Life Disrupted: American Excursions, Greek Diversions, and the Challenges of Education in Greece

A Long Intermission, With an Interval of Grief

My world changed this past winter: my mother died suddenly. For nearly a year, this blog has been deferring to life and death: to course revision and preparation, family, home, holidays, teaching, travel--and most notably, my mother's completely unexpected death. Even after I overcame the months of disabling depression that followed my sudden trip to the U. S. last winter to share the love and sadness of family and friends, so much has reminded me of my mother and my loss: hairspray, my kids' clothes, tall trees, cooking, scenic views, makeup, flowers, fudge cake…. Our summer trip to the U. S. came too late for my children and me to play miniature golf with their grandma; relax and play with her at the playground, amusement park, and beach; relive my childhood walks on the boardwalk together; or show her their drawings and discoveries. It came too late for me to spend time close to my mother during the relaxed vacation days that bear little resemblance to her annual fall visit to us in Greece, when school hours, homework, and (this time) preparations for the last birthday party she'd share with us distracted me, yet again, from the importance of our relationship. I thought we had at least ten more years to share.

An American Interlude

Our summer in the U. S.--my longest stay there since 2000--did include a number of enjoyable reunions, as well as enabling more accurate comparisons between the two countries I know best. I was most struck by differences in size, space, and convenience: even in the smallest state of Rhode Island, everything from paper towel packs and milk cartons to appliances, parking lots, and highways tends to be big. Not only the excessively extravagant Gilded Age mansions of Newport, but even the smallest middle-class houses on our street in a Providence suburb, were roomier than typical middle-class homes in Greece. And so much is ultra-convenient: "drive-thru" pharmacies, pre-cut and peeled carrots, cash back with debit cards at supermarkets, smart phones, little electronic boxes to entertain kids. Of course, it all comes with a high price in both dollars and health; I was surprised by how much healthy, real, and especially organic food costs in comparison to the omnipresent junk food, how often I saw kids interacting with electronic devices instead of with each other, and how much health care and medicine can cost for the uninsured. Expenses did vary; gas was cheaper than in Greece even in the Northeast, as were many of the clothes and shoes at Delaware outlets, but groceries, rent, and services were more expensive. My friends and I talked about corruption in the government and the legal system, injustice and poverty, crime and danger--in general, about the imperfections of the American system as well as the Greek one. But mostly, this past summer, I savored time with my family and friends and appreciated the good side of American life: helpful new neighbors; polite strangers; clean yards, sidewalks, roads, and parks; vast extents of green grass and trees; plentiful space inside and out; mint chocolate chip ice cream; sweet corn; blueberries; and being surrounded by completely comprehensible English.

As fortunate Americans who could afford to explore, we were impressed by the monumental bridges we crossed on our way up and down the Eastern U. S., and even  landscapes that bored me in childhood inspired a lazy, peaceful fascination, an attraction of the old and familiar: smooth, wide, endless highways between lush green cornfields and roadside forests, marshes, rivers, and ponds contrasted with the rugged dryness of much of Greece; neatly paved roads through neighborhoods of carefully manicured lawns with flowerbeds and well-kept single-family homes contrasted with the large, boxy concrete structures and compact, largely utilitarian fruit, vegetable, and flower gardens of our neighborhood in Crete. We also passed through areas of the industrial ugliness, monotonous strip malls, crowded and unkempt lower-income housing, and littered yards of smaller rural homes that are additional hallmarks of America, but most of our trips took us through the more prosperous areas that fit the positive stereotypes of the USA. Driving through New England with Prairie Home Companion and Garrison Keillor's caricature of Minnesotans as "God's chosen winter people," the highway a ribbon snaking along between tall deciduous trees toward New York City and its Spanish and Greek radio stations, I was often amused. But a nostalgic sadness and fondness hit me as the Pennsylvania Turnpike's smooth roads wandered across rolling hills of farmland and forest in the green and gray of light summer rain. The grazing horses and cows between the cornfields, tall silos, capacious barns, and rambling old farmhouses and outbuildings were as welcome to me as if I'd never seen a farm, as if I were a tourist on a first visit to Amish country, and as if I'd grown up there--as I had. 

It was often a summer of nostalgic memories, visits, and re-creations of childhood pleasures, but it was also a summer of discovery in Rhode Island, where I hadn't spent much time before. I wandered among colonial era houses near Brown University; we joined the street-fair-type excitement of Waterfire's bonfires on the river; and I joyfully breathed in the smell of thousands of real paper books in libraries peopled by real readers, such as Edgar Allan Poe's hangout, the Athenaeum. My children and I delighted in the extensive lawns and forests of Roger Williams Park, with its carousel, swan boats, gardens, ballfields, playgrounds, and zoo, the latter boasting far more shade, space, and water, not to mention air conditioning and misting stations, than the zoo outside Athens. We enjoyed visiting the strangely lumpy camels, seeking out the elusive snow leopard, adoring the furry red panda, and hunting for the monkeys in their large rainforest-like building. But on the hottest, most humid days of a record-setting July, we sought refuge in the cool reading room of our local public library, which offered so much more than the children's library in Chania. In addition to checking out hundreds of English-language books, we appreciated free internet access; free performances by a storyteller and a magician; free or reduced tickets at the Providence Children's Museum and the RISDE Art Museum; and the incentives of the children's reading club, which (after the discovery of Nate the Great) finally interested my son in reading by offering crafts, prizes, fast food meals, and passes to such extravagant mansions as Blithewold in Bristol and The Breakers in Newport. (Talk about conspicuous consumption--as Mark Twain and Edith Wharton did!) That's America, with all its contradictions: more (offerings, solutions, problems), bigger (spaces, places, income gaps), richer (communities, organizations, elites). In spite of Greece's glorious beaches, clear waters, and breathtaking scenery, as well as the generosity, hospitality, openness, and friendship of Greeks, I wasn't ready to leave the USA.

