[Reader-list] Every day news from Greece

[Patrice Riemens]

In the Train

The train is overcrowded, as usual since a year or two. Passengers pile up
in the corridor, on the platform between two bogies. Going to the buffet
car or the toilets requires acrobatic skills - or fine-tuned diplomacy.
"Soon it will be like Indian trains!" moans a lady who's unable to make it
to the lavatory. To which another lady adds "- and by then the railway
company will be Chinese-owned."

Between Athens, the capital, and Thessaly province, and if you book 2-3
weeks in advance, you can get a return ticket for 22 Euros. For the same
trip by car (700 Km) you'd have to dish out 1,70 euro per litre of petrol,
plus 20 Euros super-higway toll. The long distance bus costs 60 Euros.
People therefore put up with the lack of comfort. But they do tease the
conductors:

- "Why can't you add a few more bogies? You like to move us like cattle,
don't you? And you guys still get payid - not the case with half of us
here, mind you!"

- "Technical reasons prevent us to make the trains any longer. There are
stretches where the rails won't take it. And OK, we're still being paid,
but we fight the privatisation of our enterprise. It's for you safety, you
know ... And well, if you see what for salary we get ..."

(...)


Harvest

In Athens these days it's only the weather forecast that uses the word
'mild'. Recent storms have made the olives and citrus fall of the trees in
public parks, avenues, and on squares. In olden days these trees were the
municipality's responsibility, and were maintained by the PWD. But since
two years the fruits are plucked by needy people in the neighbourhood.
Hence anger and despair when the storms spoil the harvest.


(from Le Monde Diplomatique, special file on Greece, Februari 2013)
(Q&D transl by yrs truly)