Orthodoxy or death

I was browsing a depository of funny images from Greece when I spotted the picture on the left. For the uninitiated, it just shows a coach. Upon closer inspection, however you can see that the driver added his personal motto on top of the destination sign. The motto reads (in Greek) 'Orthodoxy or death'. For most people this would simply sound funny (i.e. Greece its own version of religious fundamentalists) or just bizarre (what is the use of putting that on the coach?). For me, however, there is a personal story behind this picture.

Believe it or not, this was the coach that took me to Chalcidice (the destination printed below the motto) in August 2000. I was invited by friends to spend a weekend at the camping installations operated by the Aristotle University of Thessaloniki. I can therefore tell you that riding this coach was quite an experience. The space around the driver's seat was ornated with what looked like two dozens crucifixes and icons. A flag of the Byzantine Empire was hoisted over the back windscreen. The mastermind behind all this, the driver himself, sported a huge beard that made him look like an Islamic fundamentalist in his secular clothes. My rotten luck had it that the coach was packed and I had to sit right behind the driver's seat. It was rotten because I had to put up with his uncontrollable rants and conspiracy theories about religion.

According to his theory the deposed king of Greece, is in fact the direct descendant of the last emperor of the Byzantine Empire, and according to a legend, the hexadactylus who is going to free Greece from the infidels and restore the Byzantine Empire. (When somebody argued that the deposed king does not appear to have six fingers in any of his hands and hence cannot be a hexadactylus, the driver argued that the deposed king has six toes). What a load of horseshit!

The person sitting next to me was an engineering PhD student from India. He seemed indifferent to what was happening. Blessed are the lost in translation: for they shall have their peace of mind.