color: #222222; font-family: Arial, Tahoma, Helvetica, FreeSans, sans-serif;"><span style="background-color: white; font-size: 13.2px; line-height: 18.48px;"><br /></span></span>
<span style="color: #222222; font-family: Arial, Tahoma, Helvetica, FreeSans, sans-serif;"><span style="background-color: white; font-size: 13.2px; line-height: 18.48px;">Shortly thereafter, the concession agreement - passed by a large majority in Parliament - incorporated the existing State tolls to the funding scheme of the new motorway to be constructed. In exactly the same way (via a parliamentary process studied since 2002 and hardly a novel one), the State's operating rights on four other motorways were transferred at the same time (2007-2008) to private special-purpose companies.</span></span><br />
<span style="color: #222222; font-family: Arial, Tahoma, Helvetica, FreeSans, sans-serif;"><span style="background-color: white; font-size: 13.2px; line-height: 18.48px;"><br /></span></span>
<span style="color: #222222; font-family: Arial, Tahoma, Helvetica, FreeSans, sans-serif;"><span style="background-color: white; font-size: 13.2px; line-height: 18.48px;">This whole process didn't give rise to a serious left-wing and/or patriotic reaction. Local MPs and local authority leaders were almost unanimously happy that the motorways would be "made". People trusted the private sector, judging from the first generation of such projects. Construction progressed fast, service and safety were improving - and tolls were being paid without complaints. International finance parties acknowledged the existence of a "toll culture" in the country.</span></span><br />
<span style="color: #222222; font-family: Arial, Tahoma, Helvetica, FreeSans, sans-serif;"><span style="background-color: white; font-size: 13.2px; line-height: 18.48px;"><br /></span></span>
<span style="color: #222222; font-family: Arial, Tahoma, Helvetica, FreeSans, sans-serif;"><span style="background-color: white; font-size: 13.2px; line-height: 18.48px;">A driver wouldn't examine, for example, what exactly he was paying for through the State-run tolls, for almost half a century. "Children's fares" were an open secret, as were other frauds, part of an unhealthy management reality and - as revealed later by the State's auditor Mr Rakintzis - bad corporate governance.</span></span><br />
<span style="color: #222222; font-family: Arial, Tahoma, Helvetica, FreeSans, sans-serif;"><span style="background-color: white; font-size: 13.2px; line-height: 18.48px;"><br /></span></span>
<span style="color: #222222; font-family: Arial, Tahoma, Helvetica, FreeSans, sans-serif;"><span style="background-color: white; font-size: 13.2px; line-height: 18.48px;">There was no <i>crisis</i> in 2008, Greeks didn't sense that their incomes were being reduced or that they would have to be economical. Therefore, the rates of 0.04 EUR per kilometre (plus inflation and VAT) didn't appear excessive. Nor were they, compared to the rest of Europe, with which we were anyway converging in terms of purchasing power. </span></span><br />
<span style="color: #222222; font-family: Arial, Tahoma, Helvetica, FreeSans, sans-serif;"><span style="background-color: white; font-size: 13.2px; line-height: 18.48px;"><br /></span></span>
<span style="color: #222222; font-family: Arial, Tahoma, Helvetica, FreeSans, sans-serif;"><span style="background-color: white; font-size: 13.2px; line-height: 18.48px;">Naturally, the gradual abolition of an all-purpose redistributional fund - and its replacement by bank accounts financing specific projects under clear conditions - was not a welcome development for everyone. How could one support, however, a non-transparent and outdated model.</span></span><br />
<span style="color: #222222; font-family: Arial, Tahoma, Helvetica, FreeSans, sans-serif;"><span style="background-color: white; font-size: 13.2px; line-height: 18.48px;"><br /></span></span>
<span style="color: #222222; font-family: Arial, Tahoma, Helvetica, FreeSans, sans-serif;"><span style="background-color: white; font-size: 13.2px; line-height: 18.48px;">The golden opportunity arose in 2009 when, with the first dark clouds amassing over the horizon of the Greek economy, Pasok candidates did not hesitate - despite having themselves voted for the concession agreements - to promise cheaper tolls.</span></span><br />
<span style="color: #222222; font-family: Arial, Tahoma, Helvetica, FreeSans, sans-serif;"><span style="background-color: white; font-size: 13.2px; line-height: 18.48px;"><br /></span></span>
<span style="color: #222222; font-family: Arial, Tahoma, Helvetica, FreeSans, sans-serif;"><span style="background-color: white; font-size: 13.2px; line-height: 18.48px;">And when recession started, from 2010 onwards, to show its teeth, the torch was passed on to the leftists who, taking advantage of the <i>Pasoki's </i>inability to make good on their promises, simply raised hell.</span></span><br />
<span style="color: #222222; font-family: Arial, Tahoma, Helvetica, FreeSans, sans-serif;"><span style="background-color: white; font-size: 13.2px; line-height: 18.48px;"><br /></span></span>
<span style="color: #222222; font-family: Arial, Tahoma, Helvetica, FreeSans, sans-serif;"><span style="background-color: white; font-size: 13.2px; line-height: 18.48px;">Local leaders joined too, asking for exemptions, jumping on the bandwagon and highlighting certain local shortcomings of the toll structure, who for its biggest part nevertheless achieves an optimal balance between construction cost and the required distance-based proportionality.</span></span><br />
<span style="color: #222222; font-family: Arial, Tahoma, Helvetica, FreeSans, sans-serif;"><span style="background-color: white; font-size: 13.2px; line-height: 18.48px;"><br /></span></span>
