Gay-friendly cities have more economic prosperity

Since last weekend it was the Gay Pride in Athens (also in Toronto as my friend Fotini informed me) let's write something about gays.

I found this research from the George Mason University in USA. According to it, the more "gay-friendly" a city is, the more "economically prosperous" it will be. In his March 2007 paper (which can be read here), they use a "Gay Index" to show that "artistic, bohemian, and gay populations" have significant effects on housing values. They also found that gay-friendly areas typically support technological innovation and higher income levels. Additionally, educated young people tend to move to the most gay-friendly cities, because they generally have the best job markets.

Could those cities really owe their prosperity to gays?

Yes and no. I believe in the power of the citizen. When citizens are not supressed, and they are able to hunt their happiness and dreams they can do miracles. Either they are gay or not. So it's not that gay people are bettter than others. It's just that those cities make sure that a piece of them, an important one actually (10%), is free to act as it wills and has no obstacles or supression. They give it a chance to do miracles.

That can be a good lesson for Greece. The Greek politicians have not realised yet the power of the citizen (maybe only George Papandreou). Last week the mayor of Athens (Nikitas Kaklamanis) refused to put Athen's Gay Pride 2007 under the auspicies of the City Hall (municipality). He received very strong critisism about that.

The sooner Greeks wake up, the better for them. Especially in the gay issue, the whole Europe laughs when they hear that the country in which homosexual love was invented (or at least flurished) is actually... homophobic!

EU agreement

I read that the EU managed to go into a new agreement last night, replacing the failure of the European Constitution.

It's funny how two countries who want the same thing, but fight for it in a different way always manage to ruin Europe's true union.

The greatest difficulties were Poland and England.

Poland doesn't want to leave the veto-system. I agree. The new system just gives the big countries more votes. It doesn't give the decision to the majority of the European Citizens, so it's actually less democratic than the old one. But this is not why Poland dissagrees. Poland just wants to stay as much as independent as possible. Because it's a big country, compared to other EU countries it's powerful enough to stop any decisions it doens't like using the present system. If the system changes, it won't. Poland just wants to take from European Union and not give.

England is actually the same. England wants to be in EU, but also be as independent as possible. The new voting system doesn't affect it (cause it's a big country), but if the Constitution or the new agreement is going to pass, she has to accept the Charter of Fundamental Rights, which gives the workers of England too many rights, and England doesn't want that. How ironic that the Labour Party is in power!!!

Actually England has a Guiness Record on "exceptions"! The most obvious are Euro-zone, Schengen zone, etc etc. Whenever Europe goes forth, England stays behind. Whenever it comes to military stuff and common foreign affairs policy, England is more like the advocate of USA and never agrees with the rest of the Europeans. England was obsessed with terrorism and forced all these exhaustive and hysterical measures in the airports.

So, is UK in the EU because it feels like European or is it inside EU just to sabotage it?!

I'm tired of watching the same play again and again, every time EU wants to move on; having to discuss UK constant disagreements and eventually accept ANOTHER exception. Let's move on. The countries that are really interested in uniting Europe may follow. The rest of the countries can just make us a favour and stay the hell out of it!

Sto para 5

I spent my evening yesterday watching the last episode of the famous Greek comedy series "sto para 5". It's one of the innocent but not naive series that the whole family can watch. Some people complained about the last episode. It was too dramatic they said for a comedy. I think the last episode is like a break up. And break ups are always dramatic. It was nice. And it sent so many messages about life and death, love, etc. But the best I think was the last message: Switch the TV off! The real life is out there!

This message, along with the last picture of the 5 friends playing in the sea sent all my stress away and gave me a great feeling. I think I'm going to have a really nice summer :)

Welcome

Welcome to my blog.

I have no idea why people create those things. I just felt the need to create one too. I don't know where it comes from, I don't know how to satisfy this need, neither where it's going to lead me to. But I'm doing it anyway.

I'll start with a song. To present myself. It's Greek so I'll give you first the Greek lyrics and then I'll tranlsate for my international friends. I wish I could write in Greek in this blog. It's my favourite language. But things change, and we have to adjust. We always have to adjust, though never yield.

Με λένε Γιώργο
και ποτέ δεν τραγουδάω
για της αγάπης το γλυκό-πικρό καημό.
Δεν έχω μάθει
μαργαρίτες να μαδάω,
δεν περιμένω κανενός το γυρισμό.

Με λένε Γιώργο
και ποτέ δεν τραγουδάω.
Θα υποφέρω στη ζωή κάθε στιγμή,
γιατί δεν έκανα ό,τι θα ΄πρεπε να κάνω,
γιατί σαν άνθρωπος δεν είχα την πυγμή.

Με λένε Γιώργο...


My name is Giorgos
and I never sing
about love's sweet-bitter "pain" (although "kaimos" cannot be exactly tranlated)
I've never learnt
to pluck margaritas,
I don't expect anyone to come back to me.

My name is Giorgos,
and I never sing.
I'll always suffer in life, every single moment,
because I didn't do what I should have done,
because I didn't have the strength.

My name is Giorgos...