By PHK
Neither. Best bets? September or May.
What is it about foreign classical archeologists that compel them to write travel articles or even an occasional book about modern Greece? If they’d stick to their expertise on the ruins, excavations and the history they know so well and describe them in laymen’s terms, terrific. Otherwise, short trips to Athens to attend conferences – while making a little money by writing travel pieces on the side - just do not compute.
That’s - at any rate - how Justin Marozzi’s “Democracy in Action” which dominates page 17 of the “Life and Arts” section of the August 4-5, 2007 Financial Times struck me.
Don’t get me wrong, I’m a fan of the Financial Times including and especially its weekly “Life and Arts Section.” But to publish such a strange article on this world famous city written by a neophyte – who tells us that he never set eyes on the city until after the 2004 Olympics and who bases his FT feature story on a single week’s visit last November just . . . well doesn’t compute.
The FT could do a lot better. It normally does.
You’d think the paper would have tapped any number of seasoned British writers who know Greece like the back of their hands and could have come up with a more insightful story for travelers destined for Greece. There’s been a large ex-pat community in Athens for decades after all.
Avoid November
Meanwhile, for anyone contemplating a trip to Greece, avoid November. Its only redeeming feature is the smell of roasting chestnuts from the sidewalk vendors that permeates the early evening air.
November prices may be right: but there’s a reason. Athens in November is often cold, damp, and overcast as opposed to the crisper, but still warm September days or the country’s velvet spring.
In November, the sea can be choppy and even Crete can be clammy and unpleasant. The good news is that there are fewer tourists in November – except for the intrepid ones who come on bargain basement tours that often also include Egypt and Israel where the weather is far better that time of year. These are the some of the same tourists who are herded to the Acropolis whether or not they want to clamber on its rocks. Too often, they then display their ignorance for everyone in earshot even when excellent Greek guides lay it out in plain English for them.
The ‘highlight’ of “Democracy in Athens”
Marozzi’s description of such an American tourist group being addressed by an ever more exasperated Greek tour guide is priceless. It’s the highlight of his article. His reported exchange between two tourists and their guide would be hilarious – if it weren’t so sad. It demonstrates once again the sub-basement quality of the US educational system and the lack of worldly and historical inquisitiveness of too many of our citizens.
Or maybe the Acropolis just brings out the worst in some people. During a visit there over Easter 1966, I overheard a similar American tour group being lectured by their American preacher. The lecturer – I won’t call him a guide - expounded loudly and in great detail about the importance of a pile of non-descript rocks in the foreground. His flock was reverently informed that that was where Paul had preached to the Athenians. Meanwhile, the preacher blissfully, or ignorantly, ignored the incredible setting, the spectacular sunset and the Acropolis’ primary significance to the classical and modern worlds.
Summer in Athens is also far from ideal.
Hot sandy winds blow north from the expanding Sahara. They fan fires in the surrounding hills and make life generally uncomfortable - sometimes even gritty. This year, the fires came early. But that’s why Greeks often head for the islands or the shore – and stay there until August is over. The Assumption Day August 15 holiday translates into a deserted city devoid of the usual jostling, boisterous crowds. The heart and soul of the city have, for good reason, temporarily moved elsewhere.
In Athens, November means prices are at rock bottom – although that bottom is a lot higher than before Greece joined the EURO club. Autumn’s softer prices probably still include those at the Monastiraki Flea Market – a favorite tourist haunt just below the Acropolis and across from the Ancient Agora. Bargaining there helps – and speaking even a little Modern Greek can open doors.
Getting to know Athens from the spectacular roof top terrace of the King George II Hotel on Syntagma Square or via short breaks snuck from an apparently incredibly dull conference at the British School of Archeology as Marozzi did hardly provides adequate acquaintanceship with or knowledge of the real flavor of the place. The Getty photograph of the Acropolis that accompanies the FT article, by the way, was not taken from either and the BSA website indicates that accommodations are limited to 20 members at a time. They’re certainly not available to everyone.
