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DCGreeks.com's Summer 2010 Recap

September 7, 2010

Members of Greek America Foundation's volunteer staff take time to pose with The Guys @ DCGreeks.com at the Forty Under 40 Awards Party on June 12, 2010.

While it seems that this summer in the Greek community in DC and Greek America in general has passed by quieter than most, there have a few highlights worth recapping before heading into the fall season. A few destination weekends were enough to supplement the few scattered opportunities to see other Greeks here in DC.

Greek America Foundation’s Forty Under 40 Weekend and National Innovation Conference

Back on June 11^th-13^th, the Greek America Foundation hosted its inaugural National Innovation Conference in conjunction with its Forty Under 40 Weekend, providing an interesting opportunity to gather Greek-Americans from a variety of fields who have already established themselves as leaders in their industries (the NIC Presenters) with those who while accomplishing much at an early age, have years of contributing to their chosen fields, the Greek American community, and the world ahead of them. The weekend was hosted by the same organization behind The Gabby Awards last summer, so from an event perspective, it was as advertised, actually living up to the hype, something that many Greek events across the country sadly fail to consistently do. The choice of the W Hotel in Chicago’s City Center announced a break from the typical Greek convention hotel, with an atmosphere that was more cocktail party than business meeting, serving as the backdrop for the social events for the weekend. The National Innovation Conference itself though took place offsite at Resolution Digital Studios, a black-box state of the art industrial setting flanked on three sides by enormous video screens that made attendees think they were about to see a man in a black turtleneck step out from behind the curtain to launch the next piece of must-have technology. Instead a rare collection of speakers, from high-level executives at FedEx and Microsoft to the X-Prize Foundation to celebrities like Cat Cora, spoke to a cross-section of Greek American professionals who could afford the $550 conference registration fee and Greek-American college students whose registration was sponsored by the PanHellenic Scholarship Foundation. The running theme of each of their presentations was how each of these speakers was incorporating innovation in their professional or philanthropic pursuits.

The balance of the NIC Weekend was devoted to the Forty Under 40 Winners, the great majority of whom actually were able to make it to Chicago that weekend. While great lengths were taken to highlight the achievements of each of the winners, particularly at the Awards Party on Saturday night and to keep the winners accessible to the rest of the weekend’s attendees, it was surprising that some time wasn’t set aside for the winners to network amongst themselves in a more structured way, as the cross-collaboration of these individuals could have been perhaps the greatest outcome of the weekend in terms of its potential benefits to Greek America.

Over 30 people braved a 6:30 AM CDT kick-off and a quickly conceded goal by the Greek National Team to attend DCGreeks.com's World Cup Wake-Up call in the Windy City at the Elephant & Castle Pub in Chicago, IL on June 12, 2010.

(From our perspective, we’d like to thank the over 30 people who trekked to Elephant & Castle at 6:30 AM on a Saturday morning for our Windy City Wake Up Call to watch Greece get beat by South Korea over breakfast. This turnout was particularly surprising given that all but a handful of people were local Chicagoans, not affiliated with the NIC Conference/Forty Under 40 Weekend, who had found about the event from DCGreeks.com, Facebook, and friends in Chicago. Had Greece not let in a goal in the first seven minutes of the game we would have likely seen a ton more people from the Conference hotel itself who demoralized went back to bed before the long day and night ahead.)

The 88^th AHEPA Supreme Convention in Montreal

It’s hard to admit that we could be so wrong about an event that on paper seemed was going to be departure from the past few lackluster AHEPA Conventions. An AHEPA Convention in Montreal should have produced a great turnout of young adults just from the Greeks in Montreal itself, but this was not the case. While the Sons and Maids are still managing to get their late high school/early college aged members to the Conventions (likely on their parents’ dollars or loonies in this case), there is a dearth of Greeks between the ages of 22 and 45 attending these conventions. When an afterhours at a Greek restaurant who you would think would have its own established Greek clientele isn’t packed with Greeks in their mid to late 20s and 30s from Montreal, what hope does a Friday night non-exclusive non-Greek themed club night or a Saturday night hotel party have of a huge turnout? The Greek population of Montreal really didn’t come out in droves to support the rest of the AHEPA-sponsored events during the rest of the week either. It was a nice convention and the hospitality of our Greek Canadian hosts went a long way to mask the inefficiencies associated with most Greek events; it’s hard to get too frustrated with transportation delays or to be disappointed in the menu or entertainment at some of these events when everyone is so damn nice.

