Anyone can make them. “You just need flour, salt, sugar, sesame and water,” said Manolis Kolovos, owner of the Ionia bakery. Koulouria, or bread rings, originated with the Greeks of Smyrni, on the coast of what is today modern Turkey.

“When Greeks were deported from Asia Minor they brought the recipe for the koulouri with them to Greece,” said Kolovos, “First to Thessaloniki, and then to Athens.”

The family-run Ionia, located in the Athens suburb of Nea Ionia, has been turning out koulouria since 1942. “We used to open at 3 a.m.,” said Kolovos. “Our first customers would come before 5 a.m., and no one would leave without at least one koulouri.”

The koulouri is the breakfast… Continue reading →

“It’s not like it used to be,” said Panayiotis Koutakos, owner of the Koutakos Brothers Butcher shop. His sales have plummeted as fewer and fewer customers order chicken and other poultry products from his small business in central Athens. “In just a few months our sales have dropped 70 percent,” he said.

In October, authorities in Greece mistakenly confirmed the country’s first case of bird flu on a turkey farm on the Aegean island of Oinouses. In Romania and Turkey, however, cases of bird flu were confirmed by the European Union.

European Health Commissioner Markos Kyprianou said in an interview with CNN, “The presence of bird flu in southeastern Europe does not increase the risk of a pandemic.” Nevertheless, the… Continue reading →

The American College of Greece recognized World AIDS Day on December 1, 2005 by distributing red ribbons and AIDS information pamphlets to students.

The red ribbon is the international symbol of HIV and AIDS awareness. The global campaign to promote AIDS awareness is sponsored by the United Nations’ AIDS agency.

The ribbon is worn to represent support for those living with HIV and for those who have lost friends, family members or loved ones to AIDS.

The annual report of the UNAIDS agency said that this year there will be five million new infections and more than 3.1 million deaths.

“Wearing a red ribbon is the first step in making a commitment to the fight against AIDS,” read the campaign’s mission statement at UNAIDS.org.