Hellas futebol

[Josef Vierine]

Faliro, how do you and Greeks in general feel about USA? I notice USA has done some intervention in Greece in the 20th century. How do Greeks feel about that in general?

Well there are millions of American Greeks. They of course love America.

Then you have Greeks from Greece.. About half of those are leftists.. They despise America. They believe (perhaps correctly) that the USA supported the Greek Junta. They hate capitalism/commercialisation and see the US as the spearhead of this.  The other half.. the capitalist Greeks don't mind the US and let US culture envelope them - perhaps more so than any European nation besides the UK.

Personally I like America. I like people who love their country. When I visited the US - people were good to me. I like what the US stands for. Would like to see Greece have a leader like Trump/Bolsonaro - just to see the left explode.

Enjoy a typical Greek advert:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ispFPEY3n4Q

I guess Greece is lucky not to stand in the way of American geopolitical interests right now. Ask Serbs about the USA as a no.1 invader, self-proclaimed world policeman and no.1 war-mongerer, supposedly on a war against terrorism at home but supporting it elsewhere and turning countries into piles of dust.

Well the US and UK decided half of Cyprus would be Turkish and it happened. The US decided ancient Serbian lands would also be Sunni owned and it was done.. What do the Greeks and Serbs do? The Greeks elect a communist called Tsipras who goes to Turkey to get honorary degrees from meaningless Turkish universities and builds a mega mosque in downtown Athens. The former 'conservative' New Democracy foreign minister states Islam is a beautiful religion for women especially..    The Serbian minister sings Turkish songs to Erdogan in what can only be seen as an attempt to seduce him.. Greek mainstream TV has wall to wall Sunni Turkish soap operas - in Turkish! Why should the US support Greece or Serbia when the people's themselves elect Ottoman appeasers and clearly don't respect their own ancient cultures? Every time a Jew rules a hollywood studio - you get tonnes of films educating the world on jewish culture and history. Spyros Panagiotis Skouras, a Greek - born in Greece - who came to the US when he was 10 - is the president of 20th Century Fox studios from 1942 to 1962 and chairman of 20th Century Fox after. He produces some of the biggest Hollywood films ever made while president of Fox - he invented the blockbuster movie - Don't Bother to Knock, The Seven Year Itch, The Hustler, The King and I, Gentlemen Prefer Blondes, Cleopatra and The Robe...  discovered Marilyn Monroe etc.. Guess how many films he produced that even mentioned anything Greek? 0. Why should an American respect a person who does not even respect their own culture? Now the Serbs.. ok - they have more cause for grief.. but the Greeks.. they don't respect themselves.. that is why no one else does.

That is great information about modern Greece.   

You call Tsipras a communist? In here we didn't have any more that perception, well, maybe perhaps durante Varoufakis period, but not now. Perhaps more as an social-democrat aligned with the EU.
And that subservience to Turkey? You had more than 300 years of Otoman dominance. I had always wandered - and I do not want to offend- that more than 300 years of Ottoman domination in Greece didn't have a effect in the greek culture?
I think that most of the Europeans still had in mind the romantic perception of the ancient Greek, the resplendent Pericles' Athens, the Spartan imaginary or the Alexander the Great tales and didn't know almost nothing of the modern Greece.

Greece where only talked when had that problem with the bailout, and the image was not quite good. Some portuguese journalists called you lazy while others only stressed the violence in the street.
I know a little bit of ancient greek (quite difficult tongue) and quite well (or maybe no that well) the history of Ancient Greece, but I am (and I think we Europeans) are completely ignorant about Modern Greece and his contemporaries problems.

This is a very interesting post, so I will answer each point.

Tsipras is a communist, but communist is a general term. Specifically Tsipras is a progressive Trotskyist like most northern Greeks with dubious heritage. I believe parts of his family 100 years ago were actually Albanian. Now Trotskyists make up most of his party - Syriza. How I classify them is an international communists. For example - you have isolationist communists - like the former Albanian state, North Korea, Cuba etc. Then you have international communists - like the PT party that ruled Brazil for so many years. Like Tsipras, Dilma was basically an anti police, crypto-anarchist terrorist in her youth. Tsipras -  there was even a picture of him rioting against the police as a youth.  As they matured (they are both from wealthy parents) - they evolved into Trotskyists. Dilma and Lula made the Brazilian taxpayer fund African, Venezuelan and Cuban infrastructure for years as per their internationalist ethos. Tsipras believes the very idea of national borders is 'silly' and his first act as Greek PM was to lay flowers at the graves of Greek communists killed in the Greek Civil War. Tsipras like Dilma believes nationhood and patriotism are fascist ideals. Varoufakis is very similar too. Multi millionaire parents and a Trotskyist internationalist outlook.

Now to the second point. Ottoman subservience. Ottoman subservience is only partaken in Greece by leftists, liberals and generally speaking - those of convoluted and fractured balkan ancestry who became Greeks rather than being descended from Greeks during the Greek territorial expansions in the 20th century. The right, royalists, most of the Peloponnese and Crete and many of the capitalist Greeks despise Turkey and their culture. The media in Greece - in its totality is left wing. Every single channel. There is no such thing as a American FOX type of channel in Greece. So the Greek media feed pro Turkish programmes 24/7. They try and push Greece towards the east even though Greeks are exceptionally Christian and genetically - exceptionally homogeneous to their region with very little in common with Turks. That is why whenever they dig up ancient Greek bones and test the DNA - the closest living relatives to these ancient bones are usually the people down the road from where the bones were found. It is the same in Italy. When you look a Turkish DNA - it is like a cloud atlas rainbow. Far eastern, middle eastern, Armenian, Greek - bits of slav - central asian. They are a cocktail that reflects their journey across Eurasia from China and they look it and act like it. Turks were eternal nomads - living in tents, drinking horses milk - many still do in the countryside there. Many of Anatolia's traditional food industries (olives, figs, fishing - where and what to fish) died when the Greeks were expelled in the 1920s. Turks even invited Greeks back in the 1930s to tend to the olive groves and agriculture because the Turks had never worked the land since they arrived in Anatolia. Greeks under the Ottomans were the farmers, fisherman, bandits and business people since the Ottomans arrived. The Ottomans were more concerned with Allah, the Sultan and the military. Only the Ottoman high classes lived it up and they were exceptionally few. Turkey still looks to expand. That is why they control large chunks of Syria now. They are a people of conquest. You can't turn that off.

The Greeks are descendants of the ancient Greeks genetically, linguistically and culturally. The Byzantines damaged and preserved that legacy. They damaged the continuity by force-feeding Christianity to Greeks - which is a type of communism - and persecuting all Greeks who still follwoed the ancient Olympian religion. Greeks became 'Christians' first and Greeks second or at least that is what the Byzantine rulers wanted. There were Byzantine thinkers who tried to return the Greek peoples to the Olympian religion, most markedly Gemistus Pletho. The Byzantine legacy is the strong Christian and anti paganism that still runs through Greece - although many Greeks are now returning to the Olympian religion - despite the Greek Government not allowing it to have official status.

When the Ottomans took over - instead of wiping Greeks off the face of the earth like they did with other peoples they conquered - they offered the Greeks they did not sell into slavery a stark choice. Convert to Islam and pay virtually no tax - or stay Greek - be heavily taxed - could have your children stolen for the Devshirme and expect massacres and persecution. Many many Greeks including the upper Byzantine classes picked the first option. Behind many Turkish Asiatic eyes.. there lies many a Greek who converted to Islam and became Turkish as a result and is now lost in the Turkish soup. Now the few Greeks that did not convert to Islam, that is what is left of the ancient Greeks and they now make up modern Greece - and indeed that is romantic - that Greeks even exist today.. Ottoman times were desperate for Greeks. However, most refused to learn Turkish, they kept their traditions, their bloodlines, were often massacred - but enough survived to tell the story. Luckily the Turks also left certain regions of Greece under self rule so many areas of Greece never even had to meet a turk. The region my ancestors came from - despite experiencing a nasty massacre from the Turks in the 1700 - were allowed to live with very little Turkish interference under the ottoman Empire and even had free trade deals with Constantinople which made a fair few in the region very rich. Modern Greek communists despise this idea of Greeks surviving the Ottomans or even surviving the unsuccessful slavic invasions during the central point of the Byzantine Empire. Greek communists tend to believe in one global nation. That is why they all love the EU. Any Greek proud of their ancient heritage is seen as a 'fascist' and laughed at. Ancestor worship is laughed at by Greek communists. During the Greek civil war - the Greek communists wished to join Greece to the Soviet Union and dissolve any links anyone had with their pasts! 

Now your final part. Greece is correctly mocked by other Europeans because Greeks themselves do not promote, protect or enhance their own culture enough and Europeans cannot be blamed for going for the weakness. Greeks have never been loved by most Europeans. Most Europeans could never figure Greeks out. Are they ancient Greeks? Are they a completely modern people who have no connection to their pasts (and just happen to speak Greek) as some now debunked pseudo victorian anthropologists such as Jakob Philipp Fallmerayer insidiously claimed?

The sad truth? The Greeks did not kill the communists after the civil war or even expel them. They were allowed to return home and breed and now their grandchildren rule the country. To make matters worse - the capitalists - the royalist Greeks - the highly educated.. they fled Greece the last 100 years for greener pastures and now live in Canada, US, Aus, France, Germany, Brazil etc causing terminal brain drain to Greece. If the communists had won the civil war - they would have massacred their opponents. They were massacring Greeks during the actual civil war - what they would have done afterwards had they won is not worth contemplating. The communists went home after the civil war. Their children all became teachers, govt funded workers. Now they rule. Why do you think Greeks are the only Europeans allowed to riot at a football game - fight for hours, burn and attack others - and yet no one is arrested? It is because the Greek police are seen as fascists since the Junta and not one of them is allowed to arrest anyone! Rioting by the Greek left is seen as an expression against capitalism. Even the Greek Govt communist sports minister stated hooligans are violent in Greece because of a broken capitalist society as opposed to them being actual criminals - he states they are victims. That is why anarchists rule central athens - police can't even patrol in Exarcheia! 

Greeks survived the Persians, the Romans, the Slavs, the crusaders, the Franks, the Ottomans...the Nazis, however perhaps the nemesis of the Greeks will be pseudo communism. Greeks could survive anything - however they have struggled to survive a parasitical Trotskyist doctrine where one Greek states to another Greek that Greeks actually don't exist in the first place.. That could be the fatal blow to a people that are so essential to the history of the West but then again - was Hellas ever just a beautiful memory that can never die? Even if I am the last one who believes in Hellas - I make it real..

Thank you for your reply. 

You explain it very well  . I understand the Tsipras point (and I know that famous picture of Tsipras rioting). Here, in Portugal, we had a party similar to Syriza (and supports Syriza, of course), called Bloco de Esquerda (Left Bloc), which is a amalgam of Trotskyist parties that were melted around 1999. Curiously, we had an old Communist Party, a relic, (called PCP: Portuguese Communist Party) that still had some power in the Portuguese democracy. It links on that you called isolationist communists. Kind of Soviet Stalinist and patriotical too. One of the their slogans are:  one patriotical policy and of left (some like that).

That second point is very interesting. Your report suggests a highly fractured society and a Greece surrounded by enemies. Turks in the East, Balkanians in the North or West. And that Anatolian narrative fits well with the history of Greece. People ignored that in the ancient times, until 1453, at least, all the so called Asia Minor were Greek.

The third point, for me, is very curious. The conversion of the East to Cristianism is paradoxical. The proto-Christianity had some strong spots (Damascus, Antioch, Corinth, etc), and without the Greek koiné, in my point of view, there will no be Christianity as we know; but, in the other hand, even after the famous edict of Milan by Constantine and Licinius, wee see a strong resistance (I remember Alexandria (the case of Hipatia); or even the closure of the School of Athens by Justinian. Or, as you said, Gemistus Pletho, but that is far away the period that I am talking. I don't know that some people rejects the Byzantine heritage, I had always think, and especially for the Justinian period and later, that the Greeks were proud of their Byzantine heritage. But well, I am glad that some of you are returning to the Olympians.

