Received from "The Eagle":
Why I am proud to be Greek
Because nights in Greece finish in the morning.
Because we drink our coffee slowly and not in "gulps".
Because flirting is our national pastime.
Because we always moan about the public sector and everyone seeks to get a job in it.
Because we go out almost every night, even if we are penniless.
Because we respect our Grandmothers sometimes more than our wives.
Because we know how to "spend" better than we know how to "save".
Because we never visit others empty-handed. We bring a cake or a bottle of Retsina.
Because we do not share the cost of gasoline with those traveling with us.
Because there is no way to explain to foreigners what "kapsoura" (burning desire for someone) or "kefi" (party mood) really mean.
Because the word "filotimo" (helping someone because it is the right thing to do) doesn't exist in any other language.
Because whenever foreigners cannot find a word, they bloody steal one of ours!
Because we always make it, albeit in the last moment.
Because we are everywhere around the planet.
Because we love and hate with passion.
Because we spend our bad and low times with our friends and family; not with therapists and counselors.
Because Socrates, Plato, and Aristotle were Hellenic and we still quote them!!
Because we invented the theatre.
Because we gave birth to Democracy.
Because we discovered logic.?
Because we jump-started science.?
Because we are proud of our culture, not of our wars.
Because when we were building the Parthenon, the others were still sleeping under trees.
Because when others created wars, we created the Olympic Games to stop wars.
Because we have a distinction between Eros (falling in love) and Agapi (innocent love), while we feel both passionately.
Because we don't use ketchup or mayonnaise with our food!
Because we get angry quickly, but forget about it ..even quicker.
Because?Greek men are not ashamed to cry .
Because we dance when we are sad and party when we are happy.
Because we work to live and we do not live to work.
Because 97% of the cosmic stars are named after?Hellenics.
Because although we know danger well, we dare.
Because when you shout "adelphi" (brother) in the streets, everyone turns around.
Because "Greeks do not fight like heroes; heroes fight like Greeks."
(Winston Churchill, 1941)
Because we speak loudly and laugh even louder !!!
WHAT MORE IS THERE TO SAY? No one will love you more deeply than a Greek. Yiasas!
Skopelos and Virgin
-by Skorda
when first you see it
across the water,
rising round and new above the mountain.
Open your mouth and swallow
while youth holds its roundness near,
and you are running fearless in the dark.
Hold it inside, it is still warm
and you will need its light,
there, inside you.
Down the road of time, somewhere
after you’ve aged, traveled,
Explored, discovered.
And the dust around your doorway
has been pounded hard and smooth under your feet.
When you find yourself growing weary and bored,
when your eyes see only ruins,
and your heart is empty.
You may believe, in your exhaustion,
that this is truth, at last.
That the mystery has unraveled,
leaving no wilderness to explore or tame.
All secrets have been shared,
the frontier has dissolved.
Know then, with these thoughts,
you have been swallowed.
The warm belly of the beast
comforts with confining darkness
and lulls with rhythmic sounds
Murmuring to you,
Curl up and sleep,
just go to sleep.
Shake your head,
stretch your legs,
do not sleep now.
Remember what you know.
You swallowed the moon,
you hold it inside you.
Not as a magpie hoarding shiny things,
or wearing the moon for beauty
or bartering the moon for wealth.
You swallowed the moon for this moment.
When you will walk to the water’s edge,
open your mouth, release the moon
and let its light build you a pathway
across the wine dark sea.
©Skorda 2008
Saturday, March 29, 2008
happy to be
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