s lie so thick on

The antiquities are so thick on the ground in Athens, people are literally tripping over them:

Heavy rainfall in Athens has brought an unexpected find: an ancient marble statue which had been buried in a ditch near the capital, Greek archaeologists said Monday.

The 1.8-metre (5.9-foot) tall marble torso of a young man was accidentally discovered Friday by a passer-by who alerted authorities, said Yiorgos Steinhauer, director for Athens classical antiquities at the Greek culture ministry.

The statue, thought to represent Apollo, may have been uncovered at nearby construction site and tossed into the ditch to avoid archaeologists from stopping the work.

This week Yad Vashem will honor a Greek woman who sheltered a family of six from the Nazis. In 1944, Hariklia Sayanou took in a Jewish mother and five children that she barely knew.

In 1944, just one year before the end of the war, the Nazis took away Ettinger's father, Menahaem Akou. He and the others all perished at Auschwitz in Germany.

But six in the picture survived.

That's because Sayanou, a wealthy widow who had befriended Ettinger's aunt, offered to take in Ettinger's mother and her children — four girls and a boy — in a small room on her garden grounds in a town near Athens. Ettinger assumes Sayanou, who was a stranger, told others that she was related to Ettinger's family.

Then just a little blonde 7-year-old known as Voula Akou, Ettinger tends to remember only in fragments. The fruit trees she used to play with in the yard. The green peas she ate every day. Or the Sign of the Cross that her mother forced her to do at church, lest anyone suspect the family was Jewish.

As for Sayanou's sacrifices, Ettinger and her family must perpetually wonder: Why?

"We'll never understand what she risked to do what she did," said Mark Ettinger, Evelyn's son, who lives in Boston. "If you think of your daily life, if you had to risk your life every single day for a few years, would you do it?"

"She had to be one of those special souls," Evelyn Ettinger concluded. "The ethical fiber of her being must have been stronger than anyone else. She must have known she could have made a difference, and she did. That's what lacked during the Holocaust. The Germans never could have done it without collaboration."

Yeah, That's Gonna Work

Unless you have been to Athens, it is difficult to imagine the happy anarchy that rules the streets of the capital. I don't know how, but despite a near infinite number of cars using a finite amount of pavement it works (maybe not well, but it works). (Though, for God's sake, if you are American, do not attempt to drive into the city Friday late afternoon. Your years of experience of driving in Detroit, Boston and Chicago count for nothing. Also, it will push your marriage right to the edge)

In an attempt to impose order, Athens officials are planning to again introduce pay parking in the city center.

A pilot program will be put into effect in September, in the so-called historic center — a triangular area delineated by Stadiou, Athinas and Ermou streets — of Plaka and Psyrri, while municipal officials, somewhat optimistically, think the full system could be operational a month later in the densely populated districts of Kypseli and Pangrati.

If the system finally takes off, motorists will have to purchase smart cards that will be on sale at kiosks, allowing them a certain amount of parking time. They will then activate the countdown by sending a text message to municipal officials. The system will be electronically monitored by the municipal police.

[ . . . ]

As a result, most of the day it is well-nigh impossible to find legitimate parking on the streets, while many car owners double park or leave their vehicles on pavements, pedestrian streets, bus lanes or street corners. Municipal officials say an estimated 22,000 motorists park their cars illegally in the city center between 10 a.m. and noon every day.

Paying for the Games

A study by Standard & Poor's assessed the prospects of the cities vieing for the 2012 Summer Games, and concluded that only the largest (New York, Paris and London) could do without difficulties. The burden on smaller cities, like Madrid, is just too large. S & P studied the post-Olympic economies of Sydney and Barcelona, and concluded that a boost in tourism is an important factor in the success of a given Games, but that it is not certain:

The report also stressed that the success of an Olympic financing plan could not be tallied until after the Games. A big reason the 1992 Olympics in Barcelona are considered a boon was not just the city's ability to stick to a strict budget, but also because of a huge increase in tourism afterward.

The report says that the number of tourists doubled between 1991 and 2000, when Barcelona became the third-most-visited city in Europe behind Paris and London.