The fourth point is a classic of emperorship command. Here, in the Iberian Peninsula, we had a similar approach when Tariq defeated the Visigoths. Most of the Visigothic upper classes converted to Islam instead of paying taxes. And we had a special group called Moçárabes, (Mozarabs) that were people that continuing to follow the Roman Catholic rite, but adopted Arabic costumes and speak Arabic too. And for long years, before the Crusades, we lived peacefully with the Arabs, and even had some autonomy - like the region your heritage lived.

You said that "Greeks have never been loved by most Europeans." For now, I agree, but in the XIX century and XX century, perhaps no. Especially in the XIX century, because of the Philhellenism, you had many admirers (I remember that even Lord Byron joined you in  independence war). But you are right as some of the intellectuals despise you. It was a king of love/hate relationship. Jakob Philipp Fallmerayer was a fraud, as you well know. In the other hand, people who loved History (and unfortunately nowadays are few) connect you with the ancient Greeks. I remember a Portuguese politician who died recently, by the time of the peak of the crisis of your bailout, that said that Greece must be saved because it was there that Democracy was born.

The penultimate point: well that resumes the whole thing. A highly divided society. I had almost forgot the Junta, but your 20 th Century was highly dramatic. The Second World War and immediately the Civil War. Problems with Cyprus, etc. I think that one of your problems are that you are always on the maximum or the minimum. From total oppression to total anarchy. That story that the Police had no powers at all is almost surrealistic - and I am not a great fan of military forces. But as for the EU (I am pro-European but I defend the complete autonomy of the members and no interference of the European Commission in the internal affairs), there was no improvement after the admission in the EU? Here in Portugal it was almost the night for the day. We had a corporatist authoritarian regime (similar to Mussolini's fascism) for more than 40 years, and after the establishment of the democracy in 1974 and admission of Portugal in the EU in 1986, we had a deep improvement of our life conditions.

Your final statement is very true. The Greeks survived everything and everyone. Why not now? I believe that will be some reaction. Modern Greece is a country relatively recent country and like you there will be some persons that love Hellas and that are not happy with the recent developments... One final question: and about Macedonia? I heard that Tsipras had made a deal with the Macedonians because of the question of the North of Macedonia? But I heard that are some opposition in Greece to that deal (and that proofs that not all Greeks are "sleeping").



 

[Faliro]

Thank you for your reply. 

You explain it very well  . I understand the Tsipras point (and I know that famous picture of Tsipras rioting). Here, in Portugal, we had a party similar to Syriza (and supports Syriza, of course), called Bloco de Esquerda (Left Bloc), which is a amalgam of Trotskyist parties that were melted around 1999. Curiously, we had an old Communist Party, a relic, (called PCP: Portuguese Communist Party) that still had some power in the Portuguese democracy. It links on that you called isolationist communists. Kind of Soviet Stalinist and patriotical too. One of the their slogans are:  one patriotical policy and of left (some like that).

That second point is very interesting. Your report suggests a highly fractured society and a Greece surrounded by enemies. Turks in the East, Balkanians in the North or West. And that Anatolian narrative fits well with the history of Greece. People ignored that in the ancient times, until 1453, at least, all the so called Asia Minor were Greek.

The third point, for me, is very curious. The conversion of the East to Cristianism is paradoxical. The proto-Christianity had some strong spots (Damascus, Antioch, Corinth, etc), and without the Greek koiné, in my point of view, there will no be Christianity as we know; but, in the other hand, even after the famous edict of Milan by Constantine and Licinius, wee see a strong resistance (I remember Alexandria (the case of Hipatia); or even the closure of the School of Athens by Justinian. Or, as you said, Gemistus Pletho, but that is far away the period that I am talking. I don't know that some people rejects the Byzantine heritage, I had always think, and especially for the Justinian period and later, that the Greeks were proud of their Byzantine heritage. But well, I am glad that some of you are returning to the Olympians.

The fourth point is a classic of emperorship command. Here, in the Iberian Peninsula, we had a similar approach when Tariq defeated the Visigoths. Most of the Visigothic upper classes converted to Islam instead of paying taxes. And we had a special group called Moçárabes, (Mozarabs) that were people that continuing to follow the Roman Catholic rite, but adopted Arabic costumes and speak Arabic too. And for long years, before the Crusades, we lived peacefully with the Arabs, and even had some autonomy - like the region your heritage lived.

You said that "Greeks have never been loved by most Europeans." For now, I agree, but in the XIX century and XX century, perhaps no. Especially in the XIX century, because of the Philhellenism, you had many admirers (I remember that even Lord Byron joined you in  independence war). But you are right as some of the intellectuals despise you. It was a king of love/hate relationship. Jakob Philipp Fallmerayer was a fraud, as you well know. In the other hand, people who loved History (and unfortunately nowadays are few) connect you with the ancient Greeks. I remember a Portuguese politician who died recently, by the time of the peak of the crisis of your bailout, that said that Greece must be saved because it was there that Democracy was born.

The penultimate point: well that resumes the whole thing. A highly divided society. I had almost forgot the Junta, but your 20 th Century was highly dramatic. The Second World War and immediately the Civil War. Problems with Cyprus, etc. I think that one of your problems are that you are always on the maximum or the minimum. From total oppression to total anarchy. That story that the Police had no powers at all is almost surrealistic - and I am not a great fan of military forces. But as for the EU (I am pro-European but I defend the complete autonomy of the members and no interference of the European Commission in the internal affairs), there was no improvement after the admission in the EU? Here in Portugal it was almost the night for the day. We had a corporatist authoritarian regime (similar to Mussolini's fascism) for more than 40 years, and after the establishment of the democracy in 1974 and admission of Portugal in the EU in 1986, we had a deep improvement of our life conditions.

Your final statement is very true. The Greeks survived everything and everyone. Why not now? I believe that will be some reaction. Modern Greece is a country relatively recent country and like you there will be some persons that love Hellas and that are not happy with the recent developments... One final question: and about Macedonia? I heard that Tsipras had made a deal with the Macedonians because of the question of the North of Macedonia? But I heard that are some opposition in Greece to that deal (and that proofs that not all Greeks are "sleeping").

Yes Greece still has the equivalent to the Portuguese PCP.  It is the KKE, literally, the Communist Party of Greece. They model themselves on a type of Stalinist isolationism.  They used to have summer festivals that would include seminars discussing why the Soviet Union collapsed and how they would do things differently to ensure their own revolution doesn't fail.. Interestingly, the KKE which still polls around 3% refused to go into coalition with Syriza claiming Syriza were too far left!!

As to your second point, you are correct. Sadly the Greeks allowed the world to use the word Byzantium - a descriptive term coined by a German long after the fall of the Empire. The Greeks themselves called the Byzantium Empire - Romania - a term that the Italians disliked being associated with Greeks - to this day..  The latin world and especially Iberians, French etc called the Byzantine Empire - 'The Empire of the Greeks' - I remember that was the term Tirant Lo Blanc used.

To your third point. You are correct. Most Greeks are proud of Byzantine heritage. Me not so much because I did not like the idea of a backward desert religion (abrahamic religions of the Chrismusjews) dominating the Hellenes - whose love of knowledge was unsurpassed. AEK, PAOK - many religious Greeks - they respect Byzantium. Me.. meh..

To your 4th point. The Mozarabs had their mirror in Greece. However many Greeks went full retard and actually became muslims. They correctly were not forgiven by the Greeks and removed from Greek controlled lands when Greece was liberated. A good example of this was the Cretan muslim Greeks. The minute Crete became free, these muslims - although Greek speaking and even Greek genetically - were booted out of Crete - and of whom many ended up as far as Libya and Syria - and to this day - they still speak Greek and to this day the Greeks still see them as traitors. Greeks never forget a traitor.. After WW2, every Greek woman who had slept with a nazi officer - most often simply for food - was hung in her respective town square after Greece was liberated. Greeks never forget someone who defects.

To your fith point. The major reason most europeans do not connect greeks with ancient Greeks is Fallmerayer. In fact mainstream German newspapers still quote him to dehumanise Greeks:

http://en.protothema.gr/die-welts-provocative-racist-article/

Hungarians, Albanians, Fyromians still quote his nonsense concerning Greece daily. Now remember, Fallmerayer was a contemporary to Lord Byron... so even at the height of philhelenism, there was still powerful voices seeking to pretend Greeks were simply turkish/ slavic Christians who learnt the Greek language by accident and were masquerading as something else. Byron could see immediately the ancient in the Greeks - good and bad and DNA testing has now shattered Fallmerayer's Greek extinction theory. But it is too late. The voices of 80 million Turks, Germans, Albanians, Skopians, Hungarians, Greek communists etc shout louder than 5 million patriotic Greeks - many of whom have not even read the classics or care to. Greek politicians also like Portuguese culture at times. Famously former Greek PM Andreas Papandreou used to lock himself in his office with fado music blasting..

To your penultimate point. In this respect Greece has a little bit of a diffetent story to Portugal. Greece boomed in the 60s and 70s. Especially under the Junta. In fact tge only country that grew faster than Greece in those years was Japan..

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Greek_economic_miracle

After the Junta collapsed, the unions took over and Greek industry died completely soon after. PASOK created 100,000s of govt funded jobs per year... the country was finished. The leftist parties were so popular, the Greek conservative party - ND - shifted left and in any other nation on earth except Greece, ND would be considered centre left rather than conservative. Now the EU was the final nail in the coffin. Suddenly Greeks could borrow for nothing and the minute the Euro was introduced, prices shot up as wages stayed the same. It was a disaster. As for EU projects.. remember the joke?

A Greek mayor of a small Greek village visits a Spanish mayor of a small Spanish town. Once there, the Spaniard takes the Greek out to a good restaurant. After that they return to the Spaniard's villa. The Greek can't believe how well the Spaniard lives. 'How did you do this on your mayor salary?' the Greek asks.. The Spaniard points to the horizon.. 'See that bridge? It was supposed to have 4 lanes.' The Greek looks. 'My goodness!' - he says. 'I only see two lanes!' The Spaniard smiles.. 'Exactly..' he says..

Years later the Spanish mayor visits the Greek one. The Spaniard is surprised at how small the Greek village is. However what is more surprising is the Greek's villa! Gold taps.. marble floors, two swimming pools.. it is like Saddam's palace in there! 'How an earth did you afford this,' the Spaniard screams! The Greek says, 'you see that bridge over there on the horizon?' The Spaniard squints and says ' err..I see nothing..' The Greek replies - 'Exactly..'

To your final point. Tsipras - like all Greek communists is decended from communists. His relatives would have fought on the side of the communists during the Greek civil war. To get more troops, the Greek communists frighteningly promised slavs in Skopia and Bulgaria - land in Greece if they won - because Greece would no longer have borders with fellow communist states and be a defacto Soviet state - with all peoples allowed to live in Greece. However the communists lost, but Greek communists have ever since always had a soft spot for Skopians and Bulgars - who they would have shared the spoils of Greece with had they won the war. Tsipras by allowing Skopians to call themselves Macedonians is simply rewarding his old communist slavic allies. That is why his first action as PM was to visit the graves of Greek communists who died in the civil war. Tsipras is still there - in the 1940s mentally. He literally calls anyone who does not agree with him a 'fascist.' As for this absurd deal.... 70% of Greeks are against it:

http://www.ekathimerini.com/229746/article/ekathimerini/news/seven-in-10-greeks-opposed-to-north-macedonia-poll-shows

Tsipras called those who oppose the deal 'fascists'... yes - he actually said that.. so 70% of Greeks are suddenly fascists according to the Greek communist PM.. 
That accusation did not sit will characters like this talented man who is as left wing as they come:

https://greece.greekreporter.com/2018/06/26/greek-composer-mikis-theodorakis-calls-macedonia-deal-national-humiliation/

So are Greeks sleeping on the issue? Yes. 70% don't want it.. yes they protested in Athens and Salonika.. but so? Tsipras invented the protest - that does not scare him.. The only thing that will scare him is if someone physically removes him from power..

