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Greek Language and Culture OMILO Greek Newsletter November 2010

Hello OMILO students and friends!
After our small OMILO update in October, here again the Newsletter in English. To obtain the Greek version, please subscribe. Now that the winter days are shorter and the evenings longer, maybe you find some time to sit in a chair, turn off the television, and read some news in Greek. In this Newsletter we write about : 1. THE OMILO NEWS 2. NEWS ABOUT ATHENS 3. NEWS FROM GREECE 4. LETTERS, STORIES and EXPERIENCES FROM OMILO STUDENTS 5. READING SUGGESTION

1. The OMILO news

The website is updated with the 2011 course information. We have also added: a. The new info about the course on the island of Andros. Link : http://www.omilo.com/cms/index.php? option=com_content&view=article&id=34&Itemid=49&lang=en b. A new link in the photo-gallery 2010 OMILO courses and students. http://www.omilo.com/cms/index.php? option=com_phocagallery&view=category&id=21%3A2010-omilo-courses-andstudents&Itemid=52&lang=en Here you can find over 100 photos taken during the 2010 courses. However, we do not have the same amount of photos of every course, and we do not have photos of every 2010 OMILO student. This is not on purpose! Photos are taken by the OMILO staff, but unfortunately, many times we forget to take photos because we are too busy or we forget to take the camera with us For that reason we are always happy to receive your photos as well, if you agree we put them online. For those students that do not like to see their picture online, please let us know which photo you would like to have removed, and we will take care of it. We just finished the intensive 6-day course in Athens, and could witness again that Athens is a great destination to visit during the fall or spring. Students from Norway, Germany, Spain and France enjoyed the mild weather, the cultural events, walks, museums, nice taverns and Athens. The next

intensive courses in Athens are scheduled for February and April 2011.

2. News about Athens

a. Athens has over 300 theaters, music venues, museums, etcand is a great destination for a citytrip. Although the financial crisis in Greece does not make it easy for all those cultural organizations to survive, people are trying hard to make their city a very interesting place to be. For all the major events and useful tourist information about Athens, our favorite website is www.athensinfoguide.com b. During our intensive November course, also Eleni Karaindrou was back in town with a splendid concert in the Athens concert hall. Eleni Karaindrou is known for the film music she wrote for all the Angelopoulos movies. Very nice music and something different than the more usual Greek beat! To see her playing her music on the piano, go to http://www.youtube.com/watch? v=ljxGsCFgVPQ&feature=related. In YouTube you can find a lot of her music and different styles. c. A few weeks ago the New Acropolis Museum won the British Guild of Travel Writers (BGTW) prestigious global award for Best Worldwide Tourism Project for 2010. If you did not visit this beautiful museum yet, put it on your list! The Culture and Tourism Minister thanked the organizers and the voting travel writers, noting that this distinction has opened the door for the return of the Parthenon Marbles to their homeland Greece. (they are now in the British Museum in London). d. If you are interested to find out what is going on in the daily live of Athens and Athenians (so not for tourists!), you can find the most inspiring daily Greek-language weblog in town at athensville.blogspot.com . They now decided to also put words into action with the recent initiative and website www.atenistas.gr. Their goal is to do a little something for Athens every week. The idea is to inspire Athenians to take their city to heart and change their attitude towards it. Anyone can make a difference, even if its just picking up the garbage in front of your apartment building or taking care of a neighboring flowerbed. At this point the whole idea is still at an experimental stage, but we hope more Athenians will join them soon.

3. News about Greece

A. Elections, elections andmore elections? By Christopher Leeds These days it doesnt seem that Greece is left out of the international press for long, and November

would appear to be no exception. This month in particular, even more developments, both political and social, have come to the fore. On Sunday 7th November, the Greek people returned once again to the polling stations to vote in the local and regional elections, which take place in Greece every four years, so as to elect a mayor and regional governor. However, it is the run-up period to the elections that is the most interesting, as it is during this period that the elected councillors of each party are out in force, alongside their respective mayoral candidates handing out leaflets to residences and businesses alike, as well as organising political speeches in an attempt to gain as many votes for their party as possible. Quite often, the contents of these speeches can be humorous to say the least. Recently, I had the good fortune to be invited to one such speech organised by two mayoral candidates of the Municipality of Tithorea (http://www.gialas-parnassos.gr/) a beautiful mountain village just an hour and a half away from Athens and well worth a visit!!! You can picture the scenea village kafeneion filled to bursting with local villagers, all thumbing their worry beads and shrouded in a mist of, as far as the law is concerned, illegal cigarette smoke. There we all were, waiting to hear the wise words of the future mayor who was supposedly about to put an end to the problems of the long-suffering villagers. Amongst other things, they were promised a dramatic reduction in the enormous local deficit, aided by the construction of a brand new mountain ski lift and swimming pool, as well as resistance to European Union measures, whilst taking advantage of EU fundsneedless to say that the speech was, in general, taken with a proverbial pinch of salt. This years elections mark the first time in Greek history that non-EU immigrants residing in Greece were given the right to vote in Greeces local elections. This really is a groundbreaking move in Greek politics, a priority set out by the Prime Minister, alongside that of granting citizenship to those born to legal foreign residents on Greek soil. Despite the multitude of problems that have arisen since the PMs coming to power last year, we can at least say that for this he deserves a pat on the back and a round of applause. Well done, Mr. Prime Minister, sir!
Christopher