<span style="color: #222222; font-family: Arial, Tahoma, Helvetica, FreeSans, sans-serif;"><span style="background-color: white; font-size: 13.2px; line-height: 18.48px;">Despite commitments made in late 2013 (as concession agreements were amended) to correct these local issues, the reactions have since been provoked as well by the new political heroes: regional prefects. This is now a cross-party movement: the person who introduced the original concession agreements to Parliament (under the New Democrats) now calls tolls a <i>plague</i>!</span></span><br />
<span style="color: #222222; font-family: Arial, Tahoma, Helvetica, FreeSans, sans-serif;"><span style="background-color: white; font-size: 13.2px; line-height: 18.48px;"><br /></span></span>
<span style="color: #222222; font-family: Arial, Tahoma, Helvetica, FreeSans, sans-serif;"><span style="background-color: white; font-size: 13.2px; line-height: 18.48px;">Social envy is a key ingredient of reactions. It is clear that the liquidity of concession projects is being eyed-upon by public bodies which, for various reasons, cannot achieve something comparable. A revival of the infamous bucket-fund would probably be convenient for those agencies.</span></span><br />
<span style="color: #222222; font-family: Arial, Tahoma, Helvetica, FreeSans, sans-serif;"><span style="background-color: white; font-size: 13.2px; line-height: 18.48px;"><br /></span></span>
<span style="color: #222222; font-family: Arial, Tahoma, Helvetica, FreeSans, sans-serif;"><span style="background-color: white; font-size: 13.2px; line-height: 18.48px;">Abolition of tolls would mean the end of concession projects, but this minor detail is overlooked for now. A "smarter" variation calls for maintaining the contracts until the end of construction and then write these debts "on the snow". A less obvious, but equally important, detail is the need to maintain the motorways themselves, in whichever way their construction would be funded. Some have started labelling the current maintenance regime a luxury, as if "using a dog leash made of sausages" - despite the admittedly overwhelming improvement in quality during the concession years. </span></span><br />
<span style="color: #222222; font-family: Arial, Tahoma, Helvetica, FreeSans, sans-serif;"><span style="background-color: white; font-size: 13.2px; line-height: 18.48px;"><br /></span></span>
<span style="color: #222222; font-family: Arial, Tahoma, Helvetica, FreeSans, sans-serif;"><span style="background-color: white; font-size: 13.2px; line-height: 18.48px;">A better dog metaphor would be the Dalmatians, purchased in huge quantities thanks to the namesake movie - only to be abandoned as soon as kids got bored of them. In </span></span><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: Arial, Tahoma, Helvetica, FreeSans, sans-serif; font-size: 13.2px; line-height: 18.48px;">2005 everybody asked for "motorways everywhere", far beyond the <i>Greece 2010 </i>strategic plan (itself impossible to materialize in full, due to the crisis). Karpenisi, for example [a small town in mountainous central Greece], would be at the intersection of two major highways - one along the Megdovas river and another across the Veloukhi mountain. Populists (sometimes sons of modernist political families) currently engaging in toll-bashing had better tell the public how they intend to fund the projects - not the irrational ones they still promise or adopt, but the ones currently being built with a thousand hurdles and struggling to stay decent. </span></div>
Yank_ohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14232324419358386226noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8503602324548533488.post-45971659081841499282015-03-27T03:43:00.000-07:002015-03-27T04:28:45.087-07:00Solidarity<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<i>Greek version first published on 14 March 2015.</i> </div>
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Poland is the answer to a lot of things.<br />
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As, for example, to the question, "Which country was simultaneously attacked by all its neighbours, along a frontier thousands of kilometres long in total?"</div>
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For what took place in 1939 was not just an attack to Danzig (today's Gdansk) by the western/northern neighbour, Hitler's Germany. <br />
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But a concerted invasion from the other two points of the horizon as well. The new, pro-German Slovakia from the south - and the Soviet Union from the east. <br />
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Proportionally to its population, Poland paid the highest toll compared to any other country in the Second World War. It is estimated that it lost 6 million people (out of a total of 35 million). Some of the most tragic cases of human carnage have to do with Poles (e.g. the officers murdered by Beria's NKVD at Katyn) or occurred on Polish ground (such as the large concentration camps). <br />
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For two years, the basic "Nazi collaborators" were the appliers of state socialism in Moscow. Only when they were attacked themselves did they denounce the alliance with the "bad" socialism, the national one (hence "nazi", from "Nationalsozialismus") and tried to lead the international antifascist struggle. After June 1941, spontaneous hammer-and-sickle rebel movements grew rapidly (e.g. Greece's EAM National Liberation Front didn't exist before September 1941).<br />
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And when the German defeat was imminent, Poles weren't at all discussed in Stalin and Churchill's "percentage agreements". Soviets kept the territories east of Brest (todays Belarus) and shifted Poland westwards, by handing over Pomerania and Silesia that were captured from the receding Germans. They controlled Poland for 45 years, as it was "too distant" for others to claim it - only the Pope might have been interested, but as Stalin wondered, "how many divisions did he have?"</div>