As you stated, Greece is one of those rare nations that is completely surrounded by enemies. Even North Korea has often had a friend in China. Greece.. its nearest ally? Armenia.. Bulgars think the Macedonian region of Greece used to be theirs.. Skopians think the same.. Albanians think every Greek is really a Crypto Albanian who was forced to be greek  or sold-out to become Greek..  All of them are breast fed Fallmerayer from birth.. Hungarians believe all the above as does the mainstream modern German and UK press. Italians are still angry at Greeks calling the Byzantium Empire the 'Second Rome.' They also tried to conquer Greece under Mussolini to create a 'New Rome' and southern Italy went from a region that spoke Greek as a ligua franca from 600 BC to the 1500s AD - to a region where only 20,000 still speak Greek today thanks to years of anti Greek propaganda.. Under Mussolini for example there were posters across Southern Italy saying: 'Don't speak the language of the donkey' (the language of the donkey referring to Greek of course..). Turkey still believes Greece should belong to them and flies its armed jets over Greek territory every day to intimidate and bully Greece.... Greece is basically this island:



And you know what? I am fine with that. What I don't forgive is Greeks who back the other side... Northern Greek 'academics' who clearly have slavic ancestry.. saying that Greeks as a people have no connection to ancient Greece.. These are the dangerous ones. These are the ones I will never forgive.

[miguelsousamartins]

faliro what do you think about atromitos match?

[Faliro]

faliro what do you think about atromitos match?

Which one friend? The one coming up for them vs Apollon or the one on the weekend where they played Olympiacos and lost 1-2?

[miguelsousamartins]

faliro what do you think about atromitos match?

Which one friend? The one coming up for them vs Apollon or the one on the weekend where they played Olympiacos and lost 1-2?

the coming up match... the odd is good for them to win. but I don't know very well greek football!

[Faliro]

faliro what do you think about atromitos match?

Which one friend? The one coming up for them vs Apollon or the one on the weekend where they played Olympiacos and lost 1-2?

the coming up match... the odd is good for them to win. but I don't know very well greek football!

Atromitos will be massive favourites unless the match is sold...

If the match is played honestly, Atromitos will win. Atromitos are one of the best teams in Greece this season, Apollon the worst.  Atromitos also have the best coach in the league and the lead goal scorer in Greece (Koulouris on 9 goals).

[Josef Vierine]

Thank you for your reply. 

You explain it very well  . I understand the Tsipras point (and I know that famous picture of Tsipras rioting). Here, in Portugal, we had a party similar to Syriza (and supports Syriza, of course), called Bloco de Esquerda (Left Bloc), which is a amalgam of Trotskyist parties that were melted around 1999. Curiously, we had an old Communist Party, a relic, (called PCP: Portuguese Communist Party) that still had some power in the Portuguese democracy. It links on that you called isolationist communists. Kind of Soviet Stalinist and patriotical too. One of the their slogans are:  one patriotical policy and of left (some like that).

That second point is very interesting. Your report suggests a highly fractured society and a Greece surrounded by enemies. Turks in the East, Balkanians in the North or West. And that Anatolian narrative fits well with the history of Greece. People ignored that in the ancient times, until 1453, at least, all the so called Asia Minor were Greek.

The third point, for me, is very curious. The conversion of the East to Cristianism is paradoxical. The proto-Christianity had some strong spots (Damascus, Antioch, Corinth, etc), and without the Greek koiné, in my point of view, there will no be Christianity as we know; but, in the other hand, even after the famous edict of Milan by Constantine and Licinius, wee see a strong resistance (I remember Alexandria (the case of Hipatia); or even the closure of the School of Athens by Justinian. Or, as you said, Gemistus Pletho, but that is far away the period that I am talking. I don't know that some people rejects the Byzantine heritage, I had always think, and especially for the Justinian period and later, that the Greeks were proud of their Byzantine heritage. But well, I am glad that some of you are returning to the Olympians.

The fourth point is a classic of emperorship command. Here, in the Iberian Peninsula, we had a similar approach when Tariq defeated the Visigoths. Most of the Visigothic upper classes converted to Islam instead of paying taxes. And we had a special group called Moçárabes, (Mozarabs) that were people that continuing to follow the Roman Catholic rite, but adopted Arabic costumes and speak Arabic too. And for long years, before the Crusades, we lived peacefully with the Arabs, and even had some autonomy - like the region your heritage lived.

You said that "Greeks have never been loved by most Europeans." For now, I agree, but in the XIX century and XX century, perhaps no. Especially in the XIX century, because of the Philhellenism, you had many admirers (I remember that even Lord Byron joined you in  independence war). But you are right as some of the intellectuals despise you. It was a king of love/hate relationship. Jakob Philipp Fallmerayer was a fraud, as you well know. In the other hand, people who loved History (and unfortunately nowadays are few) connect you with the ancient Greeks. I remember a Portuguese politician who died recently, by the time of the peak of the crisis of your bailout, that said that Greece must be saved because it was there that Democracy was born.

The penultimate point: well that resumes the whole thing. A highly divided society. I had almost forgot the Junta, but your 20 th Century was highly dramatic. The Second World War and immediately the Civil War. Problems with Cyprus, etc. I think that one of your problems are that you are always on the maximum or the minimum. From total oppression to total anarchy. That story that the Police had no powers at all is almost surrealistic - and I am not a great fan of military forces. But as for the EU (I am pro-European but I defend the complete autonomy of the members and no interference of the European Commission in the internal affairs), there was no improvement after the admission in the EU? Here in Portugal it was almost the night for the day. We had a corporatist authoritarian regime (similar to Mussolini's fascism) for more than 40 years, and after the establishment of the democracy in 1974 and admission of Portugal in the EU in 1986, we had a deep improvement of our life conditions.

Your final statement is very true. The Greeks survived everything and everyone. Why not now? I believe that will be some reaction. Modern Greece is a country relatively recent country and like you there will be some persons that love Hellas and that are not happy with the recent developments... One final question: and about Macedonia? I heard that Tsipras had made a deal with the Macedonians because of the question of the North of Macedonia? But I heard that are some opposition in Greece to that deal (and that proofs that not all Greeks are "sleeping").

Yes Greece still has the equivalent to the Portuguese PCP.  It is the KKE, literally, the Communist Party of Greece. They model themselves on a type of Stalinist isolationism.  They used to have summer festivals that would include seminars discussing why the Soviet Union collapsed and how they would do things differently to ensure their own revolution doesn't fail.. Interestingly, the KKE which still polls around 3% refused to go into coalition with Syriza claiming Syriza were too far left!!

As to your second point, you are correct. Sadly the Greeks allowed the world to use the word Byzantium - a descriptive term coined by a German long after the fall of the Empire. The Greeks themselves called the Byzantium Empire - Romania - a term that the Italians disliked being associated with Greeks - to this day..  The latin world and especially Iberians, French etc called the Byzantine Empire - 'The Empire of the Greeks' - I remember that was the term Tirant Lo Blanc used.

To your third point. You are correct. Most Greeks are proud of Byzantine heritage. Me not so much because I did not like the idea of a backward desert religion (abrahamic religions of the Chrismusjews) dominating the Hellenes - whose love of knowledge was unsurpassed. AEK, PAOK - many religious Greeks - they respect Byzantium. Me.. meh..

To your 4th point. The Mozarabs had their mirror in Greece. However many Greeks went full retard and actually became muslims. They correctly were not forgiven by the Greeks and removed from Greek controlled lands when Greece was liberated. A good example of this was the Cretan muslim Greeks. The minute Crete became free, these muslims - although Greek speaking and even Greek genetically - were booted out of Crete - and of whom many ended up as far as Libya and Syria - and to this day - they still speak Greek and to this day the Greeks still see them as traitors. Greeks never forget a traitor.. After WW2, every Greek woman who had slept with a nazi officer - most often simply for food - was hung in her respective town square after Greece was liberated. Greeks never forget someone who defects.

To your fith point. The major reason most europeans do not connect greeks with ancient Greeks is Fallmerayer. In fact mainstream German newspapers still quote him to dehumanise Greeks:

http://en.protothema.gr/die-welts-provocative-racist-article/

Hungarians, Albanians, Fyromians still quote his nonsense concerning Greece daily. Now remember, Fallmerayer was a contemporary to Lord Byron... so even at the height of philhelenism, there was still powerful voices seeking to pretend Greeks were simply turkish/ slavic Christians who learnt the Greek language by accident and were masquerading as something else. Byron could see immediately the ancient in the Greeks - good and bad and DNA testing has now shattered Fallmerayer's Greek extinction theory. But it is too late. The voices of 80 million Turks, Germans, Albanians, Skopians, Hungarians, Greek communists etc shout louder than 5 million patriotic Greeks - many of whom have not even read the classics or care to. Greek politicians also like Portuguese culture at times. Famously former Greek PM Andreas Papandreou used to lock himself in his office with fado music blasting..

To your penultimate point. In this respect Greece has a little bit of a diffetent story to Portugal. Greece boomed in the 60s and 70s. Especially under the Junta. In fact tge only country that grew faster than Greece in those years was Japan..

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Greek_economic_miracle

After the Junta collapsed, the unions took over and Greek industry died completely soon after. PASOK created 100,000s of govt funded jobs per year... the country was finished. The leftist parties were so popular, the Greek conservative party - ND - shifted left and in any other nation on earth except Greece, ND would be considered centre left rather than conservative. Now the EU was the final nail in the coffin. Suddenly Greeks could borrow for nothing and the minute the Euro was introduced, prices shot up as wages stayed the same. It was a disaster. As for EU projects.. remember the joke?

A Greek mayor of a small Greek village visits a Spanish mayor of a small Spanish town. Once there, the Spaniard takes the Greek out to a good restaurant. After that they return to the Spaniard's villa. The Greek can't believe how well the Spaniard lives. 'How did you do this on your mayor salary?' the Greek asks.. The Spaniard points to the horizon.. 'See that bridge? It was supposed to have 4 lanes.' The Greek looks. 'My goodness!' - he says. 'I only see two lanes!' The Spaniard smiles.. 'Exactly..' he says..

Years later the Spanish mayor visits the Greek one. The Spaniard is surprised at how small the Greek village is. However what is more surprising is the Greek's villa! Gold taps.. marble floors, two swimming pools.. it is like Saddam's palace in there! 'How an earth did you afford this,' the Spaniard screams! The Greek says, 'you see that bridge over there on the horizon?' The Spaniard squints and says ' err..I see nothing..' The Greek replies - 'Exactly..'