Back to School Blues and the Modern Greek Tragedy

But we did leave. Welcome back to Greece, I thought, as we rode in a taxi amidst the suffocating fumes of uncontrolled vehicle exhaust at the end of the summer. Welcome back to Greece, I thought, as I struggled to re-acclimate to the intensely burning sun, the frequent barking of dogs tied up to act as alarm systems, and the intermittent strikes that  interrupt garbage pickup and close public services such as post offices, hospitals, and schools. Welcome back to the "Utter Confusion" a Greek journalist associated with Greece, and to its illogical public education system.

Now, the kids are more or less back in school. I think most of the high school teachers in our area ended their week or so of strikes a few weeks ago, although one local junior high school started full-time classes only in October (instead of mid September). Some Greek universities remain closed because their presidents (called rectors here) claim they don't have enough administrative staff to function now that the Greek government has allowed the Troika's insistence on transferring and firing civil servants to hit their campuses. By American standards, D's university is and was understaffed (if over-creatively designed, architecturally speaking), but some of the public universities in Greece boasted far more staff members, some of them unproductive and illegally hired by political patrons at taxpayer expense. I can see why such past mistakes need to be remedied, but it's not clear that the remedy, hurriedly applied to please the Troika, avoids disrupting necessary administrative functions performed by diligent staff members.

And I can't figure out why the Troika would insist on firing grade school teachers. This packs many elementary school kids into classes with 34 other children and reduces secondary school students' already dim hope of learning enough at crowded public schools to pass the demanding Panhellenic exams, an extremely stressful ordeal of six two to three hour exams taken over a two-week period that determines whether or not they attend a public university in Greece. I can't see why the Troika would increase the need for public school students to attend private "frontistiria" (costly after-school schools) or hire tutors to properly teach them the foreign languages, science, composition, and math they'll be expected to master. Since the government needs to save money, why don't they fire the civil servants who sit around smoking, drinking coffee, or chatting while lines lengthen in the post office or at City Hall, or those who receive a paycheck for a job they don't do, rather than the people who teach the youths of Greece? And why on earth don't they ask students to refrain from writing in their school books, so next year's students can use the same texts, they way we did in the U. S.? It's not like Greece has extra trees, extra paper, and extra money to spend on new books each year! Yes, Greece certainly needs to cut its budget, combat tax evasion and corruption, and reform its civil service system, but what bewilders many people here is that the government hurries so fast to give in to the Troika's demands that many of its "cost-saving" "reform" measures are illogical and ultimately costly because they disrupt society and destroy health and lives.

One Troika official claimed that they are "not blind," that they know that about 60% of Greek youths are unemployed. What are they, then, deaf to pleas to allow proper education of these young people? I realize they want to reduce public spending and strengthen banks and the economy, but the public education system was faulty enough without firing teachers and increasing class size. And what is the basis of a nation's economy, if not its people, who need a good, affordable education? I repeatedly demand of hapless middle-class parents why they continue to pay the thousands of euros required each year--even during this economic crisis--so they can drive their children to extra lessons to do extra work at extra schools, staying up late studying instead of enjoying the sports, dance, or music lessons most have to give up by high school, if not earlier. Families may give up expensive food and drink, new clothes and shoes, but many continue to pay frontistirio fees even now! I've asked so many times why Greek parents do not demand that the public schools do their job of educating the country's sons and daughters, rather than simply accepting the fact that they don't expect their children to learn enough in them. Greeks strike, occupy, and protest hundreds of times more often than Americans (or so it seems to me!), and teachers, students, and parents do call for better funding of better free education, but their protests, organized by political parties such as SYRIZA to shame the government, seem to me to most often highlight anger at particular changes in the laws, rather than emphasizing a serious demand to overhaul an unnecessarily ineffective, costly, wasteful public/private education system. Of course, under the reign of the Troika, they face an uphill battle against even one new law, so I suppose it's unreasonable to expect them to fight for more, but I’m bewildered by the acceptance implied by the ever so common phrase "ti na kanoume," what can we do? The answer is most often merely "ipomoni," patience.

I'm discussing the middle class here, whose parents expect their children to attend university and pay dearly to ensure that they do, but I wonder just how many intelligent lower-income students are shut out of Greece's public university system because their parents cannot afford frontistiria or tutoring for them. (Yes, there's universal free public primary and secondary education in Greece, but not enough to ensure the ability to continue into the free public universities, for which there is stiff competition!) Wealthier families often send their children to expensive private schools which offer better preparation for university entrance exams--or for studying abroad--and then supplement that schooling with private tutoring. But for the middle class, according to one Greek mother, frontistiria are in style, enabling families to keep up with the Joneses (or Yannis  and Maria's children), since one child must know as much English (math, science, composition) as the next child rather than being embarrassed or disadvantaged by falling behind. This Greek mother also believes nearly everyone in Greece, or her brother (sister, aunt, father), works for a frontistirio or tutors children, so that dismantling the current system would damage the national economy too seriously to be acceptable. It's true that Greece could hardly absorb another large group of unemployed individuals right now; nor is there money to employ these teachers in the public school system. An annoyed British mother here recommends closing the public schools, since kids don't learn there anyhow. Since no one expects students to learn much, many teachers apparently don't try too hard to teach. Other teachers--even very good, dedicated instructors--work with the justifiable expectation that most students are also learning part of each lesson at their frontistirio, so that the entire subject need not be covered in public school. In fact, in the last month before the Panhellenic exams, masses of students suddenly become too "sick" to attend their public schools, spending all their time studying for the more useful frontistirio lessons. There are too few vocational or technical schools below university level, so even many middle-class students who don't do especially well in school are pushed to struggle their way into universities.

