How To Cheer Yourself Up... Greek Style!

We all have our down days, though if you're Greek they're probably more 'raging mad' days but whatever! Here is a list of things I came up with to help cheer yourself up, Greek style!

1) Eat something. Preferably Greek food. Fried greasy meat of some kind tends to do the trick.

2) Go visit yiayia. Not only will she cook for you if you're too lazy or unable to, but her classic one liners will have you in stitches in no time! 

3) Read TypicalGreek twitter. You know you will find something there that will make you laugh!

4) Put on some Greek music and dance. The vareto is a good one as you can release all that Greek passion! Eh, seeing as you're meant to look drunk anyway when dancing, have a few whiskies as well.

5) If you're a woman, frantically clean and vacuum the entire house with the rage of a Spartan and then yell at anyone who dares try to use your clean toilet. You'll feel better after screaming for a while.

6) Go for a nice drive, and yes you can yell at people for being "poushties" and "malakes" if they get in your way.

7) Watch "My Big Fat Greek Wedding".

8) Buy a new Mercedes or BMW. Or at least rent one for the day and drive around like a poser... make sure you have Greek tunes blaring out too.

9) If you're a guy, go Gini (hunting) for some male bonding and drool over the fases (wood pigeon).

10) Sing your heart out while imagining you are at the bouzoukia with people throwing flowers at you.

11) Go to the bouzoukia! But stick to drinking and dancing, or your attempt to steal the microphone may get you kicked out, #JustSaying.

12) Meet up with that 3eni friend you have called Vilos, just so you can laugh to yourself every time you say his name.

13) Meet up with your Greek friends and go to a really 3eni area and bitch about everyone really loudly in Greek.

14) Teach your 3eni friends Greek swear words.

15) Teach your 3eni friends the incorrect meaning of swear words and insist that "Eisai vilomatos" really does mean "I'd like some more bread please".

16) If you don't live in Greece or Cyprus, spend hours looking at photos of the motherland and dream about being there.

17) Eat something else. Try something sweet this time like loukoumades...

18) Ask papou about his stories from the village. With any luck they should get you snoring away in no time.

19) Hide your sister's facial bleach then sit back and enjoy the drama.

20) Watch some really bad Greek T.V. The acting is so horrendous that whatever problems you have will seem so small in comparison! 

I hope these gave you some 'Greekspiration' of ways to cheer yourself up! Don't forget, no matter how bad you think things are, some people have it worse; some people aren't lucky enough to be Greek after all! 

Greeks off to University!

It's that time when all the students are off to University. For most it's a simple process but for the Greeks, it's a fussy, controlling, argumentative, emotional and chaotic experience.

The 3eni parents wipe away a little tear when they see their little darlings off to University, but later go home and decide what to do with the spare room! The Greeks? Hell no. That room is going to be kept as a shrine...

First of all, the morning of the big move expect lots of screaming and shouting (nothing new there then). The big Mercedes gets stuffed full of luggage and Greek food that you can't get anywhere else, apparently.

After emptying the car, most would let their kids unpack and the parents can get on their merry way. The Greeks? No. Not even close. Firstly before anything else, mother storms in the room and gets out all the cleaning equipment and the entire room is given a scrub down from top to bottom. She then moves onto the kitchen and bathroom where she continues to clean. She meets the housemates who immediately love her for cleaning everything and want her to visit you often. Great, just what you wanted...

The father helps moves things around, checks everything is working and that your door locks... Then up go the religious icones and perhaps a bit of the old holy water splashing to bless the room. As you do.

All done? Nope. Off to the supermarket as you need a year's worth of food and supplies now. So cue an hour or 2 food shopping: enough canned goods to feed the street for a year, enough toilet roll to wrap around the building twice and enough cleaning products that you probably won't be reaching for much; they're more for your mother to use when she visits...

That has to be it now? Er not quite. Greek parents tend to want to stay over with you on your first night, then take you out for lunch the next day. They want to squeeze out every last opportunity with you before an emotional and melodramatic goodbye, followed by a phone call shortly after asking you where you are and what you're doing. Just don't tell them you're back in the supermarket that evening picking up the alcohol that they forbade you from buying earlier...!

Visiting Greece/Cyprus for a "holiday"...

So it's the summer. Almost the end now, but no doubt all you Greekies not currently living in the motherland will be off in Greece or Cyprus on your holidays!

Let's explain what a Greek holiday is really like. For the 3eni, it's lovely being on a gorgeous Greek island, sunning themselves on the beach, drowning themselves in beers and cocktails while they slap on their factor 50. But, for the Greeks, it's not so glamorous...

As a kid, the thought of going away over the summer did not conjure up thoughts such as "yayyy I get to play on the beeeeeach!" or "woohoo I can't wait to lay on the sun lounger all day and tan up!" No, no, no, no, no... A kid going to Greece or Cyprus for their holiday meant bracing themselves for weeks on end of being dragged to relatives homes during the best part of the day in the blazing heat, being force fed food for hours on end and being compelled to engage with some random 'cousins' whom you hardly knew while they laughed at your funny Greek accent.

If you did manage to find any down time by yourself, it would be something authentic like playing with yiayia and pappous little cute bunny rabbits that they were breeding, to only later find them slaughtering them to eat for dinner later that night... cue mortified child, scarred for life.

Finally, just when you had spent the whole week seeing every relative in the country and thought you were done, it was time to do the goodbye visits which took up the whole of the final week of your holiday.

And before you ask why we let ourselves be pulled back and forth by our family whilst we are meant to be on "holiday", let me just warn you that every Greek knows of the unwritten rule that states "sheer hell will be unleashed upon any family that visits the country and does not go and eat with them". 

Yes, our countries are gorgeous; we know this! If only we got to actually see and appreciate some of it once in a while...!? Having said that, once the sun goes down, night life is brilliant and you're often out with your cousins late at night, just don't let the family see you have been drinking...!

Most of you will be coming back from your trips soon, and no doubt you will be in need of another holiday to recover from the exhaustion! I'm sure there will be an army of Greeks waiting for you at 'Gadwig' airport and a nice hot bowl of augolemoni/augolemono (depending on where you come from!) to settle you back in.

What did you get up to in Greece or Cyprus this summer?