Two birds with one stone: save lives, eliminate people smugglers

The refugee situation is escalating into epic proportions.  The photo of little Aylan's dead body on Budrun Beach was the turning point which galvanised Europe and a few other countries such as Australia into accepting more refugees.  However, this is only after they have braved the Mediterranean or long overland route, risking their lives (more than 2,500 drowned so far this year) and having been exploited by people smugglers to get them there.  I propose a simple solution which will eliminate both.

1.  The UNHCR should set up processing posts on the soil of the countries which the refugees are trying to flee.  Where this is not possible due to war or politics, they should anchor large vessels as close as possible within international waters, and supply safe dinghies to ferry people from the shore.
2.  The countries willing to accept refugees should also provide safe legal transport by chartered planes or ships.  Refugees who are able to would pay their fares, which would be set at just their share of the cost of chartering.  This would be a fraction of what they have been paying to people smugglers.

Two immediate benefits: no more people drown, suffocate in lorries or otherwise lose their lives on the way.  And the obscenely lucrative people smuggling rings would be out of business.  Indirect benefits would include the refugees arriving in their host countries with the best part of their savings intact, thus being less of a burden on their hosts, enabling them to make a dignified start in their new lives, perhaps even able to invest this money in their new countries, rather than having lost everything on the way to the smugglers, robbers or in the sea when their boats capsized.

Europe and the other countries which have opened their doors to refugees have done so to all in need, not only to the ones who had the courage to risk the arduous journey, who had the money to pay the smugglers, who knew how to swim or the stamina to walk to their borders.  They should go the extra mile and pick the refugees up from their own places of origin, not expect them to make it to the host country on their own and take only the ones who survive the journey.  Unless they are using this as a warped way of "selecting the fittest"?

This would also ease the burden on the countries where the refugees first arrive, mainly Greece and Italy.  The refugees would be spared the indignity of being held in camps, and the local residents on the most accessible Greek islands such as Lesbos, Kos and Chios would not reach bursting point.

To sum up, apart from the human lives saved, the greatest benefit of my proposal is that the people smugglers would be eliminated.

I have just sent a copy of this to the UNHCR.  If you like this idea, or can improve on it, please write to them too.

Little ways we can help

This morning on FaceBook I shared a couple of links to Greek news stories regarding exploitation of refugees by "clever businesspeople" selling goods such as water, sandwiches and services such as hotel rooms and taxi rides at outrageously overinflated prices.
Perhaps we can counteract these sad incidents by showing our welcome in little ways.  'Ahlan wa sahlan' and 'Merhaba' both mean "welcome" in Arabic--I haven't found much difference online but if you are a Native Speaker of Arabic reading this please enlighten me.  Without words, a smile and a little gesture such as a few sweets or biscuits or some bottles of water won't impoverish us, nor will it necessarily do much to feed them, but it will be a little human gesture that will brighten the day of a few children, perhaps blot out for a few moments the horrors of the war that they have managed to escape.  Or perhaps you have some clothes, shoes or toys your children have outgrown.  If you don't have children, then clothes, underwear or shoes for the women and men.
And of course, there are also so many homeless people, mainly Greeks, who would also welcome a little help.  Since many (though not all) are addicts, a gift in kind (food, clothes, shoes) is probably wiser than money, which would go to supporting the addiction.  I often take the obvious addicts to a bakery or coffee shop to buy them something to eat and drink--at least it will go in their tummies and not up their veins.  Occasionally some have asked me to buy them medicine or band-aids, or to bring them shoes or sandals.  I've seen a few homeless people reading, and they were happy to get books and magazines.
Finally, let's not forget the animals.  I put leftovers suitable for cats or dogs and water outdoors in a spot where they won't annoy my neighbours.  Any stale bread or out-of-date cereal/rice etc goes to the pigeons in the square--soaking bread in water is a good idea, especially in summer where water is so scarce in the streets.  I carry a small tin of cat food in my bag in case I meet a stray.
Please dear Friends, do not reply to this post by telling me how wonderful I am for doing these things.  That's not why I'm posting it.  I just hope I've given a few ideas of little ways we can all help.  We reading FB and blogs are blessed--we have a home with a PC, internet connexion and electricity.  We can afford to share our blessings with others.  While I am more fortunate than many I am not rich, so I look out for specials at supermarkets on packaged, portable things such as croissants and small individual packets of biscuits.  If the budget is tight I buy bags of lollipops.  And there are so many things we can do that cost nothing at all: not throwing leftovers or unwanted clothes/shoes in the rubbish bin, but putting them out for animals or passing them on to less fortunate people.  Maybe I didn't eat all my lunch: instead of carrying the remaining half sandwich or a piece of fruit home, I give it to a homeless person on my way to the bus, or what's not fit for humans, even an apple core, goes to animals.
Please share your own ideas in the comments below.  