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Nevertheless, when - following 35 rather quiet years of Soviet influence to Warsaw (a city that gave its name to the "Warsaw Pact" i.e. eastern bloc) - the first Polish Pope was elected at the Vatican, something did change. Shortly afterwards, Poles were cheered up when the <i>Solidarity </i>trade union came to the forefront at Gdansk (ex Danzig). Lech Walesa's popularity led to a repeat of Soviet interventions against skittish allies, which had occurred in near-perfect 12-year cycles (Hungary 1956, Czechoslovakia 1968 - the very last one on themselves, with the coup against Gorbachev in 1991, just before their collapse). This time, in 1981's Poland,
martial law was declared under Jaruzelski, so that <i>Solidarity </i>would be crushed.<br />
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And here may be the answer to another question - why Pole seems to confuse so much some of our compatriots - such as the minister who "coordinates the government's work", while he should rather coordinate some mangled historical information inside his head (he recently said that Poles "cooperated" with Nazi Germany, in the framework of a paranoid and harmful anti-Germanism promoted by Greece's new leadership). <br />
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For at that time (1981) we had again a political change in our country. The first foreign-policy crisis of the new Andreas Papandreou government was our differentiation from the rest of the EEC (the other 9 countries back then), who wanted to apply sanctions against the Jaruzelski regime.<br />
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Asimakis Fotilas (father of a likeable young politician of today, by the way) was Deputy Foreign Minister when he took off after a European meeting - in which he had, "wrongly" as it turned out, supported the communiqué. Upon landing in Athens, he had already "placed himself" out of the cabinet.</div>
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Andreas Papandreou wanted the support of the anti-rightwing bloc, nurturing EAM's memories. For that reason, he had decided to adopt a stance that satisfied Soviets and pro-Soviets, under fire then by those who were both anti-American and democratic. </div>
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I remember a Greek Communist Party (KKE) wall writing saying that "Poland will not become Chile", implying that Jaruzelski thwarted a supposed capitalist "reactionary" takeover of Poland. This was a somewhat odd claim, though, at the time that Poland had a junta, a socialist one of course, but equally uniformed to that of Pinochet. </div>
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Plain folk, on the other hand, were so confused that I doubt whether any intended message was passed to the supposed target audience. The following summer, a relative of mine, in the broader left-wing camp, proudly praised Poles, for bravely daring to raise banners at Spain's football stadiums, in the 1982 World Cup, "against the junta" - meaning <i>Solidarity</i>'s banners, which in essence said the same thing. <br />
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Years passed by, we met Poles for a while in their small, quiet immigrant community (before the Albanian influx), around Michail Voda Str. in Athens; and several years later as partners in the enhanced European Union. They joined the "club" later than we did, and yet their former Premier is now head of the European Council. I think we envy them for that too, as well as for their overall decent standing at the international stage, despite their having suffered more in total. Going a long way back, we would even owe them a little bit of gratitude for their king, who expelled the Ottomans and ended the Vienna siege. Coming back to the present day, it would suffice in my opinion if we could just admire them a bit, instead of envying them. And, in any case, respect them a little more, avoid offending them by claiming that they were "Nazi collaborators" at a time when we are about to turn Europe upside-down on the pretext of our own resistance.<br />
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Yank_ohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14232324419358386226noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8503602324548533488.post-39562767903887284432015-01-12T07:11:00.000-08:002015-01-12T07:11:04.642-08:00Five Greek flavours in Denmark<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<strong>The Danish "Rion-Antirion" Straits </strong><br />
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The "Sound" between Copenhagen and Malmoe is the narrowest entry point to the Baltic. In Scandinavian tongues it is called Øresund, as we learned thanks to the cable-stayed bridge inaugurated in 2000. <span dir="auto">The <em>øre</em> prefix means (a) gravel beach and (b) one cent of the Danish krone. Maybe more than a coincidence: there was a price for passage through these straits. According to legend, the king controlled traffic from the Helsingoer fortress (Hamlet's Elsinore, that is), shooting with the guns in order to warn pirates and other would-be free-riders - and surcharged the gunning costs on top of the toll rate. Today, the bridge [of a similar type to that of Rion-Antirion in Greece] has made Malmoe a suburb of Copenhagen (the two downtown areas are within 6 train stations from one another - barely an hour's ride). Helsingoer still serves a part of cross-channel car traffic via the once-busy ferry; at the same time [and contrary to the two fortress towns at Greece's Rion and Antirion] it has remained attractive, not just for the Shakespearean palace but also for the exceptional marine museum and cultural centre at the premises of the old shipyard. </span><br />
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<strong>Ja sou, ti kanis?</strong></div>
