High life
In a fix
Taki
Athens javing the unspoiled and beautiful village of Gstaad to fly into the i Polluted hell-hole that is Athens is as Perverse as, say, leafing through Hustler magazine after having read the Spectator from cover to cover. Fortunately, it was on- ly leafing through. I stayed 24 hours, 24 hours too many as far as I was concerned. 9nce upon a time my heart would beat taster with anticipation and excitement as se'clo as the aeroplane would begin its ap- proach. No longer. Now I feel almost h`aegraded upon arrival. The shabby airport, the confusion, and the studied arrogance of the customs men remind me that however many millions of dollars the EEC is willing to Pay Greece to keep her in the European me.Mrn, unity, Hellas will remain a poor n iddie-Eastern country, poor because she as no oil, Middle-Eastern because of her oPle's false values and propensity for ..,alning others for their self-induced disasters. Only tourism keeps the proverbial Wolf from her door.
socialist since October 1981 Greece has had a !9clalist government, one that has na- ,nonalised every business its predecessors had not, which — in view of the fact that beery major utility and industry already w.longed to the state — left the socialists af!th Only small private companies to go !h. ter.. To give them their due, however, ere is not a scintilla of truth to the rumour that certain souvlaki joints and some taver- "as have been taken over °Ile does not need to have excelled at `reek history to comprehend what envy (an ancient Greek trait), expedience, political 'Ielshonesty (a modern Greek invention) and buck) du dollar (the passing of the _114) have done to a once proud and hard- awneirk,_Ing Populace, and to a once beautiful "aunting city. The people nowadays act traffic e svages, while the pollution and the are worse than in Mexico City or
Cairo. Worse, the ugliness of the buildings is on a par with the harshness of the socialist rhetoric and anti-American pro- paganda.
Ironically, as I was about to leave Gstaad to visit my parents I ran into a childhood friend from Greece. His name is Carolos Fix, and, as most of you know who have visited Greece, Fix in Greece has always meant beer. Ever since the conception of modern Greece in 1830. That is when Otto of Bavaria became the first King of Hellenes, and brought with him lots of ar- chitects, engineers, and the de rigueur brewer, the first Carolos Fix. Fix has brew- ed beer in Greece ever since, and, justly, has made a lot of money from Greek thirst. When the socialists came to power they decided that Fix might have been good for Greeks (Fix had copied the Guinness mot- to), but it was high time that Fix profits went into their pockets instead of his.
So, Fix was nationalised, and now my old friend Carolos is reduced to spending his time trying to emulate me as an over-the-hill playboy. Well, it could be worse. In certain socialist democratic republics people like Fix would have been shot for having 'ex- ploited' their workers. As it happens, the state fired more than half of them something Fix could not have done — but the rest are assured that however much money the company loses — and it is losing — their jobs are secure. Their earning power, needless to say, is another matter.
And speaking of exploitation, Andreas Papadoc's ideology has always consisted of a 'humanistic opposition to human ex- ploitation', a fact that one is reminded of constantly by the graffiti and slogans that have become as much a part of Greek life as the sunny disposition of the people, the brilliant sunshine and the olives once were.
Thank God that hellenophiles like Mr Henry Miller aren't around today. I wonder what they would say if they saw what rotten political leadership can do to a people. When I apologised for the Colonels not so long ago, true lovers of Greece like C. M. Woodhouse were appalled. Well, maybe it's time they realised that Greeks were not as ready for democracy as they imagined. The Colonels were stupid and crude, but in their primitive way of thinking they got one thing right. The Greeks need to revert to their basic and time-honoured values of hard work, love for family, and tradition in order to survive; not continue with their illusion of being a nation that has been exploited by the great satan, the West. The fact that the mayor of Olympia, a tiny village of 1,259 people, has managed to convince the Greeks, and many Europeans as well, that a non-profit organisation which devised a way to raise money for young handicapped children by having the Olympic torch sponsored by companies as it's carried through various American towns, is an exploitation of the Olympic ideal, and has become famous as a result, is par for the course. As a wiser man than I once said, `Twas a famous victory.'
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