September 17, 2002
DCGreeks.com
2002 Fall Preview
It's that time of year again. Fall is upon us and there are no more excuses for a lack of good Greek events. Everyone is back from their Greek vacations. The college kids from GW and elsewhere have returned. There are a lot of new people in town, whether for school or for work. The weather has cooled down and there are no more excuses for road trips to the beach that keep people away on the weekends. From here on out, the DC area is your source for Greek entertainment, with something happening almost every weekend. We here at DCGreeks.com present our 2002 Fall Preview of what you can expect from now until Thanksgiving in the DC area. We've broken down the events by category, providing our best bets for what will be the can't miss events this fall, no matter how you'd like to spend time with your fellow Greeks.
Greek Festivals
T-1. St. Constantine & Helen's
T-1. St. Sophia's
3. St. Katherine's
We hate to even rank Greek Festivals because they're church events and all of these festivals are quite good. Any of these Festivals could be competing for the #1 ranking in any given season. St. Katherine's comes in as an unknown quantity of sorts this year. They haven't had a festival since last fall with the construction of their new community center taking place throughout most of this year. The new community center is outstanding, but it may have taken away what made St. Katherine's a great festival every year - a large open space outside. Greek festivals are better when they take place outside, especially during the early fall, when the weather is a little cooler and the smell of meat on the grill carries better. Those of you who remember how St. George's festival used to be before they opened their grand hall, may recall that their festival seemed a lot more active when most of it took place outside. (St. George's doesn't even have a festival in the fall, so this is why they're not ranked.) We're curious to see how St. Katherine's will recreate the same atmosphere.
In the meantime, St. Sophia's and St. Constantine & Helen's are sure bets this fall. We will admit we haven't been to St. Constantine & Helen's in a long time but we miss the courtyard atmosphere, which is almost better suited for a fall festival when the weather is a little cooler. St. Sophia's has never had a bad festival and if the turnout from the Spring festival is any indication, they should have a good turnout under the big tent again this year.
If you're wondering about why we haven't mentioned any other Greek festivals, especially those in Baltimore, we have to admit that we haven't even been to a Greek festival in Baltimore because they normally overlap with the festivals in D.C. We welcome any information and/or pictures from any of the festivals in the Baltimore area or elsewhere.
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Greek Dances
1. Byzantine Ball
2. YAL Weekend
3. Laconian Dance
The top-ranked event on this list is one that many of you haven't heard of before, because it's only in it's second year of existence. The Byzantine Ball, on Saturday November 23, a fundraiser for St. Sophia's new community center building, isn't the cheapest of events at a $125 dollar advance purchase price tag, but it has a few things you're not going to find at most Greek Dances. First of all, the Byzantine Ball is black tie optional, which you don't see at most Greek functions. Secondly, it's open bar. It's the one Greek event where you know that once you've paid to come in, you're not going to have to spend another dime to have a good time. Throw in a nice dinner and both a Greek and an American live band (That's right, two bands) and you've got the makings of a good time for a worthy cause.
YAL Weekend comes in as a close second to this event. (Read: If YAL Weekend open bar, all weekend then YAL Weekend perennial champion of universe now until eternity.) It will obviously be the most-heavily-attended event for strictly young adults in the fall season. This year's Greek Dance is taking place on Saturday, November 9, with the organizers relying on the same successful formula as last year, a hotel in downtown Washington, DC, and Atlantis, from Philadelphia, as the entertainment.
The Laconian Dance, on the Friday after Thanksgiving slips to #3 in this year's rankings partly based on the turnout last year. The choice of having it at Martin's Crosswinds, in Greenbelt drove away the Virginia crowd that normally attends this event. It's funny how Marylanders have this thing about crossing a river to come into Virginia and Virginians have a similar feeling about crossing a river to come into Maryland. With the Greek community as small as it is in the DC area, we shouldn't let river crossings come in the way of everyone having a good time. (This public service announcement is brought to you by "Greeks Entirely Together On Voluntarily Engaging Rivers In Tranquility. (G.E.T.O.V.E.R.I.T.))
