You can't get there from here

I’ve talked a lot about the drivers over here. I can’t tell you quite how crazy they are. I think you have to see your life flashing before your eyes a few times when you think the coast is clear and all of a sudden a motorcycles comes out of nowhere about to side swipe you to really get the picture. But I have clearly been here too long because I now feel comfortable with the behavior of Greeks behind the wheel. The hierarchy goes like this…. Motorcycles have the right of way first, then cars, then people, then animals. And let me explain to you what “people” means. It means ALL people. Everyone from the elderly to a woman pushing a stroller, from a man on crutches to a little kid chasing a ball into the street. And it definitely includes anyone in a wheelchair. They all get honked at, sped by, and generally disregarded by anything motorized. Feeble old ladies get pushed up against parked cars to avoid getting hit, my very nice teammate accelerated by a man on crutches. They have no mercy and no conscious behind the wheel.

The benefit of course is there is no question who has the right of way. There is no hesitation by anyone. Unlike America, you will never step off the curb and a car stops for you, you tell them to go, they tell you to go, you step once, they inch forward, you both stop, laugh, and then someone stops vacillating and the interaction is over. But time has been wasted. The moment of hesitation and uncertainty when you first step off the curb doesn’t exist here. Its more a moment of adrenaline rush. Flight or fight. Can I make it across the street without getting hit, without getting yelled at, without causing a cacophony of honking horns down the street? And you WILL get yelled at. Sometimes it’s a pair of guys on a motorcycle who see the blond hair and sometimes it’s a very normal looking person who behind the wheel feels the need to say, “ Fuck your whole family” in Greek.

The comforting part of this whole thing is that the cars aren’t very big. You aren’t staring at the hood of an SUV but rather looking down at a mini cooper. These cars might get more damaged done to them by hitting someone than the pedestrian.

The only problem is the role in never reversed. I never get behind the wheel. I don’t get to chase down old ladies with their shopping carts or scare the crap out of little kids on their bikes. Don’t I deserve to reciprocate? On the other hand I would get lost. In this city there is no rhyme or reason for the placement of any streets. Its like the definition of “you can’t get there from here.” Generally that statement is untrue but in Athens, four right turns will not place you back where you started. You turn right once, you might be fine, you know where you are. But then it curves, forks, goes one way, dead end, and you are somewhere to the back and left of where you started. I’m not exaggerating. Streets here are not numbered, the are not placed on a grid, do not go parallel, perpendicular or anything else remotely mathematical or logical. They are the definition of arbitrary. And they are named in Greek so its impossible to remember the name of a street when it has ten consonants in it and two vowels.

Last year I thought it was just me. I was driving with my coach on the way to a game down a main road when he saw some traffic, not unusual of course. Its Sunday though, and the traffic won’t be bad. But he decides to take a short cut. So we go up into the mountains. We go up, down, curve around, stop, go, hit some more traffic, speed up. All in all we went for nice drive before the game through the rolling hillside of Athens for about 35 minutes. We ended up 2 miles from where we turned off the main road. Why did we take the longcut you ask? Because this is Athens, I drive around with Greek people, and nothing makes any sense.

Miraculously though, I can get around. I know the public transportation, I can pronounce and remember most of the areas of Greece. I know how to say right, left, straight, and drive you asshole to the Greek cab drivers. And I know most of the main roads despite the fact that they turn in weird directions and change names at certain spots. It can be fun if you don’t take it too seriously. And since I am on Greek people time, I don’t worry about being late to places so it doesn’t really matter. I just sit back and feel like I am in a video game. It’s a maze and you get to run over people for points. The problem is I don’t really get to play.