MARCH!

When you type “Greece November 17” into Wikipedia this is what comes up:

Formation –

The group's name, 17N, refers to the final day of the 1973 Athens Polytechnic uprising, in which a protest against the Greek Military Junta (1967 - 1974), also known as the Regime of the Colonels took place. The uprising ended after a series of events that started when a tank took down the main gate of the Polytechneion and security forces, including soldiers, stormed the campus. 17N self-identified as Marxist. In addition to assassinations, 17N was convicted for a number of bank robberies. Members of 17N claim they stole money to finance their activities.

Today, on the 17th of November we went to the Polytechnic University in Athens and saw representatives from every political party- complete with posters, newspapers, pamphlets, stickers, etc. We also saw on display extremely powerful pictures from 1973. Pictures of storms of people, tanks in Syntagma Square, and signs that wrote “USA = *swastika*”. Wow.

This alone convinced a few of us that we were definitely going to the march this afternoon. This march proved to be a life changing experience.

The different political parties had their own ways of doing things.

Although it was storming incredibly outside, that only fueled their fire.

The Communists were the largest of the groups, and the most peaceful. We marched with them for a while, and nobody gave us any trouble.

The Anarchists on the other hand were pretty extreme. Wearing all black, and blasting head-banging music these anarchists chanted loudly while marching down the street.

A few times the chants included “F*** Americans”. They had the courtesy to say it in our own language for us to understand!

These Anarchists were followed on both sides by extreme police brigades.

These police were decked out, helmets, shields, gas masks, and the whole uniforms.

Why were they wearing gas masks you ask? Tear gas is the way to deal with these anarchists that come out of order.

Many water bottles were thrown at these police, but it did not deter them.

Only when massive chunks of stone were thrown at them did the tear gas come out.

Don’t worry, we were a-ok. A wonderful distance away to view, but not to be involved.

What really struck me personally was the Green Anarchists. They wanted to live natural without all of this hubbub is what I got out of their campaign. Sounds pretty sweet to me!

What really got me was there were secret federal agent type dudes incognito. We had to be careful taking pictures, not zooming in on specific people in certain groups, because we didn’t want them to think we were one of these undercover rats.

I guess that these guys sometimes even start the major riots, like a 50/50 chance! Just to make the marchers look bad. Peaceful marchers makes the marchers look good. The government wants them to look bad. Whhhhat!!

Overall, this day was an eye-opening experience. Very exciting!

What a great day!