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Happy Hours
1. Third Thursdays
2. St. Sophia's YAL Happy Hour
3. ?
This fall doesn't feature that many happy hours. St. George's YAL, a major player in the Happy Hour game last year, has abandoned the sport altogether of late it seems. With St. Katherine's YAL not organizing any social events this year, the YAL Happy Hour banner is being flown by St. Sophia's YAL. Their offering is actually on Tuesday, September 17th, at the Capitol City Brewing Company on Capitol Hill. (By the way, this is the first Greek event to take place on a Tuesday night since the dawn of time. We applaud St. Sophia YAL's out-of-the-box thinking in not placing this event on any of the already busy weekends during the fall.)
The reigning King of Greek Happy Hours over the last year has been Third Thursdays, a totally independent, loosely organized, call to all the young Greek professionals to converge on a DC area bar on the Third Thursday of every month. The organizers treat their duties really casually, taking longer and longer each month to announce their choice of bar. Third Thursdays are looking to come back from a below-average turnout over the summer. September's Third Thursday is at the Rock Bottom in Bethesda on the 19th, the second time in the last three months it has been in Bethesda. We hope the organizers continue to pick a variety of places in D.C., Maryland, and Virginia that will get people excited about coming out every month to see their fellow Greeks.
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Greek Nights
Sigma vs. Exodus vs. ??
To tell you the truth, we have no clue how to call the Greek Night races this fall. There is still a lot that remains to be seen in how the Greek Night scene is going to turn out in the coming months and who is going to be contending for Greek Night King this fall. Exodus, a new production company formed by former members of Sigma Entertainment, kicked off September with a solid showing at Vida on Friday the 13th. Sigma Entertainment gets its chance to hold serve on Friday, September 20 at Acropolis. (Acropolis has replaced Ooh La La as Sigma's home for Greek Nights. Usually the best game in the Greek Night Fall season is the October 28th OXI Day Greek Night. Will Sigma or Exodus or some other production company have an event? Will we have a repeat of March 25th, when Sigma and Asteria battled it out on the same night?
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Special Events
Basilis Karras- Prodromos- Dora - Live in
Concert
It's rare when DC actually is a stop on a concert tour straight from Greece. Normally Greeks in this area would have to drive to at least Atlantic City, if not New York City, to get a chance to see an actual Greek concert. Asteria Productions brings Basilis Karras, Prodromos and Dora to the Crystal City Double Tree Hotel on Friday, September 27th. Asteria's events usually have a good mix of people and this one should be no exception, as a concert will bring out a lot of Greeks who you don't normally see at Greek events. And with smoking allowed in the ballroom, there will be no excuse to miss a minute of the fun.
St. George's Silent Auction
St. George's decided a couple of years ago to scrap their fall festival altogether and hold a silent auction instead. It's almost amazing that Greeks are in charge of organizing this event, because of how smoothly and professionally it is run. This year's theme is "Athens Awaits You" which besides the food is really the only truly "Greek" thing about this event. The proceeds this year will be shared with Metropolitan Washington Senior Housing (MWOSH), a project to establish an assisted care facility in the Washington Metropolitan area; and Childhelp USA, a national organization with a regional office in Virginia, focusing on child abuse prevention and treatment. (The remaining proceeds go to St. George's Church. St. George wouldn't stop doing a fall festival if they didn't have another way of raising funds for the church.) This year's event takes place on Saturday, October 26, at St. George's Hall.
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DISCLAIMER:
This Fall Preview couldn't possibly be complete. There are a lot of Greek events that have yet to be announced and we here at DCGreeks.com couldn't possibly know of everything going on in DC, much less in Baltimore. If you have an event that you would like posted on DCGreeks.com,
please let us know about it.
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