Breaking into the mainstream - Greek blogging

The strangest thing is happening today. I'm seeing the arrival of a new era in terms of media coverage in Greece. For the first time in my recollection a story which started on a blog has made it into the mainstream news. In fact not just one story, but two that I first came across on Devious Diva's blog.

Picture by Devious Diva

The first concerns an arson attack on a Jim Crow school that was built for Rom kids in Athens. Two months later the school remains in ashes, the victim of bureaucratic neglect and latent racist feeling towards this particular Greek minority. At least now it got some coverage on the national TV news via NET

The second story was about the Greek blogosphere's attempt to bring to people's attention the case of Amalia Kalyvinou the victim of cancer, of medical malpractice and of Greek bureaucracy that lead to an excruciatingly painful odyssey of suffering for 22 years and ultimately to her death at the age of 30.


Her blog, fakellaki.blogspot.com catalogued her painful journey through a brutal, corrupt, often incompetent health system in which many have their hand out, seeking bribes and other financial favours. Nor is this an isolated case, I remember my mother-in-law who also suffered the same kind of treatment at the hands of rapacious "health care" professionals before her death from cancer.