To your final point. Tsipras - like all Greek communists is decended from communists. His relatives would have fought on the side of the communists during the Greek civil war. To get more troops, the Greek communists frighteningly promised slavs in Skopia and Bulgaria - land in Greece if they won - because Greece would no longer have borders with fellow communist states and be a defacto Soviet state - with all peoples allowed to live in Greece. However the communists lost, but Greek communists have ever since always had a soft spot for Skopians and Bulgars - who they would have shared the spoils of Greece with had they won the war. Tsipras by allowing Skopians to call themselves Macedonians is simply rewarding his old communist slavic allies. That is why his first action as PM was to visit the graves of Greek communists who died in the civil war. Tsipras is still there - in the 1940s mentally. He literally calls anyone who does not agree with him a 'fascist.' As for this absurd deal.... 70% of Greeks are against it:

http://www.ekathimerini.com/229746/article/ekathimerini/news/seven-in-10-greeks-opposed-to-north-macedonia-poll-shows

Tsipras called those who oppose the deal 'fascists'... yes - he actually said that.. so 70% of Greeks are suddenly fascists according to the Greek communist PM.. 
That accusation did not sit will characters like this talented man who is as left wing as they come:

https://greece.greekreporter.com/2018/06/26/greek-composer-mikis-theodorakis-calls-macedonia-deal-national-humiliation/

So are Greeks sleeping on the issue? Yes. 70% don't want it.. yes they protested in Athens and Salonika.. but so? Tsipras invented the protest - that does not scare him.. The only thing that will scare him is if someone physically removes him from power..

As you stated, Greece is one of those rare nations that is completely surrounded by enemies. Even North Korea has often had a friend in China. Greece.. its nearest ally? Armenia.. Bulgars think the Macedonian region of Greece used to be theirs.. Skopians think the same.. Albanians think every Greek is really a Crypto Albanian who was forced to be greek  or sold-out to become Greek..  All of them are breast fed Fallmerayer from birth.. Hungarians believe all the above as does the mainstream modern German and UK press. Italians are still angry at Greeks calling the Byzantium Empire the 'Second Rome.' They also tried to conquer Greece under Mussolini to create a 'New Rome' and southern Italy went from a region that spoke Greek as a ligua franca from 600 BC to the 1500s AD - to a region where only 20,000 still speak Greek today thanks to years of anti Greek propaganda.. Under Mussolini for example there were posters across Southern Italy saying: 'Don't speak the language of the donkey' (the language of the donkey referring to Greek of course..). Turkey still believes Greece should belong to them and flies its armed jets over Greek territory every day to intimidate and bully Greece.... Greece is basically this island:



And you know what? I am fine with that. What I don't forgive is Greeks who back the other side... Northern Greek 'academics' who clearly have slavic ancestry.. saying that Greeks as a people have no connection to ancient Greece.. These are the dangerous ones. These are the ones I will never forgive.

It seems that the summer festivals are attribute of the Stalinist communist parties  . In Portugal, the PCP hold a summer festival called Festa do Avante (Avante! Festival). But they had much more power than KKE. They controlled most of the syndicates (especially the State employees) and some municipalities around Lisbon and in the middle-south of Portugal. And still had around 10 % or more in the elections. Now they support -since 2015- (with the Trotskyists) the PS (Socialist Party), a social-democrat party similar to the PASOK. It was as unprecedented in the Portuguese political scene, but people were tired of the center-right coalition (PSD/CDS-PP) (by the time of the bailout). You can read all the process here: (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Portuguese_legislative_election,_2015#Government_formation). Of course the PCP doesn't like the Left Bloc, but they set aside differences to form the coalition. (It seems that the KKE had more firmness than the PCP.) Still, the PCP is a great reference of nationalism in Portugal (weird no?). They support Portuguese traditional customs and even are in favour of the compulsory military service. In fact, the center-right parties, in the times of the bailout, cut some important national holidays (like the Implementation of the Republic and the Restoration of the Independence (it is today. 1st December) and it was that coalition that restore and celebrate it...

It is true. We are too much influenced by the German scholarship (too much nomenclature and concepts that we used today are XIX German conceptions, as you rightly noted)  and Anglo-Saxon, btw. In some books still reads as "The Roman Empire of the East", but the term "Byzantine" is 99.9 % used, even by scholars. But yes, until the fall of Constantinople, the western chronicles used "Empire of the Greeks" to describe.

You are at the right team . My club in Greece is, of course, Olympiacos, and I always liked your badge. The rise of Christianity had always intrigue me. Without the greek koiné there will no be Christians . And even Neoplatonism had some influence in the dogma of Christianity. But then, when the Christians came to power, they shut all the religious tolerance of the Ancient World.

It is a surprise for me that Fallmerayer's farce had still that force. A farce that was used even by the Nazis. And you are saying that the Greek communists support the theories of that guy?! Completely nonsense - not of you but of those people. And who do not read the classics? The patriotic Greeks? It seems that Greece is completely surrounded by enemies (internal and external)... Well, Fado is a great symbol of Portugal for the foreigners(not for me, particularly), but that word "Fado" that comes from the latin fatum is orignaly greek: the moirai. Sometimes I think that Portuguese and Greek had some characteristics in common: here the fado, not the music, but the concept, aligned us on a kind of resignation. We resign himself s to the Parcas. The sad fado....like "we must resign ourselves to be a poor country". Are you like that too?

You benefited the Plan Marshall right? Portugal almost rejected (in fact, we don't deserve it too). So, your best period of economical growth was under the Second Republican Government and the Junta? What went wrong then? The world crisis of the late 70s?
Ahaha. That joke is too real...and for Portugal too (well, for most Mediterranean countries...) We've received tons of funds by the late 80s. Farmers would destroy farm land to plant eucalyptus, buy villas and Jeeps. Corruption is a great problem here, but it is even worse in Greece.
Thank you for the explanation about the question of Macedonia. In resume, 70 % of the Greeks are against, even left-wing personalities, and Tsipras still is secure in power? Well...
Armenia is your nearest ally? What about Russia? I remember seeing Tsipras with the Russians when he was blackmailing the EU... Bulgaria didn't invade Greece in the WWI?
The Italians are not angry with Russia by themselves calling the "third Rome"? 
The invasion of Mussolini is one of the ironies of the history. Hitler was planning with Franco (in spite of some disagreements), the invasion of Portugal, Gilbratar and the Azores islands (that belongs to Portugal),- Operation Felix- but Mussolini's dreams of resurgence of the Roman Empire had conducted the war for the East. Well, I still think that war in the Balkans and Greece was inevitable because of Hitler's wishes about Russia, yet it leads for a destructive war for the Greeks. What the Italians had done in Southern Italy was totally a shame. Even under the Roman Empire the emperors respect Greek culture and even adopt their clothes when they are in the Magna Graecia, and I see that tolerance had go beyond the centuries to finish with the completely shameful Mussolini's propaganda.

Greece had to resolve his internal powers. When you had enemy inside it is still more difficult to gain respect from the other countries.

[Faliro]

It seems that the summer festivals are attribute of the Stalinist communist parties  . In Portugal, the PCP hold a summer festival called Festa do Avante (Avante! Festival). But they had much more power than KKE. They controlled most of the syndicates (especially the State employees) and some municipalities around Lisbon and in the middle-south of Portugal. And still had around 10 % or more in the elections. Now they support -since 2015- (with the Trotskyists) the PS (Socialist Party), a social-democrat party similar to the PASOK. It was as unprecedented in the Portuguese political scene, but people were tired of the center-right coalition (PSD/CDS-PP) (by the time of the bailout). You can read all the process here: (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Portuguese_legislative_election,_2015#Government_formation). Of course the PCP doesn't like the Left Bloc, but they set aside differences to form the coalition. (It seems that the KKE had more firmness than the PCP.) Still, the PCP is a great reference of nationalism in Portugal (weird no?). They support Portuguese traditional customs and even are in favour of the compulsory military service. In fact, the center-right parties, in the times of the bailout, cut some important national holidays (like the Implementation of the Republic and the Restoration of the Independence (it is today. 1st December) and it was that coalition that restore and celebrate it...

It is true. We are too much influenced by the German scholarship (too much nomenclature and concepts that we used today are XIX German conceptions, as you rightly noted)  and Anglo-Saxon, btw. In some books still reads as "The Roman Empire of the East", but the term "Byzantine" is 99.9 % used, even by scholars. But yes, until the fall of Constantinople, the western chronicles used "Empire of the Greeks" to describe.

You are at the right team . My club in Greece is, of course, Olympiacos, and I always liked your badge. The rise of Christianity had always intrigue me. Without the greek koiné there will no be Christians . And even Neoplatonism had some influence in the dogma of Christianity. But then, when the Christians came to power, they shut all the religious tolerance of the Ancient World.

It is a surprise for me that Fallmerayer's farce had still that force. A farce that was used even by the Nazis. And you are saying that the Greek communists support the theories of that guy?! Completely nonsense - not of you but of those people. And who do not read the classics? The patriotic Greeks? It seems that Greece is completely surrounded by enemies (internal and external)... Well, Fado is a great symbol of Portugal for the foreigners(not for me, particularly), but that word "Fado" that comes from the latin fatum is orignaly greek: the moirai. Sometimes I think that Portuguese and Greek had some characteristics in common: here the fado, not the music, but the concept, aligned us on a kind of resignation. We resign himself s to the Parcas. The sad fado....like "we must resign ourselves to be a poor country". Are you like that too?

You benefited the Plan Marshall right? Portugal almost rejected (in fact, we don't deserve it too). So, your best period of economical growth was under the Second Republican Government and the Junta? What went wrong then? The world crisis of the late 70s?
Ahaha. That joke is too real...and for Portugal too (well, for most Mediterranean countries...) We've received tons of funds by the late 80s. Farmers would destroy farm land to plant eucalyptus, buy villas and Jeeps. Corruption is a great problem here, but it is even worse in Greece.
Thank you for the explanation about the question of Macedonia. In resume, 70 % of the Greeks are against, even left-wing personalities, and Tsipras still is secure in power? Well...
Armenia is your nearest ally? What about Russia? I remember seeing Tsipras with the Russians when he was blackmailing the EU... Bulgaria didn't invade Greece in the WWI?
The Italians are not angry with Russia by themselves calling the "third Rome"? 
The invasion of Mussolini is one of the ironies of the history. Hitler was planning with Franco (in spite of some disagreements), the invasion of Portugal, Gilbratar and the Azores islands (that belongs to Portugal),- Operation Felix- but Mussolini's dreams of resurgence of the Roman Empire had conducted the war for the East. Well, I still think that war in the Balkans and Greece was inevitable because of Hitler's wishes about Russia, yet it leads for a destructive war for the Greeks. What the Italians had done in Southern Italy was totally a shame. Even under the Roman Empire the emperors respect Greek culture and even adopt their clothes when they are in the Magna Graecia, and I see that tolerance had go beyond the centuries to finish with the completely shameful Mussolini's propaganda.

Greece had to resolve his internal powers. When you had enemy inside it is still more difficult to gain respect from the other countries.

Yes indeed, i think the KKE still has these summer festivals actually. I know the Italians also have theirs last time I was there.. The Portuguese politics you describe sounds a bit more Iberian.. a bit more 3 dimensional than the partisan and myopic Greek politics.

I am gald you support Olympiacos in Greece. In my experience we have the best fans and also the most 'Greek.' Piraeus itself is in a sense the heart of Greekness. Flashy and very wealthy, working class sections, ordered but ruined by over development in parts. Huge capacity, very busy, huge potential but still.. as the sun sets there in the summer.. the true soul of urban Greece is there with you too.. It was my Greek grandfather's favourite place in Greece - how could I not support the team from there?

