Frappé is an example of cultural colonisation and bastardisation of culture by global corporations.
Frappé a disgusting coffee served in Greece and Cyprus, an ice cold frothy coffee made with Nescafe.
Frappé is not a Greek drink.
Frappé was introduced by Nestle at a trade fair in Thessaloniki in 1957. Nescafe mixed with cold water in a cocoa shaker to create the foam then poured over ice.
Following its introduction in Thessaloniki in 1957, frappé was heavily promoted by Nestlé.
Zante to Cardiff the second tui coronavirus flight in as many days.
Two tui covid-19 flights, the first Zante with coronavirus-positive passengers bound for Plymouth, the second Zante to Cardiff. Is there a third, a fourth? On each flight at least half a dozen cases.
The Cardiff flight, passengers have complained lack of social distancing at check in, staff handling phones of passengers, on the flight failure to enforce lack of wearing of face masks, passengers not wearing masks walking around the plane to speak to fellow passengers, one lady had someone sat next to her with no mask, it beggars belief tui serving food and drinks on the flight and it goes without saying packed in like sardines.
Failure by tui to thoroughly clean the plane on turnaround. One passenger found wet wipes behind the seat in front.
On public transport, trains and buses, mandatory to wear masks but on tui flights anything goes.
Delta no mask removed from flight, blacklisted from future flights.
Why did the crew not note all those who refused to wear face masks as instructed, pilot radio ahead their details, police waiting to escort them off the plane on landing?
Passengers on the Cardiff flight say the first they were aware they were at risk of infection was when they heard it on the news and through social media.
A lady who was sat next to a passenger not wearing a mask, who said the crew failed to act, has now developed coronavirus symptoms. She hopes it is only a cold, but will have covid-19 test to be sure.
Stephanie Whitfield who was on the tui flight to Cardiff has described how passengers were not wearing masks correctly and just seemed to “disregard the rules”.
She told ITV Wales that she “didn’t feel safe” on board the flight:
I don’t think many of the passengers had been completely educated on the use of face masks.
There were people with their masks underneath their noses, underneath their chins, people were taking them off to speak to other people, taking them off and wandering down the aisle to speak to other people.
I didn’t feel safe and we took the decision before we got back into Cardiff that we were going to self isolate just because we thought it was the responsible thing to do.
I was sat in the middle seat and the gentleman next to me had his mask around his chin so for me to kind of highlight it to someone I would have then had to spend the next three and a half hours sat next to someone feeling very uncomfortable, so I didn’t feel like I was able to do that.
Every single passenger on the Cardiff flight has been instructed by Public Health Wales to self-isolate.
Tui claim they care about the health a safety of their passengers. A sick joke as they do not care about their package holiday clients and their welfare. In 2016 tui was knowingly dumping clients on a building site.
Travelling in a sealed tube in close proximity to other people is a sure plus way to catch covid-19. Passengers wandering around the sealed tube help spread the virus to other passengers.
On the Zante to Cardiff flight, at least three groups of people scattered throughout the plane have tested positive.
Dr Gwen Lowe, consultant in communicable disease control for Public Health Wales has said last week ‘we’ve had about 30 cases in Wales that have come back from Zante’.
Different flights on different days staying in different locations. These are confirmed positive cases and we’re expecting that number to rise.
Up to 30 in a group travelling to Plymouth may have been infected on a flight from Zante. They have subsequently been out drinking in Plymouth.
Greece was already at risk of of being placed on the UK quarantine list.
Greece must deal with the Zante coronavirus hotspot that is spreading covid-19 across Europe. Zante must be placed in lockdown, no travel to and from Zante and as absolute minimum close all bars and nightclubs and anywhere groups of people gather. In an attempt to slow covid-19, across Greece bars and restaurants have to close by midnight.
Tui should halt all flights to Zante. The only flights to bring back stranded clients, who must then face 14-day quarantine.
Update: A third tui flight, Zante to Glasgow had passengers who tested positive for covid-19. Glasgow has been placed in partial lockdown.
Update: Wales has imposed quarantine for all flights from Zante. Scotland has imposed quarantine for arrivals from Greece.
