Last night I stayed
up as late as I could, waiting for early exit polls. I fell asleep to the sound
of political pundits theorizing and making predictions…. I woke up to the news
of Obama’s victory and I felt relief, hope, and when I heard Obama’s victory speech,
I felt inspired:
I believe we can keep the
promise of our founders, the idea that if you’re willing to work hard, it
doesn’t matter who you are or where you come from or what you look like or
where you love. It doesn’t matter whether you’re black or white or Hispanic or
Asian or Native American or young or old or rich or poor, able, disabled, gay
or straight, you can make it here in America if you’re willing to try.
Fifty years ago,
Americans began the fight for civil rights; the women’s movement began to gain
momentum; early gay rights pioneers began to take action. In the decades that
followed, society changed for the better. And today, we have a government, a
president who respects and includes all
people. Obama unifies. Obama inspires.
Today, here in
Athens, we are still collapsing. Parliament has been in session all day.
Tonight a key austerity vote is to take place. The measures must be passed
before Greece can receive the next tranche of bailout money from the troika
(EU, IMF, ECB). Lawmakers have been fiercely debating all day; strikes have affected
the city and the nation all week – from air traffic controllers to garbage
collection to public transport and banks… At one point tonight, outside of the
parliament building protestors hurled Molotov cocktails while riot police
sprayed a giant fire hose to keep people back; while inside the parliament
building another kind of circus was taking place – lawmakers shouted at each
other, stood up gesturing in disgust, walked in and out of the chamber, the
sessions stopped, the sessions resumed... Proposals were made, proposals were
retracted…
Here in Greece, we
seem to have lost our way. We don’t know what we are fighting for anymore.
Today I watched Obama speak words of real hope, words that aim to unite. And then
I watched the debate in the Greek Parliament – extreme-right Golden Dawn MPs
spoke. Socialists spoke. Pro-European MPs spoke. Communist MPs spoke.
Anti-austerity supporters spoke. They spoke words that only inspire division and
hopelessness.
Tonight, as I type
this, I watch the parliament members voting… ναι; όχι;
The protesters outside have gone home. And so I am up late again, waiting for
the results of another vote. However, whatever the outcome of this vote will be, it will not inspire
hope and change. The coming years in Greece will be filled with hardship,
suffering, disparity, disunion. And I wonder if in my lifetime I will ever
witness a Greek political leader express sentiments which echo Obama’s message
of inclusion, acceptance, cooperation, promise and inspiration.
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