Το φιτρί αγόρι (colourful life)

September the 16th, 2008. One would think that in 2008, in the city centre of a big urban area, you won’t be attacked by men handling tables and chairs and covered with motorbike helmets. But add in a mix Athens, Greece, University and Brainless people and everything is possible (with the consent of people, police and government).

Let’s go to the juicy story. 16/09/2008 around 7 o’clock in the afternoon, I witnessed a brutal attack with chairs and tables against a car with diplomatic plate parked in Stournari St. (in front of Papasotiriou bookshop). There was at least a woman inside shouting loudly and asking for help while the assailants were attacking her car. But a second one (her daughter) appeared seconds after. I don’t know if she was inside or she just arrived.

After the aggression the attackers hid inside the university because Greek laws don’t allow police to get inside the university and it doesn’t matter what you do: you’re safe there. I did not try to stop the attack (sorry 4 vs 1 ), I only checked that the woman wasn’t injured (then I saw the second girl calling the police). I left after I checked on them.

Some minutes latter I returned and saw some young people provoking and addressing both women in a really rude way to both women. They were saying things like:

• “I didn’t know that Cyprus had diplomats now”.
• “Don’t worry your government will buy you a new (car) one”.
• “Let’s go for some gas to burn it all, HAHAHAHAHA”.
• “Look at the poor woman, HAHAHAHAHA” (yes the same guy).
• “That’s because you put your diplomatic car near the university”.

I couldn’t stop myself and I asked what happened. But I didn’t receive a clear answer. It was something related to a “diplomatic car”, and I don’t remember more. Perhaps my mind couldn’t assimilate such spoon of irrational behaviour.

It happened that ther car had a diplomatic plate from Cyprus. And the woman was waiting for her daughter to come out from the university. Also the woman and her daughter were Greeks. The mother claimed that she also studied when she was trying to get an explanation for what happened.

My opinion.

-1 point rate to:

• People who didn’t move a finger to help. Or even just to check if the woman was right. You can die in the middle of Athens and these ones will not help you.
• The police for his fast reaction times. I saw a car latter when I was arriving to Omonia square, it was running towards the place of the incident. I also found 4 policeman in Omonia with their motorbikes having a talk about the weather.
• The government, because policemen are not guilty for the bad organization in their systems.
• The students, because they protect these violent people. They do not kick them from the university, but at the same time they fight against anyone who dares to say about removing the “no police in the university”. Hey folks!, or you clean your house, or the “cleaning lady” will come inside and will make a mess (I prefer to my business and do not wait for others).
• The passivity of the typical Athens citizen. Shame on you who didn’t even check if the woman was bleeding or needed medical assistance.

I can understand a guy who needs money for drugs and asks/steals the money from me. Buy drugs -> money. But my mind cannot understand how 4 young guys can attack a woman, a mother, in front of her daughter. And I cannot understand how people can make fun of that latter.

I felt powerless, and I still have some anger inside me after that incident.

Notes

• The rear glass and rear left car windows were broken. The picture doesn’t show that.
• Perhaps it better for you to hear the poor woman shouting because the panic while I was approaching to car to check on her. Here it is

Beautiful, isn’t it? Today the Parthenon was open at night and it was for free for tourist like people. Also it was full moon an also moon eclipse (The next one will be on 2010). Nice opportunity to appreciate Athens at night from one of its symbols.

As far as I know the Parthenon opens only once per year at night, so today was the day for me to visit it for the first time (Yes, more than a year here without visiting it). The only bad thing was that the Parthenon was full of people.

At least I was a poor expat carrying a point and shoot camera. I saw a poor tourist couple being stopped because they were carrying, not a tripod but a mono-pod. I heard something like “If you want to carry that for professional pictures you have to pay”. Good, you open once and you want to get money if you carry good photo equipment.

My photo issues were fixed with stones to stabilize the camera and some fighting with the camera menu to find the right settings. I don’t know how to take pictures (Sascha, I have to learn from you), but I’m quite happy with the results.

In order to overload a bit your poor internet connection, here there are more awful pictures

• Mount Lycabettus from the Parthenon:
  
  
• Dark parthenon at night:
  
• Parthenon and full moon:
  

Beautiful, isn’t it? This marvellous image that identifies the evolution of the human kind. Glass, ice, metal and 0,3 litters of chemicals with bubbles. Cost… 3 Euro . What?!?!?!

Last saturday night we decided to go to the cinema in the famous (and only?) shopping mall in Athens: The Mall. As always we were a bit late but hungry so we stop in Ruby’s Tuesday for some food. Starting with a coke can for 3 Euro, then like a dozen of shrimps for 13 Euro and chicken steak served like a hamburger for 12 Euro. Last night we had dinner (2 people) for 19 Euro including coke and beer and we couldn’t finish! (Ladokola rlz).

After the overpriced dinner (and service), we went to the cinema. More surprises were awaiting us.

The cinema in The Mall:

• 9 Euro per ticket (ouch!).
• At the beginning of the film the assistant decided to move places, so we lost the start of the film.
• Of course the credits with light and without volume for a while, so if you like to see the credits at the end. Nothing for you.
• A guy put his feet in front of Stella. In the back of the seat just in front of her. What the…?!?!
• Some people people laughing, playing with the mobile phone and commenting the film.