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My home island of Samos happens to be a favourite holiday destination among Danes. No idea if this is related to the old local flag, used during Samos' autonomy period (1834-1912), which looked like a cross between the Greek and Danish emblems. In any case, there is a centrally-located restaurant called "Samos" near Copenhagen's Cathedral. We found nice and reasonably-priced food there, with tzatziki served in all dishes, plus paper-napkins featuring basic Greek vocabulary, allowing some basic tourist-friendly vocabulary to prospective Greece visitors - such as "ena uso parakalo" for "one ouzo please". <br />
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<strong>My royal(ist) love affair</strong><br />
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The combed hair is unmistakable, despite the dim screenshot (and the equally dim collective memories). At Amalienborg, one of the numerous palaces of "Europe's oldest kingdom", there is a special room dedicated to the marriage of Anna-Maria, sister of today's Danish queen, to the pictured gentleman - Greece's then king Constantine (also a descendant of a Danish royal house). The screen shows the official 1964 wedding movie (a similar one is to be found <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MIidQLb07tw">here</a>). It is a high-quality film - reportedly the most widely shown one in Copenhagen that year - in which the royal yacht, after passing through the Corinth canal, lands near Athens, where the royals are welcomed by a very tall George Papandreou [grandfather of the recent namesake Greek leader], Greece's then prime minister. Just one year later, the polite relationship between king and PM were no longer there; Greece's parliamentary monarchy entered a crisis with no exit, terminated only by its abolition through the 1974 plebiscite. <br />
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<strong>Our citizenship</strong><br />
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Whatever the changes to secular regimes, faithful Christians look forward to the true citizenship, which according to the Apostle Paul "is (only) in heaven", as quoted on the Greek inscription at the building of Copenhagen's Lutheran <a href="http://kirkenikbh.dk/">Diocese</a> - at Nørregade 11, opposite Our Lady's Cathedral. This epistle had been sent by Paul to the residents of the northern Greek town of Philippi [near Kavala] (Philippians 3:20). <br />
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<strong>Always on my mind</strong><br />
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George Papandreou the grandson had spoken about [Greece capable of becoming] a "Denmark of the south"; however, Scandinavia had already been connected for a long time with the specific political family and the broader centre-left spectrum. Andreas Papandreou was based in Sweden for his resistance activities against the Greek dictatorship; nevertheless, Denmark had a fair share of the action as well. In 1968, a onetime Greek Embassy employee named Mavrogenis was murdered at a forest near Copenhagen, apparentlly by Greek junta agents. How apt, therefore, that one day after grandson George announced his latest political party, we saw at Helsingoer a poster for Carmina Burana, a musical theme associated in the past with rallies of the seminal political party of Pasok, which was founded by Andreas P. and had dominated Greek politics in the post-junta period.<br />
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Yank_ohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14232324419358386226noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8503602324548533488.post-22203259233967832692014-10-04T10:27:00.004-07:002014-10-04T10:27:56.780-07:00Why I (still) don't want U" - The need for a new Athens map of fixed-track transport<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
Where not a single spade has been used, there is time to prevent mistakes. I am referring to the U-shaped line, part of the Athens metro planning for nine years as if nothing has changed. It was recently announced that, with a bit of good will (i.e. cash and final designs), the 12 km between Galatsi and Goudi are feasible <a href="http://www.kathimerini.gr/785278/gallery/epikairothta/ellada/metro-apo-to-galatsi-sto-goydi">[see link]</a>. The goal seems down-to-earth, just one-third of the original 33 km, certainly more realistic than the outrageous "paper drills" of the 2009 Regulatory Plan <a href="http://yankogohome.blogspot.gr/2009/04/blog-post_14.html">[see Link</a>].<br />
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But I still "don't want U" <a href="http://yankogohome.blogspot.gr/2010/11/u.html">[see link]</a>, same as in 2010. For more or less the same reasons.<br />
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- In 2005 (and as late as the end of 2009) we were thinking that <em>money is there</em>. <em>Securitization,</em> i.e. loans to be paid back by future revenues, was in fashion. On the Athens Ring Road's (Attiki Odos') handover to the Greek State tolls would be maintained so as to pay back the loans for construction of a giant metro line [<a href="http://www.rizospastis.gr/story.do?id=3136338&publDate=">see link]</a>. This (theoretical) ease inspired design largesse. That's over now.<br />
