Greeks Bearing Gifts

“Of all the countries in Europe, Greece is the one that can least afford to be anyone’s savior. It is the continent’s most beleaguered country: constantly threatened with expulsion from the European Union, it is hugely in debt to European banks. In 2010, the “troika”—the European Commission, the European Central Bank, and the International Monetary Fund—forced the government to adopt extreme austerity measures., and Greek society has been in a state of crisis ever since. Unemployment is 25.2 percent. Suicides are up 36 percent since austerity was introduced. Nearly half of all schoolchildren aren’t getting enough to eat. Greeks have every right to be exhausted and selfish. And some of them are: on Kos and Lesbos, the two islands where most refugees are landing, the neo-Nazi Golden Dawn party almost doubled its share of the vote in the September 20 general election. (It didn’t help that supporters of the leftist ruling party Syriza stayed home in droves.)

But if Europe has failed both Greeks and refugees, one of the strangely beautiful things about the current crisis is the way both Greeks and refugees have been helping each other get through it. As their government flounders, and the big international aid agencies focus on the 95 percent of Syrian refugees who aren’t in Europe, Greek volunteers have provided everything from housing to food, medical and legal help. Volunteers from Greece and other European countries even produced a clear, comprehensive guidebook for incoming refugees, with useful Greek phrases like “I want a doctor” and “I am from Iraq,” and translated it into Arabic, Farsi and English.”