For those who cannot afford living “the life of Reilly” at the King George II or even for those who can, a Funicular to the top of Lycavittos Hill offers an even more spectacular view of the Acropolis, the Ancient Agora below and the urban sprawl that defines much of the rest of the metropolis. From there, the blue Saronic Gulf glistens on the horizon on a sunny day. A walk up Voukourestiou from Syntagma Square affords a great view of Agios Giorgios the small, white-washed chapel that crowns Lycavittos’ summit. So too from the Zappion Gardens behind the parliament. They make great photo-ops.
Athens: a city of the night
Meanwhile Marozzi is right about one thing: the Plaka District below the Acropolis is overrun by tourists – but it’s been that way for decades. What he didn’t say, however, is that the “in” downtown restaurant and nightclub district for Greeks is Psyrri.
Psyrri is a stone’s throw from the Monastiraki metro stop but a long walk from Syntagma and Omonia Squares. In the evening, Psyrri swarms with Greek youth, music, dancing, food and more. Some come by motorcycle, but many more pour out of Athens’ excellent, newly expanded and upgraded metro – finished just in time for the Olympics. The revelers stay until the crack of dawn: Greece is very much a Mediterranean country where dinners can begin as late as 11 pm, but restaurants that cater to tourists open far earlier.
Heed the warnings: stay away from political demonstrations
The advice Marozzi was given – and ignored – to stay away from the huge annual November 17 anti-American demonstration against the U.S. Embassy was sage. He should have listened. He, at least, was forewarned. I found myself years ago in the middle of a major leftist, anti-American demonstration in central Thessaloniki because the US Consulate had failed to notify the private American-supported school where I worked - or the school administration forgot to pass along the message. Regardless, this too close-up manifestation of democracy-in-action was an unnerving experience.
Those cudgel bearing thugs Marozzi encountered in the November 17 demonstration’s midst were most likely part of a Greek leftist anarchist movement that’s been around for years. The anarchists concentrate more on breaking window panes and less on breaking heads – although I certainly wouldn’t want to provoke them as he apparently did by asking to take their picture. Businesses on the march’s route close up shop well before the demonstration begins. They lower metal protective screens over their windows to blunt the all too predictable annual damage.
Just as more Greeks still smoke than their northern European counterparts, participatory politics – especially political argument - is also part and parcel of many Greek lives.
The three party system divides mainly between center-left and center-right and focuses on personalities. Greeks are an emotional people and arguments are heated. In former days, the sometimes illegal, but ever present, Communist Party (KKE) or other configurations of the extreme left held the balance between the two large centrist parties. This made for a particularly uncomfortable and unstable political brew.
Today’s anti-Americanism is nothing new. It began well before the military junta which seized power in the midst of the political mayhem in 1967 but it intensified during and after the Nixon administration’s showy support for an increasingly unpopular military dictatorship. Once again, however, the Greeks I know distinguish between the United States where many have relatives, friends and may have studied and American foreign policy – particularly the Iraq invasion. Small countries with colonial heritages especially dislike it when a large power goes on the rampage.
The most extreme anti-American reaction came from a home grown terrorist group that combined an idiosyncratic Trotskyite form of Communism with ultra-Orthdoxy. The group named itself “November 17” after the uprising at the Polytechnion (the Polytechnical University) that led to the military junta’s downfall in 1974. It began with the murder of Richard Welch, the CIA station chief, in 1975. N-17 was only rounded up July 2002. Its members are in jail, but a copy-cat group called Revolutionary Struggle ("Epanastatikos Agonas" or EA)” apparently assailed the US Embassy seal with missiles in January. They missed the seal but shattered a nearby bathroom window instead.
Athens by Night and Day
Athens, however, is far more than political arguments that last into the wee hours in smoke-filled cafes complete with over-amplified bouzouki music. The city also has a vibrant cultural scene. In the summer and into September, the Athens Festival performances at the ancient Herod Atticus open air theater bring in world class artists. If you go, take along a cushion and light wrap. The seats are hard and the air can get cool after sundown.
Athens’ culture is also more than productions of works by foreign artists or the spectacular collection of ancient Greek art in the National Museum. Shopping is far more varied than the Flea Market in Monastiraki or the shops that line the Plaka.
