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What’s different?

How to pretend to be a Greek?

Poland

What does it mean to „pretend to be a Greek” in Polish? What is the relation between the Polish and the Greek national teams and why does their performance on the field remind me of the economic, cultural and social situation of these two countries?

Each medal has two sides

In 2012 Poland and Ukraine were organizing together the UEFA European Football Championship (Euro 2012), and the opening match during this tournament was a meeting between Poland and Greece. Robert Lewandowski managed to score the first goal at minute 17: however, Dimitris Salpingidis replied at minute 51, and in the end there was a draw (1:1). The public opinion was divided – from the Polish side there were voices saying that we should have won this match, and as you probably imagine – the same voices in Greece were saying that they should have scored 3 points instead of 1 in the general classification.

That’s how I would descibe the main differences between our countries, even though I’ve been here, in Kalamata, only for 3 weeks now. There are, of course, small details between the countries which might make me think that Greece or Poland deals with some particular issues better than the other, but in the end of the day - it balances out and there’s a draw between us. This applies to the cultural, economic and social spheres as well. Three years later, in 2015, our teams again played against each other, in a friendly match. The result? History repeats itself – a draw, 0:0.

Unfortunately, I haven’t had the opportunity to attend to a football match in Greece yet, but - from what I can gather from the streets - I have a feeling that the atmosphere is similar to the one in Poland. Here, also, I can spot many different graffiti or stickers stuck everywhere related to football teams. I have also talked with a few Greeks and they told me that the tension between the biggest teams is really intense, and the same situation takes place in my country – football fans would do anything to defend their team’s colours.

Another thing related to football that we have in common are the successes. Of course, it depends on the year, but let’s be frank – none of us is the European hegemon of the ball right now. We both have „produced” some good players, but right now the teams from our leagues are in stagnation.

Don’t play dumb We have a saying in Poland that goes like this: “don’t pretend you’re a Greek”. When I was a child I was wondering what it could mean. So, given that right now I’m in Greece, I feel it’s a perfect time to finally understand the meaning of it. “Don’t pretend you’re a Greek” means don’t pretend that you have no idea/no knowledge about something; don’t play dumb and pretend that you don’t know something because we know that you do know this issue. It comes from Socrates who was asking many questions trying to go deeper and deeper into the con

versation. He had an attitude as if he didn’t know anything. This way he could get a lot of different answers, and also could annoy the interlocutor because the questions Socrates was asking were very often investigative.

(...) we have a big “ commitment for our loved ones ”

However, now that I’m in Greece I find this saying unfair, because it may strengthen a negative stereotype about the Greek nation in Poland. Through this, the Greeks might be perceived as people who play dumb and it is not true. I really don’t understand why this saying is so popular in Poland, we have even a very buzzing song that mentions it. What is more, and probably the most important, this saying has no basis in

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