In contrast, the report said that Sydney had not enjoyed an increase in tourism since the 2000 Olympics and spends $34 million a year to operate the facilities built for the Olympics, which have been largely underused since then.

The Kathimerini reports that the economic condition in Greece is worsening, and that there has been little post-Games boost, and that optimism for one in 2005 is declining.

By contrast, there is a significant drop in the Business Expectations Index in capital goods, to 101.3 in December from 106.2 in November, as a result of projections of low sales and a rise in inventory.

The survey shows that the high expectations in the runup to the Athens Olympics have been partly deflated and that most businesses do not believe in a post-Olympic boom.

This is in line with European Union forecasts of lower growth but contrasts with the government's optimistic view, expressed in the 2005 budget, that growth will actually accelerate in 2005, to 3.9 percent.

Thanks for Making the US Look Stupid

The FCC investigation- sparked by a total of nine complaints - of lewdness in the Opening ceremonies is sparking worldwide derision.

GIANNA ANGELOPOULOS-DASKALAKI:

Our Games’ positive first impression was created by the opening ceremonies. Before 72,000 spectators in the open-air stadium, lighted by pyrotechnics, with performers and props flying through the air on wires and moving en masse across the infield, the ceremonies presented the Greek origins of democracy, philosophy, theater, sport and the Olympic Games. In this context, we represented the Greek sculpture people see in museums, realistic human beings as God made them. We also showed a couple enjoying their love of the Greek sea and each other. And we told the history of Eros, the god of love. Turning love, yearning and desire into a deity is an important part of our contribution to civilization.

Far from being indecent, the opening ceremonies were beautiful, enlightening, uplifting and enjoyable. There was no cause for shame or complaint. As Americans surely are aware, there is great hostility in the world today to cultural domination in which a single value system created elsewhere diminishes and degrades local cultures. There is also a vast and violent global culture war raging between the forces of modernism and fundamentalism, a battle whose outcome cannot be known. In this context, it is astonishingly unwise for an agency of the U.S. government to engage in an investigation that could label a presentation of the Greek origins of civilization as unfit for television viewing.

200 million Americans watched the Olympics, and only nine were offended enough to to fire off a letter. By all means, let's have a federal investigation. Thank God these nine mental sideshows are seemingly unaware that the Olympics are the recreation of an ancient pagan religious celebration that included days of debauchery.

The European Union is claiming that Greece's budget deficit will exceed that mandated limit again this year, and the Finance Commissioner for the EU is threatening action:

EU Finance Commissioner Joaquin Almunia is to recommend austerity measures for Greece that must be approved by the EU finance ministers.

Never since the euro came into circulation in 2002 has the EU gone so far in taking legal steps against a violator of the currency's stability rules.

In 2003, it took on France and Germany for running excessive budget gaps. However, the two countries resisted, rallying a majority of EU nations around a declaration saying Paris and Berlin will get their deficits under 3 percent of GDP by 2005.

A Guide to Hellas

I posted this months ago on the old, much-lamented Hellenophile. It is a good enough link to use as the first post for the Hellenophile redux.

The best web guide to Greece that I have found is Elizabeth Boleman-Herring's A Thinking Person's Guide to Greece. Boleman-Herring is a travel writer and photographer who has been traveling to or living in Greece for forty years. If you are even considering a trip to Greece, visit this site and download the PDFs immediately. The site is more informative and less mercenary than Matt Barrett's site.

She show that it is possible to both love Greece and be clear-eyed about the short-comings the nation:

What is Athens like? I'm often asked this question, as I've made Athens my home, on and off, since I was nine years old, and I love it like no other place on earth. But Athens, unlike Paris, is not always a city easy to love. Almost four million people live there now (sometimes, I think 99 percent of them are smokers) in a forest of echoing concrete apartment blocks ringed on three sides by mountains: a prescription for smog, which is precisely what builds up overhead during the heat of high summer, which can get intense.

Even if you are not actively planning a trip, her reading suggestions alone are worth the time to download the PDF files.