Greece

When I visited Greece last summer, its Classical past seemed to be a facade. This Classical legacy, which is so often impressed upon the students of Western civilization, is manifest in the ruins of the Parthenon. These are simply the remains of what once was, existing in what seemed like relative isolation from the lives of contemporary Greeks; though the Acropolis was teeming with Western Europeans and Americans, the only natives I saw at the Parthenon were the tour guides who earn a living by feeding the Classical past to Westerners who eagerly eat it up.

Though the Classical past is often used to connect Greece to a Western identity with which tourists can identify, it struck me as a markedly Balkan country. In wandering the streets of Athens, I came to see contemporary Greece as the product, chiefly, of Byzantine and Ottoman legacies. These imperial legacies are what make it such an incredibly charming, but potentially "peripheral", place.

Robert D. Kaplan's take on Greek music in Balkan Ghosts summarizes the nation's contemporary identity:
"The undulating quarter tones of bouzouki music...are, in fact, siblings of Bulgarian and Serbian rhythms, and are close cousins of the Arab and Turkish music that, heard in its pure form, gives most Western listeners a headache. Yet run through a Mediterranean musical filter, these monotonous and orgasmic sounds of the Orient appeal perfectly to Western ears...The fact that this music is often very sad - because for the Greeks it is meant to evoke memories of the loss of Byzantium, Hagia Sofia, and Smyrna - made it no less beautiful."

Naturally, Kaplan displays a Western bias in regarding both Greece and the Balkans (as do I); I'm curious to see how my thoughts will change once I read Maria Todorova's Imagining the Balkans.