[ALBSA-Info] Where is the news? The Guardian

[Agron Alibali]

The Guardian (London) 
May 18, 2002 
Guardian Foreign Pages, Pg. 17 
Capital letters: Farewell to the 'ugly old woman with oodles of charm' 

Helena Smith in Athens 



"Why don't you give me your shoes?" It was pronounced more as an order than a plea. The dishevelled Albanian was deadly serious. 

I should, he muttered, give him what he was owed "plus those nice leather lace-ups", because he had sweated profusely moving a van-load of belongings into my new home. And anyway, I should know that there were certain things that worked differently in Greece today. This could not be denied. The city of the gods does not come close to resembling the place it was a decade ago. 

My own change of locale - from a studio-flat overlooking the modern world's first Olympic stadium to a neoclassical townhouse in a neighbourhood that might once have passed for a slum - brought me face to face with the magnitude of the metamorphosis. 

First of all there was Akim asking me for my shoes. And demanding them in fine polished Greek. 

Not that long ago Albanian emigres, who are thought to number 300,000 in Athens alone, were content to scratch a living on the streets. Now Akim, who still has vivid memories of sneaking past trigger-happy Greek border guards, was speaking up, loud and clear. 

True to tradition Yiannis, the Zorba-like character who ran the removals company, drove a van whose wind screen mirror almost trembled under the weight of amulets and crosses. 

"In Greece, only God and faith ward off the evil eye," he snarled. "All these xenoi (foreigners), they'll be the curse of us." 

But of one thing Yiannis was absolutely sure: he, like so many others, was benefiting enormously from the influx of the xenoi 

"I drive, they move," he said, jabbing a fat finger at Akim. Jimmy, the Albanian's happy-go-lucky compatriot, was somewhere in the back, bent-double among the lampshades, chests, boxes and chairs stuffed somewhat ingloriously into the swaying open truck. 

We drove past the Polish ghetto and the Pakistani ghetto, past Indians selling incense and Koreans selling binoculars and Nigerians flogging CDs: in short, the cosmopolitan mix that is killing off Greece's once fabled homogeneity. 

"All these xenoi ," growled Yiannis as we crawled through gridlock caused by one of an estimated 96 refurbishment projects under way for the 2004 Athens Olympics. "They're like all these blessed public works. They never seem to end!" 

Not that, if truth be told, most Athenians really mind. Nationwide, the games are seen as Greece's great test, its coming of age in the modern era. 

All the massive public works launched in their name, from the ultra-efficient Athens metro to the unification of the capital's historic centre in a giant archaeological park, have greatly improved its infrastructure and quality of life. 

There is much less air pollution, more green space and better public transport. With cleaner climes and cleaner streets, cafe society has also taken off with a vigour not seen since the 1960s. 

My Greek reality owes everything to Athens's gradual gentrification; the revival of the neighbourhood started when ladies in fur coats began patronising restaurants set up by "artistes" who had replaced artisans. 

" Po, po ! My, my! How Athens is changing," Yiannis exclaimed as he edged his van up to the ochre-coloured building that was about to become my home. 

The Greek capital is no longer the ugly old woman with oodles of charm that the late Athenians actress Melina Mercouri once raved about. Increasingly, it is becoming a sprightly young thing - confident, chic and energised by new blood, new looks and a new way of being. 



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