My Greek Olympics: More work

Working with Rick and Eric:

Now that David and Vic were gone, Rick and Eric were the ETeam experts. I had them and the other ETeam crew members at the MOC. Eric was doing everything he could to make SAIC happy and Rick did his "I know everything" act. I got along good with Rick and I knew Eric from previous work. I warned them not to go beyond their contract, but Eric wanted to do a lot more. This set them up for problems down the road, but at the time they happily went along with everything asked. I spent a lot of time with Rick, since he was working with the customer mostly and I had to as well.

Some of the ETeam crew were screw offs and I didn't quite know what they did half the time. They were to help with the customer, yet hardly ever went anywhere. Also some of them complained about living arrangements, but this was an ETeam issue. ETeam was asked to do a lot, since the IET was fast approaching and nothing was working.

Rick liked to have a good time and was somewhat like David, he liked to drink and eat and hangout with his little group around him. Rick made good friends with the police guys and talked them into a lot of stuff, but he didn't hold a firm line with SAIC shitheads. Jesus and the Vampire manipulated them to do things and it would come back to bite them at IET time.

Lunch:

One day we invited Stavroula, Alex and Sophia to lunch at the noodle bar. So we all walked to the place, about a 10 minute walk and we went in. Stavroula and Sophia hadn't had noodles like this before, so we helped them decide on what to order. When the food came, we all had a good time watching Stavroula try to eat with chop sticks. We knew what to order so it was easy for us, but the others had to look for something to get. It was fun to watch and we gave encouragement. We paid for them and they all said that it was very expensive. We didn't think much of the 6 euros per plate, but for them I can see why they thought it was so expensive. With a salary of just 1000 euros a month, 6 euros on lunch a day was a lot.

On another day, I took Stavroula to Poliathina for lunch. It was expense too, but I liked the place and I always got good service. I ordered grilled sardines and took my time eating them. Stavroula said I spend too much money on lunch and that she would take me to a place for lunch that she goes to. All the staff at the place run around and gives us great service while the other people are left waiting as we get our food first. A few days later we go to a place that makes crepes and we get a ham and cheese crepe, a big one like a quesadilla. It was good and only cost a Euro, so I could see why she would go there. 

Fire Bombs at the bank:

One night, the whole gang of ETeam and 'the good guys' went to dinner in the Adrianou square area. We went to the place that had OK food and served a cheese stuffed squid and it also had a night club inside which would get crowded. It was an average night and as we walked back to the annex, we heard a couple of bangs. I didn't think much of them but as we went around a corner onto Pandrosou street, we could see a fire burning in an alley. I went around the building and could see three fires burning at three different banks, one in an ATM vestibule and the others on the ATMs in the street.

This was an anarchist attack on the banks. It is a common occurrence actually and I wanted to see how it was handled. I waited and finally a cop showed up and looked around, he didn't ask anything of anyone. I could see the fire brigade trucks coming down the street, but they were blocked by cars and since this was Athens, no one moved for them. I stood there for about thirty minutes and watched the fire and police guys do their thing. Just an average day, no one ever asked me if I saw something or to step away. I stood and saw how they handled the incident. If it was here, the FBI would show up and it would be a big deal, attacking a back is a federal offense, not in Greece.

Sushi:

On Apollonius Street, at the end, there was a Japanese place that had Sushi. It wasn't bad and since it was one of the only places in town that we knew of that had sushi, we ate there from time to time. The place was small and the guy who owned it wasn't very friendly. We would do as we said "channel Semos" and order a bunch of food. Soup, platters of sushi, fried things, what ever we wanted. We would eat until we were stuffed, it was expensive, but once or twice a month it was worth it.

The noodle bar down the street would fill in and they would be a cheaper alternative to sushi. A bowl of noodles and a beer would be about 10 Euro compared to 25 at the sushi place. I could always count on the noodle bar and I would go there for lunch once in a while. Once while I was eating, I met Ari and the prime ministers brother, who were eating there and talking business.

I had to spend time at the Fire Brigade center which they were still building the place so we had to deal with the construction. Some times the power would go out or the stairs would be blocked by garbage. We would have to move from room to room as they worked on finishing the place. The daily operations were still going on in the old part of the building, soon they would move up to the new offices.