Sons & Maids at the 88th AHEPA Supreme Convention Sons of Pericles & Maids of Athena After-Hours Party at Mythos Ouzeri Estiatorio on July 15, 2010.

The highlight of the week had to be the Charity Casino Night featuring plenty of gaming tables and a Texas Hold’Em Tournament for intergenerational gambling fun. (I’m not actually typing this article on the laptop I won that night in a heads up blackjack tournament amongst the other non-Hold’Em Winners as I haven’t been able to de-Canadianize it for everyday use yet.) AHEPA leadership will tell you that the highlight of the week was the Grand Banquet, which experienced a major upgrade in emcees by going with Angelo Tsarouchas over banquet mainstay Basile. Somewhere between the salad and the main course, a roomful of old-timey Greeks broke out into a medley of songs that included, New York, New York, the Beer Barrel Polka, a.k.a. "Roll out the Barrels" (an infectious tune we thought was probably a mainstay of NHL games in Canada, but actually is the song played during the seventh inning stretch at Milwaukee Brewers games), and then began Greek dancing on and in-between tables. The program itself, which isn’t the shortest of sit-throughs during the week, went on into the eleven o’clock hour as a result of an ill-timed display of jubilation likely brought on by not being as well entertained at some of the earlier events in the week.

A Farewell to Ambassador Kakouris

This summer marked the end the tour of duty of Andreas Kakouris, the Cypriot Ambassador to the United States, who finished up four years as a champion of the Cyprus issue not only here in DC, but in the United States as a whole. On July 27, the American Hellenic Institute, AHEPA, the Hellenic American National Council (HANC), and SAE-USA, in a rare and hopeful collaboration, came together to host a farewell dinner attended by a surprisingly large gathering of Greeks from DC and across the country. Ambassador Kakouris was by far the most accessible of all the ambassadors from Greece and Cyprus in recent memory and had a unique way of being able to describe the Cyprus Problem is such a way that even the most uninformed Greek, Philhellene or other listener would instantly not only understand the issues but would be inspired to do something about it. Armed or perhaps "disarmed" with the most intoxicating of British accents, "Ambassador Charming" (as we called him) even found a way to keep those Greek Americans who are saturated with talk of the Cyprus problem at every Greek gathering they attend engaged in the effort. We look forward to welcoming the new Ambassador and hope that he continues Ambassador Kakouris’ efforts, but regardless Ambassador Kakouris will be missed.

What Greeks were doing in DC without Greek Nights...

The DCGreeks.com Kickball Team at the Safe at Home Kickball Tournament in Arlington, VA on 8/7/2010.

The lack of Greek Nights during the summer is not unexpected as promoters take the summer off as much as their patrons who flock to Greece or the beaches every summer. This left a few sometimes surprising opportunities for Greeks to get together in DC. Since May the Avalon Theatre in DC in conjunction with the Greek Embassy has sponsored a monthly Greek movie showing at 8:00 PM on the first Monday of the month. After a stretch of sometimes heavy dramas, the Avalon ended the summer with back to back palette cleansing comedies. The movies for the most part have been good and well attended as the Parthenon Restaurant a couple of blocks down the street from the Avalon has seen some impromptu late night gatherings of Greek young adults trying to figure out what they just saw on screen over drinks and mezedes. The only real scheduled bar events this summer have been Third Thursdays, which didn’t take the summer off, and has started to attract a more diverse crowd from month to month under a new philosophy of trying to bring different groups of Greeks together through an expanded Facebook invite. We here at DCGreeks.com decided to get together a random group of Greeks for a one-day kickball tournament in Arlington benefitting the Arlington-Alexandria Coalition for the Homeless. For a team that had never played kickball together before and for the most part hadn’t played kickball as adults, we made it through to the playoffs with two wins and a tie only to face a professional kickball team that crushed us 25-1. Making the playoffs was worth it if only to hear the public address announcer butcher ten Greek last names, including the Hellenized names of the Philhellenes on our roster.

Read past feature articles