I think many of the youths who spend at least their last year of high school studying intensely for long hours become too sick of this educational struggle to care to attend their university classes. Urged to excel in music, dance, or sports on ultra-competitive teams or with high-level exams or recitals in elementary and junior high school, and then to focus on intense study to learn an impressive amount at a very advanced level by the end of high school, middle- and upper-class Greek children are pushed to be highly educated, but they don't have much chance to be children who enjoy childhood. By the time they reach their university years, many tend to merely take the exams that are the sole requirement in most courses--and they may take them as many times as necessary to pass, as long as they finish in seven years (for a degree that should take five). Finally released from parental and social pressure to perform, university students begin to relax and enjoy themselves, partying, lounging at cafes, and driving drunk just as they should become serious about preparing for life and a career. I realize that this happens elsewhere, too, but it strikes me as a more widespread problem here, with a more obvious, ironic, and perhaps avoidable cause.

There are some encouraging signs that the situation may be starting to change, however, as more students attend classes during this economic crisis, especially following the recent reform that requires students to finish their studies within seven years. That reform led to great fury and many occupations of universities by a radical minority of students offended by the idea that they couldn't attend university indefinitely at taxpayers' expense. While it may be hard for some students who are earning enough for their room and board to finish on time, most are supported by their families, and many seem to simply feel entitled to fail exams as many times as they wish, without bothering to attend classes. As I understand it, a minority of students, some of them belligerent and violent in the face of disapproval of their disruptive protests, generally manages to control student meetings and votes on whether to occupy the university to protest any proposed changes, closing D's campus (for example) several times per year so professors can't teach and the students who wish to can't learn. In 2012, classes continued an extra month or so into the summer here to make up for time lost during occupations, scrambling summer plans for internships, research, or travel.

My children learn quite a lot at their public elementary school--for now, since their classmates attend frontistiria only for foreign languages so far, and their parents still expect public school teachers to teach the rest of the classes adequately. There are many excellent, hard-working teachers and professors as well as serious, talented, smart students at Greek schools and universities, and many students do manage to learn enough to excel in prestigious foreign graduate programs, so Greek public education works for some. But so much more is possible. Students, unite! Not to further curtail your education with more occupations and strikes--to expand your education with sensible demands and plans for a logically organized, truly free, well staffed, wisely utilized, efficient public education system that could realize the full potential of Greece's intelligent, talented population without the excessive financial and psychological demands on students and parents during secondary school years that reduce the quality of many a university education. Of course, I am well aware that sensible demands tend to lead to little action now, with deep divisions between political parties and few non-ideological efforts at logical compromise--so widely known an American problem these days that my kids' school principal asserts that I'm better off here in Greece, even if she can't tell me when Christmas vacation starts or when we'll have the additional teachers we need, even if there are no substitute teachers after kindergarten, so students simply miss their lessons if teachers are ill (on strike, at a meeting, etc.). It is always hard to agree about what is "sensible" or "logical." A common Greek response is to take to the streets in desperate attempts to attract the government's attention--or change the government--and no solution is in sight.

Here in Crete, we aren't as seriously affected by strikes and demonstrations as Athenians are. We have our share, but this term D's university stayed open except for a two-day occupation, and our children's elementary school teachers kept teaching all along, although some in the area went on strike for a day or two. In fact, once I'd given up on my son's school days lasting more than a meager 4 ¼ hours (that's through 2^nd grade), our principal astonished me with an announcement on the first day of school, September 11: school days would be extended to last from 8:10 to 2:00, thanks to the EU program the Greeks call ESPA! I am less surprised that this hasn't happened yet, even in October; but the missing art, music, and theater teachers materialized last week, so school ended at 2:00 three out of five days this week. There's still no sign of the additional English and gym teachers needed to staff the extra classes, and they're still trying to finish the computer room this week, but we have had a computer teacher for a week or so, along with 10 or 12 computers that will eventually be shared during lessons. Every year, there's uncertainty about who will teach each elementary school class until the first day of school. Last year, there were many missing school books, and no English teacher at our school until November, with our usual, wonderful English teacher on maternity leave and some difficulty providing for all the far-flung islands of Greece. (And what an English teacher we ended up with! He could barely understand or respond when I slowly and clearly introduced myself!) But this year the Ministry of Education seems to be shuffling teachers in even more belated, wild confusion than usual as it tries to decide whom to fire. So we've had a gradual lengthening of our school day, which ended first at 12:25, then 1:15, playing havoc with working parents' schedules. We're luckier than some students in Chania, though, where school ended at 11:30 at least through late September because a building was not finished.

