Athens Is Still Athens

ATHENS -- Athens has been getting gruesome press recently. In American coverage of Greece’s crisis, the country’s capital has been portrayed as a godforsaken wasteland, as fun-filled as a penal colony and as charming as a cauldron of boiling pitch. The New York Times (which is publishing ample Euro crisis poverty porn at the moment) has variously described it as "tottering on the edge of complete dysfunction," and in another piece, as recalling the last days of Pompeii (perhaps they have advanced eruption warnings I’m not privy to?). The Atlantic Cities has partly echoed this relentlessly bleak portrait, in an otherwise excellent article published here recently that posited "whole neighborhoods are now all but abandoned to squatters and rioters."

To anyone familiar with Athens, this picture is a little bizarre. It certainly doesn’t represent the stressed but bustling, fully functioning city I saw on a recent return visit there with my Greek partner. Although it’s under severe strain, the city is a resilient place. In fact, given how dire Greece’s situation is, one of its paradoxes is that it still appears so normal, with cafes, bars, museums and theaters still full as if nothing had changed.

Certainly times are tough in Athens. Some already rough areas are increasingly busy with homeless and junkies, looking more lost than anyone I have ever seen before. Likewise, many people are desperate for a quick buck. The friend we stayed with had recently had her building’s brass door handles stolen, likely to sell on as scrap – not something I expect happens much in Geneva. But faced with grueling difficulties, Athenians are adapting, finding new ways to get by, help each other out and even enjoy themselves in what remains a strikingly lively, vibrant city.

This isn’t so surprising, given that Athens has long had qualities worth emulating. In many ways, the city cleaves closely to a Jane Jacobs-ish high density ideal, though as this panorama shows, if you want to love the city it helps if you like concrete. Many of its high density neighborhoods are mixed use, with courtyards of offices and workshops often taken over at night by bars, meaning the streets stay busy without disturbing early risers’ sleep. The city’s often narrow streets (which deter excessive car use) are attractively alive day and night almost year round with people of all ages, making Athens still surprisingly safe and well monitored for a city supposedly hurtling towards Armageddon.