As for the religious angle and Christianity. I spose what I tried to get across but didn't was that in Greece - there is a semi prevailing view among the old - that used to be far more repeated - that Greece came out of paganism to be civilised by the teachings of Christ.. The church still teaches that under paganism, Greeks were like animals. This is what I can't stand. The reality is that when the Greeks were forced to abandon paganism - specifically the Olympian religion that championed education, arts, sciences - all these essential assets to the Greek soul suffered a dramatic and catastrophic abandonment. The other reason I get a little perplexed is that along with the bizarro Christianity civilised Greeks argument the Greek Orthodox Church spout ad infinitum.. there is another myth they circulate - one that has been in circulation in the Hellenic peninsular since the early evangelical Christians started terra-forming Hellas. The myth that Christianity took over the Greek world due to its message.. in fact very few Greeks converted to Christianity because of a Christian message. They converted because worshipping the 12 Gods became illegal - with the death penalty in force for those who refused to abate.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christian_persecution_of_paganism_under_Theodosius_I

Even worse - the brutal destruction and cynical levelling of quintessential cultural centres like Delphi to extinguish the pagan religion further damaged the Hellenes in my opinion. Whatever the Olympian religion was - what it is now - its influences on others - others who have influenced it - its meaning to the arts and sciences - all this is almost incalculable. But what is certain - is that this religion was intertwined with logic, the arts, music, history, the sciences - and most importantly - Hellenism. All the Minoans, Mycenaean, pre Greek tribes - all their stories, cultures and beliefs added to that religion. The Eastern influences provided some backdrops - even North Africa got in on the act (Antaeus).. but the religion of the Greeks - the Olympian religion - was forcibly removed from the Greeks. No Greeks heard newly baptised  evangelical Israeli hebrews in their market squares across Greece and thought.. 'mm - this jewish Jesus who lives like Diogenes, talks of one all powerful male God like Plato.. and his disciples who all copied the lifestyles and even names of 5th Century Greek sophists.. these are the people I will believe over our own Zeus and Athena..'

Anyways, I ramble.. pleasantly at least as each day goes by more Greeks remember and engage with the ancient religion.

As for Fallmerayer's insidious teachings - that the Nazis so adored as you correctly pointed out.. his voice will never be silenced in the West. Greece will always have enemies in the West and enemies in the East. Any stick to beat Greeks with will never be forgotten and the Greeks themselves will always still unhelpfully talk about how the crusaders ruthlessly sacked Constantinople during the 4th Crusade - a city and empire that never recovered from this incident. The trust is gone and the liberal Western European who virtue signal how progressive they are by transforming themselves into Turkophiles adds further distance between Greeks and Latins. What will always draw both Asians and Westerners to Greece is Greece itself and its remarkable beauty, food and culture. Those who dislike Greece the most are usually those who have seldom if ever visited. The place has a hypnotic beauty that is hard to resist to anyone who has any type of cultured soul.

The concepts of music transcending its own surface nature in both Portugal and Greece are one of the many commonalities between the two nations. Greece, Italy, Spain and Portugal share a massive amount. Sometimes I think all 4 forget how much they share - how much commonality there is once you dip past the languages.  Concerning the 'we must resign ourselves to being a poor country.' Greece does not have this - it has something worse. It has 'we must resign ourselves to accepting Greece will never be civilised.' Whenever some shit goes down in Greece - it is rare to get a reaction like 'How the fuck could this even happen??' The reaction from 99% of Greeks will be a rhetorical.. 'pwpwpwpw... Hellas... Ti tha kanoume?' ('What can we do?') - as they say that they will roll their right hand as shown here:

https://youtu.be/TCMWIuQi_Io?t=20

It is amazing, everyone will do that.. Doesn't matter how insane the event is..

As for our economic miracle in the 60s and 70s. The reason was deregulation. Greeks opened up to world trade. Coca Cola opened a plant in Greece, so did many foreign beer companies. Greeks produced everything - from clothes to tobacco, to washing machines to chemicals. Businesses flooded into Greece. You could build whatever shit you wanted in Athens - it became a wealthy concrete jungle. Money was everywhere. When PASOK came back into power after the fall of the Junta.. all businesses - including the port of Piraeus and the powerful ship building yards in Elefsina all became heavily unionised. Strikes returned as did leftist terrorism. Greece became a country where nearly everyone worked for the Government controlled utilities.. Gas, electric, water, telecommunications, TV - everything was state owned and the unions and government ran each one into the ground.  Greece did benefit from the Marshall plan but very little. The farmers got nearly all of it - nothing was spent on industry.

As for Tsipras, he bluffs and loses each time. He bluffed that he would leave the EU. His bluff was called as everyone knows he is exceptionally pro european. He bluffed there would be no deal on debts and called an election to add to that bluff. He then signed an even worse debt plan the following week shocking every Greek alive who voted to end austerity.. He bluffed that he was pro Russian - he is not. He has been throwing out russian diplomats from Greece all year because Russia - like most Greeks doesn't want this deal with Skopia. Russia doesn't want it because it hates the idea of another Balkan NATO nation and Greeks hate it because it steals and revises Greek history. Greeks like Russia and Serbia. Sadly - the average IQ of Greek politicians is around the 70-90 mark. Greeks do not know how to play real politik - so constantly ignore opportunities. Both Israel and Russia could have been used to stop Turkish incursions and expansions in the Aegean - neither card has been played by the vacant minded Greek politicians. Tsipras would refuse anyway to play those cards because he openly dislikes the idea of borders, loves Palestine and doesn't like the idea of Greece so much anyway - so Turks violating Greek borders and encroaching on and questioning Greek territory is hardly going to keep him up at night.

As for reading the classics. As a boy I was in Viotias one hot summer and I had brought my copy of Thucydides' 'Peloponnesian War.' Some kid saw I had it and said in English - 'hold on - you are reading this for pleasure?? Why would you do that? We are forced to read this in school, in ancient Greek and we go crazy that we have to..' I just replied - 'it is your history - you should cherish it.' Greeks often boast in Athens how little they care about the ancient past..  it is all about women, food and money. Pleasure seekers.. There are some Greeks like me.. when I meet them.. I am instantly their friend forever. The South has more like me. Peloponnese.


Greece is a dying culture. You are correct about internal and external enemies. Greece simply ran out of good leaders the way Ancient Athens famously did. The saying 'Greeks eat their own children' has some metaphorical base. There is an internal sabotage always alive in Greece that you dont automatically get in other nations. However, that's life.. what can I do? I wasted years trying to help Greece rise again. I realised around 10 years ago - there is no point fighting Greece's enemies - when a significant portion of the Greek population doesn't want Greece to exist anyway. So if ever I get involved in anything political - I instantly remind Greeks that those northern commie academics who state modern greece is a fabrication - while holding their Greek passports aloft are the biggest threat to the future of the country. The fact there is no basic law and order in greece is just a symptom of a broken leftist society struggling to find an identity that includes non Greeks.. As an old Italian once told me.. 'Rome fell when the emperors cared more about those living outside the city walls and those within..'

[Festivus]

Damn, some huge posts here...

How do you feel about Israel and the Israel/Palestine conflict, Faliro? Also, what about the history of Jews in Greece? What's it like?

[Faliro]

Damn, some huge posts here...

How do you feel about Israel and the Israel/Palestine conflict, Faliro? Also, what about the history of Jews in Greece? What's it like?

Hard to really have a side in the Israeli/Palestinian conflict imo as a European. I think the Israelis have made mistakes and perhaps even exacerbated the situation. Palestinians on the other often seem not to have the intellectual capacity to change anything themselves.

Always been a few Jews in Greece since antiquity. Sadly many of the stories in the Jewish Torah are not that old as one would think - many of which were formulated around 500BC..
The story of the Greek Jews at their height is one of Salonika. Inundated with Iberian refuge Jews from Isabella's expulsions - these Sephardi Jews made up nearly half the population of Salonika and had a massive influence up there in that city. Sadly when the Nazis entered Greece most of the them were wiped out.

What is curious is the Jews of Greece never dominated certain industries the way they did in other parts of Europe and East. For example - most jewellers in Greece have always been greek..  It seems the Jews lived a fairly peaceful existence in Greece until the arrival of the barbaric Nazis. Greeks in general are fairly ambivalent to the Jewish story simply because the Greeks themselves are a merchant people and a very old people themselves.   

[Festivus]

Damn, some huge posts here...

How do you feel about Israel and the Israel/Palestine conflict, Faliro? Also, what about the history of Jews in Greece? What's it like?

Hard to really have a side in the Israeli/Palestinian conflict imo as a European. I think the Israelis have made mistakes and perhaps even exacerbated the situation. Palestinians on the other often seem not to have the intellectual capacity to change anything themselves.

Always been a few Jews in Greece since antiquity. Sadly many of the stories in the Jewish Torah are not that old as one would think - many of which were formulated around 500BC..
The story of the Greek Jews at their height is one of Salonika. Inundated with Iberian refuge Jews from Isabella's expulsions - these Sephardi Jews made up nearly half the population of Salonika and had a massive influence up there in that city. Sadly when the Nazis entered Greece most of the them were wiped out.

What is curious is the Jews of Greece never dominated certain industries the way they did in other parts of Europe and East. For example - most jewellers in Greece have always been greek..  It seems the Jews lived a fairly peaceful existence in Greece until the arrival of the barbaric Nazis. Greeks in general are fairly ambivalent to the Jewish story simply because the Greeks themselves are a merchant people and a very old people themselves.   

Portugal has one of the lowest Jewish populations in Europe. The ones we had here were expelled, killed or forced to convert to Christianity in the 16th century due to pogroms and the Inquisition. Holland took a lot of Portuguese Jews that were expelled from here.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lisbon_massacre

Since we were not in WW2, naturally we didn't take any part in the heinous act that was the Holocaust. One of our consuls at the time helped a lot of Jews: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aristides_de_Sousa_Mendes

Nowadays there's barely any Jewish people in Portugal. The few who exist don't have any political power or any major role in our economy. I think even Hitler said at one point that he liked countries like Portugal, Spain and Ireland due to their lack of Jewish influence. That would also explain why he never messed with these countries either.

Anti-semitism is not really a thing here. There's so few Jewish people in Portugal and they don't play a significant role in our society or economy so there's not much room for the population to develop an aversion to them.

As for Israel... well communists and left bloc voters generally are pro Palestine and consider Zionists to be modern day Nazis. The rest of the country doesn't care much, I guess. Some are pro Israel, but aren't as vocal as the pro Palestine crowd.

[Josef Vierine]

It seems that the summer festivals are attribute of the Stalinist communist parties  . In Portugal, the PCP hold a summer festival called Festa do Avante (Avante! Festival). But they had much more power than KKE. They controlled most of the syndicates (especially the State employees) and some municipalities around Lisbon and in the middle-south of Portugal. And still had around 10 % or more in the elections. Now they support -since 2015- (with the Trotskyists) the PS (Socialist Party), a social-democrat party similar to the PASOK. It was as unprecedented in the Portuguese political scene, but people were tired of the center-right coalition (PSD/CDS-PP) (by the time of the bailout). You can read all the process here: (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Portuguese_legislative_election,_2015#Government_formation). Of course the PCP doesn't like the Left Bloc, but they set aside differences to form the coalition. (It seems that the KKE had more firmness than the PCP.) Still, the PCP is a great reference of nationalism in Portugal (weird no?). They support Portuguese traditional customs and even are in favour of the compulsory military service. In fact, the center-right parties, in the times of the bailout, cut some important national holidays (like the Implementation of the Republic and the Restoration of the Independence (it is today. 1st December) and it was that coalition that restore and celebrate it...

It is true. We are too much influenced by the German scholarship (too much nomenclature and concepts that we used today are XIX German conceptions, as you rightly noted)  and Anglo-Saxon, btw. In some books still reads as "The Roman Empire of the East", but the term "Byzantine" is 99.9 % used, even by scholars. But yes, until the fall of Constantinople, the western chronicles used "Empire of the Greeks" to describe.

You are at the right team . My club in Greece is, of course, Olympiacos, and I always liked your badge. The rise of Christianity had always intrigue me. Without the greek koiné there will no be Christians . And even Neoplatonism had some influence in the dogma of Christianity. But then, when the Christians came to power, they shut all the religious tolerance of the Ancient World.

