aorati melani: i am here to stay

what happened to a friend of mine, aorati melani, when she went to see a play, in athens, greece.

last night, i went to go see corpus christi. the reason i wanted to go and see this particular play was my desire to support the right of artists to freedom of expression. i never imagined i would face so many difficulties and dangers in this simple task.

i took the subway, got off at kerameikos station, and walked from konstantinoupoleos street towards iera odos, where the theater is located. from the previous intersection, i could see that a large crowd had gathered and the special forces of the police had blocked off the street. i turned right and made my way to iera odos from the previous street. in front of the theater, another crowd had gathered, and another group of policemen was preventing them for approaching. behind the police, there were a few people, priests, monks, a lady with a scarf on her head and some men in suits, three of which, as i learned later, were parliament members of the golden dawn party.

the air smelled of tear gas and my eyes stung, but generally there was relative calm. i approached the officers and said that i wanted to enter the theater.

“go away, ma'm. please, go away”
“has the play been cancelled?”
“we don’t know. please step back.”

i did step back, but i didn’t leave. i tried, in vain, to locate my friends with whom we had arranged to meet. i walked around the ring of police officers, trying to get through, all the while explaining that i wanted to enter the theater to see the show, but without success. my efforts, and the atheist union t-shirt i was wearing, attracted the attention of protesters who started to comment:

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