The Colby Echo

Issue date: 2/11/09 Section: Opinions

Media Credit: Dash Wasserman

Editor's note: The writer was enrolled in Anthropology 176, a class that spent much of JanPlan in Greece. While in Athens, the class stayed at the Art Gallery Hotel, quite literally down the street from the Acropolis.

The ancient Greeks were known for their odd (by modern standards) traditions and habits. The strangest-other than sacrifice of course-was the host-guest relationship. The ancient Greek laws of hospitality required a householder to take in a guest and provide him with food, shelter and clothing before the guest even has to share his name. In the United States in this day and age, the thought of allowing a random person to enter your house and stay with you when you have no information about him at all is completely and totally absurd. However, as odd as the concept is, I think that it is an interesting practice that shows an inherent trust and belief in the good of humans that has all but disappeared from our modern day society.

Although Greece as the "Hellenic Republic" (its official modern name) is a very new country, it has a long history and some of its oldest practices appear to have been carried over into their modern way of life. The host-guest relationship is one of those practices, although to a much lesser extent than what is described above.

Classic was a darkly-lit café down the street from our hotel, right next to the cheapest but best gyros in all of Athens. When we walked into that tiny café we had no idea that it would soon become our home away from home, but right away it was clear that there was something different about it.

All of the people in the café began asking us questions about our trip and what brought us to Greece and then digressing into other more interesting topics that they thought of based off of our answers. The owner of the café came over to greet us too and offered us drinks on the house before we began discussing Aristotle. They had no qualms about us taking the seats of their regulars or imposing on them, as we surely did during our week and a half in Athens. Instead they welcomed us with open arms and ears, simply wanting to hear our stories and teach us about their culture.

We got many free drinks over the course of our stay; I'm pretty sure that I only paid a few times, but they didn't seem to mind.
They simply took pleasure in our company and wanted us to enjoy ourselves as much as possible during our brief séjour in their country. Some may complain that Greece is behind the times, but in some ways its people are light years ahead of us, even if this comes from ancient traditions.

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