It is a surprise for me that Fallmerayer's farce had still that force. A farce that was used even by the Nazis. And you are saying that the Greek communists support the theories of that guy?! Completely nonsense - not of you but of those people. And who do not read the classics? The patriotic Greeks? It seems that Greece is completely surrounded by enemies (internal and external)... Well, Fado is a great symbol of Portugal for the foreigners(not for me, particularly), but that word "Fado" that comes from the latin fatum is orignaly greek: the moirai. Sometimes I think that Portuguese and Greek had some characteristics in common: here the fado, not the music, but the concept, aligned us on a kind of resignation. We resign himself s to the Parcas. The sad fado....like "we must resign ourselves to be a poor country". Are you like that too?

You benefited the Plan Marshall right? Portugal almost rejected (in fact, we don't deserve it too). So, your best period of economical growth was under the Second Republican Government and the Junta? What went wrong then? The world crisis of the late 70s?
Ahaha. That joke is too real...and for Portugal too (well, for most Mediterranean countries...) We've received tons of funds by the late 80s. Farmers would destroy farm land to plant eucalyptus, buy villas and Jeeps. Corruption is a great problem here, but it is even worse in Greece.
Thank you for the explanation about the question of Macedonia. In resume, 70 % of the Greeks are against, even left-wing personalities, and Tsipras still is secure in power? Well...
Armenia is your nearest ally? What about Russia? I remember seeing Tsipras with the Russians when he was blackmailing the EU... Bulgaria didn't invade Greece in the WWI?
The Italians are not angry with Russia by themselves calling the "third Rome"? 
The invasion of Mussolini is one of the ironies of the history. Hitler was planning with Franco (in spite of some disagreements), the invasion of Portugal, Gilbratar and the Azores islands (that belongs to Portugal),- Operation Felix- but Mussolini's dreams of resurgence of the Roman Empire had conducted the war for the East. Well, I still think that war in the Balkans and Greece was inevitable because of Hitler's wishes about Russia, yet it leads for a destructive war for the Greeks. What the Italians had done in Southern Italy was totally a shame. Even under the Roman Empire the emperors respect Greek culture and even adopt their clothes when they are in the Magna Graecia, and I see that tolerance had go beyond the centuries to finish with the completely shameful Mussolini's propaganda.

Greece had to resolve his internal powers. When you had enemy inside it is still more difficult to gain respect from the other countries.

Yes indeed, i think the KKE still has these summer festivals actually. I know the Italians also have theirs last time I was there.. The Portuguese politics you describe sounds a bit more Iberian.. a bit more 3 dimensional than the partisan and myopic Greek politics.

I am gald you support Olympiacos in Greece. In my experience we have the best fans and also the most 'Greek.' Piraeus itself is in a sense the heart of Greekness. Flashy and very wealthy, working class sections, ordered but ruined by over development in parts. Huge capacity, very busy, huge potential but still.. as the sun sets there in the summer.. the true soul of urban Greece is there with you too.. It was my Greek grandfather's favourite place in Greece - how could I not support the team from there?

As for the religious angle and Christianity. I spose what I tried to get across but didn't was that in Greece - there is a semi prevailing view among the old - that used to be far more repeated - that Greece came out of paganism to be civilised by the teachings of Christ.. The church still teaches that under paganism, Greeks were like animals. This is what I can't stand. The reality is that when the Greeks were forced to abandon paganism - specifically the Olympian religion that championed education, arts, sciences - all these essential assets to the Greek soul suffered a dramatic and catastrophic abandonment. The other reason I get a little perplexed is that along with the bizarro Christianity civilised Greeks argument the Greek Orthodox Church spout ad infinitum.. there is another myth they circulate - one that has been in circulation in the Hellenic peninsular since the early evangelical Christians started terra-forming Hellas. The myth that Christianity took over the Greek world due to its message.. in fact very few Greeks converted to Christianity because of a Christian message. They converted because worshipping the 12 Gods became illegal - with the death penalty in force for those who refused to abate.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christian_persecution_of_paganism_under_Theodosius_I

Even worse - the brutal destruction and cynical levelling of quintessential cultural centres like Delphi to extinguish the pagan religion further damaged the Hellenes in my opinion. Whatever the Olympian religion was - what it is now - its influences on others - others who have influenced it - its meaning to the arts and sciences - all this is almost incalculable. But what is certain - is that this religion was intertwined with logic, the arts, music, history, the sciences - and most importantly - Hellenism. All the Minoans, Mycenaean, pre Greek tribes - all their stories, cultures and beliefs added to that religion. The Eastern influences provided some backdrops - even North Africa got in on the act (Antaeus).. but the religion of the Greeks - the Olympian religion - was forcibly removed from the Greeks. No Greeks heard newly baptised  evangelical Israeli hebrews in their market squares across Greece and thought.. 'mm - this jewish Jesus who lives like Diogenes, talks of one all powerful male God like Plato.. and his disciples who all copied the lifestyles and even names of 5th Century Greek sophists.. these are the people I will believe over our own Zeus and Athena..'

Anyways, I ramble.. pleasantly at least as each day goes by more Greeks remember and engage with the ancient religion.

As for Fallmerayer's insidious teachings - that the Nazis so adored as you correctly pointed out.. his voice will never be silenced in the West. Greece will always have enemies in the West and enemies in the East. Any stick to beat Greeks with will never be forgotten and the Greeks themselves will always still unhelpfully talk about how the crusaders ruthlessly sacked Constantinople during the 4th Crusade - a city and empire that never recovered from this incident. The trust is gone and the liberal Western European who virtue signal how progressive they are by transforming themselves into Turkophiles adds further distance between Greeks and Latins. What will always draw both Asians and Westerners to Greece is Greece itself and its remarkable beauty, food and culture. Those who dislike Greece the most are usually those who have seldom if ever visited. The place has a hypnotic beauty that is hard to resist to anyone who has any type of cultured soul.

The concepts of music transcending its own surface nature in both Portugal and Greece are one of the many commonalities between the two nations. Greece, Italy, Spain and Portugal share a massive amount. Sometimes I think all 4 forget how much they share - how much commonality there is once you dip past the languages.  Concerning the 'we must resign ourselves to being a poor country.' Greece does not have this - it has something worse. It has 'we must resign ourselves to accepting Greece will never be civilised.' Whenever some shit goes down in Greece - it is rare to get a reaction like 'How the fuck could this even happen??' The reaction from 99% of Greeks will be a rhetorical.. 'pwpwpwpw... Hellas... Ti tha kanoume?' ('What can we do?') - as they say that they will roll their right hand as shown here:

https://youtu.be/TCMWIuQi_Io?t=20

It is amazing, everyone will do that.. Doesn't matter how insane the event is..

As for our economic miracle in the 60s and 70s. The reason was deregulation. Greeks opened up to world trade. Coca Cola opened a plant in Greece, so did many foreign beer companies. Greeks produced everything - from clothes to tobacco, to washing machines to chemicals. Businesses flooded into Greece. You could build whatever shit you wanted in Athens - it became a wealthy concrete jungle. Money was everywhere. When PASOK came back into power after the fall of the Junta.. all businesses - including the port of Piraeus and the powerful ship building yards in Elefsina all became heavily unionised. Strikes returned as did leftist terrorism. Greece became a country where nearly everyone worked for the Government controlled utilities.. Gas, electric, water, telecommunications, TV - everything was state owned and the unions and government ran each one into the ground.  Greece did benefit from the Marshall plan but very little. The farmers got nearly all of it - nothing was spent on industry.

As for Tsipras, he bluffs and loses each time. He bluffed that he would leave the EU. His bluff was called as everyone knows he is exceptionally pro european. He bluffed there would be no deal on debts and called an election to add to that bluff. He then signed an even worse debt plan the following week shocking every Greek alive who voted to end austerity.. He bluffed that he was pro Russian - he is not. He has been throwing out russian diplomats from Greece all year because Russia - like most Greeks doesn't want this deal with Skopia. Russia doesn't want it because it hates the idea of another Balkan NATO nation and Greeks hate it because it steals and revises Greek history. Greeks like Russia and Serbia. Sadly - the average IQ of Greek politicians is around the 70-90 mark. Greeks do not know how to play real politik - so constantly ignore opportunities. Both Israel and Russia could have been used to stop Turkish incursions and expansions in the Aegean - neither card has been played by the vacant minded Greek politicians. Tsipras would refuse anyway to play those cards because he openly dislikes the idea of borders, loves Palestine and doesn't like the idea of Greece so much anyway - so Turks violating Greek borders and encroaching on and questioning Greek territory is hardly going to keep him up at night.

As for reading the classics. As a boy I was in Viotias one hot summer and I had brought my copy of Thucydides' 'Peloponnesian War.' Some kid saw I had it and said in English - 'hold on - you are reading this for pleasure?? Why would you do that? We are forced to read this in school, in ancient Greek and we go crazy that we have to..' I just replied - 'it is your history - you should cherish it.' Greeks often boast in Athens how little they care about the ancient past..  it is all about women, food and money. Pleasure seekers.. There are some Greeks like me.. when I meet them.. I am instantly their friend forever. The South has more like me. Peloponnese.


Greece is a dying culture. You are correct about internal and external enemies. Greece simply ran out of good leaders the way Ancient Athens famously did. The saying 'Greeks eat their own children' has some metaphorical base. There is an internal sabotage always alive in Greece that you dont automatically get in other nations. However, that's life.. what can I do? I wasted years trying to help Greece rise again. I realised around 10 years ago - there is no point fighting Greece's enemies - when a significant portion of the Greek population doesn't want Greece to exist anyway. So if ever I get involved in anything political - I instantly remind Greeks that those northern commie academics who state modern greece is a fabrication - while holding their Greek passports aloft are the biggest threat to the future of the country. The fact there is no basic law and order in greece is just a symptom of a broken leftist society struggling to find an identity that includes non Greeks.. As an old Italian once told me.. 'Rome fell when the emperors cared more about those living outside the city walls and those within..'

Once again, thank you for your reply. 

It is more like Portuguese politics than Iberian politics. The Spaniards are quite different. They have problems with autonomy of their regions (Catalonia and Basque Country, for example) and more partisan politics than Portugal. One example is that they had recently the opportunity recently to form a coalition somethat similar to ours and they didn't. You, in an anterior post, said that Greece was an island, in the metaphor (and almost real) sense. Well, we are an island too. Most of the current politic phenomena in Europe are completely alien to us 
I am glad that the Olympiacos essense is based on working class people. The junction of your grandiose past and the resisting present represents totally the true Hellenic spirit. 

Wow. The prevailing view is really that?! I think that every learned people in West (and I believe that in Greece too) thinks exactly the contrary. Your big achievements and legacy to the Western world came exactly in what you said. And that is a very good point. Apart from minor centres of Christianism, Greece was almost absent of Christians. And we all know the difficulties that Paul of Tarsus -described in the Acts of the Apostles- had in Athens. Christianity rise because of the your language but not because of you.
The 4th Crusade is one of the hideous acts in the history of humankind. Since I had heard that story, I had think that as a shame for the western world. I had read some Byzantine chronicles and the view of the westerns was not good. They called "us" barbarians (and with reason, btw). The "Turkophiles" was another face of the so called "orientalism"; and that same time that we had Byron, we had other fellows that worshipped Ottoman style of life, Chinese customs, etc. They ran deeply into the 20th Century, and with that huge and powerful community of Turks in Germany (and I do not forget the German support of the Ottomans in the WWI), the balance turns definitely to Turkey. And I do not even think what will be the consequences of the admission of Turkey in the EU. And yes, I do not understand too the distance between Latins and Greeks. It is more that unites us than apart us. Well, I had always liked Greece and I wish that one day will visit that beautiful land.
That is exactly our reaction too. When something bizarre happens in our country we used to say that Portugal is a "Banana republic"  But I think that you are more catastrophist, indeed.

