by Sean Mallen
A couple of hundred people gathered in a square by the waterfront for their march in support of the victims. I wondered how representative they were, given that Golden Dawn had managed to elect an MP in Perama in the most recent election.
I spoke with a young man named Rabab Hassan, who told me he was born in Greece of Egyptian parents. He said he was feeling the chill. “I’m afraid, afraid, afraid. I’m afraid for my baby because I have a three-year-old. Afraid to be here now. But I can’t leave from Greece. Where can I go?”
As we walked along with the demonstrators, Maria pointed out the fish shop owned by the family who had been attacked. She asked around on our behalf and found one of the brothers in the crowd in the square where the march ended. Ahmed was chatting with a few supporters and apparently in no rush to step away from the people who had staged the protest on his family’s behalf.
An Australian news crew was also on the hunt for him, led by a reporter with a chiselled jaw and a sour face, one of the very few unpleasant Aussies I had ever met. He was eyeing me warily as we negotiated with Ahmed for an interview.
Through Maria we asked Ahmed if we could interview him at the home that had been trashed. The Australian’s pushy fixer, a bald, middle-aged guy, butted in and offered to drive our fisherman to the place. I smiled and shook my head, not wishing to be part of an international media feeding frenzy, but also not wanting to be elbowed aside. It was agreed that we would all meet at the house shortly.
We flagged down a cab and the driver knew exactly where to go.
“He says he just took a crew from Sky News there yesterday,” translated Maria.
So much for our exclusive.
We beat the Australians to the scene and found two other brothers who were happy to speak and show us around. Saad Abu Hamed brought us inside and showed the broken windows and clothes still scattered around.
“I was scared I was going to die,” he told us via translation. “It makes us sad because we’ve lived alongside the Greeks for many years.”
It was a squalid little hovel. The thugs had not exactly targeted rich folks. I wondered why the Egyptians could not afford anything better, given that they seemed to be running a successful small business.
Out front, Saad showed me their old minivan, battered and windows smashed by the assailants.
The Aussies arrived, with the reporter still looking as if he had inhaled a lemon. Trailing along were a young Italian woman and a guy with a compact camera, anxious to record the same story.
Over her shoulder I spotted Maria standing cross-armed with a wry grin, watching the spectacle with bemusement. The Egyptians had had undoubtedly a pretty rough week, but were now at least enjoying the attention and more than happy to tell their story.
Their misfortune had become a kind of commodity in the international news business — a telling vignette in the Greek election story, one that visiting international reporters swarmed to record. We all need these kinds of compelling human elements in our stories, much like you need good olive oil to dress a salad. We all knew the game and told ourselves we were playing it to the greater good.
Maria knew a nice fish restaurant in Perama, but the taxi driver claimed to know a better one right beside the water. We suspected that he likely got a commission for delivering passengers to the place, but decided to give it a try.
The waiter brought over a platter of dead fish, which he said were yesterday’s catch, all perfectly good, but suggested that if we waited five minutes we could get the catch of the day.
One hour and several glasses of wine later, the catch of the day finally arrived. The platter display looked very much like the catch of yesterday, but never mind. I ordered the smallest fish and it was fine. Dan ordered grilled calamari, which was a large load of seafood when it arrived. Maria took one look, saw that it was clearly undercooked, gave the waiter a bit of hell in Greek, and sent him back to grill it some more. She was a native of the island of Lesbos and knew her fish.
On the long taxi ride home, she got into a long conversation in Greek with the driver, then translated for us: “He says yesterday an Al Jazeera crew hired him to bring them to the same Egyptian fishermen’s house. They were with him all day, bought him lunch, and in the end paid him one hundred euros. We should have more elections so that foreign journalists can stimulate our economy.”
As Dan and I made our way to the Plaka for supper, the streets were filled with cars honking and jubilant Greeks hanging out the windows, shouting and waving the national flag. Although it was election eve, this was no campaign event. The football team had just upset Russia at the Euros to unexpectedly advance. Athenians welcomed the distraction from the world of economics.
Greece could not pay the bills. Unemployment and economic suffering were everywhere. Black shirts were beating up people of colour and winning seats in Parliament. But this was one of those glorious nights like nowhere else in the world. On a rooftop patio, I was served sublime lamb chops, all the more spectacular with the view of the Acropolis, lit golden against a cloudless sky. All around us, the daughters and sons of this ancient nation ate, drank, loved life, and put aside their cares for the moment.
For me it was an imperfect occasion. I wished my wife and daughter were with me to see those sights. Tomorrow morning my little girl would be passing a life milestone without me.
Election day was scorching hot and largely joyless. At a polling station in the Plaka, a Syriza voter told us, “Maybe today we give the world a lesson in democracy.” No small irony, given that the Greeks gave the world democracy in the first place.
At another voting spot, we hit a bit of journalism gold: a woman born and raised in Montreal, but now casting a ballot in Greece. “The politicians are not capable of handling anything,” Anna told us. “I’m very worried for young children, teenagers, people just starting out with their lives.”
I asked Anna if she would prefer to go back to Canada.
“Yes, but my husband doesn’t want to go.”
