My country is on fire and all I can do is watch…

Before I start writing I have to warn you dear readers. This isn’t a pleasant post, it isn’t full of wisecracks or a funny take on life. I ditched my self sarcasm cloak for today and put the DP mask in the closet… This is about me , Christos, trying to exorcise the demons that raised their ugly heads in front of me today.

My country Greece is an 11,000,000 people nation, a small dot on the map, a beautiful country bathed in sunshine, a place of great historical heritage and mediocre modern achievements. It is a place where people live life to the fullest even if that means being lazy a lot of the time, we are not amazingly organized, we love to laugh and when pressured by time we make miracles happen… Greeks whine a lot that they don’t get paid much but live life like they won the lottery… Greek people are extreme people in the way they love, the way the swear , the way they beat eachother up, in every single way they are full of passion be it negative or positive. So, yeah I may be biased, I may sound a bit too patriotic or just a greek sentimental fool but I do love my country a lot, not in a creepy uber ethnicist way but in a romantic idealistic way.

Today my country is on fire… no we are not rocking the world with some event of Olympic proportions… “we” are literally on fire!!! As I am typing this, I am watching the news and they just said there are 177 fire starting points all over the country!!! The news stations are having a blast, they are blaming politicians for everything, they ask about ‘who kickstarted the fires’, they interview innocent bystanders and survivors, they thrive on human pain and misery. Reporters mixing rumour and fact, casualty figures are changing before my eyes “oh no 41 is not a large enough number” let’s make it a “50”, a nice round number maybe we are going to get that extra boost in ratings who knows…

My country is on fire… A woman burned alive hugging her three children while the fourth one tried to run away and combusted a few metres further, the reporter sheds a tear and me and my dad feel like we were hit with a sledgehammer. My God, how can you be so cruel… letting a mother getting burned alive and listening to her children scream in pain before her eyes… She was just going to a bloody wedding and look at her now, only 4 corpses and ashes remain…Oh, but I forgot, God has nothing to do with this, this was all caused by actions of "men"...

My country is on fire… Villages burned to the ground, people left helpless without a glimpse of hope, not enough firetrucks , not enough planes, the wind is blowing so hard nothing can fly…. People got burned, people fled away, aged men watching the hardships of a lifetime go down in seconds… Help… nowhere to be found, a nation watching in awe, standing, praying, feeling angry at what it sees… Surely this can't be happening to Greece…

My country is on fire… A state in stasis and hibernation, an invisible government, a non–existent coordination of available resources. This is by far the worst government that I have "survived" through in my 28 years, it is disastrous, it is totally incompetent and they got the nerve to come and ask for our vote in 3 weeks time (national elections). I guess they had to go out with a bang… The prime sinister speaks but you can see it in his eyes he cant handle it, he is as scared as a kid on the first day at school, he can't inspire a nation to unite or just emmit some sort of courageous aura… He is the guy you want to have as a friend, to talk about football, drink uzo and eat meze, have a laugh with at the cafeteria… he is a nice guy... just not a prime minister…

My country is on fire… Noone knows what happened exactly…. Was it the real estate fuckers wanting more land, was it some stupidass shepherds wanting to expand the nourishment grounds for their herds, was it a malakas driver passing by throwing a cigarette out of the window, was it a devious coordinated plan by some external non-Greek force to royally fuck up this country and manipulate it easier afterwards or was it a damn side effect of a fucked up extremely hot weather that lit garbage, wood or other flammables… ? Noone really knows, maybe a combination of sorts, I don’t know and I cant think… what is the point… I am no policeman, judge and jury. I am just a Greek citizen angry and in pain…

Dont mind the initial messages in Greek, they simply state that we are grieving as a nation for our people, our forests, our lost hope... We have lost so much in such little time... this year's summer was such a nightmare... Tonight is time for grieving and licking our wounds... I just hope, tomorrow this nightmare ends...

My country is on fire… and all I can do is watch. I think about my dead compatriots that died for no reason at all, I anger at the lack of coordination of the available resources –lives could have been saved-, I spare a thought for all those people that lost their houses and have to face an all new reality starting tomorrow… Immigrants in their own country, a caravan of wounded souls looking for some support and inspiration in their time of need. Fires still burning all over the country, when is it going to stop….?

My country is on fire… the nation is shocked, victims and no victims alike. I sense that the same feel of impending gloom that spread on the streets few years ago, when a bus full of students was literally butchered by a fucked up lorry will make a comeback once again probably even worse. Oh, we will mourn for a couple of days and move on, such is the nature of life, in a couple of days maybe more I’ll be cracking wisecracks again being my usual merry self having a bit of harmless fun. ‘Us’ the non-directly affected ones will move on, the news stations are going to have a blast blaming everyone with or without proof and then the attention will shift to the national elections. And those souls that lost loved ones in the fire or buried an entire way of life in the ashes will have to move on, away from the limelight, trying to rebuild some sort of tolerable existence using miniscule inefficient means… No rest for the wicked it seems is at hand…

As I finish this post, I realize that all countries have tragedies like these embedded in their psyche, stories of horror and pain, stories untold and efforts in vain. However, disaster has hit home and I just can’t shake this feeling of insecurity and dread that the whole nation feels, watching helplessly its beautiful country burn…

This post was written on Saturday night, 11:26 pm and the flame burning my heart has been tamed a bit, making sleeping tonight a tad easier… The actual fire(s) is still raging, tearing my beautiful country apart bit by bit… Eventually, it will be put out, leaving the fuming carcass of a nation’s psyche behind…

As I post this blog entry , today on Sunday night... 63 people have died, Ancient Olympia (this is the place where the Olympic games originated from and were originally held in ancient times, a place of great historical value as much for Greece as for humanity as a whole...) has burned to a great extent, not totally at least... The fires are still raging, burning Peloponessus to the ground as they go... The following song depicts totally how myself and most Greeks feel at the moment:

P.S. I really needed to get this out of my system, since I was so enraged and miserable today it truly defies belief… I felt like a loved one died even at short intervals… imagine the people that were actually affected by the fire directly… I just can’t bare the thought…

(Click on map to enlarge it)

I added this map to give you an idea of the localization of fires. Nome Ilias in the Northwest of Peloponesus (yellow region on the map) is the one that has been totally devastated. Then comes, Nome Evias (this is the green area that has the shape of a hippocampus ). Several fires are burning in other parts of Peloponesus and Sterea Ellada (green area in the central part of the map). Still, Nome Ilias is the one that has been totally devastated. Personally, I live in Sterea Ellada, Nome Fthiotidas, in the town of Lamia.

Talk to you later all…