Percy Jackson - A little bit of Greek!

So, "Percy Jackson - Sea of Monsters" came out in the cinema recently (depending on where you live...!) and I thought I'd give it a mention for all you movie lovers out there, purely because of the Greek heritage. (Yes, I am that easily swayed; anything Greek and I'm all over it!)

For those of you who don't know, the Percy Jackson series are about Demigods who are the children of the Greek Gods. So if you like Greek mythology, seeing the Greek key symbol all over everything, laughing at the 3eni pronouncing Greek words and hearing people buying things in Drachmas (ah, the good old days...) then check out the movie!

Anyone else seen any good movies with some Greek heritage recently or know of any coming out? Let us all know!

Greek-o-vision 2013!

It's that time of year again, the Greek-o-vision song contest, as I like to call it! This year we only had Greece and not Cyprus qualify for the final, but ofou they did really well coming in at 6th place overall! At one point Greece were top trending on Twitter worldwide! 

In case you missed it or you want to relive the experience, you can watch the performance here:

Ahh, so the Greek dudes were kicking it in their converse shoes, while playing the traditional bouzouki and singing in Greek for a change! (I think someone must have read last year's post I wrote here where I made that very suggestion...)

And of course we can't overlook the wonderful catchy lyrics of "Alcohol is free"... yes, well in this current climate free alcohol is the most appealing, enen!

Overall, a cracking performance and a really good result! I don't know why they just didn't let us win it though, even if the country is skint the Greeks will always we able to scrounge the money together for a party and to host the Eurovision! Maybe next year, who knows!


P.S. the moustache wipe at the end was awesome.

Greek Easter 2013

Xristos Anesti to the Greeks! Christ is risen!

So last night was Church night again for midnight mass. That meant more standing around with candles and waiting until midnight to commemorate the time when Christ rose from the dead.

This is where the candle is meant to be taken from the church and to your home without it being extinguished. The flame from the Church on this day is holy and is thought to be a great blessing if taken into your home. So all the peeps coming home drunk from the bars last night were not hallucinating if they saw cars glowing as they drove past... Nor was that drive thru cashier imagining things as the glowing car approached their window. It is highly likely that you may end up with candle wax on your car seats though, so beware!

Seeing as it is after midnight, technically the fast can be broken so generally there is a mini feast ready for when you get back from Church, some nice augolemoni always goes down well! Those lovely eggs we dyed a few days ago can also get smashing too!

And then there is Sunday where the mass "Xristos Anesti / Alithos Anesti" texts get sent to all your Greek contacts on your phone and then you prepare for the biggest feast of the year! Of course, this tends to consist of meat, meat and even more meat. You may need a nap from the meat coma...

I hope all those celebrating Easter today have an amazing day and take the opportunity for a fresh start, like Jesus did :)