The most recent strikes and protests are understandable, if no more constructive than usual; the Troika demands more and more firings of public sector employees, and there are no jobs, social services, or insurance plans to help all the people who'll be sacked, or already have been. There is no money to replace their salaries, to pay their rent and bills, to buy their groceries, to pay for their medical care, to pay the higher and higher taxes demanded by the Troika and accepted by the Greek government. But the Troika isn't blind. They're just deaf to reason. Fire the civil servants, they say, fire them, and cut off their health insurance; reduce the salaries and pensions of the rest. They don't seem to hear that this means children go malnourished and undereducated, that the sick go without medicine. For the Troika, it seems that anything goes, as long as Greece can repay its creditors and strengthen its banks. The Troika is not blind, not to the numbers that look slightly better in terms of Greece's ability to repay its debt, even as the numbers of unemployed skyrocket beyond the latest statistic of 27.6 %, which counts part-timers as "employed" and drops the hopeless from the counts as the numbers of suicides climb. This helps to explain the increasing popularity, during the years of the economic crisis, of not only the relatively new opposition (SYRIZA, the Coalition of the Radical Left), but also the neo-fascist Golden Dawn, which entered parliament for the first time last year. Only the recent murder of a Greek man by a Golden Dawn member--not the hundreds of acts of intimidation, the many beatings, or the murders of immigrants allegedly carried out by people affiliated with this group--has finally led to a serious investigation of this political party as a possibly criminal organization, as well as belated arrests of prominent party members. (For more on this, see, for example, this brief overview of Golden's Dawn's role in Greek politics and society by a conservative/centrist Greek editor. Leftists criticize the government's delayed response to violence against immigrants in much stronger terms.) Increasing numbers of Greeks seem to agree with a slogan of KEERFA, the Movement United Against Racism and the Fascist Threat: "Each vote for Golden Dawn is a knife in Nazi hands." The Troika seems to be deaf to pleas to help desperate Greeks in order to stop them from turning to neo-fascists for the answers. We can only hope the government's crackdown on Golden Dawn opens people's eyes to the dangers of fascism, rather than creating a backlash of fascist sympathizers who believe Golden Dawn's hypocritical claims that they are being persecuted, rather than being the persecutors.

Natural Uplift: Awe-Inspiring Agios Pavlos

When we first returned to Greece at the end of August, jetlagged and kidlagged after a summer full of family time, D and I needed a vacation, a brief escape from the utter confusion of Greece's modern tragedy. Unlike many, we were fortunate enough to manage a few days in our favorite part of southern Crete, the Plakias area south of Rethymno. (See my October 25, 2012 blog for some photos from last year's trip there.) We enjoyed visiting favorite beaches and restaurants, plus one that was 1 hour and 20 minutes' drive farther east of where we stayed, taking the "good" roads vs. the treacherous, rutty gravel ones we got lost on last year. We'd made it to the top of the Agios Pavlos cliffs and sand dunes last year, but just at sunset, too late to descend to the beaches. We found closer parking this year, right above the dunes, instead of next to a café above another beach from which we needed to ascend many steps, traverse a wide open area, and climb up before heading down. This time, it was just a matter of carefully slide-walking down dunes several stories high--with a much harder climb up afterwards, obviously. Initially, it wasn't clear to me that last year's vantage point from on high didn't provide as spectacular a sunset view as one could find, with the sea extending out to the west and layers of hills and promontories fading off into the distance in varying tones of purple or orange and gray (as in my last two photos from last October's blog section, Exploring to the East: Toward Agios Pavlos on a Blustery Day). Down on the beach at sea level, the perspective looking inland to that hill of dunes rising close behind us was rather unsettling. But once I began exploring to the north, where boulders and cliffs hide caves accessible by wading or swimming around the rocks, I became enchanted. I love the cool, dark spaces of caves freshened by little waves washing up onto their minibeaches, rustling the tiny pebbles against each other. I love the frames provided by the black outlines of cave openings looking out toward spectacular views of the Libyan Sea at sunset. Cave walls, boulders, distant hills, sea, and sunset--what more could we ask for? Crystal-clear waters for viewing fish and the sea bottom, with or without masks--and we enjoyed that, too. Of course, we didn't manage to tear ourselves away from all that before dark, but fortunately D had come prepared with a strong flashlight and a head lamp for the challenging ascent. Life in Greece is no vacation, but vacation in Greece reminds me that there's hope for Greeks' life. Along with neighborly, sociable, kind, clever people, Greece has its glorious scenery and sea, and so do the people who live here--as I do. By no means will it feed or heal everyone, but it can both offer peace and attract the more tangible economic benefits of tourism, which continues to thrive into a warm October this year.

 

Midsummer Night Themes

Let Them Eat Cake (and Hear Music, and See Fences)

A week and a half ago, our neighborhood organization sponsored its second party of the summer, and of the last ten years, at the local basketball court. Actually, it co-sponsored the gathering, along with the recently expanded municipality of Chania, which has been paying musicians to appear at get-togethers in various neighborhoods, and has sponsored other free, family-oriented entertainments, for the first time in recent memory. When I expressed my surprise that the city government thought it could afford this, these days, one of our neighborhood association officers replied that it’s better for us to go out and enjoy ourselves, rather than listening to the news. After all, it’s not good news, but just more of the same ol’ same ol’ talk of austerity: budget cuts; reductions in salaries, benefits, welfare, and pensions; struggling and failing businesses; recession; and little realistic hope for economic growth any time soon. The news is actually getting worse: the government has temporarily (we hope) frozen spending on everything but salaries and pensions, meaning hospital and pharmacy suppliers (as well as others) will not be paid, and pharmacies will probably stop accepting our insurance and require that we pay in full  for medications--again. (And who knows if D’s “promised” research grant money will ever appear, so he can pay graduate students for the work they do.) In this bleak socioeconomic climate, there have been almost 500 racially motivated attacks against immigrants in Greece in just the past six months, according to the president of the Pakistani community, who is also the leader of the Migrant Workers’ Association in Greece (Migrants call for protection).