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- Athens' current fixed-track network is still underperforming. A few days ago the minister, the same minister that (again) promised the fourth metro line, inaugurated a suburban rail station at Tavros [<a href="http://www.iefimerida.gr/news/172425/%CE%BF-%CF%80%CF%81%CE%BF%CE%B1%CF%83%CF%84%CE%B9%CE%B1%CE%BA%CF%8C%CF%82-%CE%AD%CF%86%CF%84%CE%B1%CF%83%CE%B5-%CF%83%CF%84%CE%BF%CE%BD-%CF%84%CE%B1%CF%8D%CF%81%CE%BF-%CE%B1%CF%85%CF%84%CF%8C%CF%82-%CE%B5%CE%AF%CE%BD%CE%B1%CE%B9-%CE%BF-%CE%BD%CE%AD%CE%BF%CF%82-%CF%83%CF%84%CE%B1%CE%B8%CE%BC%CF%8C%CF%82-%CE%B1%CE%B9%CF%87%CE%BC%CE%AD%CF%82-%CF%87%CF%81%CF%85%CF%83%CE%BF%CF%87%CE%BF%CE%90%CE%B4%CE%B7-%CE%B5%CE%B9%CE%BA%CF%8C%CE%BD%CE%B5%CF%82">see link]</a>. (Parenthesis: Fortunately, thanks to the <em>damned </em>George Papandreou, the same minister is now responsible for both urban and suburban trains - there used to be separate ministries for Public Works and for Transport). Unfortunately, trains pass only every two hours through this new station, located in a neighbourhood just outside downtown Athens [<a href="http://www.athenstransport.com/2014/09/proastiakos-tauros/">see link]</a>. Instead of being the metro of west and north Athens, as it could, the suburban rail is virtually unexploited. This cannot last forever. Someone, sometime will <strong>put on the map </strong>this worthwhile fixed-track network. And they will see that it covers the centre, the port, the airport as well as the business node of Maroussi. Not bad. If the suburban rail is taken into acccount, one can see the metro network's "shortcomings" in a different light. Different kinds of questions will then be posed, such as:<br />
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(1) Is it worth building a new metro line along Kifissias Ave. when the suburban rail can take you directly from [Maroussi's] OTE building and <em>Skyscraper City </em>to Athens and Piraeus? <br />
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(2) How "deprived" of a metro are the working-class neighbourhoods west of the Kifissos River, given that the metro reaches Peristeri, a new line (under construction) will link Aegaleo to Piraeus and there is also the suburban line from Piraeus to Liossia and Menidi? <br />
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From that viewpoint, only a few areas remain to be covered. Practically we are left with the densely-populated Kypseli, north of the centre, and the zone either side of Syngrou Ave. <a href="http://yankogohome.blogspot.gr/2013/01/blog-post_4221.html">[see link]</a>. These two could be linked by a fixed-track route passing through the centre. <br />
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I've got news for you. This route already exists and it is called the tram. Today it links the seafront and Nea Smyrni with Syntagma Sq. In conjunction with the redesign of Panepistimiou Str. (whichever form this may take) it will reach Aigyptou Sq. [near the archaeological museum]. By extending it northwards, it is possible to serve - gradually and at a fraction of the cost for an equivalent metro length - an area dependent for decades on jammed trolleybuses. If tram now causes an allergy similar to that which led to the abolition of its old Athens network after 1955, we don't have to go as far as Brussels and its pre-metro, i.e. the light-rail network that evolved into a metro [<a href="http://yankogohome.blogspot.gr/2014/02/blog-post_9.html">see link].</a> In Athens' Plakentias to Airport stretch we have the first successful track-sharing case Greece. A fixed-track network (on condition of a normal gauge, i.e. the metric network of the late 19th century, fit for the museums, is not included) may accommodate a large spectrum of trains. If a line (open to modifications) is in place, everything is feasible, at the right time. <br />
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The U line exists on paper since 2005. It replaced the metro design's original plans for branches of the main lines towards Galatsi and Maroussi <a href="http://www.ametro.gr/page/default.asp?id=384&la=1">[see link]</a> - branches being problematic from an operational viewpoint. With time the U line itself acquired, of course, its own branch, once the heroic Vyronas municipality demanded to have metro service. Moreover, I sadly saw that the recent announcement featured a repetition of the bad example applied in the current SW metro terminal of Haidari a.k.a. "Agia Marina" <a href="http://yankogohome.blogspot.gr/2014/08/blog-post.html">[see link</a> - i.e. an edge-of-town station next to the Aegaleo mountainside. This is now to be replicated across the town, with a station to be named Near East - whereas Far East would be a more appropriate name, at this remote location between the Shooting Range and Mount Imittos.<br />
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To put it plainly: A metro is expensive to build and therefore it is customary to align it amid sufficient <em>bread </em>- i.e. along busy, radial routes in densely built-up areas. <br />
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In order to make courageous decisions, it is important to take a comprehensive look, not a partial one. As already mentioned, a <strong>proper map</strong> will be of assistance - as pictured but with an equivalently thick line also for the suburban rail (not the thin one used on purpose in order to underplay its potential). The essence behind such a map would be the integration of urban and suburban fixed-track services in one single body, not the exception of the former Greek Railways (OSE) - the latter to be incorporated in a supposedly lucrative package, heard of for years but not visible yeet. We won't live to see a new 2004. A lot of tears were shed for the crumbling stadiums ten years after the games. As a transport engineer I hope others too will speak out about the need to get disengaged from pharaonic project-mongering and to fully utilize the, not insignificant, networks our country obtained at a time when we all believed it was entering the next level. <br />
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<em>All links are in Greek</em><br />
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Yank_ohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14232324419358386226noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8503602324548533488.post-21450885131352617482013-12-16T02:08:00.000-08:002013-12-16T02:10:19.043-08:00Let's get energetic<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<i>The Greek version of this post appeared on 27 Dec 2012</i><br />
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A few days before Christmas, on a Piraeus street, without a single grill house at a radius of at least 100 metres, I thought a grill party was going on. It was a bit less tasty than that, for my nose.<br />
