This is Panos. I met him the morning of July 30th 2019 on the train from the airport to Athens when I moved my luggage so that he could take a seat on the crowded train. He is currenty 78 years old and a Greek-Canadian leather worker who has been living in Montreal for now 50 years; thus, unlike the average Greek citizen, he speaks Greek, English and French fluently. Because of how wonderful he was to talk to, about halfway through the 40 min train ride, I asked him if he would like to do lunch with me, and this turned out to be one of the luckiest decisions I have ever made.
The next seven hours, quickly became a guided tour of his hometown (he spent his teenage and college years living in Psiri). He walked me to my hostel because he was worried that I may get lost. After having given me time to settle in, he proceeded to take me to his favorite restaurant in Monastiraki, buy me lunch (and other coffees and cokes throughout the day, despite my insisting to pay), wait in line with me to go to the Akropolis Museum, teach me Greek history and mythology, engage with me in interesting philosophical, political and cultural questions as we walked through the city, and patiently answered my many, many questions for his infinitely wise mind. He gave me his Greek and Canadian phone numbers, told me to call him if I have any problems in my upcoming three week stay in Greece (he was going back to Montreal exactly on the day I flew back to Germany), promised to help me if anything were to happen, and gave me an open invitation to his shop and home in Montreal for the next time that I travel there.
In fact, when my friend on a later part of my trip had food poisoning, I called him, and he immediately picked up to advise us not to go to the general hospital because of the day-long waiting times. He called me a few days later out of concern for my friend’s well-being.
Since then, we have talked on the phone briefly because he wanted to know that I was doing well and happy, because he wanted to make sure I had his Canadian number for my next visit to Montreal, and because he wanted to give me his daughter’s email address so that I could send him the pictures I took of him and us.
I feel so incredibly blessed, lucky, and warm inside for having met such a wonderful person with such vitality and kindness rooted so firmly in his heart. I hope that someday I will be as generous and kind.
