Growing up, moving on

I will be 34 soon. It's a bit scary, I think. Sometimes I feel that it's not true, that it's some kind of mistake. A couple of years ago someone asked me how old I was and I instinctively replied '19'. And I meant it.

Last year was an odd year, bad things happened, at work, with 'friends' etc. But at the end of the year I felt that I was better, I felt that I had moved on from many things.

Every year, I feel the new problems coming, I can see the challenges ahead. It's hard being older, it's hard trying to be sincere, trying not to hide, trying to behave as one should.

But I guess this is the good side of growing up: by growing up you're also moving on.

And that can only be good, 34 years and all. 

Photos

Coming back home, at least for me, often entails getting distracted with old photos. I just spent a good hour looking at ancient photos that made my heart jump. Most of them were badly taken, out of focus pictures taken at times of family bliss. In them, I managed to see myself extremely thin (it doesn't even look like me), drinking a beer from a tin (I don't drink beer anymore ), hugging people I don't even know existed, hugging ancient boyfriends and hanging out with friends that I don't see anymore with their boyfriends that they broke up with in what feels like the last century.

I saw my parents young, or at least younger, my mum with a killer bikini body I never knew existed, and no lines in her face. My father young, with a beard, like I've never seen before. I also saw people that have died, and I saw them happy and alive. I saw my old pets, most of them dead, when they were young pups having their pictures taken constantly, the novelty factor not having work off (we got. A dog!!)

Sometimes it made me feel unreal as if all this wasn't me: I couldn't remember myself, the people, the place, anything and there I was laughing away, wearing clothes that I don't recognise and sporting terrible haircuts I wouldn't want to be seen dead in.

Some other times, though, my heart jumps: a picture works like an electric shock and I go back to the time and the place, I am back there, wherever there is, transported back in time. I am back being my 15 year old self, sporting a terrible haircut and clothes I don't recognise, posing for the camera, being on top of the world.

On a personal note

In Belfast, it's raining. Heavily, falling on my windows, as if it is October. But it's June.

In Greece, the conservatives are into government, with some ex-socialist losers and an opportunist small "left-wing' party that will soon go to the footnotes of History. Not "the radical left", because if it was up to them we would be out of the Euro apparently. Whatev.

In Greece again, but in the whole of Europe, neo-nazi movements are on the rise. Prominent figures note that last time the world had an austerity agenda, nazism rose. But people don't listen. Perhaps they didn't get the 'history repeating' memo? Should we give them a copy of Thucydides's Historiae? As if...

But life goes on, you know? I am leaving for Greece tomorrow. And no matter what is wrong with my country, I really want to go back and spend a month there. I want to spend a month in the heat, feeling myself again. And then get married. That's right, I am getting married this summer. I am usually working like an idiot, having no time to stop and think, but this year I will take it easy, go to Greece for a month, tan like a motherfucker and be a bride!

So, in the immortal words of the amazing Robyn: Konnichi wa bitches! Have a good summer, go to somewhere sunny and forget the woes of the world. it will all be ok, as long as there is sun...

First they came for the communists,
and I didn't speak out because I wasn't a communist.

Then they came for the trade unionists,
and I didn't speak out because I wasn't a trade unionist.

Then they came for the Jews,
and I didn't speak out because I wasn't a Jew.

Then they came for me
and there was no one left to speak out for me.


(Martin Niemöller)

More and more often in my life, I find myself thinking about the above poem. These days I've been thinking about this because of how I feel of the way Greece and the Greek people have been treated by the western media. In a poignant article, economist Yanis Varoufakis tries to set the record straight. Essentially, he criticises the way the BBC have misrepresented the Greek election as a fight between a Pro-Europe group and an Against-Europe group. Don't get me wrong, there have been many many excellent analyses of the Greek crisis in foreign media, and you can have a look at some here, here, here and here (courtesy of my friend, Captain Red, as I like to call her these days). 

My estimation, which is not a very well-informed one admittedly, can only be summarised in the poem above: be careful who you don't fight for, fellow Europeans. Greece is a corrupt country with a lot of problems, but these problems are not the reason for the crisis. They just contribute to it. When the euro collapses, and the bubble of the Northern EU countries bursts, they won't have anyone to blame but themselves, because they chose to blame Greece for everything that was wrong with the EU, without realising the truth behind the problem. Then, though, it will be too late and truly there will be no one to speak out for them. 

Racism

How do we go from this:



to this:


Different as they are, they both deal with some form of racism. Real life racism vs. racism in art. The Golden Yawn rep (new term courtesy of my good friend WL) attacked people, women, live on air. He is a neo-nazi fascist, racist to the bone, of the people who go around terrorising immigrants in Greece everyday. I even saw they attacked an israeli journalist, and they they don't like the term 'neo-nazi'



I am in two minds about these people, do we need to see them in TV or not? Norway, France seem to think not. In some countries it is a crime to be a holocaust denier. Some years ago I thought we didn't need to go down this road, I like Voltaire too much "I do not agree with what you have to say, but I'll defend to the death your right to say it." But these days, seeing elected representatives hitting women on live TV, I am not so sure anymore. Perhaps freedom of speech should be somehow restrained and when you are a criminal and speak and behave in a way that society has deemed as criminal and disgusting, then you have no more right to speak. 


You do however have every right to fuck off out of my face. 

The slow win

I hate Facebook, this much I am sure you know. Foolishly I thought I hated all social media (obviously forgetting I am a blogger). I guess I think blogging is not a silly social medium, or something like this.
Last week though I succumbed to the charms of instagram (those filters!). And today I joined twitter... There is no hope for me now, is there?

Missed being Greek

I've been living outside Greece for 10 years now. Seems too much sometimes if you ask me. When I first left I never thought whether that was for ever, or when I would come back. Now of course, my return seems more and more unlikely and doubtful. I live here, I work here, my fiancé is from here. Most probably I will never be able to get a job in Greece anyway.

Financial crisis aside, I often feel out of place when I go back to Greece. People shout a lot. They drive like mad. They smoke everywhere. People put too ugh oil when they cook (whereas I have to count it...) Nothing works properly. And so on and so forth.  These, of course, are stupid generalisations, but I am Greek myself so I can make them, and entirely unapologetically so. My father jokes with me often when I complain, sometimes with a hidden bitterness in his voice "why are you complaining, are you not Greek yourself?"

Sure, I am, I think. but not a real Greek surely, at least not anymore. I have been too bastardised by living in these western lands for so long.

Sometimes however, I miss my Greekness. I want to sing again, I want to dance trashy eurovison songs (Paparizou - my number one, anyone?) and go to μπουζούκια. I want to eat σουβλάκια for dinner in the warm summer outdoors. I want to stroll in the heat. I want to eat καρπούζι till I feel entirely bloated. I want to sweat so much from the heat, that I cannot put any make up on whatsoever. I want to listen to my favourite radio shows in real time. I want to watch trashy and not so trashy TV (Το νησί rules! I found it so late...) I want to know who is big in Greece these days, which songs do kids like. I want to buy Korres stuff from my local pharmacy. I want to go to my local bar and have a beer. I want to feel Greek again, I want to feel myself.

People change. Our lives change. I think I've written it before here in this blog: am I the same person I was when I was 19, living in Crete, listening to stereo nova and reading 01? Maybe. Partly. Maybe not. Yesterday I was dancing to Greek trash in my oh so proper office and it felt so out of place really, it was comical. But I felt myself again, and it was fucking fun.

Can't wait for the summer.