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There was an explanation for this, my fellow-traveller gave it to me. It seemed reasonable. A few evenings later, I got convinced. It was Christmas Eve and the same smell dominated the south Athens exterior coastal highway - quite far from the zone of influence of any souvlaki-house.<br />
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I parked my car outdoors in Kallithea, a southern Athens suburb full of blocks-of-flats (with scarce indoor parking spaces). One and a half days later, the windscreen had ashes on it.<br />
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Four-plus-million-strong Athens now burns far more wood than ever. Reduced incomes and increased taxation have forced many households (and companies) to limit consumption (which is not necessarily a bad idea, the old TV ad with "grandpa in T-shirt" was an exaggeration by all means) while looking for "alternatives" - albeit, ones causing additional problems of their own.<br />
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Unfortunately, the consumer's own choices cannot alone lead to greater energy efficiency. For the game is "fixed", regulated by the State through taxation. Equalizing taxation for heating oil with that of vehicle diesel was a violent act. It was also strongly advertised: allegedly for fighting illegal trade (meaning, enforcement had failed); however, they failed to mention that Germany, a generally exemplary country, is one of several countries that still apply differential taxation (vehicle diesel is generally 50% more expensive than heating oil in the EU's largest economy).<br />
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It is not absurd that so many people turn to "something cheaper", such as:<br />
- Natural gas (sometimes LPG too) - also subject to a totally controlled oligopoly, the State can do pretty much whatever it wants regarding taxation.<br />
- Electricity - convectors, heat pumps, even "silly" energy-devouring fan heaters or winter airconditioners. There too, the Public Power Corporation - precisely, those Frankenstein companies / authorities created by so-called liberalization - maintains a State monopoly and does whatever it wants.<br />
- Wood or "pellets" for fireplaces, stoves and other "traditional"-style, smelly heaters. Sometimes, sophisticated solutions (or makeshift ones) are being applied, in the spirit of "central" heating (hot water or air flowing in the whole home). At other times it's simply that standards get lowered, so that we feel hot in the living room, get rolled up in our bedrooms and simply shiver in the bathroom. Some people call this <i>wretchedness. </i>Worse, the need for hard savings leads also to the degradation of other quality standards, not just comfort:<br />
(1) Safety: Cleanness and maintenance require cost (and care). Things were simple with the mass product called "central heating in blocks-of-flats". New tricks come with new knowledge to be mastered.<br />
(2) Environmental impact: Shall we see again centrally-placed electronic signs informing us about the values of pollutants? Shall the overall impacts (at town and even country levels) of this dramatic change in habits ever be measured? <br />
(3) Energy efficiency: At the end of the day, in a world seeking a more viable balance between energy production and consumption, especially in a country still based on imports for covering its energy needs (oil, gas), taxation-inflicted distortions can hardly lead to efficiency. I will consume what (seemingly) costs me less, which nevertheless does not necessarily lead to wiser use of (truly) limited resources. <br />
To be fair, distortions are caused not only by taxation but also by the very oligopolistic structure of the energy market (the oil cartels et cetera) as well as political tensions and fixations.<br />
- "<a href="http://yankogohome.blogspot.gr/2008/05/blog-post_06.html">Taboos</a>" (e.g. nuclear energy) are not uniquely Greek - see Merkel's "green reaction" after Fukushima.<br />
- "Green growth", too, wasn't of course only George Papandreou's vision. Here, it's true that the lack of policy was masked under an impressive new ministry title (headed by Tina Birbili), with "Climate Change" added to its name; also, solar energy "entrepreneurship" was promised "to the people" (not to mention the recycling factories which, according to some Pasok people back in 2009, would serve all of the Balkans - not an energy issue admittedly, hence no further mention here); finally, an energy certificate requirement came into force, little more than a job opportunity for several fellow-engineers with decreasing workloads during the recession. Whether our homes become more "energy efficient" just because an engineer spends a couple of hours - for 200 EUR - to get a "paper" issued, this you can judge for yourselves.<br />
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Last but not least: the unspeakable behaviour (roguish farting, pardon my French - full of methane) of some politicians and journalists towards an <a href="http://www.protothema.gr/blogs/blogger/post/?aid=236897">MEP</a> who dared say that "the king has no clothes", that is, the search for specific energy sources (fossil fuels) will not necessarily lead to economic, environmental or energy benefits for the country. I think that this attitude is part of the package also including "ecologists" bothered by wind generators...</div>
Yank_ohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14232324419358386226noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8503602324548533488.post-51853711957297778292013-11-23T09:32:00.001-08:002013-11-23T09:36:10.632-08:00Cartoons and safety distances<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