So, your economical problem was of state control? Well, one problem of that big companies is that they had no nation at all. With the open of the markets of the prior Soviet Bloc and China, all that big companies abandon our countries. Here in Portugal, in my view, liberalism is even worse than state control. All denationalized industries formed oligopolies (with no competition at all) and by now almost strategical industries are in the hands of the Chinese...
The question of Israel and Russia are very interesting. Curiously, the EU fear both. I am very spectikal about Israel and Russia, but I think that we Europeans gained much more having good relations with them instead of tantalizing. They had much faults but they share most of our culture. As for you, an alliance with Israel and Russia would put the Turks alert.
That is a beautiful testimony. I think that we all had that kind of problems. In nowadays Portugal, for example, few of us read Camõe's Lusiads. And we ignore much of our past. But we don't have a huge problem of identity as you. I am kind of surprised by the absent of knowledge of your past. I had always think that you adore of your ancient legacy. But I am happy that you and others preserve the Greek past.
When you said that the "Greeks eat their own children", I am immediately think on the myth of Chronos. It all flows to the mythical times... I had that sentiment for Portugal too. The difference is that your problem is a problem of survival.

[Festivus]

You know, Faliro, I've been reading your posts and your insight about Greece and its history since 2013 and I must say, it seems like, based on your description and insight, that Greece and Greeks as a whole barely know who they are as a nation or people anymore. All of those invasions didn't help your culture and society either.

Greece does seem like a nation that lives from its past. If you mention Greece people think naturally of Ancient Greece and its philosophers. Modern day Greece is debt, crisis, unemployment and I guess some food? That's it. It's sad, to be honest. I was reading about minimum wages all over Europe and it looks like Greeks are now poorer than us. The country is economically now practically an Eastern European country, it seems. What future does it hold for Greece at this point?

Many Portuguese also are not confident in our country's future. Even if data says our economy is growing, we're still lagging and you gotta realise that things might look good now in comparison to 2010-2014 when we were in the gutter. Things were quite hard here for a while and we had a record 17% high unemployment rate in 2014. Nowadays our unemployment rate is below 10% but it seems like Spain and Greece still have A TON of unemployment?! How? Don't Spaniards and Greeks pack their bags and immigrate often like we do? We've always been quick to pack our bags and GTFO somewhere else when things get bad, here. It's practically in our genes nowadays, sadly. Go any wealthy nation in the world and you'll meet Portuguese people, despite us being a small country with low population. Like, seriously: France, Germany, Spain, Switzerland, Belgium, Luxembourg, the UK, USA, Canada, Australia and even countries like Brazil and Venezuela have a lot of people of Portuguese ancestry or immigrants.

We're a fast ageing country and at this point will cease to exist. How can we have children if it's so hard to raise them nowadays?! Like seriously, I am 28 years old and I plan on NEVER having kids. I see ZERO advantages in starting a family. You'll just lose a ton of money. People say "oh but having a wife and kids is wonderful", well that's not enough motivation to get them. You gotta be able to feed them and pay the bills.

People complain that we're a pessimistic people, but how can we NOT be when looking at our situation and our salaries? We're overworked and don't have good productivity. It's like we're living a life of servitude at this point. No wonder we "invented" slavery 

Tourism might be cool and all, but we just can't get the entire world here. There's no enough of us to work at hotels to server a number of tourists that doubles our population at this point. And then there's gentrification. Why the need for like 3 Starbucks in the historical centre of Lisbon? Ofc you can say our city had a lot of decaying buildings, but if you're demolishing historical and typical Portuguese buildings in order to build another Starbucks or McDonald's or a shop for pseudo-intellectual hipsters who work in IT, I'd rather keep the old run down building.

Allow me to go back a bit and address your point about Greeks not knowing how to promote their culture well through movies and such. Well neither do we. You live in the UK, right? Well, try one day, not literally but you know what I mean, going out and asking people around you to name products, brands and cultural aspects of Portugal and Portuguese culture. They might say "nandos", but that's South African. They might know Sumol is Portuguese due to Um Bongo juice. They might know port wine. But I'm sure 90% won't know any of these things. Portugal for foreigners is Ronaldo, Figo, Eusébio, Cristiano Ronaldo, Benfica, Porto and Sporting. Oh, and beaches. Yep. For 90% of people it's what we are. Remember most people don't care much about history and only care about the current times and what they see on tv 24/7. Back to Greece again, other than Varoufkis and Tsipras who were on the news a few years ago for a while, I dunno what famous people around the world Greece has nowadays. I dunno if currently there's any great celebrity or sportsman from Greece that most people know. I could be wrong, though.

You also talked about Greeks valuing what's foreign more. Well, I mean, on one hand that's good because being self-absorbed in your own country bubble is bad and makes you narrow minded like Americans are. But on the other hand, there's a big downside to it, which is importing all the bad and stupid things form countries like USA. Like SJWs. Ok, sure talk about LGBT rights, feminism, etc. all you want but we need to focus on other things as a country. It's like we're trying to worry about things that you'd expect someone as rich as Sweden worries about, all so that others look at us and think "wow so tolerant", as if their approval means something. Most richer countries look at us as if we're poor and toothless, anyway, so none of this crap is gonna make them change their minds. And please don't come tell me "but at least you still have White privilege!". Ok, thanks? 

Our political landscape is repetitive and stagnant and it's like politicians all lack IQ points or just simply don't care about the country. Hence why we have like a 44% abstention rate in most elections and we're not getting relevant new parties to rock the boat like many other countries are. Ok there's that party about animal rights, but of all things to worry about in this country why does it have to be THAT sort of party? They even bitched about Benfica flying an eagle before games once  . Yeah, clearly Benfica's eagle is the biggest problem in our country right now 

It's funny because, on paper, Portugal had the potential to be a pretty good country. We are united, peaceful, haven't had a war in our territory since fucking Napoleon and have a huge coastline and territorial waters. If you're wealthy or rich this is a GREAT country to live in. Portugal has the potential to be a California like type of country, but it doesn't know how to take advantage of it.

[Faliro]

You know, Faliro, I've been reading your posts and your insight about Greece and its history since 2013 and I must say, it seems like, based on your description and insight, that Greece and Greeks as a whole barely know who they are as a nation or people anymore. All of those invasions didn't help your culture and society either.

Well the Greek socialists never knew who they were anyway - so nothing has changed there. A slav who added an 'as' to the end of their name 100 years ago.. his kid's kid's will be socialists and kinda hate Greece.. The Peloponnese and places like that, Greeks know who they are. If you tell them they are not Greek you will not have a positive experience and your physical health may also be in instant danger.  Urban centres like Athens and Salonika.. not so much.. those are commie zones.

Greece does seem like a nation that lives from its past. If you mention Greece people think naturally of Ancient Greece and its philosophers. Modern day Greece is debt, crisis, unemployment and I guess some food? That's it. It's sad, to be honest. I was reading about minimum wages all over Europe and it looks like Greeks are now poorer than us. The country is economically now practically an Eastern European country, it seems. What future does it hold for Greece at this point?

It is important when you think of people losing jobs etc that you do not think that these people lost genuine jobs. Just because a PASOK makes 100,000 public sector jobs per year at the height of their madness, does not mean those 100k public sector jobs were ever economically viable or even useful to anyone other than those who collected a salary from it and an early pension. In return they would vote PASOK again and again to protect their newly created job..

As for the eastern Europe thing, Greece will always have wealth unlike those Eastern European places. Yes there is unemployment, but there is also a lot of money over in Hellas. The old adage - 'Greece is a poor country populated by millionaires' also has a strand of truth to it. There are only 10 million Greeks, so there is wealth. A poor Greek will still own parcels of land - a car or two - they are quite smart. And smartly they complain to anyone who will listen what they don't have.. to start the bidding low as it were..

Many Portuguese also are not confident in our country's future. Even if data says our economy is growing, we're still lagging and you gotta realise that things might look good now in comparison to 2010-2014 when we were in the gutter. Things were quite hard here for a while and we had a record 17% high unemployment rate in 2014. Nowadays our unemployment rate is below 10% but it seems like Spain and Greece still have A TON of unemployment?! How? Don't Spaniards and Greeks pack their bags and immigrate often like we do? We've always been quick to pack our bags and GTFO somewhere else when things get bad, here. It's practically in our genes nowadays, sadly. Go any wealthy nation in the world and you'll meet Portuguese people, despite us being a small country with low population. Like, seriously: France, Germany, Spain, Switzerland, Belgium, Luxembourg, the UK, USA, Canada, Australia and even countries like Brazil and Venezuela have a lot of people of Portuguese ancestry or immigrants.

Greeks do leave - in droves. Greece's population has barely changed in 30 years. They have very very few kids and many professionals leave and never return. You have to remember - greeks speak far better English that Italians, Spanish, Portuguese, French etc. They are designed to leave to Greece. Greeks leave and often never return. Portugal is a country I have only ever seen from the waiting lounges of the Lisbon Portela Airport en route to Brazil. I need to see it properly to form an opinion. Spain I do know well and the place is a disaster. Also I find many Spanish not 1% as open minded as Portuguese. The fact that I exist on this forum - discussing all the football clubs of the world - with Portuguese Benfica fans.. this would never happen on a Spanish forum.

We're a fast ageing country and at this point will cease to exist. How can we have children if it's so hard to raise them nowadays?! Like seriously, I am 28 years old and I plan on NEVER having kids. I see ZERO advantages in starting a family. You'll just lose a ton of money. People say "oh but having a wife and kids is wonderful", well that's not enough motivation to get them. You gotta be able to feed them and pay the bills.

I feel you. I think the most common reality is a girl you have been going out with over 10 years pressuring you to have kids and in the end you give in.. what is unforgivable is then telling other childless couples how wonderful it is and that you should join them and have kids.. In the UK we say - couples have kids when they have come to the point in their relationship when they have nothing else to say to each other.

People complain that we're a pessimistic people, but how can we NOT be when looking at our situation and our salaries? We're overworked and don't have good productivity. It's like we're living a life of servitude at this point. No wonder we "invented" slavery 

Tourism might be cool and all, but we just can't get the entire world here. There's no enough of us to work at hotels to server a number of tourists that doubles our population at this point. And then there's gentrification. Why the need for like 3 Starbucks in the historical centre of Lisbon? Ofc you can say our city had a lot of decaying buildings, but if you're demolishing historical and typical Portuguese buildings in order to build another Starbucks or McDonald's or a shop for pseudo-intellectual hipsters who work in IT, I'd rather keep the old run down building.

Tourism cannot sustain a nation. That is why I cannot forgive the left for wilfully destroying Greek industry and replacing it with public sector token jobs..

Allow me to go back a bit and address your point about Greeks not knowing how to promote their culture well through movies and such. Well neither do we. You live in the UK, right? Well, try one day, not literally but you know what I mean, going out and asking people around you to name products, brands and cultural aspects of Portugal and Portuguese culture. They might say "nandos", but that's South African.

They might know Sumol is Portuguese due to Um Bongo juice.

Um Bongo is your stuff? I used to love that stuff as a kid!!

They might know port wine. But I'm sure 90% won't know any of these things. Portugal for foreigners is Ronaldo, Figo, Eusébio, Cristiano Ronaldo, Benfica, Porto and Sporting. Oh, and beaches. Yep. For 90% of people it's what we are. Remember most people don't care much about history and only care about the current times and what they see on tv 24/7. Back to Greece again, other than Varoufkis and Tsipras who were on the news a few years ago for a while, I dunno what famous people around the world Greece has nowadays. I dunno if currently there's any great celebrity or sportsman from Greece that most people know. I could be wrong, though.

You are right. However it is not just Greece and Portugal who have this problem.. even Italy is getting boring.. On the plus at least people know Greece and Portugal exist.. Ask an American, Chinaman or an Australian what a Latvia is..

