What’s Up in Greece, Aug 16? tagged: , ,

What’s Up in Greece, Aug 16?

Posted by in Very Mix

Not much is Up in Greece these days and I wish I would have been splish-splashing at an island beach instead of being in the city. The government has turned its eyes to the meeting of German Chancellor Angela Merkel with French president Nicholas Sarkozy in the afternoon. However officially the Euro-bond won’t be on the agenda of the talks. So the debt-ridden country will still have to wait for a while, until the EU-summit decisions of July 21st will start materialize.

At the same time, as these days are the peak of the summer vacations for citizens and politicians alike, there are not so many news, no new austerity measures, not mass anger. Of course, anger and frustration are there, hidden and slowly boiling in the hearts and minds of people, and three governing party PASOK politicians, including one minister, were target of verbal attacks by citizens.

Prime Minister George Papandreou sent to citizens a ‘message of optimism’ underlining the “the efforts of Greeks bring results” – he didn’t elaborate to whom the bell tings though…

 Mass media feed their readers and hearers get fed with the successes of the Financial Crimes Units combating tax evasion. Doctors and academics, a super market owner, a hairdresser and even an astrologer were caught to have bank savings of over 70 millions euro in total but who were unable to declare where the money came from. That’s a big blow especially for the astrologer, who could not foresee the tax officers approaching his bank accounts…

Greece’s civil servants are supposed to start working 40 hours per week (instead of 37,5) as of today. From what I hear in the media, the new working hours are not full applying yet, as apparently there is not official directive to the all departments in the public sector.

160 Greeks lost their life by drowning while swimming this summer. This is the second cause of death nationwide; first cause are traffic accidents.

The price for a  package of French coffee (250 gr) went up 0.33 euro cents within two weeks in my local supermarket. From €4.12… there it exploded to €4.45 – The smart director was on leave so I couldn’t ask the reason for this unbelievable price hike. I’ll keep it in mind for the next visit.

Enjoy the summer as much as you can. Winter will be economically hard, and September is expected to be hot too, when unionists will take war positions again.

If the no-news series contintue, I ‘m afraid I will have to post about my vacation impressions and my gardening experiences of this summer. I can’t post about Greek recipes as I preferably cook … Italian.

 Summer indolence – Mama Cat in Pilion