Update: A WizzAir flight Athens to Larnaca, a passenger not wearing a mask correctly was questioned by police on arrival and fined.
In 1960 Leonard Cohen bought a house on the Greek Island of Hydra.
Once you’ve lived on Hydra you can’t live anywhere else, including Hydra. — Kenneth Koch
Leonard Cohen wished for somewhere quiet to write. He left Montreal on his first trip outside North America with a Canadian Arts Council Grant of $2,000 and one published book of poetry. He was writing a novel or trying to, blackening the pages three pages a day. Hydra seemed the ideal place, warm and sunny, especially compared with cold and grey and damp London. He arrived on Hydra with his green Olivetti. He had taken up an offer of Barbara Rothschild to stay on the island, only when he arrived at the house and mentioned her name, he was turned away by the housekeeper ‘we don’t need any more Jews here’. Leonard Cohen put a curse on the house and within six months it had burnt to the ground.
Prior to the purchase of his house, Charmian Clift and George Johnston offered a room in their house. He would sit writing on their terrace.
It was on Hydra he met Marianne and where he wrote ‘So Long Marianne’ and ‘Bird on the Wire’.
In a letter to his mother:
It has a huge terrace with a view of dramatic mountain and shining white houses. The rooms are large and cool with deep windows set in thick walls. I suppose it’s about 200 years old and many generations of sea-.men must have lived here. I will do a little work on it every year and in a few years it will be a mansion… I live on a hill and life has been going on here exactly the same for hundreds of years. All through the day you hear the calls of the street vendors and they are really rather musical… I get up around 7 generally and work till about noon. Early morning is coolest and therefore best, but I love the heat anyhow, especially when the Aegean Sea is 10 minutes from my door.
What more could an unknown writer ask for?
He was part of a group of writers and artist and poets who used to meet at Κατσικάς Katsikas.
One of his friends Charmian Clift wrote Peel Me A Lotus her account of living on Hydra in the late 1950s.
They were all cursed. Charmian Clift killed herself after leaving Hydra, George died a year later.
His first concert in Australia was dedicated to the couple and he opened with ‘Bird on the Wire’.
We have photographer James Burke to thank for a series of photographs of these days in 1960 on Hydra.
A Theatre for Dreamers a fictional account by Polly Samson seen through the eyes of an 18-year-old girl, who with a thousand pounds left to her by her mother escapes from an abusive father. She reads a book Peel Me A Lotus by Charmian Clift, sent to her mother by the author a close friend of her mother, of life on Hydra. She remembers the friend of her mother from when she was a child and writes to her asking if she can find her a room to rent.
We start in 2016, Leonard Cohen has recently died, a very sad loss, and Trump has won the US Presidential elections. Word reaches Hydra ‘and spread rapidly like a stench along the agora. There were horrified groans, even from the donkeys, disbelieving splutters from every table, passer-by and boat. For a moment it was a comfort to think at least Leonard had been spared this.’
Upon the Earth, Under the Clouds, a documentary on Danae Stratou’s large scale installation in Elefsis, with music by Brian Eno.
Wandering around Athens.
Awake in the morning with breakfast with a stunning view of The Acropolis, and Olympian Temple of Zeus.
During the day, walk around The Acropolis, climb the Hill of the Muses with stunning views over Athens and out to sea, walk along the Koine Road, visit Library of Hadrian, the Ancient Agora, walk the streets of Plaka and Monastiraki, visit the National Garden, discover some amazing coffee shops where served by champion baristas, in one Little Tree, a bookshop cum coffee shop, latest book by Yanis Varoufakis.
Danae Stratou artist wife of Yanis Varoufakis.
Many thanks to Yanis Varoufakis for mention of this documentary.
I looked out this morning and saw the roads outside Parliament blocked.
Another protest as on Thursday?
I went to investigate.
National Liberation Day, a public holiday.
By the time I arrived, the parades had finished.
When will there be a Liberation Day to mark libation from European Union occupiers who are destroying Greece, bleeding the country to death, with Alexis Tsipras having betrayed his country their puppet?
Yanis Varoufakis and Paul Mason in conversation at Union Chapel to discuss Adults in the Room, an account of the European Deep State.
Larry Summers asked Yanis Varoufakis, are you in the inside or the outside?
