ισχυροί βόρειοι άνεμοι που φυσάνε στην ανατολική Mεσόγειο ιδίως κατά το καλοκαίρι. strong northerly winds blowing in the eastern mediterranean especially during the summer.

Monthly Archives: December 2013

Austerity, taxes and grenades

I was going to the local tax office this afternoon in Greece (I needed to pay a fee for the replacement of a lost ID card) and as I was approaching I noticed several police cars, cops cordoning off the sidewalk and after a little bit a fire truck, ambulance and military truck as well as a few unmarked vans pulling up. Apparently an employee noticed a hand grenade at the balcony of the 2nd floor and they called police and evacuated the building. As I was leaving the bomb squad was moving in with their remote robot and police were evacuating all nearby buildings.
I don’t know how, or when, the grenade ended up there but enough people are angry about all the tax increases and new taxes that it is hard not to jump to conclusions. And, judging from the side conversations I overheard, many of the people milling around didn’t seem at all upset at the prospect of a tax office getting blown up.

Sanitizing Mandela

I have commented a fair amount about the sanitization of Mandela’s life and legacy and I want to make an important clarification, prompted by a someone’s Facebook comment. It isn’t that I don’t appreciate and value Mandela’s messages of reconciliation. I do in ways that I cannot even begin to describe. But it is important…Continue Reading

6 December

The 6th of December is a day of many anniversaries of death. I am sure that I am missing some but here are the ones that I recall: 1961 Franz Fannon, decolonization thinker and writer extraordinaire, dies. 1989 Marc Lepine kills 14 women in Montreal, calling them “a bunch of feminists.” 2008 Alex Grigoropoulos, a…Continue Reading

Faith in people and community

Yesterday afternoon I was in the center of Athens with my mother and after we finished some errands and visiting with some friends we decided to stop by a local place that she likes, to get something to eat. Just outside the entrance an older man was pacing around, hand slightly extended, muttering over and…Continue Reading

Swift “justice”

A few days ago a young girl died from poisonous fumes in Greece after she and her mother had been using a homemade brazier to heat their apartment when their electricity was cut off for non-payment. You would think that this is as bad as things could get for the poor mother but no. She…Continue Reading