----------------------------------------------------------------------With tens of thousands of foreigners now allowed to vote, parties were discovering the changing face of municipal politics. Mainstream political parties now realised they could not ignore the immigrants vote anymore, something that never happened in Greece before. Non-Greek registered voters: where there from ? These are only the registered voters, living legally in the country and having there official address in Greece. Many non-Greeks also keep their address abroad, do not have legal papers or do not bother to get voting rights. However, you get an idea of which nationalities reside in Greece. European Union Austria 263 Belgium 240 Britain 240 Bulgaria 2.059 Cyprus 1.227 Czech Republic 68 Denmark 127 Estonia 10 Finland 118 France 612 Germany 2.159 Netherlands 605 Hungary 38 Ireland 120 Italy 863

Latvia 6 Lithuania 16 Luxembourg 4 Malta 1 Poland 830 Portugal 25 Romania 1.142 Slovakia 70 Slovenia 5 Spain 80 Sweden 222 TOTAL 14.961 Non- EU Albania 6.444 Algeria 16 Brazil 6 Canada 3 China 4 Egypt 174 Ethiopia 27 Georgia 187 Ghana 27 India 1.667 Jordan 10 Lebanon 5 Moldavia 101 Morocco 26 Nigeria 33 Pakistan 2.110 Philippines 187 Russia 95 Serbia 18 Sri Lanka 55 Syria 83 Turkey 23 Ukraine 176 United States 15 Uzbekistan 12 B. Swap services! (non-currency exchange) In difficult times and a financial crisis, people look for alternatives how to pay for services and goods. Greece is no exception! Greeks are tired of paying taxes, high VAT and having cuts in their salaries. Slowly-slowly they now find their way in exchanging goods. In several villages and on the internet you can now find swap-shops! For example : You repair my car and I give you 5 kilos of oranges. Or you can stay 5 nights in my hotel, and I get your goat! A great way to avoid taxes as well! A jar of honey in return for medical advice created the idea behind the Greek-language website www.logo-timis.gr, a new website where people can exchange skills and services without paying any money. Through reciprocal trade, people have the opportunity to be part of a social structure that is not measured by money. The real value of the services you offer is defined by how much the recipient needs then. Users of the website can easily exchange messages, create a profile and log on to find out who has shown interest in the services you have offered. That way you can maintain a certain standard of living and dignity in difficult times. Anybody interested in swapping services or goods for a Greek Language Course in Greece, please let us know! 4. LETTERS, STORIES and EXPERIENCES FROM OMILO STUDENTS Anybody wishing to participate in this section, you are very welcome! Write down your Greek experiences, whether you are living in Greece or you are spending your holidays there. Comedies, tragedies or just your thoughts about Greece , the Greek language or culture why not share it with other Greek students? You can write in English, German, French, Dutch, Spanish or Greek. (the languages of our Omilo web-page). (The original stories will not be translated to Greek by OMILO.) Voting in Greece By Laurien van den Hoven . Yesterday (7/11/2010) I went voting for the first time here in Greece. I voted for the council of Sparta, the regional council of Faridos (our municipality till now) and the local council of Xirokambi. It does not give the impression that less municipalities - from over 1000 to less than 400 - also means less talking! As none of the candidates for Mayor of Sparta gained the necessary 50%, I'lll be heading to the polling station again upcoming Sunday.

Despite the overall low turnout for these local en regional elections it was quite busy at the polling station in the elementary school of Xirokambi. As voting is organized by alphabetical order, we had looked up our registration on the internet. We expected some confusion, when they would need to find our names amidst alphas, betas and gammas. We were the first foreigners here that registered for local elections before Summer. They even had to look up the procedures. No wonder we received - positvely - surpised reactions on the fact that we were exercising our right as EU-member to vote for the local council. But we worried for nothing: there was a nice shortlist available with three names on it in Latin characters. Armed with three lists - one for each candidate for Mayor of Sparta and his candidates for the various councils - we went into the voting booth together ( a new experience as well). I was supposed to throw away the lists of the 2 candidates I was not going to vote for - a huge garbage bag was available in the booth for this purpose- and marked the people of my choice on the remaining list. My sealed and stamped envelope - stamps are a sacred feature in Greece disappeared in a big see-through box. My first vote in Greece was cast. Let's do it all again upcoming Sunday! Anton and Laurien, both ex-OMILO students, have been living in Greece since the summer of 2006. In 2008 they moved from Athens to Xirokambi (Peloponnese). Their website: Photo workshops in the Peloponnesos - www.photothema.com ----------------------------------------------------------------------PASOK-afffiliated candidates handed Prime Minister George Papandreou a dramatic victory the local elections, capturing 8 of 13 regional governorships (including Athens and Thessaloniki, for the first time in decades). But the outcome of the countrys war for economic survival is far from over. The government can now concentrate again on the national issues and how to deal with the financial crisis. It will be hard work, but we all try to stay optimistic.

5. For the winter months to come, here also a Reading Suggestion

For those of you who would like to improve their ability to express themselves in Greek, or just want to understand a few Greek idiomatic expressions (oh yes, there are quite a few), then we can suggest the following dictionary of idioms by Evangelopoulos: '- The dictionary contains around 4.000 expressions, idioms, proverbs, mottos, literary structures, metaphors, and similes. It can be used by students of Greek, regardless of their level (as long as they can read the alphabet) as well as by teachers and translators etc. Knowing even a few idiomatic expressions can deeply enrich your learning and interactional output and experience. Try it out and Happy reading!!! Many greetings from Athens and have a nice winter

The OMILO team

OMILO, PO Box 61070, 15101 MAROUSSI, ATHENS Tel. (0030)210-612.28.96 email: info@omilo.com