6th August: It is still very hot. Halkidiki has been put on yellow alert for forest fires. No barbecues until further notice. Surprisingly, people were also warned not to throw cigarette ends out of cars. Why? Shouldn’t that be a matter of common sense? And shouldn’t it apply at all times and seasons, not just... Continue Reading →
23/009 Life in Northern Greece
Summer is here and we are in the middle of a heatwave called Cerberus. About three weeks ago there were three deaths and one life-changing injury in northern Greece. In Perea, next door to me, a young Syrian dived off the jetty into the sea. He’s now paraplegic. Three older people were also pulled out... Continue Reading →
23/007 Irish Music in Northern Greece
9th July 2023. Our depleted numbers assembled to celebrate the Dubliner’s 8th birthday. It’s amazing what Ken, the owner, has come through from bureaucratic tribulations to Covid. Yet the bar is still there. Our April/May/June playlist did an additional month’s service, but I have finally given it a rest. A couple of days after the... Continue Reading →
23/013 Greek Word
μανούρα = a ball ache. Well, that was the translation my bilingual interlocutor proffered. It is a colloquial word, not as vulgar as my interlocutor’s translation. It’s also missing from several dictionaries including the Babiniotis. My Word Reference app defined it as “sth: requires effort” or “κτ που θέλει κόπο” while giving ταλαιπωρία as a... Continue Reading →
23/012 Greek Word
λαθροϋλοτόμος – an illegal logger I came across this in an article about a forest ranger being the victim of a serious attack by an illegal logger who hit the man on the head with a metal bar. This is the article: https://www.ethnos.gr/greece/article/267539/poseginehepitheshmeoploapolathroylotomosyxnaantimetopoimediaplhktismoysoidasikoiypallhloileipoyn1000atomaapotisyphresies The word has three parts: λαθρο = hidden/secret so by extension ‘illegal’... Continue Reading →
23/008 Life in Northern Greece
The elections are over. An overall majority for the New Democracy government, a slight increase in the vote share for PASOK and the KKE, the election of one extreme right and two far right parties, and the re-election of the demented Zoe Konstantopoulou who, having scraped into Parliament with 3.17% of the popular vote, declared... Continue Reading →
23/006 Irish Music in Northern Greece
As I write, the Athens Irish Festival is underway. No-one up in the wild north received an invitation. Not that that’s a problem in itself; it is the "Athens" Irish Festival, after all. The clue is in the name, as they say. However, what annoys me – apart from the mad story-telling banshee opening the... Continue Reading →
23/007 Life in Northern Greece
For an election period, things seem quite quiet. The first round was a disaster for the opposition leader, Alexis Tsipras, the biggest chancer in Greek politics. It’s a terrible situation when you don’t want the government to win and when you want the opposition to lose. No joy at all. Here in Thessaloniki, Tsipras did... Continue Reading →
23/011 Greek Word
εκπαραθυρώνω – defenestrate I love it when a word is immediately understandable. In Greek, like English, it can be used literally and metaphorically. The current metaphorical favourite in British English is ‘throw someone under/in front of a bus’. Were I to translate that into Greek, I would probably choose εκπαραθυρώνω. As Greek has borrowed extensively... Continue Reading →
Greek Word 23/010
παράσυρση = running over and dragging a pedestrian or a cyclist along the road. Word’s spellcheck does not recognise the above. It offers alternatives like παράλυση and παράφυση. Nor does Babiniotis have it as a headword or even within the definition of its parent verb παρασύρω. The word caught my attention when I saw this... Continue Reading →
23/006 Life in Northern Greece: Graffiti
Graffiti used to be a simple affair. Political graffiti in Greek and football graffiti mainly in the Latin alphabet. For instance, ‘IRA’ did not signify support for Irish Republicans – it was short for Iraklis, a transliteration of the Ηρα of Ηρακλής (Hercules), Thessaloniki’s third football team. There was plenty of it, and practically every... Continue Reading →
23/009 Greek Word
ετεροδημότης (fem: ετεροδημότισσα) = someone who lives in one municipality but who is registered to vote in another. It’s election time. Maybe it’s because I live outside the city that the campaigns seem less febrile than usual. Besides, Sunday 21st May will likely be Round 1, so the real battles will take place from Monday... Continue Reading →
23/005 Irish Music in Northern Greece
April was quiet. On the 2nd of the month, we did our April session. It was our quietest since we began in October 2021, with only seven of us playing. Further bad news – three of our regulars, Kostas from Tir Fada and his twin sons are moving to Crete. This is in addition to... Continue Reading →
23/005 Life in Northern Greece Το Περίπτερο
The “periptero” is a fixture of Greek life which might slowly be disappearing as more convenience stores like 4all and Today are muscling in on it. Although similar in concept to the French kiosque, the περίπτερο defied translation. Long ago when I was working in an English-speaking environment in Thessaloniki, it wasn’t uncommon to hear... Continue Reading →
23/008 Greek Word
σκαρφίζομαι = dream up, make up, come up with an (improbable) story, επινοώ I got this from the telly. There is a channel on Nova called Epic Drama, mostly consisting of murder mysteries such as the Canadian series Murdoch, a UK/Austrian series called Vienna Blood, Agatha Christie’s Miss Marple, and other UK staples such as... Continue Reading →
23/007 Greek Word
Λέτσος = shabbily dressed, a borrowing from the Italian ‘lezzo’. The Dictionary of Greek goes further: Άνθρωπος βρόμικος και κακοντυμένος, κουρελής μτφ. α) άνθρωπος χωρίς αξία και σοβαρότητα β) άνθρωπος με άσχημους τρόπους και άσχημη εμφάνιση. What amused me, on overhearing two women talking, was that they were not talking about some tramp hovering nearby... Continue Reading →
23/006 Greek Word
κουτσουπιά = Judas tree, also known as δέντρο του Ιούδα We drove down to Athens on 9th April, our Easter Sunday and Orthodox Palm Sunday. The motorway was unusually quiet - almost like driving in Peak Covid again. For large stretches, on both sides of the motorway one could see beautiful lilac-coloured trees. Apparently, they... Continue Reading →
23/004 Life in Northern Greece
Street names tell you a lot about a nation’s history. In my hometown in Ireland there is a Parnell Street and an O’Connell Street, named in honour of Charles Stewart Parnell and Daniel O’Connell, and these street names will be repeated in most Irish towns. On emigrating to Glasgow, I made a number of mistaken... Continue Reading →
23/004 Irish Music in Northern Greece
Only in Greece! How can a small mountain town of 14,000 inhabitants host a 4- or 5-day St. Patrick’s festival? Well, Grevena manages it, and it is a commercial and artistic success. We set off at 10:30am on Saturday, 18th March, our destination a restaurant called Marmita in a village called Megalo Sirini (Μεγάλο Σειρήνι)... Continue Reading →
23/005 Greek Word
καρμίρης, plural καρμίρηδες, feminine form καρμίρω Basically, it means a miserable git, a bit of a miser, too mean to enjoy life if it involves spending money. Άνθρωπος μίζερος, κακομοίρης που δεν χαίρεται τη ζωή, για να μην ξοδέψει λεφτά. (Babiniotis) It seems to have developed from an earlier form of κακομοίρης, the Hellenistic κάρμοιρος... Continue Reading →