To this you add that the film was the new X Files one, not very good. In this moment I was asking myself why I went to the cinema. At home I can enjoy more and watch “all the film” or even pause it if is really needed.

And to finish the night: 22 Euro for 1-1,5 litters of something they called sangría: sweet wine with some traces of fruit. At least it wasn’t the well known “Sangría Don Simón“.

Moral of the story:

• Be careful where you go, Athens can be quite expensive.
• Some times we swear about politicians not doing anything to fix this high prices situation, but we should look at ourselves because  we are paying these prices and therefore accepting them.

It’s the first hour of the Saturday and I’m still awake listening to the rain beating on the floor of my alley.

It’s late but I’m still finishing some “job” tasks. This happens when you go commando in programming (but with underwear), and if everything goes well you´ll only make another 4 extra hours, but if something fails you´ll be doomed. A 7 instead of a four made me to stay until now connected (The good and the bad of the Virtual Private Networks).

As always I leave my Blog a bit abandoned. Some times it’s because the lack of free time, but other times it’s because I’m lazy. Not in the mood these days to do much.

I’m still in Athens and still working for that marvellous company who helps me to pay the bills every month. The good of working in a big IT company is that:

• You learn how to move between multiple manager levels.
• You can play the hot potato game with the problems. There is always someone to forward the email.
• You improve your skills in how to solve problems quickly.
• Your definition of dirty coding changes.
• Yeah, it’s my first job here, so it’s experience for my résumé.
• I have in the office 2×20″ screens, making a total resolution of 3200×1200 pixel.
• You save the company with your skills.

The bad:

• You learn how it feels to arrive home at 2:30am after all the day working.
• You receive hot potatoes and you run out of addresses to forward them to.
• You improve your skills to solve problems quickly and in a dirty way.
• You forget about good coding.
• You realize that your résumé needs the experience, not you.
• It tooks 3 months to get a computer.
• After you saved the company. You don’t see a part of the profit.

About friends and life. From time to time I meet the “International Pizza” to go for ouzo and food. The “International Pizza” is a mix of greeks and foreigners who meet to have good time

As objectives to accomplish:

• To learn Greek. C’mon! One year here and I cannot speak it. It’s not so difficult.
• To go to the gym. And also add an excuse to escape from the office.
• To continue some personal projects/ideas. Not only talk about them when going for beers.

And from here send greetings to:

• Sascha, Panos and the International Pizza.
• Kat, her mac, and her 1001 stories. Life is long but I guess she lived twice or three times more experiences than anyone.
• Nazgul2, from Palencia but working and living in another two different places.
• Graci, and his amazing adventures in Belgium.
• Alberto, and his never ending PhD problems.
• Seattle and Andoni, or the two guys who got the job they were waiting for.
• And you, who are reading this.

Note: Believe me if I tell you that I pressed the publish button like 5 times, and 5 times the post appeared in the front page. Then I leave, check the next day and It’s not there. Grrrrr.

The weather changed a lot during the week. Last weekend I took pictures from Katehaki bridge full of snow and talked about sliding cars. But this weekend the sun shines and you can feel it warming your face while you are walking in the street. Today was a beautiful day. I enjoyed it playing music, preparing a tasty lunch (with a stolen recipe), and fixing an ill powerbook.

The winter seems to come to and end, and the weather forecast talks about 17º/18º C here. It’s gonna be better until the burning summer arrives.

The image speaks by itself. 3 o’clock and 6 people in our floor. Using the snow as an excuse, almost nobody came to the office today.

The good of this massive absence is that the office is quiet. No phones ringing, no people speaking loud or interrupting your work. Only the noise of CPU fans and some people teetering their fingers on the keyboard.

Enjoy your snow day off

If you have seen the news or you are right now in Greece. Yes, it’s cold.

This weekend has been one of the coldest I my life in Greece. This time it was snowing (not like my last post) a lot. I started to feel the cold and the first snow flakes on Saturday when I was leaving for Markopoulo to spend the night with some () friends. We arrived and the wind was really cold. The weather was “shouting” snow!

Hours later it started. In the beginning it didn’t stay, but after all the night snowing we woke up with a white landscape and thinking on staying there (Panos, I love your place, but I have to go to work ). We moved with a car to the nearest Proastiakos station, and after some time waiting in the car (to avoid to die frozen) we were on the way to Athens.

I didn’t expect what you can see on the pictures. But when I got to the top of the bridge to with the elevator, the image was that (bad quality picture, I know). I couldn’t believe it. Snow everywhere. And not a bit… enough to organize a nice snow battle.

The return trip to home was a bit difficult. Without the right shoes I was walking using small steps to avoid to eat snow But even with that weather, there is always someone who believes that his/her 4WD car can do miracles and drive over 20cm of snow without chains (or similar device for ice/snow) or even good wheels. So a crazy driver almost killed me. I saw the reflection of a yellow light in the snow, and I thought: In this street that goes down the hill… I’m almost sliding, therefore a 1 ton car should be like a huge sledge. Of course, the car just slid down the “hill”. I had time to jump between two cars and see the car following the way of the road (even its wheels were saying otherwise).

At least I’m alive. It’s cold. It’s late, and tomorrow nobody will go to the office. I’ll be the only stupid there because I live 1 minute from my place.

Have a nice freezing week