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Does anyone live in Greece?


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There are several local bands/singers that keep to the Greek "popular" music (called "Laika" La -e- KAH).

 

You have to understand that Greece was and still is in the middle of two worlds - one is Europe and the West and the other is Turkey/Egypt/Middle East.

 

The affinity with the West makes pretty much everything that is popular in the USA, popular to Greece too.

 

The affinity with the East makes for the belly dancers' success. Pretty much every Greek woman knows how to wiggle her hips. I remember all the little girls of early elementary "dancing" during recess to the tune of popular Laika songs... The belly dancing is called "tsifteteli" tse-fteh-TEH-le

 

Check out "Zorba the Greek" dance and music or "syrtaki" youtube videos. The music and dancing in those videos are still hugely popular.

 

You see, (and here comes the history lesson) Greece was under the Turkish occupation for four centuries - that's a lot of influence. Greece became a democracy in 1830. There were a lot of Greeks living in Egypt until Nasser kicked them out and the Aegean coast of Turkey (Anatolia) until recent history (1918), when millions of Greeks living in Anatolia came as refugees to mainland Greece.

 

There is a pocket of Greek Muslims (of Turkish ancestry) living in the north-east part of Greece today.

 

The Eastern (Turkish) influence shows in the many dishes, desserts, music and words we share mainly with Turkey.

 

HTH

Edited by 4littleones
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That helps tremendously, thank you! I will go ahead and have dd print up something on the belly dancer then! It also explains why my dh saw that one of the foods that my other dd listed, was Baklava, and said "I thought that was Turkish?"

 

Thanks again, to you and KungFuPanda too!

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I have a feeling the parents of the daises and brownies wouldn't appreciate my dd mentioning belly dancers, :D but thanks!

 

I once performed an Egyptian cane dance for a Girl Scout Thinking Day event. Nobody was offended by the bellydancing. (In fact, some people had the wrong idea about it until they saw that performance.) The dress I wore was folkloric and covered my midriff.

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