So, instead of prosecuting violent offenders or promoting economic growth, why not opiate the masses with some wine, cake, and tsikoudia—well, they can bring that themselves—or at least with some songs, violin, and laouto (a Cretan instrument that’s related to the lute)? Our smart neighborhood organizer decided to accept the city’s offer of co-sponsorship, partly to entice a city official to come see the pitiful state of our basketball court, with its aged hoops (no nets), and especially the many missing sections of fencing. This way, the official would be embarrassed enough to take action to fix up our long-neglected facility. Our wonderful organization officers—by far the best in the ten years I’ve been here—had already succeeded in convincing the authorities that we needed a safety railing on both sides of the bridge over the little gorge at the entrance to our neighborhood, rather than just on one side, and had managed to finish fencing in the playground and remove the most dangerous piece of dilapidated equipment. But for the basketball court fence we needed more help from the city’s bulldozers. I was astonished when I woke to the sound of machinery digging up overgrown brush around the basketball court, so new fencing could finally be installed. And a day or two before our party, I was amazed to see a properly fenced space. I think officials are working on the fence on the border between Turkey and Greece, too; they’re certainly letting fewer immigrants slip in there these days. Not that there are so many who want to enter Greece any more, unless they’re escaping from Syria.

Second Neighborhood Gathering of the Summer

A pastry company and a juice company had been convinced to donate orange juice and far more pastries than we needed (both sweet, and filled with mizithra cheese). Neighbors provided other drinks as well as homemade desserts, salty pies, pizzas, and popcorn. Our organization offered art supplies, so children could draw health-conscious and environmentalist pictures with the encouragement of our neighborhood kindergarten and art teachers. Supplied with whistles, older kids joined a little bikeathon to alert more neighbors to our gathering. They were ably led by the twelve year old who seems likely to be the next (or at least an eventual) president of our organization, since he demonstrates impressive organizational abilities: he labeled all the borrowed balcony chairs with letters and made a list of which letter corresponded to which family and address, so chairs could be properly returned after the party. His sixteen year old brother politely invited some newcomers at the adjoining playground to come to the party, switching to English once he realized they weren’t Greek. Later, he tried to teach me a Cretan dance, then sat and chatted with me a bit. Those boys give me hope for the future of Greece; they are good kids.

This neighborhood party featured an even wider range of ages than the first one: everyone from a 40 day old baby to great grandparents. And it seemed to emphasize the importance of family ties in Greece: at least in our neighborhood, it appears that when a young unmarried couple is expecting a baby, that couple is likely to marry and to live with parents or grandparents. We couldn’t amplify the music at our party much, because a grandmother had died two blocks away, and it would have been inconsiderate to disturb the pre-funeral vigil underway in her house. It was the two- to three-year-old girls who started dancing, with the encouragement of one mother; soon, a few grownups joined in, and I did my best to follow. When more adults tried another Cretan dance, and I figured out whose foot movements were easiest to watch and duplicate, I caught on well enough to earn a hug from a jovial neighbor. 

With the music fairly quiet, it was easy to catch up with neighbors I hadn’t talked to for some time, since we spend most days hidden away from the sun, and don’t seem to emerge in the same places or times most evenings. A kindergarten teacher is working at a fast-food franchise at the airport. A Dutch couple is happy enough here, and economically secure enough, that they don’t consider leaving Greece. An American and a Romanian have recently moved into our neighborhood, and the Romanian children are taking intensive Greek courses in preparation for entry into a Greek public school—but not the one closest to us, because that’s not the one that complies adequately with European law to offer supplementary classes for immigrant children who need additional help with the Greek language. A Greek homemaker is tired out from cooking for visiting family, caring for her three children, and commuting to “the village” to help her father, who’d broken his ankle. Most of us, for that matter, are tired, in all this heat and humidity.

In the Village and at the Exhibition:  Locals vs. Tourists

So many Greeks have family roots in a rural village, to which they return either regularly, bringing eggs and produce, or occasionally, for vacations, to help relatives, or to harvest olives. We visited some vacationing friends last weekend at their lovely old house in a traditional mountain village. The interior staircase smelled of rich old wood. Something about the house reminded me of my grandmother’s rural Kansas farm house, although the actual resemblance eludes me. No mountains or dark wood in that Kansas house, no grape stamping space outside to make wine the old way. We sat on a patio under an immense grapevine, enjoying some of its plump purple grapes (along with prickly pear cactus fruit, watermelon, and honeydew) between courses of sweets and more sweets.  Parents and grandmother sat and watched the children play in the cool evening air of the island’s mountains.

Why are so many of us who live near sea level so tired this summer—even those of us who are fortunate enough not to be street sweepers, ditch diggers, or dishwashers in hot taverna kitchens? I’m not sure if it’s because we can’t sleep in our hot houses at night, or because we spend evenings in the cooler outside air as much as possible—and as late as possible—becoming night owls who struggle to wake up to the bright sun of morning. The Greek sun has always struck me as far brighter than any sun I encountered in North America, or other parts of Europe I’ve visited—with the possible exception of the sun on bright white ski slopes. It’s the only sun that forces me to wear sunglasses, which I always resisted before I came here. And while our temperatures aren’t any hotter than many parts of the U. S.—usually not much more than the low to mid 90s—the strength of the sun combined with the humidity, plus the stark contrast between air conditioned stores and cars, and the heat of the outdoors and many homes, wears us out, and keeps us indoors until the sun disappears. So our neighborhood party was barely getting going at 7:30, when the sun was still a bit too high in the sky, and the 14^th Exhibition of Cretan Products in the Western Moat next to the Old Port of Chania was still relatively quiet by 8:30 the next evening, but increasingly crowded as we left at 9:30. With our kids’ morning swimming lessons and other sports activities requiring us to get up earlier than we’d like, we’ve often been the first to leave an event. But now it’s sleepy August in Greece, and the activities are over, so we’ll give in to our inclination to stay out more at night and sleep late every day—even though that will make it harder to re-adapt to school hours in mid September.

