When three Greeks opened the Island of Mastic in Izmir, the once famously cosmopolitan town that many of their relatives had hailed from, none of them could ever have imagined its runaway success.
Within days of the cafe-cum-bar’s inauguration on the Turkish city’s elegant seafront, its pastries, jams, Greek-style coffees and mastic products were going down a treat.
“It’s great here, it’s so great that the Greeks are back again,” said Dilek, a Turkish student. “We’re neighbors, we both live around the same sea, the Aegean, we’ve got a lot in common.”
The Island of Mastic might have gone unnoticed had it not also made history: It is the first Greek-owned enterprise to open in Izmir since the sacking of Smyrna by the Turkish armies after the Greek campaign to occupy Asia Minor in 1922.
For the Greeks, who still refer to the event as the “catastrophe,” no other place is as redolent of loss or defeat as the city they once dominated and still call Smyrni. For the generations of Greeks and Turks raised on schoolbook stories of hatred and chicanery, no other place provokes such passion and rancor.
Until recently, it would seem. The tragedy, not least the fire that raged through the city on the night of Sept. 13, 1922, and the massacre that ensued, have become a distant memory as Greeks and Turks attempt to forge better ties.
“In our hearts, we just want to get on,” said Nektarios Memekas, who divides his time between Chios, the nearby Greek isle, and Izmir, where he opened the cafe two years ago. “As neighbors we are like two branches from the same tree. Our relationship on the ground has nothing to do with politics or what you see or hear on television. It couldn’t be more different.”
The Island of Mastic appears to have set a trend. Last week the first forum was held in the town between the local chamber of commerce and entrepreneurs from Greece’s Aegean islands. The inauguration of the first air link between Athens and Izmir this month has facilitated exchange.
“I grew up speaking Greek because that was the language I heard at home,” said Hasan, a 46-year-old hotel employee. “My parents were Muslim, but until the exchange [of populations between Greece and Turkey in 1923] they lived in Crete.”
“It’s a pity that Turkey doesn’t have its Greek community anymore, that there are only 2,000 or 3,000 of them left,” he said.
In Izmir, at least, good neighborly relations is what it is all about.
“Thank God for [newly elected Greek Prime Minister George] Papandreou,” Dilek said. “Turks like him. Maybe, at long last, we can just get down to the business of liking one another.”
BEYOND WASHINGTON: Although historically the US has been the partner of choice for military exercises, Jakarta has been trying to diversify its partners, an analyst said Indonesia’s first joint military drills with Russia this week signal that new Indonesian President Prabowo Subianto would seek a bigger role for Jakarta on the world stage as part of a significant foreign policy shift, analysts said. Indonesia has long maintained a neutral foreign policy and refuses to take sides in the Russia-Ukraine conflict or US-China rivalry, but Prabowo has called for stronger ties with Moscow despite Western pressure on Jakarta. “It is part of a broader agenda to elevate ties with whomever it may be, regardless of their geopolitical bloc, as long as there is a benefit for Indonesia,” said Pieter
US ELECTION: Polls show that the result is likely to be historically tight. However, a recent Iowa poll showed Harris winning the state that Trump won in 2016 and 2020 US Vice President and Democratic presidential candidate Kamala Harris courted voters angered by the Gaza war while former US President and Republican candidate Donald Trump doubled down on violent rhetoric with a comment about journalists being shot as the tense US election campaign entered its final hours. The Democratic vice president and the Republican former president frantically blitzed several swing states as they tried to win over the last holdouts with less than 36 hours left until polls open on election day today. Trump predicted a “landslide,” while Harris told a raucous rally in must-win Michigan that “we have momentum — it’s
CARGO PLANE VECTOR: Officials said they believe that attacks involving incendiary devices on planes was the work of Russia’s military intelligence agency the GRU Western security officials suspect Russian intelligence was behind a plot to put incendiary devices in packages on cargo planes headed to North America, including one that caught fire at a courier hub in Germany and another that ignited in a warehouse in England. Poland last month said that it had arrested four people suspected to be linked to a foreign intelligence operation that carried out sabotage and was searching for two others. Lithuania’s prosecutor general Nida Grunskiene on Tuesday said that there were an unspecified number of people detained in several countries, offering no elaboration. The events come as Western officials say
The Philippines yesterday said its coast guard would acquire 40 fast patrol craft from France, with plans to deploy some of them in disputed areas of the South China Sea. The deal is the “largest so far single purchase” in Manila’s ongoing effort to modernize its coast guard, with deliveries set to start in four years, Philippine Coast Guard Commandant Admiral Ronnie Gil Gavan told a news conference. He declined to provide specifications for the vessels, which Manila said would cost 25.8 billion pesos (US$440 million), to be funded by development aid from the French government. He said some of the vessels would
RSS