He clearly understood, but piped up with a response in Greek, causing her to laugh.
“He doesn’t like the snow.”
Having stumbled upon some helpful Canadian content for my story, we were finished by early afternoon with nothing left to do until the results arrived later in the evening.
As darkness fell, we searched around the Plaka in hopes of finding people watching the results on TV. There were not many, but we did manage to capture one shot of a woman shaking her fist at the screen when the leader of Golden Dawn appeared.
We returned to the hotel to watch the results in the lobby bar as New Democracy, the old line party, took a narrow but consistent lead. The only real suspense came when a couple of guys in the bar wanted to switch the channel to watch Euro soccer. The bartender intervened on our behalf so that we could confirm that Syriza had fallen short and the Greeks would not yet be tearing up the bailout agreement. Europe could exhale.
Supporters of ND started to gather across the street in Syntagma Square in anticipation of the arrival of their leader and the next prime minister, Antonis Samaras.
A few young partisans tried to get up a rousing cheer, but their rhythm was off, the enthusiasm forced, and it all petered out.
“These guys make me want to throw up,” observed Maria, whose sympathies were more to the left.
When Samaras arrived, he was engulfed by a giant scrum. On this night of lukewarm triumph, the crowd was dominated by foreign camera crews, given the paucity of party supporters. I advised Dan to keep on the outskirts, seeing no need to enter the maelstrom given that anything Samaras said would likely be anodyne and would subsequently be transmitted on our feeds where we could easily access them.
Dan hopped up on a rickety plastic chair to get a high shot of the arrival, and to my dismay, I saw the mob edging in our direction. I suggested that he might wish to get down rather than be knocked down, but he was determined to get his shot and instead stepped up onto an even more precarious plastic tab
le, which started to bow alarmingly in the middle. Maria and I each grabbed a side to steady it as I visualized what it would be like to try to catch a six-foot-two cameraman if he were toppled. Luckily the scrum passed just to the side and disaster was avoided.
Samaras was an elegant scion of the Athenian elite, with a Harvard M.B.A. and a perfect knowledge of English. In other words, another product of the class that had so infuriated so many Greeks and led them to consider radical alternatives.
Now he would be getting his turn to clean up the mess. One commentator made the observation of the day: “Hercules was not on the ballot.”
But at least they had a government.
After filing our story, an email arrived from Isabella with a glorious picture of Julia at her First Communion. She rarely wore dresses, but Isabella made the milestone special by buying her a saintly frock and a pearly hair band that complemented our little girl’s beatific expression. I had missed it.
On the morning of our departure, Athens seemed more or less normal. The heat had eased. The news vendors on Syntagma Square were open for business like any other day, with the headlines moving on to other stories. About an hour before we were to leave for the airport, I strode out of the hotel on a mission. My fatherly absence at a key moment demanded a special, if wholly inadequate, present from Greece.
I walked down Mitropoleos Street in search of jewellers.
Having had her ears pierced, Julia was now building an impressive collection of earrings. My goal was to get her a pair with the traditional Hellenic symbol of eternity, similar to what I brought Isabella back from Athens on my 2004 Olympic trip.
Just a couple of blocks off the square I came upon a familiar storefront. It was the very same shop where I had bought those earrings, eight years earlier. Nick Papadopoulos still owned the place. I had interviewed him for my final story on the Olympics, a multibillion-dollar international extravaganza that brought him little extra business.
As I walked in the door, there was a minor flash of recognition on his face, but he clearly did not remember me and at first I did not remind him. We picked out the present I wanted, and added a ring for Isabella with a Cycladic spiral design.
As I pulled out my card to pay, I said, “Actually we’ve met before.”
He gave me another long look.
“At the end of the Olympics. I interviewed you for Canadian TV.”
He beamed and clapped my hand with a hearty grip.
“You were right about the Olympics!” he said. Business had remained mediocre, so much so that he was retiring at the end of the year. It was just too tough to make a living.
Nick wanted to give me a huge discount. I insisted on paying full price, but he threw in an extra little charm for Julia. It was a delightful moment — not so often that a past interviewee greets you with such warmth.
Back at the hotel, the lobby was jammed with TV crews checking out. The circus was largely leaving town.
As the doorman opened the door of our taxi, he wisecracked, “Sorry you didn’t get the more interesting story.”
The reception back in London was cool, but not as icy as it could have been. Julia liked the earrings. But for as long as I live she will remind me that I had missed her First Communion. And that a neighbour taught her how to ride a bike back home in Toronto while I was playing at being a Foreign Correspondent in London.
I was now determined to be witness to every single major event for the remainder of Julia’s life.
The next one was to be a solo performance at the school. She had been practising for weeks to sing an a cappella version of “Breaking Free” from High School Musical, and the tune was now fairly drilled into my skull. Isabella coached her with some appropriate gestures to make the presentation complete.
There were only two classes and their parents were seated in the gym for the performance, but still it was a high-pressure moment.
“My heart is just pounding,” Isabella whispered in my ear as she grabbed my hand in a bone-crushing grip.