A film about the Greek recession

I've just come across this film, which sums up much of what has been happening in Greece in the past six years.  One and a half hours, in two parts (you can skip the first four minutes of Part 2), well worth the time spent.
http://www.aljazeera.com/programmes/specialseries/2015/07/agora-democracy-market-150701120718536.html

Corruption

Unfortunately Greece has once again featured high in a negative list: the EU Commission's report on corruption , both perceived and actual.  This BBC map shows how widespread the problem is, but it is most evident in Greece, 99% according to this interactive visual..
As in most languages, Greek has evolved various euphemisms for the practice of bribery, depending on size and context.  Here are just a few: fakellaki, 'little envelope', given to doctors in public hospitals for doing their job properly, or for bumping a patient up a waiting list for an operation; grigorosimo, 'fast stamp', paid to civil servants to speed up applications for various services such as getting a building licence or processing a pension claim, miza, 'kickback', (literally  the ignition on a car), handed to politicians or people in power such as heads of hospitals to induce them to choose one particular supplier over another for lucrative contracts.
Of course any such money paid over is not declared for taxation, adding to the problem of insufficient revenue to cover the country's needs.  Famously one politician is now in prison for kickbacks for a military contract.  There have also been a few cases of doctors being caught receiving marked bills when patients went to the police after the doctor demanded extra payment for his services.  According to this 2010 article in Greek, 39% of patients hospitalised in the public health system have given a little envelope, 19% of doctors outright ask for an extra fee for performing operations, which can reach EUR 3,000 to 6,000 for heart surgery.  17% of patients report giving a fakellaki to thank their doctors for services rendered (probably because they feel it is expected).  Waiting lists (link in Greek) for appointments at public hospitals range from two to six months.  For operations the waiting list can reach one year.  One patient died on 3rd January 2014 (link in Greek) while waiting his turn on the waiting list.  He was unemployed and uninsured, so he was waiting for free treatment in a public hospital.  Obviously he could not afford the fakellaki that might have bumped him up to the top of the waiting list.
I have two personal experiences.  Without my knowing about this at the time, when I took my driving test about 15 years ago my driving instructor told my husband that most people were automatically failed on their first attempt unless they "bought a coffee" for the examiners, which cost about the same as the retake fee would have been.  My husband paid.  Also, when tax auditors came to his business some years ago, they brazenly told him that they could camp in his office for days and would be sure to find some violation on some technicality, no matter how well his books were kept, or he could pay them X sum of money and instantly get a clean audit.  Again he paid.
There is a website called 'I gave a fakelaki' (in Greek) where citizens can report their experiences with bribes.  To be fair, this phenomenon is by no means exclusive to Greece.  One word in use in English is baksheesh, which is of Persian origin.
There is some hope.  After an investigation into his overseas bank accounts a former Greek government official has admitted taking bribes, again for a defence contract, and has actually returned some of this money.  The government has earmarked this for Health and Education.  There are now proposals of offering incentives such as amnesty from prison to anyone else coming forward voluntarily to return bribes, provided this is done before they are the focus of an investigation.
In Greek there is a saying, 'the fish stinks from the head'.  When ordinary citizens see politicians, officials, civil servants and doctors getting away with corruption on such a large scale for years, they find it easy to justify any small irregularities of their own.  Now the first few big fish have been caught.  Most people believe this is just the tip of the iceberg.  Let us hope that these investigations continue to cleanse the system from the top down, and that all these bribes are returned to public coffers.  They might well be enough to pay off Greece's debt!

