Crushing Negative Stereotypes About Greece- "Alex" An Animated Story

I still remember vividly this moment. One of many in fact, but this particular one had stuck. 2 years ago, London, having a smoke outside of uni during a library cram session. A rather polished young man, he should have been 24-25, new age Muslim type of guy, wearing his jeans low but not quite at boxers' height and sporting a checkered purple/blueish slim fit shirt. He was quite buff as well. He wanted a smoke. I wanted to chat. I handed over my pack of cigs and he notices the Greek health warning. Guy: 'Ah mate, it's so great that you have money to buy cigarettes' Ok. Granted. This is London and everyone, especially people who've been here for a very short period of time, like to identify with the place and thus adopt the 'Londoner' identity early on. At least that's what they think. And as we know, Londoners are infamous in some circles for their uncanny sense of humour. But it is unacceptable. Rebranding Greece has been quite a big thing in the past years. And that's exactly what I find disturbing. It should be a continuous collective effort by all of us. And the institutionalised part of it could be more organized, from the state-side. Currently, Greek tycoons and businessmen do most of the work that actually pays off in this respect. The rest is pretty much noise. While the international image management efforts of Greece go down the drain, a group of young Greeks decided to produce an animation video solely with one goal in mind: "To show the world the untold side of the Greek crisis, and crush the negative stereotypes of our country." The young creators advocate that the symbolic character of Alex is based on the story that goes around the past 3 or so years. Yes, it's the one you might hear at work, while queing or in your own head. Add 2 pinches of salt and bags of irony. Take a look below:

#globalgreek #culture #greece #politics #dailywisdom #london