Meanwhile, we pull our son away from the water at the port and try to prevent our kids from tasting every single food sample at the fifty or a hundred attractively arranged and well-staffed stalls of cheese, honey, herbs, pastries, wine, and raki at the Exhibition of Cretan Products. We wait in the long lines of extra traffic that tourists bring each summer, as motorcyclists use the double line in the center of the road as their own passing lane.  The Cretan economy certainly needs its tourists, but everyone who’s not directly dependent on tourism is extra annoyed by the delays in traffic that moves slowly between Chania and the beaches, traveling more uncertainly that we locals (ha—that’s me!), making sudden stops, stalls, and unsignaled turns, or hesitating at a snail’s pace before they figure out where to go. We do the same, naturally, when we’re on vacation in unfamiliar areas, but here I feel more solidarity with the Greek supermarket cashiers who bemoan the impossibility of getting into and out of Chania and feel worn out by the increased number of “foreign” shoppers, such as Athenians. I feel honored that I’m not one of the “foreigners” in that context, at least. At last.

Frangokastello:  Castle, Sand Dunes, and Clear Sea in Southern Crete

We took our turn as tourists last Saturday, visiting Frangokastello in southern Crete. We started with the 14^th century Venetian castle, with its impressive towers and crenellated stone walls. This time, floors and stairs had been added inside one tower, which featured an art exhibit—folk art, embroidery, and photography—as well as striking views of the beach and mountains from its deep stone windows. Once we convinced the kids to conclude their exploration and ghostly games, we headed for the Orthi Ammos (Upright Sand) beach, with its huge dunes of the softest sand partly covered with greenery and merging with white cliffs in the distance. The beach features both pebbles and sand, and the sea, clear, clean, cold water. Schools of finger to foot-sized fish swim near large rocks, including some green, blue, yellow, and black striped beauties easily visible during  my first attempt at snorkeling in ages. The kids loved climbing up the immense dunes, running and rolling down them. Several families were camping, with their tents on the beach, but we left the beach just at dark to head home through the moonless night. D surprised me by stopping in the middle of nowhere, in silence and darkness, and under STARS—such stars as we hadn’t seen in years. We were all awed by a brilliant meteorite that shot over our heads for a thrilling instant. 

Living in Greece All Summer Long

We Can't Beat the Heat--or at least we couldn't

Summer vacation started in mid June for elementary school students, but it hasn't started yet for many of their parents. At home and at work, summer in Greece is no vacation. As the temperature reached at least 102 F in Chania at the beginning of last  week, and the Acropolis closed early because of the heat in Athens, I decided we'd hit the days of serious summer. For me, this means housework in the heat (since we have no air conditioning, like many Greeks), experimenting with opening the windows, hoping to let in a breath of welcome air, or closing them to keep the sun's oven outside. (When I was childless, I had no clue how much more housework children would create....) Serious summer in Greece means the stink of garbage in neighborhood dumpsters and bathroom trash cans (since Greek plumbing isn't set up to handle toilet paper). It means errands with the kids on the run in the sun. (And yes, alliteration and rhyme help distract me so I feel better.) We do have air conditioning in the car, but the sharp contrast between a cool car and a draft of hot air hits us hard as we emerge into the sun en route to the cool shelter of the supermarket, pharmacy, or produce store. The big supermarkets are the most comfortable places to be these days, aside from a movie theater; since we have no malls in Crete--at least not on our end of the island--I've lingered over grocery lists in a more leisurely fashion than usual lately. I know how lucky I am not to have to sweep streets, empty dumpsters, operate bulldozers, or build houses these days. It's the immigrants from more impoverished parts of the world that suffer most in the heat.

I've given up taking walks during my kids' 10:15 swimming lesson; even on the days when it's only in the upper 80s by then, with the hot sun beating down on me and sending everyone else indoors who possibly can be, the exercise is too excruciating a chore. If I get out between 8:00

and 8:30, it's cool enough in the shade that I actually see neighbors outside, so I don't feel so isolated in a burning world full of rusting buses and scaffold supports, discarded lumber, overgrown lots, and unfinished buildings scattered among middle-class homes, bougainvillea, potted flowers, and pastel-painted apartment buildings. I've noticed one particularly interesting two-story building in Chania that must house a paliatzees--someone who collects and sells old things, or, one might say, a junk man. Parked outside, next to the dumpsters with their typical overflow of rubbish, is the standard ancient pickup truck. Strewn about the yard, old clothes are draped over boards, unidentifiable metal objects continue their rusting process, and boxes overflow with miscellaneous junk. I suspect the second floor of the boxy building looks the same, since its unwalled balcony is also filled with junk, and I sometimes see a youngish man maneuvering between boxes there. We see and hear the paliatzees frequently in our neighborhood--he's a fixture in Greek life, with his loudspeaker monotonously announcing his presence and his false promise to "clean up everything." If only they could, at the household level and the national level!

Last Monday, when the temperature was supposed to start dropping, it actually felt hotter and more humid, with a hot wind and a discouraging cloud that resembled the noxious "nefos" of pollution mixed with hot air that hangs over Athens during much of the summer. But after a sweat-soaked, exhausting week, the temperature dropped on Tuesday, and we were surprised by a few clouds in the sky--enough, in the morning, that I was puzzled by the change in the summer light. We see so few clouds here throughout the summer that we become unaccustomed to them.