In other words, are you one of us?
Christine Lagarde, after hours of fighting with Yanis Varoufakis, relaxing afterwards, admitted, he was right, and what was was being done to Greece was wrong, but it had to be done to satisfy the political establishment.
In discussion with US Treasury, they admitted, what was being done by the EU to destroy Greece, they were not happy with, but Greece was Germany’s sphere of influence, and they could not interfere.
Yanis Varoufakis was then warned, be aware, in a week, a smear campaign will be launched against you by the EU.
One week later, that was what happened, a smear campaign was run. Lazy journalists, with ties to the Deep State, were briefed, they print their lies, and the rest of the media regurgitates. Lies become facts.
If Yanis Varoufakis attempts to correct the lies, it is then reported as Yanis Varoufakis denies he said. That was never said, not reported.
Until that is he was interviewed by the New York Times, and said it was all a pack of lies. Who should we believe, it is your word against theirs? Ah, yes, I recorded the meetings.
Not all journalists are of the calibre or integrity of Paul Mason.
Greece was neither here nor there. Greece had to be destroyed to serve as a warning to others.
We are seeing the same with Brexit. UK cannot be seen as being better off outside the EU. It must be punished to serve as a warning to others. That this will destroy Europe is seen as irrelevant.
Yanis Varoufakis set up the Untouchables, a secret task force to deal with Oligarchs and tax dodgers. They obtained records from the banks to show where the money was flowing, then compared with tax receipts. They then offered an amnesty, declare and we will tax you at 15%, we are letting you off lightly, fail to declare and we will bring criminal prosecutions, and by the way, we know who you are.
This programme, which would have brought in billions of euros, was scrapped by the Troika.
The Troika was supported by the Oligarchs, the Troika in turn supported the Oligarchs.
When Greece held its referendum, the media campaigned against No to the Troika. The media owned by the Oligarchs. The Greeks showed courage, they voted No, even though they knew there would be a price to pay. They were betrayed by Greek politicians.
A condition of the next bailout, was to scrap the programme to claw back the tax that had been dodged.
Know who is your enemy, the enemy within. In Labour, those who sabotage the leadership of Jeremy Corbyn.
In Brighton, it is insanity for Labour to oppose Caroline Lucas.
Everyone urged to join DiEM25 to form progressive alliances across Europe.
We have to transfer power back to nation states, back to town halls, back to people, at the same time, network and cooperate.
When Greece needed help and support, they were betrayed by politicians across Europe, politicians who pretend to be progressive.
When someone says they want to be a politician, want power, they are the people not to vote for.
When Greece was being screwed by the ECB I suggested creating a parallel crypto-currency, an alternative currency for Greece. Why, because it was not possible to leave the euro, a major logistics problem.
In Prague, last year, I saw parallel currencies in action, they use both Czech crown and the euro, therefore my idea for a parallel currency for Greece, part of Plan C, a transition to a commons based economy, was both practical and feasible.
Medium is looking to charge for reading articles. Medium, though not intended as, functions as a collaborative commons. To charge, would be a retrograde step, a classic case of enclosure of the commons. I have suggested to founder Ev Williams, that convert to an open coop, open source platform, do not charge for articles, all articles remain free to read, but have an option, where if readers wish they may pay for an article, and use faircoin.
Deliveroo, is an exploitative platform, serfs working for an app at often less than the minimum wage, replace with Deliver2U, an open source open coop platform, payment using faircoin and fairpay card.
Unicorns are mythical companies valued at over a billion dollars. Mythical because in reality worthless. Such has been the excesses of Uber, it has been proposed zebras, but these are business as usual, simply a little cosmetic tweaking to make it look good. When I had the audacity to suggest this, exposing the Emperor has no Clothes, a lot of stick over the weekend. What did not go down, was my suggestion, we are postcapitalism, the future open coops, open source platforms, local currencies, faircoin and fairpay card.
In Protaras, a little coffee shop Miyu Coffee and fashion boutique Nia Boutique overlooking Fig Tree Bay. Protaras is dying, Fig Tree Bay end dead, killed by all-inclusive hotels, no money flowing into the local economy. We explored the possibility, or at least tossed around the idea, why not establish a weekly mid-week market, a mix of flea market, farmers market and craft market to revitalise the area and retain and circulate money within the local economy.
