Episode 15: Living in Greece

Nick: Today I'm talking to my friend Phil about a country that he knows really well, which is Greece.

Umm, so why, uhh, or what's your relationship with Greece? Phil: My relationship with Greece is I'm married to a Greek lady called Pagona.

Umm, and we spend part of the year there every year to, umm, spend time with her family, to catch up with, umm, with friends and live … follow the sun, basically. Nick: Yeah, it's interesting that you … because you're Australian and she's Greek and what you're trying to do is find this, sort of, balance where you spend some time in each country so everybody gets their, kind of, home country.

But it's kind of difficult to figure that all out, isn't it? Phil: It is difficult, very difficult, because, umm, because the distance is one factor.

Umm, you also have other factors like visa eligibility and, umm, balancing that with, uhh, hopefully finding yourself with a solid home base somewhere. Umm, but at the moment we prefer to spend more time in Australia and treat, uhh, Greece as more of a holiday destination for various reasons. Nick: That sounds like a good way to do it.

But, yeah, I mean, you think, you know, if you sort of say, you get to live in Greece part of the year or part of the time, it sounds like that would be amazing. Is the reality of it … it's not quite a Greek island holiday, you know, three months out of the year, is it? Phil: Not quite.

That's what we're aiming for but we haven't quite reached that stage yet. It's, umm, yeah, if you're tied up to, uhh, a place like Greece and its bureaucracy, uhh, things can be very, very difficult just to make general things happen, so we're trying to un-domicile ourselves from there and, umm, make Australia our solid base. Nick: So when you're there, do you have a … do you have a right to stay for a certain time?

Phil: I do at the moment, I'm, uhh … I have a, uhh, spouse visa in Greece.

Umm, that's a whole different story about … that took about two or three years to actually get. Originally they gave me a humanitarian visa, umm, which was a mistake and which a couple of times I was hauled into security offices at Athens airport because I apparently didn't have the right visa. Nick: And were they nice to you or was it a little bit of a struggle?

Phil: Umm, to start with they were a little bit, uhh, aggressive.

At one stage I met a particularly unhelpful woman who told me I owed a 1200 euro fine to the state of Greece. Umm, but eventually when I explained things, umm, we all had a good laugh when they saw I had an Australian passport but I'd been given a humanitarian visa, it was slaps on the back and, uhh, ‘Away you go'. Nick: OK, good stuff.

Umm, so let's start with the good then: what do you like about spending time in Greece or living in Greece? Phil: Spending time … I love spending time by the water in Greece in summertime.

Umm, it can get extremely busy so the month of August is a month that you generally don't want to be in Greece. Umm, or if you are there, it's a good time to spend, uhh, time up in the mountains, which is generally … kind of an unknown quantity about Greece. Not many … everyone sort of thinks about the water and the islands and that's about it. But Greece has some fabulous mountains and some fabulous winter scenery as well. Umm, yeah, I mean the food is great, it's quite a relaxed lifestyle there, umm, and if you can go there as a tourist, just having fun, it's much better than if you're having to deal full-time if you're living there. Nick: Yeah, no, definitely.

I mean, when I was there, yeah, you just feel that, that vibe of everybody's very relaxed, very laid-back, umm, and you just feel kind of comfortable, you know, unstressed and all of that. But then on the other side like you said, you have the bureaucracy that you have to deal with if you're trying to live there. Umm, any other kind of, uhh, slightly negative points about Greece from your point of view? Phil: Well, well, the bureaucracy is number one, probably.

There has been a tendency for, uhh … especially with the refugee crisis recently, there's been a tendency for some nastiness in Greek society. It's still very much a minority and some … many Greeks, uhh, have barely anything to give but they're giving all of it and more to these refugees who are kind of stuck in transit in Greece at the moment. So it's bringing out good and bad in the population there and, you know, as usual with things in Greece, if you want something to get done, you're better off doing it yourself than relying on the government because it's so dysfunctional, you just can't rely on them to get anything done at all. Nick: And that probably means that they don't have the means to support or to house all these refugees coming in…

Phil: The government itself?

Nick: Yeah.

Phil: No, no.

And they don't have the resources and they don't really have the organisational skills either. There's too much in-built corruption and road blocks in the system for anything to really be functional. Nick: Right, and so when you're there with Pagona, I mean, she's obviously Greek, but she's a very international Greek, she's lived in different countries and stuff … do you, if you criticise Greece for example, does she kind of get defensive or does she … can she see it slightly from your point of view or does she sort of still see it from the Greek point of view?

Phil: Umm, she … yes and no.

Most of the time, I think when we're in Greece, she tends to be a lot more defensive about it. When we're outside of Greece, she tends to see these negatives factors more for what they are. I mean, it's not … it's never anything personal that you‘re having against someone when you make a negative comment about Greece or trying to get things done in Greece. It's … but I think a lot of Greeks find it difficult not to take those sort of things personally. Nick: And so when you've been living in Greece you found a place in the Peloponnese, is that right?

Phil: Yeah, we rent a place down in a little village called Kardamyli, which is about an hour south of Kalamata, four hours south of Athens, down on the middle finger of the Peloponnese.

Yeah it's quite, uhh, quite a nice spot. Not my ideal spot in Greece, but we needed to get out of Athens. Athens is a big city that's, umm, just getting bigger and crazier by the day. Nick: Yeah I imagine if … because you sort of do freelance work and things like that, so it's not … you don't need to be in that, that big city with all the traffic and all the other problems.

Phil: No.

We're very lucky that if we have an Internet connection, our work … we're able to continue with our work, so … for a lot of people it's just not an option, so it's either staying in a big city or you have to, you know, make a huge lifestyle change and get out of the city into the country and start a … start a new life, which I think a lot of people by necessity are going to have to do anyway. There's actually a big movement in Greece at the moment with people doing that, moving out of the cities into the country, taking up some land, growing their own food, building natural-style houses, becoming energy-independent. It's quite exciting times for them. Nick: And I know thats something you're really interested in with permaculture and things like that, so is that your … one of your dreams in Greece?

Phil: Yeah, certainly.

We'd like to do it. We're talking with friends about trying to buy some land together to have something like that where we can all spend time and, uhh, you know, not necessarily live there full-time but have a place to go and spend time whenever we are there. Nick: Alright, and then you get, sort of, the best of Greece and you, sort of, don't have to deal so much with some of the problems.

Phil: In and out, ‘hit and run missions'.

Purely holidays. Nick: Alright, well, good luck and thanks for talking to us.

Phil: Thanks mate.