Most Greeks don't seem to know the name of the largest city in Turkey.
Are they in a time-warp or still clinging on to an unrealistic fantasy?
Are they in a time-warp or still clinging on to an unrealistic fantasy?
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SF Bay Area
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Re: Geography
Tue, November 27, 2007 - 12:32 PMhah-ha. Istanbul. :)
i feel ya. after the last time i went to greece i decided that most greek-americans are kinda backward. no offense to my dad. -
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Re: Geography
Tue, November 27, 2007 - 6:15 PMWhen I was in Athens last fall I went to hear a talk by a Greek lesbian who visited Istanbul and was reporting on the present state of women and gay people in Turkey.
She prefaced her talk by saying she had to use the name Constantinopoli because it was the only one Greeks understood.
Greek-Americans tend to be more conservative than Greeks, probably because many of our ancestors came to the US from the horia for economic reasons and were not well-educated. -
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Re: Geography
Tue, November 27, 2007 - 8:52 PMHmm, my Papou was one of the best educated in our family when he came over but was highly educated, my Great Papou was strictly peasent stock and was very open minded.....also in Lowell Mass where my family took root one of the largest liberal communities are the Greek American community...same thing here in SF...hell we even have had two Greek American Mayors in this most progressive bastion of liberalism in America. -
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Re: Geography
Tue, November 27, 2007 - 11:50 PMBoth of my parents were life-long Democrats while my maternal grandmother voted Republican, crossing over to support Dukakis for President.
My paternal grandfather, who remained in Greece, was a schoolteacher during Ottoman times. Most of his sons came to America. My father was 15 when he arrived here, went to night school and even studied at the San Francisco Art Academy before it was named that.
Racism persists within the Greek American community even in San Francisco. My father did not like blacks and mistrusted Jews. Of course he lived during a time when hotels and other establishments were allowed to refuse service to both blacks and Jews.
A few years ago a black man attending one of the Greek food festivals on Valencia Street was not allowed to join the line of dancers.
I recently realized that both Greek Orthodox Churches in San Francisco established schools for the children of parishioners after desegregation. The church remains an anti-gay institution both in the US and Greece and resists accepting women into the priesthood.
www.nikosdiaman.com
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Re: Geography
Wed, November 28, 2007 - 2:36 AMI meant to say my Papou was the best educated but very conservative, but my great Papou was strictly peasent stock but very open minded...of course racism and homophobia is rampant in the church, seems to be that way throughout chrisitndom, kinda miss' the whole point of the new testament...when it comes to the Turks deep wounds heal slowly and it's only been a little shy of 90 years since the Armenian Genocide and the slaughter of the Ionion Greeks...I personally am able to seperate the actions of a government from the life of the individual and havn't met a Turk I don't like....on the other hand my family immigrated here because the Turks was after their butts but that was their experience not mine... -
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Re: Geography
Thu, November 29, 2007 - 11:51 AMgreat to see this discussion sparked. i went to turkey on a boat ride from Kos, with my parents on a visit to Rodos and the Dodecanese, where my dad is from. i understand why he fears and sometimes loathes Turkish peeps and all Muslims. they had their butts kicked by them and were ruled despotically for 500 years (not to mention the "ethnic cleansing" of Greeks from Ionia). the Turkish coast is visible from Rodos and the town my dad is from is a hop skip and a jump over about 5 miles of water and faces the said coastline. my dad comes from a farming community, but like all Greeks seems to be extremely well educated for only having received a high school diploma.
while in Turkey (we visited Ephosos, one of the coolest ancient spots I've ever seen, in addition to Teotihuacan) i formed an opinion of Turkish people. i realized that they were just normal people, not the villains of history. they have a culture, a religion, and a life and deserve to preserve these things in their own way just like Greek people do. i won't stop believing in people in general and their ability to accept other people based on our commonalities, instead of rejecting each other based on past insults.
to my dad's credit, he went to turkey without fear (he pretended to be American, but laughably got discovered to be Greek by the local merchants in Bodrum). and he opened up to the people there, as it was hard to resist their hospitality and good manners.
btw, that is sooo messed up that dancers wouldn't let an African American to join the line dance -i am glad I've never experienced this. in an example of much better behavior... in Portland, OR i attended the orthodox church Sunday service where they had an Ethiopian congregation in attendance. at the time the Ethiopians were new immigrants and had no Ethiopian orthodox church of their own (they do now). the other orthodox churches should follow their example! sheesh. actually i also heard that the it was only recently that the Jewish churches have accepted the Ethiopian jews into the fold. argh. there's no excuse for any of it even based on people's backwardness. because there are plenty of prejudiced well-educated people as well.
thanks for letting me ramble...
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Re: Geography
Thu, November 29, 2007 - 1:03 PMI heard, from an Ethiopian, that many Ethiopians go to Greece to study religion. I don't know how true that is, but I find it particularly bothersome that a Greek church would only recently let Ethiopians into the congregation. Jeeze...
But no judgement here, I have family at the Vatican. Ahhhhh! -
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Re: Geography
Thu, November 29, 2007 - 1:54 PMno it was the jewish church that wouldn't let the judaic ethiopians in!! until a few years ago.