Therefore to see in Heraklion this very idea up and running, and not only that but to see faircoin and fairpay card being used is excellent news.
On Saturday, 18th of March 2017, we hopefully reached to the 6th Autonomous Street Market, which are regularly organized by the Integral Cooperative of Heraklion (I.C.Her) at Georgiadi’s park. A project that is constantly strengthened and has come to serve some basic needs of those who actively show that they want and intend to disengage from the competitive and alienating market. Step by step, we cover more and more categories of products and services that are offered through our alternative currencies, Kouki and FairCoin.
The only problem I see with faircoin, is how to transfer from say euros to faircoin. To have to buy bitcoin from an exchange then use the bitcoin to buy faircoin is too cumbersome.
If fairpay cards are easily available, local nodes where they can be ‘charged’ with euros or faircoin, it will be a lot more viable.
More details are needed on how the market in Heraklion are managing these issues.
Re-posted from Light on a Dark Mountain.
Last year the Greek economy suffered a further blow, contracting by 1.2% at the end of 2016, according to revised figures released earlier this week. The figures, published by the Greek statistics agency Elstat show it was the worst quarter since the summer of 2015, when the European Central Bank closed the Greek banks.
The medicine imposed by the EU is killing the patient, not that there was ever any intention of helping the patient to recover.
Capitalism is an adaptive system, or was, 50 year long Kondratieff cycles, each new cycle driven by technological innovation. This came to an abrupt end in 2008. We are now post-capitalism.
2008 a banking crisis, morphed into an economic crisis, into a social and political crisis, and now a geo-political crisis.
2009 the German banks were bankrupt, their ‘assets’ worthless dodgy US financial instrument. They were bailed out by the German taxpayer.
2010 the German banks were in trouble again, back with their begging bowls, the Greek state was bankrupt, could not service their debt, technically the German banks were insolvent. The German taxpayer would not stomach a second bail out of the German banks. A clever ploy, biggest ever loan to a bankrupt state, the money flows to Greece straight back out to French and German banks. Classic extend and pretend. And a bonus, control the Greek state, plunder the Greek state, force sell off of state assets at knockdown prices. The result, Greek economy shrank by 25%. To put that in context, Great Depression following the Wall Street Crash economies shrank by 20%.
2015 Syriza won a landslide victory, with a mandate to challenge the EU.
What we saw in Greece, was not ‘conventional Left politics’, this was a radical, progressive moment with popular support. Greeks were saying, enough is enough.
Most intelligent observers recognise, the EU is close to collapse. It is a rigid hierarchical system. Such systems lack the ability to adapt, they are brittle and cannot survive shocks.
The banking crash of 2008 was one such shock. The election of Syriza was another shock. The example being set by Syriza could not be allowed to spread, the contagion had to be contained.
The mechanism used to destroy the Greek banks and destroy the Greek government was the ECB. The role of a Central Bank when banks are in trouble is to help support the banks, ECB did the exact opposite.
But was the closure process legal and within the ECB’s charter and mandate?
ECB President Mario Draghi wasn’t sure; Draghi commissioned an independent legal opinion on this issue.
Fabio De Masi, a German Die Linke MEP, asked for a copy of this legal opinion. He was denied a copy.
When money flowed into Greece, then back out to bail out German and French banks, why were EU citizens not told what was happening? Instead they were led to believe that hard working Germans were subsidising lazy Greeks.
Greece was bankrupt. The existing debts should have been written off, or at the very least restructured. Instead, more money was loaned to enable the Greeks to continue to service their debts.
ECB is a Central Bank without a government. Countries within the eurozone are countries without a central bank. The eurogroup lacks any legitimacy, legally and a constitutionally it does not exist.
ECB used its powers to interfere directly in the democratic process of a country.
Yanis Varoufakis and Fabio De Masi MEP have launched a public campaign demanding the immediate release of what they are calling The Greek Papers.
Greece is the canary in the mine, symptomatic of a wider problem within the EU and the eurozone.