Statistics

A couple of days ago the General Federation of Professional Artisans and Merchants of Greece (ΓΣΕΒΕΕ) published their annual research (December 2013) into the income and spending habits of Greek households and how this affects their purchasing ability.  The full report is in Greek, here I give a summary.  I've rounded decimal figures up or down to nearest whole for ease of reading.
40% of Greek households (1.4 million households) have at least one unemployed member.  Of these only 10% receive unemployment benefits.
44% owe money to banks.  10% have had to liquidate assets since the beginning of the financial crisis in 2010.
35% are late in payments for taxes, health and pension insurance, utilities, banks, loans etc even though some of these delays incur fines.  42% do not have enough income to cover such obligations
95% have seen a decrease in their income over the past four years.  In the lower-middle income bracket (EUR 10,000 - 25,000 per annum) this approaches 97%.
Average loss of income is 40%.  In Attica (where the country's capital and largest city, Athens, is located) this is 41%.
49% of households rely on pensions as their main or even sole source of income, 36% on salaries, 10% on business profits.  The remaining 5% are supported by relatives, income from rent on properties (1.3%), benefits and their savings.
Pessimism pervades Greek households.  42% feel that they won't be able to honour their financial obligations next year.  This rises to 51% in households with at least one unemployed family member.
The market continues to be in "hibernation" as 75% of potential consumers state that they wait for the biannual sales to buy basic goods.
Consumer spending has fallen considerably due the shrinking of their income.  64% have reduced their spending on food, over 75% have limited spending on heating and transport, around 90% have curtailed their outlay on clothing, shoes, outings to restaurants, bars, cinema and holidays.  The only areas where more than half of the sample have not cut back are alcohol/tobacco (52%), education (84%) and health/medications (76%).  (But this still means that nearly one in four have had to reduce their health spending, sometimes unable to afford preventative check-ups and even essential medication.)
The quality of life continues to be degraded as 37% buy goods of lower quality than they used to.  In large families with more than five members, as well as the households in lower income brackets this rises to 45%.
One in three households fears that they will lose their home.  While home ownership is 87% in Greece, 28% of households who live in their own home are still paying off the loan to purchase it.  This translates to about one million households.  Of these, 17% are regularly behind in payments, and another 22% are frequently late.
Last year 44% of home owners paid (or were asked to pay) property tax or "solidarity tax" up to EUR 500, 23% from EUR 501 - 1000, 23% over EUR 1000.  This is controversially levied through the electricity bill.
The only positive element reported was that 56% would prefer the public health system, but my own interpretation of this is that this could simply be because they cannot afford private health care.

