Snails as food, snails as business
By Yiorgos Karahalis
One of my fondest memories is of the snails my mother harvested after the rains. I couldn’t wait for her to get home so that I could grab those tiny animals and play with them for hours, all the while looking forward to the next day’s lunch! Little did I know then that this childhood pastime was also a big business.
Perhaps it was my memories that led me to be intrigued by the story of Greece’s Fereikos Helix snail farming company, a successful business started by two sisters, Maria and Panagiota Vlachou.
“I was having dinner in Zurich as I was speaking to my sister on the phone. I told her that I ordered snails for near 37 euros. And she joked with me, saying we must start growing and trading snails,” Maria Vlachou said, explaining what motivated them to start their business in 2007.
Greek protesters walk off the job, block property tax
ATHENS (Reuters) – Greek protesters tried to disrupt collection of an unpopular new property tax on Thursday and transport workers went on strike in a growing wave of protests against harsh new austerity measures.
With the socialist government of Prime Minister George Papandreou trying to push new cuts through parliament to meet demands from international lenders, opposition has strengthened ahead of a planned general strike on October 19 which is expected to shut down much of the country.
On Thursday, protesters occupied the printing offices of Greek power utility PPC, which is set to collect the property tax, with a few dozen protesters hanging banners reading: “We are not going to stop providing electricity to the poor people even if they put us in jail.”
Protests have spread to other sectors as well. The ancient Acropolis, Greece’s most famous monument, was closed to tourists and Athens was hit by strikes by garbage collectors and hospital workers. Lawyers refused to appear in court.
The wave of protests come as euro zone leaders scramble to put together a new rescue plan to stave off bankruptcy and stop the crisis spreading out of control.
International lenders are demanding further painful reforms but unions say the belt-tightening hurts only the poor and middle-class and will drag Greece’s stricken economy further into recession.
The action at power company PPC underlines the challenge faced by the government, which has included the property tax in electricity bills to ensure it will be paid in a country where tax evasion is endemic.
Greece’s new army of the homeless
By Yiorgos Karahalis
Ragged clothes, small piles of belongings and a bleak future, Greece’s new army of homeless have swelled in numbers since the debt crisis hit the country.
As part of ideas to highlight the story that has dominated headlines for the past two years, I wanted to illustrate the emerging problem of homelessness in a country which has seen a rise in the number of homeless by 20-25 percent in the last two years alone – a staggering rise in a country where adult children live with their parents, in some cases until the day they get married, and pensions traditionally go to support young families.
Athens is the country’s largest city with an estimated population of five million and where the homeless problem is much more visible than anywhere else. Even its city center, a top tourist spot, sees dozens of homeless people having made building entrances and shop fronts their new home. Sleeping bags and cardboard boxes piled against walls, a few shopping bags of clothes and food their only belongings. Homelessness has now permeated all genders, races, ethnic backgrounds and social classes.
The large number has forced shelters to restrict people to a few nights stay before making way for new people. Many of those who are getting a hot meal or just a night sleep in the shelters, are still stunned by how fast their lives changed. One of them said he could not believe how quickly it happened, how he went from a homeowner with a job as a chef to a homeless person cooking in such a shelter. “We are all potentially homeless,” he said.
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