One doesn't need to go back to the times of cavemen to prove the lasting importance of illustration. Quoting Chinese proverbs is not necessary either. Everyday life features plenty of meaningful images. For many decades now, even centuries, this everyday reality includes cartoons. Maybe there exist some people who dislike the <i>genre</i> - but I think these are very few. Personally I have always sought for cartoons, in the "grown-up's" print I came across. Some magazines regularly featured such figures as the Stingy Man [<i>Spangorammenos </i>in Greek]; later I learned to distinguish the styles of several newspaper cartoonists, domestic ones at first (Skoulas in the Greek daily <i>Apogevmatini</i> being my earliest such memory) and later world-famous celebrities (e.g. Plantu). I must admit that the simultaneous presence of many cartoonists at the Rion Antirion Bridge (in 2005, I think) was one of the most hilarious company events I ever participated in. <br />
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A cartoon can be extremely powerful, we all know that. Trudeau (the Doonesbury strip creator, dealing primarily with American topics - familiar to me through the International Herald Tribune) had annoyed Sinatra when, shortly after a public honour, showed him as being friends with organized crime figures. </div>
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As for Adams, creator of Dilbert (a satire primarily of large firms' employees and executives), he has remarked that the very <i>proximity </i>of a popular person to other, deplorable persons (or things, or situations) is often a reason to get offended. He is himself a casualty of this, since some faithful people criticized him for the following strip, in which - he claims - the gullibility of "souvenir" collectors had been the main object of satire.<br />
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The recent furor over a cartoon by Hantzopoulos [depicted below] is of a similar nature, even if the popularity of the two female MP's implied in it (Mrs Konstantopoulou and Mrs Makri) is far less than that of Sinatra or of Our Lord. The proximity pattern is present here, too. The cartoonist targets the impression-mongering (the two MPs had climbed Greek state TV's railings in a protest) - at the same time, though, the pole-dancing metaphor as well as an alluding phrase used ("will they do anything else as well?") are violating the line which, in the minds of many people, should separate a public figure (in particular a woman) from "abuse of their bodies". <br />
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If you're asking myself, I had considered a similar matter almost 8 years ago, after a Dane had drawn a picture of Prophet Muhammad. I have re-read <a href="http://yankowenthome.blogspot.gr/">what I had written back then</a> and I realize it is also valid for me today, word for word, therefore - instead of another conclusion - I choose to copy it in full (the original was in Greek only).</div>
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<b>In favour of the irreverent </b></div>
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<i>04.02.06 at 20:08 EET</i><br />
Denmark's organized society hasn't been known in recent years for their sympathy to foreigners, especially if these are dark-coloured and/or slit-eyed - such as the Danes' nominal fellow citizens from Greenland, for example. So, at first sight, racist superiority feelings could have been diagnosed in the famous caricatures satirizing Prophet Muhammad - and Muslims treading on the Danish flag in cities all over the world wouldn't have made one too sad. </div>
The problem with the avalanche of dismissals, bans and "political correctness" that followed the publication of the notorious cartoons is, of course, more serious. I found it very interesting to read opinions reflecting two different approaches to satire - and to free expression, in general. </div>
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One approach, the same one that my friends and myself have followed in [our satirical webpage] <a href="http://www.laspi.gr/">www.laspi.gr</a>,
has been very eloquently described by the great Greek cartoonist Costas Mitropoulos in <i>Ta Nea </i>paper: making a cartoon (or an article) "respectful and harmful at the same time". It entails a certain degree of self-censorship and has the advantage of usability (should the need ever arise) also in countries or environments (corporate etc.) where freedom of expression is subject to certain limitations (greater or lesser ones). </div>
The other approach lies in testing the limits of the respective environment, taking your risks of course but, at the end, almost inevitably widening the scope for acceptability (and narrowing the forbidden zone). It is the daring ones that open the road towards greater liberty. I find it hard to follow their way but I do admire them and I think history will be on their side. <br />
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How each mass medium and each country will handle that matter is their own business. Let me simply point out that, if a similar satire had been made regarding Jesus, the reaction would have been limited to announcements by the Vatican or to lawsuits at worst. It is the fear of violent retaliation by Muslim "suicide bombers", not any kind of great sensitivity towards religious feelings, that very obviously dictates the hasty "wrap-up" of the Prophet cartoons issue. This, however, is in my opinion the very definition of terrorism. </div>
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Yank_ohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14232324419358386226noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8503602324548533488.post-45991742616510716742013-10-01T01:22:00.000-07:002013-10-01T23:49:06.246-07:00Bursa, out of nowhere<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