These statistics are not numbers, they are human beings.  While Skai TV's news magazine was presenting some of the above research findings they were showing video of people rummaging in rubbish bins.  Not homeless people, not professional rag-pickers (mainly Roma and Pakistani) who search through recycling bins for cartons and metal to sell to scrap merchants, or clothes to sell on the Sunday street markets.  These were ordinary-looking Greeks in ordinary clothes, neither shabby nor unkempt.  The presenter assured the viewers that these were genuine videos taken in an average urban suburb of Athens.
No need for such assurances, unfortunately I witness such scenes often.  An old woman in black searching through a dumpster near the central market for wilted vegetables.  Another old woman whom I saw from the bus window, inspecting a small red fish she had found in the bin to see whether it was still edible.  A young man brushing dirt off half a cheese pie he had found dropped on the pavement, then eating it.  People of all ages, going through the street at the end of the weekly farmers' market in every suburb, scavenging through what the stall-holders had left behind.  Men picking up cigarette butts at the bus stops, often still lit as they are hastily dropped by the smoker when their bus arrives.  People, even children, standing hopefully outside supermarket exits, waiting for charity.  I won't even mention the numerous beggars and homeless people on the streets of the country which currently holds the presidency of the European Union.
The suburb where I live is considered underprivileged to the point where the Niarchos Foundation is providing free lunches at my son's school.  According to their 2012 figures 60% of households face food insecurity, with 23% actually hungry.  Children have fainted in classrooms because they go to school without breakfast, or have even gone without food for days.  A friend who teaches in the state school system told me she and colleagues regularly baked cakes and brought food for the children in their classes in Athens because they were so hungry they could not pay attention to the lessons.
Yet even though most households in my neighbourhood would be classed in the lower socio-economic bracket, with many immigrants and Roma, I am amazed at how many valuable things are still being discarded in the rubbish bins in my street.  I see the rag-pickers pull out clothes, metal and all sorts of things that are still be useful.  A bakery fills a rubbish bin with yesterday's bread.  It breaks my heart.  I try to find recipients for useful things that I no longer need.  If I can't I hang them in a bag outside the recycling bin and I have noticed that people do take the shoes, handbags, toys, an old but still working TV set, etc that I place there.  I also collect aluminium cans separately from the rest of my recycling rubbish, and hang them outside the recycling bins in a transparent bag since I know that they are valuable scrap, thus helping the rag-picker who finds them as well as preserving finite natural resources.
I think the days of the throwaway society have to end.  Before discarding something please think.  Do you know someone who could still use it?  If not, a quick internet search will reveal organisations which can make use of it, maybe even come and pick it up from you if you cannot deliver it yourself.  Your child's school teacher knows needy children and can discreetly distribute outgrown clothes, toys, last year's school bag or pencil case.  If none of these are convenient, at least please don't throw useful things in the rubbish bin.  Hang them in a transparent bag on the outside of the recycling bin and at least there is a chance that someone needy will find them without needing to rummage through the bin.
And if you see someone standing at a supermarket exit, or your supermarket has the trolley or basket where they collect contributions for the soup kitchens, why not buy a couple of extra items to give away.  If you are reading this you have a roof over your head, you can afford internet connexion so you are more fortunate than many.  I am reluctant to give money, especially to children and drug addicts, but something they can eat or drink will help them, at least it won't go into the pockets of exploitative parents or traffickers and the drug dealers.  When the supermarket has special offers on biscuits, croissants and other non-perishable, easily carried items I often buy some extra and carry a couple with me when I commute, along with a tin of cat food or a little bag of dog biscuits for a stray.  I always find recipients and wish I could carry more.  Tiny gestures of kindness, a drop in the ocean, but every little bit helps.

Sharing crumbs

There is a beggar I sometimes see near Syntagma Square in Athens.  He sits on the pavement, knees drawn up, face hidden on his knees so all one can see is the back of his curly head and an outstretched hand.  Sleeping or too embarrassed to show his face, it's hard to tell.  I sometimes give him something--when I can I prefer to give food rather than money.   There's a McDonald's nearby where I sometimes buy a snack or a hot coffee for him or others like him I come across, but the other day when I had seen him in his usual spot I happened to have more time so I went some distance to buy him a proper hot meal: roast chicken, rice, a bar of chocolate for dessert.
As I returned to the square with his meal I saw him from the trolley window.  He was sitting up, eating some bread.  He had broken some of the bread up into little crumbs and was tossing them to the pigeons that had gathered at his feet.  I was moved to see that despite his poverty he still shared the little he had with other hungry creatures. When I gave him the bag with the meal I told him that God would bless him for his kindness.  It was true on that day at least, he gave breadcrumbs and got a hot meal in return.  And I was more blessed than words can tell, privileged to have been used by Providence to repay a poor man's big-hearted gesture.

The darkest places in hell...

'The darkest places in Hell are reserved for those who maintain their neutrality in times of moral crisis.'
This prefaces Dan Brown's Inferno, which I am currently reading.
Brown's books are entertaining but not academic, so I did an internet search for the exact source to check the implication that this comes from Dante's La Divina Commedia (Divine Comedy).  Although this has been quoted often, most notably by President JF Kennedy, I have not found the precise canto in Dante's masterpiece this supposedly comes from.  So until I re-read the original I am afraid I cannot vouch for its accuracy.

During my search I also came across another unauthenticated quote along similar lines, this one attributed to Edmund Burke:
'All that is necessary for evil to triumph is for good men to do nothing.'

And of course in a similar vein are the famous lines by Lutheran Pastor Dietrich Bonnhoeffer, but also ascribed to Evangelical Theologian Martin Niemoeller (I've conflated various versions below):
'First they came for the Communists
but I did not speak out, as I was not a Communist
Then they came for the Socialists/Trade Unionists/Catholics/Jews
but I was silent, as I was not a Socialist/Trade Unionist/Catholic/Jew
And when they came for me,
there was no-one left to speak out for me.'

All the above by way of reply to well-meaning friends who have warned me to be careful about what I blog about, lest GD or others retaliate.