Keep It Simple

Hey hey whaddup! Well you must be wondering "what's da dealio wit dis muddafucka and he hasn't updated dis shizzle fer a while now?" Well, since I asked this question to myself too I'm here to say do not worry. Do not panic. Everything's under control!

I've just been too bored lately to update you on what's been going on, plus I'm putting together a zine. What's that you say? "A zine?!" I hear you ask? "But you're way too lazy..." I hear you say again.

Well, buddies of mine that's true. I'm putting a zine together with sloppy poetry and short stories with a friend of mine. I'll be doing the writing and he'll be doing the drawing. The name of that zine as it was decided will be "Keep It Simple" and if everything goes according to plan it will be finished and done at the end of August maybe mid of September.

If not it will never be finished and you'll end up crying and probably need tons and tons of ice cream and sedatives to calm you down. Since I do not want that to happen to all you lovelies out there, I'll do my best. Now I have to bounce and finish off my coffee! 

Till the next time, keep it simple and keep goofing it up!

Metro Rides, Armpit Sweat And Gypsy Accordions

Normally a ride on the metro equals with awfully strong arm pit sweat odor, tired/anxious faces and 15 year old kids who play music on their phone or smile for absolute no reason. But during my last ride there was another thing added.

I was sitting waiting for my metro to arrive, reading a pizza menu contemplating if the prices were right and how badly I'd like to have one of those pizzas right then as it was 15:54 and I had nothing to eat all day when a group of what I think they were Romanian Gypsies came and sat on the seats next to me. There were 3 guys with accordions and 2 women with one of them pushing a baby trolley.

I lift my head looking at those guys and the woman, trying to see the baby in the trolley but the trolley was covered with a blanket and if there was a living soul in there I have absolutely no idea how it was still breathing. Anyway, the train arrives and we all walk in. I take a seat and I'm ready to fall asleep when I hear an accordion playing.

I turn around looking at the guys that walked in the same car with me and it wasn't them. They were talking. The noise was coming from the other car and was approaching our car. Now in Athens it's a usual thing having hobos, drunks or junkies begging for money in metro rides, telling everyone their problem real loud and then going to each one of the passengers separately asking to spare some change. But I never heard some one playing the accordion and begging for money in the metro.

Anyway, I think it'll probably be one of the Gypsies' friends that got in in another car and started playing asking the passengers to spare some change and I wasn't far out. I lean forward to check and I see this gypsy girl that couldn't be over than 18 years old walking towards my car playing the accordion. She walks over and stands above the person who was sitting right opposite me. I could only see her back and listen to her music.

She turns around, still playing and smiles at me. She had the most beautiful eyes I've ever seen, the most perfectly structured face that others pay lots of money to have and a body that again a model would kill to have (and I'm not saying that in the “my hand's down my pants ready to jack off” kind of way) It's the first time I look up at a beggar and then straight down again feeling lost for words and searching frantically for change in my pocket.

I still remember her face and I can say with the greatest of certainties, it's prettier than your girlfriend's. Not in the “beauty is in the eye of the beholder” kind of way. You'd admit it yourself if you were there too. And if you're a girl you'd either cringe of jealousy or you'd question your sexuality for a couple of minutes.

We Can Raise The Titanic

The riots are over. Or so it seems. No signs of Molotov cocktails, broken windows or trashcans that were set on fire. The scent of tear gas has disappeared and the channels have forgotten all about the three people that died. It seems like both fashion anarchists and looters and fresh to the profession photo-reporters are waiting for their next chance to break through and shine. Wear their hoods/ armed with their cameras ready to give their own fight for equality and righteousness.

It’s that feeling you get after you read a feature on the web about how all these were “the calm before the storm” that actually makes you believe it. Makes you believe that the city centre of your country is actually going to turn in to a battlefield. But then I see a miracle somewhere in the horizon. To be honest, it feels like I’m the only one who sees it. There is a way out of this mess.

Many people say IMF, some others talk about help from the European Union but I say no. We can stand on our own. Let me tell you how. It seems like all the Greek female “celebrities”, will start becoming porn stars after the humble start that came from a famous pop singer/ model and whatever she thinks she is. Believe it or not, the copies of her porn movie sold like crazy. After that, another female “celebrity” made a porn movie, which came out like two days ago, while the sequel of the first celebrity’s movie is on its way. See where I’m coming from? Apart from an economical messed up country. Are you getting what I’m trying to say here? We could gather the money by making porn movies!!!!

Imagine that. I’ve never thought about it. Apart from a form of “entertainment” I’ve never thought that the porn industry had something more to offer. But here it is. Our rescue! Embrace it. As it seems by the polls 3 out of 4 Greeks have watched – either by downloading or by buying- the movies of these two so called celebrities.

So if all these so called celebrities came out and said “we’ll work our ass off (literally speaking) to save our country” EVERY GREEK, no matter political beliefs and social background, would be right behind them supporting what they’d be doing. Plus, we the Greeks are famous about spreading the love and hospitality.

So, here’s a proposal that I bet our government would love too: Drop the molotov cocktails, quit spending energy on riots and marches, shouting about justice and start making porn movies. Loads of them! Grab your camera and start shooting. Stop downloading the movies of these honest celebrities of ours that do their best in this dire time of our country and buy them. Give all your money and support them. Support your country. Watch porn.

I don’t mean that. I don’t know. We’re sinking slowly and soon enough- hopefully not- we’ll have to salute and go down with the sinking ship that they created. Enjoy your time and your summer. Hopefully I’ll find the nerve to write another entry during or before the summer. Till then take care.

Ooooh We're On Fire

It has become something like a tradition in Athens Greece, during the summer time –mostly during July and August- a fire to be spreading and burning a great extend of forest ground but also residences.

Same images on T.V every year around same time on the evening news, residents running amok trying to stop the fire and complaining of not having enough help from the authorities.

But I’m one of those who always see the light at the end of the tunnel. I always find happiness and reason to believe even in the toughest of the situations. Think about these facts: 1 Greece, 2 Athens, 3 fire, 4 evening news, 5 top story in 3 international channels…and number 6…of course…*drum roll* FAME!

1: http://www.newser.com/article/d99nlhe00/greek-firefighters-contain-blazes-near-athens.html

2:http://news.sky.com/skynews/Home/World-News/Greece-Forest-Fire-Villages-Near-Athens-Threatened-By-Growing-Blaze/Article/200908415367012?lpos=World_News_Top_Stories_Header_2&lid=ARTICLE_15367012_Greece_Forest_Fire%3A_Villages_Near_Athens_Threatened_By_Growing_Blaze

3:http://cnnwire.blogs.cnn.com/2009/08/22/wildfire-rages-outside-greek-capital/

That’s fame for us folks and don’t pretend you don’t just love it. We are the Greeks who own beautiful islands and charge crazy amounts of money for our famous greek salads and sell cheap impure alcohol to teenage English tourists and then complain about them passing out on the streets, we are the Greeks who became famous for the 2004 Olympic Games and our laziness (we are the Greeks who invented homosexuality as one might would like to add to that…); and to this wall of glory, the bush-fire and conflagration have been added as a “glorified” tradition since 2007.

Two years have gone by and we’re still keeping strong. Burning down the forests, building resorts and villas on the burnt ground. Let me reveal a secret here, that the news won’t tell…the fires and the residents running in panic trying to save the properties is not an accident. It’s another sort of Big Brother, it’s more like an emergency test for the end of the world. It’s an emergency test turned into a reality show which is broadcasted not as a television programme but through the news. Clever huh? Beat that if you can. Take it away Bruce...