Greece Vs. Germany

Good Morning! Kalimera!

Hmmmm, that greeting felt a little enthusiastic. After the results of last night's soccer game, enthusiasm will likely NOT be the word of the day. Remember when the Canucks were fighting for the Stanley Cup last year and we almost won it...but then we didn't? If you forgot about that then you should probably be packing your bags right now and moving to somewhere where hockey doesn't matter....like Toronto. Anyway, remember that? Even if you never watch hockey, you don't understand it, you don't know who any of the players are or even if you think they play with a "funny little black ball" rather than a puck it doesn't matter, when they lost we all felt it. It was a sad sad day. Well that's how the Greeks feel today after losing HORRIBLY to the Germans last night in the Euro Cup...or whatever the hell they call these soccer tournaments over here (What?! I'm a HUGE fan, what are you talking about? That black and white thing is totally a ball, not a puck. See? Super Fan.)

Ok, so maybe I'm not the biggest fan of football. SOCCER!! Damn it, it's soccer! I keep doing that. If at some point in this blog you see the word 'football', just tell yourself it's soccer and know that I apologize. No one says soccer but us North Americans so I've sort of adopted the word football by accident...but it bugs me that I can't switch back and forth between the two without thinking about it first. Anyway. So I'm busted, I'm not the biggest fan out there. Honestly I don't even know what this tournament is all about other than all the teams come from European countries, so the winner will likely feel like they're the best country in all of Europe (naturally). I guess that's a pretty big deal for any of those patriotic types, which Greeks DEFINITELY are. I don't have a problem with that at all because I'm fairly patriotic myself. As far as I'm concerned, Canada is THE best country in the world and I will even go as far as saying that Pamela Anderson is awesome simply because she's Canadian, even if she is completely made of plastic and kind of a twit. Anyway, Canada of course isn't in this tournament but my second favourite country in the world is (or was) so even though I may not be a soccer fanatic, I had to watch the game and cheer on my boys in blue and white.

 The One and Only German in a Sea of Greeks watching the game last night at the restaurant

Actually this game was probably watched by most Europeans last night because it had some political undertones going on. Here's the short version of the story: Germany is one of the more powerful and financially well off countries in the European Union. Greece....well you've probably heard a little something about how Greece is in some serious trouble these days. Since Germany is pretty much holding pole position in the EU, they have a lot of the power to decide how to help Greece out of with their debt and get them on the right track to recovery from this mess. Angela Merkel is the Chancellor of Germany so she's the face of the German people right now. Putting it simply: Greeks. Hate. Merkel. She's had some tough things to say that a lot of Greeks don't really agree with so unfortunately this translates into: Greeks. Hate. Germany.

That's too harsh actually, I'm using far too strong a word to describe their feelings towards Germany. It's probably better to say that there is some tension between Greeks and Germans right now. For the sake of this conversation...which is in writing and can therefore be used against me very easily...I will now insert the following disclaimer:

I REMAIN NEUTRAL ON THIS SUBJECT! 

Except when it comes to the soccer game...in which case, I was Greece all the way (sorry Charlotte!)

But sadly....we lost 4-1. My poor Greeks. I was really hoping for a win just to boost their spirits a bit. It's been rough for them lately, was kicking some German ass just too much to ask for? I suppose so. I know I don't know much about football but it was pretty clear that the German team played really well and once the game was over every Greek in the restaurant gave a respectful applause for their opponent (and probably for our good friend Rolf, the lone German at the restaurant that night whom everyone loves no matter what team he cheers for).

Here's a look at the aftermath:

 Broken hearts mended with beer, cigarettes, and talk about what the Greek coach SHOULD HAVE done....an international ritual, not just a Greek thing

My brother in law Lefteris...what the Greek coach SHOULD HAVE done was get a goal keeper the size of him. We'd be undefeated!

Such sad faces :( Except Andreas in the back ground. He's upset about the results too but he's already onto the next thing which is 'drink a few beer here and then off to Congas to chat up some ladies'. Good for him! That's the right attitude to have: life goes on! And there are always pretty ladies out there somewhere to make you feel better? Maybe that was a step too far...

Babis Squared 

They're both named Babis...when I told this joke last night it flopped because no one knew what I meant by 'squared', so I'm trying it out again here even though I basically just over explained the punch line and killed the joke. Haha?

Ok, it's time for the fat lady to go home. I've had too much 'champagne' and heard enough soccer talk for one night.

I found this poster on a tree on the way home. Apparently there's some kind of celebration happening tonight that I might go check out. The picture on the right is a guy dressed up in traditional festival dress dancing over a pretty raging bonfire. That peaked my interest. The picture on the left explains this clay jug that's surrounded by flowers, called a Kildonas. It said: "The Kildonas. The jug where personal items are thrown in and collected the next day while singing naughty poems"....???? really? So dirty jokes and fire walking? Yeah I gotta see this. That's tonight around 9pm as long as I have the energy I'll go down and check that out and report back tomorrow.

This is the bakery. It's about 2am and it's prime baking time...the whole neighbourhood smelled like cinnamon raisin buns!

And I'm home. This is our way overgrown garden at night. I just took this picture because I wanted to test some different setting on my camera for night and some other things but I thought I'd throw it in here too with the rest of them. Why not?

Have a good weekend!