In truth, she was also feeling a bit hungover, having had a rare night out with other Royal parents. It was a lubricated evening that lasted until two thirty in the morning.
Our little girl showed no sign of tension, though — a natural performer, she seemed cool as she stepped up for her moment. I suspected she was nervous inside, but she showed none of it.
Julia belted out her song like a pro, missing some of the planned gestures, but generally delivering a solid performance. Isabella exhaled.
Julia came over to us and I wrapped her in a big hug. “I need to go, sweetie. Have to catch a train.”
She grabbed my tie with both hands and glared at me. But this time I had done my duty and now needed to return to work.
Chapter Thirty
To be a Canadian in Britain is to be a walking synonym for boring. We tend to take it with good nature, preferring it to the odd mixture of fascination and disdain that Brits hold for Americans. We are infrequently thought of, and when we are it is with minimal interest, even though a startling number would actually prefer to leave the sceptered isle and make a new home in Canada. The tourists thronging Trafalgar Square barely notice the stately mansion on the western side festooned with red maple leaf flags — Canada House, our diplomatic centre in the U.K.
But on July 1 of each year, Canada Day, the square was taken over by Canadians (a festival since cancelled after the private sector sponsor pulled out). The anniversary of Confederation was marked by ball hockey games (with teams largely composed of expatriate bank employees), long lineups for Alberta pancakes and maple syrup, as well as opportunities to have your picture taken with a Mountie dressed in traditional red serge.
We found it both silly and irresistible fun. Julia even talked me into getting a temporary tattoo of the flag on my cheek. We listened to Canadian bands, chowed down on pancakes, and generally enjoyed the novelty of it all. I resisted the opportunity to buy a Molson Canadian, given that it is a beer I never drink at home.
We scrambled back to the flat to pull together a supper for some friends, a rare hosting moment in which Isabella did not want to trust my sketchy barbecue skills and instead bought a lasagna from an Italian joint in the neighbourhood.
Julia was entering the last week of the school year and I struggled to convince her to finish her homework as we awaited the arrival of our guests. The final days of the Royal School were proving to be both frantic and bittersweet. Her friend Addie, with younger sister, Celia, were with us for the night, and after supper they performed the Royal School song, which would be sung for the last time in a matter of days. It was a poignant moment.
With two days left in the school year, the redoubtable and wonderful Miss Eisele organized a little graduation ceremony for Julia’s class, where she thoughtfully said a few words about each girl. Although she had a plummy BBC announcer accent, she was actually born in the United States, and spoke about how difficult it had been for her when she arrived in the U.K. at age eight, a parallel to Julia’s struggles in her early days. When she lauded Julia for all the progress she had made, a great big lump grew in my throat. Our little girl now was able to reproduce a perfect received pronunciation accent, though she proudly kept speaking like a Canadian, and no longer needed special assistance from the sympathetic Cockney cafeteria cook, Christine, to navigate unfamiliar food choices.
There are too few teachers like Miss Eisele. Too few people like Christine, with big hearts for kids. If you have young children struggling to adjust in a new environment I hope you are lucky enough to meet similar saviours.
The girls gathered around the piano in their classroom, now a portable in the schoolyard thanks to the new corporate owners, and raised their voices in song. Another tear-jerker pulled from the pages of sentimental English boarding school stories.
In reality, British private education was now thoroughly a business, and we were seeing the symptoms as the Royal School prepared to pass into history. Some staff were being let go;
others did not wait for the axe and lined up other jobs.
On the second-last day, I snuck out of work for an hour to catch a gymnastics performance by the girls. Julia’s flexibility and strength had grown dramatically. She could now do a bridge that was impossible when she landed in London. Our daughter had grown in so many ways. She had also taken up guitar at the school. The resourceful gym teacher, Ms. Lada, had gently coached her into becoming a much-improved swimmer.
None of this seemed to mean much for the corporation responsible for the regime change. In the final week of school, Julia’s judo teacher, the ebullient, inspiring, and chiselled Winnie, was told he would not be able to offer his courses in the fall.
For all the aggravations, the school was invaluable to us, bringing a couple of friendships that had quickly solidified and deepened — fellow expatriates facing similar challenges who made common cause and joined together in an essential mutual support society. We thought it would be ephemeral, but some relationships turned out to be lasting and profound. Almost like we had been through a war together.
Julia’s best friends were now settled: classmates Zoë from Calgary and Addie from New Jersey. Collectively, they formed the JAZ club, an ingenious name they dreamed up themselves. Zoë, reserved but mischievous; Addie, deep but fun-loving; Julia, ebullient yet sensitive. Brilliant, beautiful, happy girls. Their shared love for Harry Potter meant that their playtimes were filled with Hogwarts wizardry.
And then it was the last day of the Royal School Hampstead. After 157 years of educating girls, the name was passing into history. I took the day off work. A tent was set up in the playground with chairs inside. The official ceremonies focused on the girls who were graduating, but in many ways it was also a wake for all.
Over the years, the Royal had evolved, the military link as a school for soldier’s daughters withering to a distant memory, even if it was still officially part of the mandate. It was now dominated by international students. The valedictorian for the final graduation service was an Australian girl.
