Douglas Anders: The HellenophileAbout Greece. Travel, history, archaeology, and culture.Vacation- July 28, 2004 This may be the last post until next Monday. I'm leaving for Mackinac Island and will be spending a few days in a Victorian-era inn. It will be Gabe's first visit to an island, trip on a ferry, and ride on a horse-drawn carriage. I'm taking Donald Kagan's Peloponnesian War with me, but reading it will not be a priority.http://blogs.salon.com/0001147/categories/theHellenophile/2004/07/28.html#a1118 Olympic News--July 27, 2004- July 28, 2004 Athens Hotel Staff and Doctors Plan Olympic Strikes It wouldn't be Greece if there wasn't a strike. Both hotel workers and doctors are gearing up for strikes in August. Many unions are using the Olympics as an opportunity to demand more pay, and the hotel workers strike will begin just as IOC officials arrive in the capital city to examine the last-minute preparations. Due to the rising costs of the Games, the Greek government has been unwilling offer more pay increases. The hotel union...http://blogs.salon.com/0001147/categories/theHellenophile/2004/07/28.html#a1117 Olympic News--July 26, 2004- July 27, 2004 Reuters: Olympics-Greece guerrilla trial may extend until Athens Games The Greek government had hoped that the trial of several members of a left-wing revolutionary--the ELA-- group would have ended by the opening of the Olympics, but an extension will drag the trial on through the Games. The five suspects have been on trial since February and face charges of "setting up and participating in a terrorist group". The ELA has claimed responsibility for two murders and dozens of attempted...http://blogs.salon.com/0001147/categories/theHellenophile/2004/07/27.html#a1116 Olympic News--July 25, 2004- July 26, 2004 Wired News: Greece Battles Olympic Security 'Hysteria' If the strategy of the Athens Olympics security planners is to confuse would-be terrorists, they have succeeded beyond their wildest dreams. The snag is that three weeks before the Games open, everyone else is equally confused too, with rumors, conspiracy theories and paranoia reaching fever pitch. "Olympic terror hysteria" is loose in the country and abroad, To Vima, a major Greek newspaper, said Friday. It is hard to argue with.http://blogs.salon.com/0001147/categories/theHellenophile/2004/07/25.html#a1115 Construction Safety- July 23, 2004 Long shifts, lack of adequate safety equipment and an absence of supervision is causing a very high number of construction deaths in and around the Olympic projects in Athens. Though the official death toll is 14 (Sydney had one death and Barcelona two during their construction phases), the president of the Greek Olympic Committee admitted that the actual number was much higher. "The human price is very high for me," he told the BBC. Workers in peril at Athens sites. A BBC reporter finds...http://blogs.salon.com/0001147/categories/theHellenophile/2004/07/23.html#a1112 (Untitled)- July 23, 2004 A bombing in Athens. No one was injured in the attack on the building which has featured a four-year Olympic exhibition running up to the Games in August. There was no claim of responsibility or motive, but anarchists, who have carried out hundreds of similar attacks, are thought to be to blame. Previous targets have been businesses, banks and diplomatic vehicles. There have been a number of attacks linked to the Olympic Games in recent months. Athens centre hit by petrol bombs. Two petrol.http://blogs.salon.com/0001147/categories/theHellenophile/2004/07/23.html#a1111 Exhibit Reviews- July 23, 2004 The New York Times reviews both the New York and Boston museum exhibits that are focused on the ancient Olympics. Of the two, the Boston exhibit is larger and more impressive: On display are more than 180 objects ranging in date from about 1350 B.C. to the end of the fourth century A.D., when the Games were discontinued. (Their modern revival was largely a result of the efforts of a Frenchman, Baron Pierre de Coubertin, at the end of the 19th century, and they have been held every four years...http://blogs.salon.com/0001147/categories/theHellenophile/2004/07/23.html#a1110 Scinias- July 22, 2004 The Schinias Rowing Center, built near the Schinias marsh has sparked controversy, both from environmentalists and archaeologists since it is located near the ancient battlefield of Marathon, and a rare, ecologically sensitive wetland. Constructed to accommodate 14,000 spectators, it will host events through most the Games.National Geographic's TravelWatch column covers the ecological and archaeological concerns. "Inconceivable" is what the Archaeology Society at Athens has called the...http://blogs.salon.com/0001147/categories/theHellenophile/2004/07/22.html#a1108 Exhibitions- July 22, 2004 Two more exhibitions--this time on the East coast--about ancient Greece and the Olympics. The Games in Ancient Athens: A Special Presentation to Celebrate the 2004 Olympics at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York is an exhibit drawn from their own collection that runs through October 3, 2004. Opening today at the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston is Games for the Gods: The Greek Athlete and the Olympic Spirit, pulled both from the MFA's own collection and from other museums.http://blogs.salon.com/0001147/categories/theHellenophile/2004/07/22.html#a1107 Coming of Age in Ancient Greece- July 22, 2004 Just a reminder. The exhibit Coming of Age in Ancient Greece will be at the Cincinnati Art Museum until August 1, and then it will move on to the the J. Paul Getty Museum in Los Angeles from September 15 through December 5 (also at the Getty will be Byzantium and the West, a look at the influence that Byzantine art had on Germany, Italy and Armenia). The exhibit includes more than 200 works, from coins to toys and baby feeders to gravestones. Included is the grave stone of Melisto--a touching.http://blogs.salon.com/0001147/categories/theHellenophile/2004/07/21.html#a1106 |