As it celebrates the signing of the Rome treaty, EU has proposed changes but it is merely a watered down version of business as usual
EU is not Europe.
We should be planning now for the collapse of the EU to be replaced by a network of cooperating democratic countries.
At local level, as we have seen in Spain, Madrid, Barcelona and A Coruña, ordinary citizens seizing control of their local Town Halls, opening to public participation, then networking with other citizen controlled Town Halls.
We need across Europe a Green New Deal.
At local level, establishment of open coops, support for small businesses, collaborative commons.
We need faircoin and fairpay card as cooperative digital alternatives to the euro, at local level, local currencies.
In Foundation, first book of the Foundation trilogy, the Galactic Empire is collapsing. A group of citizens establish at opposite ends of the galaxy, two foundations. They do so in the knowledge that the Empire will collapse, but by preserving what is known, they will greatly reduce the period of instability.
That is the situation we now find ourselves in Europe. 2008 could be our 1929, when Europe descended into Fascism and chaos.
We are already seeing the end, the rise in Fascism, the chaos.
We must work now to plan for the future, otherwise our 2008 will be 1929.
Please support Yanis Varoufakis, Fabio De Masi and DiEM25 in their call for the release of The Greek Papers. Please support their request to release these critical documents by signing the petition calling for the release of #The GreekFiles.
Those who support the EU, why do they continue to turn a blind eye to Greece?
Greece dared stand up and challenge the EU, for that Greece had to be destroyed.
The main route for destroying Greece was to destroy the Greek banks.
That action may have been illegal.
Deep in a vault in the headquarters of the European Central Bank (ECB) lie #TheGreekFiles, a legal opinion about the ECB’s actions towards Greece in 2015 that could send shockwaves across Europe.
As a European taxpayer, you paid for these documents. But the ECB’s boss, ex-Goldman Sachs head Mario Draghi, says you can’t see them.
Former Greek Finance Minister Yanis Varoufakis and Fabio de Masi MEP, together with a broad alliance of politicians and academics (below), have announced they will file a mass freedom of information request to the ECB to uncover #TheGreekFiles once and for all.
If Mario says no, they’ll take the campaign to the next level, and consider all options – including legal action – to make this vital information public.
Please support their request to release these critical documents by signing the petition calling for the release of #The GreekFiles.
This DiEM25 petition is supported by a coalition of politicians and academics, with divergent views on the future of the EU and the Eurozone.
Here is the most recent list; check back for updates:
with the support of university professors including:
In June 2015, the newly-elected Greek government was locked in tense negotiations with its creditors (the ‘Troika’ – the ECB, EC and IMF), doing what it had been voted in to do: renegotiate the country’s public debt, fiscal policy and reform agenda, and save its people from the hardship of the most crushing austerity programme in modern history.
The Troika knew they needed to make a drastic move to force the Greek government to capitulate. And that’s just what they did: through the ECB, they took action to force Greece’s banks to close, ultimately driving the Greek government – against its democratic mandate – to accept the country’s third ‘bailout’, together with new austerity measures and new reductions in national sovereignty.
But in their haste, their zeal to crush the Greek government’s resistance, the ECB feared their actions might be legally dubious. So they commissioned a private law firm to examine whether those decisions were legal. The legal opinion of this law firm is contained in #TheGreekFiles.
In July 2015, the German MEP Fabio De Masi asked Mario Draghi to release the legal opinion. Mario refused, hiding behind ‘attorney-client privilege’. Clearly #TheGreekFiles contain something he doesn’t want us to see.
One of the foremost experts on European Law, Professor Andreas Fischer-Lescano, examined whether the ECB was right to refuse to release #TheGreekFiles. His detailed conclusion leaves no room for doubt: the ECB has no case for withholding from MEPs and the citizens of Europe the legal opinion the ECB secured (and paid for using your money) regarding its own conduct.
But in addition to the legal imperative: in today’s Eurozone, the power of the ECB to close down a member-state’s banks violates every democratic principle. It also violates the ECB’s own aspiration, and charter obligation, to be independent and above political strategising.
We must all throw light on the lawfulness and propriety of ECB decision-making – beginning with this case – to give European democracy a chance, as well as to make the ECB less vulnerable to power politics.
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