A shame

One of the truths of summer is fires. That can be said of many
countries, but in Greece there are an unfortunate number started on
purpose, and we're not talking controlled burns. Land that is
considered forest can't be built upon. So, people burn said forest so
building can take place later on. A fabulous system, don't you
think? I get so mad every time I see a fire here, some people just
have no respect for their surroundings or the environment.

The pictures above represent two different fires within 5 days. The
first pics are taken from my balcony. The fire which generated this
smoke was many miles away, but with the high winds the smoke carried
over towards us. I first thought a sandstorm had blown up from Africa
(it does happen), but realized we had North winds blowing so was
confused. I had called Vasilis, out on his bike ride, to alert him in
case he wanted to be picked up. Turns out he was relatively near the
fires whose smoke I was seeing. Fortunately it wasn't affecting him,
so didn't need rescuing.

The last two photos were near a friend's house, an area which had
experienced a much larger fire a couple months ago. The picture I
took was at the beginning of the fire - when we returned a couple hours
later it had swept over a decent-sized area, sadly burning up a local man's
beehives perched on the hill to the right of the photos. I didn't
take the "after" picture, as the firefighters were just leaving the
area and I was a little shy about snapping shots.

Little of this and that

Apologies to start - for the 7 of you that read this (and that's aiming a bit high, I'm sure). I know postings have been rare, and maybe even rarely interesting at that. With it being summertime, and the damnable heat keeping my activities limited, my observations about life here have diminished a bit. Also, I am nearing on 2 years in sunny Greece, so less and less jumps out at me as different. I have a couple different topics for your perusing pleasure today.

Different levels of Greekness

It's truly hard to determine what makes a person Greek, in the eyes of the Greeks. At one point in time, it merely took being educated in the Greek way to be considered a citizen. Although certainly harder than that to gain citizenship, I understand that many people still believe that's what makes you Greek.

For those of us with Greek ancestry, which I am simply defining as having ancestors who came from Greece, there seem to be different levels to which Greek society looks at us. For instance Greek-Americans (or Greek-Australians or any other country), who are 100% or even 50% Greek heritage and born/raised elsewhere, don't seem to be deemed fully Greek. Fairly conversant in Greek upon their arrival here (and I am speaking of those who have relocated to Greece) and definitely more able to assimilate than I was (being nearly Greekless in vocabulary), they aren't quite Greek. I envied them, already familiar with language and customs that I had yet to learn, but they may have not necessarily fit right into mainstream Greek society. I can't speak to outright social distancing or mistreatment, I just know they are viewed differently by home grown Greeks.

Then there's me. Technically a quarter Greek (my paternal Grandfather was 1st generation Greek-American), I can visually pass as Greek much of the time (assuming I am not wearing my Teva's) but am really quite American. I don't usually identify as Greek-American here, since that may come with assumptions of my knowledge of aforementioned language and customs. However, when I say that I am a bit Greek and explain further, the response is typically "then you are Greek!." As delighted I may be with this pronouncement, I feel a bit of a poser saying it myself. But I have been proclaimed "Greek" quicker than those who have a stronger claim to "greekness" than I do. I am sure they are just being nice to me, since I am making no claims myself and no one really thinks I am fully Greek, but you see the variation in treatment.

Having said all of that, I had a strange encounter with a fellow American (who is 0% Greek) during the Inauguration last Fall. I had volunteered to help out at a party for the Inauguration and while watching the ceremony, one of the other volunteers was telling me and another that we didn't understand what a long hard road it was (presumably for Democrats) to get to that big day. Since we were all Democrats there, I wasn't sure why she was considering herself part of some other group, why I personally wouldn't understand this long journey. I asked her what she meant and she responded, "well, you're Greek-American". I cleared her up on that point, but didn't seek clarity for myself. Why would a Greek-American (assumedly raised in the States) would understand any less than a non-Greek American. She was already on my nerves, and asking for an explanation wouldn't have helped. ;-) Evidently Greek-Americans just can't win, not falling completely in either camp.

Slug Bug vs. Slug the Priest

For whatever reason today, as we were driving down the road, I remembered playing the Slug Bug game as a kid. You know, where you are the first to spot a VW Bug on the road (usually on long road trips, but really can be played anytime) and you slug the person next to you, claiming "slug bug!".

I told Vasilis about this game, wondering if they had something similar. They did, but it was when you spot an Orthodox priest (not like there are any others here). And no, they didn't call it slug the priest. In this essentially one religion country, where priests are abundant and obvious in their long black frocks, I can see kids bruising each other playing this game!