By Diane Farr Louis
Two years ago, I celebrated my Golden Anniversary: 50 years as a permanent resident in Greece. And last year marked 60 years since I first touched Greek soil, soon after having graduated from college
At this stage in life—and you can probably make an educated guess what stage I’m at—every day is worth celebrating. But this month is special because gr2me, the website we’ve been working on since the fall of 2022, has finally been launched into cyberspace.
On gr2me anyone can find their Greece, though if it’s standard-issue tourist fare you want, you should look elsewhere. While I’ve enjoyed writing about places dear to my heart—like the restaurant Varsos and Anafiotika, a neighborhood in Athens—it’s the videos about places and people beyond my ken, like rock climbing in Leonidio or Greece’s first female professional boxing champion, that I’ve really found eye-opening and fascinating.
How strange it is to think back to the ‘60s and ‘70s, when television and Coca Cola had not even arrived in Greece, when getting to Spetses took five hours rather than two—and when we got there, we walked everywhere instead of hopping on a noisy motorbike. Back then practically no one on the island had a home phone, yet we always managed to connect at the right time and place for a swim, some disco, an ice cream, or a picnic.
Nowadays we get anxious if we’re separated from our phones for half an hour. But at its best, at least, technology can open new worlds for us. And with gr2me, you can sample some of those worlds … and then come and experience the real thing. Gr2me can become gr2u!