 

Obstacle Courses:  Driving in Greece 

It often appears that Greeks can't tell the different between a lane of traffic and a parking space, so that even two-lane roads in the center of Chania frequently have one lane blocked by someone who just had to run into a shop. Of course, the definition of "two-lane road," like "two-way street," is unclear here. I dread driving on one main street in Chania because, with cars parked on both sides, two more can barely squeeze by each other. And then there are single-lane roads that allow two-way traffic. Those are fun. The problem with parking is often that there is no parking lot nearby, since most apartment buildings, stores, and restaurants are built without such trivial considerations. But sometimes the trouble is that the driver (even if young and able) prefers to block a lane rather than walking more than a few steps--or that the driver sees a friend and decides to stop in the road and chat.

I've long believed that Greek drivers must be highly skilled at the arcade games that involve swerving around suddenly-appearing obstructions, because driving around here generally feels like making my way through an obstacle course: car parked on the right, blocking half of the traffic lane; motorcycle veering toward me, over the center line, on the left, helmet hung over the driver's arm; car door opening into traffic on the right; motorcycle passing me in a no passing zone on the left, with cars approaching us in the left lane; dog lying in the middle of the road; cat running onto the road on the right; car stalled at the stoplight on the right, others passing it in the left turn lane that disappears. Walled yards and parked vehicles frequently obstruct drivers' views, making it necessary to pull part way into traffic in order to see what's around the corner. Traffic laws mean little: stop signs often seem to mandate a brief pause; double lines in the center of the road never apply to motorcycles, or to anyone with a slow moving vehicle to pass; speed limits are just suggestions; no parking signs are invalidated by flashers left on, or other cars parked nearby (unless the police decide it's time to crack down). Actually, it seems that no laws apply to motorcyclists--at least, that's how they drive. Last time I repeated my claim that all Greek economic problems would be solved if fines were collected from motorcyclists for every traffic violation, D suggested that most police have too much sympathy for daredevil drivers to care to stop them, however many lives they may endanger daily.

The First Major Electrical Outage of the Summer, and Other Bad News

 Last Tuesday, I awoke to the all too familiar sound of F16s roaring through my shuttered bedroom--or so it seemed--and no electricity to turn on a lamp. (Due to budget cuts, Greek F16 pilots practice only once or twice a week now--plenty for me.) I cursed the electric company, which had failed to post the usual announcements of planned electrical outages on utility poles in our neighborhood, just posting a few in the nearby town, without any information about the area to be affected. Although 5 out of 6 Greek neighbors surveyed had no advance knowledge of the 8:00 a.m. to 12:45 p.m outage in our neighborhood, and it wasn't even mentioned on a web site dedicated to such announcements, the electric company rep I talked to insisted that if I could read Greek I'd have seen (nonexistent!) announcements. Believe me, I've had adequate opportunity to learn that "thiakopee revmatos" means electrical outage! (That, along with "eepomonee"--patience--and "tee na kahnoume"--what can we do?--is basic, essential Greek for residents here. Lately, we've also heard a lot about "kourahio"--courage.) This outage--supposedly for maintenance--was announced only in the local paper most people don't read. So there was hot water in the bathrooms, but not in the kitchen, thanks to limited solar heating; I couldn't do laundry or cook as I'd planned.

 

Plans? No wonder Greeks don't plan ahead much; they never know what they can count on--electricity, water, school, internet, trash pickup, open stores, telephone service? Again, Thursday: "The number you are calling is temporarily out of service"--kindly translated into English for befuddled foreigners who actually expect phones to work when there are no electrical storms and bills are paid. I tried to explain to my friend that her home phone wasn't working, but her cell phone connection was interrupted before I could finish my sentence. Friday, our neighborhood's water supply was cut off, albeit only for an hour or two this time (unlike the days without it when I'd just brought home my first newborn child). This usually occurs courtesy of bulldozer operators who dig up water lines. And "due to serious problems in the power supply" at one of my favorite Greek metereological sites, Poseidon, that system has been down for a week or two. We've never had electrical outages for weeks, so I wonder if it's a matter of government funding disappearing. 

With one third to one half of all Greek income tax returns due to be filed last Monday, the government once again extended the deadline; after all, it only recently sent out statements for a real estate tax from 2009, so how could it be ready for a new onslaught of 1.8 million returns? The government claims that it will decrease bureaucracy and red tape, but so far we see extra paperwork for physicians who struggle with faulty new computer systems for prescription drugs, professors required to file research project reports with enough accounting to require a CPA, and taxpayers who are expected to save, add up, and submit all receipts for groceries, gasoline, restaurant meals, children's activities, and most other purchases all year long! No, no red tape or bureaucracy around here.... The goal is obviously to combat tax evasion and wasteful and illegal spending, but it certainly doesn't involve decreased bureaucracy. Meanwhile, we continue to suffer shortages of common medications. The Human Rights Watch recently published a report about the mistreatment of, and attacks on, many immigrants in Greece. The Council of Europe will send an investigator to check on alleged links between the neo-fascist Golden Dawn party and the police, and it is reported that half of the police voted for that neo-Nazi party. I just hope the Council of Europe will also acknowledge that Greece needs more help dealing with the large number of immigrants flooding into Europe across its borders.