Perhaps because the country sits between east and west, its music, painting and literary traditions provide a unique blend – depending on the artist or writer. Just listen to the music of composers like the venerable Manos Hadjidakis and Mikis Theodorakis whose compositions inhabit both popular and classical spheres, the cinema as well as the tiniest boites.
When the summer season ends, classical music moves indoors – to smaller venues or into the Mousikis Megaron Concert Hall, the home of the Athens Symphony. It’s on Vassilias Sophias not far from the American Embassy.
The still upscale Kolonaki district is home to a plethora of art galleries, restaurants, and tavernas as well as 
small, exclusive boutiques and the BSA. Many, but not all, of the eating establishments almost encircle Kolonaki Square.
Shops of two of Athens best known jewelers – Lalaounis and Zolotas – are found at Kolonaki’s edge. They are at six and ten Panepistimiou respectively, about a block apart and across the street from the back of the venerable Hotel Grande Bretagne. The Lalaounis’ Jewelry Museum is on Karyatidon and Kallisperi Streets just off the esplanade of Dionysiou Areopagitou St., on the south side of the Acropolis. Oh, and don’t forget the National Welfare Organization’s shop for quality Greek handicrafts in Monastiraki at Ypatias 6 and Apollonos.
For a more complete and up-to-date listing of galleries, openings and even shopping check out the English language Athens News. Meanwhile, if you’d like to read columns by two people who really do know Greece, the Greeks and life in Athens from a foreigner’s perspective click on the Athens News links to Brian Church, who has recently returned to the UK, and Brady Kiesling, who still lives there.
Certainly, visit the major museums. The city is now full of them including the collection inside the Syntagma metro stop. One of the largest and best known is the Benaki Museum at 1 Koumbari and Vassilias Sophias. Check out its shop for museum replicas and have lunch in its roof top restaurant which also includes a snack bar. The Benaki also has collections elsewhere – including a special one of Islamic art.
Friends also told me the Museum of Cycladic Art is not to be missed. It opened in 1986 and is down the street from the Benaki. The address is Neophytou Douka Street 4. Unfortunately, this museum was closed when we planned to visit it last September. It too has a restaurant and museum shop worth seeing. For us, it will have to wait until next time.
By all means, watch the changing of the guard in front of the parliament (Voulis) that dominates Syntagma 
Square and if you catch it on a Sunday morning, the parade of the Evzones will be unimpeded by traffic. But also stroll through the shaded Zappeion gardens behind the parliament some afternoon.
Athens has improved considerably since I worked there from 1981-84 and visited in the early 1990s. My stay there September 2006 prove Marozzi’s informants right. The city is far cleaner, buses no longer spew unadulterated fumes, and the metro is a God-sent. Over the years, Greece’s EU membership has considerably raised the standard of living and the 2004 Olympics – despite the enormous cost – helped serve as an impetus to change.
Demonstrations and a few errant missiles not withstanding, the country’s political life has lost much of its standing-on-the-brink-of-the-political-abyss edge. Sure, not everything is perfect – higher prices make living too expensive for too many and there’s still way too much traffic. But if you give wide berth to the demonstrators and the intrepid, no-nothing tourists, you’ll have great time. The koulourakia sellers still hawk their wares on 
the street corners, kiosks brim with newspapers, magazines, maps, books and postcards and the flower stalls around the corner from the parliament perfume the sidewalk's air. All provide a sense of permanence that helps to link this city to it's past while distinguishing it the others. Athena’s city has come along way.
Photo Credits: Parthenon by WJK, summer 1981; View of Acropolis from King George II Hotel Terrace by PHK Sept. 2006; Ancient Agora from Acropolis Hill by PHK March 1971; Athens Parliament at Night by PHK, Sept. 2006; Kolonaki Street by PHK Sept. 2006; Syntagma Metro Sign by PHK Sept. 2006; Changing of the guard at the parliament by PHK from the King George II, Sept. 2006; Periptero (kiosk) by PHK, Sept. 2006; Koulourakia by PHK, Sept. 2006.