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Re: Geography
Thu, November 29, 2007 - 2:13 PMI understand that Ethiopians also attended Annunciation Cathedral in San Francisco a few years ago but were encouraged to start their own church. A few came to a holiday art show I was involved with at Holy Trinity Church three years ago, probably having attended the liturgy there.
A friend christened the son of a Greek-American father and African-American mother who I believe are parishioners of Annunciation.
Being an unorthodox Greek-American I don't know what goes on at any of the churches in the Bay Area on an ongoing basis.
I went to Turkey 11 years ago and enjoyed the trip. Both my niece and my mother visited Turkey before I did. I took a boat from Samos to Kusadasi. The only unpleasantness was the surly attitude of one of the soldiers at customs. The people were wonderfully hospitable and generous the rest of the week I spent there, though I quickly tired of the many rug salesmen who approached me in Selcuk.
Epheses was impressive and my favorite building is the library wall that is still standing. I went on to Izmir and then Istanbul that is fascinating because of its long history. I stayed in a hostel next door to Agia Sophia.
I am currently reading Twice A Stranger about the Greek-Turkish population exchange. The book not only explores the political forces at play but also includes personal accounts of both Greeks and Turks forced to leave their homes and resettle elsewhere.
Nikos.
www.nikosdiaman.com -
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Re: Geography
Thu, November 29, 2007 - 11:31 PMNiko -
I had friends in Minneapolis who were from Eretria. They were 'black' and attended St. Mary's Church in Minneapolis, many years ago...
According to these people, there were many Greeks in Eretria and they sort of 'spread the word.' Eretria is adjacent to Ethiopia.
My friends attended St. Mary's because they were orthodox. They were perfectly at home there. I'm wondering if the Ethopians that attended the Annuciation in SF were actually Eretrian. The two countries are very close. -
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Re: Geography
Thu, November 29, 2007 - 11:50 PMUsed to be one country at one time...
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Re: Geography
Thu, February 14, 2008 - 5:57 PMMy own Papou was from Marmara Island, in the west part of the Marmara Sea. His family lost everything in the exchange, but I never heard him speak badly of Turks. Both countries have used each other as a boogeyman, and the single best tool in uniting people in a new nation state is to give the a common enemy. The Turks are slowly coming to terms with the Armenian issue - while the government is still stiff on it (as are some ultranationalists), many many people know it happened and tell the stories related by their grandparents. Meanwhile, the Greeks are finally starting to talk about the atrocities committed by the Greeks in Anatolia between 1919 and 1922. And about what happened to the Turks of Athens, and the Peloponnese, and Macedonia.
Louis de Berniere's "Birds Without Wings" is a beautifully written book on the subject and I'd recommend it to anyone.
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Re: Geography
Thu, February 14, 2008 - 5:50 PMI think the answer to the original question would be different for different people.
Unrealistic fantasy? I don't think most Greeks have any fantasies about ever taking Istanbul/Konstantinoupoli back. Just the fact that Greece has a population of 9.5 million while Istanbul has 15 million or more would be a good reason not to. Greece has had a hard enough time dealing with the remains of it's Turkish population in Thrace! Also...the "real estate" is still here but Istanbul Greek culture is really not. There are a total of about 1,500 Greeks left in the city now. Most of them are old. Many of the young ones leave as soon as they finish high school if they went to a Greek high school. Others hardly speak Greek and when they do they speak it with a Turkish accent. (Sad to see the Istanbul Greek dialect becoming a thing of the past.)
As for the name itself - I don't think it's as big a deal as a few people on both sides try and make it. Turks say "Midilli" for Mytiline, "Selânik" for Thessaloniki, "Gümülcine" for Komotini, "İskece" for Xanthi, "Dedeağaç" for Alexandroupoli...and the list goes on. But some nationalists here go nuts when a Greek says Konstantinoupoli. Greeks use their own names for the cities they left in Asia Minor, at least when they know them. Trapezounda, Smyrni, Magnisia, Angira, it's perfectly natural to do so. It doesn't mean they are out to oust the Turks from those cities or try another "megali idea."
But I do think some people on both sides *are* in a bit of a time warp, and more. I get tired of Turks who feel the need to tie everything of any value in Turkish society to the nomads who came out of Central Asia, and Greeks who can't admit that *anything* in Turkey is anything other than Byzantine. Nowadays, while many Turks have a complex about what they "should be" according to Kemalist politics (European), many Greeks are also too attached to what "we were." "We" did this and "we" did that. When a modern Greek who has no appreciation for modern Greek culture, language, music, tradition etc., let alone ancient Greek literature, theatre or other cultural heritage suddenly goes on about how "we" did this and "we" did that, all I can ask is "what are you doing now? Isn't that more important?" -
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Re: Geography
Fri, February 15, 2008 - 3:30 PMHistory is a fascinating subject. I want to know about the lives of my ancestors as well as the larger movements of people. However, I live in the present. And I can only take responsibility and credit for my own actions.
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