INTRO
Contents

Getting there
Geography,
Climate,
Regions,
Population,
Language,
History,

Economy,

Resources,
Industry,
Banks and insurance,

Government,
Parliament,
Army and Police,
Customs,
Judiciary,
Political parties,

"The Macedonian
question",

Health on the road,
Transport,

Education and
Science
Arts
Culture,
Sports,

TOURISM

Accommodation,
Greek kitchen

Atica,
Beotia,
Epirus,
Macedonia,
Salonica,
Thessaloniki
Peloponesus,
Thesaly,
Thrace

THE ISLANDS

The Dodecanese,
The Aegean islands,
Evia,
The Ionian islands,
The Cyclades,
Creta,
Rhodes

This may not appear like it, but the balcony with Irina up there has a view on history. She was not aware of it till well after I shot the picture. She simply enjoyed the view: note her posture, a relaxed rich young woman, probably a baroness or marchioness, a noble lady for sure, myself faking as a fra Pandolfo, in the best hotel house of Athens. A really fine accommodation invites your best attitudes in the open, so as to match the warmth and elegance encircling you and although at that particular moment her whole life was in a turmoil Irina up here stands as an epitome of relaxed contention. That is one of the qualities of a fine accommodation.

You will have scrolled by now and figured it out that it is a balcony of hotel named Grand Bretagne. I have seen many a Grande Bretagne hotels around the world, but this one is in Athens, and this is a room with a view on a piece of history which had affected many of my and Irina's friends.

Somehow I did not contemplate where did Irina sent her gaze although she must have watched for my sign "It is OK, you may come down now". But if she were out there on 13 August 1944, some 32 years before she was born, she will have seen the beginning of the Greek Civil War. Yes, from right out there, from the balcony of the Grand Bretagne hotel, otherwise a beautiful place which opened its doors way back during 1874 some 130 years ago and still, for me and the crowned, it remains the top residing place in the land. Grand Bretagne overviews the Sintagma Square and the former royal palace, after 1933 parliament building.

Now, the square is a very profane place, swarmed by peddling, assertive Gypsies and backpacks, while the Parliament is dominated by a different breed of people, also very assertive and stubbornly persistent.

The hotel has always provided accommodation for visiting royalty, heads of states and the wealthiest who visit Athens. There is nothing better. Way back in 1979 arriving there with a 4-years tenure as a YNTO representative for Greece, I have chosen the premises of the office on the first floor of 16 Boukourestiou Str., some 100 meters from the Grand Bretagne, the Parliament, the Foreign Office, Floka, GB-corner and JAT. At that time, probably today too, one needed nothing more, location wise, for the job of representing the Yugoslav tourism in friendly Greece. The owner of the building, a fine white haired, well mannered lady, always thought that we could afford the rent because we were a great firm bringing some 750,000 Yugoslav tourists to Greece year after year.  The same kind of misconception shared Mr. Doxiadis, owner-manager of the Grand Bretagne and president of Greek hoteliers association. He was a polished man, a touch of brilliantine in his lightly curly low lying hair, amiable shine in the eyes behind very unobtrusive, Roddenstock or what, glasses  and always bi-coloured shirts.

Probably under pressure from his Thessaloniki colleagues and other Northern Greek constituents, he invited me to meet them either privately or for meetings. And then he ha begun inviting me to his place. Everybody who is somebody on the business side will have a snack or a drink in the GB-corner during working hours and it is overcrowded and fun. Politics and business are the staple food of the corner. Come dinnertime the place transforms. Hookers and tourists take over.

Urged by the organizers of the Winter Olympics in Sarajevo I was pressed to stage, at the bottom of the Yugoslav recession, a lavish presentation of the forthcoming event ?in the best place in town?. After generating direct business and paying without hackle, my image with Mr. Doxiades improved tremendously.

So, when I wrote him that Irina was graduating and I wanted to prepare for the event, stay a day or two in Athens, he invited me to be the guest of the house. So I invited my cousin Nikola Anastasov, down, by the taxi, a very good dentist, to come and be my guest in AThens. Irina, who wears a most delicate beach dress from Alexandrakis, the elegant shop with a most distinguished owner-manager, always so perceptive, his sharp glances scooping loads of data which you felt was instantly transformed into correct conclusions, always with a bow-tie, always so meticulously combed and clean and attentive. I loved shopping with him though it was a terribly expensive place. But then, this dress was worn by both mother and latter daughter, after Maca faced a problem with that dress entering Il Duomo Cathedral in Milan. The padres found her tits were swelling over and requested her to put a cardigan around her shoulders before letting us in. "Irina, I think you just got a new dress", and she said - "And the matching bikini, yes?"

But then, the point here is about accommodation, not about this runaway train of thoughts. The point is that from the best hotel in Greece the one had grand-stand view over one of the worst pages in Balkan history

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