My Greek Olympics: Athens life and work..

Re-Enter Vic and David:

At this time, Vic and David had gone to work for ETeam. Vic was put in charge of services and had control over the work in Greece and David was made a technical expert and was there to assist Vic. Jay had returned months ago and was working with Semos from the side, she was helping SAIC in the background as well as the committee. So the whole gang was back, though doing different things.

I was told not to hang around them, but I could talk to whom ever I liked and I didn't give a shit what the corporate assholes thought. It was an interesting time and I had all sides available to me for information. David got his place back and Mie Tie enjoyed the increase in business, Vic eventually got an apartment in the Hilton area and David moved in with him as well to save money.

Enter Kost:

At this time we had a whole bunch as assholes at the MOC, I was in my office and I had my things to do, but the shits were everywhere. Charlie Kost was there, a slack-jaw hillbilly type who was a total moron. He was trying to play a greater role, but knew nothing of what we were doing. Charlie would always use his favorite saying, 'That dog don't hunt'. Or in his slack-jaw southern talk, Thad’t daag dun’t hun’t. He would use it always, the Greeks though he was crazy, so did I. Most of the time Kost would just sit in a meeting and sleep, once in a while he would spout off about something, but most of the time he just sat. Still he was a pain to have to deal with, he would cause problems from the background and I know he was talking to the embassy about what was going on. A lot of that happened, the embassy got a lot of info from the company. Kost was a retired General, he like Adm Meese where two of the most disgusting and corrupt people I have ever met.

Good O'ld American food:

One day I got an email from the shits saying there would be an 'American BBQ' lunch at the Marousi office that day. We were invited to come and have hamburgers and hot dogs, chili and all the other crap that goes with a BBQ. Charley Kost wanted to have some home cook-in and everyone was invited. Of course all the shit heads in the office were excited since they all hated it in Greece. I wasn't going to go near the place.

Kost had a favorite line, "That dog don't hunt", so I can imagine Kost spotting off the whole time about how things are. I happened across a kids play ride, the one that you put a quarter in and ride a plastic animal for a minute or two. The coin box had a plastic turtle, a kind of cartoonish version of a turtle, slack jawed and all. It looked just like Kost and I wish I took a picture of it. Anyway, the BBQ was taking place on a cool and wet day, I think it rained a little actually. From what was said for the Greeks who were there, it was kind of strange and everyone seemed to wish they were back in the US. I can image what it must have been like. The Greek people said the food was strange and didn’t look good, Sweet sauce on meat and bean was not something the Greeks liked. From the comments, all the US people kept saying how much they miss the US and the food and how bad the food was in Greece. What a bunch of close minded idiots…

MOC overrun:

The MOC in training mode.

We had a bunch of people brought in by the Vampire. There were a couple of sub-contractors doing coding, which was never part of the contract. There were a few lackeys of the Vampire and two new 'assistance'. Marcini was pissed, but she couldn't do anything so someone needed to be there who could at least do basic clerical work. The Vampires boys were all over one of the girls, they were young and thought it was all for fun. No concept of why we are there and what the big picture was.

I just ignored them and didn't talk to them at all. Most of the time they just sat around and talked, I had things to do. My office was in the back ad they were all in the front, I interacted with them as needed and I tried to stay out of their way. The girls downstairs were supposed to be our support, but they mostly just sat around and talked. I had some meetings and I didn't care what was going on in their personal lives. I had to work so I couldn’t be bothered with all the high school crap.

Psiri:

I found a new place to hangout, though I didn't go there as much as other places. The Psiri area, to the west of Monastiraki, was up until recently an area were most people avoided. With some new restaurants and clubs opening in the area, it became a cool hangout location. There was a Cuban club that I went to a few times and a bunch of Bouzouki clubs, plus an assortment of other places to visit. I would stop at the Souvlaki stand and get a few kabobs then walk into the area and find a lively place. It was close and different from the annex, a nice change of pace.

Mostly I would go with Roula, Silvia and Rick. A stop at a Bouzouki and some drinks and maybe food was the usual plan of action. The places didn't pick up till at least 11:00 and they would go until 3 or 4 in the morning. The weekends were very crowded, but it was almost all Greeks. To get to the clubs you had to walk down some streets that were not very inviting and I think it scared most tourists. The streets were dark and a lot of people hanging around made it look like it wasn't a good place to go.

