In less than a week I'm going back home to celebrate the Christmas holidays with my family and already chaos reigns in Greece. Buildings burning, cops and kids fighting each other, people afraid to leave their homes because the scene looks like a war zone.
In case you haven't heard, there was a protest movement a couple of days ago, (I'm not sure what they were protesting, but it was probably insignificant) they ended in front of the police station where eventually, to quote a friend, the shit got real. During the mayhem, a 15-year-old kid was shot by a police guard. After that, riots have broken loose in all the major cities (Athens, Thesaloneeki, Patras). Although we have had our share of riots before it has never been this serious. Some people think that the government might fall, which might be a good thing.

Below I have a news report on the riots from a Greek site, I have translated it so you can read it.

"The centre of Athens is out of control at this time. More than 30 buildings, banks, hotels, restaurants, private schools, shopping malls and cars have burst into flames. Rocks, molotovs, tear gas canisters are thrown and shops are destroyed in all the major streets and squares (The site lists 11 major streets and squares in Athens). Earlier today, at Panepistimiou and Eolou street, masked figures broke into a weapon's shop, removing guns and swords which were on display in the shop, while in Eolou street they took over a fire engine, which they eventually burned.

The same goes with Thesaloneeki, as riots take place outside of Aristotle's University. Several fires have started in Egnatia and Tsimiski street. Two salesgirls were almost burned during a shopping mall raid while a police officer was wounded from a molotov attack. At this time, the government comitee is attending an emergency meeting. On Tuesday morning, Prime Minister Karamanlis is called to meet with President Karolos Papoulia and will later meet with political leaders."

I love my country to death, but it's things like these that happen all the time and it really pisses me off. One of my friends works at a lawyer's office in Athens. Today the office was burned.

What do you guys have to say on the matter? Have we made the front cover?

I hope you can get through the chaos all right - sort of like Thailand it's a really messy place to travel in right now (yes it made my world news ticker).

If the news report I saw was accurate, police were sitting in a patrol car being pelted with rocks when they shot a teenager as he attempted to lob a petrol bomb at the officers. Scary business all around.

My local news channel covers only puppies, so I have yet to hear about this. As soon as I find free time, I'll certianly keep up to date with the events over there.

Serves the kid right. Who in the right mind would try and throw a petrol bomb at a police car. The kid isn't innocent, and rather it is the policemen who shot for self defense and unfairly and unfortunently got suspended and removed from duty who are innocent and unfortunent. I have no sympathy for the kid at all.

Anarchists. Just telling you now- if the Greek government were to fall not only will it directly affect you but it will also mean everything inside Greece goes really really bad. And you know thats a really really bad thing right?

Yeah, I've been somewhat following the story. Ridiculous.

Just wondering, what don't you like about the current Greek government? I like it because of the foreign policy that I hope won't change even if it falls.

We managed to make it through in the end. First time I was kinda on edge while walking the streets at night. People are still writing on the walls with messages such as "6/6/2008 we haven't forgotten".
Dude, our policemen are nowhere near innocent. Our policemen beat the living daylights out of pretty much anyone they "believe" to be a bad guy and don't bother asking any questions, just to show everyone else that they are actually doing something. There is a Cypriot student out there who got the beating of a lifetime when he was in Thessaloniki by 5 cops and is now afraid to walk outside of his own house, to top it all off he was even imprisoned at the local police station. Why was he beaten up? He looked like a criminal.
The kid who got shot was dumb (What did you expect? He was 15.) but he never deserved to get killed. The policeman, who was around 40 I think, was supposed to be a whole lot smarter but instead decided to shoot the kid in cold blood. No one in Greece has any sympathy for cops.
If you still doubt me you can search "Greek police" on YouTube. The first result shows a bunch of cops forcing two Albanians to beat each other up, apparently the cops were having fun.
By the way, things are already really really bad for us and it is kind of affecting us (23% VAT, people in the public sector losing thousands of Euros to name a few) and our government hasn't even fallen yet!
I don't know if it turns out for the better or for the worse but if the government falls, we manage to survive the chaos and a new one rises from the ashes, maybe we could be looking towards a brighter future. ^^

I'm just saying!

Post has been edited 1 time(s), last time on May 4 2010, 1:38 pm by CecilSunkure. Reason: Triple post.

And Greece was thought ready to join the EU, let alone the Eurozone?

The country is a complete shambles at the moment. For a place that was the home of Western Classical civilisation it's in a lamentable state.

Are you going to be bailed out by the IMF or are Germany going to do it?

Well we have been given a significant loan from several European countries (a great chunk of that money comes from Germany) and around 30 billion from the IMF to helps us avoid bankruptcy. And actually you are right we are in a right mess right now.

I think my favorite part about the whole fiasco is that Greece is crying out that they gave us democracy, when really it was their ancestors. I hate that argument.

But as so many people pointed out...I do believe its time for that government to reform. Sometimes the only way to do that is revolution. Now that being said, I doubt it will get the opportunity to do it, thanks to Germany et al bailing them out.

I'm surprised that America hasn't been degraded to a junk bond like Greece was. One day, a world power (maybe the UK, maybe us, who knows?) is going to get degraded to junk bond. And at that point they're going to re-index the system and everyone's going to come out just fine...but different levels of fine. The financial market right now is interesting. We'll see.

The thing I am worried about is, If greece ever declares bankruptcy and withdraws from the EU due to is fiscal and financial problems. This can have global ramifications on the global economy (I.E: Others withdraw from the EU due to dire fiscal situations). This can really hamper the global economy if this gets out of control. Lets hope for the best.

However, this is complicated problem as greece has been teetering on the fiscal brink for awhile, and there is no easy solution. We'll all have to see how this plays out and how globalization will affect us.

-Dolle