Athens

I’m drawn to sketchiness but even by my sketchy-drawn standards, the state of Athens is deflating. The cradle of Western civilization now appears to be the graffiti capital of the Western world. The luridly colored scrawls are everywhere; Greek grannies air their carpets over balconies marred by multicolored tags and swirls. The Parthenon temple still looks mighty grand atop the ancient Acropolis citadel, but down in the modern city a lot of people look hard-up and downtrodden: lined faces, permanent frowns, hastened aging, disheveled clothes. Wandering through central Athens, I passed two shuttered shops set back from the street. About twenty homeless people lounged in the alcove, amicably passing round substances to smoke and ingest.