Towards the Olympic time, more people would show up and a bunch of TV crews would be there filming. I stayed away during the Olympics, mostly because I had to work, but also it was too crowded and the prices went way up. But for a time it was a fun area to hangout in.

Verkiza:

Alex would call me up and ask what I was doing on the weekend. I would go with him to a small town south of Athens on the coast called Verkiza. He would pick me up and go with his sister, who was a nurse, and maybe someone else. His cousin came a few times or even Stavroula. The place we would go was a little cafe on the water, a nice view out to the south and a few islands were always visible. The place had a large patio in the back with several levels and a big covered area, which was good for hot days.

The cafe in Verkiza

They served the usual stuff, nothing really special, but the location was nice and it was always good to get out of the city. The drive there was interesting, the road was used by people to do street racing and there was always crashes and some fatalities. The road would wind around following the coast and it was just past Vouliagmeni. I really like that place, always relaxing, though it could be crowed in the summer months. We would go back several more times and I always like it there no matter how crowed it was.

Rick, Tryphon, and Chris night out:

So with January out of the way, and not much to show for it, we decided to take a break and have some fun. Of course it was winter and there wasn't much to do, we planned on a night on the town. We ate at Tops and Chris said he wanted to go out to a club. So it was back to the strip clubs with Rick, Tryphon, Chris and a few others. Much money was spent by the others, but I didn't want to spend all that cash for nothing. I would sit and have a beer and watch the girls' dance, once in a while a girl would come by and ask if I would buy her a 10 euro drink, I didn't. Some looked good, others average.

There would have some African girls, they looked nice but you never knew about them. They were the more aggressive ones and would always be the first to the table and ask you for a drink. It always was a long night though and I didn't always want to stay. On this night George came along, I almost puked when George got a young girl to give him a lap dance. George was about 60 and the girl was maybe 20, she did the usual stuff and was all over him, George just loved it, I was sick. Rick and Chris took girls in the back for the “special” stuff, they spent maybe 400 or 500 at the club, just crazy. At the end of the night, it was about 4 am, Alex had the best looking girl in the place give him a dance, save the best for last, she was hot and Alex had the best.

The Crew again, sort of:

David and Vic were working for ETEAM and Jay was doing some stuff for them as well, so everyone was back but in different uniforms. We held special meetings at Aries office and I would fill them in on what was happening, they let me know what the committee was thinking. It was a good way for me to stay up on the news, no one from the company would talk to me since I was one of the "crew". Our lives had just diverged a bit then mixed again. Jay, Vic and that crew had returned and would continue the fight.

Zombies:

On a rare occasion I would go to Marousi for a meeting or something. I would walk in and see the "support staff" working hard. Basically they would just play computer games all day, with breaks to eat Pizza Hut or KFC down the street. These were the people who were supposed to be managing the contract and time tracking of the employees. In most divisions, one person would do this for a few hundred people or more. There they had 4 people to manage the 'charge numbers' for 100 people, but since this was a fixed contract and there wouldn't be any changes, they didn't need anyone to do this in Greece. It was a way for the divisions to charge to a contract and get money, it was a drain on the contract but no one cared.

Green Line Metro Station in Marousi

I would walk in and see the idiots just sitting playing solitaire or something. Most smoked and drank coffee and talked with nothing to do but get paid. What a waste of money and space. We could have gotten more out of burning the money for heat. It was the land of the dead, zombies. We had three corporate groups sending people at this time, each group had people to support there staff, the staff were all corporate support people. So they had support to support the support people, think of having a maid to clean up for the maid. No one did anything to further the project, they just made money for their group. No wonder the company lost $200 million dollars.

Altec disaster:

One of the subcontractors was Altec, they were to do a lot of the physical system installations. Mostly they were screwing things up. They were the worst one out of the bunch, so un-trustworthy and unprofessional. Always behind and half-assed, yet Jesus and the Vampire loved them. Maybe they had some kind of arrangement going on but I wondered how they got away with doing such a poor job. During status meetings they always complained about everything, excuse after excuse on why they were behind. Siemens seemed incompetent, Altec just seemed like slime.

Enter Fene:

In January the Vampire brought in the one thing that would doom the project for sure, Fene. Michael Fene, my old co-worker from my old division. This is a person who thinks the world exists because he is here. He thinks he is God, knows all, can do anything and everything. He will cause more problems is less time than anyone on the project.