As Nikos Konstandaras argues in Kathemerini newspaper's online English edition, "The government is struggling to find ways of cutting another 11.6 billion euros from the budget without triggering a revolt and our partners [the troika of Greece's lenders] are waiting for the magic number before releasing the next tranche [loan installment]. We forget that which should have been our priority: We need to make not only the state but the whole country more functional.... As long as citizens don’t see better services, their sacrifices are in vain. As long as they don’t see a more efficient state -- that collects taxes from all and punishes those who break laws -- the sense of injustice will grow" ("Make the state work first"). Hear, hear! But does anyone here hear? The news is not encouraging, as many expect additional job, salary, pension, and benefit cuts, even as the government says it will add no new austerity measures until next year--that is, none they didn't already pledge to enact in 2012. With no signs of sensitivity or sense from the troika, there's little hope of economic growth. Most Greeks want to renegotiate the bailout agreement, but the troika does not. 

But Ah! Those Summer Nights!

In spite of all the problems, Chania is one of the more popular tourist destinations in Greece these weeks, as the two cruise ships anchored just outside the Old Port confirmed last week. This is particularly obvious as the city cools off in the evening, and many apparently prosperous locals emerge from hiding to join the tourists who appear to be more tolerant of the heat. Venturing into the Old Port area on a weekend night with our children, we passed mime statues and immigrants selling junk for kids, threaded our way through crowds, and ran into two sets of friends. Seeking a more contained spot for the children on a Sunday night, we met with friends at the equally crowded MegaPlace, with its movie theater, bowling, cafes, and exciting play place (bouncing contraptions, kiddie pay rides, and playground). We received no more invitations to major events, but a hairdresser reported that she was busy preparing others for the weddings and baptisms that continue during Greek summer weekends, and we passed extended lines of cars parked on both sides of the road around 11:00 p.m. near a reception center in the middle of nowhere. Which is where we were, on the way back from a wonderful beach.

Some parents here take their kids to the beach daily. Others dislike sand and dread the effort involved in preparing young children and all their gear, keeping them safe in the sea and sand, and dealing with the aftermath of sandy, salty people, bathing suits, towels, and toys; these avoid the beach as much as possible. Then there are those in between, like us. When we can, D and I sneak off to the beach without the kids, one at a time, for a quick morning swim without all the hassle. But at least once a week we feel obligated to endure the whole exhausting production, which for me includes packing a picnic supper to eat on our beach blanket. Don't get me wrong: I know I am extremely privileged to live closer than I ever expected to some of the most beautiful spots in the world, and to have the ability and means to take the time, now and then, to enjoy them. I love relaxing on the beach as evening falls, and I do enjoy my swim and my view of the sea, the surrounding landscape, and my children's pure happiness as they frolic in and out of the water, dig in the sand, and begin to really swim in the sea. I appreciate the amazing views and the (sometimes) clear aquamarine waters. It's the preparation and especially the aftermath I find exhausting, especially when it ends around 1:30 a.m., as it did for me last weekend after a trip to a beach an hour away, on the western edge of Crete: Falasarna.

Substituting the catchier tunes of a Sesame Street CD for whining and are-we-there-yet complaints, passing gas stations charging as much as 1.84 euros per liter of their cheapest gas (up from a low of 1.68 two weeks ago in Chania), sinking into a deep pothole that extended right across the single-lane road through a village, we arrived at Falasarna. Each time I emerge from the village onto the road high above a valley dotted with greenhouses, I'm struck anew by the view of towering hills, dramatic cliffs, and wide-open sea. From several long, sandy beaches, we choose one with a natural shallow sea pool nearly surrounded by boulders. At times, that western sea is churned up by waves reminiscent of the Atlantic Ocean and the Delaware beaches of my childhood, but last weekend we could clearly see sand, seaweed, and new rocks on the bottom through its calm waters. While our daughter showed off her new endurance swimming abilities with D, my son and I dug a large pool and a wall to defend it against the sea's wavelets, bringing back nostalgic memories of my own childish battles against the Atlantic's greater onslaughts. As the sun lowered into the sea, spreading its sweet evening light on faces, water, and boulders with tidepools full of sea salt useful for our boiled eggs, we enjoyed our picnic on the beach. We didn't finish until after some campers had lit fires and torches near their tents under the trees, and I'd gazed long at the cliffs silhouetted against the afterglow. But my romantic appreciation was disturbed by concern about campfires and torches in such a wind, which so often spreads destructive wildfires across Greece in the summer heat.

On our way home, as the children fell asleep in the backseat, D and I listened to calls from Chicago, Brisbane, and Norway on a radio show for Greeks around the world. The host seemed ready to cut off the callers before they'd finished their nostalgic comments. I'd need to be much more concise than I have been to avoid the same. My own nostalgia is a complex mix: nostalgia for the privileged enclaves of America where I used to live, the types of places where gunmen now shoot crowds of innocent civilians as they used to do only in the urban slums that scared me, and premature nostalgia for the Greece I long to leave but know I'd miss. Greeks are often angry, and they can act crazy, but even the anarchists here warn people to leave buildings if they're going to burn them, and even the fascists beat people up rather than shooting them. In the aftermath of the latest horrifying shooting in Colorado, I wonder why 45% of American homes contain guns (according to a 2011 Gallup poll). I wonder if the U. S. A. is a safe place to take my children, and whether anyone will take meaningful action to make it a safer place for everyone's children. Would my kids be better off here in Greece, even with the economy in shambles, the infrastructure so faulty, the government and its services so inefficient, the repeated possibility of Greece leaving the euro zone, and the prime minister telling Bill Clinton the situation here now is comparable to the American Great Depression of the 1930s?