It seemed unlikely that <i>that</i> city would start standing out. What did we know about it? That it had been the first capital of the Ottomans, when they settled "for good" across the declining Queen of Cities. That the area was called Bithynia, which I sometimes confused with Palestine's Bethany, while at other times I (equally erroneously) believed it belongs to the Pontus. That it is historically related to the [Greek village of] Prousos, which I heard the locals pronounce Poursos, with the "oo" in front of the "r", as in the Turkish name of the city (Bursa). That, finally, tourist agencies added it even in short tours of Istanbul and the Prince's Islands, for those that wanted to add a bit more "oriental flavour".<br />
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Suddenly, last year I discovered that Turkey's fourth largest city, too, is about to compete with the Athens basin - Izmir had already reached the Greek capital's population level. Bursa is approaching 2 million. Besides our neighbours' overall rural exodus, Bursa has certainly also been "lifted up" by its industrial growth, including the automotive industry: we already knew <i>Tofaş </i>as a basketball team sponsor - it is the local Fiat plant, there is also a Renault factory there.<br />
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The town has a "tough" terrain, being built at the foot of the Great Mountain, Uludağ - another Olympus of ancient times - see an <a href="http://yankogohome.blogspot.gr/2009/01/blog-post_22.html">earlier article of mine (in Greek)</a>. Its central area, with the most important monuments (such as the Great Mosque and the Koza Han), is on a hillside. However, a metro line with two branches is already in operation (Salonika, do you read me?), as is a "retro" tramway similar to Istanbul's (a green one though, in the true Bursa colour, not red as in Beyoğlu). Moreover, road projects in the area are not negligible. An orbital motorway is already in operation, far beyond the inner by-pass arterial. More importantly: the link to the most populous Turkish city is being upgraded in an impressive fashion.<br />
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How? With what is perhaps the longest suspension bridge of our broad region (Balkans - Near East). Independently of any big sporting events or of <a href="http://www.todayszaman.com/news-273542-erdogan-lashes-out-at-cancer-report-says-only-god-can-determine-lifespan.html">God's will</a>
(regarding the Turkish leader's lifespan), prime minister Erdoğan would definitely like the Izmit Bay crossing project to go ahead. An almost pharaonic project, maybe a bit arrogant and audacious - a few kilometres to the west of the 1999 major earthquake's epicentre. Its practical usefulness is undoubted, as today's link between 10+ million-strong Istanbul and 2 million-strong Bursa is either via a long detour or via ferry. (There is the direct Istanbul-Mudanya line, a 2-hour trips similar to Rafina-Andros in Greece, or the Gebze-Yalova car ferry, resembling Rion-Antirion). Note the population sizes, nothing to do with the Economist's "<a href="http://www.economist.com/node/2970724">nowhere much to nowhere at all</a>" description, which had so enraged us at the time of the Olympic fever (2004).<br />
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But times have changed, banks are cautious about the Turkish boom, they fear it could be another "bubble". Therefore, the large-scale project - also including the full motorway between Istanbul (Gebze, to be precise) and Izmir - is having difficulty in obtaining the required funding. This year, they managed to rally <a href="http://www.roadtraffic-technology.com/projects/gebze-izmir-motorway-project/">8 Turkish banks</a> (not a single foreign one...) for the first phase, up to Bursa. Nobody knows what will happen with the second phase and whether beloved Izmir will ever be linked via motorway to the rest of the world. Maybe it doesn't even need to. <br />
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I must agree with the "moustached man" (Erdoğan): generally, nobody knows how the next day may dawn. Regarding the bridge, however, I believe there is no turning back. They will do it - and they'll make it strong, by means also of Japanese technology (and the know-how already existing from the two Bosphorus bridges, suspension structures both). Works have already advanced to such a degree that navigation is <a href="http://www.reuters.com/article/2013/09/26/turkey-shipping-idUSL5N0HM2FD20130926">affected every now and then</a>. <br />
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So maybe in a few years' time trips between Istanbul and Bursa will be easy to make within a single day. Unless the fans of Rafina Thyella (thanks to AEK [a historic football club relegated to the 3rd division] we will learn a lot of such teams now!) decide to take advantage of the bridge's existence in order to visit the land of their ancestors. No rush is recommended for such a trip, picturesque Zeytinbağı / Trilye is awaiting them several kilometres to the north, at a seaside location with quite a few <a href="http://www.zeytinbagi.bel.tr/?&Fa=1&Id=82741">Orthodox church ruins</a>. (Triglia was the original and long-time name of refugee settlement Rafina.)<br />
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In order to manage everything, the visitor should definitely plan at least one overnight stay at the <a href="http://www.bursa.bel.tr/hizmetler/sayfa/150">city of Karagöz and Hacivat</a>
(there even exists a relevant museum at Bursa). And, since they'll stay for the night, they might as well (like I did) try the delicacies of a great <a href="http://www.iskender.com.tr/iskenderin-tarihi.html">kebap house</a>
and finish their evening at the Arap Şükrü pedestrian street*, which refuted my fear that the city of the Great Mosque is so "devout" as to lack any trace of nightlife.<br />
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*<i>more on that, some other time...</i><br />
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Yank_ohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14232324419358386226noreply@blogger.com0