You also talked about Greeks valuing what's foreign more. Well, I mean, on one hand that's good because being self-absorbed in your own country bubble is bad and makes you narrow minded like Americans are. But on the other hand, there's a big downside to it, which is importing all the bad and stupid things form countries like USA. Like SJWs. Ok, sure talk about LGBT rights, feminism, etc. all you want but we need to focus on other things as a country. It's like we're trying to worry about things that you'd expect someone as rich as Sweden worries about, all so that others look at us and think "wow so tolerant", as if their approval means something. Most richer countries look at us as if we're poor and toothless, anyway, so none of this crap is gonna make them change their minds. And please don't come tell me "but at least you still have White privilege!". Ok, thanks? 

Greece is so past the white privilege thing. We have communists battling Nazis on the streets of Athens.. The place is too fucked to even pause for white guilt or PC garbage although the TV channels constantly try and introduce PC culture to Greece..

Our political landscape is repetitive and stagnant and it's like politicians all lack IQ points or just simply don't care about the country. Hence why we have like a 44% abstention rate in most elections and we're not getting relevant new parties to rock the boat like many other countries are. Ok there's that party about animal rights, but of all things to worry about in this country why does it have to be THAT sort of party? They even bitched about Benfica flying an eagle before games once  . Yeah, clearly Benfica's eagle is the biggest problem in our country right now 

You hit on something here. The Greek politicians simply don't like Greece. Yes we know Tsipras hates Greece - he is a trotskyist - it goes with the territory.. but even the so called 'conservative' voices in Greece hate Greece. I remember when Pangalos, foreign minister was caught on tape telling the Turkish Minister that Greeks are lazy and make poor workers.. He denied it of course - threatened to take anyone who repeated the story to court.. sadly for him a turk had recorded the whole thing.. so he backed down.. he is still in parliament.. (again a Greek with non Greek ancestry bashing Greeks - Pangalos is descended from 'Arvanities' - Albanian Greeks). 

It's funny because, on paper, Portugal had the potential to be a pretty good country. We are united, peaceful, haven't had a war in our territory since fucking Napoleon and have a huge coastline and territorial waters. If you're wealthy or rich this is a GREAT country to live in. Portugal has the potential to be a California like type of country, but it doesn't know how to take advantage of it.

Bad leaders. Like Greece. You know - Athens lost to the Spartans 2400 years ago. Everyone spent the next 500 years asking how Athens (the intellectual light of the world) could lose the Peloponnesian War to Sparta - basically educated soldiers in a totalitarian state. Thucydides I believe put is best. Athens ran out of good leaders. Pericles, Themistokles, Kimonas.. After each one died or was exiled.. in the end there was only shit leaders left.  For a nation to prosper you don't need a clever leader - you just need a leader that genuinely loves his country - and the left hate those characters... Trump, Bolsonaro, Erdogan.. 99% of politicians become politicians for money - not because they have some deep need to change their country for the better, lawyers become lawyers for money - not because they are quick witted and never lose an argument, doctors become doctors for money - not because as kids they were obsessed with the human body and how it works.

To be honest guys, I tell you all these things because you ask about Greece.. So I tell you the truth. if we were to meet in Greece - we would just have beer and enjoy the place so much.. When I go to Greece sometimes I argue with communists - but usually I just say my piece and leave.. I know it will sink in later to their minds.. I am not after a war there, I just enjoy the place.. swim.. eat.. I have fun.. I am artificiality more Greek than I should be because despite only my Grandfather being Greek but my mother brainwashed me into being Greek - took me every year since birth to the empty beaches of Atalandi.., baptised me Greek Orthodox.. the beauty of the nation did the rest. I will always love the land there.. but the people? 50/50.. I am not representative of most greeks.. I represent around 10%... if that..

[Festivus]

Well the Greek socialists never knew who they were anyway - so nothing has changed there. A slav who added an 'as' to the end of their name 100 years ago.. his kid's kid's will be socialists and kinda hate Greece.. The Peloponnese and places like that, Greeks know who they are. If you tell them they are not Greek you will not have a positive experience and your physical health may also be in instant danger.  Urban centres like Athens and Salonika.. not so much.. those are commie zones.

Well, that's good to know. That Greeks still know who they are.

It is important when you think of people losing jobs etc that you do not think that these people lost genuine jobs. Just because a PASOK makes 100,000 public sector jobs per year at the height of their madness, does not mean those 100k public sector jobs were ever economically viable or even useful to anyone other than those who collected a salary from it and an early pension. In return they would vote PASOK again and again to protect their newly created job..

As for the eastern Europe thing, Greece will always have wealth unlike those Eastern European places. Yes there is unemployment, but there is also a lot of money over in Hellas. The old adage - 'Greece is a poor country populated by millionaires' also has a strand of truth to it. There are only 10 million Greeks, so there is wealth. A poor Greek will still own parcels of land - a car or two - they are quite smart. And smartly they complain to anyone who will listen what they don't have.. to start the bidding low as it were..

And here I thought the Portuguese state was too omnipresent.

Greeks do leave - in droves. Greece's population has barely changed in 30 years. They have very very few kids and many professionals leave and never return. You have to remember - greeks speak far better English that Italians, Spanish, Portuguese, French etc. They are designed to leave to Greece. Greeks leave and often never return. Portugal is a country I have only ever seen from the waiting lounges of the Lisbon Portela Airport en route to Brazil. I need to see it properly to form an opinion. Spain I do know well and the place is a disaster. Also I find many Spanish not 1% as open minded as Portuguese. The fact that I exist on this forum - discussing all the football clubs of the world - with Portuguese Benfica fans.. this would never happen on a Spanish forum.

Well what do you mean by open mindness, exactly? When it comes to football, basically? Well that's simply because we're from a small country with a league that's not part of the big 3 or even big 5. So we're a tier or two below in the hierarchy. We have no other choice but to get bombarded with news of other clubs on social media.

We are also doomed to leave the country. Only in the 90s did immigrants into our country outnumber the locals leaving the country to elsewhere. Nearly everyone heree has a relative or a distant relative that either lives or lived abroad at some point. Een highly educated Portuguese people often leave the country. My brother, for example, left for Belgium nearly a decade ago already. At this point I think only the Polish or Romanians outnumber us in terms of immigration in Europe. Polish people are everywhere. You're from the UK, so you probably have met Poles, Romanians, Bulgarians and I guess Portuguese people there. A guy I talk to from the Uk who works at a hospital doing paperwork/administrative stuff, told me the hospital has a lot of Portuguese nurses.

I feel you. I think the most common reality is a girl you have been going out with over 10 years pressuring you to have kids and in the end you give in.. what is unforgivable is then telling other childless couples how wonderful it is and that you should join them and have kids.. In the UK we say - couples have kids when they have come to the point in their relationship when they have nothing else to say to each other.

That's very cool of you to say to me, considering you're married. I can't stand when married men or men in long term relationships act condescendingly with me because I am single. Relationships in general are overrated, imo. And by this, I'm not saying there aren't many great ones out there or that yours is bad by any means, know. But they're not the secret to permanent happiness, especially when you consider that most of them fail and that most people have a few bfs/gfs in their lives until they find "the one", if they do, and even "the one" might result in a divorce. Honestly, the main reason most people get into them is because of sex, especially when they're young. That or financial stability when they're older. All of this also boils down to people simply loving company due to human beings being social creatures. It's like it's in our biological senses to do that in order to procreate and continue the species.

We're getting married and having kids later and later. It's simply no longer sustainable to have 4 kids like it was in the 1950s. Most people of middle class only have 1 or 2 kids. It's the poorer and the richer people who have the most kids on average.

Movies and the media overrate the whole love and fmaily thing and only show us the good parts.

Fact is, this is no longer the 1950s-1990s. The bubble has burst and even if your country is growing for a few years you just know it's a matter of time until shit hits the fan again. And countries like Portugal and Greece will suffer strongly again when the next crisis comes.

Tourism cannot sustain a nation. That is why I cannot forgive the left for wilfully destroying Greek industry and replacing it with public sector token jobs..

Exactly. Industry? What is Portuguese industry even anymore? And let's not even talk about our agriculture. We're ages behind large parts of Europe in terms of farming technology. We export lemons and oranges because obviously we have the climate and soil for that.
As for actual industry? We make... shoes, car parts, cork(number 1 exporter in the world), olive oil and wine. Our largest brand is either Sumol+Compal who make juice and soft drinks or Renova, a company that makes napkins and toilet paper. It's good stuff but kinda funny that one of our biggest companies makes that kind of stuff lol. Meanwhile we can't wipe our own shit 

Um Bongo is your stuff? I used to love that stuff as a kid!!

Yes, it is! UM BONGO UM BONGO, O BOM SABOR DA SELVAAAA!

You are right. However it is not just Greece and Portugal who have this problem.. even Italy is getting boring.. On the plus at least people know Greece and Portugal exist.. Ask an American, Chinaman or an Australian what a Latvia is..

Latvia regained its independence 30 years ago or less and, afaik, it never did much in history. Of the Baltic countries, Lithuania is the one with the most well known history, I'd say. Estonia is known for having a very good economy for a former Soviet country.

Greece is so past the white privilege thing. We have communists battling Nazis on the streets of Athens.. The place is too fucked to even pause for white guilt or PC garbage although the TV channels constantly try and introduce PC culture to Greece..

Tbh it's harder to sell it to you guys. You didn't colonise or oppress natives from the Americas, Asia or Africa like we did nor do you have a significant black population like we do 

You hit on something here. The Greek politicians simply don't like Greece. Yes we know Tsipras hates Greece - he is a trotskyist - it goes with the territory.. but even the so called 'conservative' voices in Greece hate Greece. I remember when Pangalos, foreign minister was caught on tape telling the Turkish Minister that Greeks are lazy and make poor workers.. He denied it of course - threatened to take anyone who repeated the story to court.. sadly for him a turk had recorded the whole thing.. so he backed down.. he is still in parliament.. (again a Greek with non Greek ancestry bashing Greeks - Pangalos is descended from 'Arvanities' - Albanian Greeks). 

Damn, that's brutal, hearing that from someone you might have voted for.

Bad leaders. Like Greece. You know - Athens lost to the Spartans 2400 years ago. Everyone spent the next 500 years asking how Athens (the intellectual light of the world) could lose the Peloponnesian War to Sparta - basically educated soldiers in a totalitarian state. Thucydides I believe put is best. Athens ran out of good leaders. Pericles, Themistokles, Kimonas.. After each one died or was exiled.. in the end there was only shit leaders left.  For a nation to prosper you don't need a clever leader - you just need a leader that genuinely loves his country - and the left hate those characters... Trump, Bolsonaro, Erdogan.. 99% of politicians become politicians for money - not because they have some deep need to change their country for the better, lawyers become lawyers for money - not because they are quick witted and never lose an argument, doctors become doctors for money - not because as kids they were obsessed with the human body and how it works.

Yeah, I must ask you,do you know what education is like in Greece? Are the philosophical texts of Plato, Aristoteles, Socrates, etc. valued?

To be honest guys, I tell you all these things because you ask about Greece.. So I tell you the truth. if we were to meet in Greece - we would just have beer and enjoy the place so much.. When I go to Greece sometimes I argue with communists - but usually I just say my piece and leave.. I know it will sink in later to their minds.. I am not after a war there, I just enjoy the place.. swim.. eat.. I have fun.. I am artificiality more Greek than I should be because despite only my Grandfather being Greek but my mother brainwashed me into being Greek - took me every year since birth to the empty beaches of Atalandi.., baptised me Greek Orthodox.. the beauty of the nation did the rest. I will always love the land there.. but the people? 50/50.. I am not representative of most greeks.. I represent around 10%... if that..

Well me and others ask you because you don't seem to have a problem educating us on Greece and I personally always like reading your perspective on things. Greece is usually viewed as a romantic place to go on vacation. It does indeed have lovely islands and scenery, from the photos I've seen of the country. But like every country it has a dark side.